by Matt Betts
Linden thought about it and he really wasn’t sure what they got in a maximum security prison for sensitive war criminals. “No?”
“I don’t either. It was based on color. What’s for lunch today? Green. Green is for lunch. Tomorrow’s orange.” He took a tiny bite and chewed it slowly, and with a smile.
Linden was afraid the man might hug the sandwich if things went much further. “The modern American navy is about to clash with your beast. What do you think is going to happen?”
Another tiny morsel dangled in front of Tsui’s mouth, just on the verge of being devoured. “I told you, it’s not my monster. I was just sort of there.” He bit the sandwich piece and slowly chewed it up. “But… from what I’ve overheard? My money would be on the Lusca.”
“Is there anything you can tell us that might even things up? You said you have no stake in this. Help us out,” Linden said. “I’ll make sure you get a sandwich every week.”
Tsui held up his food. “One of these? One of these exact sandwiches?”
“I didn’t mean that. We’re not having food catered in from hundreds of miles away, but I’ll get another sandwich for you from somewhere around the prison.”
“So you need my help, but you don’t need it that much?” Tsui popped an onion slice in his mouth. “Hmmm.”
There was a loud sigh from Holli. “You’re good at painting yourself into a corner, aren’t you, Linden?” She turned to Tsui. “Here’s the deal. He will order a sandwich for you from the Kay-tee Inn, or wherever we are, in Oregon for you, once a month. The other weeks, you get whatever is closest.” She stuck out her hand to Tsui. “Deal?”
The prisoner stared at her hand suspiciously. “Two Oregon sandwiches a month.”
“One Oregon sandwich and a side of onion rings. I can smell your breath from here. You obviously like onions.” Holli extended her hand even further.
“I want…” Tsui began.
“In five seconds the deal disappears. Don’t push it.” Holli began withdrawing her hand. “Five…”
Tsui shook her hand immediately. “The Lusca is really fucking you guys over with the energy drain. Knock out the electronic nerve center, and you’re in business.”
“Wouldn’t that end the threat of the atomic explosion as well?”
“Theoretically.”
“You initially said it collected energy until it overloaded and triggered the nuclear reaction,” Linden said. “If it can’t collect energy, then it shouldn’t explode, right?”
“True, but I don’t know if has any failsafe connected to it. It shouldn’t explode because of the lack of a catalyst.”
“But?”
“But it’s not my project. I can’t be sure.”
Linden looked down at the monitor and saw the Cudgel stumbling around in the simulation. Additional feeds showed the crew squabbling with each other over their comms. “I gotta say, if we all get killed by a nuclear explosion, I’m less likely to buy food for you.”
49
Within a couple of hours, a small crew from the Alba Varden arrived at the Adamant. They dropped everything at the Swansea treasure site as soon as they got Rina’s call about what had happened to Martin. By the time they’d arrived, Martin was sitting up, just a little. Ozzie had suggested against it before he’d taken off, but Martin wasn’t having it, and Ben didn’t want to fight with him.
Angela, Hakim, and Theo arrived in time to stop Martin getting up to make a martini, though in truth Martin couldn’t get up if he tried. He just said he was going to do so in order to calm their concerns. “Jesus, I’m fine. Ozzie did a great job; I’ll still be able to play the violin.”
Hakim changed Martin’s wraps and took a close look at the wound. “It looks like maybe he went a little heavy on the glue, but otherwise, you’re doing okay.” He put the temp strip on Martin’s head. “Close to normal, no real fever. We brought some supplies from the Varden, just in case.”
“How’s the site? Any new discoveries? What did you find?” Martin asked. He figured that the site would be a wealth of items, but he couldn’t be sure what might have been destroyed over time, or lost when the Swansea sank.
“Seriously?” Theo asked. “You were on death’s door less than a day ago, and now you’re getting back to business?”
Angela laughed. “You’ve met Martin, right? That’s how he works.”
