The submarine commander came back on the comms net, and Anya started to understand why the submarine was so unnerving, whatever its limitations. She had no idea where it was at any given moment. It was like having grubs tunneling beneath her. It was another monster lurking under the bed.
“Clement to Falconer—we just pinged something, and we thought it was a cetacean, but the acoustics weren’t right.” Garcia paused. “Is Sergeant Fenix there? Ask him about the Locust leviathans.”
Marcus cut in. “No idea what they sound like underwater, Commander.”
Anya took another look at the vessels through her binoculars. The machine guns on the main boat were still secured. “If they’re planning to open fire, they’re going to have to step outside to do that.”
Michaelson nodded. “And we didn’t intend to board, so we’ve lost the advantage of stealth. Massy’s our insurance—if they want him alive, that is.”
“You think they don’t?”
“Perhaps he’s expendable and they’ve got other plans,” he said. “They wouldn’t abandon vessels like these for no good reason. Too valuable. And we need to know what that reason is, for our own security if nothing else.”
Anya kept an eye on the largest boat’s wheelhouse. As the distance between the vessels gradually closed, the lookout’s voice came over the radio again.
“Small arms damage to the main boat, sir—inboard. Just above the wheelhouse door.”
Michaelson raised his binoculars to check. “Might not be recent, but given the debris, let’s assume it is.”
Anya tried to focus on the damage, but something else caught her eye as she adjusted her binoculars. There was suddenly movement on the lead boat. She saw a man come to the wheel, waving slowly and deliberately.
“I see him,” Michaelson said. “Stand by, all guns.”
The radio crackled again. “Falconer, nice of you to join us. You’ve got something we’ve been looking for.”
“This is Captain Michaelson. Am I speaking to Cormick Allam?”
“No … Mr. Allam can’t come to the bridge. This is Darrel Jacques, and let’s just say we’ve carried out a company takeover. We’d really like to have Massy, please.”
Anya interpreted that as a mutiny. Michaelson gestured to Muller, then picked up his radio mike again.
“Baird, see if the name Darrel Jacques rings a bell with Massy, will you?”
Anya watched Baird dip his head slightly as he spoke to Massy, and suddenly it was clear that Massy knew the name, and not in a good way. Baird still had hold of his arm, but Massy pulled back as if to make a run for it—just reflex, because there was nowhere to run. Anya heard a few words of the argument as Baird jerked him back. Bernie watched, no expression visible at all.
“You can’t do that, man, he’s gonna frigging kill me.” Massy didn’t look as if he was putting on an act. “No! Fuck you, you can’t do that to me!”
Baird got on the radio. “In case you missed that,” he said, “Jacques is from a rival gang. He’s got plans for Massy for stiffing his guys over something. It sounds painful.”
Michaelson scratched the side of his nose. “How convoluted. Well, I came here to remove the threat of piracy, so I don’t care which camp they’re in. And we can only use Massy for this sting once, so let’s hand him over and see what else we can get out of this.”
So that was why Massy didn’t recognize the main boat: it wasn’t one of his. It was a hijack. That explained the damage to the wheelhouse. The whole mission was starting to veer off course, but Michaelson didn’t turn a hair. Anya had him pegged as a gambler.
“Either they tailed Massy’s people, sir, or they intercepted the messages about coordinates,” Anya said.
“Good point.” Michaelson flicked the mike’s switch again. “Mr. Jacques, you’ll excuse my directness, but what’s in it for us?”
“Maybe we can do a deal.”
“Explain.”
“We’ll deal with the likes of Massy’s people in exchange for being allowed to carry on our normal business—taking care of the islands. We’re not pirates. The worst you can call us is vigilantes, and I’m not sure that’s such a bad thing anyway.”
“Will I notice the difference?”
“We see our job as getting supplies where they’re needed, making a fair living from it, and looking after our communities. We’re in the same profession, right?”
Michaelson paused for a moment and seemed to be thinking it over. Anya had no idea what he was going to do next. Perhaps he didn’t, either.
