by Anna Burke
Kraken unlocked the hatch slowly. It swung inward, switching on the automatic lights in the hold and temporarily blinding our uninvited guests. I couldn’t see much from my vantage point, but from what I could hear of the skirmish, the stowaways had not been expecting a band of fully armed Mercs.
Kraken fought silently. Jeanine laughed, once, as if something had surprised her, and after a few moments Orca let out an explosive curse. Whoever she was fighting grunted in satisfaction.
My hand spasmed on my knife. I knew that grunt. I tripped over my feet in my haste to rise and stumbled into the room, ignoring Finn’s startled look.
Standing before me, giving Orca as good as she got, was Harper Comita.
“Wait,” I shouted, stunning my crew, Harper, and the lanky SHARK with her into temporary stillness.
“Rose?” Harper asked, sounding as incredulous as I felt.
“You know her?” Orca rubbed her shoulder, staring at Harper with a mixture of respect and frustration.
“Yeah, I know her,” I said, and then Harper jumped into my arms and hugged my head so tightly I worried it might implode. When she was done squeezing the life out of me, she dropped to the ground, leaving bruises on my hips from the force of her grip.
“What the hell happened to your hair?” She reached up and touched my curls, and I got my first good look at her in weeks.
Someone, or several someones, hadn’t been treating her very nicely. She sported faded bruises on her cheeks and arms, and her wrists were ringed with red marks that looked like rope abrasions.
That still didn’t explain what Admiral Comita’s daughter was doing in the middle of the Gulf of Mexico, fleeing an Archipelago mining station in a drifter tub.
“What are you doing here?” I asked.
The SHARK did not look nearly as overjoyed to see me as Harper. I didn’t recognize him, which wasn’t surprising, and at any rate his attention was fixed on Kraken.
Not that I could blame him. Kraken’s shirt was off and his tattoos writhed in the light, an effect that was disturbing enough even if you were used to it.
“It’s a long story,” she said, running a hand through her tangled hair. “You got any rum on this thing?”
“Hold up,” Orca said, taking a menacing step toward us.
Harper stepped in front of me, her familiar shoulders shielding me from harm, as she had so many times before.
Orca stopped her advance, more surprised than anything at Harper’s protective snarl.
“I’ve known Harper since I was a kid,” I said. “She’s all right.”
“Like hell she’s all right. She’s a goddamn stowaway.”
“Well, now she’s our stowaway. Just hear her out. Please.”
The word hung between us.
Orca’s scowl deepened.
“You were offering me rum,” Harper prompted, shifting her posture from Ready to Kill to Casually Gorgeous.
There was no way Orca could have prepared herself for Harper Comita, I reflected, biting back a smirk. Harper’s charm, when she chose to employ it, was just as vicious as her right hook.
“I should have let Annie drown you,” Orca said, shaking her head as she gave in.
I didn’t miss the sideways glance she shot at Harper.
For her part, Harper clung to me as we escorted her to the common room, but not before Orca bound the SHARK’s hands behind his back. Courtesy did not outweigh precaution.
My body objected to the idea of rum so soon after waking up. I stuck with my tea as Orca poured a measure for herself and Harper. I couldn’t take my eyes off my best friend. Seeing her here, in the midst of the once alien surroundings I had grown to love, was more confusing than I cared to admit. I saw them through Harper’s eyes— cramped, rough, and more than a little grungy. The familiar feeling of displacement I had felt on North Star overwhelmed me, and I clutched to the scarred table for support.
Harper seemed totally at her ease, lounging in her chair and knocking back drinks with her usual enthusiasm. Questions queued in the back of my throat. Orca was acting captain, however, and so she got to call the shots.
“Who are you, and how do you know my navigator?” she asked Harper.
My navigator? I thought irritably. Like hell.
“I’m a fleet engineer,” Harper answered. “I served on North Star with Rose.” I took note of her caution. She did not mention her mother.
