The Loch (33 page)

"Whoa."

"Whoa what?"

"Either our bait sank, or it was just snatched."

"Look!" Jones pointed to the length of steel cable as it strained against the cleat. "We hooked it, baby!"

Fiberglass moaned, then began cracking along the edges of the cleat.

Casey looked at Jones, a lump in his throat. "I thought you said this boat could handle a big load?"

"It can, I mean it should. The monster must've gone deep. Maybe the—"

Captain Lindner bounded from the pilothouse. "What the hell's going on back here?"

Casey pointed to the line. "We think we hooked Nessie."

"Hooked? You never said anything about catching it!"

The boat lurched, causing the tripod to tip.

Casey caught the camera as the stern dipped hard to starboard.

The captain fell sideways against one of the outboards, then held on tightly as he examined the cleat. "Are you assholes crazy? The transom's not made to drag this kind of weight."

The boat rolled back to port, the steel cable catching the starboard engine's propeller, sheering off two of its blades.

"Son of a bitch! I just had that prop rebuilt!" The captain hurried back to the pilothouse, Chuck Jones trailing.

"Skipper, relax, you're about to be famous. All we have to do is haul this monster in, and we'll have enough money to buy you a dozen new props."

Lindner shut down the starboard engine, then pushed down on the port throttle, his vessel straining to move against the ungodly force. "Haul it, Mr. Jones? Haul it where?"

"Into the shallows. The Bona Narrows."

"By the time we reach the narrows, this boat'll be kindling."

The vessel rolled hard to starboard again, sending both men caroming across the navigational console.

The captain grabbed hold of the wheel, yanking it hard to port. Pushing down on the throttle, he accelerated, his lone engine fighting to achieve six knots. "Your plan's got a few holes in it, hotshot. For one, whatever you hooked weighs more than my whole damn boat. For another, it ain't too crazy about having a hook in its mouth."

A
screech
of wrenching steel pierced the night as the cleat and part of the transom wall behind the outboard motors began peeling away from the hull's mainframe.

"Christ, it's tearing my vessel apart!" The captain grabbed the radio. "Mayday, Mayday, this is the
Wiley
! Mayday… "

Clansman Wharf
12:57 A.M.

Having made it to the
Nessie III
's berth, I hid behind a piling to listen. I could hear voices belowdecks, but they were muffled.

Seeking a better vantage, I climbed over the rail, creeping forward into the pilothouse.

The tiny cabin was crammed with aluminum equipment cases, stacked high along the back wall, partially covered by a gray tarp. Curious, I pulled back the covering, reading one of the invoice tags in the dim light.

UHF Master Radio Link. Property of NIST.

It was equipment for the sonar arrays' master analysis station.

"…David, stop!"

Hearing Brandy's voice, I dropped to my knees and pressed my ear to the deck.

* * *

"What's wrong?" David cooed.

"Slow down a wee bit, I'm no' yer whore!"

"Whore? Brandy, you and me, we're a team, partners on a great adventure. When viewers see me, they'll see you. That's the association I'm going for… unless you aren't up to it? I mean, if that's the case, tell me now, because there must've been a hundred applicants dying to be my partner on this gig, but I picked you."

"Why? So ye could get intae my knickers?"

"Of course not. You and me, we have a chemistry. I know you feel it, too, don't you, babe?"

I clenched my fists, ready to storm her cabin.

"Maybe if ye'd slow down a bit, I'd feel it more, yeah?"

"Okay, I'll slow down, but this is the fast track to stardom. You and me, we're gonna be famous. We'll be Hollywood's next power couple. You, uh, do want that, don't you?"

My veins burned as I heard them moaning and kissing.

And then I heard something else—a mob of people, running down the pier.

It was the captains and crew of the three research vessels, all hurrying to make way. A dozen more civilians were heading for the
Nessie III
, led by the Highland provost.

I was trapped.

Wedging myself into the far back corner of the pilothouse, I dragged the metal cases around me to form a blind, then draped the gray tarp over the top of the stacks.

