by Eric Flint
“Why did you ask about prybars, Sergeant?” Franky asked. “You think we might have to pry while it is under water?”
“Maybe not, but maybe so, son. And that’ll probably have to be you; Hitomi’s just too small to be able to pull hard enough to matter. She can crank the block and tackle, though, with the right attachment.”
Hitomi saw the problem with that right away. “But if I’m doing that, Mr. Campbell, then I can’t watch Francisco underwater!”
“That’s the part I’m worried about, yeah, honey. You’ll both be working and there’ll be no one to help either of you. But there doesn’t seem to be any way around it. Once you get tied on, we’ll sure try just pulling it out, but if it won’t move, someone’ll have to be down there to pry it loose.”
“Then I will have to do that,” Francisco said simply. “Hitomi, I will have my lifeline.”
“But I won’t be able to hear you underwater!”
“Without a full-face mask, I won’t be able to talk underwater, either,” Francisco said. “We only have the omnis. Dive goggles should have been on board but we did not find any.”
“Someone slipped up,” Campbell agreed. “If you’ve got rebreathers, obviously you’re assuming someone’s going for long swims and ought to have the other equipment around.”
“There is no point in waiting,” Francisco said after a moment. “Hitomi, we have to get the cable hooked on.”
We’re going to have to go into the water. Hitomi swallowed hard, then forced herself to focus again. Forget the raylamps. Focus on the work. Focus.
Slowly she felt the frantic jig of her mind smoothing out, as she went over the steps—prepare the cable, evaluate the situation, make sure everything is clear, prepare for dive. Finally she turned and picked up the cable and started detaching the extender sticks they had been using to try to move it remotely.
“Check for raylamps,” she said, trying hard to make her high-pitched voice sound as calm and controlled as Mommy’s.
“On it,” Franky said, and in his voice she heard the same determined imitation—this time of both Xander and the sergeant, as Francisco Coronel began a careful sweep of Emerald Maui and the water surrounding her.
Hitomi thought that the number of raylamps had been going down, maybe because all the free food from the flood had started to run out, drifting away or being eaten. Even so, they were still around; not a day had gone by without seeing at least one.
“Time to swap out crews,” she heard Campbell say. “Tav, you stay onboard with your oversight on the kids. Rest of us, let’s go.”
Hitomi could vaguely see the trading of crews in her omni view, but focused on her job. She made sure the rope was ready, then set it down over the rear support; it looked kind of like a hangman’s noose, which was creepy, but she tried to ignore that.
Francisco appeared atop Emerald Maui from the other side. “No raylamps on board. I do not see any around Emerald Maui, either.”
Hitomi swallowed, loud enough that she knew Francisco had heard. “Then…Then we do this now, right?”
“Right. Check safety lines.”
The two checked each other’s lines, tugging hard to make sure they were secure. Hitomi pulled on Francisco’s a second time, just to be certain. She checked that the knife on her hip was secure but able to be pulled out easy. If something bad happened, she’d need that.
Francisco was looking into the water, shifting uneasily. “Remember, take lots of breaths first—”
“I know, Francisco, I swim better than you!”
“Sorry,” he said, looking guilty. “Just making sure.”
“It’s okay,” she said. “I’m scared too.”
Francisco bit his lip, then nodded. “But we go, right?”
“Right.”
“Be careful, both of you.” Mom’s voice was calm but firm, a reminder that even if she couldn’t help, somehow she was still there.
After a few hyperventilating breaths, Hitomi and Francisco dove into Lincoln’s sea.
Everything was suddenly immersed in green-blue, shimmering shafts of sunlight dancing through the faint mist of the sea. Her implanted omni optics adjusted the view, focusing what would otherwise be blurred. Goggles would have been better—they had no idea exactly what might be suspended in Lincoln’s water here—but at least she could see.
