Lust Island
Darren G. Burton
Published by Darren G. Burton at Smashwords
Copyright © 2010 Darren G. Burton
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
The Author asserts the moral right to
be identified as the author of this work
Cover Design: Darren G. Burton
1
Tim Donnelly had been sailing boats since he was seven years old. Now at twenty-eight he had more than two decades experience. For the past few days he’d been making the trek west from Samoa to the Solomon Islands, where he planned to stay for a few days before embarking on a voyage to Indonesia, and then on to Thailand.
It was late afternoon and the weather threatened to turn from brilliant sunshine and a light breeze, to dark and stormy. An electrical storm had built to the south and was advancing rapidly toward him. To the north there was a smudge of green on the horizon and Tim was tacking toward that island, hoping to find calm waters and ride out the storm.
The only problem was the wind was blowing in the wrong direction. He was trying to fight his way against that wind and choppy seas in his thirty foot sailing sloop. The little boat bounced around, up and down, side to side, like some bizarre theme park joyride. Tim constantly had to work the wheel left, then right to tack into the wind and make some headway.
He glanced behind him. Lightning licked across the black clouds. In the distance he heard a low rumble of thunder. Pretty soon, he knew from experience, the wind would switch around and blow him towards the island. Chances were the storm would catch him before he made it to relative safety, though.
As the water surface got rougher, Tim found himself really having to wrestle with the wheel to maintain course. His forearms and biceps ached from the effort, lactic acid build up threatening to cramp his muscles and render them somewhat ineffective.
The sea went dark as the late afternoon sun was swallowed by the pursuing cloud bank. Momentarily the wind swung around to the south, then it unpredictably switched back to the north again.
“Fuck!” he cursed the wind while continuing to fight the obstinate wheel. “Swing round. Blow from the south, you bitch.”
The wind must have listened because it swung round to the west, then south-west. Tim held his breath, half expecting it to switch back to the north. When it held firm from the south-west, blowing him in the general direction of the island, he exhaled a heavy sigh of relief. The going was much easier now. The small yacht made good headway with the breeze behind it, the bow slicing a ragged path through the chop.
Thunder growled behind him as Tim steered his craft ever closer to the land mass. It was more than a green smudge on the horizon now. The closer he got the more he could make out the shapes of palm trees lining the beach. Just how big the island was, he couldn’t tell at this distance.
Light was fading rapidly now. Night would come early. With the wind whipping at his brown hair, Tim glanced behind him in time to see jagged lightning streak across the sky. Thunder cracked vocally. He felt the wheel shudder under his hands. The clouds were greenish-black and undulating. The storm had gathered force, feeding off the moisture of the sea, and was quickly eating up the distance between itself and the boat.
Tim realized then with grim certainty that he wasn’t going to make the island in time. He may be forced to trim the sails and ride it out on the open water.
After another twenty minutes of battling through increasing swells and wind gusts of fifty knots, Tim was forced to haul in the sails and lash them off. The island was tantalizingly close now, maybe only eight hundred metres away, from what he could see of it in the increasing gloom. An eerie twilight had settled over the sea, regularly lit up by brilliant flashes of lightning.
The next explosion of thunder made him jump it was that loud. When he finished tying off the mainsail and looked south, he shuddered.
The black clouds looked like they were boiling. They swirled and undulated and changed shape constantly. Sheet lightning lit up the cloud bank, and in that brief illumination Tim could still see a hue of green in there. He knew what that meant.
Within minutes the first fat drops of rain splattered the deck of the yacht. Wind blew rain into his face, stinging like lashes from a tiny whip. Tim wiped water out of his eyes as he watched the storm approach, then he went below deck.
He stowed anything loose in cupboards and locked them. From a cabinet near the head he retrieved a bright orange life jacket and slipped into it, strapping it securely to his torso. For a few minutes he debated whether he should stay below deck and ride it out, or take his chances up above where he could see what’s going on and perhaps have a chance to counteract a catastrophe. His main concern up on deck was the lightning, but he climbed back up the stairs anyway.
The wind nearly blew him off his feet when he emerged from the hatch. Once again rain stung his face and arms. A bolt of savage lightning shot down from the sky and hit the ocean surface only five hundred metres away. There was a tremendous bang! and he could literally hear the water boiling where it struck.
“Holy fuck,” Tim whispered into the gloom.
It was almost full dark now. He spun around and tried to make out the island in the darkness. In the distance he could just see it. It was hard to determine whether he was closer to it now, or further away.
A moment later, true to the form of a greenish-colored thundercloud, heavy stones of hail started pelting from the sky.
Tim literally jumped down the hatch to avoid copping a blasting from nature’s fury. He slammed the hatch door shut.
