CHAPTER 8

 

Frederic steepled his fingers together atop the table. He exchanged a look with Etienne and then took a deep breath.

“There have been others here–” he nodded solemnly “–others who felt emboldened.”

Stella leaned forward in anticipation.

“We are blessed down here with a rare chemical environment that generates oxygen. The clash of the underwater vents with the cold ocean water–the extensive cave system with minerals that seem to extract the carbon dioxide–the runoff of boiling water from the vent which feeds this freshwater stream. We have learned how to catch our own food when flotsam fails us.”

“Yeah, I get it,” Don cut in. “You’ve built a downright Utopia here.”

The sarcasm was acknowledged with a twitch of Frederic’s eyelid, but he continued. “It is a Utopia in that it has allowed us to sustain life.” He hesitated, his eyes dropping to his hands, “But there were a couple survivors–they didn’t adapt as well, physically. They exhibited signs of hypercapnia–carbon dioxide build up. Disorientation. Anger.”

“What happened to them?” Colin probed.

Frederic glanced at Etienne. It might have been imperceptible, but Stella noticed Etienne’s assenting nod.

“There was an entrepreneur whose yacht had capsized. He was irate from the moment he washed up in the cave. The situation here only worsened that. He tried to make demands–demands that we show him the way back to the surface. When we explained there was no such exit, he switched tactics and offered us a huge payout once we made it to the surface. When that didn’t work he charged back to the pool and dove in.”

Stella’s spoon paused in mid-air.

“Did he come back up?” she whispered.

“Part of him,” Frederic murmured.

He noticed Stella’s raised eyebrow and elaborated in a soft voice. “The next day a human arm surfaced in the pool. We recognized the Rolex on the wrist.”

The spoon lowered. Stella pushed back the beans.

“Shark.” Don guessed, still eating.

“Most likely,” Etienne agreed amiably. “We’ve caught a few in here. You’ll find some harpoons lying near the cave pool. If you happen to see something edible make an appearance, please give a stab at it.”

Jill looked horrified. She dropped her spoon and clutched her arms about her.

Stella knew Jill wasn’t much of a meat-eater. It was probably why she had that cheerleader perfect body.

Etienne caught Jill’s reaction. “We’re not desperate for food. We have a huge stockpile.” He shoveled in a mouthful of corn and spoke while chewing, “But if a fish does swim by, it’s a nice change of diet.”

Oh my! Did Jill think they would harpoon a person if they surfaced?

Stella stared around the table.

Would they?

Another awkward silence ensued until Colin spoke up.

“I understand that all the wreckage we see in here washed up in your cave, but how did you move it? Some of these pieces are exceptionally large. How did you transport the fuselage of that old plane? There is no crane.”

Etienne scratched beneath the rim of his knit hat. It dislodged a curly tuft of gray/black hair.

“What you see here didn’t happen quickly. Initially it was just Fred and me. We moved what we could and then started laying out a rope hauling system. One thing we have plenty of is rope,” he added with a grin.

“What about Sarah?” Stella asked.

Etienne frowned. “Well, she’s a woman. It was hard work, and she was busy narrowing down the medical and food supplies.”

That was all it took for Stella to form her opinion of Etienne. If someone told her she needed to lift a plane in order to survive, she would do it.

“But we eventually had help,” Etienne grinned across the table at Jordan.

Jordan Connover crossed his arms, looking smug.

“So, in answer to your question. Many makeshift pulleys and lots of patience,” Frederic explained. “We’ve worked hard as a team to make this place a home. Maybe someday a miracle will happen. Maybe a reliable deep sea exploration crew will discover us and will be able to extract us safely, but clearly we can’t wait around for that. We’ve been able to make a comfortable world for ourselves.”

“Surely there are risks down here. Life-threatening obstacles.” Don tipped his head back and searched the vaulted ceiling.

Etienne’s thick eyebrows raised. “Well, of course. We suspect an earthquake created this cave system. And an earthquake can destroy it just as easily.”

Jill rose on the other side of the table. She picked up her bowl and spoon and turned towards Margie, mumbling, “Is there somewhere I can wash these up?”

Margie’s eyes rounded and her lips plumped in sympathy.

“Loren and I will take care of all of this for tonight. Maybe we can meet tomorrow and go over some of the chores around here.”

“Sounds swell,” Jill replied indifferently. “If you’ll excuse me, I’d like to go see my mother now.” She tucked her chin down and added, “It was nice to meet you all.”

It was the catalyst to break up the welcome reception. Stella quickly rose, which brought Colin to his feet. They each muttered their adieus while Don climbed off the bench and mutely accepted their well-wishes for his wife’s swift recovery.

