• • •
Big Time had already fallen half a dozen times before reaching the service ladder that marked the beginning of the pipe’s descent into the Gulf. He could feel the fumes coating the inside of his lungs as he tried to breathe, but he just kept moving. The temperature had dropped significantly, but it didn’t bother him too much. Part of him was just happy to be out of the rain.
The service ladder was disgusting, so sticky with crude that Big Time wondered if anyone had actually used it since it went into operation. He figured if they had, they wouldn’t have without heavy gloves, a jumpsuit, and a ventilator, but he didn’t have that luxury.
That’s when he realized that the sounds he’d been hearing of the sludge oozing down the sides of the pipe towards him had ceased. He stopped, flicked on Scott’s lighter, but couldn’t see a thing. He had no idea if had actually stopped or not.
No, he found himself thinking. No, come on. Follow me down. Follow me to Hell…
• • •
Zakiyah raced down the ladder as fast as she could and quickly pulled Tony’s head out of the water.
“C’mon, kid,” she said. “Not this way. Not after all we’ve been through.”
Tony lazily opened his eyes but barely seemed to register Zakiyah’s presence. She saw that one of his pupils was dilated far more than the other, which indicated a concussion. His head was bleeding from where it struck the pallet but wasn’t too bad. She checked the rest of him over and it seemed like the water had cushioned his fall just a little.
The sludge worm had peeled itself off the pipe and now snaked through the water towards Zakiyah and Tony. The rest of the collective had been in lockstep, pouring itself into the pipe, but had now frozen in place as this one tendril investigated this possible prey.
“Oh, dammit,” Zakiyah cursed. “Don’t tell me this is gonna fuck all this up.”
She couldn’t get Tony back up the ladder to the top of the pipe, but there was a work shed nearby. Pallets were stacked alongside it, and she thought she could drag him up to its steel roof. It just be enough to get him out of harm’s way.
“I’m going to need your help, Tony,” Zakiyah whispered. “You hear me?”
Tony nodded a little. Zakiyah got him to his feet and hurried him over to the pallets. The sludge worm was only a few feet away now but was moving slowly. Zakiyah was surprised, as throughout the day, she’d watched attacks uniform in their viciousness. Like watching a shark seize its prey. This was much slower. A python noiselessly gliding down a tree limb.
But then, something changed.
The sludge worm was yanked backwards as the collective mass was drawn back into the large tank. The steel around the hole bowed in to allow even more of the sludge to be yanked in, like meat pulled through a grinder.
Mama! RUN! I’m holding it back. Run!
At the same time as Zakiyah heard her daughter’s voice, the collective lunged backwards, pulling itself out of the tank. She expected a tendril to come after her and Tony, but it stayed away. Quickly, she carried the teen up the pallets and placed him on the roof.
Mama, hurry! I can’t hold onto it much longer. Too much is getting away from me. RUN! Get back in the boat.
But Zakiyah knew this wasn’t the answer. Mia’s concentration had been shattered and she might not know it, but the collective was getting away. Tony was lying down, passed out again. Zakiyah wondered if he might be dying but didn’t think so. Above in the darkening sky, the clouds had parted enough so that she could see stars. She couldn’t believe it, but without the lights of any city, they were as clear as she’d ever seen them.
Good-bye, Mia. I love you.
As the sludge collective continued its exodus, Zakiyah came down off the roof and stepped back into the floodwaters. Walking quickly, she approached the moving sludge and touched it with her hand. It burned like fire. The sludge rapidly traveled up her arm, burned off her clothes, and within seconds had engulfed her completely.
• • •
Mia screamed and screamed and screamed. She let everything go. She could feel the collective oozing towards a new goal and out of the cold but didn’t care. She wanted her Mama. She searched through the voices both near and far but couldn’t find her.
MAMA! She cried again. Where are you?! MAMA! Why did you do that?!
In the pitch black, Big Time could hear Mia’s cries in his mind as easily as if she was whispering into his ear. He knew what must’ve happened on the outside, and he shuddered to think what this meant for Tony.
But as the sludge collective continue to move away, he tightened his grip on the ladder and turned his head towards the retreating sound.
“Mia, listen to my voice. Follow me down.”
Big Time waited but heard nothing in response. Mia must be hurting, but this was the final act. They had to keep going. There was nothing to do but that. He’d lost too much. He thought about his wife, his mother. His sons. He thought about Muhammad and Elmer and Beverly. Finally, he thought about Scott.
Unless they burned this thing, they’d all be trapped within it forever. He’d never see them again, and it’d be his fault. He hesitated but then began to sing the only song he could think of:
“One night when the moon had illumined the sky,
When first I took a notion to marry,
I put on my hat and away I did hie.
You might think I was in a hurry.
Till I came to a spot where I often had been,
My heart gave a leap when my darling was seen.
I opened the door and I bid her good night and I said,
Will you come over the mountain?”
He barely knew the lyrics. It was an old,
