"We're twenty five degrees North and seventy two degrees West."

I was staring at the coordinates on the radar.

"Yes," Captain Phillip confirmed.

"I mean where do you intend to go actually?"

"Where you're thinking I'm going," a small smile payed on his lips.

"Stop the ship here and turn back. No way am I going to let you go beyond this," I shouted.

The panic in my voice brought down the others. Sam was rubbing his eyes, bleary from last night's drinking. He had downed two shots of Vodka.

"Actually I'm not thinking of going beyond this. This is where we dive underwater and explore." he proceeded to lower the anchors.

I turned to the others, my eyes narrowed, "Which of you bastards planned for this? You're crazy or what? You wanna go diving so close to the Bermuda triangle?"

"Hey buddy relax," Jake put an arm around me. "We deserve some bit of fun and besides one degree longitude in this region is near about sixty kilometers and that's a huge range to actually go into the notorious triangle."
I was fuming.

"We've girls with us," I pointed to Nina and Mia who were standing there, equally frozen at the altercation.

"They're braver than you, chicken," remarked Sam.

"You're drunk," I retorted, "First go grab some lemon soda and get to think with a sober head."

"There is nothing to think," Mike came face to face and crossed his arms. "We can't let you spoil our fun. We've been planning for days. It doesn't matter if you come with us. We're going."

"If you're a daredevil, I've nothing to do." I stormed off.

Entering my cabin, I locked the door with a slam and sat down on the bed. I was shaking from anger.

I heard banging on my door.

"Open up Alex. It's Mia here" she called.

"Go away and do whatever you want with those creeps. You were involved in the planning too," I retorted.

"You know that I'm not going anywhere," her voice was agitated. "Besides I didn't have a hint of their plans and hence I'm staying with you. Now stop sulking and open the door for heaven's..."

I opened it without further argument.

She came in and looked at me, her eyes full of emotions and then dragged me out.

"Look, I have an idea to know if they're safe. We need someone to monitor their oxygen supply and track their location, we'll sit at the controls and we are the ones who can guide them during an emergency," she went to all business mode, no trace of the Mia a few seconds back.

I shook my head in defeat and followed her to the deck, where Sam, Jake and Nina, dressed in their wetsuit, boot, mask and gloves, were donning their fins.

"Oxygen Tank." screamed Captain Phillip.

"Check," replied Sam.

"Gauze, octo, regulator..."

"Check"

"Buoyancy compensator."

"Check"

"Fine then you're good to go," Phillip beamed.

The three looked at us and even beneath their masks, I could see disdain in their eyes.

Mia and I trudged to the control room where Phillip was already pressing buttons and regulating weird looking dials.

He explained all the systems to us and showed the vital oxygen regulator and emergency warning systems in place.

"We need to check for high levels of oxygen which could cause oxygen toxicity," he explained.

I looked at the monitor. The sea floor was being illuminated by their headlights alone and the inbuilt cameras were relaying the images directly to us.

The water was mucky and grey and it was difficult to make out a single living organism. The weeds reached out menacingly, threatening to entangle them but they were experts in maneuvering and somehow they moved forward.

"Wait," I screamed, "They shouldn't go any further. It's already about thirty kilometers."

"Don't worry,' Sam's muffled voice chuckled. "Isn't it Phillip?"

"Yeah you can," he got up from his seat before I could react.

And just then the image flickered and disappeared from our sight.

"Sam, Nina, Jake," Mia screamed into the communicator, but no sound was heard at the other end.

The slamming of the door made it clear that Phillip had left.

I jumped up and rushed to the door, pausing for a second to grab a gun hanging there.

We burst into the ship's control room to find Phillip raising the anchors.

"What are you doing?" I asked, my gun pointed.

"Setting sail."

"You can't leave them behind," Mia begged.

"They're fools. I just played along. I knew this was dangerous. The currents of Bermuda could capture anything within thirty meters of radius.

"Put back the anchors," I had my finger on the trigger.

"Throw your gun," another voice rang out and I saw a pistol pointing at Mia.

I surrendered my weapon and lifted my hands.

They herded us into a corner.

"You're beasts," Mia screamed.

"Sam and his gang had bullied my sister and driven her to suicide, those three deserve to die," his eyes were cold but the compassion in them shone through.

"If you commit the murder, you're no better than them," I said through clenched teeth.

The gun pressed tighter to my forehead.

"Cliché movie dialogues won't bring back my sister. And I'm a monster. Accept it. Besides, you're a witness too and you see too eager to help them so why not..."

"What would you do to us?" Mia was hysteric.

"Marcus," throw them into the sea.

The muscular man grabbed Mia by the hair and dragged her kicking and screaming. I tried to fight but he backhanded me, and I hit my head on a rod. I felt dizzy as the world around me spun.

I was barely aware of Marcus pushing Mia off the deck.

I rushed after her and without second thoughts, plunged into the cold waters of the Atlantic.

