The last time she talked to Les, they had just reached Red Sphere and were preparing to drop the EMP bomb. It had to work. She was sick of waiting around and hoping. She wanted to take action.
Her eyes flitted back to the reason the divers were in the cargo bay. The white sheets covering Jed rippled in the wind. She had considered taking his body to the island to bury him, but despite the clear weather and lack of radiation, it was still too dangerous. She wouldn’t risk another attack by some mutant beast.
Instead, they had decided to do Jed’s send-off in the water. It was no different from in the sky, really. When someone passed away on the Hive, they would drop the body from the launch tubes, sending it back to the earth, the way it was always supposed to be.
“We’re all here now,” said Trey.
She turned to see the other divers present in the cargo hold. Trey, Sandy, Eevi, Alexander, Vish, Jaideep, and Edgar joined her in the enclosed space, out of the wind and rain. Katrina laid her gloved hand on Sandy’s shoulder.
The teenage girl had suffered greatly on the journey, seeing her blossoming love destroyed by aberrant evolution in the wastes. Katrina feared she had lost two divers to that hybrid monster on that island. She wasn’t sure Sandy would be of much use when they reached the Metal Islands. Since Jed’s death, the girl had mostly slept.
“I’m not very good at this,” Katrina said. “But I’d like to say a few words about Jed before his send-off. First, though, does anyone else want to say anything?”
“I do.” Sandy wiped away a tear and stepped closer to the body.
“I didn’t know Jed very well when we were younger,” she said. “He was the shy kid in school. Kept to himself. Helped his mom after classes and was pretty much by her side until her last breath. I never heard him talk about his father, who died as a Hell Diver not long after he was born.”
She drew in a breath and let it out. “I don’t know if you guys know this, but he told me something about Michael and Layla when he first volunteered to join the Hell Divers. A memory from when he was a kid.”
“What memory?” Katrina asked.
Sandy cracked a half smile. “He said they approached him and his mom in the trading post when he was about six or so, and they gave him a cookie to eat.”
Katrina grinned. “Sounds just like Michael and Layla.”
Sandy wiped away another tear. “Jed never forgot that. He said it taught him how to treat people. He used that kindness in his own life, and he treated me like he treated his mom. Always looking out for us and making sure we were okay. Giving us the last drink of water or the last bite of food or making sure we were comfortable. I think that’s when I knew I was falling in love with him, when I woke up at night and he was covering my feet.”
Katrina felt the tears welling up in her own eyes. The emotions she had suppressed were boiling back up with the memories of a good man. There weren’t many left in this world, and each loss hurt.
“Jed told me he volunteered to become a Hell Diver because of Michael and Layla, but also because he always liked me and wanted to protect me,” Sandy continued. “And now he’s gone because of me.”
“It’s not your fault,” Trey said. “It’s mine. He would never have been out there if I hadn’t let my guard down on the deck.”
“It’s no one’s fault,” Katrina said. “We’re here because of the Cazadores. All we can do now is avenge him when we get to the Metal Islands.”
“I will avenge him,” Sandy said.
There was anger in her voice. Good. Anger, when managed properly, could be a powerful motivator. At least, that was how Katrina used hers, and she had plenty stored away in the tank.
“He was a good man,” Edgar added. “Ramon and Jed used to run laps in the launch bay. He said Jed was the only one who could beat him in a sprint.”
“I knew his mom,” Eevi said. “She worked as a seamstress. Chances are, everyone here has worn something she made.”
Thunder boomed in the distance, and rain pattered down on the weather deck. The storm was back.
Sandy bent down to the body and tucked a handwritten note inside the sheets. Then she put her hand on Jed’s chest.
“Be at peace,” she said.
Katrina nodded to Alexander and then to Trey, and together, the three of them picked up Jed and carried him to the starboard rail. The cold rain hit them at a slant, and Katrina tucked her exposed face against her chest. None of them were wearing their armor, and now she wished she had at least thrown on a poncho.
Sandy followed them to the rail and helped them lift Jed’s body.
“On three,” Katrina said.
She counted down, and on three, they eased him over the side. All four of them looked down to watch the ocean swallow the body. Bubbles gurgled to the top as the white spot below the surface dimmed and then disappeared.
“Bye, Jed,” Sandy said.
Katrina put a hand on her shoulder again and guided her away from the railing and back into the protection of the cargo bay. Eevi hit the button to close the hatch, and all the other divers but Trey walked with Sandy to the ladder for the upper decks.
He waited for Katrina as the door clanked shut.
“Captain, may I talk to you?” he said.
“Of course, Trey. What’s on your mind?”
He turned to make sure everyone was gone. When the last footfalls faded away, he said, “I’m sorry for letting you down, Captain. Jed’s death is on me, not the Cazadores. That’s why I want permission to take a Zodiac and scout out the Metal Islands before we meet the airships there. We have two days before—”
“No,” Katrina said, cutting him off. “It’s too dangerous, and your old man would kill me.”
