THE GUARDIAN

 

 

“WELCOME TO PARADISE!”

Eva gripped the chrome handrail and stood, bare feet balancing on the boat’s laminate floor. Their bronze, shirtless guide eased them into a cove and the small island—which had appeared as nothing more than a thatch of dense palm trees ten minutes ago—took on more dimension and character.

The edges of the cove extended into the ocean like rocky arms sprung with saplings. At the center of its embrace lay a strip of sand that grew as the boat cruised ever closer.

A beach, Eva noted with pleasure.

When they’d decided to give into the local man’s sales pitch of taking them to a secluded, uninhabited beach for the afternoon, she had been worried about being ripped off, or worse, but it seemed the guy wasn’t pulling their leg after all.

Looks amazing, she thought, and turned excitedly toward Bryce, who now stood beside her. His face showed his own surprise and delight. “Pretty cool, huh?” she said, and he nodded in return. She noticed with a stab of lust how much the vacation agreed with him—his blue eyes bright chips of ice in his tanned face, his russet hair mussed by saltwater wind, his smile white as the frothy wave tips they were cutting through.

Privately, Eva hoped this would be the trip, when he’d finally sneak a ring into his pocket to spring on her at the apex of a breathtaking hike, or during an after-dinner stroll along a night-soaked beach.

Now that they’d been here a week, she found it hard to believe she hadn’t been initially sold on a vacation in Bora Bora. When Bryce brought the destination up on Google, she’d physically sickened at the idea of being stuck in the middle of a vast ocean on a pinprick of island, hundreds of miles from any major land mass—and that’s if you counted New Zealand or Hawaii, both glorified islands themselves.

But when they finally arrived, and she’d seen the row of thatched cabanas along the thin strip of beach that would be their home for the next two weeks, she’d squealed in delight, already eager to dive into the emerald-green, crystal-clear water.

She turned around and looked past their guide to the two couples seated in the rear, roughly shaded by a makeshift canvas canopy. The quartet looked as tanned and eager as Bryce, and she wondered if her own features shared that healthy sheen, that fervent energy.

It had thrown her at first, the other couples. When the handsome young man, who introduced himself as Manu, first pitched she and Bryce on the trip, he’d made it sound exclusive. But when they arrived that morning, her stomach sank at the sight of two other couples waiting on the dock. She felt better when one of the men looked at the group and, as if reading her mind, as if reading all their minds, turned up his palms and flashed an easygoing smile. “Hey, we’ve paid already, right? So, let’s just hope this is all of us. And look at the bright side,” he said, lightly kicking a cheap Styrofoam cooler at his feet, “you can all share the twelve-pack we already have on ice.”

They all relaxed then, exchanging names and starting to compare their unique invitations when Manu approached, golden-muscled and smiling, his thick dark hair pulled back in a rough ponytail. He wore nothing but a lime-green sarong around his waist and a split-seashell ornament, that looked to Eva like an arts-and-crafts angel, strung to a choker of brown beads at his throat.

“My friends!” he said, the Polynesian accent warm and rough beneath the words. “Thank you for coming!” He gripped every person’s hand between his own while making eye contact, his smile never wavering.

Such a salesman, Eva thought, looking into his hazel eyes. But a hot salesman, at least.

After they boarded the boat, and the purring motor had pushed them away from the dock, the six passengers settled in for the 45-minute ride to the mysterious beach that was even more beautiful (allegedly) than the one they’d been basking upon all week.

Manu assured them for the hundredth time, “It’s completely virgin. Very exclusive! Only my family can go there. Only we have the right. Few people have ever seen it, very few.”

Eva didn’t care about exclusivity. What she craved was adventure. Lying around on a beautiful beach, eating, and drinking and screwing and dancing, is all well and good, but after a week of gorging on luxury she felt cagey and in need of some stimulation that involved more than tourist-trap boat tours or lazy hiking trails.

And now, as the boat pulled deep into the harbor—and the strip of beach became more pronounced—she hoped this little trip would be just the trick.

Fifty feet from sand, Manu killed the engine and released an iron-clawed anchor, knotted to a heavy frayed rope, over the side. “From here you must swim,” he said. “The beach is beautiful and deep. You can see interesting rock formations, and the water is very good for snorkeling, many turtles and exotic fish.

“One rule, please. Do not go into the trees. There are animals and many snakes. The forest is dense and without proper clothes you could get hurt. Or lost. Remember, there are no homes here. No people. All private.”

He smiled widely at this, obviously proud of his access.

“But the beach itself? Very safe. If you happen to see a wild pig, please do not approach it. Let me know and I will take care of it.”

“What will you do?” The tight-lipped woman, who had introduced herself on the dock as Karyn (“with a Y” she’d explained, as if it mattered).

In answer, Manu reached into a cutout shelf next to the wheel and pulled out a four-foot wooden spear with an iron tip so whetted that it filled with fire when the sun caught its surface. “Kill it, clean it, and bring it back for a luau!” He laughed, and the passengers chuckled along. “You are all invited,” he said, too loudly, and Eva had the sudden urge to get away from Manu and the others.

