Virus

by S. D. Perry

  Foster fumbled at a panel and the shrieking stopped, the lights flashing silently now; at least she was good for something, terrific, that was just fine.

  Everton’s gaze was drawn again to the gradually sinking barge; he couldn’t watch, couldn’t, but he couldn’t look away for more than a second or two, either. It was everything, and nobody understood, nobody cared.

  Foster had been tapping at her screens, trying to look busy as his life slipped away. She was an idiot, Woods was an incompetent—the engine alarm had probably gone off because Baker and his man had screwed something up—

  “Captain, recommend new course heading of—two two nine degrees,” Foster said. “We’ll find the eye, it’s only an hour and a half out . . . Captain?”

  It was impossible. The only way to break the eye wall was if they cut the barge loose, and Foster knew it. What did she have to lose?

  “We don’t have an hour and a half,” he murmured, and watched as another several barrels slid away, sank beneath the waves. Lost, so much of it lost now . . .

  The woman would not stop. “Captain, once we’re in the eye we’ll have calm seas for almost two hours; we could make repairs and steady the barge.”

  Did she think he couldn’t hear the pause, the mocking tone in her shrill voice? They didn’t have the power to make it through the worst of the storm, not with the weight of the pull—

  Woods spoke urgently. “Captain, I need an answer on that.”

  They’re all against me, all of them.

  Why couldn’t the Star have just gone down, just given him some peace? What had he done to deserve this, to be forced to watch his life torn away?

  There was a blast of noise from below and Everton turned, saw Steve Baker climb onto the bridge.

  “What the hell’s going on up here, Captain? The engine room’s taking on water!”

  Everton felt a surge of anger and self-righteousness; he turned on the younger man, fuming.

  “Then pump it out, mister, you’re the bloody engineer!”

  “We can’t get in! The bulkhead door took a hit and it’s wedged tight, Hiko’s cutting in now—”

  Foster broke in. “Winds one-twenty!”

  Baker ran his hands through his hair, looked around the bridge—and his gaze caught the heaving tow behind them.

  “The barge! You’ve gotta be fucking kidding me.” He stared at Everton, incredulous. “We’ve got to cut it loose.”

  “That’s not an option, Baker,” he replied. It was foolishness, cowardice—

  “Captain, should I head for the eye? I need an answer, I’m losing her!” Woods asked.

  “Winds one twenty-five, sir—”

  “I gotta have an answer!”

  The woman and the incompetent, and now Baker again, resentful, malicious.

  “Captain, I’ll put it real simple for you—if that barge sinks, we sink with it!”

  Everton shook his head. I am captain, I’m captain here!

  “A chance I’ll take,” he growled, barely able to suppress his rage at the blatant disloyalty, the willingness of them all to see him destroyed.

  Baker stared at him a moment longer and then turned, headed for the stairwell that led out onto the howling deck. “I’m cutting it loose,” he said, and Everton felt something inside snap.

  He drew his revolver and leveled it at Baker, the weight of it in his hand good, powerful. He saw fear on the engineer’s boyish face, fear and respect for the gleaming weapon.

  “Move away from that door,” he said, and felt his control return in a hot surge of adrenaline; he was captain, he would make the decisions, and no one was going to take that away from him.

  Baker would stand aside or he’d find out the hard way that Everton meant what he said.

  • 3 •

  Foster stared at the captain in stunned disbelief as the Sea Star rocked wildly in the raging typhoon. She rose from her seat on numb legs but didn’t leave her console, afraid to draw Everton’s attention.

  He hates me enough already—Jesus, he’s nuts!

  She could see the same disbelief on Steve’s face, astonishment and a sudden angry curiosity. “What’s so precious about that cargo, what the hell you got back there? Drugs? Gold bouillon? The insurance company’ll eat the loss, Captain! Am I missing something here?”

  Everton’s faded blue eyes were wild, his voice desperate. “The cargo’s mine, I—I leveraged everything I own and it isn’t insured!”

