There was vomit everywhere: on the floor, on the mahogany steering wheel, on the dark dials and displays that had been lifeless for the past three days. Early on New Year"s Day, they had left Honolulu to celebrate the New Year at sea, and sail to San Francisco. A day later, a terrible storm knocked out the ship"s radar, radio, engines, everything that required electricity.

They spent the next two days drifting with the current and the wind. No propulsion meant that they were tossed around as the hull tilted crazily every which way, hit by the waves. The only mast available was the mast carrying the electronic gear: a radar dish and several antennas. They had rigged a toy sail using their biggest tablecloth, but it didn"t help much.

Rafi Susanto couldn"t ever remember being so helpless. He kept shouting at everyone. He shouted at his eight Filipino crewmen. He shouted at the three luxury wh.o.r.es aboard the yacht. He even shouted at his guest, and his guest was not someone to shout at in anger.

Gabriel Cruz was a billionaire. He was worth much more than Susanto, who had only recently cracked the half a billion barrier. Cruz was easily worth four times more. His business empire stretched all around the world.

He definitely wasn"t someone to be shouted at by anyone, even a multimillionaire.

What was more, Susanto had an important reason to be especially nice to Cruz. He had invited Cruz for a cruise aboard his yacht in order to make a deal. It was a deal that would be profitable for Cruz, but it would be even more profitable for Susanto.

So he lured the older man into taking a cruise on the Golden Dawn from Honolulu to San Francisco. He had heard that Cruz was getting very tired of his third wife, and was seriously considering exchanging her for a fourth.

He"d also heard that Cruz was getting seriously tired of his seven children, two of which were adults already. But they continued to shamelessly sponge on the billionaire, demanding atonement for the abandonment they had suffered when they were younger. He had been an absent father! It was only fair that he gave them some of the millions he had made while he was busy neglecting them.

Gabriel Cruz, the man who crushed other men as if they were mosquitoes, was incapable of saying no to his children. Despite his wealth, he felt that they were the only things in the whole universe that were truly his. Money came and went; blood endured.

He had been more than happy to accept Susanto"s invitation. Of course he knew that business would be involved. But he was greatly looking forward to the pleasure aspect of the cruise. He had secretly booked the best wh.o.r.e he could find for the entire month. Thus, he had ended up with two: the one he chose, and the one Susanto had chosen for him.

As for Susanto, he couldn"t be happier. Cruz could have brought a whole platoon of high-cla.s.s wh.o.r.es, and he would have gladly accommodated them all aboard his yacht. The wh.o.r.es didn"t count. What counted was that he had Cruz to himself for a full fortnight. Given all that time, Susanto was sure he"d convince Cruz to agree to his deal. It was as good as done.

He was about to start talking to Cruz about that deal when the storm struck. There hadn"t been a good opportunity to talk business ever since. And anyway, Susanto wasn"t sure this was the right time for business talks.

He had other things on his mind. Over the past fifty hours, he"d thought he was about to die at least a hundred times. The way Cruz looked, he"d had similar thoughts. Great minds thought alike.

"Rafi."

Susanto turned. Gabriel Cruz stood atop the short staircase that led to the bridge. His thinning hair had been carefully arranged to hide the bald spots as much as possible. He had shaved, and changed his clothes. He was wearing a light tan hand-knit V-neck sweater with a cable motif. Under the sweater, he wore a white shirt with a narrow collar that probably cost a hundred dollars per square inch.

Below both of the above, he wore tan chinos that definitely cost far more than the average suit. The brown leather moccasin loafers on his feet were decorated with string, to indicate they were really hotshot yachting shoes.

In short, Cruz was looking like a guy you could do business with. He wasn"t thinking about death any more, he was thinking about life. Susanto made a mental note to control himself, and refrain from shouting at Cruz even when close to losing his mind. He said:

"h.e.l.lo, Gabriel. Had any breakfast?"

"Yes. A steak tartare with a couple of shots of vodka. I can recommend it to you. There"s plenty of steak tartare. The chef says the meat will go bad soon."

"That sounds good. Your breakfast I mean."

"Yes, it went down well and it seems to be staying down. Can"t complain."

