Leviathan
May those who curse days, curse that day
Those who are ready to rouse
LEVIATHAN
Kept hidden from mankind forever, it is about to surface.
When it rises up, the mighty are terrified.
After a rash of violent attacks throughout the Caribbean, marine biologist Kelly Andrews captures evidence of an unidentified predator in the Atlantic. Something unknown to science, something altogether new . . . or else something very old.
It makes the depths churn like a boiling caldron and stirs up the sea.
Billionaire Oscar Wright also learns of the sea monster’s existence, which he considers to be the Biblical Leviathan. Driven mad by grief, the old man devotes his vast fortune to kill the beast for a personal vendetta and harvest its hide as a trophy.
Nothing on earth is its equal — a creature without fear.
Two separate expeditions race across the ocean to find the animal. And when it’s finally discovered, one thing becomes clear: humanity no longer tops the food chain.
Leviathan
――― • ―――
Jared Sandman
LEVIATHAN
Copyright © 2010 by Jared Sandmann
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by electronic or mechanical means, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system without written permission from the author.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or persons (living or dead) is entirely coincidental.
Cover art by Ruth Taylor. Visit http://ruth-tay.deviantart.com to view more of her artwork.
FIRST EDITION
CHAPTER ONE
IN CUBA MIGUEL Espinoza had been a respected doctor. Now he was nothing. Out on the ocean, he’d left behind that part of his life. He was still a father and a husband, but he’d given up his medical practice for what he preferred to think as early retirement, jubilación temprana. He’d saved two years’ worth of government paychecks for this trip; little remained of that amount. The physician wondered if he could pull off their escape, especially with his family expanding once again.
His wife, Maria Garcia Espinoza, was eight months pregnant. Despite Miguel’s healthcare connections, they chose not to learn the baby’s gender. For all Miguel knew, José soon could have either a younger sister or brother to babysit.
The boy sat in the backseat of the car. He had little to occupy his time, so he watched the clouds drift by and imagined his new life in the United States. Only ten years old, he had the ambitions of someone more than twice his age. He’d already decided to be a journalist. El Presidente allowed one government-run newspaper to circulate the island, Granma Internacional, which José didn’t enjoy reading. He often made up stories and played alone in the mountains behind his village, picturing himself anywhere but Cuba. He wasn’t familiar with geografía; therefore, he didn’t know much about the world beyond his homeland. His mother had taken him once to Havana to hear one of Castro’s marathon speeches. The crowd had cheered and rejoiced at el Presidente’s fiery words — there were so many people in attendance, he could barely move in the dense throng — but the applause rang hollow in José’s ears. There had to be more, and for that the boy looked to his abuelo.
Maria’s father, Juan Garcia, was asleep in the back next to José. His face was peaceful, his white hair mussed. Deep grooves cut into his cheeks, and there were crow’s-feet around his eyes from years squinting at the sun. He’d become a professional fisherman after dropping out of school at age fifteen. That had been in 1950, and now Juan was an old man. Although hard and filled with his share of disappointment, time had snuck up on him as it did all men. He’d once been able to tie any necessary knot with ease; now his hands shook so badly he couldn’t sip soup with a spoon. It was more aggravating to him than a day spent fishing with no catch to show for it. Lacking formal education, he’d always prided himself on exquisite penmanship. That too had been destroyed by the palsy.
The family had left Cuba from Puerto Escondido, thirty kilometers east of Havana. They stole away in the night, watched the town’s lights disappear into the distance. That had been two days ago; they expected to reach American soil within twenty-four hours, sometime tomorrow morning. It was a ninety-mile trek north through the Straits of Florida to the southernmost tip of the Keys, nicknamed The Puddle by former defectors. Farther out was the Dry Tortugas, nothing there other than the remnants of a Civil War prison, Fort Jefferson.
Miguel’s brother had made a similar trip four years ago and urged the doctor to move his family to America as well. Ricardo played up the United States to be a seductive siren. And though Miguel didn’t buy into the theory the U.S. was as good as claimed to be, it had to be better than Cuba. He was tired of el Presidente’s policies. America held promise and hope, something the Cuban people desperately craved.
If they did make it to America, they planned to stay with Ricardo until they could afford to live on their own. He resided in a town named Miami and maintained it was a wonderful place for new immigrants. There were entire city blocks where no one spoke English, so the language barrier needn’t be a problem. His English nowhere near fluent, Miguel understood enough rudimentary sentences to get by.
Miami seemed far away at the moment. Right now Miguel had to focus on getting his family safely to America. As long as they touched U.S. soil, they’d be granted political asylum. For anything less than that, the Coast Guard would send them back to Cuba.
This trip was the product of meticulous plotting. He’d spent months fitting their only vehicle, a 1948 four-door Nash, onto an aluminum frame. Welding together the hull late at nights, he constructed a floating craft that incorporated the car. He purchased a stripped small-craft engine from a black-market dealer that he attached to the stern. Without a sail they’d need some way to steer toward America; otherwise they might drift for days or never find land.
