Michael Bray - Feed

‘You do that,’ Nash said, staring out into the dark. ‘You get your rest and save your energy.’

Tyler ignored him, and despite what he said, he knew that sleep would not come easily that night. On the opposite side of the rock, Liam lay with his eyes open, having listened to everything that had been said. He stared out to sea and imagined the waves were whispering to him and telling him what he had to do.

The hunger and thirst woke Tyler before dawn. His body felt as if it had shrivelled, and he was wasting away hour by hour. To his surprise, when he woke, Liam was in the water. He was standing there up to his waist. Tyler could see ghostly shadows where his ribs were showing through his skin. Tyler sat beside Nash. ‘What is he doing?’

‘Fishing. He’s had this crazy idea he saw on a film once to just stand there and be still until a fish comes close then he says he’ll snatch it out of the water.’

Tyler glanced at Nash then watched Liam. ‘Is that possible? It seems unlikely.’

‘I told him that already. He won’t listen to me. He does crazy stuff like this when he’s off his meds.’

‘He’ll burn out there in this heat.’

‘He’s stubborn. Best to let him do it. I’m too tired to argue with him again. Like I said, he won’t be all that rational now.’

It was the first time Tyler had realised how old and tired Nash looked. He seemed to have aged impossibly in a short space of time. He decided it was as good a time as any to try to talk to him about what happened during the dive without Liam’s short fuse threatening to explode at any given moment. ‘I want to talk to you about the dive,’ he said, unsure how things would play out. To his surprise, Nash only sighed and wiped the sweat from his brow.

‘My throat is so dry I don’t know how much talking I have in me. Still, I suppose I owe you an explanation. After all, you were nothing to do with this. Wrong place wrong time.’

The nonchalant way he said it made Tyler angry, but he wanted answers and pushed his frustration aside. He waited, staring at his long, skinny shadow on the rocks in front of him.

‘You have to understand,’ Nash said, looking straight out to sea, his scars visible in horrific clarity. ‘That thing ruined my life. I wish it had killed me.’

‘No, you don’t. You wouldn’t have fought on for all these years dealing with those injuries if you thought that.’

‘It’s because of the way I look that I wish I was dead. You don’t get it. You weren’t there. It’s bad enough dealing with how I look. It’s the memories. People I knew, my brothers who were taken by that fucking thing. It savaged them. Every time I see this… mess that’s left of me, it reminds me of them. It’s like an open wound that can never heal. In some ways, I’ve never been away from the day I first saw it.

‘Why now? Why wait until now to get your revenge if that’s what this was all about?’

‘Because I wasn’t sure.’ Nash glanced at Tyler then immediately looked away. ‘Not until I heard about that gold being found. I suspected, of course, I did. Why do you think I chose to come and live out here? I was waiting for a chance to get my revenge. I just needed help.’

‘And you chose me,’ Tyler said.

Nash shook his head. ‘Don’t make it sound bad. You wanted the gold, I get that. Nobody forced you to do this. We gave you the opportunity.’

‘No. You can’t try to sell that story, Nash. You sold this as a simple dive to get some gold.’

‘I told you the stories. The legend. I told you what was out here. Just because you chose not to believe it, that’s not my fault.’

‘Fine, that I’ll give you. Using me as bait, that’s on you, though. You can’t talk your way out of that.’

‘No, no I can’t.’

They fell silent and watched Liam standing motionless in the water.

‘For what it’s worth, I’m sorry. Like I said, this wasn’t how it was supposed to be. The drone was supposed to detonate when he bit into it and kill him. I never imagined… Well, you know.’

‘Yeah, I know,’ Tyler said, leaning his head back on the rocks and wishing for water. He didn’t want booze anymore, though. That was one relief. It seemed a slow agonising death was a fantastic cure for near alcoholism.

Twenty feet away, Liam stood in the shallows and stared at the shimmering ocean. He had detached himself from the world. The fear, the hunger. The thirst. All of it now felt as if it belonged to somebody else. The water lapped against his abdomen, the sounds of the water like voices telling him what he needed to do. He wasn’t religious by any mean, but now was silently praying to the god he hoped existed. Not only for a way out but also for the strength to do what he knew was necessary. The brutal, inhuman things he would be forced to undertake to ensure he lived. He had asked his questions and was still waiting for an answer yet to arrive. He was starting to consider that his lack of answer was enough of an answer to his query when something touched his cheek. He blinked and turned his eyes to the sky. This time, there was no mistake.

Rain.

Water.

The strength he had asked for and also the go ahead with the barbaric and brutal things he was going to have to do. The rain started to fall faster, pattering the ocean around him. He opened his mouth and let it land on his parched tongue.

Water. The biggest problem, the biggest drain on his strength was now given to him. As he heard his father and Tyler cheer and whoop as the rain fell, he didn’t smile or change his expression. The strength to do his job was now on its way. He just needed to find the will to do it.

The rain was ferocious, driven from the heavens with a fury unlike anything any of them had ever seen. They whooped and cheered, revelling in the unexpected lifeline. Tyler had made the inflatable into a container to collect the precious water and was holding it in place to stop it blowing off the rock. Nash and Liam had their faces turned to the sky, mouths open as they took in the precious life-giving water. Such a simple thing as rainfall had given renewed hope and energy after the punishment of the previous days. With the joy of receiving the precious water came also fear, as the tiny rock they were stranded on was pounded by waves churned up by the storm. They watched the storm rage above them, sky alive with lightning, the power of nature in evidence all around them it was both exhilarating and terrifying at the same time.

Later, when the storm passed, they sat in contemplation.

‘That should buy us a few days,’ Nash said, looking from Liam to Tyler. ‘Now all we need is for it to rain food and we’ll be set.’

‘I was actually thinking about that,’ Liam said, shuffling closer to the others.

‘You’ve had an idea?’ Tyler said.

‘Not an idea as such, a suggestion.’

‘Go on.’

He glanced out to the black ocean, then at the others, his face milky in the moonlight. ‘I was thinking about you, Dad; more specifically, your leg. You know, how infected it is.’

‘Yeah, it’s not looking too good, is it?’ Nash said, staring at the discoloured appendage.

‘You need help, at a hospital, even then I think we all know the odds are you’ll lose it. That kind of infection isn’t easy to come back from.’

‘You’re killing my good mood here, son.’

Liam shifted position again, and now addressed Tyler directly. It was the first time he had seemed civil and without the chip on his shoulder.

‘We could help him. Cut it off, the leg. Stop the infection from spreading. If we catch it quickly, we might be able to save it above the knee.’

‘Are you insane? That’s not an option. It’s not possible. Tell him, Nash.’