“Marker 16” is a turning-point chapter from my forthcoming book ARCemedes™ and the Moving River Bottom . It follows nineteen-year-old Alexi farther into the Anclote River system, at a point when his search for answers has begun to change into something else.
Earlier in the story, Alexi encountered an octopus he calls ARCemedes in waters where he did not expect to find one. What began as curiosity became an effort to understand what he had seen. He took measurements, returned to places along the river, asked questions, and learned that the instruments and assumptions he trusted did not always tell him what he thought they did.
Along the way, two questions have stayed with him. His grandfather, Gus, asked, “What are you trying to prove?” Katerina, who has encouraged his curiosity about the river, has asked him to think about where that curiosity might lead.
As this chapter begins, Alexi is not setting out to answer either question.
He is simply going farther down the Anclote.
His destination is Marker 16 and Sunset Key, near where the river opens toward the Gulf. He wants to see another part of the river for himself.
What he brings back will be more than what he went looking for.
Movement One — The Sky Over the Expanse
For some time, Alexi had been looking over the different parts of the Anclote he still wanted to explore. Sunset Key was one of them. He had planned to go today, and the weather looked good. So he went out.
Alexi turned into Anclote River Park and drove around the boat-launch area.
Before he went much farther, the sky stopped him.
He pulled over and got out.
From here he could see across the lower Anclote and toward the Gulf.
The morning was intensely blue over the park, but far out toward the Gulf, enormous cumulus clouds had built upward, bright white where the sun caught them and darker underneath, in places nearly black. In another direction, the sky opened almost completely blue.
Beneath one bank of clouds, a narrow gray band streaked downward all the way to the water.
Rain was falling there. He could see it. Not across the whole horizon. Just in that one section, a distant curtain of rain reaching from the clouds to the water.
From where Alexi stood, the sun was still shining.
Alexi stood beside the Tacoma and looked.
This was part of what had drawn him to the lower Anclote. He loved the expansive view, especially in summer, when Gulf Coast Florida clouds could build across different parts of the sky at once.
Over the past several months, he had followed the river into places he once would have passed without thinking much about them. He had paddled upriver, into coves, canals and along shorelines, stopping because something caught his attention or because he simply wanted to know what was there.
But he had spent less time at the other end, where the Anclote widened toward the Gulf.
Sunset Key had caught his attention when he looked at the map. It sat just beyond Anclote River Park, low and mangrove-covered, with shallow water around its edges. It was uninhabited. Along one side was a small stretch of beach where he expected he could bring the kayak ashore and get out for a while. Marker 16 stood near the center of the river.
It gave the morning a plan.
He would launch from the park, paddle east in front of the public beach, cross the Anclote, then turn west toward the key. From there, he would work his way along the shallows around Sunset Key. If conditions allowed, he would beach the kayak, get out, stretch his legs, and spend some time looking around before paddling back.
Sunset Key was farther than he wanted to go from the Sponge Docks, which was why he had brought the kayak down to the park.
It wasn't a long expedition. That wasn't the point.
Marker 16 stood ahead of him, red against the water.
Red, right, return. The old reminder for boats coming in from the Gulf—keep the red markers on the right.
The larger boats would have to stay in the deeper water and marked channels. Alexi wouldn't have to follow them. In the kayak, he could leave the channel behind, follow the irregular edge of the key, move closer to the mangroves, and slip into water too shallow for most of the boats using the lower river. He could simply drift when he wanted to look longer.
There, he expected the world to get smaller.
Instead of looking across the river, he could look into it—beneath overhanging branches, along exposed roots, into patches of grass, and across whatever sand, shell, or darker bottom the shallow water allowed him to see.
There might be herons or egrets standing motionless along the edge. Perhaps an osprey overhead. Something moving through the shallows before he could decide what it was.
And there was always the possibility of dolphins. They were regular travelers along the river.
Behind him would be the river he had been exploring for months—the bends, coves, docks, bridges, houses, working boats, and the Sponge Docks farther upstream.
Ahead of him, the water opened. The shoreline fell away. Beyond Sunset Key lay the broader water toward the Gulf and, farther out, Anclote Key.
There was nothing he had to measure. That investigation was finished. He simply wanted to see what was there.
Alexi looked once more toward the distant curtain of rain.
Movement Two — Clear Here
Alexi is still standing near the Tacoma, looking across the lower Anclote, when he meets Chuck, the Anclote River Park ranger.
Alexi comments on the clouds. He has checked the forecast. There may be weather around, but where he is standing it looks clear.
Chuck asks about lightning.
That changes the conversation.
