Jack Scarlet

by Dan McGirt

  Gal banked into a climb, trying to put as much distance between himself and Deepfire as he could. The searches sliced the night in tight arcs, converged, found him, tracked him, exposed him. Galahad realized his first instinct had been wrong. Powered flight was not his métier. Jack was the would-be human hawk, and Jack would have dived below the range of the deck-mounted search beams to evade their stealth-devouring light.

  Galahad rolled into a power dive over the open water, but it was too late – the snipers had him in their sights. Four shots went off in quick succession from a pair of shooters who had lain concealed on the high platforms of the cargo booms, covered under tarpaulins, escaping Galahad’s notice.

  Great scout I am, thought Galahad.

  Two rounds missed, streaking into the night. But the shooters were good, and each found his mark with a second shot – impressive considering they were aiming upward at a partially illuminated moving target. One sniper worked a Belgian bolt-action rifle firing .308 Winchester cartridges loaded with Citro explosive rounds. The bullet gave off Citro’s distinctive orange flash as it detonated and vaporized half of Galahad’s left wing. The other shooter worked with a monster of a Russian anti-materiel sniper gun that thundered out armor-piercing ammo meant to maim anything short of a tank. The hit obliterated the entire right wing, spinning Galahad around in mid-air before he started a long fall. It was three hundred feet to the steel deck of Deepfire. If he missed the platform, he’d fall another hundred to the water, which would have the stopping power of concrete. Splat or splash – from this height, both looked the same.

  ***

  The security team disarmed Jack, then had him strip off his combat suit – including undergarments – and put on a pair of green LiquiOil coveralls and Gatorz foam clogs. His hands were secured behind his back with electronic cuffs – a V-shaped steel and ceramic device with angled sockets to fully enclose each hand, allowing far less range of motion than standard bracelet cuffs. Only then was Jack marched to the bridge, with an escort of eight guards.

  My third surrender on this caper, thought Jack. I hope strike three isn’t game over.

  The bridge was a large room jammed with rows of consoles and mounted video displays. Huge slanted panes of heavy duty glass stretched almost floor-to-ceiling, giving the control room’s occupants a full view of Deepfire and the surrounding waters. Outside, the S-61T helo was in the air, circling the platform at a range of several hundred yards in an evident search pattern, its NightSun beam sweeping across the water below.

  The squad leader directed Jack to a small square marked on the floor with reflective tape.

  “Stay in the box,” said the merc. “You step over that line, we shoot and don’t stop until you drop. Got it, Doc?”

  Jack nodded. Four mercs took up positions around the square, just beyond his arm’s reach – assuming his arms weren’t bound behind him – with their weapons at low ready and their eyes locked on him like a pack of dogs on a rabbit. The other four parked themselves around the perimeter of a raised platform at the center of the bridge. There, facing away, stood a man dressed in dark slacks and a starched white Oxford shirt.

  The squad leader snapped a salute at the man’s back. “Director Oswald. The prisoner is secured, sir.”

  Oswald looked up from the tablet computer in his hands, shaking his head. “Not prisoner. Guest.” He turned. Oswald was fiftyish, heavy in the face, with a receding hairline and salt-and-pepper hair. He regarded Jack with amused contempt.

  “I expected you sooner, Dr. Scarlet,” he said.

  “But you did expect me.”

  “Naturally. You have an unfortunate habit of interfering with the Special Engineering Group.” He tapped an icon on his tablet. “We were aware of your tête-à-tête with President Corbett and departure from San Marcos. It was inevitable you would return here.”

  “You made sure of that by holding Cassidy Settles as your prisoner,” said Jack. “Where is she?”

  “I understand her research vessel was lost with all hands,” said Oswald. “Have you found any evidence to suggest otherwise?”

  Jack’s eyes flashed dangerously. “Are you saying you don’t have Cassi?”

  The corner of Oswald’s mouth tugged upward in a malicious smile. “You are predictable,” he said. “Our threat assessment team has a lengthy and detailed psychological profile on you, Dr. Scarlet. Did you know that?”

  Jack didn’t answer.