  Everything clicked into place—the anger, the blame-laying. Foster suddenly understood why he’d done this, why he’d risked the lives of everyone on board rather than jettison the barge. There had to be hundreds of thousands of dollars at stake—

  —and he’ll see us all dead before giving it up.

  The engineer saw it, too, and Foster could tell that it wasn’t going to stop him. Steve moved again towards the door.

  Everton pulled back the hammer smoothly, cocking the long barreled .455 Webley.

  Steve shook his head in exasperation. “I go out that door, you’ll shoot me; I stay here, we all drown!”

  The captain couldn’t hear him, just as he hadn’t heard Foster or Woods. “I’m warning you, mister!”

  Steve glared at him for another second and Foster held her breath, wondered if she could make it to Everton in time; a step and a jump, he wasn’t looking at her . . .

  Steve turned and grabbed for the door just as the Sea Star was pitched forward suddenly, throwing them all across the bridge.

  Foster hit the console, bounded off into the same railing that caught Everton; she heard Woods trip and fall behind them. Steve was tossed against the side of the stairwell and came up fast, ready to charge the captain.

  They all heard it then, the whiplike, springing thwapp of cabled steel snapping.

  Foster looked through the storming night and saw the shredded cable give, lash across the top deck to tear out more of the safety railing and knock the cheap aluminum lifeboat off its mount. The small boat was immediately torn away by the storm—and the heavy barge disappeared behind a swell, lost from view.

  Seconds ticked by and the Star kicked up, gave them all a clear view of the cargo barge as it slipped beneath the waves. Everton’s obsession was gone.

  For a moment, nobody spoke, all of them staring out at the vast and blustering sea. Foster could feel the change, imagined they all could—the Sea Star had more power, had lightened suddenly and smoothed in the turbulence. The waters were still rough, but without the drag of the container barge, their chances had improved about a hundred percent.

  Foster looked at Captain Everton, who dropped his gaze to the revolver in his hand as if he didn’t understand how it had gotten there. After a moment, he eased the hammer down and reholstered the weapon.

  Steve stared at the captain, his eyes bright and flashing with anger. “Let me tell you something,” he said softly, and took a menacing step towards Everton, hands tightening into fists. “If you ever pull a gun on me again, I’ll . . .”

  “You’ll what?” said Everton, but the fight had gone out of him. He seemed defeated, his shoulders slumped.

  Foster moved past the captain and took Steve’s arm, pulled him back towards the ladder. Everton still had the weapon, and the tempers were too high, the storm too strong, for them to lose their engineer.

  “You figure it out,” said Steve, but he let Foster lead him, still glaring at Everton.

  “Stand your station, Foster,” said the captain, but it came out bluff and weak; she ignored him. Getting the engineer off the bridge, getting herself off the bridge, was more important right now. Woods had the coordinates; let him deal with Everton.

  She watched Steve go down and then started after him, suddenly more tired than she could remember being in years.

  Everton watched them leave, watched Foster defy him openly, and then turned to Woods. The helmsman wouldn’t meet his gaze, but Everton was too angry to care.

  “Woods, enter in the ship’s log—oh four hun
dred hours, Captain Robert Everton jettisoned cargo barge to preserve the lives of Sea Star crew. Captain was unaware of impending typhoon conditions, owing to the failure of meteorologist and navigator Kelly Foster, female, to inform.”

  He turned back to the window, saw only simmering water where his future had been, and felt the anger die. It didn’t matter anymore, none of it. They could all go to hell.

  Woods cleared his throat nervously. “Captain, what about Foster’s idea? We can reach the eye . . . Captain?”

  Everton stared out at the ocean, the massive swells whipped into foam by the winds, torn apart and then rising again, endlessly. After a while he heard Woods make the changes that would take them to the eye, and that didn’t matter, either.

  . . . gone, gone, gone . . .

  He stood there for a very long time, Captain Everton and the sea.

  • 4 •

  “It’s comin’ in faster than it’s goin’ out,” said Squeaky, and Steve sighed and nodded. Even with the pumps on full, the level in the engine room wasn’t dropping. It had been hip-deep an hour ago and now it sloshed against Steve’s navel. Water shot out of the open deck hatch, the hum of the pumps’ generator the only mechanical sound in the eerie quiet of Leiah’s bizarre, unblinking eye.