“Can I get a monitor in here to see the dive site, and see what’s happening with the Cudgel?” Martin was worried more about everyone else than himself. It was a stupid move to take the machine like that. He hoped they wouldn’t make it in time, hoped they lost power and didn’t wade into a stupid fight and get themselves killed.
Theo tapped Martin on the leg lightly. “I’m on my way to get hooked up with communications here, I’ll see what’s up, and see what I can do about giving you a feed in here. Just take it easy.”
“I’m not an old man; you don’t have to talk to me like I’m your grandpa or something,” Martin said to Theo as the man left.
Hakim waved the others out, too. “Okay, they’re gone. Are you going to tell me how you actually feel, or are you going to stick with the thumbs up?”
Martin looked at him, thinking about that very thing. He looked toward the door, thinking about the new arrivals.
“They’re all gone. They have more important shit to do than wring their hands by your bedside,” Hakim said. “Now come on. I need to know how you feel so I can take care of you.” He looked over at the tablet clamped onto the wall that was serving as a monitor.
Of the whole team, Martin knew Hakim the least. He’d been on the team for years, but had always asked to be on the second team, the one that came and catalogued the finds, rather than the team that came in first and made the discoveries. They’d talked, but not much, Hakim was closer to Ben than anyone. He’d volunteered for crap jobs to make a little extra money once in a while—he’d wash down gear, fill air tanks, and paint the boats when they needed it, whatever. In fact, he’d screwed up a very important task when he painted the ship this time out. “How long have you been in America?”
“Excuse me?” Hakim stopped what he was doing, but had a smile on his face. “Why are you asking?”
“Just… how long?”
“I came a few years before the war, maybe fourteen years now.” He stared at Martin for whatever was forthcoming.
“And you don’t know who Adam Ant was?” Martin was baffled, sure he was long dead, but his music was still played. Occasionally. “A singer? British? He sang a bunch of hits. You have to know him.”
At that moment, Martin saw Ben wheeling up to the door. “Ben, you know Adam Ant, right?”
Ben rolled himself on down the hall, not stopping to answer.
“Come on. He sang ‘Goody Two Shoes’ and ‘Strip’… ‘Dog Eat Dog?” Martin was nearly pleading.
“Nope.”
“My grandmother was a big fan. She’d sing me to sleep with Adam Ant songs when I was a kid.”
“Your grandma sang you songs about stripping? That seems awkward,” Hakim said. “I’ve been in America long enough to know that doesn’t sound right.”
In spite of himself, Martin laughed until he was suddenly coughing and holding his wound.
“Now, how bad is that pain?” Hakim asked.
“Honestly?” Martin asked. When he saw that Hakim might punch him, he answered. “It’s mainly when I take deep breaths. As long as I’m lying down or sitting up a little like this, it’s not bad. But sudden movements are a terrible idea.”
“Okay. We’re taking the ship back to the nearest port that has a real hospital. We’ll take our time. We’ll keep an eye on you the whole time. If something starts to go poorly, we’ll… I don’t know… we won’t take our time,” Hakim said. He was smiling. “We’ll get you to help, I promise.”
“I don’t want to leave them on their own.”
“Them?”
“The crew. The crew on the Cudgel, they aren’t ready, they a
ren’t trained for that shit. They’re just a bunch of god damn swimmers.” Martin turned to look out the portal over Hakim’s shoulder. Martin had lost all sense of time, and was surprised to see the sun rising in the distance.
“Look. They decided that themselves and there’s nothing we can do.”
Martin didn’t want to look back at Hakim. He suddenly felt weak for talking about how bad he was hurt. “Just get me a monitor and a feed, so I can see what is going on.”
Bag in hand, Hakim walked to the door. “Your vitals are good, you’ve got clean bandages.” Hakim held up another tablet, identical to the first. “I’ll keep an eye on you while I get settled and talk to Ben about my suggestion to get the hell out of here.”
“Don’t forget my…”
“Monitor and feed. Got it,” Hakim said. He left and stomped down the hall.