"Well I"ve got good news for you. Please come up here and join me.

Cruz stepped out onto the bridge and walked up to Susanto, who was standing next to the huge front windows. Susanto raised his hand and pointed.

"There," he said.

There was land in front of the ship. It was still several kilometers away, but it was land for sure. It seemed to be an island, though it could also be the tip of a peninsula.

"We"re moving really fast thanks to the current," Susanto told Cruz. "We"ll be there in half an hour at most. Here."

He took the strap of the binoculars off his neck and handed them to Cruz.

Cruz laughed.

"So our troubles are over?" he said.

"I think so. Now, if you"ll excuse me, I"ll have my breakfast and tell the others we"re about to make land."

Before he left the bridge, Susanto spoke quickly and quietly to one of the crewmen who had just finished making the bridge clean. The man nodded and took a big can of air freshener out of his pocket and started spraying it around.

Susanto went to the mess and had lots of steak tartare with three raw eggs and a quarter-liter carafe of vodka. The vodka wasn"t cold but it worked, worked very well indeed with the food. Then he had two cups of coffee and smoked a hand-rolled cigarette. The tobacco in the cigarette had been sprinkled very, very lightly with angel dust. Angel dust was basically pollen from marijuana flowers. It tasted like honey and blew the mind.

Rafi Susanto became all smiles, and very energetic. For the next twenty minutes or so, he ran around the ship telling everyone what to do without raising his voice once. Then he went to rejoin Cruz on the bridge.

The island was less than a kilometer away. Susanto had brought an extra pair of binoculars, and when he put them to his eyes he saw a dangerous-looking, gigantic grey cliff rising from the sea on his left, and a strip of sand indicating a beach directly in front of the ship. The current was carrying them straight towards the beach.

It appeared it was carrying lots of other stuff, too. The sea around the yacht was dotted with floating rubbish. He examined it through his binoculars. It was all plastic: containers of all sorts and sizes, bags, styrofoam trays and cups and plates. He counted two semi-deflated basketb.a.l.l.s.

As the ship neared the sh.o.r.e, it became apparent the beach was littered with trash. It wasn"t all sand, either: flat stones suggested a rocky landing. Susanto got very busy putting everyone in the emergency mode. He had to scream at the wh.o.r.es to make them put on life jackets.

They had just finished doing that when the ship"s hull struck the bottom for the first time. Susanto was jolted off his feet and had to clutch at the wall for support. The wh.o.r.es all fell over screaming expletives. There was a horrible grinding noise and they could feel the ship coming to a halt. But then it moved freely again.

Susanto shouted at the wh.o.r.es to come out on the deck and ran to the bridge. The pointed prow of the ship was no more than fifty meters from the sh.o.r.e. The crew had already taken the covers off the two lifeboats, and cracked open the containers with inflatable rafts. He felt proud of them, and decided he would give them all a bonus. After all this was over, of course.

Susanto felt Cruz put his hand on his shoulder.

"Look to ten o"clock," Cruz said.

Susanto swung his binoculars left. At first he thought Cruz had meant a group of coconut palms that rose from the bushy ridge behind the beach.

Then he saw the whitish, glowing cube.

It was standing right where the sand turned into gra.s.s. At first he thought it was some sort plastic decoration that had been deposited on the sh.o.r.e along with other garbage. But it glowed, there was no mistaking it. Radioactive plastic?

A few minutes later, the ship grounded for good amidst thumps and groans and screeches from the hull. Susanto and Cruz were the first to go ash.o.r.e in a lifeboat manned by five crewmen carrying a.s.sault rifles. Susanto always carried a small personal a.r.s.enal aboard his ship in case a compet.i.tor turned violent.

There was nothing and no one to shoot at on the beach. There was nothing but plastic garbage, and the glowing cube.

Susanto issued appropriate orders to his men. Three of them went back to the ship in the boat, while two stayed on the beach, guns at the ready. While the boat went back and forth ferrying people and supplies, Susanto and Cruz examined the cube.

They were both very bright men, thinking men. They a.s.similated new information fast, even when it bordered on the incredible. They were quick to spot a potential profit, too.

