Shrouded Loyalties

by Reese Hogan

  “Are we shrouding, ma’am?”

  Blackwood looked over to see Holland watching her with wide eyes, both hands clutching the chain on one of the bunks.

  “Not yet,” she told him.

  “Because we’re not close enough to… to a dekatite source…?”

  “The source is Kheppra Isle,” she said, “and yes, we are. But we get more warning than this. Unless we’re actually being pursued, or if a Dhavvie ship is using hydroacoustics to track us…”

  She trailed off. Unless we’re actually being pursued. With their boat out of commission for the few days following the accident, it was entirely possible a Dhavnak ship had gotten through the Qosmya Canal. And the last thing Captain Rosen would want was to inadvertently lead the enemy to the other side of the island, where all the research stations were. What better way to vanish without a trace than by diving under the waves and shrouding through the dekatite of Kheppra Isle?

  “CSO?” said Holland. The kid’s hand was to his chest, clutching a fistful of coverall.

  “Don’t skip out,” said Blackwood tightly. “We need you here.”

  “I’m not going anywhere,” Holland answered, sounding uncertain.

  “You’ll be fine. Remember, the accident was a freak incident.”

  Holland nodded, his breath coming fast and short.

  With the solar motors off, the temperature was already rising. As the ocean around them grew colder, condensation formed on everything in the compartment. Within moments, sweat ran down Blackwood’s body, stinging her eyes and wetting her palms against the metal of the ladder. Only red emergency lights lit the interior of the sub, as all extraneous energy had been powered down for the dive. Blackwood worked on keeping her breathing long and slow, but the tension in the compartment was palpable. Knowing their oxygen would get thinner the longer they were under was always at the back of everyone’s mind. Knowing a potential enemy was overhead, tracking their every move and sound, was at the front.

  The deck tilted again, steeper than usual, and Blackwood could tell by the tension on her arms that they were moving fast into the dark water. Any doubt had left her mind now. They were heading straight for the side of Kheppra Isle. Her feet slipped toward the maneuvering hatch. She looped her arm around the rung of the ladder, holding tight. On the other side of the ladder, Mahanner did the same.

  A hollow click sounded throughout the bulkhead. The Chief of Boat wouldn’t speak over the loud system now, but the click was all the warning Blackwood needed; they were getting ready to shroud. Only moments later, the walls seemed to dim around them. The red emergency lights blurred as if a cloud of smoke obscured them. The stifling air dampened and cooled. A heavy weight settled throughout the boat, pressing against Blackwood’s skin.

  “Stay still,” she said, as a general reminder to everyone. She watched the hatch overhead, which was barely visible in the murky light. She’d gone through this process nine times now.

  She couldn’t shake the memory of that last time from her head, though. A huge jarring against the boat. Screams through the maneuvering hatch. The breach had been in the radio room. The galley, mess, and crew’s quarters had been flooded before the rest of the boat was sealed off. Thirty-nine lives were lost. The bodies left behind were twisted, ripped apart, drowned, smothered. Some even had burns. It was thought to be linked to the dekatite ring found on a disembodied hand afterward, coupled with similar incidents involving a tank and an armored truck in recent days. Blackwood was sure they wouldn’t have shrouded again so soon, except for the fact that every act of aggression kept Belzen one step ahead of being taken.

  Desperate times required sacrifices. From them all.

  The boat grew colder around them as they passed into the dekatite face of the island. Blackwood realized Holland was breathing in shallow gasps off to her left, every breath catching just short of a whimper. She reached across the narrow space between the ladder and bulkhead to wrap her hand around the young man’s wrist. Holland jumped at the touch.

  “Is it almost over?” he said in a shaky voice.

  “Not yet,” murmured Blackwood. “But while we’re shrouding, we’re safe from the Dhavnaks. See? It’s a good thing.”