Trey stiffened. He stood a good foot taller than she. “Captain, I was actually hoping you would come with me on this recon mission.”
She backed up slightly so she could meet his gaze and confirm that he was serious.
“It would be a great honor for me,” he added.
Katrina had actually considered doing some reconnaissance before the airships arrived, but dismissed the idea as too dangerous.
“I want to surprise the Cazadores when we do show up,” she said, “and getting spotted beforehand is too risky to the overall mission.”
“Ma’am, all due respect, but don’t you think el Pulpo expects us to come? He isn’t stupid, and he’s likely interrogated X and Magnolia, right? He has to know they weren’t out here all on their own.”
She had considered that, too.
Before she could respond, her wrist monitor beeped. She held it up just as a message played over the comms system.
“Captain, please report to the bridge immediately,” Eevi said over the channel. “I’ve picked up something on radar, and it’s heading this way.”
Trey and Katrina looked at each other. He was probably wondering the same thing: Had the Cazadores already spotted them?
ELEVEN
“Take this, and be careful,” Michael said. He lifted the weapon by its curved grip and handed it to Layla.
She exchanged her AK-47, loaded with armor-piercing rounds, for the laser rifle and pressed her helmet shield against his before stepping over to the ladder.
“I’ll look after her, don’t worry,” Les said. He followed her up the metal rungs.
Michael watched from the front of the central structure, standing by a massive steel door warped and pitted from a powerful blast. The concrete walls had collapsed into a mountain of debris that now formed a jumbled apron to the main building.
Rain blew sideways through the translucent hologram standing beside him. Michael couldn’t see Deliverance or hear the whir of the turbofans, but the airship was up there, hovering two thousand feet above Red Sphere and ready to descend at a moment’s notice.
“According to these blueprints, this fa
cility had only three entrances and three exits,” Timothy said, gesturing toward the ruined doors. “This was one of them.”
Michael recalled the blast from the USS Zion that had saved his life and, apparently, destroyed the main access into Red Sphere.
“What’s the other way besides the rooftop?” he asked.
“I’d rather not say, Commander, because it would be highly dangerous. But if you must know, it’s underwater.”
“Well, that’s out,” Michael said. He turned away from the AI and bent down to get his first look at one of the defectors.
The humanoid machine was buried under the mountain of concrete rubble and steel. The “skull” was crushed, and half the chest and torso were also flattened, but an undamaged arm stuck out of the pile, metal fingers reaching toward the sky.
Under the chunks of rock, he glimpsed a laser rifle.
“Oh, hell yes!” he murmured, slinging his rifle across his back. He got down and began pulling away rocks until it was free. Then, holding his new laser rifle, he stood and walked back a few steps to get a better look at the rooftop.
Layla and Les were nearing the top now, but that ladder was in bad shape. Several rusted rungs didn’t look as if they could support much weight without snapping like a calorie-infused herb stick.
“Be careful, Layla,” Michael said over the comms. “Three points of contact at all times.”
She looked down. “You found a laser rifle?”
“Yeah. It was buried, but it looks operational.” His breath caught when she stepped through a decaying rung and fell down a step. Les reached up with a long arm and grabbed her ankle.
“I’m good,” she said.
The two divers kept moving, and Michael let out the air in his lungs, clouding his visor. When it cleared, Layla had reached the top of the ladder. She swung her legs over a parapet wall and brought up the laser rifle.
Les followed suit, and both divers disappeared from view.
“See anything?” Michael asked over the comms.
He heard crackling, then a reply from Layla. “All clear up here. We’re headed toward the hatch.”
Michael went back to scanning the piers for contacts. The ship where Erin died was docked to the left. More debris littered the pier. Erin’s blood had long since washed away in the rain and the surf that pounded the edges of the docks.
Michael blinked at the view, remembering the young diver’s courage. She had saved him that day by laying down supporting fire, paying for his life with hers.
Standing there, waiting, Michael realized how lucky he was to be here, even without his arm. So many divers had perished over the years, trying to keep the airships in the sky, and now he just might have a chance to see something none of them had ever seen: habitable land.
He brought the laser rifle up in his left hand, as ready to fight as a one-armed diver could be. It wasn’t just the killer robots that had him on edge. Sea monsters lived in those cold, dark depths.
Holding the weapon one-handed, he felt its weight. Within a few minutes, his arm was shaking. But it was the phantom pain that finally made him sling the laser rifle and grab the stump under his shoulder pad.
“Commander, are you okay?” Timothy asked.
It was so bad, Michael could only grit his teeth in reply.
“We got the hatch open,” Layla said over the comms. “I’m taking a look to see if the entrance is blocked here, too.”
“Layla …” Michael groaned. “Wait …”
“Tin?” she replied. “Tin, is everything okay down there?”
He closed his eyes as a drop of sweat raced down his forehead.
“Long, deep breaths may help,” Timothy said.
Tell me something I don’t know.
Dr. Huff had given Michael several pain-managing techniques, and he really didn’t need the AI to repeat them now.
