by Greg Keyes
For several long moments, no one spoke. Then Chitto cleared her throat.
“That’s pretty dramatic,” she said. “A little over the top. But if I can put in my two cents here—I’d kind of like to see India.”
“The Ghats are supposed to be beautiful this time of year,” Amar said. “And I have some contacts in the area.”
Everyone looked at Nishimura, who threw up her hands. “The Andes are nice this time of year, too,” she snapped. “But whatever. Bacán. India it is.” She glared around at them. “So who knows how to sail?”
When no one said anything, Sam raised his hand.
“I found a manual,” he said.
* * *
That evening, Amar went back up to the lip of the caldera alone and looked westward, out over the sea.
The sky was unusually clear, and the dark orange ball of the sun was just touching the horizon. He watched it disappear a little bit at a time, thinking about how much more slowly it seemed to happen than the sunrise. The last spark seemed to linger, a tiny ember drowning in the waters. Then, finally, it was gone, leaving the night to the stars.
“Goodbye, Toby,” he said.
* * *
Amar dragged himself up to take his watch. It was midday, and the seas were rough. Sometimes the horizon was only a few meters away as they descended into a trough; when they reached the top of a swell he could see forever. But there was nothing to see except more water.
The temperature was still close to freezing, although they had been sailing northeast for five days. He—like everyone on board—was starving. They had managed to catch some fish before leaving, and they had some rations in their packs. But they had been a lot less successful at finding food out in the deep water.
What was more alarming was that they were running out of potable water—and, for that matter, fuel. The boat was not, of course, able to access any sort of global positioning system. Sam was sailing with charts, a compass, and an astrolabe. Given that this was his first attempt at such a thing, and that the island they were looking for was little more than a big rock, they might have even passed it a day ago.
South America was starting to sound pretty good, although they were way beyond the point of no return on that score.
He peered over at Lena, in her bunk, still asleep. Neither of them had mentioned what had happened back in Wunderland. At first, there had been too much going on, and now there was no chance for privacy. And although it had seemed like a good thing at the time—no, had been a good thing at the time, in that moment—now he wasn’t so sure. Like Sam, he kept seeing Thomas and Toby in his dreams—not as he wanted to remember them, but as he had last seen them. He now believed Lena had not been an intentional spy, but it was hard to put aside the fact that if there had never been a Lena—if she had not left her life in Gulf City to pursue a naive, ill-advised adventure—his two friends would still be alive. They would all be on their way to India, not in a tiny ship designed for relatively short voyages, but in the Elpis. He wouldn’t be freezing and feeling his gut growing tighter every day. He would have fewer nightmares.
Chitto had seen Thomas die as well, and early in the voyage she had some questions about that. Rather than having to explain it more than once, he’d called a meeting.
“Chitto was wondering why I shot Thomas after the Chryssalid attacked. Does anyone know?”
“I’ve heard about it,” DeLao allowed. “I’m glad I didn’t see it.”
“I’ve seen it happen,” Nishimura said. “In Tabasco.”
“Yeah, me too,” Amar said. “Two months in under Thomas, near Jakarta.”
“That’s real nice,” Chitto said. “But I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Amar clasped his hands together. “There is a sort of wasp that injects its eggs into a species of orb spider. The pupae grow inside of the spider, eating away. Toward the end, the spider suddenly starts weaving webs of a kind it never has before, because the pupae have taken control of its nervous system and are forcing the spider to build a web to protect them when they’ve finally eaten their way out. There’s another wasp that injects eggs into a ladybug, and when the larvae come out for cocoons, a virus that also came from the wasp forces the ladybug to stay there and stand guard over the babies. In effect, they turn their hosts into zombies.
“Chryssalids do something like this, but with humans, and they do it fast. The Captain Thomas who stood up wasn’t Captain Thomas anymore. And in another few minutes, a brand new Chryssalid would have clawed its way out of her. So if you can, you don’t let that happen. If one of those things takes your buddy down, the best thing you can do is shoot her.”
Never mind that he still felt sick every time he thought of that moment, of seeing his rounds strike the Chief. It had felt like murder, and to part of him it still did.
But he didn’t tell them that.
That had been on day one. Now, on day five, nobody wanted to talk about much at all. Chitto and DeLao were seasick a lot of the time. Amar usually felt okay on deck but not as well below if seas were high.
He had spent his share of time on the water—in the South China Sea, the Sulu Sea, a bit in the Indian Ocean. But that had mostly been going from mainland to island to island, never that far from land. They had crossed the Pacific stowed away on an automated container ship the size of a small city, and the weather had been tropical to fair. Not until now had he understood how bleak and utterly empty a place like the ocean could be.
CHAPTER 12
WHEN HE FIRST saw Gough Island on the horizon, it looked like a jewel. The sky was clear, unlike their last stop, and it wasn’t covered in snow, but instead shone like an emerald beacon. As they drew nearer, he saw that it was equally treeless, however, its color the result of moss and lichen and maybe a few scrubby bushes. But it was land, and fuel, and hopefully food. They navigated toward where the map claimed the depot was.
