The Devil You Know

by Sam Sisavath

  “Your senses are getting better. Pretty soon you’ll be as strong as me. Maybe stronger, if the eggheads are correct.”

  Porter had sounded so sure when he said it. What did he know that she didn’t? Were her senses really more developed now than before? Sure, she had heard him breathing behind her in the darkness, but they were inside an enclosed space, and she was bound to catch him sooner or later. Was her sense of hearing really so much better because she could hear the running gun battle outside? She didn’t know how thick the walls were, so that didn’t help—

  Ping! as something punched through the wall to her right, and the air above her head shifted slightly before another ping! as that same “something” pierced the opposite wall and disappeared into the night.

  Quinn caught her breath as two thin shafts of moonlight poured inside through the perfectly drilled round holes. The one on her right was a foot higher than her head, but the one on the left was almost perfectly at chest level. Which meant the stray round had come from above at a diagonal angle when it fired.

  That was close. Jesus, that was close.

  She willed her body to relax, then closed her eyes and took control of her breathing because she was hyperventilating. In and out, in and out—

  Clang!

  Quinn’s head snapped up.

  Clang!

  The doors—someone was manipulating the rods that kept them closed.

  Was it Porter? Back to finish her off? No, that was stupid. He had gone to great lengths to capture her. Not him, specifically, but the Rhim. They could have killed her so many times but hadn’t.

  “You have no idea how important you are to us,” Porter had said. “To the whole plan. That’s why the Old Men are going to look after you from now on.”

  “The whole plan?” she had thought then. “Is he talking about Red Sky?”

  She stopped thinking about Porter when the final rod on her container’s door was pulled loose with a loud cha-clang! and the doors began to swing open—slowly, as if whoever was out there was having to exert a lot of energy. The sound of chaos outside doubled, then tripled as the two heavy metal doors swung wider and wider.

  Quinn caught her breath as a silhouetted body appeared against the moonlight, with stacks of red and blue and green containers behind it. The lone figure stepped inside, the sound of their heavy breathing preceding them.

  Someone’s out of shape. Either that, or they’re hurt…

  Moonlight flashed across the new arrival’s face, revealing fleshly pink scars across one side that looked as if they were in the process of healing. She was wearing loose fitting cargo pants and a thermal sweater that hung off her like she’d stolen them from someone who was a size bigger.

  “Sarah,” Quinn said. “Jesus, you’re alive.”

  Sarah managed a smile, even though just one side of her face looked capable of it. “Let’s get out of here.” She produced a tactical knife from her pocket, then crouched in front of Quinn. “Lucky you, I picked this off a dead body.”

  Quinn looked past Sarah and out the open container at the ship’s deck. “What’s going on out there? It sounds like World War III.”

  Sarah finished, then stood up and slipped behind Quinn. “The ship’s under attack.”

  “By who?”

  “I don’t know yet. The ship’s crewed by Rhim in civilian clothes. The ones assaulting it are in black fatigues.”

  “So shoot the ones in civvies?”

  “That’s what I’ve been doing.”

  Quinn kicked the zip ties off her ankles, then moved her legs around to get the blood flowing down there again. “I heard explosions…”

  “Attack helicopters. They took out the building that housed the helm. The ship’s adrift—”

  “Sarah!” Quinn shouted as a man appeared outside the opening. He was cradling a weapon and wearing cargo pants and a wool cap, looking for all intents and purposes like someone who belonged on a commercial cargo liner.

  The man had stopped and was turning when there was as a bang!, the sound of the gunshot so impossibly loud in the closed steel confines that Quinn was sure she had just gone deaf.

  The crewman seemed to stumble before falling to his knees. He was still trying to lift his submachine gun when Sarah shot him again—one more time in the chest, before finishing him off with a round to the forehead. The man slumped partially inside the box and lay still, moonlight gleaming off a pool of blood forming underneath him.

  Quinn was certain the first shot that had gone off next to her ear had made her deaf, but that couldn’t have been the case because she heard the next two shots, even if they did sound like dull, wet firecrackers.

