The Shadow Beneath The Waves

by Matt Betts

  “Head upward, Takis was talking about a hatch. Maybe we can make it there, before this ship takes us down with it.” There was no way they could jump clear of the ship and into the water, they’d moved too far into the center for that. She was certain their only hope was to make it to a hatch or up to the head section.

  The angle got steep, but they could still run without much trouble. Ahead-the chest plate loomed and the hatch that Cass had seen through the drone’s camera had to be just before it. It came into view just as it was getting tough to move upward. They had to actually climb the last few feet on their hands and knees, but eventually managed to pull themselves in.

  “Crank the hatch shut,” Cass said.

  Jakob leaned out to see they were nearly straight up and down, and they were sinking down toward the sea with an open door. He turned and did as she said. The Cudgel was low enough that the waves were splashing salty water into the compartment they were in. Cass jumped up to help him crank the door shut faster.

  A little more water managed to make it in, but the door sealed with a hiss after Cass locked it. The compartment was nearly empty, an airlock for divers to enter when needed, like the one they came through to get Martin’s medicine. Only three deep dive suits hung on the wall nearby and one had fallen on the floor below the others.

  It was hard for Cass to fathom the fact that she was standing in the Cudgel. She’d gone through training before joining Linden’s team, she’d watched videos of the construction, the crew training, the dedication at the Naval College. She did a few of the modules that students used to prepare for actual flight on more than a few occasions. And now, here she was—ten years, millions of dollars in search efforts, after briefings and meetings and undercover assignments, she was the operative that found it.

  In the corner of the air lock, an orange light flashed slowly and dimly. Everything outside was blocked out—Cass heard no sounds, and they couldn’t see a thing. With both of their headsets gone, they couldn’t hear any chatter from the rest of their crew.

  “What should we do?” Jakob asked.

  Cass wasn’t totally sure herself. “Well, I guess we aren’t going out that door, the Cudgel is still sinking, then that door is certainly underwater by now.”

  Almost to emphasize her point, the Cudgel lurched to the side. Cass and Jakob ended up on the floor and slid into the wall. The dive suit on the floor slid along with them and thudded next to Jakob.

  “Shit. Let’s see if we can get higher up in the ship. Maybe we can get out before this thing sinks completely.” Cass held out her hand to help Jakob up, only he wasn’t looking at her, he was staring at the suit next to him.

  “I don’t think this thing is empty,” Jakob said. He got to his knees and pushed at the rigid tan suit next to him. “It’s heavy, there’s definitely something in it.”

  Cass looked in the clear visor of the helmet. “Nothing there.” She grabbed the releases on each side and twisted the helmet off. Immediately, she stepped back as a pungent smell hit her nostrils.

  Jakob stepped back and covered his face. “What the hell is that smell?”

  It seemed fairly obvious to Cass, but she didn’t want to make any assumptions before she checked. It didn’t exactly smell like a dead body, but it didn’t smell good. She moved the helmet away and looked down into the neck hole of the suit. The light was too dim to be sure, but it looked like a skeleton, or a partial one. “I think we found our first crew member.”

  “Are you serious?”

  “Did you think they wouldn’t be here?” Cass stood up and wiped her hands off on her pants. When she removed the helmet, a small amount of dust came out onto her. “There were only a few scenarios where we wouldn’t find their bodies if we found the ship, right?”

  “Hadn’t thought about it,” Jakob said. He wiped his hands too, though he hadn’t come in contact with the inside of the suit.

  “Really? You and the others said you were all excited to get in here and get a souvenir when you found the Cudgel, you didn’t think you would have dead crewmen to step over?” Cass went over to the airlock that would let them into the body of the giant machine. “You didn’t think you’d be pulling jewelry off of the bones of dead people like this?” She tapped the keypad, but it didn’t light up.

  “It wasn’t like that. We just wanted to get some pictures, some proof that we bagged the big one, we didn’t mean any disrespect.”