As they drew near, Chitto spotted something rising from the shoreline. Amar’s heart sank. It wasn’t a transport. Transports weren’t armed. This was one of the ADVENT’s smaller gunships.
“Well, that was totally worth it,” Nishimura said.
Chitto started firing at the edge of her range. Amar didn’t pin a whole lot of hope on that. She might be a crack shot, but these things were thick-skinned. Maybe if Palepoi could hit it just right with his last rocket …
A red line appeared between their boat and the flier, and the impact hurled them all from their feet. Palepoi toppled overboard, and the boat listed as it started taking on water.
“They hulled us below the water line,” Amar shouted. “They could have vaporized us with a missile. They may be trying to take us alive. Don’t make it easy for them.” He raised his weapon but waited. He only had one clip left and wanted to make it count.
He saw Lena looking at him, and he tried to smile. He wished that they had been able to talk, that he had been able to touch her face again.
Don’t get sloppy, he told himself.
The flier suddenly jerked and spun half-around, a gout of black smoke curling up from it. An instant later, Amar heard the detonation. Then the craft erupted in green and yellow flame, spinning crazily as it sank seaward. It struck the water, stood up on its end, and then hit flat. The water around it began to boil, and just as it vanished from view, seawater rose in a half sphere ten meters high. A moment later, the shock hit them and lifted their little boat, but they were already so heavy from being half-sunken that they didn’t capsize.
Beyond, nearer the island, Amar saw two puffs of smoke drifting off in the wind, revealing the Elpis.
* * *
Dr. Shen looked somehow frailer than when Amar had last seen him, although it had only been a matter of days. But for Amar those days had seemed more like months, and perhaps it had been the same for Shen. In fact, everyone seemed to be affected, so maybe it was because it had been laid bare how precarious their enterprise was, how slim their chances of success. There was the inevitable
debriefing, and condolences for Thomas and Toby. And explanations from Captain Laaksonen. After greeting them, Lily Shen insisted her father retire. He’d apparently risen from his sick bed to see them come aboard.
“The first patrol dropped depth charges on us,” Captain Laaksonen explained. “We released countermeasures—basically assorted junk, which is what you probably saw on the surface. We did sustain damage, however, and Dr. Shen was injured in a fall. That left me in charge, so the decision to leave was mine. It seemed impossible that anyone had survived the fire, and I felt I had to put the Shens and our mission before all else. When we got word that a second strike force was on the way, I believed we should be as far from that place as possible.”
He looked a bit uncomfortable, which was out of character for Laaksonen. “I deeply underestimated your resourcefulness,” he said. “Fortunate that you chose the same destination that we did.”
“It was really the only choice if we were to carry out the mission,” Amar said. “Sam saw that clearly. The rest of us had to be persuaded.”
“You could have abandoned the mission,” Laaksonen replied. “You did not, and for that I salute you.” He quickly changed the subject, bringing a map up on the conference room screen. “The ADVENT put a relatively large amount of resources into trying to find us,” he explained. “The craft we just shot down arrived here sometime before we did. We were submerged, but we couldn’t leave because we needed to refuel—we had planned to do that on Vahlen’s island. As you probably know, the next fuel depot is thousands of kilometers away. In another day, we would have been forced to surface. Fortunately you arrived in time to distract them.”
He traced a rough circle around Vahlen’s island.
“We believe they staked out every rock and atoll within about 2,500 kilometers of here. It is good news that Vahlen escaped, but I fear she may not be safe. Nor can we worry about that. Our task is to vanish again. We will depart as soon as we refuel and resupply, hopefully within the next ten hours. Then we will push on. If you need shore leave, take it now.”
* * *
After nearly a week on a rickety craft, and not knowing when he would be able to set foot on land again, Amar decided a hike was worth doing. The fuel depot was near an old weather station on the southeast end of the island. Two rather dramatic peaks rose farther north, but they were too far away, so he settled on a nearby rise that would afford him a better view.
When he reached the summit, he was a little disappointed to find that Sam had had the same idea. It wasn’t just the view Amar was after, but a little precious solitude.
“Reminds me a lot of Scotland,” Sam told him. “Especially the Isle of Skye. Except for the penguins.”
Amar had noticed a few penguins. These had funny little sprays of yellow feathers that looked almost like hair, and they weren’t in anything like the same numbers as their less showy cousins back on Vahlen’s island. Dozens of other bird species abounded, and what looked like seals sunned on the narrow beach below them.
“How long since you’ve been home?” Amar asked.
“If you mean the town I was from,” Sam said, “it doesn’t exist anymore. If you mean Scotland, I haven’t been there since I was eleven. That’s when Dr. Shen took me on the Elpis as a favor to my father. I’ve been there pretty much since then.”
“Is Dr. Shen okay?”
Sam pursed his lips.
“The Elpis apparently took a pretty hard hit, and everyone inside got shaken up pretty good. He’s got a concussion and a cracked fibula, all that on top of some more persistent health problems. But he’s determined to find this ship. He really believes it will be the turning point for the resistance. For XCOM.”
