“Like your spiders?”
Fulmer said, “I don’t call that anything but a good reason to drink.”
Nemo said, “The feeling is all the sinkings are coordinated, and you’ve given me an excellent process as to how I might find out why.”
“You’ve already taken the goddamn thing apart.”
Nemo lifted a luminous jellyfish from a tank. “Hand me a glassed needle. On the tray.”
Fulmer handed him the needle, looking around the lab at the fish swimming in their tanks, the monitors, and the large vaulted door.
“I haven’t seen all of her, but you’ve made some changes.”
Nemo said, “She certainly needed some after the cannon damage. Obviously.”
He drew phosphorous fluid from the jelly’s main sack with a hypo, carefully inserting the needle between poison ribbons. “Now, not more of this than you can spare.”
He gently submerged the fish, waiting for its cap to undulate, then bloom its sides and swim to the bottom of the tank.
Nemo held the needle filled with the light-catching fluid, moved to the spider, and opened the belly cavity with tweezers. “It’s an amazing piece of work, this thing. The interior’s a combination of mechanicals and organic tissue. That acid it spits, self-generating through some kind of glandular system that’s a variation on a poison rockfish from Australia. Hold it in front of you. Straight.”
Fulmer took the spider, keeping it as far away from his face as he could, as Nemo injected the natural phosphorus fluid into its exposed belly sacks that held its venom and acids.
“A South African jelly,” Fulmer said. “Always of the sea.”
“Indeed.”
“You were talking about something like this, years ago. Called it hybrid mechanics?”
Fulmer put the spider down on the table, almost dropping it, then wiping a grotesque feeling from his hands. “To help species of fish that were thinnin’ out, artificially building their immune systems, give them a little extra fight. Someone beat you to the punch?”
“Perhaps, but with what intention? It will be a while working through its system, but if this creation swims, it probably has some sort of device that will take it back to its nest. The fluid from the jellyfish will allow us to track it.”
Fulmer said, “To wherever in hell?”
“More appropriately, to whoever made it. Why did you fight to hold onto this creation? You were delirious, and wouldn’t let it go. You almost drowned with it.”
Fulmer said, “Ship went down, lots of men dead, and I figured I needed proof of what happened. Who’d believe it? Sun baked my brain a little, guess that’s all I could think about, not going to prison.”
Nemo replaced the needle on the instrument tray. “The lessons learned from the battles lost.”
Fulmer said, “You’d know better than me, Captain.”
* * *
Sara lay in her top bunk, staring at the riveted metal of the Nautilus’ ceiling, and feeling suddenly closed in. As Jess does. The other crew. She reached out, brushing her fingers across the iron, and tilted her head to the other men in the quarters. Asleep, snoring, and farting. But not trying to sneak their way into her bed.
She closed her eyes, felt something under her mattress. Sara felt under it, and came back with a small stiletto, and a note, “Sis—just in case.”
She held the knife to her, smiling, and let some rest happen.
* * *
The Bach resounded almost the moment that Fulmer set foot on the bridge, as if an accompaniment. Jess was at the wheel, guiding the ship over a small section of coral reef, carefully ascending to avoid any scrapings. Or hassles.
Fulmer said, “He hasn’t lost his touch, has he?”
“The Captain loves his music, that’s for sure.”
“Even if the rest of us are a little cool. I think it would have been nicer if he’d learned to play the banjo.”
Jess gave Fulmer a nod and a smile, but held back as Fulmer walked the bridge. Checking navigation instrumentation, examining the wires to the Phono.
Fulmer said, “Things are sure changed up here.”
“You didn’t bring your machett this time,” Jess said, using the pronunciation from the African Coast.
“The way you said it, bet I can I guess where you picked that up. And that you’re wearing that Colt.”
“Americans always know their guns.” Jess nodded. “And yes, I am, mate.”
Fulmer said, “Funny, you calling me that.”
“Actually, I didn’t.” Jess steadied the wheel, made adjustments through the glove controls. “And I never will. A slip of the tongue, part of me heritage, you know.”