“What are you doing on my ship?”
“I thought you were drifters. We’d been waiting for a chance to get out of the mines. You seemed like our best bet.”
“Any chance they’ll realize that you’re missing?” Orca gestured to Finn, who vanished, probably to check the sonar.
“Not any time soon,” Harper said. Her eyes flickered toward me very briefly, and my stomach clenched. She was lying. “Rose, what are you doing here?”
“It’s a long story, too. This is Orca, first mate, and Kraken, Jeanine, and Finn. Jeanine’s the ship mechanic, Finn handles communications, and Kraken . . .”
“I’m the cook,” he said with a smile that, to Harper’s credit, did not seem to faze her. I tried not to roll my eyes.
“You’re really sailing with them?” Harper looked incredulous.
“I’m navigator for Captain Miranda, of the Man o’ War.”
I emphasized Miranda’s name very slightly, hoping Orca would notice. The memory of Miranda’s face sent a stab of pain through my chest, and I regretted my petty impulse.
“That’s not—” Harper broke off her thought, but I was pretty sure I could fill in the blanks. That was not what Comita had told her.
“Does your mother know where you are?” I asked her, changing the subject.
“Specifically? No. But by now she’ll have an idea. I was on a routine jump to Ursa Minor to fill in for their engineer when we were intercepted.” Her face darkened at the memory.
I hesitated. I could not let Orca return Harper to the station and Ching Shih for two reasons. One, she was my best friend. Two, she was Admiral Comita’s daughter, and a valuable hostage. I didn’t want to think about what that would do to Comita’s plans.
I knew very well what it would do to ours. If Ching’s sailors had even the slightest idea who Harper was, then they would go to great lengths to keep her captive and alive. That was bad news for us. We needed to get away from the mine, and fast, and to do that I needed Orca on my side. I had to hope the truce we’d drawn between us counted for something.
I weighed my options. If I told Orca the truth about Harper’s heritage, she would rightly overrule me, and return Harper or risk blowing not only our cover, but Miranda’s as well. If I kept with Harper’s story, on the other hand, I would need to come up with a very good reason to get us out of Dodge, fast.
“Orca, can I talk with you?” I asked.
Orca sighed and followed me out of the room, leaving the more than capable Kraken and Jeanine to keep our unexpected visitors subdued.
“We’re taking them back.” She crossed her arms over her chest, anticipating a struggle. “Your little friend jeopardizes everything.”
“Not necessarily,” I said, thinking quickly. “Harper isn’t a high-value hostage. They’ll search the station first, which will buy us some time, and we can’t have been the only ship to dock there in the last few days. If anything—” I paused, not quite able to believe what I was about to say. “If anything, we can give them the guy and stow Harper in the bulkhead, like you did me.”
“Or I give them you and your fleet friends and call it a day. You would risk your Archipelago for one engineer?” She stared at me, evidently surprised.
“Yes,” I said, blinking back tears of frustration. “I honestly don’t give a shit about the rest of them.”
Orca opened her mouth, then shut it.
“What about Miranda?” she asked. “Do you give a shit about her? What do you think Ching would do if she finds out Miranda’s navigator and first mate went rogue?”
Her c
hoice of words made us both wince.
“Mayday.”
“What?”
I grabbed Orca’s arm, bringing her close enough that I could see the green flecks in the gray of her irises.
“We send out a mayday. We’re close enough to the coast that I can keep us hidden. If they think we’ve sunk, they won’t come looking, and they won’t find anything even if they do.”
“I am not sending out a mayday—”
“Orca!” Finn’s shout drew us both back into the common room. Finn’s face was white. “We’ve got trouble coming in hot.”
“What kind of trouble?” Orca asked, giving me a baleful glare.
“The kind with lots and lots of tentacles.”
“What?”
“Shoal of giant ass squid heading straight for us.”
“Neptune’s balls. Rose, get us the hell out of here.” Orca shoved me toward the helm, leaving Harper’s fate to chance.