  They’d made it just before dawn, broken through the eye wall in a final, frantic push and been received by a strange and unreal calm. When the sun had come up, Steve had taken five and gone out on deck for a long look; he’d never seen anything like it.

  The Sea Star floated gently a few miles in front of a solid bank of fog, thick and swirling. The fog extended out and around in a curve, blocking much of the eye from view; beyond was the storm itself, impossibly tall walls of dark and solid driving rain. The sea pitched mildly beneath the tug, under a ragged but distinctly circular patch of clear morning sky overhead. They were in the vacuum caused by the wildest of the gusting winds, the eye wall; Leiah raged on, but the Sea Star was in a soundless, pressurized pocket, only the lap of water against the hull and the soft noises of human beings at work in the still, moist air.

  Steve was exhausted and frustrated and extremely goddamn cranky. Having his balls immersed in murky salt water was certainly helping to keep him awake, but did nothing for his state of mind. The engine room was flooded, the marine diesel shut down and half submerged, along with him and Squeak—and the pumps weren’t enough, not anymore. The Sea Star had taken too much damage as she’d made her thrashing way through the storm; tiny holes in the hull had been battered into rips and tears that seeped unseen. Already she sat too low in the water.

  All thanks to the good captain . . .

  Foster had given Steve an earful when they’d gotten below, away from that crazy fuck; he was still fuming.

  Squeaky was already gathering his scuba gear for an outside look, sloshing through the room to pick up a tank. Steve shook his head, wondering if the others had any idea how bad it really was; they were screwed, no two ways about it. If they couldn’t patch it over, the ship would sink.

  “How could we be so stupid to sign up with this guy again?”

  Squeaky shrugged. “The fucker pulled a gun on you? I’da decked him.”

  Steve wished he had. “The bastard had us pullin’ five hundred tons of steel and lumber, uninsured, a hundred miles from any normal shipping lane in a typhoon. Our helmsman’s a weasel, our navigator’s a . . .”

  Squeaky grinned and muttered something in Spanish; Steve only picked up “hot” from the Cuban vernacular.

  Steve scowled. “Ah, she got drummed out of the navy for striking a superior officer—”

  He broke off, realizing that he’d just been thinking about doing pretty much the same thing. He looked around and shook his head again, not wanting to talk about Foster anymore.

  “I can’t believe this,” he said, and hoped that Squeaky wouldn’t notice the change of direction; he kind of liked Foster, or at least didn’t dislike her, and Squeaky would tease him mercilessly if he knew it.

  Squeaky was still smiling. “So Foster has a problem with authority; you’re not the coolest cucumber either, Steve.” He picked up his tank and heaved it out of the hatch as he spoke. “But I’ll tell you this, this is the last time we work for percentage of the cargo instead of a salary.”

  Might be the last time we do anything, Steve thought, and then boosted himself up after Squeaky to find out for sure. With any luck, they could fix the problem and make it out Leiah’s other side. If it was as bad as it seemed right now, though, not getting paid was going to be the very least of their troubles.

  Foster stood out on the jutting wing bridge with Richie, the two of them inspecting the damage to the radio system in the heavy, strange air. The long-range antenna had been snapped off almost at the base, which was bad enough—but the coupler had also shattered into multiple pieces, and that meant rigging a replacement wasn’t going to happen.

  On the top deck below them, Steve was helping his partner into a dive suit and Hiko was busy with a torch, leaning against what was left of the safety railing. Woods had crashed for a short spell and Everton was nowhere in sight; she hadn’t seen him in over an hour. Rays of sun pierced through the fog, made the scene look almost peaceful; a day of hard work on an ocean tug in the tropics . . .

  Richie stared out past the men, his dark features intent as he studied the silently raging storm beyond. He’d made it clear that he didn’t want to talk to her, ignoring her attempts to start a conversation; maybe this was an opening. In spite of her irritation with the sullen attitude of the crew, she was tired of feeling like an outsider.

