“God damn it, Arlo,” she hissed.
“Sorry,” Arlo said.
Gran Jefe glared at him and then turned to Magnolia.
She cinched her helmet and stepped up to the row of launch tubes.
“Pick a tube,” she said to Kade.
She climbed down into the one she always used, and her boots hit the glass bottom. The storm clouds were too thick to see through, but by looking at her HUD, she could tell they were at twenty thousand feet, directly over the Wind Talker rig.
Three minutes later, after all final checks, the glass slid open and dumped Magnolia and Kade into the darkness.
As soon as she was out of the tube, the wind sent her banking hard into a pocket of turbulence. She fought into stable position, holding out her arms and legs at right angles while searching the sky for Kade.
To her surprise, he was already in stable position and, according to his position on her HUD, almost directly over the drop zone.
Magnolia started to reposition her body in that direction, cutting through the clouds. Lightning flashed to the east, but the static wasn’t powerful enough to mess with their electronics.
She watched the altimeter tick down. At seventeen thousand feet, she was closing in on Kade. It seemed he was right about not forgetting how to dive. He looked like a seasoned Hell Diver.
She moved closer, giving a thumbs-up, which he returned.
At fifteen thousand feet, they hit a patch of turbulence that would have knocked a rookie diver out of form. But Magnolia and Kade were soon through it.
They hit another pocket at twelve thousand feet, and this time Magnolia broke from her dive and angled into a suicide dive, tucking her arms and straightening into an arrow.
Kade was doing the same.
When they hit eight thousand feet, she slowly worked back into a stable fall. Kade was already in it, arms and legs out.
“Nice job, cowboy,” Magnolia said over the comms. She bumped on the team channel. “Edgar, you’re up.”
“Copy that, launching now.”
Another five thousand feet zipped by before Magnolia hit the rain. The droplets pecked at her armor, but the neoprene suit kept her dry.
She studied the floor of clouds below them, searching for the DZ.
At four thousand feet, she blew through the clouds and finally got her view of the oil rig and the marina. The Octopus and Ocean Bull were docked on opposite sides of the rig, each ship lashed to two of the four massive cylindrical concrete columns that anchored the rig to the seabed. Huge rubber tires, scavenged from big trucks and earthmovers on foraging runs, cushioned the contact between ship and rig.
The decks and command centers were blacked out to simulate an actual dive in the wastes.
But there was a third ship down there with its island lit up, which told her exactly which one it was.
Raven’s Claw.
X was probably down there, watching.
“Deploying chute,” Kade said over the comm.
Searching the sky, she found the blue glow of his battery pack, illuminating the canopy over his head.
Magnolia pulled her chute a moment later. She watched Kade steering toward the deck of the Octopus as she pulled her pilot chute and let it go. She felt the opening shock, but it wasn’t until she started spinning that she realized something was wrong.
Heart racing, she looked up at her canopy. The lines had twisted around themselves four or five times.
“Oh, shit!” she yelled.
She still had her reserve chute, but at two thousand feet, she had some time to kick out of the line twist.
“Mags, what’s wrong?” Edgar asked.
“Lines . . . twisted,” she replied.
“You know what to do. Just keep calm and kick your way around. You got time. Now, throw that leg!”
This is what the training is for . . .
Pulling the risers apart, she kicked in the opposite direction, but the lines twisted again, and again.
“Shit, shit, shit,” she said.
Magnolia tried again, straining to kick and pull on the risers, but she kept spinning.
Her stomach felt queasy, and soon the centrifugal force could make her lose consciousness.
No. This isn’t how you die!
At one thousand feet, she was running out of time. And with Edgar a minute above her and Kade many seconds below, she was on her own.
“Commander, can you cut away and deploy your reserve?” Kade asked.
“I’m . . .”
The spin made it hard to drag her hands up to the capewells and release the main chute.
“Just keep breathing,” Kade said calmly over the channel. “Push the risers together and run your hand up the lines, twisting as you go.”
After pressing the risers into her left hand, Magnolia ran her hand up the skein of lines and twisted out the bottom coil. Twisted again, and the spin slowed as another coil unwrapped. She checked her altimeter: four hundred feet. But it wasn’t the lack of altitude that made her heart skip a beat.
She was too far away to land on the Octopus, and heading right for the ocean.
But she wasn’t alone. Kade was following her.
The line still had three wraps, and for every one she twisted out, she lost another fifty feet.
The ocean came screaming up at her. She had to slow her descent more, or it wouldn’t be much better than cratering into the ship. The impact would break bones and knock her unconscious, drowning her before any boat could reach her.
“You got this, Commander,” Kade said. “I’m with you; just stay calm.”
Working fast, Magnolia finished untwisting the lines, allowing the chute to inflate fully above her, with maybe a hundred feet to spare. Six feet from the surface, she pulled both toggles and flared, stopping her forward motion.
It felt like hitting concrete. The collision knocked the wind out of her as she slammed into the ocean. The weight of her armor pulled her down, but she hit the helium boosters on her arms and took a breath of reserve air.
After sinking for another few seconds, she stopped and started to rise.