  “You okay?” Sarah asked from behind her.

  “I think I might have gone deaf.”

  “You couldn’t be, because you just answered me.”

  “Oh, right.”

  Quinn’s hands came loose, and she let out a sigh of relief and stood up—and almost fell.

  Sarah grabbed her from behind, said, “Give it a few seconds,” and helped her over one of the walls where she leaned against it.

  Quinn waited for blood to flow properly through her wobbly legs as Sarah hurried over to the dead man. She peered out to make sure no one was around before crouching and snatching his weapon—an MP5 submachine gun—from the floor, then rifled through his clothes.

  When she was done, Sarah stood up and glanced over. “Can you walk?”

  “Let’s see…” Quinn took one step forward, then another, before finally trusting herself enough to nod. “Yeah.”

  Sarah reached behind her back and took out a pistol and tossed it over. Quinn caught the Glock. Sarah gave her an extra magazine, and as Quinn took it, she could make out a generous layer of still-wet blood around Sarah’s hand that went all the way up and beyond her wrist.

  She broke her restraints. How the hell did she do that?

  “You okay?” Quinn asked.

  “I’ll be better when we’re both off this boat.” Sarah paused and stared at Quinn, and pursed a smile that said, I know you have a lot of questions, as she said: “We’ll talk later, okay? I promise.”

  How did you know my father? Quinn thought. Who are you?

  But she nodded instead. “Let’s get out of here.”

  Sarah turned and led the way back to the doors. “We should try linking up with the assaulters.”

  Quinn followed her, thinking to herself, You knew my father, didn’t you? What about my mother? And, for God’s sake, why does everyone know so much about me except me?

  There were so many other questions roiling around in her head—about her, Porter, Ben, Sarah, and a half dozen other people—but Quinn had to shove them all aside because none of it was going to matter if she couldn’t get out of here, and right now there was a war going on outside that wasn’t going to stop for her to play Twenty Questions with Sarah.

  Focus on the moment. Focus on surviving this first…

  Sarah stopped at the doors and leaned out, looking left, then right, before glancing back at her. “The fighting’s confined to the stern and bow. Back and front of the boat.”

  “Are we on a cargo ship?”

  “Looks like your run-of-the-mill commercial liner.”

  “Where were they keeping you?”

  “In a container like this one near the stern.”

  “What about Aaron and Zoe?”

  Sarah shook her head. “I don’t know. The only reason I found you was because Porter had two people standing guard next to your container.”

  Quinn was going to ask “What happened to them?” but she didn’t because it was obvious what had happened to them if Sarah was here and they weren’t.

  Sarah stepped outside, the submachine gun in front of her. Quinn regripped the Glock and followed, each step toward the opening bringing her closer to the madness going on out there. It wasn’t quite World War III anymore, which was a sign the fighting was starting to slowly wind down.

  Moonlight reflect
ed off the scarred metal containers in front of Sarah, the words Krycek Shipping in faded letters stretching from one side to the other—

  Bang-bang!

  Two shots, so fast they sounded like one, exploded nearby, and Sarah staggered back, almost stumbling over the dead crewman she’d killed. Before Quinn could even scream out Sarah’s name, a shadow plummeted out of the sky and landed in a slight crouch in front of Sarah, who somehow found the strength to launch herself forward even as a third shot rang out—bang!

  Sarah’s body continued like a missile, undeterred, and slammed into the figure that had jumped down from the sky and driving it into one of the steel containers with a smashing boom! like two cars colliding.

  Quinn raced forward, jumping over the dead man and into the opening even as Porter (!) lifted Sarah up by her shoulders and cast her aside as if she was little more than a nuisance. Sarah’s body flew across the cold air and slammed into the wall of another container before crumpling to the ship’s deck in a bloody heap.

  “Porter!” Quinn shouted, stepping outside and squeezing the trigger.

  Her first round hit Porter in the right shoulder, but instead of going down, he seemed to merely flinch. She aimed her second shot at his chest and fired again, but he twisted a split second before she pulled the trigger, and the bullet pinged! off the box behind him.

