The Sam Reilly Collection Volume 2

by Christopher Cartwright

  Tom pressed the up button again.

  “What the fuck?” Elise swore.

  The sound of machine gun fire echoed down the elevator shaft. Three bursts and about fifty rounds fired. Tom felt the vibrations of metal piercing metal in the door below where his hand rested.

  “What just happened?” Tom asked Elise in a panic.

  He never heard her reply. Instead a large explosion rocked the elevator shaft, echoing throughout the engine room.

  Veyron listened intently and then grabbed Tom. “Get away from the door – Now!”

  A moment later, the door smashed open as the elevator came crashing through the floor. Tom fought through the smoke and debris. He looked inside the destroyed elevator.

  “Elise, are you all right?” Tom caught his breath. “What the hell just happened?”

  Silence.

  Veyron tried his own radio and then stopped. “It’s pointless.”

  “Why?”

  “The radios have been jammed again by that depressing music – Gloomy Sunday.”

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Tom watched as the red glow of the second elevator started to ascend. He tried his access card again, but received the same message: Access Denied. The engine room security codes must not have been included in the list Gerald had sent him. The elevator stopped on the second crew level.

  “We’ve got to get to her!” Tom yelled.

  “Of course we do.” Veyron grinned viciously. “And to do that, we need to get to the crew level above. Come on, we’ll take the stairs.”

  Tom kicked at the locked door, throwing the full weight of his two hundred and forty pounds of solid muscle into it. The door barely moved. The two men tried kicking it together. Nothing happened. The door was designed to stop flooding water from ascending to the levels above – there was no way they could kick it open.

  “You have any ideas?” Tom asked.

  Veyron returned to the elevator and picked up the carbine lamp. “As a matter of fact, I do.”

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Elise brought the Browning M2 machinegun out of the crook of her shoulder, where it had butted in while she shot. Close to sixty 50 caliber used shell casings were scattered on the floor to the right of her. The weapon smelled of burnt gunpowder and smoke still wafted from the firing mechanism. She grinned. The weapon had fired smoothly and accurately.

  She left the Browning on its tripod on the floor and stood up. With her right hand she took hold of the Uzi and approached the second elevator. Something exploded when she fired on the first elevator, but there was no explosion with the second. Still, she wasn’t taking any chances. She’d fired a number of rounds into the closed door of the second elevator before it had the chance to open.

  She watched carefully. Standing in a firing position, she aimed her Uzi at the door, which looked like Swiss cheese. The door opened and she stared inside. The back wall of the elevator was scattered with bullet holes. There was only one thing remaining in the otherwise empty elevator. It took her a moment to recognize it.

  A large teddy bear.

  It was one of those novelty-sized, soft and cuddly toys. Its wide eyes stared at her with an expression of affection. The bear’s round tummy was shredded by bullets, but otherwise it was entirely intact. It had a big grin made out of black stitching to match its eyes. The thing had probably been an intimate gift for one of the crew or entertainers below. Around its neck a yellow sign was attached by a small silver chain.

  Elise recognized the card immediately. It was written in the same lazy scrawl she’d seen throughout the rest of the shopfronts. The card read: I’m sorry. Do you want to play? I’ll be back in five minutes.

  She noticed a small camera at the back of the bear’s head. It had fallen off during the shooting, but the light still glowed red. Elise picked it up. “I’m sorry, I don’t play with toys. I’ll be waiting for you, in five minutes time.”

  Elise then swiped her own card on the elevator door and pressed descend. She watched as the elevator lights showed it descend until it stopped at the second crew member’s level. She depressed the transmitter to her radio. “I’m all right guys. I just sent a teddy bear packing.”

  There was no response.

  She waited a full minute and then depressed the transmitter again without speaking. The radio was full of static. Mostly white noise. When she listened long enough she heard the depressing music. She let go of the transmitter – someone had blocked the radio channel again.

  Elise sat down at her security station and looked at her computer. Someone had restarted the power to the two other elevators on board. The ones she’d disconnected earlier so she would only face an enemy from one location at a time. Both elevators were stopped on level two. She glanced through the images taken from the 205 security cameras on board the Antarctic Solace.

  According to her computer, none of them had identified any movement. She felt reassured she was still alone on the sixth level. She typed on her keyboard and quickly executed a search of any movement in the past ten minutes.

  Her eyes stopped at the one entry.

  The aft elevator moved from the second level up to the sixth. There it remained for a total of three minutes. At the same time, the cameras on the sixth floor suffered a power outage, before the elevator returned to the second level.

  The question was – did someone return with it?

  Elise thought about it for a minute. Someone was playing with them, and she didn’t like it. She considered the most secure place for her to take command of the situation.

  She gripped her Uzi for comfort. If someone had taken the aft elevator up to greet her, she was ready to play.

  A moment later, she heard the sound of a large explosion below.

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  “Jesus Christ!” Tom swore. “Do you think you used enough acetylene?”

  Veyron looked at the now demolished door. “Hey, it opened the door, didn’t it?”

