The Last Passenger

by Manel Loureiro

  But he could not know everything.

  Paxton walked distractedly toward the ship’s kitchen, whistling a television jingle. He was surprised by the lack of people walking around on the ship. The Valkyrie was huge, and there were very few crew members on board, but normally, he would have come across at least a few others along the way. The entire ship was in utter somnolence as everyone waited for something to happen. The empty hallways would make his mission all the easier.

  The spacious kitchen was sweltering. Hundreds of pots, pans, and plates all gleamed, hanging from long bars attached to the ceiling. There were enough ovens to accommodate a dozen chefs, but on this voyage there was only one along with half a dozen apprentices. They were working in a corner, busily skewering whole chickens. One of the prep cooks noticed Paxton and waved at him amiably. Paxton responded with his own friendly gesture as he rubbed his stomach with one hand and flashed a playful smile.

  From the very first day, he had made a daily round through the kitchen, striking up friendships with the personnel and taking an interest in their work. He’d hinted that he was a serious glutton, and occasionally, he would like to sample whatever they were preparing at the time. The chefs were always fretting over their culinary innovations and were happy to have Paxton stop by. He’d made it a point to make his presence in the kitchen totally normal.

  He leaned against a wall and tried a dish of crispy shrimp scampi. He was waiting for the proper moment, like a wolf stalking its prey.

  He didn’t have to wait long. One of the kitchen staff tripped, sending a seasoned chicken flying into the air. It fell to the floor and slid a few feet amid a chorus of yelling, screaming, and cursing.

  Nobody was looking at Paxton. The geologist reached for a valve connected to the sprinkler system above the stove. As he turned the valve, several sprinklers began spraying large amounts of carbon dioxide over the stoves.

  A stray chicken on the floor was now the least of the kitchen’s problems. It turned into pure chaos. A harsh-smelling white cloud enveloped the cooks, who quickly began shouting even louder and stumbling into each other. Paxton took advantage of the confusion and slipped into the pantry without anyone noticing.

  He walked deftly between crates of dry goods and mountains of canned food until he got to the stairs leading to the wine cellar. That door was locked, however. Before boarding, he’d been given the key that opened the lock, and he took it from his pocket. He sighed with relief as the lock opened with a click. For the time being everything was going according to plan.

  He quickly walked down the stairs into the narrow climate-controlled space, which stored the prized wines. On one side, from floor to ceiling, a long rack filled with bottles stretched all the way to the back of the room. On the other side, dozens of wooden crates filled with more bottles of fine wine sat waiting for space on the racks to become available.

  He walked down the corridor, looking for a particularly special wine. Upon locating two cases of 2005 Pingus, he smiled. It was a delicious wine that retailed for around $2,000 per bottle. But that was not what he had come for.

  He brought the cases to the floor and pried them open with his Swiss Army knife. Under the storeroom’s soft light, the magnums glowed temptingly. Paxton took them out one by one and lined them up single file like a battalion of guards. Then, he took out the straw that covered the bottom of the case and finally found what he was looking for.

  They looked like clay tablets wrapped in cellophane. With a triumphant smile the geologist leaned in for a closer look. Twenty units of Semtex plastic explosives per box, and there were quite a few boxes. He would not need all of it yet, but it was there just in case.

  From beneath his jacket he took out a green cloth bag and filled it with enough explosives and detonators for now. He glanced at his watch nervously. He had to get out of there before someone found him.

  He zipped the bag shut and retraced his steps after he arranged everything just as he’d found it. When he got back to the pantry door, he stood watch for a second before fully emerging. The cooks had managed to shut off the gas line, but the kitchen was wrecked. That day’s food was covered in a fine layer of white dust that was still dripping out of the sprinklers. At that moment there was a terrifying argument under way between four of the cooks, covered in white powder. It is not a good day to be a chef, Paxton thought derisively.

  He slipped out of the kitchen and made his way down the same hallway by which he’d entered, whistling, with his bag slung over his shoulder. This was the riskiest part of the plan. If someone stopped and searched him, he was a dead man. Luckily, he passed only one sailor, who was bleeding profusely from his nose and muttering to himself. It looked to Paxton as if the man were on drugs.

  Passing the library, he noticed that someone had knocked down a whole shelf as if possessed by some spirit of destruction. Books were strewn all over the ground with many of them ripped or lying open haphazardly. A partially dressed man was murmuring amid the ruins.

  Paxton looked both ways cautiously before entering. The scene was too strange to pass up.

  It was Cherenkov. The Russian physicist was on his knees; his hair was ruffled, and streaks of dried blood ran from his ears down to his neck. Surrounding him were pages filled with calculations in little Cyrillic characters. Most of the pages were ripped or crumpled. Cherenkov looked up when he heard Paxton enter, but he did not seem to recognize the geologist. His eyes were foggy, and his mind was a million miles away. He turned his head back and continued focusing on his work, which consisted of balling up his papers and tossing them into the fireplace. Paxton noticed that dozens of books and several notebooks were already in the fire.

  Paxton opened his mouth to speak, but he thought better of it and silently exited the library. Clearly, the Russian was disturbed. The wacky professor. Let the doctors on board deal with him.