She broke the surface and quickly got enwrapped in her lines and chute. A wave broke over her, pushing her deeper into the tangle.
“Hold on, Commander,” said a voice out of nowhere.
A hand grabbed her, then another. She was pulled up into a red inflatable rescue craft. Kade was here, too. It seemed that he had pinpoint landed right in the boat. He had already shucked the harness and had his helmet off.
“You okay, Commander?” he asked, leaning down.
She took off her helmet and stared into the kind eyes of a man who simply exuded calm.
“Yeah,” she said, sitting up. “Saving my ass on your first dive—I’d say that’s a good start, Cowboy Kade.”
“Aye, it was the one thing I used to be good at,” he said, “until I couldn’t save the ones who needed it most.”
* * * * *
Raven’s Claw pulled up alongside the massive rig that the Cazadores had turned into a dry dock. The great doors were open, exposing scaffolding and cranes that could hoist even the largest fishing boats. Soon, either the Octopus or the Ocean Bull would be docked inside to protect it from the storm.
X watched as the other divers landed one by one on the Octopus. The veterans guided the rookies through their flares and landings without any trouble—a relief after seeing his best diver splash down in the ocean.
Even the big Cazador soldier Gran Jefe, who had volunteered to dive, made it safely onto the deck—with Arlo, no less.
As Raven’s Claw drew even with the rig, X piloted the ship’s motor launch the quarter-mile to the docks. He walked over to wait as a rescue boat pulled up.
Kade and Magnolia climbed out onto the deck, their armor dripping.
/> X couldn’t believe it. Kade had stuck the landing in a moving inflatable boat, then pulled Magnolia out of the water—after not diving for a decade.
Kade was right. It wasn’t something you forgot.
Seeing him, both divers straightened.
“King Xavier,” Magnolia said.
“Had me worried there for a moment, Mags,” X said. “Good thing you had Cowboy Kade with you.”
“Good thing,” she replied.
“Well done, Kade,” X said.
Kade just nodded.
“Finish up the training and get to the capitol tower for a meeting, Commander Katib.” X looked to Kade. “You, too. I want you there.”
“Aye, Your Majesty.”
X walked down the dock to the open entry doors to the rig. Inside, teams of technicians and engineers were still pulling small boats out of the water. It was a remarkable system the Cazadores had built over the years to keep their precious vessels safe during storms.
Michael wasn’t far, working late into the night with Alfred, Pedro, and Rodger in the offices on a third dock. X opened the door and stepped inside, yelling over the racket of compressors, cutoff wheels, and pneumatic riveters.
Pedro sat staring at a monitor, his dreadlocks dangling over the back of the chair like short, fat snakes. Rodger was next to him, glasses propped high on his nose.
“How’s that storm looking?” X yelled over the noise.
Michael looked up from a metal table covered in blueprints and logs.
“It’s getting stronger,” he said. “It’s a level-one hurricane but about to build to a level two.”
“What’s that mean? What kind of winds are we talking about?”
Michael looked to Alfred, who held up Cricket.
“Sir, the drones are picking up winds around one hundred miles per hour,” Alfred said.
“How long until it reaches us?” X asked.
“Five hours before the edge hits, maybe a bit more,” Michael said.
“How are we doing on getting everything locked up?”
“Most of the small vessels are secure, but we still have the Octopus, Ocean Bull, and Raven’s Claw in the water. Same with Blood Trawler, which is currently offloading into our reserve tanks on rig nine . . .”
“Bring it up to about the halfway mark; then bring Blood Trawler here and fill up the Octopus and the Ocean Bull,” X said. “I don’t want to put all our precious fuel in one place.”
“Good idea,” Michael said. “Rodger, can you handle that?”
“Well, yeah, I’m on it, Chief.”
X looked at the time: almost 10:00 p.m.
“At midnight, meet me at the capitol tower, in my study,” X said to Michael.
“I’ll be there.”
X returned to Raven’s Claw, where Ton and Victor had his speedboat ready to launch in the boat bay. They motored out in the rough water and beelined it back to the capitol tower in the raging storm.
Miles was waiting for X in their quarters. X grabbed his satchel, whistled to the dog, and headed straight for the same study where el Pulpo once determined the fate of his people. The irony wasn’t lost on X, who was now doing the same thing.
Imulah waited at the long table. “I have the maps you requested, King Xavier,” he said.
“Thank you.” X pulled a book out of his satchel and began to go over the documents.
A little before midnight, the door cracked open. Ton and Victor stepped aside to let General Forge inside. The tall, muscular man was fifty, fifty-five at most, although the weathered features and the many scars made him look older.
A line traced the right side of his face, the top of his right ear was gone, and what teeth he had left were sharpened. Still, he was a handsome man in a rugged sort of way, with a certain presence about him.
X stood to greet him.
“King Xavier,” the general said. “I’m glad to attend this gathering.”
X gestured toward a wooden chair. Forge had tried his best to learn English over the past year, and X had tried his best to learn Spanish. It was remarkable how much both of them had picked up in that short time.
“Gracias, General.”
