by Scott Cook
Whatever the case, I couldn’t afford to sit around with a thumb shoved. Mostly because I was certain that an alarm would be raised sooner rather than later. Also… and I feel this needs reiterating… I don’t think I could’ve withstood anything more being shoved at that point.
I crept around the obstacles and made my way to the door that led into the office. Along the way, I managed to pick up an oversized crescent wrench lying on a table. The thing was at least two feet long and made of solid steel. A clumsy weapon, but better than nothing. The door was unlocked, which I checked by pressing myself up against the bulkhead between it and the large window and by slowly turning the knob.
Drawing a calming breath, I flung the door open, pivoted around the jamb and smashed the business end of my wrench against the back of the man’s skull. Being worried about the heft and solidity of the bludgeon, I had been conservative with my swing. The man let out a groan and jumped but did not go night, night. I cursed and hit him again just a little harder. The last thing I wanted was to crack somebody’s skull. A person who might be innocent or at least not enough of a bad guy to warrant a noggin staving.
The second blow did the trick and the engineer or whoever he was hurried into lala land and crumpled to the deck blissfully unaware that the Evil Doctor Jarvis now had control over the ship’s engine room.
I hauled the man up against the far wall and out of the immediate sight of anyone who might casually look through the big window or the small one in the door. I then began rifling the desk and the filing cabinet for some blueprints or other information. It wasn’t until I’d yanked out the middle filing cabinet drawer so hard that its casters came free of their tracks and subsequently spilled the contents of said drawer all over the deck that I noticed, much to my chagrin, that a large blow up of the ship was tacked to the forward wall of the office. Both a side elevation and a series of deck by deck top down layouts.
“Oops,” I muttered and then grinned wickedly. “The Evil Doctor Jarvis strikes again! Now someone will have to spend as many as eight or even ten minutes putting these papers back in order! Nyehehehehehe!”
Hey, if you’re gonna run around a ship in the middle of the night trying to flee evil doers and stop their attempt to rule the earth then why not make the experience as lighthearted and enjoyable as possible, am I right?
Yes, Scott, you say, you’re one-hundred percent right!
“Okay…” I muttered, going over and glancing at the laptop. “I wonder what kind of damage I can do from down here…”
After a little clicking and poking around the system, I was surprised to see that every single ship’s system was not only listed in the computer, it was controlled from it as well! Apparently, you could access different systems and perform maintenance, diagnostics and even control their functions.
“Computer, activate self-destruct sequence,” I said.
The computer did not respond.
Stupid computer.
“Oh!” I said, slapping myself on the forehead. “Gotta remember that this isn’t the Star Trek. Okay then… let’s see…”
Aside from amusing myself, which is one of my top priorities at all times, I was also trying to quell the nervous jittering in my guts. I had no idea what was happening throughout the ship. No idea if Bolivar had discovered that I’d escaped. No idea if half a dozen men with automatic weapons were even now about to burst into the engine room and turn me into Swiss cheese. The silly banter, even with only myself, helped to calm my nerves and focus my mind.
“I need two things,” I said quietly to myself. “I need to stop the ship and I need a radio. It’d be nice if I could see something too… Hmmm… Guess that’s three things… wouldn’t mind a nice sangwich either…”
I was glad I spoke Spanish. The entire ship’s control software was in Spanish, although you could probably change that. However, not having time to fiddle around with settings or get in a quick game of Angry Birds, I instead tapped into the navigation systems. I was able to pull up a split screen of the radar display on the bridge and what I saw there made me simultaneously nervous and giddy.
The range was set to maximum, which was about twenty-five miles. I saw that the yacht was nearly out of range, headed three-four-zero at twenty knots. I also saw that there was a smaller ship, not a lot smaller though, headed almost directly for us from just south of East. She was moving at thirty knots. Whoever or whatever they were, they’d be up with us in about an hour as we were moving southwest at eight knots.
