It was an Anguilla eel, a big one, maybe ten feet long, only it wasn't slithering like a sea snake, it was hanging vertically off the bottom, the tip of its tail buried in the sediment, its head aimed at the surface.
As I drifted slowly over the eel, my light reflecting off the opaque eyes of another and another, then dozens more, all frozen in the same vertical holding pattern, like a ballet of cobras, caught in a trance.
"Zack, whit dae ye see?"
"Eels. Must be hundreds of them. They're just hanging off the bottom, as if standing on end. It's eerie."
"An' dangerous. Steer clear."
"Wait… I see something else."
I eased forward using my propeller, aiming my light along the bottom. The beacon caught the jagged edge of a dark shadow. Moving closer, I saw that it was not a shadow, but a chasm, cutting across the Loch's bottom like a miniature version of the Grand Canyon.
"It's a narrow trench, and it looks pretty deep. The eels are positioned around it, almost as if they're sentries standing guard."
"Stay downcurrent if ye can. Anguilla have poor eyesight, but if they smell ye—"
"The chasm's about sixty feet wide. If I hover over it, I think I can drop down nice and easy without disturbing the eels."
I pressed gently on my thrusters, ascending higher over the rift before engaging the propeller again. Slowly I circled, the handheld beacon shining down upon a hole so deep it seemed to absorb my light.
I never noticed the elongated tract of sediment, piled eighteen feet high, that wound more than fifty feet along one edge of the crevice. Nor did I see the two luminescent-yellow eyes that gleamed up from it as I circled by.
"Stand by, True, here I go."
I pulled my feet away from both boot controls, allowing the weight of the Newt Suit to sink me — too fast… way too fast!
Sensing the sudden disturbance, the once-sedate eels broke from their ranks. They whirled about in a chaotic frenzy, then swarmed in on me, snapping at my arms and legs from all angles, bashing my face mask and backpack with their powerful bodies. I tried to fend them off, but there were too many of them, and I was moving two speeds too slow. My lights kept most of them from my face, but they attacked my legs without mercy, their sharp needle teeth clawing my metal skin, their muscular torsos whipping at my gear, and I was petrified of losing pressure within the ADS.
Then, as suddenly as it began, the assault ceased.
"Jesus …" I sucked in deep breaths, then retracted my left arm from its sleeve and mopped the sweat from my face.
"Zack? Are ye okay?"
"The eels… they came at me, all of "em at once. Then they just disappeared. Holy shit… and now I know why."
"Why? Whit is it?"
Looking around, I realized I had dropped into the chasm… and I was still falling.
"True, I'm descending within the canyon. Standby."
Pressing down on my right foot, I engaged my thrusters and slowed my descent. Raising my right arm, I aimed the hand-held light and looked around as a blizzard of brown sediment fell into the trench from above, obliterating my view.
And then something immense plowed sideways into me with the force of a locomotive and an immense pressure squeezed my brain, bashing me into unconsciousness.
Chapter 33
Well, the day that I saw the monster, it was the end of September and I was driving back from Inverness. I came up the hill where we came in sight of the bay, glanced out across it, and saw this large lump. The nearest I can tell you is it looked like a boat that had turned upside down. It was about ten meters [thirty-three feet] in length, and nearly three meters [ten feet] in height from the water to the top of the back. It was a mixture of browns, greens, sludgy sort of colors. I looked at it on and off for a few seconds, because I was driving. Must have seen it three or four times, and the last time I looked, it was gone! I thought to myself, "Oh, there's Nessie. "Bout time I saw it, I've been living here a year." And then something in the back of my head sort of said, "That's not just Nessie, that's got to be the Loch Ness Monster that everybody has spent thousands of pounds searching for, and you're looking at the darn thing." I nearly drove off the road, but luckily I didn't because we had a fairly new car. Can you imagine what the insurance claim would have been like?
When I got home I thought, "I need a strong drink." But there was none in the house, so I thought, "Right. Strong coffee will do."
There were no members of the media present, only two shell-shocked guards and Francesca Kasa, my father's private nurse, who hovered over Angus as he lay slumped on the floor of his cell.
"Angus, listen to me! You're having a heart attack! Hang on, I've called the hospital, an ambulance is on the way."
The nurse turned to the two guards as Angus lay there groaning. "They'll never get a gurney down that circular stairwell. We need to carry him up. Now! Come on, move!"
The two guards hurried into the cell.
Sirens blaring, the ambulance roared up the driveway behind Inverness Castle, then backed up to the police barracks just as the guards emerged carrying Angus.
A female EMT jumped down from the back of the van, her long, raven-colored hair tucked beneath her cap. With one of the guards help, she removed the gurney, "Lay him down, quickly!"
The guards complied, just as their superior, Captain Douglas Galliac, hurried over from his post. "Whit's a' this?"
Nurse Kasa secured Angus to the gurney as the female paramedic hovered over him, listening to his heart with her stethoscope. "Myocardial infarction… it's a massive heart attack."
"Probably a blood clot in one or more of his coronary arteries," called out the EMT. "I'm startin' him on Retavase."
The paramedic hooked up a clear IV bag to the gurney, passing the needle end to the nurse, who jabbed Angus in the arm.
"Ahh!"
Captain Galliac went pale. "Is he gonnae make it? Where are ye takin' him?"
"Where dae ye think?" the nurse yelled back.
"Well, I cannae jist let him go, he's been convicted o' murder!"
"An' he could die if ye keep us here. Then you can explain tae the media how the sheriff's office executed their prisoner without him ever bein' sentenced."
"What's the holdup, people?" the female driver yelled from the front seat of the ambulance. "We've got a surgical team standing by for an emergency angiogram and stent."
"Oh Bloody Hell… Mastramico, Edwards, load him aboard, then follow them tae the hospital. I've got tae find the sheriff. An' no media!"
The paramedic and nurse climbed in the back of the van as the two guards lifted Angus and his gurney to them. The double doors were slammed closed, and the ambulance accelerated away.
The emergency vehicle raced down the winding path of Castle Street, its blasting siren alerting a second ambulance, identical to the first, that had been waiting at the bottom of the hill for the last ten minutes.
The first ambulance, driven by Theresa Cialino, turned right onto the main road, forcing traffic to one side while the second emergency vehicle, driven by her cousin, James Fox, hesitated just long enough for the trailing sheriff's car to appear in his rear view mirror. When it did, he accelerated into traffic, turning left.
Brandy watched the scene from the back of the first van as she removed her EMT's garb. "That was fun. I've never been a fugitive before."
"Accomplice, lass, I'm the fugitive." Angus winced as he removed the IV from his arm. "Theresa, how much farther?"
"Two minutes, hang on." Theresa cut the siren, then pulled off the main road into an industrial park. Slowing to traverse the speed bumps, she followed an alleyway back to a row of self-store garages.