by Peter Tonkin
Away to the north, behind the scarifying wall of flame, something exploded like an atomic bomb, sending a mushroom cloud to tower high against the smoke clouded sky. That would be Dagupan Maru, he thought numbly. Her hold packed full of thousands of tons of priceless timber and the temperature around it reaching 350 degrees Celsius, hot enough for spontaneous combustion. The power of the explosion was so colossal that it seemed to suck the flames northwards towards the massive vacuum so much instantaneous devastation must have caused. A wind thundered northward, to fill the vast vacancy at the heart of the explosion even as a blast wall ran counter to it, making the flames gutter and die for a moment. Richard was thrown back and forward like a puppet. So were Poseidon and Katapult.
Then the pounding on his shoulder stopped being the wind. It was Nic. He let go of the gun handles, looked dazedly down at his blistered palms; up at his beaming friend; out at the brave vessel that held his wife still safe.
‘Katapult secured, Captain Chang!’ he bellowed into the headset.
‘Good job!’ she answered. ‘We go full ahead now.’
The captain must have switched on to a general band then, for Richard suddenly found himself in the middle of a conversation between Poseidon’s radio operator and Robin. ‘. . . reporting all aboard Katapult well . . .’ came her familiar voice. ‘A little scorched, and smelling more like Sunday roast than sailors, but we’re fine. Glad to hear Liberty and the girls are safe and that Ironwrist thinks he can get Neptune back in one piece. Sorry about Flint though . . .’
‘Robin?’ he said hesitantly, suddenly choked and shaking.
‘Hello, sailor,’ she answered, her voice softening. ‘Good thing you were here after all, eh?’
‘Looks like it,’ he answered, suddenly feeling very sore and shaky. Looking for a place to sit down.
‘We’d never have won without you,’ she persisted.
‘Won?’ he asked, simply astonished. ‘What do you mean you won?’
‘We have the professor’s bottle, of course,’ she chuckled. ‘Not that it was worth all this trouble in the end. What price glory, eh?’
Now Richard really did need to sit down. ‘Robin, do you know what that thing’s worth?’ he gasped.
‘I dunno,’ she answered dismissively. ‘A battered old second-hand plastic drink bottle? Not a lot, I’d say . . .
‘Now what on earth’s amusing you, Richard? What are you laughing at? Come on, you bloody man, share the joke, why don’t you?’