“Is it okay if we …” she said, sharply enough that every set of eyes locked onto her. She felt a moment of discomfort, but then Bryce took her hand, and she went on. “Can we go?”

Manu opened his arms expansively. “Yes! Please, go! Have fun! Remember what I tell you. Trees off limits. I will stay here, get boat ready for return. You may leave any belongings you wish. I will not leave, I promise.”

Eva didn’t think any of the group were stupid enough to leave anything valuable behind. She and Bryce only brought the clothes on their backs and a waterproof bag filled with bottled waters, an apple, a couple paperbacks, towels, and a tube of coral-friendly sunscreen. Mike, the handsome fella who settled all their nerves back at the dock, snatched up his Styrofoam cooler. “Remember, you can all share. I have a dozen cans in here, so two for each of us.”

There was an assorted chorus of affirmations and then they were bustling—grabbing packs and clothes, snorkel masks and whatever else would make its way landward for an afternoon in the sun.

There was a splash and a whoop, and all heads turned to see Terry, a lawyer from New Jersey, poking his head up through the water. “Warm!” he yelled, as if they’d thought it would be anything but. Karyn, who was Terry the lawyer’s wife, tossed him their own waterproof bag, then stepped off the edge of the boat and dropped into the clear aqua sea. Eva and Bryce went next, both jumping off the front like children.

When she hit the water, Eva knew why Terry had exclaimed about the temperature. It was more than warm, it was bathwater. “Lovely!” she gasped when coming up for air. Water splashed the side of her face and she twisted to see Bryce kicking away from her, swimming gracefully, excitedly, for the beach.

 

THE BEACH WAS HOT.

The bright sun reflected off the pale sand like new-fallen snow.

The three couples had spread themselves out along the strip of beach, giving each other plenty of room. Bryce had laid down towels side-by-side. Eva, wet and warmed by the quick swim, stripped off her soggy t-shirt, shorts and sandals, revealing a white two-piece bikini and sun-browned skin, before settling down on hers. They’d made camp near the tree line, where the sun was gently broken by the tall palm fronds overhead. There was a light breeze, giving the shadows a relaxing motion on the sand. She stared at the harbor, picturesque with the weathered boat anchored amidst the flat greenish-blue water, the darker blue of the open ocean beyond.

For a moment, she got that creepy feeling again, the same one she’d had when Bryce pulled up the satellite image of Bora Bora. That feeling of being a speck in the middle of an impossible vastness, beyond the reach of society. She imagined it similar to being in outer space, an astronaut floating amidst an impossible void.

Beautiful, yes. But terrifying.

“Sorry to bother,” a voice said, and she broke from her thoughts and looked up at Mike, who stood in front of them, shirtless and smiling, holding two cans of beer. “Stacy and I are gonna snorkel, so thought I’d offer the first of your rations while stranded on this horrible island.”

Bryce stood quickly and reached for the perspiring cans. “Thanks, man, very kind.”

Mike nodded and gave them a wave. “Won’t bother you guys again. If you want the other round, just come on over. If we’re in the water, feel free to grab ‘em out of the cooler.”

“Thank you,” Eva said.

As Mike walked off Bryce handed her the cold can, which she immediately popped open, taking two large swallows. “Ah!” she said, the alcohol fuzzing her brain and raising goosebumps on her arms and legs. “That’s good stuff.”

Bryce drank his own, belched, then nodded. “Hell yes. This, my dear, is heaven.”

Eva could already feel herself relaxing after the tense morning of the uncertain trip and long boat ride. She’d been more anxious than she realized and hoped no one else thought her a bitch.

Then she took another long sip and stopped worrying.

 

“OW! DAMN IT!”

Eva stirred.

She’d been lying on her back, the first beer long gone, dozing gently on the towel, frond shadows playing across her body and the sun bright on her unshaded, but sunscreen-coated, legs.

She got up on her elbows, noticed that Bryce was already sitting up, staring down the length of the beach where the other couples were staggered.

Karyn and Terry were in the middle, close to the water. Mike and Stacy at the far end. It appeared they were done snorkeling and now walked along a rocky outcrop pushing up from the sand like the ridges of a dinosaur’s back. Their eyes were down, probably studying the famous tidepools Manu had recommended.

Thinking of their guide, she looked to the boat, but saw no one on board.

He’s likely taking a nap, she thought. Or spear hunting a wild boar. She smiled at the image of Manu emerging from the trees, bloody spear held high, dragging a slayed black pig behind him, smile bright as the sun, hair loose and wild ….

Eva felt herself getting turned on, suddenly wanting nothing more than to get back in the boat and across the water to their thatched cabana, and their bed. She reached for Bryce’s hand and squeezed lightly.

“Everything okay?”

Bryce turned to look at her, and she was surprised at his expression. She thought he’d be offering her that lazy smile of his, but it wasn’t a smile at all. His brow was furrowed, his eyes worried.

She sat up. “What?”

He shook his head, looked down the beach again. “Something’s wrong with Karyn. She’s acting weird.”

Eva leaned forward, tented a hand over her eyes.

