Midnight Zone: a Cade Rearden Thriller

by JK Franks

  “It was taken the day of the attack at 11:45 AM, local time,” Doris answered. “That was about an hour after the last communication with Captain Nance. There are numerous gaps in coverage of that part of the world. It is usually not an area of much interest. The next image we have is eighteen minutes later from a European satellite.” That image replaced the first one. The image quality was much less detailed and from a very different angle, but the point of her showing it to him was clear.

  “The boat is gone,” Cade said flatly.

  “Yes. We can detect some bits of debris in the general area, but that’s all.”

  “So, we're assuming this is the attack, possibly by the creature in question. But we already know that our people were still alive. Are still alive. I mean, that’s a brutal looking attack, but you do know they're not dead, right?” Cade’s questions started coming at Doris rapid fire. Quicker than she could answer. “I mean, if it's the Saraph, and…and it just ate them, I mean, would the CommDot still be giving life signs from, you know, like within the digestive system?” Cade hated even bringing up the possibility. He’d just all but promised to bring a woman’s son home. A son that had been at the center of whatever happened out there.

  “No, Captain. It doesn't work that way—we would know if they were—if there were any fatalities. Also, the one person that is adrift probably would not have made it either.”

  Something occurred to Cade, something he hadn’t even thought to ask until now. “You know which one is adrift, don’t you? It’s not like you need to speak with them, each of the CommDots is unique to each individual.” Cade knew that was the analyst; Ace always beat him to the obvious stuff.

  “Of course, Captain, that would be Micah. I thought you knew. The Coast Guard should be at his location within the hour.”

  Cade felt one weight lift off his shoulders. “Thank God,” he whispered.

  Rubbing his head, he looked again at Steiger. “You ready, Doris?”

  “I am, Captain. Any specifics you want to know?”

  “Anything operationally important.” It went without saying that included any intel on the creature. “Who hired her, locations, weapons. All of that.”

  He turned his attention to the young woman. “How are you doing today, Steiger?”

  The girl shrugged, then said, “Ok.”

  “You know what this is, don’t you?”

  “It is an interrogation,” she said in a way that was both unemotional and determined.

  “Are you going to tell us what we need to know?” Cade asked.

  “Probably not. But, I don’t know, it depends on the questions and if I feel like you need to know it or not.” She glanced down at the leads coming off her fingers and there was another attached to her temples, but those didn’t have wires attached. “Is this a lie detector?”

  “No,” Cade said honestly.

  “You have people in trouble, people you want to know if you can save,” she stated.

  He sat back and looked at her through the window. She’d obviously been able to read his lips when he was talking to Doris. She was also much more forthcoming today than she had been. Turning around, he looked up, “Doris will it mess up your process if I’m in there with her?”

  “No, Cade, I am already processing volumes of data from her hippocampus and cortex. She is a very troubled young woman, Captain. Truly frightening.” Doris began to tell him, but he cut her off.

  “No, Doris, that is private. That’s between you and her at this point. If she wants to discuss that, it will be on her terms. Do you think you can erase it?“

  “The trauma is very deep and encoded at numerous levels and various centers of her brain, but yes, I see no reason why we couldn’t improve her psyche in many ways.”

  “Would she still be her?”

  “That is a more difficult question to answer, Cade, as you well know. At some point, the program and, by extension, ‘I’ am making a judgement call on where the monster ends and the human begins.”

  “I trust you, Doris, and I think she will, too.” Cade turned and entered the cubicle, pulling a spare chair with him.

  Steiger looked up at him curiously. This man never failed to surprise her in his actions. He was alone, she was only superficially secured, and he left the door to the small room open. She knew he hated her, at least on some level. She had seen the anger in his eyes, but somehow, that person was not the same as the one sitting in front of her now.

  “Let’s just talk,” Cade said. “No interrogation, I failed that class at war college, anyway. Also, I have a feeling you are considerably smarter than I am. No sense in having a battle of wits—I’m willing to concede that point right now.” He removed the leads from her fingers. They had simply been monitoring pulse and oxygen levels, anyway.

  “Vy do you keep showing kindness to me? I killed your friend; I tried my best to kill you,” Steiger asked.

  Cade sat there for several minutes, his face muscles twitching as he considered how to best answer that question. “I don’t know.”

  “You were ordered to keep me alive…for dis probably?”

  “No, I could have killed you. I was well within the scope of my authority and, well, not to put too fine a point on it, but it’s pretty obvious you are just the muscle, the fixer.” Calling the tiny girl ‘the muscle’ seemed ridiculous, but that was the truth. “I think it’s unlikely you have enough information to make you a high value asset. Still, you did kill my friend, and he happened to be a federal officer. That does come with consequences.”

  “And this is vare my consequences are to be delivered. Inside this laboratory?” she asked.

  “Not necessarily, Steiger,” Cade answered. “To some degree, what comes next is up to you. We are not about to torture you, if that’s what you mean. Yes, I can turn you over to the authorities, and most likely, you would never see the light of day again, nor would you receive what we normally refer to as ‘due process.’ Times are tough for America right now. Nerves are on edge, economy is for shit. They may wind up pinning a lot more on you than just that one death.”