“Timothy, what’s going on down there?” Les asked.
“Michael is experiencing some phantom pains and has asked you two to wait before going inside.”
“Roger that,” Les said. “Standing by.”
Lightning bloomed inside the line of bulging clouds to the west as Michael opened his eyelids. The pain finally faded with the blue residue of light.
“Sorry,” he said. “Layla, I want you to send in the drone before you go down. Okay?”
“Two steps ahead of you,” she said. “I’ll run the feed through our wrist monitors.”
Michael held his wrist monitor up as it connected to the feed. A fuzzy display came online as a remote-controlled drone whirred into the opening and down another rusted ladder.
The small aerial robot’s light captured the concrete passageway and steps. It didn’t go far before hitting a blockage of debris.
“Damn,” Layla said. “You see this, Tin?”
“Yeah.”
Michael cursed under his breath and pivoted to Timothy. “Where’s the other entrance?”
“I’ll show you,” he said.
Layla and Les climbed down from the ladder and rejoined Michael and the AI. He waved a translucent arm, and the divers filed in behind him, weapons up, and moved around the main structure.
Wind and rain slammed into them as they made their way out onto one of the piers stretching away from the central platform.
“Where are we going?” Layla asked.
Timothy walked past the rusted hull of a fishing boat. “To the other entrance—or exit, rather,” he said, pointing with his hand.
Layla looked over her shoulder at Michael, who shrugged back at her. Les had his rifle shouldered again. The barrel wasn’t pointed at the pier or even the boats, but at the water.
“I have a bad feeling about this,” he said over the comm.
Timothy stopped at the end of the pier, his hologram standing at the edge. Water slurped against the side, splashing through his legs.
“Beneath each of the piers is a hatch,” Timothy said. “They were meant to be exits in case of an emergency. They were designed to be escape only, and not an entrance.”
“But you just said a few minutes ago it was an entrance,” Michael said.
“This one is.” Timothy looked down into the water. “The hatch was used in one of the videos I downloaded from Dr. Julio Diaz’s team. Check your wrist computer and I will play it for you.”
The feed came online. In it, a man crawled through a tunnel.
Flashlight beams flickered through the space, hitting the feet and legs of the man ahead. A trail of blood streaked across the floor from his tattered boot. He turned, wearing a mask of horror. Despite the blood smeared on his cheeks, Michael recognized Dr. Julio Diaz, who had once run the labs at Red Sphere.
“Hurry,” Julio said. “We’re almost there.”
“They’re inside,” said a female voice.
The same person who apparently was taking the shaky video turned and looked behind her. An orange glow flickered at the end of the passage, and an electronic wail echoed.
The woman turned back to Julio, who had stopped ahead. He punched at a keypad on the wall, then bent over a large spoked wheel. Grabbing the sides, he tried to spin the hatch open.
“Dana, it’s stuck,” Julio said. “I can’t get it.”
She squeezed beside him to help, and the camera angle went awry, providing a jerky view of the floors, ceiling, and then the tunnel, where the orange light brightened. In the glow, a defector moved on all fours like a dog, its hyperalloy exoskeleton clanking.
“Hurry!” Dana said.
A cracking noise sounded, and she pivoted back to Julio, who finally managed to unseal the hatch.
“You go first,” he said, backing away.
She went to move when a bolt flashed by her, hitting the ceiling. Hunks of shrapnel rained to the floor. Another bolt cracked, and blood spattered the wal
l.
Julio let out a scream. The camera dropped to the ground, the angle giving Michael a perfect view of Dana, or what remained of her. The female face, identifiable only by the long hair, had a sizzling hole where the nose and eyes had been.
“Dana,” Julio stuttered. “Dana, no …” He crossed his chest and whispered something about God, then dived through the open hatch. Water splashed up into the blood-stained passage.
The clanking of metal limbs followed, and a moment later the machine reached Dana, grabbing her by the leg and pulling her away from the camera that continued shooting the ancient feed.
It lapsed into white noise on their displays, and the divers all looked up, their visors turning to one another.
“That was the last transmission Dr. Diaz ever made,” Timothy said. “I have no idea what happened to him, but apparently he was able to open the hatch right below us.”
Michael stepped over to the edge of the water.
“Be careful, Commander,” said the AI. “There’s no telling what kind of beasts lurk down there.”
“Can you do a scan from Deliverance?” Layla asked.
“I can, but the ship will need to descend into range.”
Michael looked up at the sky and then gave the AI a nod. The turbofans whined overhead, and the thrusters fired, purple flames streaking through the dark clouds.
“Here she comes,” Les said.
The airship’s belly and turbofans broke through the bottom of the bowl of clouds.
“Scanning now,” Timothy said.
Using his night-vision goggles, Michael searched the water for fins or any movement along the dock but saw nothing.
“I am not detecting any organic life-forms, or anything to suggest the defectors have come back online,” Timothy reported.
“You’re sure?” Layla asked.
“One hundred percent.”
Hell Divers V: Captives Page 13