Giant squid were a submersible’s worst nightmare. Their numbers, unlike the rest of the ocean, had risen over the past few hundred years as they adapted to the changing fisheries and rising toxins. They had also developed a species-wide hatred of smaller submersible vessels, and a shoal of angry squid could wreak havoc on a trawler like ours. Mostly, they avoided vessels, which made the instances where they didn’t sound like the stuff of legend.
That didn’t make those ships any less sunk.
I flung myself into my seat and felt for the currents. We could move faster than the squid, thanks to the W5000 engine I hoped Jeanine was engaging right that second, and we were close to the shallows, where they would not want to follow. Even so, it would be a near thing.
The sonar blinked steadily at me as more and more shapes jetted up from the deeps. The trawler’s bow lights flickered as the first few squirted jets of blinding ink. Luckily for everyone on board, I did not need sonar or a line of sight to navigate. I turned the trawler toward the drowned shores of Florida and tried not to flinch every time I felt the thud of a soft body colliding with the trawler.
I engaged the other engine. Nothing happened. More ink exploded outside, and tentacles slapped across the plastic. They couldn’t do much to a heavily built trawler besides damage the trawl itself, but they could throw us off course, which was deadly enough in these waters.
They were also just plain terrifying. A beak scraped across the plastic window, appearing through the inky cloud like an avenging angel. I closed my eyes and held our course, mentally cursing Jeanine’s slowness.
The trawler bucked and rolled as the engine fired into life, spurting us forward and plastering the body of a squid across the helm. Its huge eye stared at me, unblinking as I wrestled with the trawler, veering toward the coastal shelf at speeds no sane skipper would knowingly condone.
Orca joined me shortly after we broke free of the shoal with a strange look on her face.
“Your friend just saved our asses,” she said, sitting down more heavily than usual. “Damn W5000 wouldn’t start for Jeanine.”
“Harper loves that model,” I said, putting the trawler in a slight spin to dislodge our external passenger.
“I sent the mayday.”
“What?” I overcorrected in shock, sending several objects sliding around the helm.
“I said I sent the mayday. Anyone coming to rescue us will find these bastards and assume the worst.” She curled her lip at a passing squid. “Are these mines really worth it?”
“Thank you,” I said, ignoring her last comment.
“Don’t thank me; thank your friend. She’s useful. Decent fighter, too. How long have you known her?”
“Most of my life.”
“And you still can’t fight for shit?” Orca shook her head in disgust. “You are a constant disappointment.”
“And to think, for a moment there, I was actually starting to like you,” I said, steering us toward the hidden perils of the coast.
West
Captain’s Log
First Mate Orca
Sea Cat
August 12, 2513
26.2, -91.4°
First mate here. The mission has been compromised. We have two stowaways on board, an Archipelago fugitive who knows the navigator, and a Polarian SHARK with a death wish. The only reason he is still alive is that I think we might be able to use him as bait, but if he thinks I will let him get away with his untouchable superiority for much longer, he’s got another think coming.
The fugitive, I have to admit, is useful. She is some sort of fleet engineer, and she got us out of a bind with the retrofitted W5000.
Not that any of this matters, since we are all going to die.
Captain, if you find this log, I want it stated on the record that I have serious misgivings about sailing this close to the coast. Your navigator is good, but everyone makes mistakes, and one mistake out here and we’re squid food. That’s if Ching Shih doesn’t get us first.
Speaking of squid, a school of them nearly took us out. They shouldn’t even be this close to the shelf. Nasty fuckers. See attached official report for details.
Remember the day we met?
I know this is an official log, and a breach in protocol, but I put our odds of survival at thirty to one, and the chances of you finding this log even slimmer, as if I do survive the first thing I will do is destroy it myself.
It was January, and cold. When the ship surfaced for too long, the deck iced over, but you still preferred to take Ching’s readings topside.