The couple were standing near the water. Terry, in a knee-length blue suit, had his hands out to his sides, as if unsure what to do with them. Karyn, wearing a black bikini and a floppy straw hat, was bent over and—from what Eva could gather—staring at her legs.

Karyn lifted one foot, then hooked it across the opposite knee while she and Terry studied the bottom of it.

“What are they ….”

Eva was interrupted when Karyn screamed—not just kind of screamed, as if startled or stung by an insect—but screamed as if someone had broken into her house and was stabbing her in the chest with a butcher knife. That kind of scream.

Hearing it chilled Eva’s blood.

“What the fuck?” Bryce said and stood up. Eva did, as well. She noticed that Mike and Stacy, small in the distance on the rocky formation, were also staring.

“Should we go over there?”

Bryce looked at her, unsure. “I don’t know. What can we do?”

“Yeah, we don’t even know what’s wrong with her,” Eva agreed. “Maybe she’s crazy.”

“I’ll go,” Bryce said, and Eva saw that Mike had been struck with the same testosterone-fueled idea. GIRL TROUBLE, ME FIX! Eva thought, then felt a wave of shame, and gratitude. She sure as hell didn’t want to go near the crazy screaming lady.

“Bryce, I ….”

And then things got weird.

Because that’s when Terry began to scream, as well.

Bryce took a step but Eva, reacting to a long-dormant survival instinct, grabbed his elbow firmly. “Wait.”

He turned, a mixture of confusion and annoyance on his face. “Eva ….”

“Just wait. Look! That Mike guy is going over there.”

And he was, albeit slowly.

Cautiously?

What’s he afraid of?

Karyn, still screaming, ran for the water.

Eva couldn’t be sure, but she thought there were large dark splotches covering Karyn’s body. Her feet, calves, thighs.

Maybe shadows?

Terry was on his ass, rubbing at his ankles and feet, as if feverishly brushing something off his skin.

He made horrible sounds as he did so. Guttural, gut-wrenching, inhuman shrieks.

Eva’s eyes moved from Terry to Mike, who was yelling something back toward Stacy, still perched atop the rocks crumbling upward from amidst the fat river of sand.

“Jesus, what the hell’s going on?” Bryce said, thankfully staying put.

“I don’t know. What’s Mike saying?”

Mike was backing away from Terry and Karyn, toward the rocks. His hands were cupped around his mouth, and he was yelling something toward Bryce and Eva.

But with all the screaming, Eva could only make out every other word.

“… shoes! … away! … sand!”

“I can’t ….” Bryce stammered.

Then Mike turned and ran across the beach, back to Stacy and the rocks.

“What do we do? Oh God!” Eva watched in horror as Karyn, sputtering in the shallow water like she was drowning, let out a final, gurgling wail of despair so deep it dug into Eva’s core and hollowed it.

Her body, so recently warmed by the bright sun, went ice-cold. “Bryce?”

“I don’t know ….” He stopped, dumbfounded.

Karyn was crawling back onto the beach, leaving the water like an early stage of evolution, as if she were the first of their species to try for dry land. Her elbows dug into the wet sand as she army-crawled toward Terry, who lay flat on his back, twitching convulsively.

Karyn’s legs, in full view as they pulled free of the surf, were black and … shriveled.

Lifeless.

Eva could hear her loud, wet sobbing. By the time she made it to Terry’s body, his convulsions had stopped, and he lay very still.

Yeah, Eva thought, but his skin is still moving.

Karyn rested her body over Terry’s, and now Eva could easily see the large black splotches covering her back, her arms.

The woman’s legs were charcoal-colored and appeared to be diminishing. Evaporating.

As if being eaten.

Eva spun away and vomited into the sand. Bryce put a hand on her back. “It’s okay … It’ll be okay ….”

When she was finished, she wiped her mouth and looked back toward the couple. Both bodies had turned bumpy and black. Motionless.

The screaming, for now, had stopped.

“You guys!”

Bryce and Eva looked beyond the corpses to Mike, perched atop the line of stones a hundred feet away. Hearing him now was effortless.

“Stay off the beach!” he yelled, slowly articulating each word. “Swim to us over here! To the rocks! Put on your sandals!”

Stacy said something to him then and he turned to reply. She shook her head and he continued. “It’s in the sand! You hear me? They’re in the sand!”

Eva looked down at her feet. She was on the towel, but sand was blown across the fabric. I walked here barefoot. I slept on the towel … but my hand, my hair. Were they in the sand?

She looked at her hands, her legs. Looking for … what? She didn’t know. Everything seemed fine, but she brushed her skin clean anyway, tried to ignore the paranoid, phantom sensation of something crawling along her scalp like lice.

Bryce was doing the same, but Eva noticed that, unlike her, he was standing in the sand already, the bottoms of his feet buried in it.

“What’s he talking about?” Bryce said, his voice small and afraid.

“I don’t know, but get on the towel, babe. Where are the sandals?”

“By the bag.”

Which, Eva noticed, was buried in a bright patch of beach a few feet away. She leaned out, trying to keep her balance without having to put a hand down, and snagged the bag. She lifted it carefully, looking for signs of anything strange, keeping it at arms-length. She brought it closer and reached inside.