  Still, the image of Cherenkov cheering on the Reich in the dance hall lingered in Paxton’s head. Maybe he was one of the faithful. Paxton decided that once his plans had been carried out, he would return to the library and check on the Russian.

  He went down the stairs toward the service sector and was finally able to put his bag down and rub his sore shoulder.

  He checked all around to make certain no one was in the hall. He was next to one of the sealed entrances, an entrance not monitored by security cameras. He had memorized the security system’s distribution thanks to a copy of the plans he’d obtained a month ago. It was incredible what one of the restoration members had been willing to do to ensure his wife never saw pictures of his private parties with other women.

  Paxton took one of the chairs found in the hallways throughout the ship and placed it underneath a section of the ceiling that had been marked with a pencil. It was nearly invisible unless you were looking for it. He got up on the chair and gave the ceiling a hard push. A light click indicated the piece had come out. He reached up and blindly groped about until his fingers hit upon something that felt like hard rubber. He grabbed it and took it down. It was a pair of shears equipped with batteries. That little wonder would be able to cut through steel the same way regular scissors cut paper. Plus, it had a little engine that made the work effortless. He put the ceiling tile back in place and went back to the sealed entrance. He switched the shears on and brought the blades up to the welding joints. They sliced through the metal easily, like a knife through a ripe banana.

  When he was finished he kicked at what remained of the door in order to make enough space to crawl through. It had to be quite a large hole. Paxton weighed more than three hundred pounds, and he was neither slim nor trim. After a good while he succeeded in making the hole wide enough, and he slipped through to the other side.

  Immediately, he found himself surrounded by total darkness. He didn’t like the idea of visiting such an isolated and dangerous area of the ship. The time before he’d nearly broken his neck, stepping on a rotten step that had given way under his weight. Then, that stupid guard cam
e running and yelling like a madman about ghosts. The idiot shouldn’t have been there, and he definitely should not have seen Paxton. It had been necessary to cut his throat. Paxton did not have the luxury of leaving behind loose ends.

  He had two more hallways to cross through in second class before he reached his destination, but it felt eternal. The air down here was foul. It was almost as if some vat of oil filled with rotting fish was hidden somewhere. He also felt the need to yawn ceaselessly. His ears were ringing, and his mind seemed like it was turning to mush.

  Behind him he heard a noise. He whipped around like a cobra. One of the cabin doors creaked open as if propelled by an invisible breeze. Paxton knew there were no air currents down here. He must have bumped it by mistake.

  What are you going to do, Willie?

  The voice in his head spoke gently yet had a poisonous, wicked overtone.

  It doesn’t exist. That voice doesn’t exist, Paxton repeated to himself.

  He walked toward the end of the hallway and consulted a map of the Valkyrie that had cost two lives and a tidy fortune, although Paxton was unaware of this fact. The Elders were quite skilled at dividing labor—one mole must never know what the other mole is doing.

  Paxton reached a dead end. The wood paneling had taken on a sickly green color, the result of satisfied mold. Using his bare hands, he began tearing off huge panels, which crumbled in his fingers like dry cheese, leaving green streaks on his hands. After a bit, a new hole in the wall appeared right where it was supposed to be. The original designers of the Valkyrie had thought it best that the ship’s crew have quick access between the passenger and service areas in more than one place. Paxton had uncovered one of these access points.

  He pulled open the door. After decades of disuse the loud creaking hinges had rusted dry, and Paxton had to strain just to get the door open wide enough so he could enter. On the other side hot bright lights were awaiting his arrival.

  He was happy to leave the ruins of second class behind for a maintenance room adjoined to the engine room. He was practically in the heart of the Valkyrie and nearing his goal.

  He carefully advanced and looked around. He had been told there was almost never anybody down here. The way he had come had allowed him to avoid the control room and its entrances, where at least two guards were always on duty. Paxton chuckled. He was certain that not even Feldman or the chief engineer knew of the route he had taken. The Valkyrie held many secrets.

  He walked past two huge blocks of modern steel that were pressed against the side walls of one of the ship’s most spacious rooms. Paxton caught his breath and opened his bag. He began taking out the packages of Semtex, piling them at his feet, and then he searched for a good place for the explosives.

  All modern ships have lateral stabilizers, a pair of engines mounted to their sides that help in docking and sailing maneuvers as well as preventing the vessel from bobbing side to side like some circus attraction. Until the invention of such a system in the 1970s, cruise ships that encountered rough waters would begin swaying back and forth like a cocktail waitress. Such experiences ruined what was supposed to be a luxury vacation for first-class travelers and resulted in passengers, rich and poor alike, being seasick, which was not good for business. Thanks to these mechanical beasts, however, balancing on the waves became easy. Modern cruise ships were able to remain stable, even on choppy waters.

  When Feldman had renovated the Valkyrie, he’d taken the liberty of modifying the original design to include these motors. Because of them, the Valkyrie was steady as a boulder amid such turbulent waters.

  But Paxton wanted to change that.

