Marauder (The Oregon Files)

by Clive Cussler

  He heard nothing in response. Cabrillo would probably try to use an RPG to open the door, killing himself in the process, so it was time for Tate to make his exit, find a life raft, and figure out a way back to civilization.

  Of course, he might be captured by the crew of the Oregon, if they were still around, but he’d gotten out of prisons tougher than anyplace they could take him. He still had millions hidden in offshore accounts, plenty to start rebuilding his life with. The important thing was, he’d finally gotten his revenge.

  Tate turned the handle and pushed.

  It wouldn’t open.

  * * *

  —

  For Juan, going down to the armory was never about getting a weapon to fight Tate.

  A few years back, Juan got tired of having to go through the noisy shooting range just to get to the armory, so he had a second door installed on the opposite side of the large room for easier access. He guessed Tate hadn’t gone to that trouble.

  So when he heard Tate enter the range and fire his rifle, Juan had sprinted back behind him and keyed in his code for locking all fire doors on the ship, which included those to the shooting range and the armory.

  Juan heard muted pounding, followed by rifle fire and bullets hammering the door. He activated the intercom to the range.

  “You said you know this ship as well as I do, Tate. You’re obviously wrong. I thought you’d realize that this door is fireproof, waterproof, and bulletproof.”

  “You coward!” Tate screamed. “That’s a cheap move, locking me in here!”

  “Isn’t that what you were trying to do to me?”

  “Come in here and fight me face-to-face. No weapons, just skill against skill. See who the better man really is.”

  “I don’t have to fight you to know the answer to that.”

  Juan desperately wanted to punch Tate in the face for what he had been made to do, for sinking his ship, but this was his best chance to survive. The Oregon was saving Juan’s life one last time.

  Freezing water rushed up the sloping corridor and rapidly covered his feet. The irony was not lost on Juan that Tate was going to go down in the very ship he had promised to sink.

  “Time to leave now,” Juan said. “It’s been fun seeing you again, Tate.”

  He clicked the intercom off before Tate could respond. No reason to let him have the last word.

  Juan sloshed through the water toward the stairs as the Oregon tilted ever higher.

  74

  Juan had to stay dry as long as possible. His toes were going numb from their brief dip in the water that was quickly devouring the Oregon.

  Every second, the floor’s incline was increasing, making it difficult for him to make his way up the stairs. At the same time, the ship was sinking faster and faster, and it felt like the flood was chasing him with each step.

  He hauled himself up the stairway by clasping the railing with his good arm and wedging his boots against the wall, as if he were scaling a steep cliff.

  By the time he reached topside, behind the superstructure, the Oregon was sloped at an acute angle, and half of the ship had been engulfed by the water. He climbed over to the railing and used the chains on it to pull himself toward the stern.

  When Juan was within a hundred feet of the fantail, the unnatural torque at the base of the aftmost crane caused it to collapse. The steel girders smashed into the superstructure, and the boom crashed into the gunwales just behind him, sweeping down the deck until it plummeted into the sea.

  There wasn’t much time left. No life jacket was within reach. Juan looked around, didn’t see any lifeboats nearby. Not that that surprised him. He had ordered them to stay in the safety of the fjord’s other arm in case it took longer than expected for the Portland to sink. He didn’t want to sacrifice the Oregon just to see Tate wipe out Juan’s crew anyway.

  His best chance was to swim for the shore and wait for someone to pick him up. The closest flat land where he could pull himself out of the water looked to be three hundred yards away, behind the ship’s stern. Normally, Juan could swim that distance without breathing hard, thanks to regular laps in the Oregon’s ballast tank that doubled as a pool.

  But in these bone-chilling waters, and with one arm useless, his strength would be sapped rapidly as his system stopped blood flow to his extremities to conserve heat and energy for the vital organs in his torso.