As the Wexlers made their way to the infirmary, Stella hesitated before the storage container that was deemed her cabin. Colin lingered while his sister and father continued on.

“Are you okay?”

The concern in that deep timbre comforted her.

“Okay?” she asked with a raised eyebrow and a forced grin.

After a quick perusal of their environment, Colin mirrored her smile. “Okay, stupid question.”

“I’m fine,” she assured. “I just–well, you guys need some private time with your mom. I’ll go try and close my eyes for a few minutes.” She shrugged. “Maybe when I open them we’ll all be back on the STARKISSED.”

Dark green eyes softened. His wide shoulders relaxed. “Maybe,” he agreed.

Stella was startled when he lifted his hand and dusted under her chin with his knuckle. Surprised himself, Colin dropped his arm. “You call.” His voice was husky. “If you need anything–you call.”

Stella swallowed down a lump in her throat. “Your cell?”

Under the torchlight his smile was beguiling.

“Just shout, Stel. I think I’ll hear you in this place.”

Stella hugged her arms tight about her. “Okay. You’ll send Jill into this–” she glanced at the weird building, “–cabin?”

“Yeah, I’ll remind her which is hers. Dad and I will be next-door shortly.”

Stella nodded, grateful that she wasn’t in this bizarre drama alone. For a moment they stood side by side silently surveying the sunken abyss.

“What have we gotten ourselves into, Col?” she whispered.

“I don’t know. But we’re going to find out. Dinner was charming, but it felt like a show.”

Stella turned, staring up at him. “Right?” She was glad he picked up on it too. “Something is off here. They’re not telling us everything.”

“Tomorrow–” he frowned, “–heh, whatever tomorrow is. Anyway, I’m going to search this place. See what else I can find.”

“Take me with you,” she tested. “I want to learn more. I saw a notepad and pen on the desk in our cabin. I can write–an article–” Her hand flailed uselessly. “I know it’s silly, writing an article that will never go anywhere.”

“But it will exercise that mind of yours,” Colin stated with a hike of his lip.

“Yes.” Fortunately it was too dark for him to see her blush.

“Okay.” He hesitated, looking back over his shoulder at the glowing windows of the plane. “I better catch up with them.”

“I hope your mom is doing better,” Stella wished sincerely.

“Thanks,” he nodded. “Good night, Stel.”

Good night she called after the retreating shadow.

Rooted before the tarnished storage container, Stella felt so incredibly alone. She looked up at the vaulted roof of the cave. The black recessed dome represented an eternal night. A starless crown. Sun would never bathe these peaks. It would never again touch her skin. She stretched her arm out before her. Her skin held its tan for a long time, while Jill’s fair complexion turned rosy at sea and lily white back on land.

Stella turned towards her doorway. A single torch was mounted in the dark patch of copper dust that served as a front yard. Before the wall of corrugated metal sat a deck chair. She considered sitting there, but the cave was now eerily silent. All signs of life, minus the flickering torches were gone. She could not even hear the hushed conversation of the Wexlers in the nearby infirmary.

Unsettled, she crept into the circular wheelhouse at the front of the container. Light flickered through the empty window frames. Somehow being inside made her feel slightly safer. She stepped up to the desk and pulled back the wobbly chair, expecting the stool to cave in under her weight. It was resilient, though. A shadowy reflection of herself caught her attention. With the surge and lapse of the flame outside, her face would be visible for a second and then morph into a stark silhouette.

Stella reached for the notebook sitting on the corner of the desk. She flipped it open and found no written text, just virgin sheets of paper–a temptation too powerful to reckon with. Beside it was a ballpoint pen. A traditional BIC with a blue plastic cap. She held the clear plastic tube up towards the window and saw a black line running half-way up it. Pulling off the cap she tried a couple of test marks on the very last page of the notebook. It took several attempts before ink started to flow.

The seat groaned as her weight shifted. Rolling the pen back and forth with her fingers, she listened to it click over the nicked surface. Outside, came the distant sound of water falling. It was as intrusive as a trickling faucet.

Drip. Drip. Drip.

That was the first sound to wake her on the STARKISSED. A persistent series of drops landing on the small galley counter. A few minutes later she emerged into a maelstrom.

Closing her eyes, she sought to block everything out. It wasn’t much darker behind her eyelids.

Drip. Drip. Drip.

She opened the hardbound notebook to the first page, picked up the pen and wrote one word.

BENEATH

Stella jolted and nearly fell on her head as she struggled out of the hammock she had rigged.