  He began strategically placing the explosives and detonators. He set the timer, so they would explode in exactly one hour, which was more than enough time to sneak back to his cabin. Or to the kitchen, where he could eat some more food. As soon as he pressed the button, red numbers began ticking down on the tiny LCD screen.

  XXXVII

  Paxton still had some explosives in his bag as he leaned out into the hallway, at the end of which was the ship’s engine room. Three engineers had their backs to him and were attending to the multitude of dials, gauges, and indicators that dotted the control panels.

  The noise was infernal, and most of the area was covered in a shadowy darkness. The magnesium lamps were pointed toward the engine room, leaving the hallway’s edges extremely dark. It was not hard for Paxton to sneak past the engine room and slip out through a service tunnel.

  He was close to the ship’s stern, and the tunnel was slightly bowed. Consulting his map from time to time with the help of a flashlight, Paxton continued forward as the shaft narrowed. He paused, took out his Swiss Army knife, and undid the screws on the grate that was now in his way. When he finished he wormed onward. He left his jacket carefully folded in the gap of the grate to hold it open. It was too hot in there, and Paxton figured it would help facilitate his getaway should he need to leave suddenly.

  The tunnel gradually dwindled down to a circular crawl space. Paxton was forced to crawl forward while pushing his bag in front of him. The floor was trembling beneath him, and the vibrations shivered through his entire body.

  Don’t do it, Willie. It’s not a good idea.

  The voice pummeled his head as if a hammer had just driven several nails into his skull. Paxton stopped and groaned as his two nostrils became faucets of blood. The intense pain in his head only got worse, and his facial muscles began twitching uncontrollably.

  “Shut up,” he cried, rubbing his temples. “It’s my mission.”

  Where Senka had failed he would triumph. For the first time since his dream, he knew what he needed to do. He would be the one to bring the Valkyrie to a halt and stop Feldman, that piece-of-shit Jew. When the Valkyrie was at sea once more, filled with wolves and clovers, Paxton would be first in line to receive praise. The Elders would undoubtedly recognize his worth.

  Like a beacon of understanding, it came to him. He’d been on the other side. He’d seen the flags and shouted “Sieg Heil” in a room filled with those just as passionate as he. Paxton had been surrounded by true patriots. They had shown him what would be in store for him upon completing the mission—it was his destiny.

  He was the chosen one.

  He could see himself sailing on the Valkyrie toward Germany. Then, at the chancellery, an honored guest of the Führer, he would explain what had happened the first time the ship sailed and how to avoid making the same fatal errors as before by sharing the exact movements of the enemy. They would win the war and reestablish the Thousand-year Reich.

  Rubbing elbows with the Führer.

  The notion was so intoxicating that it managed to overpower the voice. Even her influence had withered under his burst of ambition so powerful and pure.

  Stop, Willie. Don’t be stupid. You shouldn’t do it.

  “It’s . . . my . . . destiny,” panted Paxton, breathless.

  The upper ceiling of the tunnel was already starting to graze his back, and he hardly had enough room to propel himself forward with his elbows and knees. Everything was dark, and the only light came from a shaky flashlight inside of the green bag.

  No, Willie.

  The pain was a hundred times worse than all the other times put together. Paxton shouted aloud, unable to restrain himself, but his howl was drowned out by the noise of the engines.

  Touching his face, he became distantly aware that, besides bleeding from his nose, blood was also pouring out of his ears. What Paxton couldn’t be aware of was that a part of his brain, unable to fend off the dark force being exerted on it, had begun to die. Thousands of tiny veins were bursting, one after the other, like a house of cards collapsing.

  Paxton shook his head and reached a tiny doorway that opened up to a room below. Awkwardly, he reached out and opened it. The noise behind the door was deafening. He pointed his flashlight down and could see the steely reflection of the Valkyrie’s propeller axle.

  The axle was as wide as th
e human body. Paxton knew the explosive would not be enough to destroy it. But mangled by the explosion, the axle would stop turning, and the engines would choke from the sudden blockage. The Valkyrie would be rendered motionless at sea like a big, sleepy whale. End of voyage.

  With no way of sticking the blocks of Semtex to the axle, Paxton began stacking them around the giant cylinder. It took him a long time to insert the timer wires into the waxy gray explosive. He’d not even realized that half his body was no longer obeying his brain’s orders.

  Stop!

  The voice became a hurricane-force roar. Paxton’s mind, already in a weakened state, had about as much resistance remaining as an old wooden fence does before an avalanche. Several arteries burst at the same time as blood began pouring through the geologist’s cranium, inundating every cavity. In shock, he realized for a fraction of a second that he was about to die. The thought struck him suddenly, and he brimmed with anger. Once again he was going to be denied the glory he deserved.

  His final reflex was to stretch his fingers out toward the timer. But he never got there. Blood had pooled extensively in his head, and Will Paxton died before he was able to complete his mission.

  Darkness grew and devoured him. This time it was for good.

  XXXVIII

  Valkyrie

  Day four

  Kate shook her wrists, angrier than she’d ever been in her life. The duct tape they had wrapped around her joints prevented her from moving her arms. She could feel the circulation being cut off as her hands began to tingle.