  Before she’d finished the sentence, something collided with the hull, explosively loud inside the small compartment. The submarine twisted to its side and the ladder jerked against Blackwood’s arm as gravity suddenly shifted to her back. Above her, Mahanner gasped as his face smashed against the ladder. She looked up to see him covering his face with his hand, but not before she saw the blood pouring from his nose. It hit her forehead, hot and sticky. The convulsion of the boat shook Blackwood’s grip. She tried to get her other arm around the rung, but Mahanner’s blood had made the ladder slick, and her fingers slipped. She fell, crashing into the folded bunk on the wall. She heard a distinctive crack somewhere near the stern, and suddenly water was spraying into the aft torpedo room. The water was freezing, and thick with salt; not pipe water, but cold seawater never touched by the suns. The red emergency lights flickered and died.

  Blackwood swallowed back a surge of nausea. It was the accident all over again. Except this time, it was their compartment that had been hit.

  Chapter 2

  KLARA YANA’S PENDANT

  Klara Yana Hollanelea could feel her ama’s dekatite pendant burning into her chest. The terror almost paralyzed her.

  How could Cu Zanthus have missed that detail during his briefing? Maybe I should have told Blackwood when she mentioned it.

  So the chief sea officer would have seen the Broken Eye? Surely she would have recognized it – she clearly had ample knowledge of Dhavnak culture, based on what she’d been telling Vin in the corner. What else would she have recognized? That Kyle Holland, with Vo Hina’s symbol, could surely not be a male, either? Being Belzene, it probably wouldn’t bother the senior officer, but even the thought of letting that secret out made Klara Yana sick with fear. If only she could have been a female for this mission… just this once.

  If Cu Zanthus hadn’t been watching when I boarded, maybe. Or if he’d given me more warning, instead of changing my assignment the moment I crossed the border…

  But no. Anger at her boy of a kommandir would do no good now. She was Deckman Holland now, like it or not, and following the CSO’s lead was her best hope of getting out of this alive.

  “It’s happening again. Xeil save us!”

  Klara Yana thought that was the other woman, Strachan. Blackwood cut her off sharply.

  “That’s not helping! Shut it.”

  A light came to life, weak and murky, near where Blackwood had fallen. The deck lurched again, and Klara Yana clung to the bunk chain as water caught at her ankles. The light swung up. A torrential force of water was spraying into the compartment from above one of the torpedoes.

  “Where are we?” Klara Yana said, staring in horror at the gushing water. “Inside the dekatite, or…?”

  “We’re in shrouding,” Mahanner snapped.

  “Like some sort of passage between the dekatite sources? Through the center of Mirrix?”

  “We’re dead, if you don’t focus,” said Blackwood. The light swung back toward the hatch behind Klara Yana, sweeping over the locker. “Damage control kit, Holland. Now!”

  Klara Yana’s eyes followed the light. A red canvas bag was stuffed under the locker, already half-submerged. She knelt in the cold water to pull the kit out, staggering on the slight angle of the deck.

  “Mahanner!” barked Blackwood. “Seal the maneuvering room hatch.”

  “The hole’s too big, ma’am!” Strachan shouted.

  “For wedges, maybe, but not for shoring,” said Blackwood.

  “We need to evacuate before sealing the compartment!” Strachan insisted.

  “And let in whatever it is that ripped us apart last time?” snarled Blackwood. “It’s in our hands, Strachan. This doesn’t end like that. Not on my watch.”

  “This is your fault, Holland!” s
omeone else screamed. Klara Yana froze, the bag pulled out and clutched in her hands. “You have dekatite, don’t you?”

  Rot in solitude, hoarder! she almost spat back. She curbed the words just in time. Not a good Belzene answer, nor even a Dhavnak female’s, but a typical young Dhavnak male’s, ingrained in her over cycles of playing the part. Apprentice Deckman Kyle Holland would never talk that way to crewmates he’d barely met two days earlier, though, no matter how badly they’d been treating him.

  “N- No,” she made herself stammer. “I swear…”

  “Vin!” CSO Blackwood exploded. “I will personally put my fist through your face if you don’t get ahold of yourself. Mahanner, close the hatch before the rest of the boat floods! Vin, Strachan, find the rubber lungs and mouthpieces. Anyone not willing to help, get out now. I’m not dealing with it.”

  Anyone not willing to help? Is she serious? Surely, none of these sailors would walk away from a comrade in crisis. But what was she thinking? They were Belzene. Their sense of camaraderie seemed strained at the best of times.