She looked down, following the rays of light into the vanishing, unguessable depths, and gulped, looking up again. She didn’t want to think of how far, far down the ocean floor was. She remembered hearing Caroline talking to Mom, and saying she thought that somewhere below them the water turned to some kind of special ice that could only exist kilometers and kilometers underwater. I’m swimming in water almost like a bathtub, and below me are kilometers of water and then kilometers of ice…
She gripped the cable in her hands tighter and kicked hard, pushing forward towards the shard of a column projecting from the engine, Francisco next to her.
The wobbling, soft loop of cable nudged the jagged front point of the column fragment, then stuck; Hitomi yanked it off impatiently, then she and Franky tried to slide it over the front.
A wave above passed over, shoving her forward and then back, just enough to make the loop miss. Francisco’s mouth tightened, but he didn’t change the approach. They shook out the loop, made it open up again, and then started up.
Hitomi paused, feeling the motion of the water, remembering the rhythm. She gestured for Francisco to hesitate, then turned up, watching the mirror-shimmering surface, the waves…
She raised her hand and pointed as another wave approached, then made a sort of looping up-and-over gesture, and by his widened eyes knew Francisco understood. If they timed their attempt correctly, the wave-motion could help rather than hinder.
The wave lifted the two forward, and they pulled the loop with them. It nudged up and over, with the lower portion now caught by the front of the fragment. But Hitomi somehow got a grip on the piece of column, feeling it rough and sharp-edged under her hands, and held on, ignoring the minor pain, as Franky drifted back and under, pulling the loop back.
It’s on! All we have to do is just move it back to the right place! She could see that location, a meter or so farther back on the column fragment.
But her chest and throat were starting to ache from holding in her breath, even as they tried to drag the loop farther back. Francisco shook his head, then waved for her to go up.
Hitomi hesitated, but really, there wasn’t much choice now, was there? She sprang off the fragment for the surface, two meters up, and broke through with a gasp. She took several quick breaths, dove back down; as she reached the rope, Francisco went up. She tried pulling the rope back more, but she couldn’t stay with it; the few moments at the surface just hadn’t been enough.
After two more tries, Hitomi found herself just barely reaching the surface, gasping for breath.
“Stop pushing it, you two!” Tavana said. “You’ll drown yourselves if you don’t take a break!”
“But…the rope,” Francisco said, trying to breathe and look down at the same time.
“It’s on, but not the right place,” Hitomi said breathlessly.
“We saw,” Campbell said. “Good work, both of you. Just take your time. Weather’s good, sea’s pretty smooth, it’s warm. You have time. That column’s plenty rough; it’s caught onto your rope pretty good. I don’t think it’s going to drift away in just a couple of minutes. Take your time, get a breath, look around.”
That made sense. The two of them clung to the support together, letting their breathing slow, occasionally glancing down to make sure the rope was still in place.
“Saw something moving by not far away,” Francisco said. “Didn’t look like a raylamp, though.”
“That’s not all that comforting. You kids get up and have a good look around before you go back in,” Tavana said. “Looks like the loop should stay put for a few minutes at least.”
Hitomi didn’t like the idea of s
omething swimming around that they didn’t know. She and Francisco pulled themselves out of the water and balanced on the tail support. “You want to do the check-around?” Francisco asked Hitomi. “I’ll watch everything here.”
“Okay!” Hitomi carefully unhooked her lifeline and started a methodical round of Emerald Maui. After a few minutes, she paused, looking down from atop the shuttle-turned-ship. “There’s something there, Tavana,” she said, making sure her omni got the image clear.
Tav grunted. A darker shadow was definitely visible under the rippling water, a shape long and slender. “Definitely not a raylamp; wrong shape and too large. Could that be Finny?”
“Wow, I hadn’t thought of that! You think it is?”
Campbell’s voice cut in. “Lemme see. Huh. Sure is about the right shape. If it is, you might’ve lucked out. See if you can get an omni in the water there, but be careful. If it’s not our old friend, something shaped like that might be hungry an’ mean as hell.”
“Francisco, throw me one of the extenders!”