  Cass tapped harder this time before responding to Jakob. “Well, there’s your picture.” She pointed to the suit on the floor.

  The Cudgel shook and Jakob pried a panel off the wall. “Obviously, the power hasn’t begun circulating to the power systems yet.” With some effort, he pulled a lever that had been concealed by the panel, and the door started to open. He followed Cass as she walked out. “Look, we feel like shit already, that’s part of why we want to make this right,” Jakob said.

  Something about what her companion said suddenly resonated with Cass and she stopped just outside the door. “We are sinking.”

  “Thanks for the recap. Are you listening to me? I’m trying to apologize for…”

  Cass held up her hand. “Listen to me. This giant robot is sinking. You and I attached the power line to it very securely.” She paused, hoping he would catch on. “Where is the other end of that cable, Jakob?”

  “The Adamant.”

  “Is that cable going to release at either end, or are we going to drag that boat down with us?”

  “It would snap, right?” Jakob stared at Cass with widening eyes.

  “I’m asking you. You had the cable.”

  Jakob shrugged.

  They had to assume that the cable wouldn’t break, just to go with the worst case scenario. Cass thought about their options. “We could go back out the portal we came in, swim back and unplug the cable.”

  Jakob looked around the hallway they were in, and Cass joined him. There wasn’t much there: a narrow corridor, ladder rungs up the opposite wall and doors that led to places neither of them could guess. Without their tablets they had no maps or schematics of the Cudgel at hand.

  “Up?” Jakob asked.

  Cass looked up the rungs and couldn’t see the top of the ladder in the soft fuzz of the emergency lights. She put her foot on the first step and the whole ship began to shake violently. A loud roar seemed to make it shake even more. “The fuck?” Cass held on to the rungs and Jakob braced himself against the wall.

  After a minute, the shaking seemed to stabilize, though the sound was still horrendous. Cass grabbed the rungs and started up as fast as she could, checking to be sure Jakob was just below her as she rose. A nearby light suggested there might be another landing up ahead. They stepped off the rungs and followed a small corridor to another airlock, somewhat smaller than the other. Here, there were no suits, no stench, and there was no dust, but there was a monitor that worked. It blinked in and out of a picture, and showed snowy lines across it.

  “Want to try opening this hatch? Maybe we can get out,” Jakob suggested.

  It was a good play, but there were too many variables. They had no idea how deep they were, no clue if the airlock would work correctly. “I think we keep going up.”

  The monitor changed, and cleared, and Rina’s face appeared. “Guys? Are you okay?”

  Jakob waved his hands at the monitor and shouted, “We’re here.”

  “I don’t think she can see us.”

  The audio on the monitor buzzed and crackled. “I’m detecting you’re near the mid-level airlock on the forward side. Open the hatch. Trust me.”

  Jakob and Cass looked at each other and shook their heads. “Trust her, she says.” Cass was getting dizzy trying to figure out whom to trust at this point.

  The two of them put their hands on the manual crank and turned until the indicator showed they could open the hatch. Jakob turned the last lever and pulled the door open.

  There was no rush of water. They were not undersea. They were level with the u
pper deck of the Adamant. Ozzie and Takis were waving from the railing, and Ben smiled from his perch at the top of the ship.

  “Hi,” Rina said from the television. “I started screwing with all of the controls that sounded like they might control liftoff or flying, and I managed to make it hover.” She sounded pleased with herself, even through the speakers. “Cool, huh?”

  Cass nodded. It was all she could do. She was standing on the very ship she was supposed to protect, and all because someone had hijacked it with their tablet.

  41

  A coughing fit woke Martin from his drug-induced sleep. Coughing led to his chest and stomach muscles contracting, which led to his wounds shaking, which led to pain. He leaned over, grabbed his water glass.

  He’d been sleeping so much that he had no real idea what time it was. It was dark out the window, so he was loathed to bother anyone in the middle of the night. When he turned to the entry to his room, though, it was bright as daytime. Light was streaming in through open doors and portals.