  Blackwood pulled something out from below one of the bunks – a long board covered in rubber or sealant. Klara Yana struggled back to her feet, hauling the bag with her. The water was just over her knees now. Her legs already felt frozen beneath the thin fabric of her coveralls.

  As she got closer to the leak, where Blackwood was hauling herself up the sides of the torpedo tubes, it was harder to hear anything else. Someone shouted, but she couldn’t make out the words. She did hear the creak of the wheel as one of her deckmates locked the hatch, and knew the five of them were cut off from the rest of the sub now.

  “Holland!” Blackwood called.

  “I’m here,” she managed, sloshing up next to the senior officer. Blackwood’s headlamp swung down in her direction, wavering in the thickly spraying water. This close, the water poured down on Klara Yana’s head too, drenching her.

  “Holland, I need a shole!”

  What in Vo Hina’s mercy is a shole? She opened the bag, holding it as far from the spray of water as she could, feeling the contents within by hand. A screwdriver? No, how would that help? There was some sort of axe… maybe… a roll of tape… don’t think so…

  “For Xeil’s sake, Holland, some time today!” Blackwood erupted. “This hole’s not gonna patch itself!”

  A patch! She found it: a piece of metal wrapped in the same rubber gasket as the board, a little larger than a Synivistic Scripture. She held it up, choking as salt-saturated water poured into her face. Blackwood grabbed it.

  “I need to drop the beam for a second. You have it?”

  “We’ve got it!” someone answered from beside Klara Yana. She almost jumped at the heavy Qosmyan accent. Shameful for an agent. She blamed it on the fear still pulsing through her.

  “Mahanner?” said Blackwood. “I thought you were still back by the hatch! Where did Vin–”

  “He left, ma’am,” the other sailor answered. “Him and Strachan both. Abandoned us.”

  “What?” Klara Yana said. Her voice came out sharper than she intended. Miserable Belzene bastards!

  “Quiet!” Blackwood growled. “It doesn’t matter now. See if you can find another light or two in there, will you?”

  Klara Yana found a headlamp and strapped it around her head, then twisted the beam on. The light shone brightly, clearly designed to operate well even drenched in water. She watched as Blackwood looped her arm around a pipe and pulled herself up. Balancing herself, Blackwood pushed the shole upward to cover the hole. Klara Yana could tell the immense pressure of the water would be too much for the sea officer by herself. Freezing cold saltwater swirled at the level of Klara Yana’s hips now. Blackwood turned her face away, coughing.

  “I can’t feel my fingers,” she ground out. “We have to–”

  “We can use the beam, ma’am,” Mahanner broke in, holding up the board that Blackwood had pulled from under the bunk. “The two of us will push from below while you steady it.”

  Something banged against the boat, hard. A deep, deafening whoomp passed through the walls and into their rapidly-shrinking space, echoing off the steel bulkheads before being absorbed by the water. The impact sent the boat swaying to the left. The water filling the torpedo room churned like a violent river. Klara Yana lost her balance, going under for just a second, before resurfacing with a gasp. She looked around frantically, but everything seemed fuzzy. Something was in her eye. She dug the heels of her hands into her eye sockets until her vision cleared, not realizing until the last horrible second that she’d just scrubbed the colored optics for Kyle Holland’s disguise right from her eyes. Gods! She looked down, straining to look for the tiny pieces of glass. All she saw was dark water lapping against her coveralls. Get through this first! Then figure it out.

  “Holland!” Blackwood shouted raggedly. “Get back up here! We have to seal this! Now!”

  “Coming, CSO!”

  Klara Yana half-walked, half-swam toward the beam of Blackwood’s headlamp, shoving through the water’s resistance as quickly as possible. The submarine bucked again, but this time Klara Yana kept her feet. The water surged almost to her neck. The steady drone of water pouring into the compartment sent tremors of panic through her. After five cycles in the field, and being so close to the promotion that would help her track down her ama, this was how she’d die? Deep underwater in enemy territory, in some unknown part of the world, wearing a false identity and surrounded by strangers?