I never told you that I asked Janel to switch her shift with mine that day. She was happy to stay below. I think it was sleeting. Anyway, I wanted to meet you. I wanted to see why Ching Shih had made you first mate, when there were plenty of other sailors who wanted the job badly enough to kill for it.
Did I ever tell you that I had to knife Nicolai? He recovered, but he didn’t wait outside your room anymore, after that. You’re welcome.
You weren’t what I expected. You were rude, for starters, but not like the Archipelago captives I’d seen before. You just didn’t care. I could have been Davy Jones himself and you wouldn’t have looked twice at me while you were topside. The crew were all full of how promising you were, this Archipelago rebel warrior goddess with your stupid blue eyes.
I just thought you were a bitch. You didn’t even ask my name.
I didn’t push you. I swear to Neptune it was the wind. You shouldn’t have been that close to the edge, not with a Nor’easter ripping toward us and the ship waiting for your skinny ass to get below deck so she could sub.
You caught yourself on the guard rail, which was covered in ice and sharp enough to make you bleed, but too slick to haul yourself back up with.
I could have let you fall. I might have even if I hadn’t looked into your eyes and realized that a part of you wanted it. It would have been quick, in the winter ocean, not like the swarm we pulled you out of. It might have finally stopped the stings from burning. You were always itching at them, making the scarring worse, so I knew they still bothered you.
I asked if I should help you. I really don’t think either of us knew what you were going to say.
Do you remember what you said?
“You tell me, Orca.”
I told you that wasn’t my name.
“It should be. You’re the best raider on this ship.”
I was so shocked that you’d paid enough attention to me to know my stats that I didn’t answer your question, just left you hanging there.
“So is that a no?” you said.
“If you were meant to drown, you’d already be dead,” I told you. “And I don’t want to spend the next hour explaining to the captain why I lost you overboard.”
I’ve never been that good with words.
The ice had cut your hand pretty badly by the time I got you back on deck. It was an odd cut. I told you it looked a little bit like a Portuguese man o’ war, and you laughed while the spray froze on our faces.
If I die, I want you to kno
w something. Ching thinks she made you, but she didn’t. You made yourself. You owe Ching nothing. You owe me nothing. We live by these stupid debts out here because there isn’t anything else to hold on to, but now that Davy Jones is knocking on the bridge door I’m beginning to see how stupid, just how fucking stupid, it all is.
If anyone made us, it’s the ocean.
I’ve had too much rum. Those fucking squid.
If we die, I’m sorry I failed you. You’re a good captain. You have horrible taste in women, but I guess that’s a bit hypocritical, all things considered, so I’ll try and keep your navigator safe.
You’re a real bastard, Miranda Stillwater, but I wouldn’t serve under anyone else.
I guess I just thought you should know that.
Chapter Sixteen
“Sweet mother of pearl.” Harper pointed out the helm window. “What is that?”
A school of tiny fish parted around the nose of the trawler. Behind them, crusted with algae and toxic shellfish, loomed the shattered remains of structures rendered unrecognizable by time and waves. Turrets of twisted metal and stone writhed from the ocean floor like jagged fragments of broken bones. Kelp waved, concealing more of the ruined behemoths.
“I think it used to be a city,” I said, awe overwhelming caution.
I brought the trawler down a few meters to get a better view. Tumbled stone and steel rusted beneath a carpet of sand and ocean life. Rising seas and storms had done their best to flatten what they could, but the remnants remained, towering around us through the billowing curtains of seaweed.
This was the kind of water that got people killed. One chance encounter with a jagged piece of metal and we could spring a leak, taking on water and toxins faster than we could patch things up.
Orca had deemed Harper trustworthy enough to roam the ship, a courtesy she had not extended to the SHARK, who was kept under constant guard and was also an increasing liability to our sleep cycles. This was the first real chunk of time I’d had alone with my friend. What she had told me was more disturbing than the miles and miles of abandoned coastline.