  “That inner wall may be as high as forty-five thousand feet,” she said. “The eye, twenty to thirty miles across.”

  Richie seemed interested. “Weird. I’ve never been in the eye of a hurricane before.”

  “Typhoon. In the South Pacific it’s called a typhoon.”

  Richie glanced at her, sneering slightly. “Thank you very much for that,” he said, words dripping sarcasm.

  Jesus, what’s it gonna take?

  Foster stared at him, wondering why she even bothered. He was stoned half the time anyway . . .

  Richie crouched down, scooped up a chunk of the broken coupler, and sighed heavily. “This thing’s history.”

  Foster looked out across the deck and watched as Squeaky plunged overboard, the splash loud in the unnatural quiet of the eye. Steve ran a hand through his thick, dark hair and paced back and forth a few steps, looking down into the rippling water. Tall, but not too tall. Well built, definitely, good-looking in a preppy kind of way—

  She realized suddenly that she was checking him out and turned back to Richie, surprised at herself. She gave it another shot. “Couldn’t you bypass that capacitor, rewire it . . . ?”

  “On an antenna coupler, it’s a resistor, not a capacitor. I don’t talk to you about navigation, so don’t talk to me about electronics, okay?” He stood up, his low words stinging and sharp.

  Foster glared at him. “Could you please explain the problem you have with me? Are you mad at me today, or is this a female thing?”

  Richie’s expression remained blank, his dark eyes unreadable. “No, no, don’t get me wrong, Foster. I love women, I just don’t think they should be on a boat.”

  He tossed the piece of mangled equipment to the floor and started to walk away—then stopped and turned, and Foster could see the anger now, the reality behind his little speech.

  “I know who your father is. We all needed the money a hell of a lot more than you did.”

  Foster called after him as he started walking again, unable to let it ride. “That’s right, Richie, I have a trust fund and a Park Avenue apartment, this is just a hobby! I love this, I love sleeping in a closet and using the head after Woods—”

  She was talking to air, Richie had walked out, headed for the top deck where Steve and Hiko waited for Squeaky to come up with news. Frustrated, she kicked at the ruined coupler, sent it skittering across the board
s.

  She took a deep breath, turned and looked out at Leiah. The raging storm mirrored her feelings perfectly; she’d made mistakes, a lot of them, but it wasn’t her fault that she was an admiral’s daughter, or that both of her parents were successful. And it wasn’t fair that Richie blamed her for it, assuming that she was some kind of debutante just because she came from money.

  Her father’s voice was tough, unforgiving. You gonna give up then, sailor? Throw in the towel because some classist asshole thinks he’s better than you? You have the skills, Kit, you worked hard to get them; don’t let anyone tell you that you don’t belong here.

  “Right again, sir,” she whispered, and let the anger go in another deep breath, blown out slowly. She’d had to prove herself before, and she was at least as smart as anyone else on the tug . . .

  Foster squared her shoulders and headed off to get a cup of sorely needed coffee, which she would drink out on the deck with the others. They didn’t want her there? Too bad; her ass was on the same line as theirs and she wasn’t going to run off crying because Richie or Everton or any of them didn’t like it.

  I am woman, hear me roar—or get the fuck out of my way, she thought, and found herself smiling for the first time in much too long. Just let Everton try to ignore her now.

  The captain sat at the battered desk in his quarters and stared down at the clutter, feeling old and tired and more than a little drunk. Papers and photos lay across the crowded desktop, a few words distorted and magnified by a shot glass that was somehow empty again.

  My whole life, right here, he thought miserably. Sitting on my own goddamn ship, sitting here with my whole life right in front of me . . .

  It was pathetic, the small spread of papers that made up who he was. Financial records from the bank that spanned decades, told of every hard-earned deposit and every meager withdrawal—up until the last one, of course. There was a picture of his tiny house in Guam, sold now; not even a place to hang his hat when they made it to land . . .

  “Not gonna make it,” he mumbled, and reached for the shot glass and the half-empty bottle. Whiskey, and not even a decent brand. Everton felt a drunken self-pity well up inside and hated himself for it, which only made the feelings stronger.