  Tom nodded and walked through the new opening. His Remington shotgun led the way through the smoke and debris. It was kind of empowering to know their enemy already expected them and so there was no reason to attempt to go in quietly.

  The smoke cleared and Tom could see the entire room well enough. It was narrow and had a series of ladders reaching to the ceiling far above. Unlike the other decks which had all been slightly less than a story high, the distance between the engine room and the crew deck was close to thirty feet to house the massive diesel engines.

  Veyron looked up to the opening near the ceiling. “You climb up first and I’ll cover that door in case anyone has other plans.”

  “Sure.” Tom slid the strap of the Remington over his shoulder and began climbing.

  There were three ladders. All of them were surrounded by a semi-circle of grated steel to stop the climber falling. Each ladder was then divided by a small landing partition so that the climber could only ever fall a maximum of ten feet.

  He climbed quickly. Hand over hand, he took three rungs at a time and reached the highest platform in just under a minute. He then unslung his shotgun and aimed it at the steel hatch. If anyone tried to come in while Veyron climbed they’d never know what hit them.

  “All right, Veyron,” he called out. “Your turn.”

  Veyron smiled and climbed up behind him. The platform was barely adequate to accommodate the two grown men.

  “Is the door locked?” Veyron whispered.

  “No.”

  “Then I suggest we go through it.”

  Chapter Forty

  Tom turned the handle and slowly opened the hatch. It opened to a long passageway. The lights were turned off along it, but in the distance the lights were on in the large living area for the crew and entertainers. The sound of a television being played came from the room ahead. It was some cheap daytime sitcom. Tom couldn’t hear the sound of anyone. He shined his flashlight in the other direction. It finished only a few feet away at the aft elevator.

&
nbsp; “Should we be concerned about the elevator?” Tom asked.

  “No. Elise cut the power to the aft and forward elevators. Nothing’s going in or out.”

  Tom nodded and then stepped out into the corridor. The lights were bright at the end of the hall making it easy to become focused on what’s ahead and forget about the doors before it. Tom had to consciously remind himself to check each door before moving further along.

  He swiped his card and then entered the first door. It was one of the sleeping quarters for the crew. A picture frame next to the bed showed a young man in a sailor’s uniform holding hands with a pretty brunette in a red skirt. It suggested the room belonged to a crewman. It took a few moments to rule out anyone hiding inside and then they continued.

  They checked at least a dozen more before reaching the main living space. The sound of the television increased. It wasn’t like the scene had changed and now was playing louder. Instead, it seemed like someone had consciously adjusted the volume until it became a blaring distraction.

  Tom fired a single shot from the Remington. The powerful twelve gauge spray created a large opening in the wall at the back. “That was a warning shot. If you don’t come out in the next five seconds I’m going to assume you’re one of the attackers and the next shot I won’t miss.”

  Silence.

  Tom pumped the shotgun. “If you’re in here, I strongly urge you to come out with your hands up.”

  “There’s a few of us in here. We’re all well-armed so I suggest you take my friend’s advice and come out now.”

  More silence.

  “It appears our friends aren’t interested in the easy way,” Tom said.

  “No. It would appear not.” Veyron signaled with his hands that he would go to the other side of the large room and then the two would approach from the opposite side of it.

  Tom nodded and watched as Veyron took his position. The common living area was basically a big square room. On one side an eatery and the other a big television with at least twenty Lazy Boy reclining chairs.

  The eatery was empty, but the back of someone’s head could be seen in each of the reclining chairs. Tom signaled to Veyron that there were people in the chairs. Veyron acknowledged and the held up the number three on his right hand.

  Veyron then dropped each finger one at a time.

  Three. Two. One.

  Both men approached with their weapons ready to fire.

  “Show’s over!” Tom said. “Who wants to start with the explaining?”

  No response.

  Tom took aim and fired at the television. It exploded into a hole in the wall behind it. “I said, show’s over. Now I want some answers.”

  Still no response.

  Veyron grabbed the first person on his shoulder. “Hey, we said – show’s over!”

  The man didn’t even flinch. His eyes were open, but they stared vacantly at the destroyed television. Tom glanced at the rest of them. No one moved. They looked like a bunch of zombies. Each one with their eyes open, taking slow, shallow breaths and entirely unaware of their surroundings.

  Tom noticed a sealed plastic bag hanging next to the chair of the first person. It dripped fluid into the man’s left arm via an intravenous needle. Every person in the room had the same bag attached to them. He picked up the fluid bag and read the name: Normal saline. Additive: Morphine and Midazolam.

  He recognized the strong analgesic, Morphine, but had no idea what the other drug was used for. “What’s Midazolam?”

  “It’s a potent sedative and also a very powerful amnesic agent.”

  “Meaning?”

  “Someone went to great lengths to make these people forget something.”

  Chapter Forty-One

  Tom took a picture of the group of twenty people who were badly drugged out of their minds in case one of the zombies were replaced by the person responsible while they were away. It took him and Veyron another half hour to complete checking the entire deck.

  “The place is empty,” Veyron said.

