The Black River (The Complete Adrift Trilogy)

by K. R. Griffiths

  Soon, the Oceanus would be full of ghosts, but Edgar would be damned if he was sticking around to see it. He'd already seen enough.

  Herb knew what he was getting himself into, and Herb was gone. Edgar loved his little brother, and he could feel the wave of grief washing around inside him, but there was no time to indulge himself in it. Not yet. He had to play the bad guy a little longer, or risk losing two more brothers.

  "Let's go," he said in a brittle tone, and strode towards the exit.

  *

  Steven Vega kicked open the door to what he thought was one of the Oceanus' two small conference rooms on the deck below the park and paused for a moment until he was sure that the room was empty.

  "Inside," he growled, and held the door open while the men followed Ledger's lighter into the dark room. Saunders and Ferguson brought up the rear, hauling the comatose man that Ledger had been dragging when he had stumbled across Vega and the others.

  When they were all inside, Vega closed the doors behind them and, after a moment's consideration, slipped the barrel of his pistol through the door handles to form a rudimentary deadbolt. Any passengers stumbling into the room would doubtless come up with questions that Vega thought would be very difficult to answer.

  In the dark space, the faces of the group of men gathered into a circle around the unconscious body. They almost looked spectral in the tiny sphere of light cast by the lighter.

  "Turn that off," Vega said. "No point wasting the fuel."

  After a moment, Ledger complied, and plunged the room into total darkness. Vega thought it might just have been the first time that Mark Ledger had done exactly as Vega had asked without kicking up a fuss.

  "I think you'd better start explaining yourself, Ledger," Vega said. "You can start with why you're dragging an unconscious man around."

  "Not exactly the hero's welcome I was expecting," Ledger said sardonically, and Vega sighed. For a moment there, he'd almost let himself believe that the situation developing on the Oceanus might have persuaded Mark Ledger to stop acting like a prick.

  "Turns out there was a security issue down in Climate Control," Ledger said amiably. "Though, of course you knew that, right Steve?"

  Vega said nothing.

  "Anyway. Four men, dressed in engineering uniforms, hiding out in the vent system. It looked to me like they were building a device, and that device looked very much like a bomb."

  Ledger paused, as though he expected Vega to snort his disbelief.

  "Carry on," Vega said stiffly.

  "I got out of there, and two of them came after me. I disabled them, and then the lights went out. I'm sure you've noticed."

  Vega ignored the jibe.

  "You disabled them? How?"

  "With my fists."

  Vega heard smugness in Ledger's tone, but also something else: a slight trembling as he spoke the words. He wasn't lying. Despite himself, Vega felt impressed, and was glad the suffocating darkness hid his face.

  "What about the other two?"

  "Didn't see them," Ledger said. "They weren't chasing. Figure they stayed back to make sure the bomb went off."

  "EMP," Vega corrected.

  "Yeah, that's what I figured. Can't think why, though. So I brought our sleeping friend along. I'm guessing he's got the answers. Before he passed out, he seemed willing to talk. Said I had to warn the captain and get him to send out a mayday. I’m guessing maybe it’s too late for that now."

  Vega grunted. It was good work; exactly what he would have done in the same situation, though he could scarcely believe that Ledger had attacked and disabled two men. Didn't think he had it in him. There was no way in hell he was going to let Ledger know that, though.

  "Any particular reason you didn't radio this in at the first sign of trouble?"

  "I did," Ledger snapped. "You didn't respond."

  Vega was about to call Ledger on that particular line of bullshit, when he remembered that he had left his radio in the office while he was in the CCTV monitoring room. He snapped his mouth shut.

  He was about to suggest that they wake the man up and start asking questions when he heard it.

  "You guys hear that?"

  Ferguson's voice.

  Vega didn't say anything for a moment. He tilted his head and focused on listening. Somewhere below the thundering of the blood in his veins and the breathing of the group of men in the conference room, he could hear another noise.

  A noise that defied logic, and made a mockery of the fact that an EMP had been set off only moments earlier.

  An engine.

  Approaching fast.

  18

  Dan exited the security suite, dragged along by Katie's iron grip, and felt his head spinning.

  What the hell am I doing here?

  It had taken several minutes for Katie to locate the cupboard that she assured him held a number of flare guns. The distress signals were, she said, a matter of last resort. Outdated technology, given that the Oceanus had satellite phones and wifi.

  When Dan asked her why she planned to send the flares up if there was another ship out there—a ship that she clearly believed carried people with hostile intentions, her answer chilled him.

  "Because I need to be sure."

  "Sure of what?"

  "Sure that we’re not alone out here."

  The security suite had an outer door that opened onto the deck at the bow of the ship, a narrow ledge behind a railing which constituted one of the few areas that it was impossible for the passengers to get to.

  It was, she informed him, where the security staff took their coffee breaks, and some took lunch out there.

  When the night air hit Dan, he crashed into the back of Katie, who had apparently stopped almost as soon as she stepped outside.

  He didn't blame her.

  It had been dark in the ship, of course, but there had nonetheless been some reassurance that at least he was in familiar surroundings. Safely encircled by walls and a ceiling. In a way, being inside the ship had been no different to waking up at night in a darkened room.