That same dealer had offered to transport them to the U.S. by cigarette boat; however, the cost was too great. The quoted price was nine thousand dollars per person, regardless of age. Miguel didn’t have that kind of money, so he turned down the proposal with regrets.
The Espinozas left their house, the only home José had known, without informing the neighbors. They couldn’t risk having one of them tip off la policía. If Miguel were caught trying to flee the country, he’d be sent to a repatriotization camp. And most people exiled there never returned. Miguel wondered if he would ever see his home again. Part of him wished to, perhaps after the Castro regime had been interred.
Much as they wanted a better life, it was hard to abandon their property. Everyone had to make sacrifices, including the boy. José was crushed to leave behind his dog, Feo. The pet was as much a family member as any of them, albeit a four-legged mutt. He’d loved that dog since it showed up on their porch three years ago. If the boy had said a tearful goodbye to Feo, Miguel had not seen. He brought up his son to be a man and had yet to be disappointed.
They took what little money was left over from their expenses. Beyond that each member was allowed one suitcase of belongings. The government would confiscate everything else when it was discovered they had left. Miguel packed food and water for the trip, along with two changes of clothing. Maria had taken clothes as well, including a handmade baby outfit her deceased mother had sewn for José. Juan selected clothes and his dog-eared copy of the Bible that rested on his lap. He read it often, particularly on this trip. José took a deck of cards, as many clothes as could fit in his duffle bag, and a picture of him with Feo. It broke his heart to look at the photograph, yet his gaze wandere
d to it many times.
The move was difficult for the Espinozas, but difficulty wasn’t new to them. There were many motivations driving them from Cuba, the foremost being José. Miguel didn’t want his son and future child growing up under Communist rule. It was bad enough the doctor had to; he didn’t want the same for his kids.
Communism itself wasn’t the problem, for theoretically it was a workable system. If everyone received as much as anyone else, there were no great disparages of wealth like in America. The only people in Cuba who made more than its citizenry were members of government or drug-runners who paid the corrupt policía to look the other way.
The trouble with Communism laid in politics. Any socialist state under a dictatorship could not flourish. Left to its own devices, Communism would not buckle under itself. Most of the island’s financial setbacks came at the hands of the United States. Cuban schools were dilapidated yet allowed children a high level of education. Its colleges produced many of the best healthcare professionals in the world, Miguel among them, well trained with twice the work ethic of their American counterparts. The majority of economic strife could be traced to crippling trade sanctions, most notably from its neighbor to the north. If Cuba were permitted to engage in free trade, the quality of life for its people would rival any developed country. The prohibitions from Los Estados Unidos had damned the Cuban people to wallow in poverty, punishment for a government over which they wielded no control.
It was tough to bring needed supplies to the nation because of both its political affiliations and self-sustained geography. Cubans could not receive the food, medicine and tourist money they needed. Before Castro rose to power, the Cuban people had been generally content; after him, most of the international community shunned them. They clung to Castro as their savior because he was all they had. El Presidente was the one person who hadn’t turned his back on them when they were rebuked by the rest of the world.
Cuban children were taught in school that America was a terrible place headed by a capitalistic government run amok. In the United States, kids were told Communism was evil. In actuality neither was true. Cuba was a decent place filled with hardworking people. But Miguel was weary of strict political rule. No place could reach its potential when the general public feared its government. The doctor tired of being afraid of la policía, of being sent to prisión.
Miguel knew all too well the repercussions of insubordination. His father had spoken out against Castro shortly after el Presidente’s coup from Batista. Men arrived at their house that night, dragged the elder Espinoza into the street and took him into custody. He was never seen again. Miguel had been twelve at the time and hadn’t the opportunity to tell his father goodbye.
Miguel reached into his supply chest for a bottle of water. He twisted off the cap, drank deep and long. But not too long, as provisions had to last another day or so. He passed the bottle to Maria, which she pushed away. She had stayed relatively cool by fanning herself with a piece of cardboard.
Today wasn’t as hot as it had been. Yesterday the heat had been unbearable. Afternoon clouds masked the sky, bringing with them a stiff breeze from the west. It would likely rain later, which would further drop temperatures. Any bit helped.
Miguel had packed five days’ worth of food and a week’s worth of water, in addition to extra motor fuel if they got lost. Miguel had a good sense of direction, and Maria’s father was an expert maritime navigator. The doctor also made sure to include a package of salt cubes to help replenish the sodium they lost through copious amounts of perspiration. Most of their sustenance consisted of beef jerky and bread. They’d eaten the last of the fruit that morning, and José wished they’d taken more bananas.
No one said much, their minds preoccupied with the future. On the first day, José had asked if he could leave the car to go swimming. Miguel forbade the idea because the trip was dangerous enough. He didn’t need the added stress from worrying about his son potentially drowning.