Unzipped … great. Whatever’s in the sand could have crawled inside.

She debated dumping the contents onto the towels but decided against it. If the bag was safe, she didn’t want all their things … contaminated … with whatever had blackened—eaten—the skin of Terry and Karyn.

She pulled the sandals free one-by-one, inspecting each as she did. She handed Bryce his, and he quickly slipped them onto his feet.

“Can’t imagine this is much protection,” he said, staring at the thin flip-flops. “But if it gets us to the water.”

“I don’t even know what the fuck we’re supposed to be avoiding.” Eva was surprised to feel tears run down her cheeks. “I mean … what’s going on? How are we going to stay off the sand … on a fucking beach?”

Her voice was raised but Bryce looked at her calmly, nodding along. “I know, it’s weird,” he said, his composed tone soothing. She felt a surge of love for him and put a hand on his shoulder.

“Sorry …” she said, but he shook his head.

“Don’t be. I’m fucking terrified. Now ….” He took a deep breath, let it out. “Should we do this? Are we walking or running?”

She looked to the edge of the water waiting beyond a thirty-foot stretch of beach. “I think we walk. Focus on keeping the sandals between us and … whatever. If we run, we’ll kick it all over ourselves.”

“Okay,” he said. “Ready?”

She clenched the sack tightly in one hand, gripped his elbow with the other. For a second, she wondered about bringing the towels.

Fuck that, she thought, and took a step into the sand.

Twenty steps later, they’d made it to the water without incident, both of them pushing into the sea until the bottom dropped away and they were forced to swim.

“Wonder what happened to Manu?” Bryce said, studying the boat anchored in the harbor. “You think we should go there instead? Might be safer.”

Eva eyed the boat but shook her head. “Let’s see what Mike has to say. I want to know what’s going on.”

“Okay,” Bryce agreed, and began swimming parallel to the beach.

When they were halfway, they both stopped, treading water, staring at the corpses—because there is no doubt about it, folks, those are CORPSES—from the supposed, relative safety of the water.

“Holy shit,” Bryce said, the first tendrils of panic slipping into his voice. “They look fucking burned!”

“Let’s keep going,” Eva said, already swimming ahead, feeling a recurrence of nausea twist in her belly.

When they reached the far end, Mike and Stacy were waiting.

The other couple stood on the rocks, which Eva noticed was an archipelago of sorts, a series of rocks surrounded by sand on all sides, the closest about a dozen feet between the waterline. The gaps between the humped brown stones varied from a few feet to a few inches, the jagged line random as a roll of dice.

Eva called out across the water. “Is there room for us?”

“Plenty,” Mike said, smiling weakly. But Eva noticed Stacy wore a frown, one that was leaning toward a scowl, as if the idea of sharing was not something she’d agreed upon.

“What happened?” Bryce asked. They’d moved closer, but not close enough to where they’d be standing on the sand, even underwater.

“Not sure,” Mike said, turning to look at what remained of Terry and Karyn. “I got within a few feet, and I don’t know man, it looked like the sand … hell … it looked like the sand was alive.”

Bryce looked at Eva. “You have your sandals?

“Holding them,” she said with a gasp, a mouthful of saltwater slipping into her mouth. She coughed and spat it out, ignored Bryce’s concerned look. She was feeling the burn in her muscles from ten straight minutes of swimming and treading water.

“You wanna do this?”

“Well,” she said, her lungs also beginning to strain. “It’s either that or sink. I doubt I could swim to the boat now.”

“I could help you ….”

“Bryce, fuck it, come on.”

She began to swim toward shore, done having languid chats while her muscles cried for mercy. When she was shallow enough, she slipped both sandals on beneath the water, and dropped her legs into the mucky seafloor.

Oh, sweet relief, she thought, but her good vibes were cut short as her feet sank into the wet sand. Bryce came up next to her, and they both stepped cautiously forward, aiming for the rocks.

“Try to keep your feet off the sand. Your skin, I mean.”

Eva was disheartened to see that Mike wasn’t watching them as much as he was watching the sand between the lapping waves and the rocks. Looking for movement, for the things that had laid waste to good old Terry from Jersey and Karyn with a “Y”.

As Bryce and Eva emerged, dripping, from the sea, they both took a moment to study the stretch between them and the stones. Eva didn’t notice any movement, saw nothing strange crawling around or on top of the bright sand.

“You guys will be fine, but I wouldn’t dawdle too much,” Mike said.

Eva agreed, and they walked across the beach, hand-in-hand, until they stepped gratefully onto the rocks.

Once atop one of the large, rounded stones, Eva looked down at her feet, her legs, and saw nothing untoward. There was a fine mist of sand on her toes, her heel, but nothing moved, nothing turned her skin black or made her want to scream out in agony.

Not yet.

She saw Bryce doing his own inspection before looking at her and nodding.

“Well, this sucks,” Eva said, and appreciated Mike chuckling at her shitty attempt at levity.

“It does at that.”

Then, as one, they all turned to study the blackened corpses, this time with a more studious disposition.

“So, you think something…what? Bit them?”