“Let’s both show some goodwill and step out onto our respective decks,” he said. “You’ll understand why I’m reluctant to send my crew across to you on trust.”
“Same here,” said Jacques. “Let’s do that.”
Michaelson broke the link with Jacques and switched to the crew frequency.
“All hands, I think we can modify Plan A,” he said. “As soon as Massy is handed over and the boats are clear, let them go, unless things start to come unraveled. Clement—this is our chance to track them back to their home port. I think your deterrent value is best kept for when we have an audience to appreciate it.”
“Clement to Falconer, understood.” Garcia sounded disappointed. “And we’re still picking up odd acoustics. Is Fenix sure about that leviathan?”
“No, I’m not,” Marcus said. “But if I see it, I’ll be sure to let you know.”
“Don’t waste a torpedo chasing phantoms, Garcia,” Michaelson said, and stepped out onto the deck.
Massy wouldn’t shut up. He was still spitting abuse and demanding his rights when Baird slammed him down on the deck to stop him struggling.
“You can’t do this to me, asshole. You’ll regret it. I got rights. And friends.”
“Do you come with an off switch?” Baird said. “Tell me where it is, or I’ll have to make one the hard way.”
Dom looked down at him. “If he wants to swim for it, let him.”
“Maybe Jacques is his best buddy and this is some dumb-ass act.” Baird had his knee on Massy’s back. “Hey, how close are we going to get to that boat? You think Michaelson knows what he’s doing?”
Dom didn’t think Massy was acting at all. He was crapping himself. He didn’t seem too scared of the COG, but he obviously knew what his own kind did to settle disputes. If that was worse than anything Bernie had in mind, then Dom wasn’t sure he wanted to know the details.
“He’s run counterpiracy operations before,” Dom said. “And we’ve got three guns trained on them. We’re as safe as they are.”
Michaelson strode out onto the deck. The pirate gunboat started up its motor and chugged slowly forward, edging clear of the mist that was now starting to lift as the sun rose higher. A short, thick-set guy with close-cropped white hair came out of the wheelhouse and took up position at the bow. So far, so good; nobody had opened fire. Dom grabbed a pair of field glasses from the nearest crewman and checked out the gunboat for himself.
There were at least three men in the wheelhouse, and half a dozen more came out to stand and look conspicuous. Dom checked out the two smaller boats as best he could, but they were still dead in the water, with nobody visible. There was now less than a hundred meters separating the lead gunboat from Falconer. It slowed and stopped twenty meters away.
“So you’re based on Vectes, yeah?” Jacques called.
“News travels,” Michaelson said.
“We pick up stuff here and there. Now, we owe Jonnie Boy some justice that’s long overdue, so how about you bring him over?”
“How about telling me how you plan to keep his colleagues in line?”
“Well, here’s a token of our intent.” Jacques turned around and gestured to one of his men. “Bring him out.”
Dom glanced at Bernie to see how she was taking all this. She had her Lancer resting on its sling, cradled in both arms, with an expression on her face that gave no clue to the personal stake she had in this. He wondered how long it had taken
her to come to terms with it. Maybe she hadn’t and was just good at acting normal. Her occasional lapses told him it was the latter.
Life goes on. It has to.
Two of Jacques’s men hauled a battered figure up to the gunboat’s bows. He slumped between them. Dom could see they’d made a mess of him. It was hard to tell if he’d been shot as well. He was still alive, though.
“Captain,” Jacques said, “let me introduce Cormick Allam.”
Massy squirmed. Baird hauled him to his feet.
“Take a look,” Baird said. “Is that your boss?”
Massy blinked a few times, then his face contorted. “Shit, Cormick! Cormick! What did they do to you, man?”
Allam raised his head a little, probably as far as he could.
Jacques did a big theatrical shrug. “Like I said, Captain, we’ll deal with these shits.” Then he pulled a handgun from his belt, turned to Allam, and put a round through his head. The crack sounded extra-loud in the quiet, damp air. “Job done.”
The two men threw the body overboard.