Now the lightning-warning sign near the launch matters. Alexi is about to put a kayak onto open water.
One fifteen-second blast means get off the water. Three five-second blasts mean conditions have cleared enough for activity to resume.
Chuck's more important lesson is simpler.
Being clear here does not mean it is clear where you're going.
Alexi looks again. Not only at the clouds above him. At the distance between them.
Alexi thanks Chuck, then gets back into the Tacoma. He continues around the boat-launch area.
That is when he notices the boat.
Alexi slows, then pulls over.
Movement Three — The Rock Boat
The launch was already a working place.
The broad ramp sloped into the river. Floating docks extended into the water on either side, pilings rising beside them. Across the opening, mangroves lined the water and sailboats sat quietly at anchor.
A boat was being backed toward the water on a trailer.
It wasn't a fishing boat or a family heading out for the day. A metal frame rose over the deck, with hand-cranked winches and cables running through pulleys. Alexi looked at it for a moment, trying to figure out what they lifted with it.
There were weighted mesh bags aboard. And rock. Lots of it.
In Alexi's mind, it became the "Rock Boat."
Two women, sisters, Ava and Mia, and a male crewmate, Jake, moved around the deck, getting equipment ready. Alexi watched for a moment.
Then curiosity won.
“So...you collect rocks?”
Alexi glanced at the load.
“A lot of rocks.”
That got a smile.
“So what's the plan? Take all these somewhere and throw them overboard?”
Ava explained that they took the rock to an offshore aquaculture site and placed it on the bottom. Once it was there, things began growing on it—sponges, tunicates, bryozoans, corals, and other marine life. Over time, the rock itself became habitat.
Alexi looked again at the load.
“But why?”
Mia explained that this was part of their business. Over time, the ordinary rock became live rock, covered with and inhabited by marine organisms. Later, they returned and harvested it.
“Then what?” Alexi asked.
“Saltwater aquariums.”
The live rock became part of reef tanks. It wasn't there just for decoration. The organisms living on and within it helped provide biological filtration and habitat, while the rock itself gave the aquarium structure and places for other marine life to live and grow.
Alexi looked at the rock again.
What had seemed like a boat carrying a pile of rocks was something else entirely.
They took ordinary rock out.
The Gulf made it live.
Then they brought the live rock back.
As they talked, Ava and Mia described some of what they encountered at the site. They could often tell what was growing there by looking at it. Sometimes they touched it. Sometimes smell helped.
Alexi had questions.
Not about salinity. Not about whether anything here proved ARCemedes could live nearby.
He wanted to know about the rock.
The conversation didn't last long.
Ava, Mia, and Jake went back to their work on the Rock Boat. Alexi got back into the Tacoma and continued through the park.
He found a good place to launch and parked nearby.
Movement Four — The River Everybody Uses
Alexi found a good launch spot and parked nearby.
He unloaded the kayak, carried it toward the water, and got the last of his gear aboard.
Then he pushed off.
From the water, Anclote River Park stretched along the northern shoreline. Across the river, sailboats rode quietly at anchor near the mangroves.
Farther out, other boats were moving.
A large cruising boat was coming upriver. Another followed farther behind. They looked like the kind of boats Alexi had seen traveling the Intracoastal, possibly Loopers making the Great Loop, the long circuit of waterways that carried recreational boaters around the eastern United States and into Canada.
Alexi watched them approach.
The first wake reached him in long rolling swells. The kayak rose and settled as they passed beneath him. By the time the water began settling, the next boat was coming through.
He waited.
Then another boat appeared downriver.
Alexi recognized the tour boat from the Sponge Docks. It was heading west toward Anclote Key, where the passengers would get off for a while, walk the beach, and collect shells.
As it drew closer, he heard the guide talking over the speaker. Alexi caught pieces as the boat passed: local history, something about the marine life around them, a story about the area.
Then the captain's voice came over the speaker.
“Keep an eye out for dolphins. If you see one, call out and point.”
People began looking from one side of the boat to the other.
Then someone pointed.
Heads turned. Others began pointing too. The captain slowed and maneuvered the boat while the passengers gathered along the side, watching the water. Phones came out. Some held them toward the water, ready for the dolphin to surface again. Others tried to follow where people were pointing.
Alexi watched from his kayak.
For a few minutes, nearly everyone aboard was looking in the same direction, waiting.
While they watched, the guide began telling them about the dolphin—what kind it was, how dolphins moved through the local waters, and some of the behaviors the passengers might notice if it surfaced again.
Then it did.
Someone called out. Phones followed it. The dolphin disappeared beneath the surface again.
Then the guide's voice came over the speaker.