  With the angle of the ship increasing steadily, it was now virtually impossible to pull himself all the way up to the fantail one-handed. Even assuming he was able to get there, he’d have to jump past the venturi tube openings. If he got sucked into one of them as the ship went down, he’d have no chance.

  There was only one choice. Without a second thought, Juan leaped over the railing and steeled himself for the cold as he plunged into the water.

  He was not prepared for how shockingly icy the water was, as it enveloped him. He nearly inhaled a lungful. He swam for the surface, his fingers losing feeling. His head broke into the air. The piercing cold felt even worse because of the breeze blowing across his wet face.

  He started swimming, with good force for the first fifty yards, through the water churned up by the sinking ship. But he could feel his muscles losing strength like batteries losing their power.

  Juan kept at it, refusing to give up, but when he looked up again, the shore seemed no closer than it had a minute before. His strength was nearly gone, and extreme fatigue was setting in. He could keep himself afloat for a little while longer, nothing more. He wasn’t going to make it.

  Over his shoulder, he heard several loud bangs. He turned and saw the Oregon’s stern sliding toward the water’s surface, white froth bubbling around it. The superstructure was already submerged. Juan must have heard bulkheads popping as the pressure got too great to hold back.

  He watched with a heavy heart as the ship’s elegant fantail, shaped like a champagne glass cut in half, approached the water, which rushed into the gaping maws of the venturi tubes that had reliably powered the Oregon through countless critical missions over the years.

  Water swept up the flaked and rusted hull, washing away letter by letter the name OREGON that was written in iron filings magnetized to the stern. The last part of the ship to descend into the water was the jackstaff holding the American flag waving in the wind. The Stars and Stripes came to rest flat on the water, as if it didn’t want to go, and then it was pulled down into the abyss.

  Only swirling water marked the ship’s passing. The seemingly indestructible Oregon was gone.

  Juan, his energy flagging, turned slowly in a circle and saw no one. Not even Linc and Eddie could see him because of the thick fog cover. He was utterly alone.

  He felt a remarkable sense of peace. His crew was safe. He’d done what he had to do. This isolated spot, with natural beauty all around him, would become his final resting place.

  Juan stopped paddling. He closed his eyes, and his head slipped beneath the waves.

  * * *

  —

  Tate pounded on the door to the armory, desperate to get inside and find a weapon to break himself out of this prison. His G36 rifle lay on the floor, its ammo magazines long since emptied. Bullet holes peppered both the doors.

  He was nearly standing on the forward wall by now. He couldn’t tell how much of the ship was underwater, but nothing had seeped past the watertight portal yet.

  Tate was hyperventilating. The Chechen prison had been torture, but this was worse. He didn’t want to die like this.

  His throat was raw from screaming, yet he continued just the same.

  “Juan! I know you can hear me! I’ll make you pay for this!”

  He heard something like a knock from the outer door. He went over to it and had to reach up to press his palm against it. The metal felt cold to the touch. Freezing.

  Then Tate felt the door pus
h against his hand.

  Hope surged through him. The Boy Scout Juan was showing mercy.

  “I knew you’d come back!” Tate yelled with joy.

  But it was short-lived. A tiny laser jet of water lanced through a seam in the door.

  Then another. And another. One caught Tate in the arm, and the pressure was so high that it sliced his skin as neatly as a scalpel.

  Then Tate realized with horror that no one was outside the door. The ship was diving to the bottom of the fjord. The intense water pressure was bowing the door inward.

  Tate backed away. With nowhere to go.

  Finally, the door could hold back the water no longer. It burst from its hinges and was hurled to the back of the firing range, a tsunami gushing in.

  Tate open his mouth to scream again. The sea instantly filled his lungs, and the last thing he felt was the agonizing pressure of a thousand feet of water crushing the life out of him.

  75

  As Juan sank into the fjord, he opened his eyes and saw that he was far enough from the surface that darkness had closed in around him. With all of his extremities numb from the cold, Juan couldn’t tell if he was moving his limbs or if they were just drifting lazily with the currents. He was too tired to care. His mind must have been numbed as well. He felt oddly relaxed, as if he were in a sensory deprivation chamber.