Dom flinched. But for the first time in weeks, it didn’t bring back memories that he couldn’t fend off. He simply noted that it wasn’t a straight link to Maria. It was just a bad bastard shooting another one of his kind. It was always shocking to see execution in cold blood, but it wasn’t the first time, and Dom was pretty sure it wouldn’t be the last.
Massy didn’t even manage to swear. He just took in a long ragged breath as if he was going to scream, but nothing emerged. He’d be lucky to get the same quick end that Allam had.
“Fifteen down,” Jacques said. “A few hundred to go. Leave it to us.”
Michaelson looked unmoved. “And what else would we be leaving to you? Or would we just be allowing one gang to oust another?”
“Like I said, we’re not scum.” Jacques put his handgun back in his belt. “We take a cut to survive, and we make sure nobody profiteers or hogs supplies. We don’t want to touch COG vessels.”
“How about the fishing fleet? We lost a trawler.”
“Definitely not us. But don’t underestimate the number of criminals with boats.”
Dom didn’t see how Michaelson could strike any deal with Stranded without Prescott’s say-so, but Falconer was a long way from Vectes, and he needed to get something going right now.
“How about an interim agreement?” Michaelson said. “I give you Massy, you prove you’re not going to give me problems, and I’ll stay away from you unless I hear you get into bad ways.”
Jacques considered it, head cocked on one side. Dom didn’t believe for one moment that either man meant it, but he’d seen stranger alliances in the war.
“Done,” Jacques said. “Although I’d be interested to know how you plan to monitor that.”
“Oh, I’ll hear,” Michaelson said. He turned to Dom. “You wanted to do the cross-decking, you said.”
“Yes, sir.” Dom wasn’t sure if any of the sailors was up to doing a risky job like that. He was still waiting for something to go badly wrong. “And what are we going to do about the two smaller boats? I could bring one back with us.”
“Good question. I was hoping to liberate at least one.” He turned back to Jacques. “As a gesture of goodwill, we’d like to keep one of the boats.”
Jacques thought it over for a few moments and nodded. “They’ve got a lot of holes now. But feel free.”
Baird shoved Massy ahead of him toward Falconer’s stern and Bernie went to follow. Dom put his hand out to stop her.
“We can do this, Bernie. You make sure Cole doesn’t puke so hard he falls overboard.”
She gave him that look, as if he hadn’t done his homework and she expected better of him.
“Okay,” she said. “They probably wouldn’t let me stay and watch them beat the shit out of him anyway.”
“It’s their justice,” Dom said. “He gets what’s coming to him, and you get to keep a clean conscience. I think that’s a good result all round.”
“I wouldn’t have lost any sleep over that.” Bernie took a few steps back. “But Marcus has a point about hanging on to the few rules we still have.”
Andresen was manning Marcus’s gun when Dom squeezed past him. He jerked his thumb aft to indicate Marcus was already heading for the Marlin to lower it over the stern.
“He doesn’t delegate well,” Andresen said. “He still expects an ambush.”
“So do I,” said Dom. “Life’s like that.”
Baird had a hell of a job getting Massy over the side and into the inflatable. Dom had a moment’s hesitation: should the COG have been doing this? But if it didn’t, what else was it going to do with Massy—execute him under COG law, or let him go? Someone had to do something.
“You know what they’re going to do with me?” Massy demanded. He landed on the Marlin’s seat with a thud, rocking the whole boat. “You know what those assholes do? You know how long they take to kill you? What they do to you?”
“Shut up,” Baird said. “Mataki would have taken longer.”
“You can’t do this. You’re supposed to be the decent guys. Civilization. Remember?”
Marcus stood aside to let Dom take the helm. He kept looking down at the water as if he was expecting something to emerge. All that talk of the leviathan had made Dom edgy, too, and he kept trying to tell himself that the thing they’d seen had to be a freshwater creature, and this was saline, so it couldn’t have come this far … could it?
But there were unpleasant and dangerous things much closer to home to worry about.
“Can’t help noticing you never denied you did it, Massy,” Marcus said at last.