  “It would not be inaccurate,” she said matter-of-factly.

  “I imagine not. You’re quite good, and I feel certain your skillset is in high demand.

  I’m not here to judge you, Steiger, or whatever your name is. You have to live with your past, but I think we can help each other.”

  “Vy vould you help me?”

  He realized her German accent got stronger the more nervous she was. “Again, I don’t know. It just seems to be the right thing to do.”

  “Is it vat McTee vould have vanted?” she smiled.

  Rage briefly set Cade’s face afire. How dare she even utter the man’s name? Yes, she’d heard them call him that countless times, but still, it felt wrong. He knew she was testing his resolve; he forced himself to not take the bait. “McTee would have preferred I threw you off an icy cliff as soon as I had you subdued.”

  They sat there looking at each other for many long, silent minutes.

  “He vas a good soldier,” she said nearly apologetically. “Made my job more difficult, he vas almost always in the right position to protect or defend your non-combatants.”

  Cade realized that was probably as close to an apology as he, or anyone, would ever get for what she’d done. He nodded. “He was, yes…thanks.”

  “How can you help me?” she asked. “Pretty sure I am, how you say, ‘fucked.’”

  He leaned back, scratched at the stubble of beard on his chin, and looked at her. For long seconds, he tried to see into the girl. What made her, what drove her to be this way? Mainly, could he ever trust her? “Help me get the rest of my friends out of the Caribbean. Help me get past the Saraph, and help me identify who we’re up against and stop them from whatever is going on. Do that, and I will help you forget.”

  “Forget vat?” the girl asked.

  “You weren’t always this way, were you? You may not have been totally sane, but you weren’t
always a killer,” Cade said.

  “Pretty much vas, yes.”

  The girl was still fucking scary, even when she was making an effort to be otherwise. “We have a therapy program that may be able to help you. No, not maybe…it will be able to help. I’ve used it…still use it.”

  “Is this part of my punishment, lobotomize me, fry my brain?”

  Cade answered, “No, punishment is a separate issue; I can’t comment on that part. Listen, I’m sure you have some very dark parts of your life, parts that probably did a lot in shaping you into this person. My friend here, Doris, can help you identify and dull those parts, or even remove them if you want. She can do it without altering the person you are. She really is that good.”

  “So, I vould still be a killer, a hunter,” Steiger stated.

  “I know what you’re thinking, those parts are probably what make you the best at being a predator. Believe me when I say, it won’t alter who you are. You will still be a killer, although from this point forward, you may begin to feel things for any of those you might kill.”

  A genuinely horrific look crossed her face. He held up a palm before she could speak. “No, those emotions will not extend back to past victims. She can put in mental blocks that disconnect you from most of that, at least on an emotional level. You’ll still remember them if you want, but that’s all, and even that will be your choice.”

  They sat there silently for a much longer time. Doris was continually providing Cade key information, subtle suggestions, and now, a name. Her real name. “Mila, do we have a deal?”

  She glanced up, but not defensively. The man knew her name, and who knows what else, but hadn’t tried to use that against her. He hadn’t threatened her family, not that it would have mattered. She gave the smallest of smiles. “I vill do this thing. I vill tell you vat I know.”

  57

  Caribbean

  “Any ideas on who they are?”

  Ivan considered it for a moment. “Military, definitely. The boat was registered out of Honduras, but somehow, they seemed to be tracking one of the Corsair runabouts.”

  “I thought the magneto drive on those couldn’t be detected,” Goldman said in a tone that barely concealed his increasing irritation with his friend.

  “I never said it couldn’t be. I said it would be extremely difficult, particularly with the technology in use currently.”

  “So, these are probably what…government agents, corporate spies, some other group that just happened to be in the wrong place…what?”

  “Unsure, my friend, it is troubling, but should not be a problem. We are safely inside Cuban waters now and will be descending back to the Midnight Zone after this call,” Ivan said.

  “They killed the Saraph,” Goldman retorted.

  “No, they killed ‘a’ Saraph, just one of the small ones. We had already extracted its data, we would have needed to terminate it soon anyway.”

  “Thrall, you know your prisoners have to be dealt with, they’ve seen too much.”

  “What happened down there, Richard?”

  Goldman knew what he meant, where he meant. He offered a long sigh, “I don’t know, friend. It looks like my Schatten team failed to stop the researchers from reaching the Delphi site. There were casualties on both sides.”

  “I thought the Shadows never failed. Wasn’t that what you told me? How much did the research team learn—did they make it into the sanctuary?”

  “You see, that’s the thing, Ivan. We can’t even find a record of the researchers. We have images, hell, now we have some names. But they don’t seem to exist.”

  Ivan considered that for a moment and checked the timer on the display. The communications window was closing soon. “So, they were not what they seemed either and apparently quite capable. We need to find out who they are and what they know. I have a feeling our…guests here are part of the same group. Possibly the same ones who have the data file.”

  “Find out,” Goldman demanded. “We don’t need this shit. Pax will have our heads; we can’t allow any interference. Not at this point. Not when we are this close.”

