Doctor Who_ Deep Blue - Mark Morris [2]
Pete held his hand up in front of his face, his mouth wide open, and the furious roar died in his throat like a wave spending its strength on the shore. For a moment the sea was reflected, a dense grey, in his wide, astonished eyes before they glazed over, his eyelids flickering.
„Catch him, lads, he‟s going down,‟ Malcolm shouted, breaking the stunned silence.
Perhaps it was his skipper‟s words that revived Pete, perhaps just sheer bloody-mindedness. For even as his fellow crew members moved forward, stretching out their arms to keep him upright, giving the spiny, malformed cod a wide berth as they did so, Pete roared like a battle-charged warrior and thundered towards the fish still some ten yards away.
Terry wasn‟t sure what his uncle planned to do - perhaps mash the fish to pulp beneath his boots and retrieve his bitten-off fingers from its gullet. But whatever his intentions, Pete never got the chance to realise them.
The lumps that had been moving sluggishly beneath the cod‟s scaly skin suddenly seemed to coalesce into a single bulbous mass at the apex of its spine. The cod opened its blood-smeared mouth and let loose a shrill and raucous cry, almost like the caw of a crow, which made Terry‟s skin crawl.
Almost simultaneously the fishy lump swelled and the skin ripped open from the pressure like cheap cloth. Barry let out a squeal of horror and Terry felt a surge of fear as several long, spiny, crablike legs quickly unfurled from the rent in the creature‟s back.
Pete might still have caught and crushed the thing beneath his size twelve boots if he had not stumbled to a faltering halt at the sight. The newly hatched legs stretched out, four on each side, clicking like knitting needles as they found the deck. Gaining strength, they flexed, grotesquely lifting the body a few inches upwards. They quivered for a moment, then, moving with astonishing speed, scuttled the creature away towards the prow of the boat.
„Hey!‟ Pete yelled, as if to a purse-snatcher, and gave chase once more. It was too late. The mutant halted a few feet from the prow, bent its spiny legs in a crouch, and sprang over the side. It hit the grey water with a splash and was gone.
For a few moments nobody moved. They stared at the patch of churning, foamy water that briefly marked the creature‟s passing, transfixed with mouths agape and eyes wide, until the sea smoothed itself over as if to deny the existence of such a monstrosity. His voice clotted with awe and dread, Malcolm said slowly, „Twenty-eight years on the sea, and I‟ve never seen anything -‟
Pete interrupted him with a rattling groan. Then he keeled over face-first, crashing to the drenched, slippery deck like a felled oak.
Terry realised with a guilty start that for the past moments he had forgotten about the terrible damage to his uncle‟s hand. For the first time he saw the blood pooled and spattered around Pete‟s prone body. There was an alarming amount of it, and the wound was still pouring with blood.
Terry rushed forward, skidding to his knees beside his uncle at the same time as John Baycock and Joe Tye. A few moments later they were joined by Malcolm, who thrust the first aid box from the wheel house into his son‟s hands. Only Barry hung back, his face ashen.
Terry had to will his hands to stop trembling in order to open the box. He took out a bottle of antiseptic, oily with fingerprints from previous mishaps, and a roll of bandage in a cellophane sheath. He tore the sheath open with his teeth and began to tug at the bandage inside, dismayed to see his own grubby fingerprints instantly soiling the pristine white gauze. He was about to pour some of the antiseptic on to the bandage when Joe Tye muttered, „What‟s that stuff on his hand?‟
For a guilty moment Terry thought Joe was accusing him of being unclean, but then realised