  “Including an extensive discussion of your compulsion to assume the role of the ‘brave rescuer’ even when is contrary to your own best interest and to any consideration of self-preservation to do so.” Oswald tapped his tablet. “Perhaps especially then.”

  “I was raised with an appreciation for chivalry,” said Jack. He pointed his chin at Oswald’s tablet. “That’s probably in your file on me too.”

  “And much more,” said Oswald. “Chivalry is not the only antique notion cluttering your brain, Dr. Scarlet. You are trapped in the paradigm of a conventional science rooted in the so-called Enlightenment. Older and far more vibrant traditions of science exist and reveal their secrets to those who possess the keys of wisdom and understanding. Beyond enlightenment awaits illumination.”

  “I’ve heard this speech before,” said Jack.

  Oswald thrust an accusing finger at Jack. “Yet you remain a blind fool, fearing and interfering with what you refuse to understand.”

  “I’m enlightened enough to know what you’re doing here,” said Jack.

  “Then tell me, Dr. Scarlet. What are we doing here?”

  “You’ve tuned the laser drill as a resonator to harness telluric energy flows.”

  Oswald scoffed. “That fool Corbett told you as much.”

  “Yes,” agreed Jack. “What he didn’t tell me is the true reason for your manipulations of the submerged telluric node. I wasn’t sure myself until now. I couldn’t believe that even SEG would be so reckless.”

  “Reckless?” Oswald chuckled. “What do you imagine is the objective of Project: Deepfire?”

  “You’ve made this platform into a beacon.”

  “Oh?”

  “You’re directing a gigawatt laser into the open sea.” Jack gestured with his chin, indicating the rows of monitors tended by SEG technicians. The screens tracked power levels from the generating plant, core temperature and outputs from the laser drill, and water temperature at various depths. One bank of screens charted a complex scrolling pattern of overlapping curves. “You’re pulsing it millions of times per second in a precise repeating pattern. Vaporizing water to create a submerged steam column that immediately collapses when the laser switches off, expanding again when the next pulse reheats the column. On that screen,” – again Jack pointed with his chin – “you have an acoustic model of the resulting subsea harmonics propagating through the Gulf and beyond. You’re playing the BOLD like a musical instrument, performing a song for an audience of one.”

  “To what end?” asked Oswald.

  “You’re calling up Leviathan.”

  Oswald gave the tight-lipped smile of a man whose secret has been guessed. “Very good, Dr. Scarlet.”

  “No, it isn’t good at all. It’s a terrible mistake. Some forces should not be trifled with.”

  Oswald laughed. “Trifle? Our purpose is far from trifling. We are on the verge of harnessing one of the fundamental powers of the universe.”

  “You want to weaponize it,” said Jack. “Control Leviathan and you own the sea.”

  Oswald’s mouth curled in disdain. “You think too small, Dr. Scarlet. As always.”

  “Own the sea and you own the Earth,” continued Jack. “The global economy depends on sea transit. Even landlocked countries need oil, gas, food, or goods moved by ship. Control of Leviathan would give LiquiOil the power of life and death over every person on this planet.” Jack’s eyes flashed dangerously. “But you can’t control it.”

  “We will,” said Oswald.

  “This isn’t first time SEG
has meddled with something out of myth and nightmares in a bid for power. It never ends well.”

  “Science is a process of experimentation,” said Oswald. “We learn from our mistakes.”

  “The mural in Sina’an Muul is a warning, Oswald. You should heed it.”

  “The Maya were wise, but they did not know everything,” said the SEG director. “Other ancient peoples, sea-faring peoples, had a more sophisticated understanding of the Litanu and its ways. They learned how to appease it. The Special Engineering Group has gathered, studied, and refined the writings and rituals of the Phoenicians, the Egyptians, the Sumerians, and nations forgotten to history. We are not frightened by cartoons on a wall.”

  “You should be.”

  Oswald sneered. “We have already succeeded, Dr. Scarlet. We know the Litanu manifested in the Gulf mere days ago, the night the unfortunate Sandpiper was lost. We have made adjustments and tonight we will call the Litanu again. We will establish communication. We will propitiate it and it will do our bidding, as it did the bidding of the wisest of ancients.”