“Oh. Two there!”
Heads turned again. So did the phones.
The two dolphins surfaced together. Oohs and ahhs moved through the boat. Someone laughed. But everyone kept watching.
Now they knew a little more about what they were looking for.
As the boat came abreast of him, Alexi lifted a hand.
One person waved back. Then another. Soon nearly everyone along that side of the boat was waving.
Alexi smiled and waved back.
“Happy group,” he thought.
After a while, the tour boat continued west toward Anclote Key. The cruisers continued upriver.
Their wakes spread across the Anclote and gradually diminished.
Alexi watched the traffic for a while longer.
Then he paddled on.
Movement Five — Marker 16 and Sunset Key
Marker 16 stands to his right ahead, its red triangle easy to spot against the water.
The water around it is not still.
Small waves work against the piling. The surface breaks and reforms around it. Bits of grass and foam move past.
Alexi makes small corrections with the paddle.
The marker stays where it is.
Everything around it moves.
Beyond it, Sunset Key lies low against the water.
The little key sits near where the Anclote opens toward the Gulf, its mangrove shoreline surrounded by shallows.
Alexi turns toward it.
The larger boats need the deeper water and marked channel. Alexi doesn't. In the kayak, he can move into the shallows, closer to the mangroves, and simply drift when he wants to look longer.
The water changes beneath him.
Some places are darker. Others lighter. Grass gives way to sand and shell. Oysters appear in places. Then a long patch of them passes beneath the kayak. Here and there, pieces of rock interrupt the bottom.
The tour boat is farther west now. The cruisers have continued upriver. Behind him are the park, the ramp, and the anchored sailboats.
Here the noise diminishes.
Alexi slows.
He follows the edge of Sunset Key.
Mangroves line the shore, their branches reaching over the water. Beneath them, roots twist down into the shallows.
Sometimes he paddles. Sometimes he lets the kayak drift while he looks.
Somewhere in the back of his mind is ARCemedes.
Alexi hasn't come expecting to see him.
That doesn't mean he has stopped hoping.
He keeps going.
Movement Six — ARCemedes
As Alexi continues along the key, a small beach comes into view.
He turns toward it.
The bow slides onto the sand.
Alexi steps out and pulls the kayak up far enough that it won't drift away. After sitting for so long, it feels good to stand. He stretches his legs and walks a short distance along the beach.
From here, the lower Anclote looks different.
Across the water is Anclote River Park. He can make out the ramp and docks, and the sailboats anchored near the opposite mangrove shoreline. Farther out, boats continue along the deeper water.
Alexi looks toward the Gulf.
The clouds have shifted since he stood beside the Tacoma. Some have grown. Others have opened, leaving stretches of blue between them. He looks for the rain he had seen earlier.
He watches for a while.
Then he turns back toward the key.
From the water, Sunset Key was a low line of mangroves. Standing on it, he notices smaller things. Shells mixed through the sand. Pieces of grass left by the tide. Mangrove leaves along the edge. Marks where the water has moved in and out.
He walks only a little way. Unlike Anclote Key, where a path leads to the lighthouse, there is no trail here to follow, and nowhere in particular he needs to go.
After a while, Alexi returns to the kayak. He pulls it into the water and turns it parallel to the shore. When it is deep enough, he sits down in the seat, then swings his legs around and into the kayak.
He continues along the key.
The bottom is visible beneath him again.
Alexi lets the kayak drift while he looks.
Something catches his attention.
He stops.
At first, he isn't certain.
Then he is.
ARCemedes.
Not a flash. Not something disappearing before Alexi can decide what he saw.
This time he has time.
He lets the kayak settle and watches.
ARCemedes is near the bottom.
Around him are grass and shell, pieces of rock, darker openings between them.
Alexi stays still.
ARCemedes moves along the bottom.
For a moment, Alexi sees more of him than he has before.
His body stays close to the bottom, mottled brown with touches of rust against the sand and broken shell. One arm reaches ahead, then another, feeling its way along the uneven bottom.
Then the rust begins to fade. The brown lightens, breaking into patches of gray and pale tan until the animal seems to take on the colors of the bottom beneath it.
And he is difficult to see again.
Alexi watches.
Eventually, ARCemedes disappears.
Alexi keeps looking at the place where he had been.
Nothing moves there now.
After a while, he lets the kayak drift.
This time he knows what he saw.
ARCemedes had been there.
Movement Seven — The Way Back
Eventually, Alexi puts the paddle back into the water.
Across the Anclote, the park comes back into view. Marker 16 stands out on the water between him and the farther shoreline.
