by JK Franks
“Name?” he demanded.
“Collins,” Nance offered. Hoping that was the correct cover name. Her mind was still so fuzzy, she couldn’t be sure.
“You are not Collins, you are no one. You are a spook. Now tell me your real name and who you are with.”
So, they didn’t have IDs on them yet, but had attempted to run prints or bio scans or something. That meant Doris was probably aware of where they were. Call Doris, she thought, attempting to activate her CommDot. Her hands didn’t make it to her chin as the restraints pulled tight after just a few inches. She hadn’t noticed those. “Who are you and where are my friends?” she demanded.
“You are American military or former military,” the Asian man said. “Your friends as well, except for the one. We know who the Honduran is, but we don’t know about the rest of you. Before we launch you out a pressure hatch, you will tell us.”
Kristen Nance was under no illusions; the man was probably right. If he was willing to kill her, he was almost certainly willing to torture her. The thought terrified her. Rearden had told them more than once, “Everybody breaks. Never try to be that hero, just buy as much time and give as little actionable info as possible.”
She wondered briefly if other American female soldiers had ever been tortured for information. She knew the rather famous case of Pfc. Jessica Lynch, who was captured and brutally raped in Iraq. Several accounts suggested other victims had preceded her, but that had not been definitively proven. But it seemed pretty certain to her.
The man continued speaking, “You were tracking us and the Saraph.”
“The what?” Nance said, genuinely confused. “Did you call that mutant kraken an angel?”
If the man’s smile was unnatural, his grin was downright hideous. He looked like a lizard who’d just snared a juicy insect. It was more than just predatory; it was outright wicked. “Yes, it is one of our more, um…interesting accomplishments. Sadly, now they are more of a pet than anything useful, but it does make for an interesting watch dog.”
Nance remembered the ‘watch dog.’ Damn thing had eaten half of her boat. She and…oh, shit, Micah, he was about to do something, then it all went black. So far, all she’d heard was Coffee. How many of them had made it? Maybe more important was how long did they have left, and why was her head so foggy? Her memories seemed to refuse to flow past in any recognizable order. She flashed back to her grandmother sitting in a nursing home in Tennessee. It was after the dementia had ravaged her mind, but the feisty ninety-year-old woman was still determined. Her memories were random, conversations incredibly difficult. Some things were clear as a bell to her Nana, yet others, elusive or absent. Waking up in this strange room, that was how Nance felt. Like someone had taken a pitchfork to her mind, rearranged all the details, and hid all the important stuff under layers of minutiae.
Pull it together, Nance, she told herself. She remembered who she was, remembered the people she’d been with, and the attack. The memories of that seemed seared into her consciousness—when she closed her eyes, they came stampeding back to the forefront. The beast, what had the man called it? The Saraph, it had caused her and Micah to collapse. Somehow, it had invaded her mind, taken her will to resist, and canceled out her ability to fight.
The man was still talking, but it no longer seemed to matter. She was tired, exhausted even, although she was sure she’d been asleep a very long time. Someone else was speaking, too. Who is Riley?
Kissa sat back against the smooth, featureless wall. He’d been the only member of the team still conscious when the strange-looking craft surfaced. After placing the boy’s body and the sample in the raft on the opposite side, he’d concealed it the best he could, simply hoping it would drift free before the yacht sank. He’d not fought when the men came aboard, not really. To some degree, he was just thankful they were human and not alien or some other hideous beast. After seeing the ‘mothership’ rise up, as that was the only way he could think to describe it, he’d nearly convinced himself they were fighting something inhuman.
They had subdued him quickly, but he had made a bit of a show of resisting. Truthfully, they were taking him where he wanted to go. To where his Thera was, if she still lived. He would have liked to have his phone, so he could call Cade, or even the one called Doris again. The others seemed to be able to simply speak to the air and hear her, but he had no such ability.
Several times, Kissa heard the master sergeant call out, whether in pain or anger, he wasn’t sure. They had not blindfolded him when they took him prisoner. He’d seen the interior of the nearly silent submersible. It, too, looked very futuristic, and the woman who was driving handled it more like a fighter jet than a sub. It was when the craft approached the vessel, the ‘mothership,’ that he finally got a sense of how large it really was.
Earlier, they really had just seen a small portion rising up above the waterline. The small recovery craft had approached the larger ship from below, silhouetting it against the lighter water above. The bottom of the larger ship was glowing with a very serene bluish light and contained a docking port that defied explanation. The pilot literally drove up an access canal, into a holding pool, and into a room with atmosphere. It reminded him of something he’d seen on a research boat once, where the bottom of the boat could just open to the sea and release a submersible from its docking cradle.
When the woman had opened the hatch, Kissa panicked. While the air would still keep the water at bay as the vessel descended deeper, he knew the air pressure would keep increasing to a point that it would become fatal. Only that didn’t happen. It was pleasant, dry, and comfortable as he was told to help take the other prisoners to an awaiting cart. Is this where they brought Thera? His eyes scanned everything, taking it all in. What he took for a depth gauge showed 456m, but the number was climbing rapidly. What is this place?