Juan barely said anything, kept busy with his Spanish version of the King James’ Bible. He didn’t want to come on the trek but eventually succumbed to Maria’s insistence. She had pleaded for him to join them, considering they already lived together. He believed himself too old for such an adventure and felt like a drain on the family, as though he’d outlived his usefulness.
The elderly man had been born in Cuba, wanted to die with dignity in his homeland. Juan remembered when Americans roamed the island with impunity, driving their expensive cars to attend lavish parties. He had even met Ernesto Hemingway once. On his way home from the harbor one evening, he struck up conversation with a grizzled boat captain fishing off the dock. It wasn’t until later he learned the bearded gentleman had been the infamous gringo writer. Cuba revered the Nobel Prize winner as a national treasure, surpassed only by Castro in popularity.
The engine droned behind the car, pushing their craft toward redemption. The Espinozas had listened to it for so long, only when the noise stopped did it register with them. They weren’t aware anything was wrong until the motor started coughing like an asthmatic and cut out.
Miguel glanced to his wife. Her features were wrought with fret.
Because the sides of the craft were not wide enough for the doors to open, Miguel had to climb out the driver’s window. He inched to the back of the boat along a slim ledge. He had been told the motor was brand new, an assertion he stupidly accepted as fact. What a fool, Miguel la bufón. They were adrift, the weather was poised to turn ominous, and the waves grew by the hour. This was the last thing the physician wanted to happen.
Until the engine caught fire.
Thick black smoke billowed from the engine block. “Maldígala,” he cursed under his breath. From the car his family watched. He didn’t want the others to pick up on his growing anxiety. The outboard’s whirling rotorblades ground to a halt. He grabbed the engine to pull it from the water and withdrew his hand. It was too hot to touch. Miguel took off his sweat-stained camisa and used it to wrest away the motor. The bulkiness proved too heavy, searing and unwieldy. It slipped from the doctor’s grip and crashed onto the deck.
With smoke rising to the clouds, one of the blades chipped off and gouged the aluminum hull. Saltwater poured through the gash. “Ayúdeme,” he yelled: Help me. Miguel dropped to his knees and began bailing out water with his cupped hands. It was a losing battle.
In spite of his advanced age, Juan was quite agile. He was the first out of the car to aid his son-in-law. The old man took over as Miguel manhandled the engine. By now it was shot; there was no way to fix it. Even if they figured out what was broken, they had no tools available to repair the issue. The outboard was a lost cause.
It had stopped smoldering by the time Miguel positioned it to the gunwale. With a great heave, he cast it into the Atlantic. It sank into oblivion and took the Espinoza’s aspirations with it.
Juan’s hand touched the doctor’s shoulder. Miguel fought back tears when the old man handed him a flare gun. They’d packed it in case of emergency, a situation exactly like this. Miguel took it, heart laden with disappointment. Using it signified a failed mission. He didn’t want his family to see him defeated, as broken as the outboard.
The doctor took aim at the heavens. “Uno. Dos. Tres.” He fired the gun directly overhead, a flare trailing high into the clouds. It left a streak of smoke behind and burned almost two hundred meters straight up. He prayed someone saw the distress signal soon, or else rescuers would discover them treading water. If they were found at all.
* * * * *
Chad McKenzie and Mikey Wilbanks were eight miles offshore when they spotted a flare shoot across the sky. Both were First Class Privates in the United States Coast Guard. Mikey was the older of the pair by a few years, both of them in their twenties. He’d joined the service at age eighteen and wanted to make a career out of it. Chad had been assigned to the Marathon Key post right out of specialized training. He was the model cadet and had been appointed to the Keys ahead
of several others because of his exemplary linguistic skills.
Chad radioed to base. “McKenzie here. We have a distress signal approximately ten miles out. Wilbanks and I are going to investigate. We’ll report back, over.”
Their orders came immediately. “Roger that. Finish your sweep and head home. Over and out.”
“Over and out.”
“Whaddya think it is?” Mikey asked. Chad steered the eighty-seven-foot Coastal Patrol Boat on a south-by-southwest route, the distinct craft recognizable by the diagonal orange band painted on its hull.
“Probably yachters who got in over their heads. Or refugees.”
“Let’s go rescue some wetbacks.”
Chad rolled his eyes. “Those are Mexicans,” he said. “If you’re gonna be racist, have the decency to use the proper slur.”
Waters off southern Florida had the highest criminal activity in the country, from illegal immigration to drug smuggling mostly. Narco-trafficking, aliens and terrorists were the top three priorities of the Coast Guard. The USCG was a legitimate branch of the Armed Forces yet caught the most flak from other military personnel.
Going a steady thirty knots toward the smoke trail, they arrived on scene within ten minutes. They were greeted by the Espinozas, four persons standing on the roof of a half-submerged car that was sinking by the moment. The immigrants’ faces expressed overwhelming sadness. They prayed for help from anyone but the Coast Guard, the very people who would turn them away.