“Infested them. Some strain of sand fleas, sand lice, whatever they’re called,” Mike said, shrugging. “It isn’t that uncommon and, well, I’ve heard horror stories. I mean, me and Stacy do a lot of traveling, sometimes to some pretty remote places.”

“Maybe,” Bryce said. “But come on … look at them.”

“I know, I know. This is totally fucked. I have no idea what ….”

“HELLO!”

A booming voice interrupted Mike’s thought, and they all turned to see Manu standing at the bow of his boat, having seemingly appeared from nowhere.

Was he hiding? Eva thought, trying not to get carried away, overly paranoid. Sleeping, more likely.

Mike waved back but dropped his arm when he saw the big smile on Manu’s face, the expression blatant even from seventy-five feet away.

“I see you’ve discovered my friends!” he yelled across the water, and then laughed as if it was a hilarious prank, a joke they’d all be laughing at later, perhaps while eating charred boar off a spit at the infamous Manu Luau to which, Eva recalled, they’d all been invited.

A chill went up her spine at Manu’s choice of words, and her defensive, sardonic inner-wit scurried away, leaving a void of empty fear behind. My friends?

Bryce said softly, “What the hell ….”

“Please, come pick us up!” Mike yelled.

“I don’t think so!” Manu called back. “The blood gets them stirred up, you know. Can you see?” He pointed in the direction of the couple, and their eyes followed.

And yes.

Yes, now…they could see.

“Oh God,” Eva groaned.

The sand was moving. It seemed okay close to the rocks, but there was a wide swath of beach extending outward from the dead bodies that was, without a doubt … teeming.

“Sand mites?” Bryce looked at Mike. “Is that what you think?”

“Shit man, I don’t know. Whatever they are, they’re quick and deadly as piranha.”

Stacy, who Eva had all but forgotten about, suddenly joined the discussion. “You think he did this on purpose?” she said, her voice high-pitched and cracking. “You think he brought us here to die?”

“Take it easy, hon,” Mike said softly.

“There’s not much left of them now,” Bryce said, and it was true. The bodies were still lumped on top of one another, but the flesh had been eaten away, leaving bloody tissue and flashes of wet gristle, like raw hamburger beneath a charred shell. A red stain of blood surrounded them.

Their flesh seemed to boil.

“You can stay on the rocks. Most people do,” Manu called cheerfully. “But sooner or later ….” He shrugged, giving them his best what are you gonna do expression. “To help you avoid temptation, I will leave now. I hope you are still alive when I come back, because that would be much more interesting!”

Manu pulled up the anchor and started the boat, gave them all a cheerful wave as he turned it around and motored slowly out of the harbor.

“Son of a bitch,” Bryce said, his tone heated. “Why is he doing this?”

“Don’t know,” Mike said.

Eva turned around, studied the shadowed tree line. “What about the trees? He made a big deal about us staying out of there, so maybe there’s help there. Safety.”

Mike nodded. “Good point. Still, there’s a lot of sand between here and there.”

“We could also try swimming to the edges of the harbor,” Bryce added, “climbing those rocks and seeing what lies beyond. He claimed this island was uninhabited but, to Eva’s point, he was probably lying, wanting to keep us on the sand.”

Stacy groaned and they all looked at her. She was looking down, one palm on her chest, pressed against her heart. “Oh no….”

Mike studied the area Stacy was fixated on.

“He’s right,” he said with a sour grimace. “Blood does get them stirred up.”

Hesitantly, Eva looked back toward the beach between the rocks and the water, the imbedded footprints of her and Bryce’s path still evident.

The sand was crawling.

All of it.

Mike cursed and leapt to a far rock, nonchalantly skipping over three feet of sand without hesitation. He picked up a black nylon belt that had been thrown into a pile along with the couples’ snorkeling gear. There was a rip of Velcro and Mike dropped the belt but held onto a black-handled knife sprouting a four-inch serrated blade.

“What are you gonna do with that?” Bryce asked. His voice was level, but Eva could hear a note of caution running beneath it.

“For one, use it to gut that bastard if I can get close enough. Two, I’m gonna want it as protection when I make it to those trees. He may have been lying about the wild pigs in there, or God knows what else, but I’m gonna stay on the side of caution.”

“Mike, no!” Stacy said, clamping a hand to her mouth.

“How will you get there?” Eva asked. “It’s gotta be thirty feet of sand. Did you see the beach? Whatever it is … it’s everywhere.”

“I know but look.” He lifted a foot casually, showing off a dark green rubber scuba slipper. “These will keep those things off my feet, better than sandals anyway. Once I get to the trees and the hard ground, I should be okay. I’ll search for help. Worst case, I’ll find something we can use to get you three to safety.”

Eva turned to Bryce, to ask him what he thought of the idea, but Bryce was no longer paying attention to them.

He was studying his feet.

Eva followed his gaze, down the tanned legs, past the bumps of his ankles … “Bryce?”

He looked at her, his eyes wide and crystal blue.

And wild with fear.

“I think,” he said, then abruptly slid one foot free of the sandal, bent his knee and turned his foot so the bottom faced upward.

A black, blistered swirl stretched from his heel to his big toe.