“Do you?” Amar asked.
Sam shrugged. “I don’t know if will be a turning point so much as a start. We still have a long way to go and a lot to do, even after we find the ship.” He glanced off to the sea. “I appreciate your support back there on Vahlen’s island,” he said. “Without you weighing in, I think it wouldn’t have gone my way.”
“I was trying to think what Thomas would have done,” Amar said. “I think I got it right.”
“Those are big shoes to fill,” Sam said, “but I think you’re up to it.”
For a moment, he didn’t even know what Sam was talking about. Then it sank in.
“What?” Amar said. “No. I’m not a squad leader.”
“Who is, then?” Sam asked. “You stepped up when Thomas died. Anybody could have, but you were the one. DeLao is as experienced as you are, and Nishimura is more so. But you took command and nobody questioned it.”
“All I remember is telling everybody to get in the water,” Amar said.
“Maybe that’s how it started,” Sam pointed out. “But now you’re in charge, trust me.”
“I don’t know that I want to be,” Amar said. He remembered what Thomas had told him, back on the Elpis.
“If I know you like I think I do,” Sam said, “you don’t have a choice.” He stood up. “I’ll make a little room,” he said, and began walking down the other side of the hill.
Amar wondered at first what he meant, but then he saw Lena approaching from the depot.
“Hey, no,” Amar said. “It’s not like that.”
“Look,” Sam said, “don’t be a jackass.” He continued on down the slope.
“Would you rather be alone?” Lena asked when she arrived, brushing a stray brown hair from her face. Her New City hairstyle was becoming not only longer, but more unruly. She looked entirely beautiful.
“No,” he said.
She looked a little relieved. “We haven’t …” she began, then stopped, looking embarrassed. “We haven’t really had a chance to talk.”
“Right,” he said.
“Don’t you think we should?”
He’d tried to get his thoughts on this together. He thought he had, but suddenly he didn’t know what to say.
“I really wanted that,” he finally managed. “To kiss you. I want to now.”
“Why don’t you then?”
“It distracted me,” he told her.
She smiled. “I should hope so,” she said.
“No. I mean that you put me off my game. I should have realized immediately that they found us through you. I should have left you with Vahlen. You would have been safe with her. Then I wouldn’t have had to argue with DeLao, which slowed us down. I wouldn’t have been worried about you during the firefight. Thomas might still be alive.”
“You wish you had left me with Vahlen?” she asked.
“No,” he said. “What I’m saying is that deep down I knew I should have left you there, for all kinds of reasons. But what I wanted was for you to be with me. And that’s what I acted on.”
“But that’s what I wanted, too,” she said. “And I know we’re not exactly even, but I think I saved your life.”
“Without doubt,” he said. “That’s part of the problem.”
“That I distract you? Put you off your game?” she asked, her face beginning to flush. “Maybe in another life?” she went on, hurling his words back at him. “Is that what you’re telling me? If we had met on a dance floor rather than downrange?”
“Yes,” he said. “I guess it is.”
“Let me clue you in about something,” Lena said, stepping closer. “There is no other life. This is it. And do you really think that just because we’re not actively making out it’s going to change how you feel? That you’ll be any less ‘off your game’? Because I sure as hell know I don’t feel that way.”
A little tear began trickling down her face, but her expression was fiercer than anything. He reached to brush the tear, but she stopped him by grabbing his hand.
This is not happening, he thought.
But of course it was, and for a while on that hill overlooking the sea, nothing else seemed to matter but her, and time ceased to pass.
* * *
The Elpis set out in the early afternoon, and Amar watched the
last land he would see for almost a month retreat into the distance and then memory. The prospect of being spotted by another ADVENT flier weighed heavily on them, but without the chip to track them, and presumably having no idea where they were going, the search zone would now spread in a circumference with Gough Island at its center. That made the first few days crucial, and they submerged at any slight indication of something passing nearby.
In a few days, however, with more than a thousand kilometers of open sea between them and the depot, they began to breathe easier. Still, they steered farther south of the tip of South Africa than was likely necessary, and when they put in to refuel at a secluded bay on the coast of Madagascar, Amar used it as a live ammo training session, even though every sensor they had—and the inhabitants of the depot—said there was nothing to worry about.
It turned out, mercifully, that there wasn’t, but it gave the greener troops a chance to learn to maneuver on land rather than on the upper deck of a submersible.
Once everything was secure, it also gave him more time to be alone with Lena, which pretty much never happened on the ship. Even though everyone seemed to know something was going on with them, it still seemed like a bad idea to be obvious about it. She had backed out of the military training, which was a relief, because it reduced his qualms about their relationship. Sam, as it turned out, was right. Everyone seemed to think of him as Thomas’s successor, and he was settling into the part. Being Lena’s commanding officer would be very much a conflict of interest.
Lena began working with Lily Shen instead. She was apparently a quick study, even though her background in science and mathematics was pretty minimal. The ADVENT administration had very little interest in educating the populations of their cities beyond a minimum—and highly propagandized—curriculum.