“Hmm…” I mused aloud. “I wonder if that’s my backup? I wonder if anybody’s seen them, too… Dammit, if I only had a radio…”
One thing I could do at the moment was override the bridge’s radar range setting. I reduced it by half. Both of the other ships disappeared off the display, but it wouldn’t be long before the new contact reappeared again. I had to get them a message, somehow.
I realized suddenly that I did have a radio! I tapped into the communications system and saw that I could utilize the VHF or single side band radio from down here through the laptop’s built-in speaker and microphone. I also realized, much to my frustration that if I activated the system down here that anybody monitoring the radio on the bridge would hear any incoming transmission. However, I could at least send a message without being noticed.
I activated the VHF transmitter, saw that it was set to standard sixteen and keyed in the mic icon on the laptop, “Unknown vessel off my port quarter… you are visible on my radar. I’ve reduced the range but at your speed you’ll appear again. I plan to disable the engines. Once you notice the freighter’s speed begin to drop, rush in at maximum speed… because the semi-solid excreta is going to strike the air circulator. This is Lieutenant Commander Scott Jarvis, U.S. Navy. Do not respond. Over.”
As quickly as I could, I pulled up the engine schematics and saw where the fuel intake was located in relation to the engine and to the engine room in general. Then I accessed the engine systems and deactivated the fuel flow. It would probably take a few minutes for the engine to use up what was already in the lines. That only gave me a few minutes of grace before the bridge would know something was up and reactivate the engine and the alarms would start blaring.
I rushed back out into the engine room, found the huge diesel fuel line that fed into the engine and used my handy-dandy crescent wrench to manually close the fuel intake valve. I hadn’t made it halfway to the forward bulkhead door when the engine spluttered, revved up and then shut down, drenching the cavernous space in an odd quiet. Not total silence, as the electrical generators still chugged along, but they were as the purr of a kitten by comparison.
“Damn!” I cursed aloud. “Should’ve killed the gennies too…”
On the heel of that thought, a general alarm bell began to blare and over the ship’s PA system, a gruff Spanish voice said: “Atención! Atención! El prisionero ha escapade!”
“In other words, everybody…” I muttered as I plunged through the door and into the near total darkness of the cargo hold. “The Evil Doctor Jarvis has flown the coop!”
My eyes had barely adjusted to the deep gloom of the hold when steel doors seemed to bang open from everywhere at once. Possibly every deck above me and at least one or two forward and one from the main deck directly overhead as well. Angry Spanish voices barked out in the darkness, their curses and questions ricocheting through the hold and off the corrugated steel sides of the shipping containers like bullets.
The hold was fairly similar to the one I’d been in aboard the Theresa Maxwell. About two hundred feet long, fifty feet wide and forty feet tall or more. Unlike Tavares’ freighter had been in Havana, though, this one was almost completely full. Rows and stacks of cargo containers were lined up all around and above me, supported by a spider’s web of girders and braces, linked together by metal grated catwalks on each level.
In spite of the plentitude of hiding places, I could easily be flushed out if I weren’t careful. I needed to get out on deck or acq
uire a weapon and go on the offensive. Something with a little more range than my trusty wrench, of course.
Men were shouting and boots and shoes were clanging on gratings and ladder ways. I moved to my left, going to the far portside and seeing if it was possible to slip between containers or the containers and the bulkhead.
I was discouraged to find that they packed them in like sardines. There probably wasn’t six inches between containers or their support systems. As the voices grew louder and the cacophony grew more intense, my mind raced for a solution. The acoustics in the cargo hold made determining the number of men searching or their exact positions a considerable challenge. I climbed up a latticed vertical brace to try and get a better view when I discovered something that could save my position-broadcasting ass. Although the sides of the containers were tightly packed, there was a good two feet between their tops and the next tier above. Having little choice, I slid myself onto the roof of the nearest container and began inching my way forward on my belly.