  No!

  Before Quinn could fire again, Porter somehow made up the distance between them and grabbed the gun in her hand and twisted. Quinn screamed as Porter wrestled the Glock from her and tossed it away, before grabbing her by the throat and driving her back, back until she felt one of her container’s open doors digging into her flesh. She didn’t know what hurt more—the pressure from Porter’s fingers around her neck or the gauge steel hammering against her spine.

  There was a snikt! and moonlight gleamed off the polished blunt end of a long metal staff as Porter revealed it, just before he pressed it against her throat. Her skin’s contact with the strange metal was electrifying, like being submerged in ice, and breathing became suddenly very difficult.

  Porter’s face was dark, and not just because it was partially hidden in shadows, but because any presence of humanity she remembered was gone, replaced by something that looked almost machine-like.

  My God, how did he change so much? What did they do to him?

  He smirked at her, even as her suffocating face reflected off the orbs of his eyes. “He saved it for me, you know. The staff. I guess he always knew I’d come back sooner or later. It’s probably the nicest thing he’s ever done for me, when I think about it.”

  “He?” Quinn thought. Who the hell is “he?”

  But she couldn’t ask the question, because just breathing was so difficult. It was as if Porter was slowly crushing her windpipe with his metal staff and enjoying every single second of her struggle. She wanted to remind him that the Rhim wanted her alive, but she couldn’t even get those potentially life-saving words out.

  “They opened my eyes, Quinn,” he said. “They’ll open yours, too. This world needs us in the worst way. You’ll see. You’ll—”

  Before he could finish, something slammed into him from the side and drove him a good six—seven—ten yards from her, before both he and his attacker crumpled to the boat’s deck. Quinn heard the whoosh-whoosh of Porter’s staff as it flipped through the air and clanged loudly against a container and fell, clanging a second time before rolling to a stop.

  Quinn gasped for breath as she slid down the door and fell to one knee.

  The MP5!

  It was the same one that Sarah had in her possession before Porter shot her. Quinn was reaching for it when she heard a ferocious yell and turned her head.

  Sarah!

  She was on top of Porter, straddling his chest as she broke his nose with a ferocious punch, then landed another one somewhere along his temple. She was moving so fast, like a demon on overdrive, hitting Porter again and again and again.

  But it wasn’t enough.

  Porter, his face covered in thick fresh blood, gritted his teeth and somehow intercepted Sarah’s fist in mid-strike. Even Sarah looked shocked by that, and before she could counter, Porter punched her in the chest with his other hand—

  No, he didn’t punch her, he stabbed her with a knife.

  “No!” Quinn screamed.

  Sarah seemed to take forever to topple off Porter’s chest, as if she were moving in slow motion. She looked over at Quinn, the shock frozen on her face, just before she vanished onto the other side of Porter.

  Quinn snatched the MP5 up from the deck and scrambled to her knees even as Porter stood back up, blood dripping from his shattered nose and broken face. His chest heaved as he fought to breathe, and he gazed down at Sarah before looking across the open space at her.

  Ten yards—maybe less—separated them.

  She gripped the submachine gun, her finger on the trigger, as they stared across at one another.

  “It went in deep,” Porter said. His words were slightly slurred, blood dripping from his broken lips. “But you can still save her. As long as the brain is intact, the spew can restore her. To do that, you’ll have to come back with me, Quinn. That’s the only way—”

  She moved the weapon lower and squeezed the trigger.

  He darted right—moving with the kind of blinding speed she was expecting and accounted for—and the first two rounds sailed harmlessly past him, ricocheting off the container in the background, but she was firing on full-auto and the third and fourth rounds found their target—his right thigh. He stumbled, and that made it easier for the next half dozen bullets to drill through his legs.

  Porter fell to his knees and screamed as his shattered bones smashed into the hard deck. He collapsed in a pile, landing sideways, as dark red blood pooled around him in thick puddles.