  No. Think, damnit! What had Blackwood said right before they’d entered the compartment? Something in the boat reacted badly with the dekatite vein. She’d been lying. There was something out there. And, if Blackwood’s and Vin’s comments about having dekatite were true, it wanted Klara Yana’s dekatite pendant. The one her ama had given her. Klara Yana reached into her shirt and pulled out her necklace, feeling the round shape of the Broken Eye within her palm.

  If I can somehow get it off the boat… maybe it will let us live.

  She pulled the long chain over her head, then clutched the pendant as she climbed up the pipes by the wall to join Blackwood. The officer held the shole and was shoving it toward the leak again. Klara Yana couldn’t see the hole specifically, but it felt like the whole Trievanic Sea was pouring in from above. There was also, unmistakably, a deep, guttural howling that seemed to be coming in on the waves themselves, woven into the water as thickly as the salt. The boat shuddered again, and Klara Yana gripped the pipes, barely holding herself up.

  “Hey!” Mahanner yelled from below. “I have the beam. You two press that shole up there, and we’ll get it covered. We can do this!”

  Klara Yana was already up by Blackwood, and she shoved her hands toward the shole, the necklace still tight in her palm. She had no idea how she could possibly get the pendant outside through the insane pressure of that water. But it was the only chance they had. She had to try.

  “You take the left side,” Blackwood grunted. “I’ll take the right.”

  Mahanner’s beam now pressed into the center, and slowly, the patch forced up against that unbearable pressure. On the spot directly over Klara Yana’s head, the flow lessened. At her left hand, where she held the other end of the shole, water continued to spill in, increasing in pressure as the hole shrank. She shoved the pendant toward that gap, forcing herself to pry her fingers apart.

  There was a growl above her, terrifyingly loud. Something grabbed her hand – something warmer than the freezing water, with a rough grip and a crushing hold. Klara Yana’s fingers were forced closed around the pendant before she could release it. The hard edges of the dekatite bit into her palm. The entire hull seemed to flicker, so fast and bright that her eyes barely registered it behind the saltwater covering them. Pain flared in her left hand. The unseen force still held her fast; it felt like her hand was being ground between two boulders. She screamed, although the saltwater spilling in gagged her almost immediately. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the flickering light danc
e over Blackwood’s form, illuminating her like a lightning bolt. The senior officer fell.

  Klara Yana spat out the water as best she could, violently coughing the silt from her lungs. Mahanner’s beam was still steady, despite their loss of Blackwood’s strength. Klara Yana yanked her closed fist back, pulling with every ounce of strength she had. After a heartbeat of agonizing pressure as the joints in her elbow and shoulder protested, she finally broke the creature’s grip. Something hissed, almost at her ear. Her hand throbbed with pain, and she didn’t know if she’d ever be able to force the fingers apart again, but she was free. She used the hand to redouble the force against the shole. The flow of water became a cascade… then a torrent… then suddenly, it ceased altogether. Outside, the unearthly howling went on, muted now.

  “Holland!” yelled Mahanner. “Grab the beam. I need to dive under and get a wedge placed so it holds. Don’t release it, whatever you do.”

  “I’ve got it!” she choked out.

  Her fingers finally unfolded and the pendant fell free, dangling on the chain now looped around her wrist. She had no choice but to leave it there as she put all her strength on the beam. The dark gray of the dekatite sparkled in the light of her headlamp – not just the pendant, but the chain, too; tiny links of dekatite made up its entire long length. She gritted her teeth and turned her head to look for Blackwood, sweeping her light across a room of deep waves. She finally saw her body, floating back by the locker. Her heart stuttered. Out of everyone on this submarine, CSO Blackwood was the one who didn’t deserve this. Unlike her comrades, she’d stayed and fought. And unlike Klara Yana, she’d done it without hiding her gender. Someday, Klara Yana thought, maybe that could be me.

  Someday. When women were allowed to serve in Dhavnakir’s military. When privileged positions, like her ama’s former role as ambassador, were commonplace for females, rather than practically unheard of. But Klara Yana didn’t have until ‘someday.’ Her ama was a political prisoner now, of one of the very countries she’d negotiated with, and the Dhavnak government either couldn’t or wouldn’t get her released. Klara Yana couldn’t ask, not at her current rank. But just one more promotion – one more big mission – and she’d have access to those records.