"Dr. Caldwell! Dr. Caldwell, are ye aboard?"

I heard David stumble up the stairs. "This really isn't a good time, Owen."

"We jist received a Mayday call from a local cruise ship. They claim they've hooked Nessie!"

From a slit between the stacks I saw Brandy dart inside the pilothouse, her shapely legs exposed clear up to the tail of David's dress shirt, which barely covered her buttocks.

The engine sputtered twice, belched a cloud of noxious fumes, then chortled, rattling my skull against the back wall. David entered the pilothouse, shirtless, followed by Owen Hollifield, who barked out orders to Brandy. "Head south, their last reported position wis jist north of Urquhart Bay."

Loch Ness
1:09 A.M.

The notion that maybe they'd made a big mistake was firmly planted in Ron Casey's mind as he watched sections of plank tear away from the transom, the rotting fibers disguised behind a fresh coat of paint.

"Chad, hit it again!"

Exhaust billowed from the port outboard as Chad Brager took another whack at the steel cable with the hand axe. "No good, I can't get any leverage, it just keeps bouncing off. If we can …"

Chad paused, he and Ron staring at the cable, which had suddenly gone slack. "What happened?"

"Don't know. Either the cable snapped underwater, or …"

Free of its biological anchor, the
Wiley
leaped forward and accelerated.

Chad and Ron looked at one another, unsure, then backed away from the transom, their eyes searching the water.

* * *

Chuck Jones leaned over the captain's shoulder, staring at the red blip chasing after them on the fish finder. "What do you mean it's rising?"

"Look for yourself, hotshot. It can't free itself by going deep, so now it's coming after us."

The captain stared at the fish finder's depth gauge as its numbers rapidly spun backwards… 43 meters… 29 meters… 14 meters… "Sweet Jesus… hold on!"

Captain Lindner veered hard to port.

Wha-boom!
The starboard flank exploded out of the water as if struck by a tank, the blow driving the already listing boat beyond its center of gravity.

The vessel rolled, sending its captain falling sideways as a wall of frigid black water burst through the pilothouse windows. He tumbled in blindness, unable to right himself as the
Wiley
continued to roll hard to port, seeking its new equilibrium.

Wood and steel groaned in his ears, was muffled, and then the pilothouse settled underwater beneath its breached hull.

The captain pulled himself to his feet, stunned to see the inverted pilothouse filling rapidly with water. Heart pounding, his hands and arms burning from the cold, he pressed his face to the floorboards above his head and sucked in several desperate breaths of air, his mind racing.

Sparks of light sizzled in protest along the navigational consoles. Cans of beer free-floated past his face, startling him in the darkening cabin. The water level continued rising, forcing him to swim in order to breathe. Somewhere below his kicking feet was the ceiling and the sound of a creaking door—his escape route.

Below and to the right.

Captain Lindner ducked his head and kicked for the cabin door. Feeling for the knob, he managed to push it open, then froze.

It was passing beneath the boat, its form revealed in the moonlight. The thickly muscled back was chocolate brown in color, adorned with a horsehair dorsal fin that tapered back to a finless rounded tail. As long and wide as two tour buses connected end to end, the creature moved left, then right, left, then right as it swam, twisting with snakelike undulations.

It passed quickly, and though he had just missed seeing its head, Pete Lindner knew he had seen a sea serpent, as cold as the devil, as ancient as time itself.

His heart thundered in his chest and his lungs threatened to burst, but still the captain refused to venture out, intent on giving the dreadful animal another twenty seconds to vacate the area.

Instead, the cabin, along with his exit, spun counterclockwise and out from under him, and then the capsized boat lurched forward, dragged stern-first through the water by the powerful creature still leashed to its transom.

Trapped underwater, enveloped in darkness, Lindner groped at the suddenly alien walls, desperate to relocate an air pocket that no longer existed. His palms banged awkwardly against the inverted forward windshield, and then he gagged, belching bubbles as he fought blindly to untangle himself from the languid remains of Chuck Jones.