Fulmer showed his hands. “No offense meant. You’re the first, and that’s it. I’m still trying to get my legs back. But this is a beautiful ship. Amazing what he built, and he’s done better with it since I stood where you are now. And those controls, they’re different, too.”
“I imagine most of it is,” Jess said. “Your being here is cause to carry this Colt.”
“You don’t need protection from me, Mr. Jess. I’m just a rescue.”
“Like in the passage?”
“Still sun-struck.”
Jess said, “Well, just in case. To protect Sis, keep the horny ones in line. And protect me-self, so I can do my duty without interruption.”
“That’s how you get paid at journey’s end,” Fulmer said. He was at the standing switches and said, “What about the Maoris? I’ve been around, I could read those tattoos. There’s a blood oath, right on the throat, with three slashes. That means three brothers, doesn’t it? They gave me the machett.”
“I know.”
Jess was now in the captain’s chair and said, “Used to be three, now only two. I took the other out with a piece of flat iron in a fight. Took his head down to his knees. He was having a go at me, it was fair, but they don’t see it that way.”
Fulmer said, “So you’re surrounded by it, aren’t you?”
He walked to the center of the observation dome, his eyes following the beams from the Nautilus’ running lights into the splay of colors of the night ocean, saying, “Really is beautiful, and worth protecting.”
Jess said, “It goes with the sea life, goes with being First Mate.”
* * *
The last echoes of the organ cords still hadn’t faded when Nemo laid out the sea spider on the examination table, keeping it on its back and working its eight legs. Back and forth, to all positions, pumping its gear and tube circulatory system with specialty wrenches made for the Nautilus’ guidance systems.
The tools aligned perfectly, forcing the natural glowing of the jelly through the spider’s joints. The diamond sliver was still in its test tube, away from the power cavity, as Nemo worked, freeing the pistons and engaging flywheels and gear works.
Finally, a hint of color traveled down a leg. Then another. The lab was dark, except for the new light coming from the mechanical, as all eight legs worked the phosphorus though the spider’s system. And was recirculated, the essence of the jellyfish glowing brighter each time, creating a beacon.
34
BEASTS AND THE SEA
The Greek freighter seemed to have been cleaved in half with an enormous blade, the bow lying twisted into the ocean floor, sides and the deck cut through, the steel shredded as wet tissue. The stern was farther away, crushed by the smokestack falling backward onto it, pounding the midsection flat before catching fire; the shape of an open wound, cut from blackened iron.
An avalanche had buried most of the ship, leaving pieces of railing, some furniture, and even sailor uniforms caught between the wreckage and the sea shelf. An accordion hung from the bow, expanding and withdrawing with the currents. Sand, gravel, and plants continued to roll down the small mountain, onto the ship, for no reason other than to bury it further.
The remains of a few bodies were strung through the wooden railings, the bones of limbs, still connected, wafting about as fish darted
around them, feeding on sinew or marrow, then schooling away.
Nemo was at the observation port, eyeing the freighter with a telescope. “Miss Duncan, here’s the wreck, as you can see, please make note, but there’s no obvious evidence of what caused it.”
Sara, standing by him, asked, “Like more spiders?”
“Meaning, we’ve made visual contact.”
“But those are burn marks.”
Nemo said, “Melted scars, more to the point. Incredible heat. The midsection will always explode when the stacks are compromised, but this ship looks to have been put apart by a Frost Giant’s battle ax.”
Sara said, “That, actually, wasn’t one of the causes listed.”
“I’m surprised,” Nemo said, refocusing the scope. “There’s some movement there. Under the sand.”
Sara said, “I see something; could be an abandoned telegraph cable, a creature pulling at it?”
Jess squinted from the control board. “Yeah, metal looking. Cap, is that some kind of deep-sea rig? Piece of a diving bell, maybe?”
Nemo took his place at the helm, his expression darkening. “We’ll table that suggestion. Mr. Jess, all engines standing by. At full power.”
