FAR OFF THE beaten tourist track, 1,125 kilometers southeast of Japan, Marcus Island lies in pristine isolation. A coral atoll tucked away without island neighbors, its shores are formed in an almost perfect triangle, each measuring approximately one and a half kilometers in length.
Except for brief notoriety while being bombed by American naval forces during World War II, few people had ever heard of Marcus Island until a Japanese developer just happened to stumble upon its desolate beaches. He visualized its potential as a select destination for winter-weary Japanese and promptly constructed a luxury resort.
Designed in a contemporary Polynesian style, the villagelike atmosphere included a championship golf course, a casino, three restaurants with cocktail lounges and dance floors, a theater, a vast lotus-shaped swimming pool, and six tennis courts. The sprawling complex, along with the golf course and the airfield, covered the entire island.
When the resort was completed and fully staffed, the developer flew in an army of travel writers, who soaked up the free material comforts and returned home to report. The resort immediately proved popular with adventurous tourists who collect exotic and faraway locations. But instead of an influx of Japanese, the reservations flowed in from other areas of the Pacific rim, and soon the island’s satiny milk-white sands were littered with Australians, New Zealanders, Taiwanese, and Koreans.
The resort island also quickly became a playground for romance and a mecca for honeymooners, who indulged in the many sporting activities or simply lolled around and made love in their village bungalows scattered among the palm trees.
Brian Foster from Brisbane came out of the ice-blue water inside the outer reef and walked across the beach toward his bride, Shelly, who was dozing in a lounge chair. The fine sand felt hot against his naked feet, and the late afternoon sun glistened on the water drops streaming from his body. As he toweled away the dampness, he glanced back over the water.
A Korean couple, Kim and Li Sang, who stayed in the next bungalow, were taking windsurfing lessons from one of the resort’s attentive guest hosts. Beyond them, Edward Cain from Wellington snorkeled on the reef while his new bride, Moira, floated on a mat in his wake.
Foster gave his wife a light kiss and patted her tummy. He lay in the sand beside her, put on a pair of sunglasses, and idly watched the people in the water.
The Sangs were having a difficult time mastering the technique and coordination it took to pilot a sailboard. They seemed to be spending an inordinate amount of time regaining the board and pulling up the sail after losing their balance and spilling in the water.
Foster turned his attention to the Cains, admiring Moira, who had rolled over on her back without falling off the mat. She was wearing a one-piece gold bathing suit that did very little to hide her lush contours.
Suddenly something caught Foster’s eye in the entrance of the channel that cut through the coral reef and led to the open ocean. Something was happening under the water. He was sure some thing or some sea creature was making a disturbance beneath the surface. He couldn’t see what it was, only that it appeared to be moving through the reef toward the lagoon.
“There’s something out there!” he snapped to his wife as he jumped to his feet. He ran to the water and began shouting and pointing toward the channel. His shouts and wild gesturing quickly drew others, and soon a crowd from the nearby pool and restaurants gathered on the beach.
The Sangs’ windsurfing instructor heard Foster, and his eyes followed the Australian’s pointing finger. He saw the approaching commotion in the water and swiftly herded the Sangs toward shore. Then he leaped on a sailboard and flew across the lagoon to warn the Cains, who were leisurely drifting into the path of the unknown apparition that was seemingly intent on invading the lagoon.
Edward Cain, with his wife floating close to him, swam blissfully unaware of any danger, viewing the sculptured garden of coral through his dive mask, enthralled by the vivid colors and the swarming schools of luminous fish.
He heard a humming sound in the distance but thought it was probably one of the guests bobbing over the water on a Jet Ski. Then, as if in a practiced precision movement, the surrounding fish abruptly darted away and vanished. Cain felt the breath of fear on his skin. The first thought that ran through his mind was that a shark had entered the lagoon.
Cain raised his head above the surface, searching for a telltale fin slicing the water. Thankfully, none was in sight. All he saw was a sailboard gliding in his direction and his wife dozing on the floating pad. He heard the shouting from the beach, turned, and spied the crowd of resort guests and employees frantically motioning toward the channel.
A rumbling vibration seemed to agitate the water, and he ducked his head back under the surface. What in God’s name was it? he wondered. Through the turquoise void, no more than fifty meters away, a great shapeless thing covered with green and brown slime crawled into view.
He grabbed a corner of his wife’s float and began madly paddling toward a rise in the coral where it broke through the surface of the water. She had no idea of what he was doing and hung on, thinking he was simply in a playful mood and wanted to roll her into the water.
The awesome thing ignored them and rolled past the reef into the lagoon and headed directly for the beach. Like some unspeakable monster out of a deep-sea horror movie, it slowly rose from the lagoon. The dumfounded crowd of resort guests parted as the immense thing, water pouring down its sides, the sand trembling beneath its weight, pulled up between two palm trees and stopped dead.
In total silence they all stood rooted and stared. They could see now that it was a huge mechanical vehicle that traveled on wide tracks, with a large, cigar-shaped housing on top. Two mechanical arms rose into the air like mutated antennae on a giant insect. Colonies of crustaceans clung to crevices of the exterior that was coated with hardened brown ooze and slime, shrouding any view through the normally transparent bow.
There was a soft clunk sound as a hatch on the roof was unsealed and thrown back.
A head with a shag of black hair and a beard slowly rose into view. The face was gaunt and thin, but the eyes that were sunken in dark hollows sparkled with green intensity. They gazed around the stunned audience and picked out a young man who was gripping a round tray in both hands.
Then the lips spread in a great flashing smile and the voice rasped hoarsely. “Am I right in thinking you’re a waiter?”
“Yes… sir.”
“Good thing too. After a diet of moldy bologna sandwiches and coffee for the past month, I’m ready to kill for a crab louis salad and a tequila on the rocks.”
Four hours later, his stomach supremely sated, Pitt was sleeping the most enjoyable and satisfying sleep he had ever known.
