Deep Ark 6 - Chapter 8

                                                            Chapter 8

                                                  Pg 97

Coralville is the biggest undersea city in the Pacific Ocean. It's also the closest to DA6, after Basin City. Even so, it's more than six thousand kilometres away, and it'll take at least two or three days to get there. And that's in a reliable, seaworthy sub. The Sea Slug is neither of those things. On top of that, she's laden to the gills with supplies of fuel and food.

We're about six hours out of DA6 and all this time I haven't spoken a word to Hammerhead. Not that he's been in a talkative mood. He hasn't moved once from his grubby captain's chair. His bulging eyes are fixed ahead, on the sea outside. From time to time, I hear him mutter to his beloved sub. "Easy, little lady ... easy. Long road ahead ... long, long road ..."

                                                   pg 98

I sleep for hours among the sacks of flour and rice stored in the tiny forward cabin. It's 

uncomfortable and my ribs are still sore, but I'm dead beat. .

When I awake, I   have  no 'idea what time of day it is. Outside, it's as black as midnight. I've grown used to the artificial daylight and seasons back at Basin City. Now my body clock is completely out of whack.

I wonder how Dad and Old Joe are getting on back at DA6. Have they caught Octo Serp? I hope so. 

Lock him in the boa pen!

I need to stretch my cramped legs, so I go exploring in the Sea Slug.

Hammerhead barely acknowledges me as I pop my head up into his stuffy cockpit in the cramped conning tower. I carry on.

The Sea Slug is a typical, old-style sub-trawler. Built for military use on the Surface, the sub has been converted to trawl for fish deep under the sea. Not much has been done to her since.

                                                      pg 99

There's more rust than metal now. She is like an ancient whale, tottering through the sea.

There are six cabins on the top deck. The forward cabin is normally used as the skipper's quarters, but it's now stacked with supplies. Next is the chart room, covered with a spew of old maps and mouldy papers. Then there's the crew galley and dining room. Sound cosy? It isn't. The galley hasn't been used since she was on the Surface. Hammerhead prefers packet soups and instant noodles. The oven is black with old grease and cockroaches roam the filthy grill.

Behind these foul cabins are the old crew's quarters. But, since the Sea Slug doesn't have a crew, the space is now stuffed to the ceiling with fishing nets, greasy ropes and rank-smelling bait boxes.

Down below, through a tight hatch, lies the engine room. I saw enough of that when the skipper and the boa did their tango! It's lined with spare barrels of fuel and oil. It's noisy, smelly and hellishly hot.

I scramble past pumping motors and pistons

                                                         pg 100

and enter the hold at the back of the engine room. This is the largest space on board the sub. Originally, it would have held torpedoes, but it has been converted for fish storage.

Except we aren't'fishing. Now every bit of space is stacked with crates and boxes. Enough food to feed an army, I'd said to Old Joe as he was loading it back at DA6.

"Can't be too careful, lad," he replied. "On a journey like you're takin, you can never have too many supplies!"

A solitary bulb, dangling by a frayed wire, lights the hold. In its yellow light, I walk down the narrow gangway, reading the labels on the boxes: rice, salt, sugar, flour, coffee; tins of tuna, baked beans, canned fruit; packets of biscuits and salt crackers ...

Suddenly, something moves.

I stop in my tracks. There it is again — a shadow on the hull, at the far end of the hold.

It is too big to be a rat. My heart races. Not another snake! Surely not. Hammerhead checked every inch of the sub.

I slowly back up, keeping an eye out for

                                                       pg 101

any other sign of movement. The sub makes a sudden course correction, throwing me against a stack of crates. The light bulb is swinging crazily now.

I see a blur of movement ... a rush ... then the light shatters.

I stagger in the dark. "Skipper! Is that you?" In my guts, I know it isn't. I know exactly who it is.

"Octo Serp?" I call out. Next thing, I feel cold hands around my throat. I get a glimpse of an oily ponytail, then there's a hoarse whisper in my ear.

"In person!"

Keeping one hand on my throat, Octo Serp moves his other hand behind my back and I feel the painful poke of a barrel in my back. The flare gun! He must have found it!

"Nice and slow now, young Rom," he hisses. "Up the ladder. Let's go see that bug-eyed skipper of yours."

"What do you want, Serp?" I spit back, with all the courage I can muster.

He doesn't answer, just pokes the barrel even

                                                          pg 102

harder into my back.