Other than food deliveries, he’d been ignored except for a short visit by a middle-aged man. He seemed more like an executive than a pirate or mad scientist, or whatever type person Kissa had imagined being in charge. “You are Kissa Alvarado from Utilla. You are searching for your girlfriend, and before you die, you are going to tell me everything you know about your friends.”
This man, Kissa thought. This man must die. Hopefully, I will be the one to help him get there.
63
Guantanamo Bay
Cade Rearden wished again he was more confident in what he was saying to the teams. Missions with this many unknowns went against all of his training. His last op had gone wrong, and it was so simple no one even questioned it. This one had way too many moving parts, going up against an enemy with unknown resources and weaponry. He and Director Stansfield stood at the head of the room. Margaret’s specialty was computer crime, but she had cut her teeth in counter-terrorism, so military solutions were not unfamiliar territory.
The only people in the briefing room were members of Talon or senior staff with The Cove Project. With the reduced numbers, Cade had picked ten of the best people they had and split them into two teams. “Not going to sugarcoat it, this one’s going to be a motherfucker,” he began, “and before you ask, yes, the MO is to get our people out, but there’s more to it.” Tapping his comms, he said, “Riley, play the audio.”
Her voice came in as if she were standing there with them. “The following was captured at 14:30 today. It was from Captain Nance’s CommDot. They obviously haven’t detected the communications devices yet.”
“
Riley then added, “Our suspicions have been confirmed—we have identified the speaker as Ivan Thrall, the former CEO of a tech giant in California.”
Margaret proceeded to give an abbreviated brief summarizing the man’s accomplishments and shortcomings. “Resume audio,” she then ordered.
“That might hold up if it were just the islander, but we know what he’s
looking for, or maybe I should say who. That doesn’t explain you, though, or the level of equipment you had in your possession,” Thrall said.
Nance’s voice cut through the room like a knife, “Look, no idea who you are or what right you think you had kidnapping us, but I want to see the rest of my team now. People will be looking for us. You don’t just wreck a research vessel, steal the crew, and not raise questions. Also, what in the hell is that thing you’ve created, the creature that attacked us?”
“Listen,” Thrall said, ignoring the question. “Maybe it was just bad luck on your part, meeting up with Mister Kissa and winding up out here in the open sea. If you are indeed marine researchers, then perhaps I can put your talents to work. The others, though, come on, they are muscle, protection—obviously military, current or very recent. While your prints and faces don’t match anything, our system is now running matches on your friend’s ink. Tattoos are photographed and tracked throughout some branches of military and in prisons. For some reason, I think we might get a few hits on that. Now, revenge is beneath me, but if I find you’ve been lying to me, well, accidents do happen all the time out here, darling. Truth is, you may as well talk, it’s your only chance. We are awaiting a few more arrivals from the mainland, and then the Kalypso is disappearing into the depths. It won’t be seen again, at least not in your lifetime.”
“So, you built an undersea workshop just so you could design your monsters? What did you call them, Saraphs….angels?” Nance asked, her voice quavering a bit when she spoke.
“Not exactly, no. Sorry, but I see no point in going over any of this with you,” Thrall said. The sound of movement could be heard. “Do you know what Saraph means, I mean, in the original Hebrew?”
“No.”
“Many interpret it as angels, of course, or even dragons, but the literal translation is ‘burning ones.’” Footsteps could be heard fading away and a door closing.
Nance’s whispered voice came back on. She may have been subvocalizing, assuming the room was bugged, but Doris’s software could compensate for the distortion. “Doris, did you get that? I’m sure you have figured out where we are. This ship rose up on the horizon, and we went to investigate, then this beast attacked us. It hit the boat with that EM pulse again. It affected us like a massive migraine followed by dreams, and I don’t know…data, lots and lots of data. If you can access Micahs’s smart-contacts, you may find a recording of the attack. I have no idea if he even survived.” She went on, “I’ve only heard Coffee’s voice, and they’ve mentioned Kissa a few times. Sorry, but my mind only cleared a short while ago. The Saraph must have been guarding this vessel…the Kalypso. And this guy, he looks damn familiar. There was also an Asian man. Other than some guards bringing food, that’s all I’ve seen. I don’t know what is going on, but this ship, or whatever, is enormous.”
Riley’s voice came back to the assembled group, “We captured the following from Specialist Trondo’s comm. We now believe he was injured in the attack, possibly badly, and appears to be receiving medical attention. That in itself is a positive sign, but, of course, you all know they may just need him well enough to answer questions. Thrall and the yet unidentified man were apparently near enough to be picked up on the CommDot, although we had to increase the pickup gain to the max. You will notice a lot of background noise as well as Trondo’s heartbeat.”
The sound of white noise, monitors beeping rhythmically, and a distant thump came over the speakers. The same man as before seemed to be talking with another man, possibly the Asian, judging by the accent. “None of this affects the timing, I don’t care who they are with. Icarus is safe, isn’t it?”
“No one is going to get to us down here. Too many years and too much money has gone into making this happen,” the man with the accent said.