  Still, he resisted the urge to inhale as long as he could. He could sense the slowing of his heartbeat and realized he might be able to set a new personal record before he had to breathe. When he did, it would be his last. I’ll go out on a high note, he thought.

  Then something changed. At first, his mind was so fuzzy that he couldn’t tell what it was. Finally, he blinked and understood.

  It was getting lighter. He was moving toward the surface.

  He couldn’t be swimming. He had neither the strength nor the will to move his arms or legs. He looked down to see if he was doing it involuntarily and noticed something metal on his arms. Bracelets? Handcuffs? It didn’t make sense until he got closer to the light.

  The shiny metal objects were holding on to him, propelling him upward. They were jointed. Like hands, yet different.

  Not hands. Claws. A robot’s claws.

  The surface was close now, but Juan couldn’t fight the compulsion to not breathe any longer. He convulsed as he sucked water into his lungs.

  At the same time that his head broke into the air, everything went black.

  * * *

  —

  When Juan came to, he was no longer in the water. He was lying on his back with heat packs and a thermal blanket covering him. While his chest and throat ached, he was breathing air again.

  Julia Huxley hovered over him with a concerned expression.

  “Welcome back to the company of the living,” she said. “It was touch and go for a while there.”

  Juan coughed and sat up with Julia’s help. He saw a submersible cockpit in front of him and realized he was inside the Nomad.

  “How long have I been out?” It felt like his voice box was being dragged across a cheese grater.

  “About an hour. You heaved up a lot of water after I performed CPR on you, then you immediately passed out again once you’d been revived. I thought I was going to lose you.”

  “At least I set a record,” he said.

  “What?”

  Juan shook his head. “Not important. How did I get here?”

  “It’s thanks to those two.” She pointed to his right, and he turned to see Max, leaning against the sub’s inner wall. Kevin Nixon was seated next to him, wrapped in a towel. His hair was damp.

  “I know you told us to stay away,” Max said, “but sometimes I’m not so good at following orders. I trailed after you. Figured you might need some backup. So when I saw you go under, I raced over and snagged you with the robotic arms. It was Kevin who did the hard work.”

  Kevin shrugged. “Once Max grabbed you with the robot, I saw that you weren’t conscious. All I did was dive into the water and pull you over to the side so we could get you on board. When I hit that cold water, it knocked the wind out of me. I was in it for just a few seconds, with a life jacket on. I don’t know how you lasted as long as you did with that bum arm and no flotation device.”

  Juan had forgotten about his arm. He looked down and saw that it was neatly bandaged.

  “I guess I need some stitches,” he said. Now that he’d warmed up, the feeling was back, and the entry and exit wounds in his biceps were throbbing.

  “Actually, you don’t,” Julia said. “The bullet missed the bone. So all we’ll do is wash and dress the wounds regularly. Stitches would just keep foreign contaminants from draining. You should be good as new in a couple of months.”

  Julia handed Juan a cup of water. He was parched from inhaling so much seawater and gulped it down.

  “How’s the crew?” he asked Max.

  “Everyone’s safe and accounted for. We even found Gomez.”

  Juan dreaded asking the next question. “Alive?”

  “Oh, yeah,” Max said. “Sorry I didn’t mention that part. He sent up a flare, and the Deepwater homed in on it with a short-range drone. Seems he crash-landed as pretty as a picture on a glacier. Eddie and Linc were able to fly down from the ridge above us through a break in the fog, and they’re on the way there now in the Gator with the Hoverbike so they can retrieve him.”

  “Any survivors from the Portland?”

  Max shook his head. “Seems like the only person on that side who got out of this alive was Li Quon. Linda has him under lock and key on the Deepwater. Apparently, the authorities in Singapore will be very happy to get their hands on him.”