  He turned back to his windows and realized that it was daytime, but something was blocking out the sun. It appeared to be a huge building, but that wasn’t it. He looked again.

  The Cudgel was upright and just outside his room.

  He tried to get up, but couldn’t, so he slouched down to try to see the top, and eventually managed it. The robot was up to its chest in the ocean, and holding steady as the waves hit the hull. The head unit was wider than the Adamant, much wider.

  “It’s pretty amazing, isn’t it?” Ozzie leaned in and walked to the window. “It took a lot to get it up and stable, but we’re good for now. They’re using solar and hydro power to get it charged.”

  “Beautiful.”

  “We’ll load it up and take off. Then we can still use solar and harvest the wind as we go,” Ozzie said.

  Martin was marveling at the giant war machine when Ozzie’s words registered. “Go? As you go where?”

  “No one told you?” Ozzie looked back at the door for help, as if someone would suddenly come through with a perfect response. He turned back when nobody came. “With Caroline and Lewis dead and that giant thing on the loose out there, we feel responsible. We’re going to take the Cudgel and try to fight the monster ourselves. This machine beat it once, it can beat it again. Or maybe someone else will know how to use it.”

  Water cascaded off of the machine not five hundred feet from Martin’s window. Sunshine glared off the hull, showing off occasional patches of mossy green. It was everything Martin had heard it was, everything he’d dreamed. He took in all of the Cudgel that was visible. Normally, a treasure hunt would end with him holding a doubloon, or a necklace in his hands—he could feel the weight of it, touch it, and determine how it was manufactured. Here, this chase ended with him in a bed staring out the window at something he’d never see again. Even if the crew took it and found a way to stop the monster, the government would immediately reclaim it, and tuck it away in a warehouse or dismantle it altogether.

  “Martin?” Ben had entered the room while Martin was staring. “Don’t you have something to say to these people? They’re your crew. Don’t you want to tell them how stupid this sounds?”

  Martin nodded slowly, and leaned back on his bed. He was already tired again. “Ozzie, can you close those blinds? I need my sleep.”

  The crewman did as he was asked. “Sure. You need anything else?”

  “I’m okay.” Martin looked at Ben and thought about what he said. “I maybe need some pain medication.”

  Ozzie lingered at the door for a moment. “Sure.”

  “Hey,” Martin said. “You guys…” He thought about it. They were all grownups and could think for themselves. He’d known Ozzie and his brother Takis for years. They’d joined after their military stint was up and they were looking for something constructive to do with their lives. They both worked with the Hellenic Navy as divers and demolitions experts. Takis took to blowing things up like it was a calling, and Ozzie took time to become a medic to help his fellow soldiers on the battlefield, or wherever he was needed. They were an important part of his crew, but they made their own decisions, much to Martin’s chagrin sometimes. “You dent that machine, it’ll have to come out of your share of the reward.”

  Ozzie smiled and gave a slight wave as he left.

  “You should’ve just stayed asleep.” Ben left the room shaking his head.

  Martin looked at the now-closed blinds and thought about the prize just beyond it. Just outside his reach.

  42

  Cass walked around in a circle in her room. Her satellite phone was on the bed, fully charged. She’d called Linden as soon as she got back, but he didn’t answer, didn’t respond. She didn’t want to pull her gun on the crew and they were better armed than she was. The inside of the Cudgel beckoned her. Once she’d put a foot on the first rung, she was hooked. But this mission? She could see flying the war machine to the naval yard and letting someone take over, but doing it themselves?

  The crew didn’t waste a lot of time on reunions. By the time Jakob and Cass got back on the Adamant, everything was packed into nice duffle bags and ready to roll. By the time Cass came back from her room, the crew was already loaded up with the bags.

  She stood in front of them on the deck. Her own gun felt heavier than usual strapped to her belt behind her back. The crew looked at her expectantly.

  “Well?” Rina asked. “What now?”