"Mia," I shouted, swallowing some salt water in the process.

"Alex," her voice was weak but somehow she fought through the water and caught my hand and as we stayed there hanging between life and death, I heard the sirens of the ship.

It was going, shattering our last hopes.

"Mia" I gasped, "You know we can't fight the water for long. And there isn't land nearby."

" My legs feel heavy, she mumbled, "How easy it would be to let go."

The rain came down in torrents, adding to our misery. The lightning cleaved the sky in two.

We tried to cling onto each other, fighting for the last few minutes.

Surging water swept over us, trying to pull us down to the depths. Of the monstrous sea. We were being tossed around like cork.

Mia stopped paddling after a while and I could feel her growing cold. Her lips became blue.

"Mia," I'm sorry, "I never should have let you come here. I love you Mia."

And my voice was lost by another surge of water which swept over us.

I could feel my hold on Mia break and so did my hold on life.

The water was filling up my lungs and my vision turned to an all-consuming darkness.

I opened my eyes and squinted at the sun which was forming blisters on my body.

I turned over and there was Mia, her wet hair spread out and her face buried in the sand.

Gathering the remaining of my strength, I dragged my unwilling body to her fallen form.

I turned her over to find her unconscious. Feeling her slow but shallow breath on my cheek, I heaved a sigh of relief.

Putting her in recovery position I laid down, staring at the endless blue sky.

I shivered as I realized that we should have been dead. But where were we?

Mia stirred. I helped her up.

She shielded her eyes from the blinding sun and buried her face in my chest for a while.

"Where are we?" she asked weakly.

"We need to find that out."

I got up and she did so, taking a few staggering steps and then pulled out a small device from her pocket.

"Will that work?" I pointed at the GPS which was dripping wet.

She frowned looking at it.

She handed it to me and it showed coordinates 25° N 71° W.

"We're in the middle of the Bermuda triangle and there is no island here. I'm a geographer and I know each and every corner of the world," she mumbled, pacing up and down the sand.

"Since there is no island, could this have been inundated and come up due to some regression of the sea?"

"Quite possible."

"Then it's uninhabited and we're anyways doomed to die without any hope of rescue."

"Not if this works, hope it isn't damaged," she dug into her pockets and came out with a small smartphone.

The screen was cracked and yet when it lit up, a flicker of hope surged in me which soon slumped seeing Mia's face.

"No network coverage," she threw the phone in frustration.

I picked it up and saw a dismal cross sitting right on top of the network. By instinct, my hands pressed the small airplane switch and one small bar of tower lit up.

"Mia," I cried, holding up the phone, "Airplane mode."

"But how?"

"It defies all scientific explanations unless..."

She looked at me as the thought struck both of us.

"You don't think this Island has its own Wi-Fi. Because that would mean there are humans or maybe presence of extraterrestrials or something more sinister. Technology and science doesn't lie."

"This particular island never showed up in satellite images."

"It won't if there is someone carefully controlling the water levels to keep it submerged whenever a satellite passes by."

"You don't think scientists recreated Atlantis here, did you?"

"If it's a secret, then it must me making illegal nuclear weapons or testing illegal drugs or maybe plotting war strategies. Who knows?" Mia shrugged.

"But that doesn't solve our problem. We can't stay here and if we get to them, it's no way they would let us go for the fear of the secrets being leaked."

"It's better to take a risk of getting captured rather than die of fear," her eyes burned with determination.

It seemed like we had been walking for days while the clock showed only a few hours.

There was no sign of life, making us wonder if we were wrong after all, because any call we tried to make to the mainland, didn't go through though the tower stayed.

"We need to find water first or we would die out of dehydration," she dropped on her knees.

Suddenly I heard a flurry of activity and the click of guns.
There were at least five men surrounding us and they each had a rifle and their main target were we.

"We're not here to spy on you," I tried to reason.

"We were thrown into the sea near the Bermuda area by the captain of our vessel and we were drowned and washed ashore," added Mia.

"What connection do you have with the three spies that tried to infiltrate our territory yesterday night?" another man asked.

"Were they two boys and a girl?"

"Yes."

"They weren't spies. We came for some fun diving. We're sorry. We didn't know it was your territory," Mia pleaded.

"Come with us," they signaled.

Helpless we followed their lead through the forest until we came to a huge clearing and what we saw was a small city, and entirely in a glass dome.

"Welcome to Sirenea," one of them chuckled.

"Fancy name," I muttered.

"What do you have this city for?" Mia asked.

"We research on drugs from marine life."

We were forcefully herded into the city.

There was a grating sound and I realized that the surroundings were turning darker.

Water rushed up and hit the glass without any effect.

"We're going underwater," Mia squealed.

"Yes, and you've no chance to escape from here."

2000 words completed
Written for the contest by adventure

Thanks everyone for supporting me MaryFahey Pipigrin KashishBelikov edelmeehan teamhathaway