“Christ almighty, I don’t even want to think about everything we’ve had to do to get to this point. Janus, the stock market, Cryptocurrency manipulation, and hell, even the drug running lately. All this shit makes my fucking skin crawl.”
“Your Kalypso cost almost ten billion dollars to build, another two to outfit with the equipment and supplies. Where did you think that was all coming from, Ivan?”
“I know, I know… it just, well, shit. Saving humanity shouldn’t involve us losing our own. I mean, I know I’ve been a son of a bitch, walked all over people, manipulated for certain outcomes, but, well, I just never anticipated all of this when my dad showed me that damn crate all those years ago.”
The ambient noise increased, and it sounded like the men speaking had moved out of range. Margaret, who had been leaning on the table, stood straight, looked at Cade, then spoke, “We’ve identified the second speaker, the Asian man, by voice print ID. He is Pax Ruan, a Chinese National and one of Cryptus’ former VC investors. Up until now we didn’t have much dirt on him. He’d stayed off our radar. But Doris is digging up a lot of very bad shit, most handled by shell companies and cutouts. The man is very careful, but suffice it to say, much of the illegal weapons and drug and human trafficking in Asia tracks back indirectly to him. Doris and Jimmy are still trying to get a realistic idea of his holdings, but they are vast, including major interest in several automotive manufacturing companies, as well as the Chinese space and weapons technologies conglomorate called UpSpace.
“So, what is the tie-in with the lab and these creatures?” Cade asked.
“First this,” the director said. “We recovered Micah’s tactical contacts. Unlike your comms, the feed from those is not designed to transmit without a Dee submind encrypting and routing the files, so we had not thought about it until Captain Nance tipped us off. Anyway, here is the feed.”
Margaret showed the video of the enormous craft. Cade was in awe at the damn thing's size and the fact it could apparently stay hidden down in the ocean depths most of the time. Where had they built this, and what all is it capable of? Then the images switched to the attack on the boat. There were only about forty-five seconds of footage before Micah’s eyes closed, but the ferocity of the creature and the ineffectiveness of the Talon Team left all of them shaken.
More than one expletive snuck out before Cade gave them all a look to ‘can it.’ “Director, I don’t know how any of them survived that, nor how they managed to get part of a tentacle. Is Micah awake yet, does he know any more of what happened?”
“He is conscious but still very confused on what happened. His experience seems to mirror what Nance went through. He keeps talking about language, data. He’s still in a state of delirium it seems.”
“Back to Pax,” Greg said. “What is his angle?”
“We don’t know, but in the last thirty days he has liquidated his entire portfolio. He has cashed in his chips and taken his fortune with him. Like Thrall, he essentially has no family. By all appearances, he is not planning on returning to China anytime soon,” Margaret said.
“So, they know something, or they’re planning something,” Greg replied.
The director concluded, “I think the clock is ticking, people. We need a solution; Nomad will be working with you on assignments. The Cove is shipping new equipment in to use. It’s going to be a challenge, but we want that undersea lab intact if at all possible.”
Charlie stood up looking worried, “And now, aye, there be dragons. Fuck me.”
“What, Charlie, you still thinking you should have retired?” Cade asked.
64
Cade leaned back against the wall he had been leaning on. “Well, shit.” Since the director’s briefing six hours earlier, everything had gone wrong. As if the foe they were going up against wasn’t formidable enough, now they were having trouble locating the captured members of their team or Kalypso itself. “Riley, I thought that was the whole point of the CommDots and tracking sensors.”
“It is, Cade. They use quantum entanglement for near instant communication from anywhere. The issue is the GPS component. That information can be transmitted via the quantum system, but it has to have the dat
a first. The unit is nearly microscopic inside the CommDot but it uses satellites, radio triangulation, or can even extrapolate from star fields taken in by the SmartOptics if needed. Our guess is that the Kalypso is so deep right now, there is too much water overhead for any of those to work. Doris and I are developing a solution for this, but it doesn’t help us right now.”
“You know all your wonderful tech seems to fall apart when we need it most.”
“I know, Captain,” Riley replied, “but we’re still learning. Most of it we didn’t develop with combat situations in mind. Who knew the thing might need to give accurate positions two miles deep in the ocean?”
Two-miles, he thought. How can this thing stay down there?
Riley changed subjects, “We got the sample of the Saraph you recovered with Micah. Jaz is analyzing it now, and as we thought, some strange physiology.”
“Anything that helps us?” Cade asked.
“I better let her tell you, but no, the opposite I think.”
Cade looked over at Charlie and shook his head. This was not going to plan, so far, and neither of them liked missions that got off to a start like this. It was bad Juju, as Kissa used to say. You stayed safe on missions where you’d planned and rehearsed, sometimes for months. You succeeded on missions where you minimized the unknown variables and neutralized the risks. In this case, they were accomplishing none of that.
“Cade?”
“Yeah, Jaz, what you got?”
“Well, a lot, and most of it isn’t good, just like Riley said. The Saraph is unlike any other life form on Earth. Its biochemistry is all wrong, its molecular makeup is off. I can’t even begin to tell you how much else is wrong with this creature.”
“Wrong with it?” Cade asked.