  “Sure, but someone must be out there. You don’t think those people drugged themselves, do you?”

  “No. Not to mention how they fed themselves?”

  “Good point.” Tom picked up one of the drugged persons arms. The drug-filled liquid still flowed into the man’s vein. He slid the clamp shut.

  “No, let it flow.” Veyron slid the clamp open until small drops of the liquid entered the man’s veins. “The last thing we need right now is to have someone waking up on us all hysterical until we make sure Elise is all right and work out what we’re going to do with them.”

  “Good point.” Tom stared at the man more closely. Most likely in his late twenties, he appeared clean shaven. His arms and legs looked like they had normal muscle tone. “These people haven’t been confined to their beds for the past ten days.”

  “You think they’ve been working in the day, only to be sedated for bed?”

  Tom grinned as realization finally dawned on him. “Look at these people, what do you see?”

  “I see a bunch of drugged zombies.”

  “What else do you see?”

  “Most are men.” Veyron sighed as he took in the entire group of people at a glance. His scientific mind reaching for objective facts. “There are two women amongst the eighteen men. They are all well cared for with no signs of malnutrition, bedsores, mouth ulcers or any other aliments common to people permanently bed-bound. Each person here is wearing a uniform…” He stopped mid-sentence. “Damnit, they’re all maintenance staff and engineers!”

  “Exactly!”

  “Someone’s been making them work,” Tom said. “And then sedating them in the evening.”

  “After being given opium based morphine regularly they most likely would have developed an affinity if not an addiction to the drug. Like any other addict, they could be coaxed to perform tasks before being given any more of it.”

  “The question is – what task have they been performing for the past ten days?”

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Tom left the engineers in their chairs, staring blankly at the wall. He and Veyron, now confident both the engine room and staffing deck were otherwise empty, returned to the middle elevator. He swiped the access card Elise had made for him and pressed the up button. The doors opened and he and Veyron stepped inside.

  The back of the elevator had more than fifty bullet holes scattered in a tight grouping. Sitting in a chair at the center of the elevator a man-sized teddy bear sat grinning at them. A large hole where its tummy belonged bled polyester stuffing.

  Veyron bent down and examined it. “This was Elise’s would be attacker?”

  Tom pressed level six. “It looks like it never stood a chance. I just hope it didn’t come with any friends.”

  The elevator stopped on level six. Veyron held the doors shut. “Elise, it’s us – don’t shoot!”

  “Us who?” Elise replied.

  “Veyron, Tom and the remains of a teddy bear!” Tom said in a clear voice.

  “All right, come on out.”

  Veyron took his hand off the hold button and the elevator doors opened.

  Elise grinned and lowered her Uzi. “Well it took you two long enough!”

  Tom smiled at her. “You all right up here?”

  “Fine. How about you guys? I heard a loud bang.”

  “Sorry,” Tom replied. “That was Veyron playing with chemistry. What happened here? We saw you had a run in with a teddy bear.”

  “Yeah, whoever sent it was playing with me specifically.”

  “Did you kill him?”

  “No. I don’t even know if it was a HIM. Whoever it was sent the teddy as a decoy so they could access this level from the aft elevator.”

  “I thought you disconnected the power to the aft and forward elevators?” Veyron said.

  “I did.” Elise shook her head. “It appears whoever we’re dealing with reconnected it so they could go snooping on what we’re doing up here.�
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  “What about the cameras?” Tom asked.

  “I think that stupid song somehow blocked them for a few minutes.”

  “Gloomy Sunday?” Veyron asked.

  Elise shrugged her shoulders. “Yeah, somehow they’ve worked out a way to make it superimpose the radio channels and some digital devices. The radios could be done easily enough, but I have no idea how they blocked the cameras. What I do know is that the cameras returned to normal immediately after the song stopped playing.”

  “Weird,” Tom said.

  “Sure is,” she said. “Everything about this ship is strange. What did you find down below?”

  “More questions without any answers,” Tom answered.

  “What did you find?” she persisted.

  Tom poured himself a mug of hot coffee. “An engine room wired with carbide gas lighting and a crew room with twenty of the ship’s engineers.”

  “What did the twenty people have to say?”

  “Nothing,” Tom said. “They’d all been drugged.”

  “That’s crazy.” Elise shook her head. “Someone downstairs is responsible for all this. Whoever came up before went back down again. That’s for certain. Any chance you missed someone?”

  “No. The living quarters are basic downstairs. There’s not enough room to hide a cat let alone a person. I'm confident those twenty people are the only people below decks.”

  Elise smiled. “And I’m confident no one is on the passengers' decks, which means one of those twenty drugged people must be the person we’re after.”

  “So, how do we differentiate?”

  Elise crossed her arms. “Let’s bring them all here – I have a few ideas how we can determine who’s faking it and who’s not.”

  Chapter Forty-Three

  Tom stared at the picture of the twenty supposedly drugged people in their recliner chairs he’d taken twenty minutes before and then back at the people themselves. They were all the same. No one had switched places or moved.