  The decision came down to whether she was willing to fight these people over something they obviously believed in. She thought of the two crew members on the Adamant killed by the slags, thought of the Cudgel crewman dead in the airlock. “If anyone wants to leave, leave now. There’s no pressure.” She looked at everyone and they looked back. “My only request is that we try to find someone who can help us fly this thing and fight. If they have a crew that can fly this, we hand it over to them.”

  The rest of the crew looked around at each other and nodded. “Agreed,” Jakob said.

  Cass’s hands shook as she picked up a duffle bag. “You guys know we’ll probably crash on take-off, right?”

  “That’s why we wanted you to come with us; your sunny disposition,” Takis said.

  They walked into the Cudgel with whatever weapons they could carry. Jakob had the heaviest one-the double shotgun with the feeder drum on the bottom, from there, most carried pistols, though Ozzie insisted on the assault rifle that had somehow made it into the pile on the Adamant. Martin claimed it had been liberated from a thief on one of the group’s treasure hunts, but everyone remained skeptical. Cass still had her pistol, checked more than once to be sure it hadn’t been tampered with.

  The air in the machine remained as fresh and antiseptic as the first time they’d come aboard for the supplies to help Martin. They swept the hall with their flashlights in the darkness, looking for a control panel, listening to Rina behind them, reading off directions from her tablet. They made their way to the small panel where Ozzie had attached a drive on that first visit that allowed them to take it over.

  Takis and Ozzie both held their lights on the panel while Rina plugged in her tablet. “Jesus,” Rina said. “This hulking mass of tech, and my little hand-held has better software.”

  “It’s kind of been stuck in the past, Rina. It may need a few updates,” Cass said as she and Jakob walked ahead toward the medical bay, where they’d seen the crewman in the sickbay. She stopped, not liking the darkness ahead, even though she’d been there before. “Let’s just wake this thing up and see what we’re dealing with. Any luck and the flight controls won’t start.”

  “Who has the keys?” Takis asked.

  “I meant, if it doesn’t initialize, this little plan of yours is over before it begins.” The fact that Rina got the thing to hover on just the lowest power, probably proved her wrong, but it would make things much easier if they couldn’t fly. As Cass spoke, the lights overhead and along the corridor flickered silently to life and bathed the gr
oup in soft white light. Nearby, the clicking sounds of computers booting up filled the air. Stale air softly blew against Cass’s face from a vent somewhere above her.

  “There’s at least enough power for lights, ventilation and computer functions. That’s a good sign.” Jakob had his hands on his hips and looked around like he had an idea of what he was looking at. “Now, let’s hope it can nuke that fucking thing.”

  “There are no nuclear missiles.” Rina looked at her tablet like she was navigating the high seas with a compass and sextant. “And if there were, I’d be the one that gets to push the button to launch them.”

  “That hardly seems fair,” Takis whispered. “We should have a vote, or we should each get to shoot one or something.”

  “Why are you whispering?” Ozzie asked.

  Takis shrugged.

  Now that the passage was illuminated, Cass stepped forward again, moving toward the medical bay. “I need to have a closer look at that crewmember that we saw.”

  “He was a skeleton in a uniform,” Takis said. “What’s he going to tell us?”

  It was tough to say exactly what Cass was hoping to find, other than a clue to the whereabouts of the rest of the crew and possibly more of the creatures. “Don’t know. But remember there was one of those slag’s shells at his feet. Maybe there were more.”

  “You don’t think they’d be alive after this much time?” Rina asked.

  There was no way Cass could answer that. It was an unknown species of what she could only assume was sea life. There wasn’t much of a precedent for their behavior and no way to research them. “Don’t know. But we’d better find out quick.” She led the group to the infirmary around the corner. The soldier was still on the bed, the husk of the thing was on the floor at the base of the table that held the man’s body.

  “Ozzie? We have a little time. Very little. Can you dig around in here to see what you can find out?” She looked around at the half shut drawers and supplies strewn about the floor from when they desperately dug around for supplies to save Martin, and realized Ozzie was staring at it all as well.