Unable to reason, unable to see, he clawed in ever-tightening circles, fumbling through the suffocating blackness for an exit.

Spent lungs expelled primal gurgles.

Arms stopped moving, eyes ceased seeing.

Silence took the
Wiley
as the Loch's icy claws reached out once more to claim its dead.

* * *

Chad Brager surfaced fifty feet from the capsized boat. Years of playing ice hockey on frozen lakes had acclimated him to the sudden cold, and his lifeguard training at USC kept him from panicking. Treading water, he called out for his companions.

"Chucky! Ron!"

Steam dissipated from his head, his body losing heat rapidly.
Gotta get out of this cold water before hypothermia sets in.

He turned to swim back to the boat, then realized the capsized hull was spinning, the boat moving towards him!

"Oh shit …"

Brager turned and swam, his arms and legs barely moving through the layers of clothing. Pausing, he forcibly yanked off his shoes, allowing himself a quick glance back.

The boat's hull was coming at him stern first now, the fractured transom and its cursed steel cable just visible above the waterline.

Brager tore off his windbreaker jacket, then launched himself into a rapid crawl stroke.

Two hundred feet… it's got two hundred feet of goddam cable!

His heart jumped as he registered the gunshot
twang
of snapping steel line--its echo as clear as the opening trapdoor of a gallows.

A dam-bursting wave of adrenaline ignited Brager's muscles, propelling him through the water—even as searing pain ignited his half- frozen nerve cells as he was jolted forward… then mercifully released from consciousness, his spine crushed and severed, his torso savagely ripped apart and swallowed.

* * *

The
Nessie III
slowed.

I stood quietly, nudging the tarp away so I could see.

The
Nothosaur
had arrived first, judging by its proximity to the capsized boat. The other two vessels circled close by, their spotlights aimed at the black water.

David fumbled with the radio, Brandy finally grabbing it from him. "
Nothosaur
, this is the
Nessie III.
Come in."

"This is Hoagland. We were too late. Three bodies went into the water, the
Galon's
recovered the lone survivor. He's babbling, but in shock. A chopper's flying in to transport him to Inverness."

David took the microphone. "Hoagland, this is Caldwell. Did he say what happened to the others?"

"Negative, but we found the remains of a forearm floating in a jacket sleeve. I think we can assume the rest of him's warming the belly of our friend."

I slumped to the deck, bile rising towards the lump in my throat.
And there, but for the grace of God, go I …

"As an M.I.T. trained scientist and inventor, I had always been intrigued about the possibilities of using modern technology to resolve the mystery of Loch Ness.

Dr. Charlie Wyckoff and I began our search back in 1970, but a full two years would pass before our first sighting. We were standing on shore, above Urquhart's Castle, when a hump surfaced in Urquhart Bay. Through my telescope, I saw something that resembled the back of an elephant. I could make out its crest and estimated the hump was at least twenty-five-feet long and four feet out of the water. I managed to get some footage of what looked like a blob on the water, but the photos all turned out blurry."

—
D
R.
R
OBERT
R
INES,
A
CADEMY OF
A
PPLIED
S
CIENCES
M
EMBER:
A
MERICAN
I
NVENTOR'S
H
ALL OF
F
AME

Loch Ness

T
he
Nessie III
remained
in the area another two hours until the sun rose, by which time my bladder had inflated like a hot-water bottle.

Brandy docked. David kissed her good-bye, he and the provost heading off to prepare for yet another press conference. I waited until she went below, then climbed from my makeshift hiding place and crept out of the pilothouse onto the main deck.

"I was wonderin' when ye'd be leavin'?"

Startled, I turned, Brandy now dressed in a lavender bathrobe. "You knew?"

She leaned back casually against the stern rail, arms folded against her chest. "I smelled ye the moment we stopped movin'."

"Why didn't you say anything?"

"I figured ye'd a'ready made enough o' an arse out o' yersel' for one evenin'. Still afraid o' the water, are ye?"