The little pole flew through the air and Hitomi caught it, a casual gesture that surprised her. We’ve all learned to do things we would never have done before. She snapped her omni onto the end, extended the pole to its maximum reach, and slid the omni into the water.
“Good, now turn…too far! Back…”
The shape in the water was still somewhat dimmed by distance, but the long, contoured torpedo outline and the sharp points in front were very familiar. “Looks like one of Finny’s people, that’s for sure. Still, we’d want to be sure it’s one of the ones that attached themselves to Emerald Maui before; they seemed to like us four-limbed types. But one that wasn’t our friend, well, they’re really badass hunters. Saw that up close.”
Hitomi frowned. She knew they’d been able to identify Finny and the others of his…school? Pod? Group, anyway, from details of their markings. But they couldn’t see the markings now, too blurred. “Sergeant? Do you think I could get it to come closer with some food?”
“Maybe. Worth a try. If it is Finny or one of his group, they’ll remember us feeding them a time or two, and if it ain’t, it still might come to see what’s up. Then you’ll be able to get a good look, anyway.”
She went to the top of the shuttle. “You still okay, Francisco?”
“Okay. You are going to get food?”
“Yes. Wait there!”
She slid down to the base of the outrigger wing, then made her way inside. She had to step past Whips’ nanosuspended body, and shivered a bit. Whips, get better. The rations were all in their place; she found some dried capy meat and brought it out, tearing the jerky into little strips.
Climbing back to the top, she quickly located the long, narrow shadow, toward the nose of the craft but now on the outrigger side. Good, I can probably work a lot better from there.
She got down to the outrigger and then snapped her lifeline to one of the loops on the winglike structure. She slung the extender pole over her back, then started tossing little pieces of the jerky into the water, toward the blurred shape.
After the third or fourth piece, she saw the silhouette change direction; it drifted cautiously forward, then gave a short lunge; she thought it must have caught one of the pieces. It seemed to approve, because it started looking for the other pieces.
Great! She tossed them now in a path that slowly drew the creature closer, then, as it began eating its way forward in a leisurely manner, Hitomi unslung the extender and put the omni back into the water.
The creature’s image was much sharper now; there was no mistaking that it was, in fact, one of the same species as Finny. The question was whether it was actually Finny or one of his allies. “Tavana? Is that good enough?”
“Comparing…Merde, no, I don’t think it—”
The torpedo-shaped thing suddenly lunged forward, exploding from the water, shattering the extender and sending the omni flying away. The impact sent Hitomi sprawling—meaning that the thing’s spined front just barely missed impaling her. A tentacular tongue lashed out, scooping up some of the jerky.
Oh no. I’ve, what was it Daddy said, I’ve made an association, made it think of me in connection with food!
She scrambled backwards—and found herself brought up short as the lifeline went taut, still locked tight to the outrigger. The creature slewed around, and she saw to her shock that its fourfold symmetry was distorting slightly, the fins being brought into alignment that made them usable for land-based movement. It rippled forward, the spined tongue whipped out again, and Hitomi heard herself scream as it twined around her left arm, burning and stabbing like red-hot barbed wire.
But she was still focused, and she remembered her preparations. Her right hand dove down, yanked the knife free, and slashed up, almost in a single smooth motion.
The carbonan-reinforced, razor-sharp blade sliced clean through the thing’s tongue, and it recoiled with a bubbling hiss of pain. But instead of backing away, it simply slid sideways, and Hitomi could see it was still intent on her. Maybe it can regrow the tongue? It wasn’t hurt enough?
She had no omni—even if the others were giving her advice, she couldn’t hear it. But she remembered big sister Sakura’s forest walk and her encounter. I have to make it back off. If it thinks I’m scared, it will kill me.
Of course, it might kill her anyway. Behind the focus she could feel terror clawing at her mind, trying to turn her thoughts to screams, and her hand shook; she knew if she did lose that focus, she would be dead.