They sent out a couple of teams of sailors armed with a.s.sault rifles to scout out their surroundings. Then they both engrossed themselves in the scrolls while the wh.o.r.es b.i.t.c.hed among themselves about their new dreary situation.

The wh.o.r.es kept their voices low, but not because they didn"t want to disturb the reading men. They discussed the size of the extra bonus each of them should get because of all the hardship and danger. They hadn"t signed up for anything like that!

They had graciously agreed to be paid lots of money to f.u.c.k and get high and sunbathe and eat wonderful food and drink wonderful booze. There was no mention of being shipwrecked on what appeared to be, at first glance, an uninhabited island.

The scout teams returned just before nightfall, and right on time for dinner. It had actually been prepared in the galley of the grounded ship and transported ash.o.r.e. It was a very good meal as beach meals go, and the atmosphere improved. Even the wh.o.r.es began to smile. The starlit sky, the food, the booze made them feel that perhaps all this was romantic. Uncomfortable and definitely deserving a special bonus, but also romantic.

But the two tyc.o.o.ns did not have any romance on their minds. They had already agreed on a plan of action. Within minutes, two crewmen clutching their guns were implanted with timon. When they confirmed there was no immediate danger in the New World, they were made to lie down on the silvery mats.

The two tyc.o.o.ns had already agreed that just one of them would implant and replicate himself in the New World. After a lot of delicate verbal maneuvering, it became clear both of them preferred to stay behind, unimplanted and firmly grounded in reality.

They decided to draw for it, twice. The first draw would decide who would hold the hidden pebble while the other man chose a hand. The all-important second draw would decide who would go, and who would stay. Choosing the empty hand meant staying put.

Cruz got to hold the pebble: a minor but nevertheless important psychological advantage. Susanto had to lick his lips twice before pointing to one of the hands.

It was empty.

Cruz put a brave face on while giving himself an implant: he placed it in his temple. He became quite confident after a minute or so. His second self was standing on a sandy sh.o.r.e strewn with rocks. The two crewmen were nearby.

Cruz lay down on the hiber bed and was asleep before Susanto had a chance to ask him a couple more questions.

The first sensation Gabriel Cruz felt upon arriving in the New World was a sensation of great peace. The stars lit up the sea with a thousand winking lights. The air was warm and balmy. Everything somehow seemed bigger. The vegetation lining the beach definitely appeared more lush. It was difficult to tell exactly in the dark.

Then Cruz became aware that he was completely naked. He immediately felt shame. He was nearly fifty years old and had spent a quite a few of them eating, and even more sitting on his a.s.s in a soft chair. It showed.

He discreetly obscured his genitals with his hand and turned away from the two crewmen, who were naked as well. They didn"t mind, they were both very well built and were cheerfully chattering about how beautiful everything was. This proved they weren"t looking at him, and Cruz felt relieved.

Suddenly he heard loud splashing and a sad, trumpeting noise, almost like an elephant in distress.

He turned to look at the sea and saw an enormous snake stand up in the water. Its head was at least two meters above the surface of the sea.The water around it gurgled loudly as it moved towards the beach. It seemed to be aiming for a spot some distance away, but Cruz didn"t take any chances.

The two crewmen did not take any chances, either. They ran into the vegetation lining the beach even before he did. It made Cruz cross, they should have waited and watched his back while he was running to safety.

The three of them crouched down in the bushes and looked at the beach.

The snake"s head was higher and higher as it got closer to the sh.o.r.e. Suddenly a huge hump appeared behind it, splashing water. It rose as well until it became apparent it belonged to the snake.

But the body that emerged from the water not a hundred meters from their hiding spot wasn"t the body of a snake.

It had a small, oblong head on a very long, very pliable neck. The neck ran into a powerful squat torso that ended with a thick tail. It moved clumsily on big thick flippers, with the tail helping and the head swaying on the long neck with each move.

Suddenly it became completely still, pointing along the sh.o.r.e. The huge body froze with the end of the tail still submerged in the water.

It must have felt what Cruz and his companions felt: a tremor running through the ground under their feet. It had a beat to it, a walking beat.

Something very heavy, something very big was coming at them.

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