Eva could see the bugs under the skin, crawling, infesting.

Eating.

“Jesus, Bryce!” she yelled, reflexively taking half a step backward, nearly pitching herself ass-backward off the rock.

“I’d felt it a few minutes ago. I guess I hoped … boy, it’s bad, I mean … oh! Oh God!”

Bryce sat down on the rock butted against the one he stood on. Its slightly higher elevation allowed him to sit, one ankle over the other knee, to more closely study his foot.

“It really hurts!” he said, hysteria creeping into his voice.

“Eva, move!” Mike ordered, already skipping back toward them. “Don’t get them on you!”

“I …” Eva felt like she was in shock. “What do we do?”

Bryce tapped her waist gently with one hand. “Do it, Eva. Move away, please.”

Eva stepped to a stone a few feet closer to the tree line, let Mike slip past her on his way to Bryce. Stacy hadn’t moved, but watched it all from nearby, a dispassionate observer.

Are they on me, too?

Eva pulled one foot from her sandal, inspected it.

Nothing.

She repeated it with the other foot, felt a rush of guilt-laced relief to see it was also clear.

Bryce, meanwhile, was beginning to panic.

“Help me!” he yelled at Mike, and Eva could see whatever had been eating at the bottom of his foot had moved upward—streaking black lines ran over the top of the foot, the ankle, along the side of one calf. “It really hurts, man. I can feel them eating me …. Fuck, I can feel them crawling underneath.”

The bottom of Bryce’s foot was completely black and bubbling, frantic with the invading creatures. The skin looked like burnt paper, and the dark lines continued to move steadily up his leg.

“Here.” Mike handed Bryce the knife, handle-first. “See if you can … shit man, see if you can scrape them off or something. Don’t let them get higher.”

“Bryce,” Eva cried, his name coming out like a sob as she watched his eyes turned wide and terrified, his lips quiver. He looked up at her, face red and wild, tears streaming down his face. Then he grabbed the handle of the extended knife and began cutting.

He began by scraping the bottom of his foot, using the flat of the blade as a straightedge, heel-to-toe.

Black, bug-infested flakes fell from his foot to the stones. Mike took a giant step back, isolating Bryce and whatever was being peeled off him.

Rivulets of blood began to run off the foot where the flesh had come away. “I think I’m getting them!” he yelled. “It hurts, though. Really fucking hurts.” He scraped again, revealing more red flesh, more of the dead, blackened skin falling in wet, leaf-sized patches.

One black tendril needling up his thigh had now traveled beneath the opening of his suit. Bryce jerked the fabric back toward his crotch. He stuck the tip of the knife into the top of the festering line as it crossed to his inner thigh, teeth gritted, sweat and tears dripping off his face.

“I don’t know how ….”

“Try ….” Mike swallowed. More softly, he continued. “I don’t know, brother. Try cutting them out I guess.”

Bryce, blood now flowing freely from his foot, began cutting along one of the black lines. More blood sprang through the cuts, but the tiny creatures didn’t fall away, they multiplied, as if the fresh blood only energized their frenzied feasting.

From one heartbeat to the next, the stripe on his leg widened, darted up past his crotch and emerged from the waistband of his suit, crisscrossing over his stomach.

“Aah!” he screamed, throwing his head back. “Oh God, no please!”

He began stabbing at his leg with abandon.

“No! Bryce, stop!” Eva yelled, and then suddenly there were arms around her, turning her around and holding her tight. The skin was soft, fragrant. Female.

Not Mike then, but Stacy. She of the perpetual frown, the seeming distaste, was now keeping Eva’s face tucked into her shoulder, her voice soft and urgent in her ear.

“Don’t look, Eva. Whatever you do, don’t look.”

Bryce continued to scream as they all stood nearby, helpless.

“I have to!” Eva said into Stacy’s shoulder. “I have to see him!”

She struggled free of the woman’s grasp and twisted around.

And screamed.

Bryce was covered in them. His chest, arms, shoulders…all boiling with black, swarming infestation. His jaw opened and closed soundlessly, his eyes bloodshot and vacant. The knife, Eva noticed, was stuck deep into one shriveling thigh.

“Get back, Mike,” Stacy said through her own tears. “For God’s sake, get away from him.”

“The knife ….” Mike said lamely.

“Fuck the knife!” Stacy screamed, and Mike nodded and stepped another rock away from where Bryce was sitting, the creatures running through him like water, devouring his flesh so fast that he appeared shrink before their eyes.

Eva put her face into her hands and sobbed. She couldn’t look at him anymore. Part of her—a part that was likely dead forever—wondered if he’d had an engagement ring in the pocket of that swimsuit, tucked into the pocket on the inside of the waistband that you used for keys when you couldn’t leave them safely on shore. Maybe she could check, later, after the rest of him was gone—had been eaten—maybe then she could check for a ring.

They wouldn’t eat the suit, would they? It was such a stupid question, she thought. I must be in shock, because otherwise I’d still be screaming. Screaming because my boyfriend, the man I share my bed with, is turning black and crispy just a few feet away, being eaten alive, in fact. How very odd it all is. Yes … I’d surely be screaming.