  “And the valuables? Did Maurice get them out?”

  “I did indeed, Captain,” said a soothing British voice behind Juan.

  Juan edged around to look at the rest of the Nomad’s cabin and saw Maurice and Overholt sitting beside a large pile of boxes and a dozen rolled-up paintings.

  “Good to see you back from the brink, Juan,” Overholt said.

  “Glad to be here. Thanks for your help, Maurice. I knew I could count on you.”

  “Although I didn’t relish the implications of the task you gave me,” Maurice said, “it was the proper thing to do. We couldn’t let the Oregon go down without rescuing our dearest possessions. Mr. Overholt and I were able to collect the Corporation’s valuables from your safe, as well as the most important mementos from the crew’s cabins. We also salvaged all of the artwork on board.”

  Maurice knew more about the ship and the people on it than anyone else, so he had been the perfect person for the job.

  “Good work,” Juan said. “I’m sure the crew will be appreciative.”

  “Speaking of which, there they are,” Max said, pointing out the cockpit window. The two Oregon lifeboats bobbed twenty yards away. “Captain Jefferson thinks the Deepwater’s engines can be fixed by tomorrow morning. Once they’re up and running, they’ll swing by, pick up the rest of us, and tow all the vessels back to Punta Arenas.”

  Juan nodded with admiration for the pluck and resourcefulness of his crew. Although the Oregon had been sunk, they’d saved what really mattered. Each other.

  * * *

  —

  I’m sorry you lost your home,” Overholt said.

  Juan almost replied, “There’s never been a ship like her,” but thought about her doppelgänger and stopped himself.

  “The Oregon was a good ship,” he said with a bittersweet smile and a hollow pit in his stomach. “I sure will miss the old gal.”

  EPILOGUE

  RIO DE JANEIRO

  TWO MONTHS LATER

  Across Guanabara Bay from Rio’s bright lights, Juan rode on a small ferry with a dozen workers heading to the tiny Ilha do Viana for the night shift. It was long past sunset, and cargo ships cro
wded around the island, shuttling goods in and out of the brand-new transshipment warehouse located there. It stood next to an abandoned fish-processing plant that dated back fifty years. When they pulled up to the dock, Juan could see the giant letters painted on the side of the new building.

  FERREIRA INDÚSTRIAS GLOBAIS. Ferreira Global Industries.

  Juan shuffled off the ferry with the others, yawning like he was still waking up from a night’s sleep. An armed guard stopped the group coming in and checked ID.

  Juan handed his over. It read “Lucas Calvo.” The prosthetic appliances glued to Juan’s face by Kevin were a perfect match for the real Lucas Calvo, who was currently being detained in his apartment by Hali. During their observations of the warehouse laborers, they discovered that Calvo wasn’t the chatty type, which was the reason they’d chosen him for impersonation. Juan hadn’t had to talk to any of the other workers during the ferry ride.

  The guard gave the ID back after a thorough review and said, “Vá para dentro.” Go inside.

  Juan, who’d been studying Portuguese for the last six weeks in preparation for this mission, replied, “Obrigado.” He entered the warehouse and followed the men to the opposite side of the cavernous space holding goods and materials from Ricardo Ferreira’s factories all over Brazil.

  They took a freight elevator two levels down. The doors opened to a broad tunnel that extended two hundred yards ahead of them. Juan trudged along, flexing his left arm. Just as Julia had said, other than a slight pull in his skin from the two puckered scars, it felt no different than before he’d been shot.

  When they reached the end of the tunnel, they entered another elevator that was located under the seemingly abandoned cannery. Two stories up, the doors opened to reveal a vast, well-lit manufacturing plant.

  The only product on the assembly line were dozens of Slipstream submarine drones. Juan had only seen a prototype on Ferreira’s yacht. Orders from drug dealers and smugglers had been so good that it had gone into full-scale production. The first finished copies were about to roll off the line.