Lost Signals (28 page)

The sound of shuffling feet and clicking silverware replaced Brionne’s voice. The effects were obviously meant to place the listener in a restaurant, but Albert decided not to be too hard on them because experience had taught him that finding free sound effects for something as specific as a bunch of seamen having lunch on a boat was really hard. Still, he made a note
 
: mention that, when an effect is not readily available, they can always go the extra mile and create it themselves.

After a few more seconds of eating and talking sounds, Tristan’s voice returned.

“The
Lady Rose
was full of merry for a while. To the surprise of the captain, who could’ve sworn the previous night that they were far from land, he and his 26-men crew were about 800 yards from an island. The tiny speck of land to their right was something they hadn’t expected to see, and they ignored they were looking at North Sentinel island. The crewmembers looked out at the beach and talked about exploring it after lunch. As they ate, someone looked out at the beach and spotted a few men coming out of the dense jungle that sprouted just beyond the shore. The men, all very dark-skinned, wore loincloths and carried spears and bows and arrows. At first, these men stuck to the tree-line and moved from shadow to shadow like fish moving from puddle to puddle.”

The writing was a little cheesy, but far better than Albert had expected. The students had managed to create an atmospheric piece of radio, and that was something no previous group had accomplished. A very loud voice said, “Look at that
 
!” It was obviously Ben. Albert made a note to also mention that, when you create your own sound effects, you need to worry about them fitting in with the rest of your audio in terms of clarity and volume. Brionne’s voice returned, loud enough to be heard over the sounds of men talking indistinctly.

“The mysterious men on the beach looked out at the crew and vice versa. Captain Willeford told his men to finish their meal. They would get a few boats in the water after lunch. By the time the crew was done eating, there were nearly 50 men standing on the sand, and they had brought out some canoes.”

Radio was a strange beast. An audio piece had a few seconds to hook a listener. Once that happened, it could only go two ways
 
: listeners either got bored of your crap really quickly or they became entranced by what you were telling them. This was clearly a case of the latter, and despite the few small problems with this piece, the group had pulled it off. As much as he hated to do so, Albert contemplated the possibility of having to congratulate these four students in front of everyone.

Brionne went on.

“This is where the story gets weird and where the official reports offer inaccurate versions of what went down. The only thing that really happened after that and was reported truthfully is the words uttered in Willeford’s second call. That morning, the captain made an early morning call just to check that everything was in order and that rescue was still on the way. After lunch, he made a second radio call, a distress call. The audio is not very crisp on the official recording, but you can tell that there’s urgency in his voice.”

Ben and Tanya had tried to fade the new clip in, but the age difference, not to mention the digitalization process, made it rough and grainy, like an old movie for the ears. Still, the quality of the audio was not as awful as it could’ve been. It had probably been cleared by an expert before these kids got hold of it.

“Wild men
 
! Wild men are coming
 
! I estimate more than 50. They are carrying various rudimentary weapons.” There was a pause. Willeford’s heavy breathing could still be heard. “They are dragging five rustic wooden boats onto the water. I’m worried that they will try to board us. If they do, we will proceed with caution, but will use deadly force if necessary.”

All sounds faded. Tristan’s voice came on and delivered a single line on top of that silence
 
: “The captain never made another call.” After two seconds, he spoke again. “At least that’s the official version. According to the report, the natives came, the crew fought them off, and the so-called wild men retreated. That night, everyone on board was rescued by a Japanese freighter and taken to safety before being flown back to New York because the
Lady Rose’s
hull had sustained too much damage. The truth, however, is very different. According to one Indian report and some rumors, the third distress call was never made public. The rescue crew was told to hurry. When they arrived, they found the crew slaughtered. Some limbs had been taken and most torsos had been opened from sternum to groin and everything but the intestines was missing. Not all bodies were accounted for. The government covered the whole thing, but Jessica Dahlby, a
New York Times
reporter who also did work for
National Geographic
on that area of the world, wrote a piece about a year later. In it, she explained how she’d been unable to find any crew member in the US despite having information about them and even previous addresses. What she did uncover was a copy of the last call. That is what you’re about to hear.”

Albert hated that last bit, but everything that preceded it had been great. It’d been a bit too gory for his taste, but it made for a truly compelling radio piece. The rough audio returned. Tanya and Ben had completely faded out the sound of the waves in order to allow Willeford’s voice to be heard as clearly as possible. They deserved props for that. The man’s voice was tinged with panic.

“Mayday
 
! Mayday
 
! The natives are on deck
 
! We tried to keep them down, but they’re chanting something and my men are dropping like flies.”

The sound of screaming and chanting could be heard under Willeford’s voice. The chant was strong, but the words were strange, spoken in a language Albert had never heard. He leaned forward and tilted his head toward the speaker a few feet above his desk. The door to the lab slammed closed. Everyone jumped. The massive metal door was part of the soundproofing system and weighed a ton. Slamming it shut was something Albert never would’ve imagined. Brionne and company were taking this joke too far.

“I think that’s enough. Please stop the audio for a second.”

Ben was frantically hitting the spacebar key, but the Audition file kept playing.

“The natives are surrounding my men. Only Sebastian Castellano and I were able to made it to the bridge. We . . . we are looking at the situation down at the bow deck. It’s . . . hard to describe. The natives have surrounded my . . . oh, God
 
! Did you see that
 
?”

Willeford went quiet. The sound of the chanting grew. Despite the poor quality of the audio, it sounded guttural and brutal.