The anchored sailboats are still there. Boats continue moving through the lower river.
Alexi watches the traffic for a while.
Then he starts back toward the park.
Later, the bow touches sand.
Alexi steps out.
Then the ordinary work of leaving.
Paddle. Life jacket. Dry bag. Kayak.
He carries everything back to the Tacoma.
He lifts the kayak into place, secures it, then pulls the straps once.
Alexi gets into the Tacoma.
For a moment, he sits there.
ARCemedes is still vivid in his mind. The bottom beneath him. Grass and shell. Pieces of rock. The darker openings between them.
Then another thought comes.
He wants to tell Papou.
Alexi starts the truck.
Movement Eight — Anclote Boulevard
Getting out of Anclote River Park isn't quite an immediate straight run back to Tarpon Springs.
The various roads wind through the park before reaching the way out. A first-time visitor could make a turn, make another, and begin wondering whether he was actually getting any closer to the exit.
Alexi knew the feeling. The first time he'd come here, he'd gotten turned around himself.
Now he knows the way.
He follows the turns until the park gives way to Baillies Bluff Road.
He turns right.
A short distance later, Alexi turns left onto Anclote Boulevard.
The road straightens ahead of him east toward ALT-19.
He settles into the drive.
The kayak is strapped above him. The paddle is put away. Marker 16 and Sunset Key are behind him.
For the first time all morning, there is nothing he has to watch except the road.
And no instrument beside him.
The question comes back.
What are you trying to prove?
Papou had asked him that.
At the time, Alexi hadn't known how to answer.
Maybe he had been trying to prove something.
Alexi drives on.
Anclote Boulevard continues ahead of him.
This morning had been different.
He hadn't brought the meter.
He had gone to see another part of the Anclote.
Marker 16. Sunset Key. The mangroves. The changing bottom beneath the kayak.
And ARCemedes.
Alexi thinks about Katerina too.
She had wanted him to keep exploring. To see where his questions might take him.
She had asked him what he was going to do with his life.
He hadn't known how to answer that either.
The road continues straight ahead.
For once, Alexi doesn't try to force an answer.
He thinks about ARCemedes moving along the bottom. About having enough time to watch him. About seeing not only the animal, but the place around him.
He had spent so much time wanting to know. That hadn't been the mistake.
Maybe the mistake had been thinking that knowing had to end the question.
Alexi drives on.
The thought settles slowly.
He doesn't have to know where every question will lead before he follows it. He doesn't have to prove something every time he looks.
He can keep looking because he wants to understand.
The long stretch of Anclote Boulevard begins to run out.
ALT-19 approaches.
Alexi turns right.
South now.
The road begins carrying him back toward Tarpon Springs.
The Sponge Docks are ahead.
So is Papou.
Alexi finds himself looking forward to seeing him.
He wants to tell him what happened.
Then Dodecanese Boulevard comes into view.
Alexi turns right.
The change is immediate.
He is back among the streets and buildings of the Sponge Docks, the boats beyond them, the working waterfront he has known all his life.
Somewhere ahead, aboard the Aegean Sounding, is Papou.
Alexi drives toward him.
Movement Nine — I Saw Him Again
Later, Alexi finds Gus and approaches him.
“Papou.”
Gus looks up.
“I saw him again.”
“ARCemedes?”
Alexi nods.
“At Marker sixteen.”
That gets Gus's attention.
“You're sure?”
This time Alexi doesn't hesitate.
“I'm sure.”
“How long?”
“I don't know. A few minutes, maybe.”
“Long enough.”
Gus looks at him.
“Long enough for what?”
“To watch him.”
ARCemedes wasn't something that moved and disappeared this time. Alexi saw him. Saw where he was. Saw the bottom around him. Saw where he could disappear.
Gus listens.
Then he teases Alexi about sitting there staring at the bottom.
“I wasn't staring.”
“No?”
“I was watching.”
“Yes,” Gus says.
“You were.”
Movement Ten — What Else Did You See?
Then Gus asks the question Alexi isn't expecting.
“What else did you see?”
Alexi looks at him.
He had come to tell Papou about ARCemedes.
“What do you mean?”
“You were out there all morning.”
Alexi thinks about it.
“Boats.”
“What boats?”
“A couple of big cruisers coming upriver. Maybe Loopers.”
Gus nods.
“The dolphin boat was heading out to Anclote Key. Somebody spotted a dolphin, and everybody started pointing.”
“What else?”
“There were sailboats anchored across from the park. Fishing boats.” Alexi pauses. “And this work boat at the ramp. I called it the Rock Boat.”
“The Rock Boat?”
“It had bags of rock all over it.”