  “Will it? ‘If you lay a hand on him, you will remember the struggle and never do it again!’” quoted Jack. “‘Any hope of subduing him is false; the mere sight of him is overpowering.’ There is some ancient wisdom for you.”

  “Surely you don’t rely on the scriptures of sheep herders for an accurate understanding of a marine entity far outside their circle of competence? That would be akin to asking a rocket scientist to perform brain surgery.”

  “I’m a rocket scientist,” said Jack. “And a brain surgeon too.”

  Oswald frowned. “So you are.”

  “Turn it off. Shut this down while there is still time.”

  “Impossible,” said Oswald.

  “Why am I here?” demanded Jack. “I know why I came. But why did you want me here? You know I’ll do whatever it takes to stop your mad scheme.”

  “Your intentions are predictable,” said Oswald. “Better to restrain you here than have you out there on your robotic yacht interfering with our experiment.”

  “Keep your enemies close.”

  “Exactly.”

  Jack lowered his head, turned his gaze to the floor. “And Cassi?” he asked. “Is she really here? Is she alive?”

  “It was suited our purposes for you to believe so.”

  Jack snapped his head up. “That’s no answer!”

  “It is all the answer you will get, Dr. Scarlet.”

  Jack glanced to the window. Where was Galahad? They lost contact more than ten minutes ago. Surely by now Gal had sussed the situation and was ready to make his move.

  Oswald noted Jack’s eye movement. “By the by, Dr. Scarlet, if you are waiting for your Monoga associate to effect a rescue, you should know that our snipers shot him down shortly after you were apprehended.” He indicated the prowling helo. “We’ll recover the body shortly.”

  Jack’s chest tightened at Oswald’s words, but he did not give the director the satisfaction of a visible reaction. Nor was he convinced Galahad was dead. I’d have felt it. In Jack’s experience, a body not yet recovered was a body that might still have life in it.

  “As for your autonomous pleasure boat, it won’t be able to aid you either,” said Oswald. He directed Jack’s attention to a monitor displaying a radar scope. Marisa’s position was indicated as fifty miles northeast.

  With a droning roar, four angular unmanned aircraft, each the size of a large conference table, zoomed past the window and shot out across the Gulf. Jack recognized them: DT-3019 Shrike aerial assault UAV units. Draconia Techtronics built the Shrikes as tank killers, but they were also effective ship hunters. The passing drones bristled with Hound anti-ship missiles, the Wotan ECM package, and .75 caliber Tybalt chain guns. A swarm of four Shrikes might, barely, keep Marisa at bay.

  Four more Shrikes buzzed past.

  “Sadly, you went down with your ship,” said Oswald. “Or so we’ll report.”

  “Then we’ll all go down together,” said Jack.

  24: The Andromeda Effect

  “I direct your attention to the floating dock,” said Oswald, indicating one of the overhead monitors.

  A crew boat came alongside the platform dock as it swayed on the waves. The boat made fast and a dozen SEG security men and technicians debarked. Jack’s attention was drawn to the only figure who lacked a hard hat or combat helmet. Her hands were bound before her. Two security men pushed her along, one at each elbow. An oversized green coverall obscured her figure, but Jack knew the defiant tilt of her chin and recognized her close-cropped hair, worn short as a convenience during long months at sea, much to her mother’s dismay.

  Cassi. Alive!

  The mercs brought Cassi to the pole erected in the center of the platform.

  “Let’s have a closer look,” said Oswald. The monitor switched to a close-up view. There was confusion and fear on Cassi’s face as a pair of crewmen lashed her to the post with a thick line wrapped around her mid-section. Jack’s blue eyes darkened dangerously. They were staking Cassi out as some kind of lure. Or an offering.

  As if reading Jack’s thoughts, Oswald asked, “You know the Andromeda myth, I presume.”

  Jack made a reflexive start toward Oswald, freezing mid-step as the targeting lasers of two NP5s converged on him. A hard-faced mercenary pressed a gloved hand against Jack’s chest and shoved him back into his designated square.

