by Steven Moore
“Look, we have no idea if any of this is true. But we have to at least go along with the general idea that Nate’s incident was an accident. We’ll stick together, but let’s keep our eyes and ears open and go about our business as usual, okay? It does seem as if someone aboard this ship is up to no good. The captain and the crew trust everyone. It might be down to us to find out who killed young Nate.”
27
Nightmares
The man who’d attempted to kill Megan and, by way of coercion, had also tried to kill R.B., hadn’t given up. The chance to take them out personally had passed, because of the incident with the kid Nate. Everyone had been on high alert for days, and although things were more or less back to normal, people were still on their guard. But he would not give up. He could not give up. There were just forty-eight hours to go before they docked in Spain, and if he hadn’t finished them off by then, he knew it would be him who’d pay for it, almost certainly with his life. Plan A or B hadn’t worked. It was time to change tactics.
The rest of that day passed without incident, but R.B. and Megan had kept a low profile. They went down for dinner again at the normal time, when they knew the dining room would be crowded—safety in numbers, Megan had said—and then retired early to R.B’s cabin, where Megan had been spending almost all her time. They’d discreetly pulled Megan’s mattress into his room, and R.B. was sleeping on that while Megan took the bed. There remained that unsaid vibe between them that neither seemed prepared to mention. Thus, they still hadn’t shared a bed, though the last few weeks’ events had pulled them even closer. As Troy had often said to R.B. in their younger years, ‘If something is worth having, it’s usually worth waiting for.’ And R.B. had to agree. So, they simply chatted late into the night, and as she always did, Megan was first to fall asleep. But R.B’s sleeping skills meant he was only a few minutes behind her.
R.B. awoke early, as he generally did, and felt fully fit again after his bout of illness, whatever it was that had caused it. He let Megan sleep until she awoke naturally, which as it happens wasn’t long. It was a little after seven, on what was now the eleventh day of the voyage, and the penultimate day before reaching Spain. Golden light spilled into R.B’s cabin and he was about to ease the curtain open a little more to check out the view when Megan started to moan in her sleep. Her arms flailed around a bit, and her eyes flickered as if in the throes of a nightmare. Suddenly she sat upright in bed, stifling a scream before it emerged. Her eyes were wide and for a moment she didn’t realize where she was. But then she saw R.B. standing over her, and she visibly relaxed.
“Whoa, everything okay? Just a bad dream I think.”
“I uh ... I think so. I had the weirdest dream, R.B. I dreamt there was a man standing over me in my sleep, watching me, as if he was going to try and hurt me. It seemed so real.”
R.B. sat down beside Megan on the bed and pulled her into a hug. “I can assure you that didn’t happen darlin’. It’s just me and you. I wouldn’t let anyone hurt you Megan, I promise.”
Megan leaned a little tighter into R.B’s chest. She knew it was true. But the dream had seemed so real. A momentary glimmer of something flickered in her mind from the night the alarm had sounded, and for a second she thought that’s what it was, that someone had been in her room that night. But she let it pass. She was probably wrong, and she didn’t want to alarm R.B. any more than necessary.
“So what’s the plan today? Something to do with Gidget?”
“Yep. I say we go get some early breakfast, then I can start running some checks over the old girl, making sure she’s ready for departure tomorrow. Hey, by the way ... are you ready Meg? I mean, this is going to be so exciting, isn’t it?”
Megan’s face remained neutral for a few long moments. Something wasn’t sitting right with her this morning. But despite it all, she was excited. She eased out of the hug and stood from the bed, turning to face R.B. “You mean it, don’t you? About not letting anyone hurt me, I mean. You really mean it, don’t you.”
R.B. stared up at Megan now, seeing once again how beautiful she was and how radiant she looked in the pale morning light streaming into the room. He couldn’t help it. His heart fluttered in his chest. “Yes, darlin’. I mean it. Totally. You’re safe with me.”
And in that moment Megan Simons felt as safe as she ever had. “Well good. Why don’t I treat you to breakfast then?”