A few minutes later, the other attendees filtered in, soaked and huffing. Michael and Magnolia, his most trusted confidants. Joining them was Kade Long. He took off his cowboy hat and nodded politely.
Next came Pedro, carrying a tablet and a crossbow that he handed off to Ton and Victor. They didn’t search the next two participants, Captain Rolo and his XO, Eevi Corey, the former militia investigator and Hell Diver.
“Thank you all for coming,” X said. “Please, have a seat. We don’t have a lot of time.”
As soon as everyone had taken their chairs, he said, “This storm is just the beginning of the threats we face. Before the brunt of it hits, I’m deploying the airship Vanguard.”
“We’re going to the poles to turn on the weather tech?” Magnolia said. “About damn time!”
X shook his head and glared at Magnolia.
“Sorry,” she said.
He rotated a map of South America and Mexico so all the attendees could see.
“I’m scouting out a place to add an outpost, with the goal of starting a new supply chain to keep the islands safe,” X said, pulling a pencil from behind his ear.
“A year ago, after the defeat of the machines, I promised we would feed everyone and keep the peace.” He let out an uncharacteristic sigh. “But no matter what we do here, the Vanguard Islands have an expiration date unless we expand.”
“What the hell does that mean?” Magnolia said. “There’s always been storms here.”
“This one is . . . how do you say . . .” Pedro extended his arms. “Un monstruo.”
“The difference between now and the past is raiding,” Imulah said. “The Cazadores brought back a steady stream of supplies from the eastern shore of South America, but those supplies have been exhausted, and the once-great Cazador navy is down to a few ships.”
“We may survive this storm, and we may have enough food to last the year after this harvest, but what about next year?” X asked. “What happens then?”
He pensively scratched his beard. It was time to share the secret he had harbored for the past month.
“El Pulpo knew this place wouldn’t last forever,” X said. He pulled out the logs that Ada had found.
“The former king sent his son Horn to look for a place called the Coral Castle, but when that mission failed, Horn turned on his father. He believed the only way to save his people would be to murder and eat half of them.”
“Wait, what the hell is the Coral Castle?” Magnolia asked.
“A fantasy, based on a man a Cazador raiding party found in Colón, Panama,” X said. “They ate the guy before he could say much more.”
“So we know nothing about this place? Because if el Pulpo thought it existed, maybe . . .”
“We only know that it is a place of coral, somewhere in the Pacific Ocean.”
Michael looked to Pedro. “Have you ever heard of the Coral Castle?”
He shook his head, dreadlocks bouncing.
X didn’t want to dismiss the possibility of a secret haven—after all, his people had survived in the sky, but there was no evidence to support the story—only the sword and armor of a very unlucky man.
To hunt for it seemed a fool’s errand. But it had given him an idea about the canal. He pondered what he was about to ask, but his gut told him it had to be done. They had the weapons and vehicles from the ITC Ranger to fight within the wastes. It was the people he was afraid of risking.
Sending young people out potentially to their deaths when he had to remain behind weighed heavily on his heart. It was what he had learned to hate most about being king, but it had to be done.
“We must
head back to the wastes and start raiding the western shoreline of South America,” X said. He put a finger on the map. “To do that, we will set up an outpost somewhere along one of the greatest engineering feats of human history: the Panama Canal.”
The others hovered closer to the map.
“We’re sure it’s clear?” Magnolia asked.
Imulah spoke. “In 2031, they punched a deeper, wider channel, getting rid of the locks at Miraflores—he pointed on the map—and here, at Gatun Lake. So theoretically, yes, it should be wide enough for our vessels. Whether it’s clear in terms of hostiles, I’d err on the side of caution and say it is unlikely.”
“Which is why I’m deploying the Vanguard to Panama as soon as it’s ready to fly,” X said. “To figure out what is down there. Magnolia, I want you to dive in with Team Raptor and recon the area. Find us the best place to set up an outpost.”
Kade stared anxiously at X.
“Kade, you’re on backup just in case we need you,” X said. He turned to Rolo next.
“Captain, you and Lieutenant Corey will lead this mission and leave as soon as we finish here.”
“Aye-aye, sir,” Rolo said.
X looked over the maps again. “What happens next will go to the council,” he said. “But if we find the Panama Canal is clear, then I’ll deploy our navy and engineering teams to establish an outpost.”
General Forge nodded. “I will work with Chief Engineer Everhart to prepare our fleet.”
“So that’s why you wanted the mounted rams? Just in case you need to push something through the canal?” Michael asked.
“Yes. But this is just the beginning of my plans,” X said. He used a pencil to draw a line over the map from Panama down to Colombia and Ecuador, stopping to circle the known ITC bunker locations.
“I want to set up outposts and keep a steady supply coming to the islands from these locations,” X said. “That’s how we stay alive until the day we’re strong enough to go to the poles and power up those weather modification devices.”
He put the pencil down.
“I’m with you,” Michael said.
“It shall be done,” Forge said.
“We dive so humanity survives, X—er, King Xavier,” Magnolia said.
Hell Divers Series | Book 8 | King of the Wastes Page 7