The pain in his chest and stomach subsided a little, Martin assumed due to the pain medicine that he’d been given. He couldn’t shake the feeling that he should be with the crew aboard the Cudgel. They were in the predicament mainly because of him. He looked around, but no one had left him a wheelchair or crutches. Probably because they knew he’d try to use it.
50
The pounding on their hotel room door came as a surprise to Linden and the others. It had been so quiet in the little mom and pop joint, that they’d assumed no one else had even checked into it.
“Linden? Open the door,” a voice came from the hall.
Lou and Linden looked at each other. The voice was more than familiar to the both of them.
Holli grabbed the door, the same look of puzzlement on her face. When she opened it, they all saw Commander Braun standing in the hall with a number of armed soldiers in black uniforms on either side of him.
“Hello, Linden. Probably time we talked.”
“You probably didn’t bring lunch with you this time, did you?” Linden was suddenly longing for the thick peanut butter sandwiches that he wasn’t at all allergic to.
“No.”
Linden nodded for Holli to step aside and let the Commander in.
“You kind of forgot to follow up on your report about possibly finding the Cudgel, Linden. And now, I have people telling me that there’s an object in the air, flying this way, with the same flight profile as our missing machine.” Braun sounded as friendly as he always had over their meetings, but his words held a note of anger in them. “I thought we had an agreement.”
“Things got out of hand.”
“Out of hand? That’s…” A woman walked into the room and found a chair to plant herself in. She was much younger than Braun, in her late thirties, Linden figured, and wore civilian clothes. “That’s a good one. Out of hand. You not only found the Cudgel, you let people get into it. They released a huge monster, and then they flew the classified weapon. Let’s see, what was your only directive? Don’t let people take the Cudgel.” She nodded. “Out of hand, I like that.”
“This is Sergeant Johnson. She was with the last class that trained to operate the Cudgel. She’s here to make sure you bring it back in one piece,” Braun said.
“We met. She escorted us to see the base commander earlier.” Linden nodded to Johnson. “Look, we really thought it made sense to bring the Cudgel into this, since it had trapped the Lusca before,” Linden said. He had expected to be called on the carpet for this whole thing, but really didn’t think it would be so soon. He thought maybe it would be after a giant robot crashed into something important. “They’re doing their best to right this situation.”
“We get that. But you need to call them off. Have them land at the coordinates on this paper.” Braun passed the note to Holli and she handed it to Linden.
Without looking at the writing, Linden spoke again. “But, are they wrong? After what we’ve seen, after that thing has easily destroyed everything that’s been thrown at it so far, isn’t it possible that the Cudgel could do some good here?”
“An untrained skeleton crew in a ship that’s been dormant for a decade?” Johnson asked. “They’ll only do harm here.”
“Do you have a real crew for it? Where are the rest of your pilots? Bring them in, and we’ll gladly turn it over to someone who knows what they’re doing.” Holli leaned against the table they were using as their makeshift command center.
“Wouldn’t matter.” Johnson crossed her arms and sat back in her chair.
The commander sighed and picked some lint off of his uniform sleeve. “Look. You’re all cleared to hear this, I think. I know Lou and Linden are. Miss?”
Holli nodded. “Edson. I’m with Gary Matthews’ team. TS/SCI clearance.”
Braun nodded and turned to see Tsui sitting on a bed in the corner. “Is that…” His eyes narrowed to slits. “Is that a war criminal?”
“Not really…” Lou started. “Well, yes. He was captured during the war, and he has been in prison ever since, if you want to be technical.”
“Technical? Sounds pretty non-technical to me,” Johnson said.
Braun returned his attention to Linden. “Look, we… I admire what you’re doing. I really do. We made your division to recover the Cudgel and by God, you did it. With no staff, few resources, and no support, you did it,” Braun said. “But that’s the thing. You weren’t really supposed to find it.”