  Quinn got up and ran over to Sarah, jumping over Porter’s prone body. The other woman was on her back staring up at the sky, the knife still protruding from her chest.

  The heart. Jesus, did he get her right in the heart?

  Sarah’s sweater was covered in blood, the warm liquid pumping out of two holes in her stomach and a third one around her waist where Porter had shot her. Sarah smiled when Quinn slid to her knees next to her. “Did you get him?”

  Quinn nodded before checking on Porter just to be sure. His body was twitching and he was still very much alive, but his legs didn’t even look like legs anymore, and he was covered from head to toe in a coat of red, made even brighter by the harsh moonlight.

  She looked back down at Sarah, at the knife in her chest. “Is it bad?”

  Sarah struggled to fake a reassuring smile, but she simply didn’t have the strength to make it work. “Yes.”

  “How bad?”

  “He put it where it needed to be.” She reached for Quinn’s hand and squeezed. “I’m sorry.”

  “Stop saying that.”

  “I’m sorry. For everything.”

  “Can you heal?”

  “I don’t know. No one’s ever…stabbed me in the heart before.” Again, that poor attempt at a reassuring smile. “It doesn’t really hurt, oddly enough.” She tried to look in Porter’s direction but didn’t seem to have the strength to turn her head even a little bit. “Porter…”

  “What about him?”

  “Don’t kill him. Not yet.”

  “He’s still alive.”

  “Good, good.” Then, “Do you hear that?”

  “What?”

  Even as she said the word, Quinn heard it—or what she didn’t hear.

  The heavy fighting had settled down into sporadic back-and-forths—short bursts of pop-pop-pop here and there, but it was nothing like the battles she’d heard while trying to make her escape. Most of it seemed to be coming from her right—the bow? Stern? Even now, she didn’t know where anything on the boat was, with only stacks of containers blocking her view of the rest of the ship.

  Quinn looked back to Sarah. “My father, Sarah. You knew
my father, didn’t you?”

  Sarah nodded.

  “Tell me about him,” Quinn said. “Please.”

  “I loved him,” Sarah said. “I loved him with all my heart.”

  “Sarah…” She squeezed the other woman’s hand. “Who are you?”

  Sarah reached up and cupped Quinn’s cheeks. Her palms were covered in blood, but Quinn was beyond caring.

  “Sarah,” Quinn whispered. “Tell me. Please.”

  “I’m sorry,” Sarah whispered. “I’m sorry it took so long.”

  “What? What took so long?”

  “I was only trying to protect you...”

  “Protect me? From what? From the Rhim?”

  “We only ever wanted to protect you…”

  “Sarah, please. Please.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said, before closing her eyes, and her hands fell and slapped against the deck.

  Quinn didn’t move. She didn’t know if she could even if she wanted to. She stared at Sarah’s body instead, at her sweat-slicked face, and the painfully slow rise and fall of her chest. Still alive, if just barely.

  Sarah looked strangely at peace, even with the knife sticking out of her. Quinn thought about pulling the blade out but couldn’t bring herself to do it, mostly because she didn’t know if it would do more harm than good.

  Who are you?

  Strands of Sarah’s hair lifted, and cold air rushed against Quinn’s face as something flashed by overhead. She glanced up, reaching for the MP5 lying nearby at the same time as a black helicopter glided past.

  It had the size and shape of a civilian aircraft, except there were no decals, and a man in black commando fatigues sat with his legs dangling off the open side hatch looking back down at her. He was cradling a rifle, but he didn’t lift it when they locked eyes.

  “The ship’s crewed by Rhim in civilian clothes,” Sarah had said earlier. “The ones assaulting it are in black fatigues.”

  Friendlies, Quinn thought as the chopper banked toward the other side of the ship.

  She put the submachine gun back down when a second helicopter, identical to the first, swooped by overhead. There was another commando leaning out its open side hatch, but he was manning what looked like a minigun. He swiveled the weapon around, sweeping the ship for targets. This one headed in the opposite direction as the first.