“What the hell?” Jill sat up on the ground beneath her.

Stumbling through the dark trailer, her blonde hair mussed in a cyclone, Jill thrust her hands up over her ears. Stooping to peer through the pilothouse windows, she cast an appalled look back at Stella.

“It’s that damn bell. That tall freak is ringing it.”

Stella took a quick inventory of the inhabitants of this cave and concluded that the tall freak must be Frederic. Standing on one leg, she untangled her other from the twisted hammock and joined Jill. Frederic released the rope and the bell fell silent, but echoes reverberated outside for a few seconds.

“Damn, I had just fallen asleep,” Jill griped as she tried to finger comb her hair.

“Me too,” Stella muttered.

Last night she had waited until Jill returned to ask about her mother. The situation there was unchanged, and sounded grim. Jill tended to get cranky when things fell out of her control. Even now Stella could read the agitation on her friend’s heart-shaped face.

“Do you buy any of this?” she asked. “I mean, come on. This place is ridonk.”

That it is.

“It’s a mystery, all right.”

Jill cocked her head and noticed the open notepad. “Working on your essay already?”

It sounded like an accusation.

Yeah, Jill was cranky.

“Not much else to do,” she shrugged.

Piqued, Jill moved back to the window. “Well, I’m not staying down here. There has to be a way out.”

That was the major difference between them. Jill generally demanded resolutions. Stella usually worked to achieve them. It was probably a 50/50 ratio on who was more successful. Jill’s looks got her a lot of things in life that Stella had to work a little harder for, but Stella rather enjoyed the lack of attention. It left her time to do what she wanted to. Jill’s time was always consumed by everyone else’s agenda.

Still, they blended. Somehow the formula worked. Even now Jill was tossing one of those silly grins at Stella, the tension short-lived. For as cranky as Jill could get–it never lasted.

“Hey,” she tensed.

Jill hunched over, and then realizing that she could stick her head through the window, hooked her hands around the wood frame and leaned forward.

“Do you see that?” she whispered.

Stella stepped up behind her. It was Jill’s whisper more than anything that caught her attention. Discretion wasn’t one of Jill’s strong suits.

“What?”

“Over there, by the basketball net.”

Stella squinted into the shadows and felt a chill creep up her spine. A male figure stood with his shoulder hitched against the slanted pole.

“I thought I saw him there yesterday when we walked in.”

The silhouette was tall and lanky, but the face was lost in shadow.

“I’m going to go introduce myself,” Jill declared, hefting off the window frame.

“Hey, wait. You know nothing about him. I don’t trust the people down here yet.”

Jill pursed her pink lips. “You never trust anyone. You have to open yourself up, Stel, if you’re going to go places in life.”

Where was she going to go? The next cave?

“I’ll go get Colin.”

“Oh God,” Jill rolled her eyes. “I don’t need my brother. I’m just going to say hi. I’m sure you’ll be right behind me.”

It was true. Stella would tail after her to enact damage control if it was necessary. She was the ultimate wing girl.

Jill ran her fingers through her hair and twirled to gaze in the cracked mirror. She wrinkled her nose at the image and adjusted the collar of her blouse. Without a word she stalked out into the dank underworld. Stella trailed behind, shaking her head.

A rectangular patch of ground had been leveled to serve as a court. There was a torch at the opposite end of the basket, making the idea of playing the game a challenge. Under the heavy shadows of the basket a man stood watching them. Every now and then his eyes would flash as the flames reached them, reminiscent of the glimpse she had seen in the cave. Was this who had been watching her?

“Hi!” Jill called out boldly. “We didn’t get to meet really last night. I’m Jill. This is my friend, Stella.” She flashed a smile and took an exaggerated look around. “We’re the new people.”

For a moment the shadow continued to study them until it finally budged from its roost and stepped into the glow of the torch.

Stella sucked in her breath at the sight of him. Choppy brown hair capped a dark expression. It was hard to distinguish an eye color in the limited light, but she guessed them to be brown. A long, narrow nose, full lips, and high cheekbones gave him a haunting semblance. For some reason, the character of Heathcliff in Wuthering Heights came to mind. A man who had left youth behind, but had not fully reached the command of maturity.

“Daniel,” he stated in a gruff voice.

Something about his cold, level look made Stella uneasy. That flat stare was trained on Jill, though. He studied her from wideset eyes as she forced on her perky smile.

“Daniel,” Jill repeated. “It’s nice to meet someone our age–I mean, you look around our age, but–”

Her awkward confusion didn’t draw a smile from the sullen figure. When he said nothing, Jill verbally stumbled forward.