R.B. laughed, and after both splashing their faces with water and throwing on some clothes, they made their way to the galley dining room, where breakfast was always free and didn’t need to be paid for.
Hopefully it hadn’t been poisoned.
The man slipped out of his stolen mechanic’s outfit and hustled into the shadows on the cargo deck, his work complete. He looked back at where he’d carried out his duties in the few minutes just before dawn, and was satisfied he’d achieved his mission without being spotted. Time to make a call, he thought.
“—Yes sir. It’s done.”
“—Correct sir. We’re a day out of Spain.”
“—It’ll happen tomorrow. I won’t fail again.”
“—Yes sir. Out.”
28
Sabotage
Once their breakfasts and coffees were devoured, R.B. first escorted Megan back to his cabin, and satisfied the door was locked, he ascended from their living quarters up onto the deck, where the sun was bright and any remnants of the storm were long forgotten.
“Mornin’, old girl,” R.B. said to Gidget. He wasn’t usually in the habit of talking to inanimate objects, but he wanted to send out positive vibes into the world that his trusty old seaplane Gidget was good to go. “How’re ya feeling this morning?”
Upon first inspection everything seemed fine. The seaplane’s paint work dazzled beneath that bright sun, and she looked on the outside as if she was in perfect working order. R.B. just hoped it was the same on the inside. It didn’t take long to find out. Scrambling up to the door and unlocking it, he made his way into the cockpit. After checking the fuel gauge, he inserted the key into the ignition and turned. Nothing. That wasn’t unusual. She’d been sitting dormant for almost eleven days now and R.B. needed to get some gas into her pipes. He turned the key again. Again, nothing.
“Come on darlin’,” he said, tapping the control panel in front of him. A few of the lights had flickered, but that wasn’t going to get Gidget in the air. “Alright, don’t be like that.” He turned the key a third time, confident this would be the one to bring the bird to life. Nope. “Son of a—”
Not good. Something was clearly wrong with Gidget, and today was not the day for that. R.B. took a deep breath and tried one more time, and when that too failed he climbed out of Gidget and stood down on the deck of the freighter, hand grasping his chin in utter confusion. Next he opened up Gidget’s engine hood and had a careful look around. R.B. knew full well he wasn’t the best mechanic on the planet. Hell, he wasn’t even the best one in his family. That accolade went to his older brother, Troy. But Troy wasn’t there. He exhaled sharply through his clenched teeth.
With no better plan than to track down the ship’s mechanic and begging him for help, R.B. locked Gidget and went to look for some expert assistance.
Twenty minutes later R.B., along with the freighter’s chief mechanic, a surprisingly young-looking middle-aged man by the name of Biggs—no one knew his first name, not even the captain, and some of his crew mates doubted he knew it himself—were standing over Gidget’s engine block. “She sure does look okay from here,” Biggs said. “But I’m guessing she ain’t. Gotta look more closely.” He grabbed a couple of tools from his belt and, out of sight of R.B., now down on the deck, he spent several minutes in the engine covers, muttering a variety of words R.B. wouldn’t repeat in front of his mother. An hour passed beneath the now blazing sun, and finally Biggs popped his head back up. “Water.”
“Water? There’s a problem with the water?” R.B. didn’t think there was any water in the engine.
> Biggs looked down at R.B. as if he were an imbecile. “Water. I’m thirsty.” Then he flashed a lopsided grin, giving him the appearance of the happy hillbilly out of the Burt Reynolds movie, Deliverance. R.B. resisted the overwhelming urge to say, ‘You got a mighty pretty mouth, boy,’ and instead hustled off to get Biggs some cold water.
An hour later, with R.B. sitting on a deck chair in the shade beneath Gidget, Biggs at last emerged from the engine again, this time with a troubled look on his face. “Fuel line. Severed. Cut clean through.”
“Cut? You mean, not an accident?”
“Cut. On purpose. No way this could have been an accident, not that deep inside the engine. Sorry to say it partner, but someone’s wishing you a whole lotta harm.”
The blood drained from Ryan Bodean’s face. His instincts had been right all along. Someone was trying to kill him ... kill them. Megan!