The sand around the wreckage shifted, something under it rippling back and forth, snakelike. But made of steel. The polished top of the thing could be seen as silt and sand fell away, revealing giant sections of tubular steel, interconnected by what could have been veins and tissue, but was actually thick telegraph wire, wrapped in rubber sheeting. It whipped upward, leaving a long, deep furrow in the ocean floor.
Nemo increased the power with the glove controls, watching the indicators strain, the Nautilus engines turning but not engaged. “All engines prepared to reverse—that’s prepare, Mr. Jess!”
“Aye, sir!” Jess repeated the order.
Sara said, “Captain—”
Nemo cut her off before the objection of not moving yet: “We don’t have enough power built, Miss Duncan! I know my ship!”
Through the dome, the steel snake erupted from the sand, so huge it knocked part of the freighter’s bow away. Tons of metal fast-spinning through the water, tossed with incredible force. The steel thing was followed by another machine-snake, and then another.
Sara watched the snakes as they drew back in unison, then were joined by two more. Metal tubes, wires, and pistons, interacting with each other as living things. Steel tentacles, snapping through the ocean, creating their own waves.
The movement of the polished metal tentacles was constant, pulling more and more away from the ocean floor, trying to free itself from under the ship. Its head, made of flexible interlocking plates, forming the artificial skull of an enormous squid and housing its impulse center.
Another machine, not an animal.
Buried beside the stern wreckage, the sides of the skull inflated, gathering water in rubber chambers, then jetted it out, powering forward, bursting from the sand and wreckage. Its tentacles snapped hold of the Nautilus’ hull and pulled itself around it in a violent motion that rocked the submarine.
The observation dome was suddenly covered with one side of the squid’s head, pressed against the glass, almost splitting it. An artificial eye roamed from its socket, the thing taking in all corners of the bridge.
Jess said, “Another beastie, made of scrap iron and bad intentions. Jesus save me, I’d believe anything now.”
Nemo ordered, “Engine room!”
Jess leapt down the stairs, and from then on Nemo gave no verbal orders. He watched the thing, reversing engines only through the helm hand controls, the crew below, scrambling at the shifting, setting gears in motion, resetting the speed.
On the bridge, quiet. Sara was about to speak, and Nemo silenced her with a gesture, fixed on the eye and its iris. Moving in and out, like the lens of a camera. Opening wider to absorb more light, more visual information. Around it, the natural “flesh” was stitched rubber cushioning metal plating.
The mechanical was strangling the Nautilus, acting on command, pulling its body onto the submarine from the bow to amidships, steel and piston tentacles wrapping tighter and tighter, covering the view ports and gears locking. Digging into the hull, as a real squid would crush an enemy.
Its body twisted, water bursting from its side as a geyser, shifting its weight, to turn the submarine on its side, forcing it over. Shaking it lifeless.
But it was a machine, fighting a machine. And if it could react automatically to what it observed, it could also react to the sounds it detected. The Nautilus shook, the hull plates groaning from the pressure of the steel tentacles squeezing the submarine’s frame. Bending. Trying to snap the iron.
Belowdecks, Fulmer charged from the crew quarters, raced the passage, getting to the Exploration tubes. He knew deepwater squids, and had fought them. He knew they would search a prey for any wound or opening, push their tentacles in, forcing through the flesh, to rip apart from the inside.
He also knew that the crew couldn’t react that way to this creature. It wasn’t an animal, but a mechanical, like the sea spiders, and it had to be dealt with the same way you’d attack a tank or a Gatling gun.
The Maori Whaler grabbed the machete from his brother before throwing his weight against the hatch to the Exploration chamber as a long steel tentacle exploded through one of the tubes. Glass shattered, and metal crumpled to nothing.
The Whaler slashed with the machete, as if he was cutting through thick skin and muscle. Bringing it down. Again and again. Hitting a thing of moving steel, whipping the air like a cat o’ nine tails against a mutineer’s back.
The blade struck. Cutting wiring between pistons. Hot sparks. The electric shock slammed the Whaler out of the dive room, tossing him as if he was nothing against the passageway wall. Dropping, in a long smear of blood, electric-burned hair and skin.
