“Go fuck yourself,” Captain said, wheezing for air as Cole wrapped the first tie and pulled it through, zipping it hard and right. He reached for the other arm. Captain didn’t fight back this time.
27
Annica
Ethan thundered down the stairs from the top perch on the yacht. “That was definitely an earthquake.”
“Really?” Annica said. “I didn’t feel anything.”
“Me neither. You don’t feel it at sea. I was watching through the telephoto and I can see the damage.”
“Oh, no . . . How much?”
“Nothing major,” Ethan said. “But I could see it. Windows breaking. Dust rising off the ground. Birds flying everywhere.”
“I’m still listening in for reports,” she said, turning up the radio dial.
“From Jackson?”
“From anyone.”
“Turn it down,” Ethan said. “I’ll radio Jackson right now.”
“Can you try Cole?”
“Does it really matter?” He gave her a blank look, and then said, “Okay, Cole.”
But Annica had gone ahead, herself, reaching for the radio with one hand, the other hand tuning it to his channel. She spoke his code-worded call sign, “Indigo, Indigo, come in.”
But neither Cole, nor Indigo, nor anyone “came in.”
She tried again.
Radio silence.
She slumped back in her captain’s chair and listened to Ethan call in for Jackson.
Finally, a response. But not the one she was hoping for.
“We’re okay,” came Jackson’s staticky voice.
She was hoping for that, of course. She was glad he was okay. But the thought of Cole inside the facility, somewhere, perhaps buried in rubble, perhaps tied down or even crushed . . . It crushed her.
“It felt a little worse than the one last night,” came Jackson’s distant radio voice. “Moderate damage. There’s glass everywhere and definitely structural damage. But I think we’ll be able to get out of here.”
“In the tank, though?” Ethan said.
“Yes, the tank.” He was referring to the garbage truck he and Macy had “borrowed,” driving through the Khan security gate for the usual morning pickup. This morning’s pickup, however, was to be anything but usual.
“We can’t get Team A on the radio,” Ethan said.
“Don’t worry about Team A,” he said. “It’s most likely switched off. They’re in deep.”
“How does he know what to do?”
“He knows,” Jackson said. “He’s always known.”
Annica, meanwhile, had been looking straight out the window to the gray shapes of the coast and the port, the facility, and the surrounding structures. She could almost sense the frenzy of post-earthquake activity. It looked blurry, from a distance, but also perhaps from the chaos.
Cole was in there, too.
Somewhere.
She hoped, somewhere alive.
She picked up a pair of binoculars and focused on the shore and started along the beach, along the rocks to where Team A’s dinghy should have been tied up and waiting.
But there was something different about it.
Twenty minutes ago, Cole and Kalani had left it hooked up, drifting in the water.
Now it was suspended, dangling down the rocks on the rope, and nowhere near the ocean.
“Ethan,” she said, her eyes widening through the binoculars.
Ethan was still talking to Jackson.
“Ethan . . .”
She kept lowering the scope, down to the beach and further back and back, trying to find the edge of the ocean. But there was nothing but dark, wet sand. And the shine of fish, flopping about.
The ocean had pulled back again.
“Ethan!”
28
Cole
He switched on his radio, too loud and for too long, but the last thing he’d heard was Jackson’s status update: “C Team in place. Revert to Primary.”
“What the hell does that mean?” the captain said, his breath still half gasping. “Was that part of your little boy-scout meeting?”
Cole shut the door behind him and then turned back to Captain, who was standing with his hands tied behind his back, standing in the middle of the garbage room. The chute room.
The kill room.
It was where he and Annica had gotten their first proper look at each other, each of them still working for their respective employers. The Cole who stepped into this room today was a changed man, and on the different side of the coin. He also had something to live for.
“Stop pointing that at me.”
“Well, then get in,” Cole said, opening the chute door and pointing in. “Climb right up in there.”
“No.”
“I can always beat you unconscious and then just throw you down there like a bag of garbage. Or like a dead body.”
“Why don’t you throw me down there like your little friend Annica? Send me down alive and well and able to escape?”
“Is that what you think happened?”
“It’s why this is happening,” the captain said. “Isn’t it? Some bitch get in your head?”
“You got in my head,” Cole said. “For far too long.”
“What the hell are you talking about? I got in your wallet. I paid your bills, you son of a bitch.”
“You also sent my roommate to come after me.”
“I did? Who the hell’s your roommate?”
Cole pushed him toward the chute. “Get in there.”
“And why are you kidnapping me?”
“It’s a citizen’s arrest,” Cole said.
He knew that was bullshit. He also knew this was a slight deviation from the plan. Jackson had given strict instructions about a laptop. Not the man who owned it. But he also didn’t plan on hand-to-hand combat and zip ties and an earthquake. It was time to make a big move.
“Go ahead,” Cole said. “Get in.”