“
Ehe
. . .
javasas-ggot . . . ”

Tommy’s scream made Albert jump again. He looked at the wimpy kid. He always sat at the back of the lab and tried unsuccessfully to hide his earbuds under his hoodie. Now he was standing up, his hands wrapped around his neck as if choking. Albert got up. Could he perform the Heimlich maneuver
 
? He knew the theory, but had never done it to anyone. He was about to run to Tommy when the kid’s feet left the ground. Every eye in the classroom nailed itself to Tommy.

“The . . . chanting keeps getting louder,” Willeford’s ghost screamed from every speaker in the room.

“Stop that thing
 
!” yelled Albert.

“I’m trying
 
! This is exactly what we were talking about, Mr. Gardner
 
!” said Ben.

Tommy’s body flew into the wall behind him and the impact of his head reverberated even over the cacophony of chanting and screaming.

“Ehe maytubi javasas-ggot igomoro
. . .
Ehe maytubi javasas-ggot igomoro . . . ”

The sounds coming from the speakers had lost their grainy quality. The chanting was now loud and clear, and Albert could make out every word even if he failed to recognize their meaning. Whatever it was, it sounded ominous. That those words were somehow responsible for what was happening in the room was something he instinctively knew and didn’t question.

“Try unplugging the fucking thing, Tristan
 
!” Ben’s voice had gone up a few decibels. He repeatedly punched the keyboard. The plastic contraption bounced with each hit, but the audio kept playing.

Unplugging the computer was the best idea. Tristan seemed frozen in place. Brionne advanced toward him, hesitated, and moved toward the wall to unplug the computer. Before she got there, her head snapped back and stayed that way for a couple of seconds. Then she turned. Blood poured from a gaping wound on her neck. Then her chest exploded, sending a chunk of her sternum, blood, and pieces of meat flying through the air. The cavity in her torso was a red mess of shaking lung tissue and pieces of broken ribs. She stood there for a second as if suspended by invisible hands and then collapsed. Her body hit the floor before the first scream erupted from somewhere in the back of the room.

“They aren’t fucking touching them
 
!” screamed Willeford over the chaos. “The natives are standing around chanting and something is killing my men
 
!”

Albert felt his heart move to his throat and his balls retract into his stomach. Ben was lifting his leg toward the computer when the leg he was standing on was apparently kicked from under him. He fell back, his head thudding against the polished concrete floor of the studio. Then his head came back up and went back to the floor with more violence.

“
Ehe . . . ”

His head was slammed by the invisible force again.

“ . . . maytubi . . . ”

Ben’s skull cracked open.

“ . . . javasas-ggot . . . ”

His head smashed into the floor, losing its shape and turning into something resembling a large mound of hamburger meat full of broken bones and teeth.

“ . . .
igomoro . . . ”

Albert looked away from the mess that had been Ben Martinez. The screams become more violent, more desperate. The realization that the shrieks he was hearing were coming from his students and not the audio file that kept playing hit him and something in his head collapsed.

“They’re right outside the bridge’s door now,” said Willeford. “
Ehe maytubi javasas-ggot igomoro . . . Ehe maytubi javasas-ggot igomoro
. . . ” The volume of the strange words grew.

Jessica Mitchell was decapitated and Brittany, who sat next to her, wasn’t done screaming when a deep, red gash blossomed in her neck. Then, Tommy Wilson, who hadn’t uttered ten words to Albert during the semester, flew out of his seat and hung in the air, his limbs making a quivering X. His shirt flew up and blood poured from a gash below his sternum. The wound grew as it travelled south. Tommy squealed like a stuck pig. The wound reached his belly and kept moving. His intestinal wall opened like a pink flower and his intestines unspooled, hitting the floor with a series of wet plops thankfully drowned by the chanting and screaming.

Albert saw two men standing near the wall behind Tommy. They were semi-translucent, but their skin was dark, naked except for loincloths. Their mouths moved. “
Ehe maytubi javasas-ggot igomoro . . . ”
Their chanting mixed in with the frantic cries and the gargling to become an unbearable cacophony. Albert closed his eyes, sank to his knees. Willeford howled that the natives were in the bridge. Then he let out a bloodcurling scream cut short by a loud crunch. The situation had overpowered Albert. He knew he had to act, but his senses, and his strength, were giving up, shutting down in some bizarre attempt at self-preservation.

The sounds subsided a bit following Willeford’s last scream. Albert was about to open his eyes when he felt two strong hands hook him by the armpits and pull him up as if he weighed less than a toddler. He looked back and saw no one. Then something pierced his chest. The pain exploded, travelled to his brain like a hot whiteness that fried his senses and made him shake. His ribs cracked inward and punctured his right lung. He reached out and grabbed something that was there but that he could not see. The thing kept moving despite his efforts to make it stop. The invisible spear raped his flesh with a brutal crunch and soon pushed against the skin of his back. Albert felt it rise like a tent before giving in to the pressure and letting the point of whatever was piercing him go through and finish its devastating journey. Something cold and sharp slid against his neck. Warm blood quickly replaced the cold feeling. The hand holding him up let go and he dropped to the floor.

“Ehe maytubi javasas-ggot igmo . . . ”

Click.

The recording stopped playing. The piece was over.

Albert coughed. Pain hit him again like a dozen steel-toed boots kicking him all over at the same time. Blood filled his mouth and trickled out. He looked around. Blood. Hollowed torsos. Decapitated corpses. Shock was starting to set in, mercifully replacing the pain with something akin to cold numbness.

With a second loud click, the massive door swung open. Students stood in the hallway. The horror on their faces was the last thing Albert registered before the dark silence took over.