  But when he saw the world outside the ship, Dan felt genome-deep paranoia clutching at him; a swirling, dizzying panic that made his stomach lurch.

  With cloud cover blotting out the moon and stars, and the light that had spilled from the ship snuffed out, the darkness of the sea appeared almost supernatural.

  Overhead, the sky rumbled loudly, making them both jump. The clouds had thickened, and from the sound of it, the storm that was brewing was going to erupt right over their heads.

  For the moment, there was no lightning splitting the dark sky, and the result was that Dan could see nothing. Not a goddamned thing. Just inky blackness that made him feel disorientated and terrified. He froze in place as his lizard brain took control, ordering his muscles to seize. For several long moments, Dan stood like that, staring into a void that seemed to form just inches in front of his eyes.

  Suddenly, it occurred to him just how very far away from safety he was, and how much he had taken the sea for granted. Humans, he thought, as he stared into the vast nothing, weren't supposed to be in a place like this.

  Without the knowledge that there were walls around him, and mindful of the fact that somewhere very close there was a railing and a long drop to the freezing sea below, he felt paralysed by the darkness once more.

  "Careful," Katie said in a breathless whisper, and the note of naked fear he heard in her words unnerved him almost as much as the vast emptiness.

  "I can't see a damn thing," he said miserably, and felt a twinge of irritation at the whining tone of his own voice. Katie was frightened, too; he could hear it in her tone. No longer did Dan have a monopoly on fear. All of a sudden he felt embarrassed by his petulance. Something scary was happening on the Oceanus; something actually scary, not just oh-no-Dan's-afraid-to-talk-to-strangers scary. The young woman at his side was doing a great job of keeping a lid on her fear, presumably because she was a member of staff and he was a passenge
r. Her job demanded that she keep him safe.

  He felt a stab of sympathy for her, and resolved to try to be less of a pain in Katie's butt. When it came to fear, after all, Dan outranked just about everybody. He should be able to help, not be a burden to her.

  Katie was dragging him from place to place ostensibly because she wanted to keep him safe, but the truth, he suddenly realised, was that she did not want to be alone in the darkness, and for that he could not blame her.

  What harm would it do to offer her some moral support? Elaine is safely locked in the cabin, and you'll be with her before you know it. She's probably still asleep.

  Dan clamped his lips shut, and strained his eyes to see anything. He had never experienced such darkness in his entire life.

  "Put your hands on my back," Katie said, and Dan frowned.

  "What? Why?"

  "Because I'm about to let this flare off, and I want to make damn sure you're not standing in front of me when I do."

  Dan gulped, and stumbled forward with his arms outstretched until he felt Katie's shoulders. He rested his hands lightly on them, and felt a burning, squirming awkwardness at the oddly intimate contact.

  "That's fine," Katie said. "Stay there. And squint. When I fire this, it's going to get real bright here for a second."

  Katie wasn't kidding.

  Moments later, the air around Dan hissed into brilliant, searing life as the flare rocketed up into the darkness, scorching a line against the black sky. Dan watched it fly, trying to catch his bearings a little at the brief sight of clouds tinged crimson.

  The flare hung in the air for several long seconds before sputtering into darkness.

  Dan squinted at the dying light, and saw nothing as it faded into darkness once more. Nothing except...

  His eyes narrowed.

  What was that?

  Katie sighed impatiently.

  "There’s nothing," she said, sounding almost disappointed. "Maybe the radar was just acting up after all."

  "No, wait," Dan said. "Fire again. Same direction, but lower."

  "You saw something?"

  "I'm not sure. Maybe. Could just be my eyes playing tricks on me."

  "Hmm."

  Dan heard a click as Katie reloaded the flare gun, and his skin began to crawl. He had seen something. He was sure of it. With each passing second he became more certain that there had been a shape out there on the waves.

  The air hissed again.

  This time, the flare spat out low and flat across the ocean, and Dan watched the burning light reflected on the onyx waves as it passed over them, and then, as his eyes followed the burning trail of light, he saw it.

  His eyes widened.

  "Holy crap," Katie breathed as the flare's light died away.

  "You saw it too," Dan said.

  "A ship. Running without lights." The fear in her voice seemed to have been amplified.

  "Maybe it got hit by the EMP, too," Dan said. "Maybe it's a solar storm after all?"

  "I don't think so," Katie said. "From what the guy on the bridge told us, there was a vessel out there, but it was at the edge of radar range. For them to close the gap this quickly, they'd have to have power."

  Dan felt like his head was beginning to ache from repeated attempts to understand problems that were beyond him.

  "So what does that mean?"

  Katie grabbed his arm, and he felt her nails digging into his flesh painfully. She dragged him back toward the open doorway that led back into the security suite.

  "It means they don't want to be seen," she said, and Dan felt his stomach twist in fear.

  They were just inside the security suite, and about to close the door on the darkness outside when suddenly that darkness disappeared, and was replaced by a single point of light.

  Dan and Katie turned and stared at it. It was distant, and impossible to make out.