R.B. sprinted from the deck and flew down the stairs below decks three at a time, then sprinted along the corridor. He turned the last corner to the section where his and Megan’s rooms were, and spotted movement more or less where his door was. It was a man.
“Hey!” R.B. shouted, and raced off after whoever was lurking outside his room. But without looking up, the man turned on his heels and was gone. R.B. gave chase, hurtling along the dimly-lit stretch of corridor that benefited from exactly zero natural light, but when he reached the corner, the shadowy figure was gone. With six doors leading to different corridors to choose from, there was no way R.B. would catch the man. He jogged back along the corridor to his room and hammered on the door.
“Megan, it’s me, R.B.”
Megan jumped up and opened the door. When she saw the concerned look on his face, she said, “What is it? You look like you’ve been running a marathon.”
R.B. hustled into the room and shut and locked the door behind him. He sat down on the bed, breathing hard. When he’d caught his breath, he explained to Megan what had happened to Gidget and what he saw when he returned to the room.
“But who the hell is doing this, R.B.? We haven’t crossed anyone, have we?”
“No, we haven’t. But it’s like George said. There are some powerful people after the same thing we want. If they know we’ve got the map, then it stands to reason they’d want that too.”
“But who is it? How did they find us?” Megan sat on the bed, her head in her hands, the stress starting to take its toll. Then she looked up at R.B., realization in her eyes. “It was that night at the bar, wasn’t it? That bartender you told about Atlantis and the map when you were drunk. He’s told someone else, or maybe he’s working with one of the guys Mister Wyatt was talking about.”
“Now hold on a minute, Megan. He was just a kid. Sure, he seemed interested, but that’s all. I don’t think he’s behind all this. He can’t be.”
“Well until we find out, I don’t feel safe. I think we should stay together, locked here in this room.”
R.B. had to agree with Megan. He hated to hide away. He wasn’t afraid of anyone, but it seemed as if they were dealing with dangerous men, potentially killers. They couldn’t take any chances. The last thing R.B. wanted was to put Megan in any more danger.
What have I done? he thought. What the hell have I done?
29
Betrayal
Twenty-four hours had passed since R.B.'s chilling realization that his seaplane Gidget had been sabotaged. But in the ensuing day and night nothing else had happened. R.B. and Megan emerged from R.B.'s cabin into a bright east-Atlantic morning, and ascended to the cargo deck just as the freighter was docking at the Navantia Shipyard in Cadiz, on the southwest coast of Spain.
"Well, we made it." R.B. turned to Megan and smiled. But the smile wasn't returned. "Welcome to Europe," he said, trying to coax a grin out of Megan. It would take more than that.
"We made it, sure," she said. "But something tells me we weren't supposed to."
R.B.'s smile slipped a little. Megan was right. There was no doubt in their minds now that someone on board, or maybe more than one person, had tried to kill them off. But they had failed. Whether that was more from luck or judgment on their part, R.B. couldn't know. But here they were in Spain, about to be free from the confines of the ship.
"Listen Megan. You're right. Some crazy shit was happening during the voyage. But whoever it was, they failed. We’re here now. Gidget is fixed up as good as new. We’re unharmed. The sun is shining. And we're about to embark on a great adventure. Right?" He nudged her shoulder with his own, and thought he saw her eyes crinkle in the hint of a smile.
She still didn't speak though. In truth, R.B. knew they'd been through quite an ordeal. Talking could wait. "Look, it's going to be about thirty minutes until they're ready to offload Gidget. Why don't we go and grab a quick coffee, bring it back up on deck so we can keep an eye on Gidget, and watch as they unload her onto shore? Then we'll get the hell out of here at the first opportunity."
Megan nodded her assent, and they slipped down to the galley dining room, helped themselves to coffee and a couple of pastries from the modest buffet, and returned to the deck, just in time to see the crewmen strapping Gidget into the winches that would raise her from the deck then lower her onto the dock far below. Just then the captain approached. He didn't speak for a minute, just stood beside them watching the activity on deck. Finally he addressed them.