Gus waits.
Alexi tells him about Ava and Mia and the rock they were taking offshore. About what would grow on it. Sponges. Tunicates. Bryozoans. Corals. Other marine life.
“What'd they do with it?”
“Put it out there and come back to see what's growing.”
Gus considers that.
“What else?”
Alexi smiles.
“You're going to keep asking me that?”
“Until you run out.”
Alexi thinks again.
“Sunset Key.”
“What about it?”
“I got out for a while.”
He tells him about the little beach. The mangroves. The shallows. The shells mixed through the sand and the things the tide had left behind.
“And Marker 16.”
“What about it?”
Alexi thinks about the piling standing in the lower river.
“The water was moving around it.”
Gus waits for more.
“That's all.”
“That's all?”
“Pretty much. Waves against the piling. Grass and foam going past.”
Gus nods.
For a moment neither of them says anything.
Then Gus asks, “Did you take time to look at the mound?”
Alexi thinks back to the park.
“I saw it.”
“That isn't what I asked.”
Alexi looks at him.
“Did you stop and look at it?”
“No.”
Gus nods.
“My grandfather used to take me there.”
“To the mound?”
“To the mound. To the river. All of it.”
Alexi waits.
“He'd make me stand there and look out at the water. Then he'd ask me what I saw.”
“What'd you say?”
“Boats.”
Alexi smiles.
“So did I.”
“Yes. But which boats?”
Gus looks toward the Anclote.
“The boats you saw this morning are the boats out there now. Cruisers. Tour boats. Sponge Boats. Fishing boats. Sailboats.”
He pauses.
“When I was young, there were more working boats. Fishing boats. Shrimp boats. A lot more sponge boats.”
Alexi tries to picture it.
“My grandfather remembered more of them than I did. Fleets of sponge boats going out. Shrimp boats. Fishing boats. Sometimes he could tell what a boat was doing before he could read her name.”
“How?”
Gus smiles.
“I asked him that once.”
“What'd he say?”
“Said I wasn't looking.”
Alexi laughs.
“That was his answer?”
“That was his answer.”
Gus looks out across the docks.
“He was usually right.”
Alexi looks too.
For a while, neither of them speaks.
Then Gus says, “But he'd take me farther back than the boats he remembered.”
“How far?”
“He'd point to the mound.”
Alexi remembers it now.
“People were living along that river long before Tarpon Springs was here,” Gus says. “Long before the sponge boats. Long before our family ever came to Florida.”
“The Tocobaga?”
“They were here in this part of Florida when the Spanish came. But that mound is older than one name. People had been living along these waters for a long time.”
Alexi looks toward the river.
“They had boats?”
“Of course they had boats.”
“What kind?”
“Canoes. Dugouts. Made from trees.”
Gus motions toward the water.
“They fished. They traveled. They moved through the rivers and along the coast. My grandfather used to tell me to stand there and imagine their canoes out on the water.”
Alexi looks toward the water and tries to imagine the canoes there.
For a moment, he takes away the cruisers.
The tour boat.
The sailboats.
Marker 16.
The docks.
He tries to see the river without engines.
A dugout moves across the water.
Then another.
Gus lets him look.
“Then the Spanish came.”
Alexi turns back to him.
“Spanish ships?”
“Spanish boats. Explorers. Sailors. People coming into waters other people already knew.”
“And pirates?”
Gus smiles.
“My grandfather had pirates everywhere.”
“Were there?”
“He said there were.”
“You believed him?”
“I was eight.”
Alexi laughs.
“So yes.”
“Every word.”
The smile stays on Gus's face.
“He could put them all out there. Spanish ships. Pirates. Fishing boats. Sponge boats. Shrimp boats. Boats leaving for the Gulf and boats coming home.”
Alexi looks toward the Anclote again.
He tries to put them there.
The dugouts first. Then sails farther out.
Working boats. Fishing boats. Sponge boats. Shrimp boats. Boats leaving. Boats returning.
Then the river as Alexi had seen it that morning.
The cruisers coming upriver. The tour boat heading toward Anclote Key. People pointing toward a dolphin. The sailboats at anchor. The Rock Boat at the ramp. And somewhere among all of them, a kayak.
His kayak.
Gus is watching him.
Alexi looks at his grandfather.
He thinks about Marker 16 again.
The red triangle against the water.
Small waves working against the piling. Grass and foam moving past.
The marker staying where it was.
Everything around it moving.
The marker hadn't always been there. Neither had the docks or the boats he had watched that morning.
But people had been looking out across that water for a very long time.
And beneath them all, the bottom kept moving.