The thought of thousands of tons of metal and goods just inches above my noggin was less disconcerting than the idea of a dozen or more men using me for target practice. I made it to the next container forward and crossed over easily. They were arranged fore and aft, and butted up to each other so tightly there was hardly a hands breadth between.
“Give it up, Jarvis!” I heard Garcia’s echoing voice drifting to me from somewhere above and forward of me. “You can’t get out of here. Give yourself up now while you still can. My men have orders to shoot on sight!”
If the acoustics in the hold were bad for me, they must be bad for my opponent’s as well. I took a chance, cupped my hands over my mouth to try and direct the sound waves of my voice and shouted, “How’d you know I escaped, Garcia?”
I then scrambled forward to the far end of the next container. My shout was met by so many curses and orders that I almost didn’t hear Garcia’s reply.
“Antonio got a call ten minutes ago,” Garcia shouted. “Apparently, someone has taken his wife and children captive… you wouldn’t know anything about that, would you, Jarvis?”
I slid sideways over the tops of two more containers. I was now just above the walkway that ran along the ship’s centerline. I could look up through the gratings above and see the overhead and its few lights thirty feet above me. Several silhouettes passed between the bulbs and my line of sight.
I cupped my hands again and called out, although this time with less volume. In this steel canyon, sound didn’t need a great deal of impetus to be heard clearly, “That’s a shame, Manny… but I did warn you. Perhaps it’s time for you and your brother to rethink your plan of action.”
I briefly considered attaching an admonishment about the deadly harvest one would yield should one be so foolish as to sow seeds of defiance and discord in the garden of the Evil Doctor Jarvis… but I didn’t want to push my luck. Even for a clever bit of action movie discourse.
I came close, though…
I quickly scrambled to my left and forward just as a pair of boots came thumping along the deck from forward. I don’t think the man saw me, but the resounding boom, boom, boom of his pistol going off in the hold was nearly deafening. I had the impression of rounds whining off cargo containers and the catwalk above and behind me.
There was another sound then. Something that began almost inaudibly but rapidly grew into a bizarre reverberation that seemed to throb through every metal surface in the hold.
Had they gotten the engines back online?
I didn’t think so. The sound was different than the sound of the engines had been. Someone must have opened a door or hatch to the main deck, because for a few seconds, there was a more distinct whining and thumping that accompanied the odd vibrations.
“It’s too little, too late, pendejo!” Garcia laughed.
Then the clearer sound was gone. I suddenly realized what I’d heard. It had been the sound of the engine and blades of a helicopter! Someone had just landed a helo on the wide upper deck! Based on the sudden diminishing of the vibration, I could also tell that someone had just lifted off in the helo as well.
I cursed under my breath. I had no doubt that Bolivar and Garcia had boarded that bird and were even now exiting the area at over a hundred knots. Apparently catching them was not in the cards.
I found myself at the forward edge of the last container before a six-foot-wide gap. This gap was the result of a thwart ships walkway that intersected the fore and aft one. I peeked over the edge of my roof and felt my heart nearly skip a beat as I caught sight of a man dressed in work clothes crouching on the deck. He was just at the point between my container and the next starboard one. He knelt on the deck, holding his pistol at the ready. Ready to shoot the first man he didn’t know who appeared in front of him.
He represented an opportunity. Here was my chance to acquire a firearm… or have one acquire me. Either way, it represented change at least. I slowly eased myself sideways until I was just at the edge of the container’s roof. I had one shot at this, and I’d better get it right…
I lowered my bent left leg so that it was pressing on the top of the door to the container, my left hand gripping the wrench, and then pushed myself sideways, using my right hand and leg to push my body off the roof and sideways.
I fell awkwardly and landed partially on top of the man, leading with my wrench. The crack as it struck his skull was sickening enough, but the spray of hot blood that hit my face and chest was almost nauseating. Not for the blood itself, but because of the idea that I might have cracked open his skull and splattered his brains all over the deck.