  Until it rose into the sky and headed toward them.

  After a few seconds, the sound of the engine was impossible to miss, and the source of the light could only be one thing.

  A helicopter.

  Incoming.

  "Oh, shit," Katie whispered.

  19

  "Wake him up," Vega said, and Mark rolled his eyes in the darkness.

  "Sure," he said sarcastically. "Pass me the smelling salts and—"

  He was interrupted by a sharp crack that sounded like gunfire in the darkness, and it took him a moment to realise that somebody—maybe even Vega himself—had just slapped the comatose man hard enough to make his teeth rattle.

  After a moment, he heard another slap.

  No response from Herb.

  "Does that ever work?" Mark asked with a grin that nobody could see, but he was sure they could all hear.

  "Who knows?" Vega spat back. "I could try and slap some sense into you if you'd like? Call it a scientific test."

  Mark's grin widened.

  "I think you're starting to like me, Steve-O."

  Vega didn't respond.

  "Get some water," he said. "There's a bathroom here somewhere. Maybe dunking him will wake him up."

  "Or he could drown," Mark said affably.

  "Ledger, shut the fuck up. One of you, get that bastard awake by the time I get back."

  "Back?" Mark said sharply. "Back from where?"

  "I'm going to the park," Vega replied. "That engine you can hear? That's a helicopter, and it's close. And getting closer every second. It could be here to help us, but I've got a bad feeling it isn't."

  Mark bit down on the sarcastic response that formed in his mind when he heard the urgency in Steven Vega's tone. The unmistakable note of concern.

  "Ledger, give me your lighter," Vega said, and Mark fished it from his pocket without question. He flicked the flame to life for a moment and held it out until he saw Vega's hand reaching for it.

  For a moment, as their eyes met across the flame, Mark thought he saw a flicker of something pass across Steven Vega's gaze. He couldn't be sure, but he thought it might have been gratitude. Not for the lighter, he realised, but for the fact that he was handing it over without being an arsehole about it.

  He nodded at Vega, and let the flame die as he dropped the lighter into the man's meaty palm.

  "Wait for me here," Vega said. "If he wakes up, get him to talk."

  "Uh, get him to talk how?" Mark asked.

  "However you can," Vega said, and with that, he turned away from the group of men and strode to the door.

  Mark heard him retrieve the pistol from the door handle, and a faint swish as he pushed the door open.

  And then he was gone.

  For a moment, silence reigned, and Mark realised that all the remaining members of the security team were waiting for someone to tell them what to do.

  "Okay," he said finally. "You heard the man. Let's get some water and wake this guy up, and then let's get some fucking answers."

  *

  Vega made it to the park just as the first bolt of lightning sheared the sky, providing a brief moment of illumination for the grateful passengers who had managed to make their way to the Oceanus' central space in the thick darkness.

  For that moment, as the lightning took a snapshot of the ship with a pale blue flashbulb, Vega saw that, for the most part, the passengers were wrestling with confusion and disorientation rather than outright fear.

  The jeering and surprised laughter had died away, and Vega had an idea that many of the passengers had already looked at their mobile phones and discovered that they were as dead as everything else.

  As he moved through a huge decorative archway into the park itself, he heard muttered conversation about the storm; passengers wondering if maybe the ship had been struck by lightning, causing a power surge.

  From more than one group of people, he heard EMP, and knew that fear would replace the confusion soon enough. For the time being though, most of the faces he saw in the park before the darkness returned were all focused on one thing; the same thing that Vega
himself concentrated on: the distant light in the sky that approached, and the hum of the engine that got louder with each passing second.

  He squinted at the approaching light, trying in vain to make out the shape behind it. From the sound of the engine, the chopper was large, but Vega didn't think it could possibly be large enough to carry the requisite amount of fuel for a trip to the middle of the Atlantic. The chopper hailed from a ship, he was certain of it. Only one question remained.

  Friendly or unfriendly?

  Vega had holstered his pistol before he stepped into the park, keenly aware that if any of the passengers realized that there was a man carrying a firearm in their midst—even one wearing a security uniform—it might spook them even more than they already were. He knew only too well that darkness could breed panic quickly, and that panic was likely to be the single greatest danger the passengers on the ship faced.

  Unless that helicopter was as unfriendly as the squirming in his gut said it could be.

  The men that had set off the EMP device didn't trouble him as much as they had earlier: if Ledger had successfully put down two, Vega guessed that they were unarmed. It stood to reason that if you wanted to hunt down a witness before he could escape, you'd send guns after him—if you had any.

  If he was right, that meant that the men who had crippled the boat were tasked only with cutting the power and leaving the Oceanus vulnerable. The real danger would come later.

  Vega had hoped that 'later' would be much later; enough time to give him a chance to prepare the staff, though he had no idea what he might be preparing them for.

  Yet there had been virtually no delay between the EMP strike and the arrival of the chopper. It couldn't be coincidence. Whatever the terrorists had hobbled the ship for, it was going to happen quickly, before the staff and passengers could respond.

  The spotlight on the front of the chopper flooded the park, blinding the people below and making it impossible to see anything other than the vehicle's dark silhouette.