I have no choice but to do as he says.

"Are you out of your mind? That's the craziest thing I ever heard!"

Hammerhead's eyes look like ripe tomatoes about to pop. Octo Serp's lips part in a flicker of a smile,  but it's a smile as cold as the abyss.

We are all crowded into the stuffy cockpit, with Octo still holding the flare gun in his hand. He has 

the skipper and me covered.

Hammerhead turned white as a ghost's laundry when Octo appeared but, now that he's heard what

Octo wants, the colour has come flooding back to his cheeks.

He slams his hand on the control panel. "I vill not do it!" he shouts. "It is impossible!"

Octo's smile has .slithered away and his cold black eyes stare unblinking, like a shark. "You 

will do exactly what you're told to do!" he hisses.

He jabs a long finger at the chart on the

                                                        pg 103

table. "You will take me to this reference point. It's twelve hours south-west of our current position."

"But that's the opposite direction to Coralville!" I interrupt.

"The boy is right!" shouts Hammerhead. "It is the middle of nowhere. Just empty sea bottom!"

Octo laughs out loud. It sounds like a rusty saw cutting sheet metal.

"I'm not interested in the sea bottom," he cackles. "There's something more interesting there — much more interesting?'

We stare at him, stunned. The map shows only barren ocean in every direction.

The skipper breaks the silence. "You really are as crazy as a barrel of snakes!"

Octo is not laughing now. He waves the barrel of the flare gun in the skipper's direction. "Turn this rust bucket around, now! And you," he snarls, turning the gun on me, "go below and get me that antivenom case you've stowed away!"

I look at him, anger burning in my eyes.

                                                              pg 104

that what all this is about? Dad's antivenom? What good will it do you? Where we're headed, there isn't a snake in a thousand kilometres:'

With the speed of a striking cobra, Octo a

shoots out a hand andagrabs ..my collar. He

pulls me close to his reptilian face and hisses, "For your information, boy, I am the one who created the antivenoms in that case. Me! Not your ignorant father. He would be nothing without me. The whole of DA6 was my creation. He treated my snakes like ... like reptiles! Like cows to be milked of their venom. I was the one who truly loved them! I am the one who will rescue them from their prison!"

He throws me to the deck, his eyes wide and wild.

"You have caused me a lot of trouble today. Don't keep pushing your luck, kid. Your daddy isn't here to help you any more. So go get me my antivenom!"

I'm stunned. Octo Serp is absolutely, certifiably insane!

I stumble down the ladder to the cabins below.

                                                                     pg 105

For a long while, I sit on a bag of rice in the forward cabin. The Sea Slug has turned around to follow Octo's new course. What is that madman up to?

My mind is spinning.

There is something he said back in the cockpit, something that has stuck in my mind like a damaged CD: "I was the one who truly loved them! I am the one who will rescue them from their prison!"

What did he mean by "rescue them from their prison"? All the snakes are safely back in their cages at DA6. Unless ...

An icy chill runs down my spine. I leap to my feet and bolt down the ladder to the hold. The shattered light bulb still dangles from its frayed wire. I find a greasy torch and flick it on.

I begin to search among the piled-up crates and boxes. My heart is thumping louder than the diesel engines next door. At the back of the hold, in the place where Octo had hidden in the shadows, I find them.

                                                               pg 106

A dozen large wooden crates, higher than my head. Stencilled on the sides in black ink are the words Engine Parts.

I  climb up on the nearest crate, torch in hand.

A startled rat, fat and4ily black, darts away into the shadows. It almost gives me a heart attack.

The crate lid is nailed shut. I look around for something to lever it open. A broken piece of wooden pallet is all I can find. It will have to do. Bracing myself on top of the crate, I begin to prise open the lid.

The timber creaks, then suddenly cracks in half. I'm sent tumbling backwards, whacking my shoulder painfully on the deck.

Surely Octo has heard the crash. I lie motionless for a while, waiting for him to come and investigate. But he doesn't come. The Sea Slug chugs on into the black sea.

I scramble back up onto the crate. The gap I've made in the crate lid is no wider than a baseball bat. But it's big enough for me to see the contents within.

There are no oily engine parts. The crate is packed with containers. Transparent containers

                                                      pg 107

dotted with small air holes. And, in each container, eyes unblinking, tongues flicking, are snakes!

Octo's children. Hundreds of them!