“All this because of some stupid bitch, huh? You really think you’re—”
Cole whipped the butt end of his revolver across the captain’s face, his already bloodied nose making an awful crunching sound in the otherwise silent room. The man stumbled backward toward the chute, groaning, his eyes blinking rapidly. His eyes were wider and watering. He turned away from Cole without a word and climbed up into the chute.
Cole leaned in and gave a hard shove. That was the last he’d see of the captain. He’d never seek him out again. He had better things waiting for him. After he completed the last step of the mission. He turned back and looked at the laptop on the floor.
29
Annica
“He just made the drop,” Jackson said over their boat radio. “The target item plus a surprise. A big surprise.”
“What is it?” Annica said, knowing he’d never answer over the radio.
“A big fucking surprise.” Jackson’s voice had a strain to it she’d never heard before. “We’re rolling out,” he said, his communication filled with a loud roar before it cut out.
“Copy that,” Annica said. “Hurry before the wave.”
Jackson didn’t bother answering that one, and Annica had begun to feel foolish for how she’d talked over the radio. She wasn’t accustomed to that, radio ops and feeling foolish. Her world was one of relaxed phone interviews, not the precise language of clandestine agents or radio operators.
Ethan’s voice came from up top. He sounded equally as strained. “I’ve got visual,” he said.
“You see him?”
“I see him,” Ethan said, “in the boat, headed our way.”
“With whom?”
A moment later, Ethan said, “No one. He’s alone.”
She was happy that Cole had escaped alive. But something had obviously gone wrong. Cole should have had at least one other person in his boat. Two if everything had gone well. It obviously hadn’t, and so there must have been some problem with Kalani and her sister. Or worse . . .
She hollered to Ethan, “How does the tide look?”
“It keeps pulling back. Cole had to drag the boat across sand for almost—”
“How far out is he? Is he close?” She couldn’t see him out the side window. It knotted her stomach not being able to see him, not knowing if he’d make it before the wave. “Hold on, I’m looking,” she said, getting up and climbing to the top deck. Ethan handed her the binoculars and she could see him coming in fast, skimming over the tops of waves, the front of the boat tilted up high. Only his head peeked over. His face. “Come on,” she mumbled to herself, and to him. “Come on . . .”
Ethan, meanwhile, was mumbling into his radio about Kalani. Cole wouldn’t answer. Jackson finally did. “Main Control, I have no information on that. Keep the channel clear, please. And keep an eye on that surge.”
The surge. The tsunami. Ethan was supposed to be watching out toward the sea, looking for the first hint of a white line forming across the horizon, a line that would signify the first wave. But he’d been staring back into Hilo the whole time. Annica gave him a stony look, and Ethan hustled to the rear of the ship.
She watched Cole’s approach, seeing his face, the wind streaming back his hair. She heard Ethan say, “Nothing yet. No wave. But I’m sure it’s coming.”
She could hear the growing whine of the dinghy’s engine, how it warbled with each crested wave. And then the throttle backed off, and she could see Cole’s face as clear as ever. He smiled at her, and then swung the boat around to the rear of the yacht.
Ethan hollered to him, “Where are they?”
Annica, already halfway down the stairs, could feel the two boats clunking into each other. “Are you okay?” she called, rounding the side of the yacht. “Cole?”
And then she heard his voice. Thank God. And thank God he was back.
Cole was saying, “They didn’t want to come,” as he crawled aboard.
Ethan said, “What about Kalani?”
“Neither of them. They were talking and . . . having some sort of scene. It wasn’t my place.” He was walking over to Annica, his shoes sandy and soaked. Water squeezed out of the soles he moved closer, making a soggy, squelching sound. There were traces of blood across his face.
“I’m radioing Jackson,” Ethan said.
But nothing could break their eye contact. No outside people or conversation. Cole had stopped just a few feet away. “Are you okay?” she asked.
“I think we did it,” he said. “We’ll have to see about Kalani. But we got the laptop.”
“And we got you,” Annica said, rushing into him for a hug, squeezing him hard.
He dropped his head to the top of hers. He smelled like gasoline and fresh sea life. “And,” he said, “we got the captain.”
There was a clamor behind them. Annica looked past Cole’s embrace to see Ethan climbing into the dinghy. She pulled back. “Ethan?”
“I’m going in,” he said, looking down into the boat, and then to his holster, drawing his gun to inspect it just like Cole and Kalani had. “I’m going.”
“Where? What are you doing?”
“I’m going back for her,” he said. “Kalani. And her sister.”
Cole was looking to the rear of the ship, to the horizon. He said, “You better haul ass to shore.”
“I know.”
“That wave’s coming in any second now.”
“I know,” Ethan said. “Annica?”
Annica was looking too, worried, waiting for the wave. “Hurry,” she said.
The engine started up again.
Cole took a few steps closer to the dinghy. “And Ethan . . . We won’t be here.”
“I’ll see you guys at the rendezvous,” Ethan said.
“You will,” Cole said. “It’s chaos in there, so you should be safe.” He sort of laughed, and Annica appreciated his attempt at levity. But . . .