51
Martin stared at the screen and tossed his small, empty paper cup at it. He couldn’t believe his team was dumb enough to be there, putting themselves in harm’s way. The beast had survived hits from missiles, lasers, and more, and had still come out without a scratch.
“Officials say that the military have given the okay to attack the creature by any reasonable means,” the news anchor said. “Currently all of the branches of the military are working together, including possible airstrikes, land-based strikes and more support from the Navy, though the spokesperson admits the Navy has taken a hard hit today from this incredible threat.”
“Jackasses.” Martin sat up straight in his bed and immediately regretted it. Pain shot from his abdomen for a brief, but not brief enough, moment. When it passed, he swung his legs around to touch the floor. He swallowed hard as he got up the courage to stand, and his legs wobbled slightly once he got up. He clutched his right arm to his belly and dragged his IV stand along in the other. Such a dumb idea, he thought. He moved toward the dresser by the big window, when a noise began to register with him, one that was increasing with each second. It was like someone was shushing him, but louder. He stepped to the window just as two large ballistic missiles roared past them nearly overhead.
“What are you doing out of your bed?” Hakim asked from the doorway. “You’re going to kill yourself.”
“Did you see that?” Martin pointed out the window to the missiles that were streaking across the sky. “What the hell was that?”
“Sit down. Please.” Hakim motioned to the bed. “You don’t have to lay down, you big baby. Just sit.”
Martin tottered over, fairly sure it was some kind of trap to get him in a position to be sedated again. He sat anyway, because standing hurt.
“We’re idiots, but we’re taking you toward Oregon. You were out for a while and we decided to take you there. No idea why.” Hakim shrugged. “We’re idiots, like I said.”
It took a moment for his head to clear, he felt like he was underwater all of the sudden. “That’s… I appreciate that.”
“Now, please. We’ll be there in a few hours. I don’t know what you think we’ll do there. But we’ll go.”
“The news.” Martin pointed at the screen, still hazy and having trouble breathing suddenly. “They said they might launch missiles at the creature. Is that what just passed us? Is that thing on its way to them?”
“Martin, move your arm.” Hakim suddenly looked concerned.
“What?” Hakim’s voice suddenly seemed very far away. Martin felt the man gently pull away the arm. “What?” He looked down at his shirt to find it covered in blood. “Shit. Whose blood is that
?”
“You tore something. It looks like that patch job your friends did is coming apart.”
Martin could see Hakim scrounging for something on his belt, could hear him call the others on the ship for help, but that was the last thing he remembered comprehending at that moment.
He awoke many times, but it was difficult for Martin to stay conscious. He tried. He didn’t know if it was his body healing, the blood loss, or if Hakim had slipped a sedative into the fluid drip. But he tried to keep his eyes open. He wasn’t sure how much time passed before he realized someone was in the room with him.
“I don’t know what you expect to do when we get there,” Ben said. “Hell, you know if we stayed put we would’ve likely missed any of the effects if this monster explodes. By chasing after your crew, you’ve doomed the rest of us to die if they fail.”
“We’re moving?” He really thought he’d had a fever dream where he begged them to let him help the crew on the Cudgel, but it wasn’t, or at least not all of it was. That was a thing that weighed heavily on Martin about the crew when he could think straight. They would be lucky to make it in time for the battle, and there was nothing that anyone on the Adamant could do to help the Cudgel once they got there.
“We can still turn around.” Ben rolled himself around the bed toward the door. “Just say the word.” He left Martin alone in the silence of the otherwise empty room, with waves and the hum of the engine cutting the silence.
Martin thought about what he’d lost already on this journey, this job. Two people had lost their lives from his own crew, maybe more; he didn’t know what had occurred while he’d been out. And civilians? Military personnel? All because he had to find the unfindable? Because he couldn’t leave well enough alone? There was a find of possible historic significance that he’d dragged his team from for this, all for his own vanity. And now he was risking more lives because of his own inflated sense of self-importance. He turned to see if there was a way to call Ben back when the boat jostled hard and Martin heard the frightening sounds of metal scraping against metal.