Instead, she lunged at it, jabbing with her knife at one of the eyes set at the corner of the mouth.
Startled by her motion, it slid back, barely evading the lunge. She wanted to continue the chase, maybe force it off, but she knew she was close to the end of her lifeline. Can’t take the time to unhook it, and even if I did, would that be good? I might slip and fall into the water, and then…
The creature humped itself up, clearly being more cautious but still not giving up. It approached as she backed up, to give herself more slack in the line, then circled to the left. She turned to face it, mouth dry. I’m going to have to charge it before it tries again. I’ll never survive if it does the charge first, it’s too big!
And then the creature whipped around as another figure leapt on it with a scream of terrified fury. Francisco’s machete came down with a meaty chunk! noise like Caroline cutting up a capy carcass, and the creature gave an ear-torturing shriek of pain and anger.
Hitomi charged and buried her knife in the thing’s side to its hilt. Then it tried to spin on her.
The rotation ripped the knife down the creature’s side, and Hitomi staggered, barely holding on, her lifeline going taut with the impact of the thing’s massive strength. But the surgically-sharp blade carved a perfect, deadly path along the thing’s flank, and blood fountained from the thing. With a cough of agony, the long, slender creature reversed course again and managed a sort of eel-like lunge that sent it over the edge of the outrigger back into the water. A dark plume of blood followed it as it swam unsteadily down, and Hitomi thought she saw other shadows moving in the water below.
“Hitomi! Hitomi, ¿estás herido? Are you okay?” Francisco was up to her, eyes so wide the white showed around them. “Hitomi?”
She gritted her teeth as a fresh wash of pain came up her arm, but she remembered how the adults did things, and forced a smile on her face. “Better than it is.”
“Doctor Kimei, her arm, it looks bad!” He looked around. “No, her omni…I think it fell into the water. I can get another of the ones…no, of course, I will give her mine.” He touched his omni twice and then handed it to Hitomi; she felt the new omni connecting with her implants. “Mommy?”
“It’s okay, baby, now that you’re connected I can see,” her mother’s voice said. Hitomi could hear the worry behind her calm words, but despite the pain, she relaxed. Mommy would know what to do.
After a few moments, she spoke, and the worry was far red
uced. “There was a mild venom in the wound, but your nanos have it under control. Same with potential infectious organisms. I’ve tweaked the protocols to make sure they get everything.”
Hitomi could see that the bleeding had already stopped, and made herself stand. Her knees felt funny, like they weren’t really hers, weak and wobbly like a doll’s knees, but she made them steady. “Then we’ve got to get this finished.”
“Hitomi, no, you need to—”
“Girl’s got a point,” Campbell said; she could hear he didn’t like saying it. “They’ve just made a statement to the local predators. Scavengers have something wounded and dying to keep ’em distracted. It’s gone a ways off, so not too near Emerald Maui. If they can get that loop fixed fast, the most dangerous part of the whole game’s finished.”
Mommy was quiet, and Hitomi unhooked the lifeline and made herself walk towards the rear of Emerald Maui. Her knees started to feel more normal.
Finally, Mommy spoke. “I suppose there’s no time that it’s going to be safe,” she said quietly. “Then…all right, you two. First, you need to get one of the waterproof bandage wraps on your arm. Otherwise you’ll be bleeding into the water.”
“I will get one,” Francisco said, and bounded towards the airlock door.
“I know this has to be done, Hitomi,” her mother said, quietly. “And I want you to know I am so proud of you, and of Francisco. You handled that as well as any of us would have.”
“One-hundred-per-cent, yes,” the sergeant said, his gravelly voice emphatic. “Plenty of older people that wouldn’t’ve come out of that alive. You’ve both learned a lot of good lessons.”
Francisco came out and helped her apply the translucent, water-tight bandage wrap. Hitomi did her best not to show how much it hurt, but she felt a couple of tears go down her cheeks. Doesn’t matter. Whips was hurt worse, he kept moving.