“The wave,” she said. “We’ve gotta go.”
Walking back toward the middle of the yacht, Annica could hear Cole say, “Get going,” to Ethan. “Full steam ahead.”
“You, too,” Ethan said, throttling up and pulling the dinghy away from the yacht.
Inside, Annica flipped the switch to retract the anchor. It made a low grinding noise that she could hear more clearly as Ethan’s dinghy set off further toward the shore. Then she heard Cole’s wet shoes coming up from behind. And she felt his hand on her shoulder.
She reached for a spoke on the large wooden wheel, and began turning toward the open water.
30
Cole
Cole held the rails on both sides of the steps leading to the top deck. He held them tightly, pausing on a single step as he braced himself against another wave. The yacht slanted back, and then flopped down hard, almost knocking Cole loose. He would’ve been tossed overboard if not for his hard grip on something other than the lump in his throat.
From his observation perch on top of the yacht, he could see a faint white line stretch across the horizon. He saw it unaided, with his naked eyes. That was what worried him the most.
“Annica,” he called, “it’s coming!”
“I know it’s coming!”
“I mean I see it!
“Fuck!”
Her response didn’t fill him with much confidence, a long chain of expletives wafting out from under his perch. “I’ll stay here for visual,” he said, “for as long as I can.” There was no way he’d be anywhere else but down inside the yacht, wrapped around Annica when the wave finally came. He asked one more time, “Are you full throttle?”
“Yes!”
There was something intensely humorous about her frazzled replies, the high pitch of her yelling. So far she’d been doing a great job of holding it together, of steering and powering the yacht, but the stress was suddenly apparent whenever she said anything. It was funny, the whole situation. He never would have imagined any of this to be happening just a few days ago. Back then, he was thinking about becoming one with the waves and ending his life there. Now he just wanted to get over this one, and survive it. And survive, for as long as he could, with Annica. Together.
“I can’t give you a distance,” he called back to her, “or an ETA, but we’re almost on it.”
“I can see that!”
Cole figured it was time to get down inside with her, if she could see the approaching tsunami just as well as he could. No binoculars necessary. It was coming, full-on and fast.
He rushed down the stairs, this time not holding and pausing at the latest wave. In his mind it was nothing compared to what was heading their way. He could hold down and pause for that one. Inside now, with Annica, he could immediately see the stress in her shoulders. Both of them were raised high and held tightly to her head. When he approached from behind to lay a hand on one of them, she flinched like a beaten dog.
“Jesus,” Annica said in a huff of air.
“What are you scared of more? Me or the—?”
“Shhh . . .” she said. “Shh, stop.”
“Okay. Can I help, though? Can I do anything?”
“Shhh!”
“Okay,” he said, trying to chuckle at her to lighten the mood, but it didn’t really come out.
“You can hold me,” Annica said, deadly serious.
Cole said, “Okay,” as he stood behind her chair and wrapped his arms around her as they began their ascent up the face of the first tsunami wave.
Together, as one, they mumbled half-intelligent strings of curse words. The boat kept tilting backward as it approached the peak of a wave that never seemed to end. It kept going on and on and up and higher. Or were they stuck and suspended in place?
They hung there for a moment, halfway up the wave, the engine chugging louder and louder. A vibration shuddered through the boat now and Cole worried the yacht would break in two.
“Oh, my God . . .”
They were just lucky to meet the wave here, out in the ocean, where most of it was still under the surface. He didn’t want to thin
k about how tall it would grow for the shore. He didn’t want to think about Hilo, or how the rest of the team would deal with it.
All he could see out the front window was an endless blue sky.
“Oh, Jesus . . .”
The thought occurred to him that there would be a life after this. Life after death. Perhaps one with Annica.
They crested the wave, the yacht finally leveling off. And then tilting down. A different shade of blue—the open ocean—lay ahead.
31
Annica
Anchored again and in calmer seas, and still holding onto each other, Annica and Cole lay in a hammock stretched across the rear of the yacht. The rhythm of the sea swayed them gently together. They had turned up the radio all the way, and from inside the boat it broadcasted the staticky details of the mission’s latest developments.
“We’re arriving at the bird’s nest,” came Jackson’s crackly voice. “We’re high enough up to be safe from the rest of it now.” He had taken the garbage truck safely out of the facility and then met with Macy and Tucker. The “birds nest” was their own compound, where Mira kept watch. Originally, the garbage truck was to conceal and carry a laptop. Now it had much more important—and perhaps dangerous—cargo.
“Did they put him in the back?” Annica asked, her head resting on his chest, tucked just under his chin.
“Like where the garbage goes? No.”
“Why not? It’s a perfect place for him.”
“I guess they were worried someone might accidentally hit the button,” Tucker said.
“That’s perfect, too,” she said.
“No,” Cole murmured. “You know what’s perfect?”
“This?”
He ran his hand down her arm. “This right here.”
DARC Ops: The Complete Series Page 147