Yes, he was a bad guy. Yes, he was ready to shoot me if he saw me… yet the idea of sneaking up on somebody and bashing their brains in was just something I couldn’t get comfortable with.
The result, however, was that his body went as limp as wet pasta. His gun clattered to the deck, which I quickly retrieved in lieu of my wrench. A quick inspection of the man showed that while I’d split his scalp open, the bone beneath seemed intact… mostly. He probably wouldn’t be doing long division in his head for a while, but he was breathing.
I quickly broke out the magazine, saw that it was full, racked the slide and pushed the ejected round back into the magazine again. I slapped it home and charged the weapon.
Once again I climbed back up onto the top of the next forward container. My thought was to make my way all the way forward and go up, or find some access to the ship’s forepeak. Surely there had to be some kind of life-saving gear or a raft or something up there. If so, then I could jump overboard and hope that the homing beacon tucked so lovingly into my derriere would eventually bring somebody to fish me out.
It had only been ten minutes, maybe fifteen, since the alarm went off. I was quite surprised that nobody had caught me yet. Up above, on the highest level of the cargo hold, I heard a Spanish voice call out “Clear!” and then three more repeat this. Evidently they’d done a thorough search of that level and were satisfied that I wasn’t there. Which meant that if they were any good at all, they’d send down more search teams on the second level and secure it. Then they could move guards down from the top level to the second level and repeat the process. All the way down to the lowest level… where I was.
Then I heard something that knotted my guts. From behind me, right about at the spot where I’d acquired my shiny new pistol, I heard a man shout that he’d located Carlos, and that Carlos had been attacked, knocked out and his gun was missing.
“In other words…” I griped under my breath. “The fuckin’ gringo is down here, so everybody come down and let’s kill him muerto…”
The time for stealth might have been coming to a close. I began to squirm faster toward the far end of the line of containers I was on. I got to the bulkhead and could see that there was about two feet between the end of the containers and the forward bulkhead. However, upright supports rose like ribs every ten feet or so, and these were butted up against the containers. Ba
sically, I couldn’t go down there and slide my way to starboard. But maybe I could climb up…
I needed to get a better picture of the situation first. So once again I slid to starboard and peeked over the edge of a container and into the canyon formed by the centerline walkway… and looked right into the eyes of a squat, thick and hairy Hispanic man. His eyes went wide, as did mine, and his pistol came up. Rather than try and bring mine around and down, I crabbed sideways as his gun roared out, sending rounds whining off containers and supports all around me. I heard his hammer fall on an empty chamber, rolled back to my right and fired three shots down in his direction without looking over the edge.
I heard a cry of pain, a clatter as a weapon hit the metal deck and then a thud as a body crumpled after it. Hot on the heels of these noises were a chorus of shouts, curses and the pounding of feet.
“Oh, just fuckin’ great!” I grumped and wriggled my body into the vertical shaft formed by the forward end of the containers and the bulkhead. It was tight, but thankfully the upright support was made of a latticework of vertical, horizontal and diagonal braces. This made it possible for me to climb up, the narrow gap letting me turn at an angle so my shoulders braced me in as well. I didn’t know what I was going to do when I reached the next level, or the one after that, but moving was better than sitting still while all the henchmen on Earth bore down on me.
Then there came more shouts and more gunshots. Seemingly from the after end of the hold and above. Louder shots than what my pistol or my enemy’s pistols had made. One might’ve even been a shotgun.
“Attention!” a strong male voice roared out. “Cease fire and surrender immediately! You are in violation of international maritime law! This is the International Counter-Criminal Enforcement agency! Cease fire and surrender or you will be hunted down and neutralized!”
This speech was repeated in Spanish. A sudden silence fell in the large cargo hold and I think everybody was holding their breath. I know I was.
“Commander!” Came a woman’s familiar voice. Was that Jackie Stevvins? “Are you in here?”
