The Left Series (Book 6): Left On An Island by Christian Fletcher Read Free Book Online Page B

pointed skyward at the bottom of the sea boat and made a cut-throat gesture. A no go. He took the spear gun from me and reloaded it with ease. He handed me back the weapon, forked at his eyes and pointed back to the reef.
    To me, keeping eyes on the problem didn’t seem much of a plan. Before the dive, Smith said we’d have forty minutes of air. Plenty for a ten minute exploration of the ship’s hull. He also said that if you breathe rapidly, the air will expend at a quicker rate.
    We were stuck down below the sea with our backs to the crippled ship’s hull and zombies and sharks all over the damn place. To add to my woes, I was breathing like a birth mother, hastily using up the remaining air in my tank.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Chapter Nine
     
    I tapped Smith again and he turned his head towards me. By the stern look in his eyes, I knew the action had irritated him. I pointed at the small gauge attached to the air tanks. The black needle hovered dangerously over the red zone on the indicator dial.
    Smith studied his own air gauge and I also took a look. His tank was only around half used up. I guessed he was a damn sight calmer than I was.
    We couldn’t stay where we were, that was for sure. If we were incredibly lucky, the sharks might disperse back further into the sea but the undead wouldn’t cease coming at us until they’d picked our bones clean.
    A naked male zombie, with a large gut and a bald head, swum around the side of the reef towards us. His right thigh skimmed against the reef’s rocks, ripping away a strip of puffy gray flesh. His large stomach and shoulders were peppered with human teeth marks, obviously from an attack some while ago. I aimed my newly loaded spear gun at the approaching target and squeezed the trigger. I figured with a target that large and at close proximity, I couldn’t fail to miss.
    As usual, my optimism was soon crushed. The spear whooshed through the water and did hit the target but with treacherous consequences. The barbed point rammed through the flesh of the zombie’s bulging gut. I didn’t know if the guy had been dead underwater so long that the body had swollen and produced internal gases but his whole stomach burst like a beach balloon under the impact from the spear. A cluster of brown, bubbles erupted from the gaping wound, along with a decaying, gray jumble of bodily organs.
    The mass of stale meat floating in every direction seemed to send the sharks into a crazy frenzy. They zigzagged around in swift circles, crossing each other’s paths and scooping up pieces of flesh in their teeth.
    This time, Smith tapped me on the shoulder and pointed towards the reef beyond the warship’s damaged hull. He motioned with his head at the rocky atoll and swam towards it. I reluctantly followed, not knowing what kind of extreme tactics Smith was ready to deploy.
    I glanced nervously all around me, gripping the unloaded spear gun as my only defense.
    Smith swum low against the reef’s surface and I followed his lead. I didn’t know if it was a purposeful maneuver or whether he was simply keeping a close eye on the contours underneath us. We didn’t want to suddenly find another large gap opening out below with more dangers to contend with.
    A ghostly white face, with wide eyes and snapping jaws suddenly emerged between the long leaves of a sea plant a few feet to my left. I instinctively jerked away to my right, attempting to gain some space between the grasping creature and myself. The seawater slowed my movement and the ghoul reached out with scrawny hands, grabbing at my left arm. I thrashed around, trying to release the firm grip of decaying fingers but only succeeded in rolling onto my back. The undead woman’s face drew near to my facemask as she snapped her jaws in repetitive forward lunges. The remains of a white summer dress billowed around her body and her reddish-brown hair drifted around her head like some kind