The hail and rain hammered the deck above that hard, it sounded like a truck was dumping piles of gravel onto the boat. The noise was deafening, almost disorientating. A wave hit the boat broadside. The yacht tilted over violently and Tim went crashing into a cupboard, the corner of the wood colliding with his temple. He slumped to the floor, dazed. The cabin lights dimmed, flickered a few times, then went out. All power was gone.
Crawling around on the floor in almost total darkness as the boat was tossed about on an angry sea, Tim tried to find a firm handhold so he could drag himself to his feet. His fingers brushed a door handle. He grabbed it and pulled himself up into a squatting position. The boat lurched again under the onslaught of another brutal wave. Still squatting, he held onto the handle and waited for the yacht to steady herself. When it had he stood upright and made his way over to the stairs that led up to the hatch. Right there was where he planned to stay; just in case he needed a quick exit.
The rain and hail continued to hammer the boat. Constant thunder crashed overhead. Brilliant flashes of lightning lit up the windows. The wind howled outside, whistling through the tiniest gaps in could find in the boat’s structure.
Arm wrapped around the handrail, locked by gripping the elbow with his other hand, Tim held on tight as the little yacht pitched and yawed on the unsteady sea. He sat on the second step from the bottom, trying to keep his centre of gravity low. Blood trickled from a small gash on the temple he’d received when he’d collided with the cupboard. His right knee hurt as well, having bashed it into something in the turmoil without realizing it.
Even though the hatch door had a rubber seal around it, water dripped in through the edges and landed on his head. The intense wind, combined with the battering of rain, hail and sea water was forcing moisture into the cabin.
How long will this storm last? he wondered. Was it forcing him closer to the island? Was it causing damage to his boat?
So far he hadn’t heard any telltale noises to indicate anything had been damaged. No raucous sound of a tearing sail. No snapping of wood or breaking ropes. No bangs or clatters or splintering. He hoped it stayed that way.
But it didn’t. A few moments later Tim’s world was turned upside down. Literally.
He sensed the wind gust a moment before it actually hit. It was as if all the air got sucked out of the boat’s cabin. The small craft tilted to starboard seconds before being thrashed violently to port by a gale force wind.
It was a scary sound, like being in the middle of a hurricane. The wind roared across the ocean. Torrential rain and hail still bombarded the vessel as the wind flattened the boat on its port side. Glass shattered in the cabin. Tim’s grip on the railing was torn loose. He was catapulted from the stairs and into the wall. Next thing he knew he was lying flat on that wall as his yacht remained on its side.
His head pounding from yet another blow, Tim could hear the waves crashing against the hull. There was another sound now, a gurgling noise, barely audible above the maelstrom.
Sea water was pouring into the cabin.
The yacht was sinking.
Just when he was about to make a dash for the hatch and get outside before it went under, the wind ripped across the ocean again, coinciding with the pounding of a tremendous wave against the hull. Tim’s head took a third blow on the cabin ceiling as the yacht was flipped upside down.
Water surged into the cabin through broken portal windows. She was filling up fast. Tim was trying to get his bearings in the blackness, totally disoriented from the head knocks and the boat being capsized.
He crawled along the ceiling which was now the floor, already thigh deep in seawater, searching blindly for the stairs and the way out. If he couldn’t get out that hatch he would drown. It was that simple.
As the waves, wind and rain continued to wage war on the yacht, thunder growling angrily as if to emphasize the storm’s intentions, Tim’s hand found wood. He felt it. It was a step. He’d found the staircase.
Water kept gushing into the cabin through the broken windows. It was thigh deep now. Tim ducked his head under and felt for the latch on the hatch. He found that the lifejacket he was wearing was making the task somewhat difficult. Too much buoyancy. He kept popping up to the surface. It was then that he wished he’d spent a bit extra getting the inflatable models.
After unsnapping the buckles, Tim slipped it off his shoulders and let it fall off his back. He wasted no time diving back underwater and attacking the hatch. Finding the latch he undid it and pushed on the little door. The water pressure outside made it hard to budge. He came up for air, then ducked under again. This time he planted his feet as best he could on the stairs and, floating upside down, pushed against the hatch with every ounce of strength he had.
It moved an inch, then another. One more thrust and the door slowly swung open. The trapped air in the cabin prevented water rushing in through the open hatchway.
Underwater he couldn’t see a thing. Everything was reliant on feel. After checking that the hatch remained open, he came up for more air and searched around the cabin in the dark for his life jacket. His hand touched it floating a few feet away. He grabbed it and forced it underwater, then planted his feet against the steps again and propelled himself downward.