  “This is barbaric,” seethed Jack. “Insane!”

  Oswald was unmoved. “Not at all. Such propitiatory measures have ample precedent in the historical record.”

  “Human sacrifice is a new low, even for SEG.”

  Oswald smirked. “You know less of our great work than you think.”

  “You don’t have to do this! You have the BOLD. You’ve sent your summons.”

  “It is perhaps a superfluous measure,” mused Oswald. “But it can’t hurt, can it?”

  “If you harm her, Oswald, you will die.”

  “Be more concerned about your own immediate future, Dr. Scarlet. I have instructions to deliver you to our Psychology and Doctrine team. Our PsyDoc colleagues have some new persuasive techniques they are eager to test against your extraordinary mind.”

  “You think you’ll brainwash me?” said Jack. “You think you’ll kill my friends, threaten the world, and then get me to join you? You’re mad! You, your bosses, all of you!”

  “Madness is a matter of perspective,” said Oswald.

  “Shut this down!” said Jack. “You don’t know what you’re doing!”

  “We’re changing the world, Dr. Scarlet.”

  There was no audio feed, but Jack could lip read Cassi’s protests as the crewmen uncuffed her and yanked her arms upward. She fought ineffectually to break away as they lashed her wrists to a perpendicular crossbar that pierced the post above her head. As a final step, one of the crew produced a knife and methodically cut away Cassi’s coverall, leaving her naked and exposed.

  Oswald leered for a moment and turned with a smirk to assess Jack’s reaction. The cold, hard fury of Jack’s expression made the SEG director flinch and look away.

  While Cassi cursed and struggled in vain against her bonds, the men stepped back to admire their handiwork. Satisfied, they withdrew to the crew boat. The other technicians completed their adjustments to various instruments attached to the floating deck, then joined their colleagues on the boat.

  Cassi shouted after them. The boat cast off and pulled away. A high wave crested over the platform. Water swirled around Cassi’s knees before draining away. Her face pinched tight with determination as she pulled against the restraints, but there was no give in them.

  Cassi closed her eyes and hung her head. In despair? Or was she praying?

  “She’ll drown!” said Jack.

  “She knows too much,” said Oswald. “This way her death is at least useful.”

  “You’ll pay for this,” said Jack. “I promise you.”

  Oswald sc
offed. “She is the payment.”

  Jack fell silent. Making threats and promises he was in no position to keep was pointless. He kept his eyes on Cassi, willing her to stay strong, stay alive, until he found a way out of this nightmare.

  The wind out of the southwest produced near gale conditions, with the sea heaping up and white foam leaping from the wave tops to streak through the air like tattered ghostly banners. The floating dock rode the waves, tilting and bouncing in the swell, rocking Cassi back and forth. The rain began, rolling down in billowing curtains. In the distance, lightning flashed. Red lightning. Never good.

  Jack’s mind raced.

  On the monitor he watched Cassi cry and shake her head side to side like a terrier worrying a rat, as if the sheer force of her denial could negate the horror of her plight. He imagined all she had endured in the past few days – the loss of Sandpiper with all her friends and crewmates. Being held prisoner on Deepfire, cut off from friends and family, with no way to tell them she was alive. Hard interrogation by the Special Engineering Group to extract every detail of her close encounter with the Leviathan. And now she was cast out, abandoned to sea and storm. Did they tell her why? Did they tell her she was a sacrifice?

  Oswald cited Andromeda, a figure from Greek mythology, the daughter of a king and queen who offended the gods. As punishment, the god Poseidon sent a sea monster called Cetus to ravage the coast of their land. There would be no relief unless the king sacrificed Andromeda to the beast. She was duly chained to a rock and left to die, desolate and alone.

  Fortunately for Andromeda, the hero Perseus had impeccable timing. Astride his winged horse Pegasus, he was returning home from slaying Medusa, the snake-headed Gorgon. Spying a beautiful princess menaced by a monster, the hero naturally swooped down from the sky to save her. Jack found this aspect of the myth bemusing – Perseus knew nothing beforehand of Andromeda and her plight. He just happened to be in the neighborhood.