But she was screaming. And Stacy clutched her as best she could, grabbed her and held her while she wailed and wept and baked beneath the hot, careless sun.

 

HOURS LATER, MANU’S BOAT CAME puttering back into the harbor.

Eva, Mike, and Stacy were perched on the highest rocks they could safely get to.

What was left of Bryce had fallen over into the sand, where the remaining flesh had been quickly covered. He’d been reduced to nothing but black dust on a brown stone, a blue swimsuit, and a blackened, skeleton-thin husk of the man he’d once been.

His teeth are still white, Eva noticed. But his blue eyes were gone. And his hair looked brittle and dark, the luscious, blonde-streaked russet color somehow sucked dry.

Eva remained free of the creatures in the sand. She was badly sunburned but couldn’t bring herself to care.

Mike and Stacy had spoken softly with one another—too softly for Eva to overhear—over the last few hours, and she figured Mike was making his case for a run to the trees.

For help.

But after seeing what happened to Bryce, seeing what those things did close-up, Eva thought Mike seemed less enthusiastic about stepping off the rocks, rubber booties or no.

As the boat neared the beach, all three survivors stood to watch.

Manu didn’t wave this time, and Eva could make out an uncharacteristic frown on his handsome face.

“Think we disappointed him,” Mike said.

“Good,” Stacy replied, without enthusiasm.

Eva looked at the other two. “He thought we’d be dead.”

Mike nodded. “He certainly doesn’t seem as exuberant as he was earlier.”

They all continued watching as Manu parked the boat thirty feet off their position, cut the engine, and lowered the anchor once more.

“I wonder,” Mike said.

“What?” Eva asked, seeing that Stacy was eyeing him hotly.

“Well, if I could get to that boat before he pulled in the anchor ….”

“Across the sand,” Stacy snapped. “And don’t forget he has that stupid spear.”

“True,” Mike said, but Eva didn’t think he sounded worried. Mike looked to be in better-than-average shape. Lean and rippling with muscle. She wondered if he had some sort of combat experience. He seemed comfortable enough with that knife, anyway.

“Hello again!” Manu addressed them once more from the bow of the gently rocking boat.

He’s trying to put on a good face, but I don’t think he’s happy at all, Eva thought.

“You guys are hard to kill!” He flashed a smile. “That’s okay! Like I said, more interesting for me!”

“This might be our only chance,” Mike said quietly, head bent toward Stacy. “The scuba shoes will protect my feet. I can make it to that boat in three minutes flat. There’s no way he could get the anchor up and the engine started before I reach him.”

“And a spear in the eye for your trouble!” she retorted, and Eva winced at how loudly she’d said it. She didn’t want Manu hearing Mike’s idea.

Personally, she was all for it. Mike was right, he would be protected with those rubber booties. And if he could overpower Manu, then they could all get out of here. They could take turns with the shoes, maybe. There had to be a way!

“Eva, stand aside, would you?”

“Mike, please don’t ….”

“It’s this or we die. Right here. All of us. It could be our only chance.”

Eva stepped carefully to another rock, her eyes lowering to the spot where Bryce had crumpled. She saw the glimmer of the knife, fallen free of Bryce’s thigh, which now looked more like beef jerky than flesh.

“Mike,” she said, pointing.

He followed her finger to the knife. “Can you grab it?”

It seemed a small risk compared to what Mike was willing to do. It was stuck between two rocks, so Manu couldn’t see it. She slowly bent her knees, minding her balance while watching the sand for movement.

There was some subtle activity near Bryce’s corpse, but the handle was above the sand. Only the blade was buried. She lowered her hand, slowly, gripped the handle, and pulled the blade free. She waggled the knife a little to throw off any loose sand still clinging to it.

“Looks okay,” Mike said, wiping his mouth. “I don’t think they care about stuff that’s not, you know, organic.” He spoke the words softly, and Eva hoped he was right.

She straightened, keeping her body between the knife and Manu, who was likely watching from the water. Mike pinched the metal blade between two fingers and gave it another little shake. Finally, he gripped the handle in one fist.

They all held their breath.

A bead of nervous sweat dripped off his chin. “Think it’s okay.” He exhaled with obvious relief, then deftly turned the knife in his hand so that the metal was hidden by his forearm.

This guy is definitely military, Eva thought. Either that or he’s a helluva boy scout.

“Good luck,” she said.

Mike held her eyes for a moment, and she noticed they were a lovely shade of green, with dark blue specks throughout. Then they shifted over her shoulder, to their target. He took a deep breath, exhaled and, without another word, leapt from the rocks.

Eva and Stacy watched Mike sprint across the sand, diving before he reached the lapping surf, slicing into light green shallows.

Manu disappeared from the bow. First, he ran to the anchor, but Mike was coming fast, so he slipped away, hidden from their view. When Mike reached the side of the boat, Manu reappeared with the spear, jabbing downward as if trying to stab a pike from a creek.

Mike yelled once, as if injured, then grabbed the shaft of the spear on Manu’s next strike and jerked it downward, out of the islander’s hands.

“I’m going,” Stacy said, and jumped off the rocks.