Massy didn’t say anything else. Dom took the Marlin wide of the garbage drifting on the slow current. The scattered books, cans, and clothing made it look like a houseboat had been blown up. As they closed on the lead vessel, the flotsam became a thin mat of assorted debris. Dom assumed he was now in someone’s sights. Someone was usually in his, after all. When he glanced over the side at the debris, his stomach lurched. A body was floating facedown in the water, life jacket in place, but minus most of its head.
“Anyone you know, Massy?”
Massy swiveled on the seat. It took him a few seconds to react. “No. Shit.”
“Who is it?”
Massy just shook his head. “How can I tell? He hasn’t got a frigging head.”
Dom brought the Marlin up against the stern and tied a quick-release line. The name on the transom was TRADER V; the boat looked like it might have been a sport boat in a previous life before it was cannoned up. Marcus waited, one hand on the stern ladder, the other on his rifle.
“Up you go,” Baird said to Massy, shoving him ahead. “Just in case this isn’t as cozy as it looks.”
Massy caught the rungs while Marcus held the boat alongside. Three faces appeared over the stern; Dom was ready for a double-cross, and knew only too well how vulnerable a Marlin was to gunfire. But pirates or not, they just hauled Massy aboard and made no attempt to do anything else.
Dom didn’t even have to set foot on Trader. The last thing he saw of Massy was him struggling as he went over the stern rail. “You’ll regret this, you assholes,” he yelled.
Dom wasn’t sure which assholes Massy was referring to, but there wasn’t much he could do about revenge now.
“You think Michaelson knows what he’s doing?” Dom asked.
Marcus shrugged. “Garcia can’t have had much warfare experience. Long time since the navy deployed a submarine in anger. But Michaelson’s been doing this for years.”
“Hey, do I get to drive the boat?” Baird said. “Captain Charisma wants that one, right?”
Dom listened in on the radio as Michaelson talked with Garcia.
“Just shadow them,” Michaelson was saying. “I want to know where they operate from. No point wasting a lead. I want the nerve center, not the odd vessel.”
Baird was listening in. “Is Michaelson too much of a gentleman to actuall
y blow the shit out of them when he’s done a deal?”
Dom wondered if Jacques had a point about being vigilantes. It wasn’t as if the COG could do anything to reclaim or even protect the islands scattered across Sera, and the COG’s enforcement could be pretty brutal too. It all came down to legalities.
When Garcia responded, he seemed a lot less concerned about the definition of pirates than the underwater sound that he still couldn’t identify.
“There’s something down here, sir,” Garcia said. “I’m not going to use active sonar and advertise our position until I work out what it is.”
It bothered Dom, too. But he forgot about it when he came alongside one of the drifting boats and helped Baird board it. It was badly shot up, and there’d obviously been a firefight before Massy’s chums had been overwhelmed. There were still bodies on board.
“Shit,” Baird said. “Doesn’t any asshole clean up after himself these days?”
He manhandled the bodies overboard. As they hit the water, Dom wondered for a moment if the guys had families who’d now never know what happened to them, but that was their occupational hazard, and there wasn’t much he could do about it.
Marcus didn’t say a word. He just kept looking over the side until Baird got the boat started, and both vessels headed back toward Falconer.
CNV FALCONER.
Jacques hadn’t been joking about Massy. He really was making him pay for something.
Sound carried. And Bernie felt she had to stay and listen. She’d chosen to remain on deck, because if she went below to get away from the sounds of Massy screaming his head off, then she had to ask herself if she’d been wrong to take her vengeance on his two buddies.
If I’d caught him when I did the others, I’d be doing the same as Jacques. Can’t turn squeamish now.
She didn’t know what they were actually doing to Massy, or what he’d done to get their attention, but she could only imagine his fate within the limits of her own ingenuity. Michaelson was waiting for Trader to finish putting a tow line on the other salvaged boat and head back to base. Bernie wasn’t sure what he was trying to achieve, other than making sure Jacques left the area and Clement followed her home.
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