On the bridge, Nemo pulled Sara to him, speaking low. “Remember, it’s not alive.”
That’s when he shut down all power.
The Nautilus was completely dark. The thing reacted as if the machine it was killing was dying, in its death throes. The tentacles tightened. Rivets on the hull loosening, then breaking from the hull like fired bullets. The submarine’s iron starting to bend.
On the bridge, the view ports bulged, the seams giving way. Water tore around the ports. Nemo had been standing close to the glass, watching the steel move over it as a giant coiled spring inside a steel shell. Examining its construction, looking for vulnerabilities, even as the Nautilus began to scream.
There was the sound: that ricochet underwater, of more iron breaking from the hull, the ship’s skeleton fighting the thing. Barely holding.
Nemo spoke in low tones. “I don’t know what sensors that thing has, but your repairs, with the rubber skin, can you cut through it, get to the outer plates?”
It was the moment that comes to all crews at sea: that time during the crisis, when they work as one, all hands doing as they do best, brought together by death, not life. Nemo had seen it hundreds of times, faced it himself with death looming, the sailors who know their fate find extra strength, extend their abilities, as if having a final salute before the inevitability of a burial at sea.
Jess would spit and grin, taking a moment to think about it. He was in the engine room, bringing the reversed engines down, letting them cool, easing their power and checking all rods.
He ran the passageways as First Mate, making sure others bolstered the crossbeams with lumber supports, using torches and candles for light even as the outside iron shifted, the tentacles bending them, the corners breaking free.
The squid-thing pressured the hull; the Nautilus was withstanding. Barely. Taking the torture, even in pain. The ship, doing herself proud, and the crew, doing the same.
Sara, Jess, and Fulmer converged on the lab.
The only light was the flicker, a spatter of fire, coming from Nemo cutting through the side of the wall with a small iron blade, heated red in a metal smith’s coal
scuttle. Fulmer pulled the wall free, and Sara sliced away the rubber skin to reveal the outer iron plating of the hull.
For them, it was as if they were building a ship a thousand years ago, but their movements were in deliberate half-inches, with no words between them. The huge mechanical’s reactions were to sense its enemy, and instantly rip the Nautilus in half, as it had the Greek vessel. Any sign of life, any movement, could be detected by the squid’s mechanisms, so the Nautilus had to look like she was dying, tricking the mechanical to ease off its force. Then they could ambush the machine.
Jess choked. “You know better than I do, Miss, but this scares me dry!”
Sara whispered, “You’ll be drinking soon enough,” as the cardio machine was hauled to the wall opening.
Nemo still whispered, “Miss Duncan’s addition of the rubber lining protects us from any escaping charge, but no direct contact with metal. If you’re foolish, you’re dead.”
He attached the copper paddles to a support beam and the hull’s outside plate, while Fulmer bared an idle power cable. Furious work, with instructions being nods, quick whispers, and pointings in the dark.
Sara lit a lens-focused candle and held it high as the power lines were pulled from the wall by Fulmer and cut open. From the passage, they heard ocean pour in from above. A section giving way.
“First Mate, has word been passed?”
Jess stood straight with a bolt of pride at Nemo’s recognition, still whispering, “Yes, sir, Captain. All set below.”
Sara moved behind the fish tanks, the creatures sensing and swimming furiously to a power grid. She connected the cardio cables, turned to Nemo. He faced the laboratory, the stretching operating theater, as Fulmer hefted himself again onto the wooden table, lying down as if for surgery. Waiting.
Another support beam screamed, the squid tightening, nearly breaking through.
Nemo kept back, away from the cardio machine and the copper contacts, feet off the floor, and turning to Sara. She had stepped up, also away from the floor, sitting on a counter next to a fish tank. No contact.
She used a broom handle, and threw the power grid control switch as Jess leapt from the table, pulling her back, away from a trail of water from the floor to where she was sitting.
Nemo Rising Page 23