Eva studied the woman’s feet as she ran away, saw she wore similar rubber booties as Mike, but that they didn’t cover the tops of her feet as well as Mike’s had.

Before Eva could yell out for her—a warning, a shout of encouragement—Stacy was diving headfirst into the water, cutting through the low waves toward Mike, who had somehow managed to get onto the boat, he and Manu now grappling like cage fighters. Mike got the larger man into a choke hold, and Manu kicked wildly, throwing blind backward punches.

Eva waited on the stones. She watched as Manu broke free and Mike raised the knife, thrusting it at the other man, backing him up until Manu had no choice but to leap from the boat. As he treaded water on the far side, Mike lifted Stacy, clutching the fallen spear, up the other. Once aboard, Stacy threatened Manu with the spear’s sharp point every time he swam near, shrieking like a madwoman. Mike, meanwhile, brought up the anchor, hand-over-hand, until it clambered over the side and dropped into the boat.

He started the engine.

“Hey!” Eva cried, waving both arms like a castaway who’d spotted a plane buzzing overhead, or a distant steamer plowing through the mist, hazy as a ghost.

Mike raised a hand in return as the engines grew louder. Stacy approached him and they argued, the words lost amidst the air-splitting buzzsaw of the engine.

Manu, meanwhile, had swum toward the beach, stopping a few feet short of the sand. He stood in the shallows, the water lapping at the top of his sarong, his back to Eva, his eyes on the boat.

Mike yelled something, hand cupped around his mouth, but it was near-impossible to hear over the engine. To Eva’s horror, it sounded like: “We’ll get help!”

She watched, helpless, as the boat backed away from the beach, slowly rotating until the bow faced the ocean, away from Eva, from the island. If not for the presence of Manu standing in the water, she might have made a mad run for it, risking death for a chance of rescue.

“No!” she screamed. “Mike, please! Don’t leave!”

Minutes later, the boat was pushing out of the harbor, long past earshot of Eva’s protests. It banked left, accelerated and, after a few moments, disappeared from view.

Eva sobbed as the boat vanished. She sat down hard on the warm stones, feeling the heat of the late afternoon sun on her head, back and shoulders. She dared not look at the licorice-limbed corpse of her boyfriend, or the similar corpses of Terry and Karyn that littered the beach a dozen yards away.

Drained of strength, of hope, she whimpered, “No no no ….”

Long after the sound of the boat’s engine had vanished, she lifted her eyes. Manu, still standing in the shallows, watched her.

“Why did you do this?” She knew that she would die here, in this virgin paradise, with only a strange man at her side, a man who wanted to kill her.

“If we wait until dark, they will retreat,” Manu said, his tone implausibly casual as he studied the sky, as if contemplating the remaining daylight. “When night falls, it will be safe, Eva. They don’t like the cold.”

“I don’t believe you!” she screamed, nearly slipping off the rock in her anger. “You tried to fucking kill me! Why did you bring us here!”

But Manu said nothing, only continued to watch the sky.

 

HOURS PASSED, AND THE BOAT did not return.

No rescue boat appeared.

Ravenous despite everything, Eva found her scuba bag, pulled out the apple she’d brought as a snack, back when this was going to be a quick trip of a few hours. She ate it angrily, staring daggers at Manu, who stood silent in the shallows, not venturing closer, but not swimming away.

“Almost time now,” he said.

Eva looked at the darkening sky—a gorgeous royal blue so clear that she could perceive a smattering of stars sprinkled like diamond dust beyond the earth’s atmosphere, as if she were glimpsing another dimension.

The sun was a red boil on the horizon, split in two by the great ocean, lowering slowly into its depths.

The day was ending.

 

LATER, WHEN IT WAS FULL dark, and the twilight canopy was bursting with glittering stars and the shimmering powder of galaxies, and the day had split from the night, Manu walked out of the water and onto the beach.

He hesitated a moment, then smiled, his teeth bright in the moonlight.

“It’s okay,” he said. “You can come down.”

“No fucking way,” Eva said, wishing she had a weapon. A knife, a gun, a spear … but she had nothing. No clothes, no possessions.

Just fear.

“I won’t hurt you, Eva,” Manu said. “And if you come with me, I’ll show you things you’ve never seen. Things you’ve never imagined.”

He walked boldly up to the stones, magnificent in the moonlight, bare-chested and native as the island itself. Unblemished.

She looked at his exposed feet in the sand.

Nothing attacked him.

“Come with me, Eva. Let me show you.” He held out a hand. “I swear on my father, you will be safe.”

Eva looked toward the black ocean, the diamond-crusted waves, the onyx abyss of its massive, infinite body. She regarded the night sky and saw the mirror image of the waters, as if the entirety of reality beyond the island was nothing but endless void.

Exhausted beyond reason, she reached out and took his hand. It was warm and dry, and it tugged at her to follow.

She dropped off the rocks, onto the sand.

Together, they walked across the beach, unharmed, toward the line of dark trees.

“Promise,” she said, as they stepped off the shoreline and into the fertile ground of the untouched garden. “Promise you won’t hurt me.”

Manu looked down at her, his shadowed face a dark chasm of infinite night.