"Listen, Mister Bodean, Miss Simons, I'm sorry about what's happened during the voyage. I have never had anything like this happen before. But despite your concerns, I still can find no evidence of any wrongdoing, so there's nothing I can say to any authorities, or the police. All I can do is apologize to you both, and humbly hope you accept it."
Megan looked up at R.B. Her face was unreadable to anyone who didn't know her, but R.B. did know her, and saw in her eyes a look that, if translated into English, would simply have said, 'Bullshit.' But she said nothing, and R.B. held his hand out to the captain.
"Thanks so much for bringing us to Spain, Captain, and of course my plane. We're both grateful. And, well, we're sorry about the kid, Nate. Nice fella. A total tragedy."
"Yes, it was. But accidents on board ships do happen, of course. Terrible shame."
R.B. stared at the captain for a long moment, forcing him to look back at him. "Listen, Captain, I'm certain what happened to Nate was no accident. There have been other ... other incidents. My seaplane was sabotaged. Someone was lurking around outside Megan's cabin. I think someone attempted to poison me. Look, we're okay now. But I think you should take a closer look at some of the members of your crew. Do you really know all of them? I mean, really know them? You let us aboard without knowing us, didn't you, based on a favor to our mutual friend George. So perhaps your vetting process isn't quite as solid as you think. I mean no disrespect."
The captain didn't answer. Instead he looked away, as if contemplating something. Then after a minute he exhaled a long breath and slowly shook his head. "You know, there were two brothers I assigned to the ship's general crew. I've forgotten their surnames, but they were recommended to me. Who was that now?" The captain rubbed his chin, trying to recall who it was who'd put the brothers forward to join the crew. "That's it, I remember. It was Thomas."
"Who's Thomas?" asked R.B.
"Thomas has worked with me for years. He's the chef."
R.B. looked down sharply at Megan, whose eyes were suddenly narrowed with anger. Finally she spoke. "Captain, R.B. was poisoned. It could only have been the chef."
"No, that's not possible. I can't—"
"It must have been him, Captain,” chimed in R.B. “And what about my seaplane? Fuel lines don't cut themselves."
The captain's normally stoic facade slipped, and despite the bright sunshine bathing the deck, he blanched. It seemed he had made a terrible mistake. A mistake that had cost the life of his youngest crew member, Nate.
"I'm so ... I'm sorry ... I have to go." The captain pulled his cellphone from his pocket and called his head secur
ity guard, then raced off. For the next thirty minutes the entire security team searched high and low for the two Edgar brothers and the chef, Tommy. But there was no sign of them. They had gone.
That was all the evidence Megan and R.B. needed. It was clear now those brothers and the chef had somehow colluded to kill them before they reached Spain. But although they'd failed, they had gotten away from the ship undetected, presumably the moment they'd reached the dock. It meant they were still out there, and still a threat to R.B. and Megan.
"What the hell do we do, R.B.? They're out there now, on land, probably waiting for us."
R.B. shook his head. This was not the adventure he was expecting. Not at all. "Well we can't go back, Meg. We've come so far. And don't you see? The fact people are out to harm us is evidence we're onto something, proof that we're not the only ones who believe in Atlantis. We can't go back now. I won't go back."
Megan stared at R.B., her eyes moist but focused. She nodded. "You're right. We can't let these people win, whoever the hell they are. They're just bullies ... dangerous bullies. But they're only people. We can beat them, can't we R.B.?"
Ryan Bodean looked down at his friend Megan. He hated to see her upset like this, hated the fact people were out to harm her. But in her eyes he saw that old spirit he'd come to admire over the last twelve months, that steely stoicism that had kept them both going during the tough times in the last year. She had inspired him all through that difficult period. It was now his turn to repay that diligence.
"You listen to me, Megan Simons. Whoever they are, they've failed. You are strong. We are strong. We can do this. We will do this. I will not let anyone hurt you, Megan. And you, me, and Gidget, well, we're going to go out there into the Spanish interior and we're going to find us an ancient lost city."