  The connection closed. “Astra, take us down again.”

  “Of course, sir. We will be inside the Zone in approximately twenty-eight minutes.”

  Thrall decided it was time to wake up his guests and discover just who the fuck they were. Then he could feed them to his protectors. Outside the giant cupola, Ivan caught glimpses of the pale blue glow from each of the other Saraphs.

  Richard Goldman closed the laptop and secured it in the large safe alongside several irreplaceable items. Thrall was his friend, but that relationship would only go so far. If he had allowed the Kalypso to be discovered through his own reckless behavior, then he put all of them at risk. Not just the billions they had collectively invested in this venture, but their lives, and their reputations as well. That couldn’t be allowed, wouldn’t be tolerated, and it wasn’t just Pax Ruan they had to worry about.

  58

  The Cove

  Mila had given up little, most likely she didn’t know that much. Despite her rock hard exterior, all that armor was sheltering a small and somewhat broken human. One that, even now, Doris was attempting to rebuild. Cade gestured for the rest of the team to quiet down. “Go for Nomad.”

  “Hey, Boss, we are heading into Gitmo. You get anything useful from the prisoner?”

  His former executive officer, Sergeant Charlie Taylor, sounded exhausted and worried. “Bits and pieces, Charlie. Not too much that I would call actionable intelligence, but we do know a little better what we are up against. There is an underwater vessel, large, but actual size and specifics are unknown. Doris is going through shipbuilders records now. The girl dealt with someone only known to her as The Lion, thinks he was American, maybe a Texan. Her orders were to protect the Antarctica site, something they call the Sanctuary of Delphi. It’s been one of her group’s assignments on and off for decades.”

  “Her group, the Schatten, what are they, some religious cult of assassins?”

  “More or less, Charlie. They’ve taken being a mercenary to a near religious experience. The Schatten are formidable, and I personally hope we never run into them again,” Cade answered. The jet hit an air pocket and bounced, the turbines outside screaming as they sped toward Cuba.

  Cade added, “One other thing, she gave us another name. A dead man’s name, Ivan Thrall.”

  Charlie knew the name. “No shit, that bastard’s not dead and could be behind all this?”

  Cade continued, “Now to the fun stuff. You saw the boat that Nance and the team were on?”

  “Yeah, damn thing was in pieces, I can’t imagine being on that during the attack.”

  “Mila, the Shadow, said they have the creature, what they call the Saraph, protecting the vessel. She only saw one, but it scared the hell out of her. If it really is what we saw on the image, it’s a true sea monster. Riley and Jaz believe it has some nasty capabilities, too. For one, it probably stays hungry and pissed off. They don’t think its body chemistry is compatible with any of our planet's life forms.”

  “Holy shit! So, how does it eat?” Charlie asked.

  “Who knows? But it does eat. Apparently, everything of Micah’s research was correct, it just can’t metabolize any of the protein into energy.” Cade paused, looking around the flight cabin. He’d not yet mentioned this next part. “Jaz believes the creature can emit a localized EM pulse field that might also disrupt anything electrical.”

  “So, besides the razor claws at the ends of massive tentacles and a mouth full of teeth, it can render most of our stuff useless?” Charlie asked. “And we’re sure Thrall is who’s behind this?”

  “Not a hundred percent, but relatively certain he is alive and onboard that craft. He’s involved, and he was in the presence of our people.”

  “Thrall built Janus, right?”

  Cade had almost been hoping Charlie wouldn’t bring up that fact. It had been haunting him since learning
the man was still among the living. The prior year, a rogue AI calling itself Janus had nearly killed all of them and managed to wreck the country before Doris stopped it. “Yeah, Deuce, he built what became Janus.”

  He heard Charlie make a noise. “Shit, man, that was what four, maybe five years ago, right?”

  “What’s your point, XO?” Cade asked.

  “Do we think he didn’t take Janus’s code with him? We could be facing that computerized bastard again. Even worse, Thrall has had years to work on updating that software, improving it with no one looking over his shoulder. What if he has something even better…or even worse?”

  Cade didn’t like that thought at all, but it was a factor they had to account for. “Look, Charlie, the kids have been tracking positions, and it seems the vessel changes depths periodically. Not on a regular schedule, but occasionally it rises much closer to the surface.”

  “So, it doesn’t stay down there in the…what did they call it? The Midnight Zone? Does that help us?”

  “Yeah, it’s also called the Bathyal Zone. It’s too deep for most of our gear. A few subs could go that deep, but it would be near impossible to try and do anything resembling a raid. It’s cold and dark, sunlight doesn’t even reach that far down. A DSV is on the way, but realistically, that’s going to take too long. If they are even still alive, I don’t think Nance’s team has that much time.”

  “So, what’s the play, Boss?”

  “Making it up as I go, Deuce,” Cade said, reverting back to his friend’s call sign. “Think a lot of it depends on knowing when the craft will approach the surface and if it moves out of Cuban waters or not.”

  “You’re going to come up with something reckless that will endanger my hopes of a quiet retirement aren’t you?”

  “Most likely, but hey…it should be entertaining.”