“How long have you been down here?”

Daniel was still dressed in his pullover shirt with red and white horizontal strips, giving him a tainted, Where Is Waldo look. His jeans were slashed into shorts at the knees, and they hung low on his hips. The outfit might have looked juvenile, but the somber expression on the man’s face removed anything amusing from the image.

“A while,” he answered evasively.

Stella wasn’t in the mood for games.

“Five minutes or five years?” she sought clarification.

Jill threw her a just chill look, but she ignored it.

Daniel stepped forward and she struggled to hold her ground. She was not about to be intimidated by some creature who had been living under the Atlantic Ocean for untold years.

“I have no clue how long,” he declared. “I was a kid. But if you have to know. It was August of 1997.” He shrugged. “I think.”

The uncertainty revealed a momentary chink in the hostile armor.

“How old were you at the time?” she pursued.

“What the hell does it matter to you?”

“Stel, we just met Daniel,” Jill pleaded. She turned towards the man and rolled her eyes. “Forgive my friend, she’s studying journalism and conversations with her tend to come across more as interrogations.”

Daniel scowled. “Then I’ll be sure not to have many conversations with her.”

And just like that, Stella was excluded as Jill prattled on about her scary journey down to the cave, a journey that was mostly spent unconscious, although that was not relayed in this enhanced version.

Stella lingered to see if Daniel offered up his tale, but he kept mum on the subject, warily eyeing her the whole time. Jill cleared her throat and crossed her slim arms. It was a signal for Stella to leave them alone. Concerned about leaving her friend with this glum stranger, Stella saw Margie emerge from her maritime bungalow, giving them a hearty wave and smile. She seemed unfazed by the young man’s presence or interaction, so perhaps he was innocent.

When body signals had not succeeded, Jill finally uttered, “Didn’t you have something you wanted to do?”

Some might take offense by the pointed dismissal, but Stella knew Jill well enough. This was not personal. If one of them could obtain more information from this Daniel, then the other would have to back off.

“I’m going to go check on your mom,” Stella murmured.

A flash of pain darkened Jill’s eyes, but she pasted on a smile for her company. She nodded and just said, “I’ll join you in a while.”

Stella turned her back, but heard muted conversation behind her followed by one of Jill’s classic giggles.

Ducking her head into the infirmary hatch she was surprised to find only Sarah inside. She was seated on a wooden crate next to an unresponsive Anne Wexler.

Sarah waved Stella closer with a congenial look on her gaunt face.

“Come. Donald and Colin just left for breakfast.”

“How–how is she?”

Sarah glanced down at the prone figure. There was a tightening around Sarah’s lips that revealed more than her words. “It’s hard to tell. We don’t know how long she went without oxygen. There could be brain damage–”

Her lips clamped shut as if she had revealed too much.

“You can tell me,” Stella assured. “If it’s bad, I won’t share with her family.”

The rumpled nurse gave a weak smile. She reached out and touched Anne’s limp arm. “If the brain damage was extensive enough, she could be in an unresponsive coma right now. The brain simply can’t send the signals, and soon organs will begin to fail.”

Stella’s breath hitched.

Sarah read her face and hastened to add, “Or, she could just be sleeping and will wake on her own accord.”

Stella’s head dropped. She stared down at her sandals. A pair of soiled white nurse shoes stepped up alongside them, followed by a light brush of fingers on her shoulder.

“I’ll leave you alone with her.”

All Stella could do was nod. This ghostly nurse was the only person who seemed sincere down in this pit of despair.

“Thank you,” she muttered, but when she looked up she was alone.

Stella sat down on the crate Sarah had just occupied. From that spot she was even with Anne Wexler’s head on the flimsy pillow. Staring at the face in repose, Stella saw a wan version of the attractive middle-aged woman. Dark roots provided a stark contrast with the matted blonde hair. The ocean had stripped all traces of makeup. Stella didn’t think she’d ever seen Jill’s mom without makeup. There were tiny blue veins scoring the closed eyelids, some pooling beneath the eyes. Glowing pink cheeks now looked ashen.

“Wake up, Mrs. Wexler,” she commanded softly.

“When my mom is not around,” she continued, “you always fill in.”

Tears filled Stella’s eyes. She reached for Anne’s hand. It was so cold. She clasped it in both of hers, hoping to infuse warmth.

“And my mom is not here now.” Emotion clogged her throat. “I need you,” she emphasized.

Stella stared at Anne’s face. There was no sign of acknowledgment, no flicker of an eyelid, no twitch of a muscle. Anne was somewhere far away from this cave…and Stella wished she was with her.