Wings of Steele - Destination Unknown (Book 1)

by Burger, Jeffrey

"Six days..?" Jack tried to sit up but pain lanced through his brain in a white hot flash.

  "His eyes!" said the second voice.

  "Lay down, sir! Lay down!" urged Toncaresh.

  Jack dropped back down to the pillow in agony. "Jesus!" he groaned. He brought his hands over his eyes to keep his head from exploding and felt the wires and IV lines emerging from under the bandages across his face. It took him several moments to recover, catch his breath and clear the pain. Then a chill raced up his back. "Who said eyes? What about my eyes? Oh God... am I blind?"

  "No. No, not completely," said the second voice. "At least I don't think so..."

  "We were awake when they bought you in," said Toncaresh. "The Doc said something about a fractured skull and your left eye..."

  Jack ran his fingertips gingerly across the bandages producing a spike of pain where his left eye should be. "Oh God," he whispered. His left eye was gone, the tubes and lines seemed to run into the empty socket. "What happened?" he mumbled.

  "We got rammed," said a third voice. "That's how most of us ended up here. Bounced around. You know."

  "I am so sorry..." The bandage became wet around his right eye.

  "For what?" asked the second voice. "It wasn't your fault. Besides, most are just bumps and bruises. Most went right back to duty."

  "Doc only lost two..." said the third.

  "Shut up, you dope!" Hissed the second.

  "Who?" shot Jack.

  "Try to get some sleep, sir."

  "God damn it, Toncaresh! Who?"

  "ABS Mystic..." He paused.

  "And?!"

  "Please, sir..." pleaded the ABS.

  "Who else, dammit!"

  "Chief Engineer Trigoss..."

  For a moment, there was silence. Steele's stomach knotted. "Aw damn... Trigoss..." it was barely a whisper. "Damn. Damn, damn, damn..." He took a deep breath to choke back a sob and swallowed hard. "What happened?"

  Toncaresh's voice was deadpan. He liked the Captain and didn't want to see him put himself through this. "The collision ruptured the interlink connectors and started a fuel leak on two of the thrust engines. There was a fire. Mystic was trapped and the Chief went in to get him. He didn't even hesitate. They never came out..."

  The three crewmen lay awake in their beds and listened to their Captain cry himself to sleep grieving for the loss of a crew member - a friend. In a moment of unspoken communication, they realized how much this man cared and agreed never to reveal to anyone, what some might perceive to be a moment of weakness. But they would never forget the compassion he displayed.

  CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN

  EARTH, CHICAGO ILLINOIS: OH WHAT A TANGLED WEB WE WEAVE

  Lynnette Steele sat bolt upright in bed and stared wide eyed into the darkness, cold with sweat. Sliding out from under the covers, she padded across the bedroom carpet, her flannel nightgown clinging damply and causing her chill. She found comfort in the heavy robe she retrieved from the back of the bedroom door. Wrapping it tightly around her, she made her way through the darkened house, the only light, coming through the dining room window from the streetlight outside. She stopped on her way back from the kitchen, brandy glass in hand and stared at the falling snow. The quiet Chicago side street was covered in a thick blanket of pure white. Clean and pristine, it sparkled in the light of the streetlights. She wondered if it was snowing where he was and tried not to think of his name because she knew it would make her cry. She shivered as a blast of wind whipped the snow against the windowpane, then sipped the brandy, letting it warm her, numb her, so she could sleep.

  She was still there when Kyle found her. He put his arms around her, embracing her from behind and watched the swirling snow for a moment in silence. "Another nightmare?"

  She sipped her brandy. "Uh huh."

  He kissed the top of her head. "Are you ok?"

  She patted his hand and nodded. "He's alive you know..."

  "I know." Kyle learned long ago to trust her intuitions about certain things, but he also knew the realities and the inherent dangers involved in clandestine operations. He wanted to believe Jack was still alive, but he had serious doubts. Lynnette began having nightmares about a month ago, when more details of Jack's disappearance came to light via an old friend of Kyle's who was still in the FBI.

  ■ ■ ■

  "He's in it way over his head, Kyle," said Cooper. "I'm sure he had no idea. They were just using him as a delivery boy." Phil Cooper went on to explain that the CIA had set up a semi-legal operation, but it had some terrible snags which doomed it from the start.

  "The whole thing was the brain child of some CIA big shot named Stephen Miles who'd cooked up this scheme to catch a Russian named Colonel Restonovich," explained Cooper. "He's KGB, supposedly backing someone in the Vasquez drug cartel somewhere near Sao Palo.”

  “But the CIA is supposed to be limited to actions outside of the US and its territories...”

  “True,” agreed Cooper, “but the principal was a Russian KGB agent, and Vasquez was a Brazilian national operating out of Sao Palo, Brazil. He was often in Puerto Rico and that's where things crossed the line, but they can rationalize that they were tracking a foreign national - the higher-ups will look the other way. We're supposed to share information across agency lines - but that rarely happens. Everybody's competing for budgetary allowances - the most successful agency gets the lion's share of the pot - nobody wants to share.”

  "What about the B25?"asked Kyle, unmoved.

  "Yes, well, Miles' personal pet project..." Cooper answered. "Evidently, it inspired an idea for disguising a large number of operatives in the same place at the same time. A movie set. The whole thing was a cover. But, of course, Restonovich and the Vasquez people already knew that."

  "How?" wondered Kyle.

  "Simple. A double agent. Miles routed all the planes through Puerto Rico where he had an agent posing as a mechanic. She would inspect and fuel the planes, make sure everything was ok. Well I don't know how the CIA got her, but she was a Soviet first and foremost. She's actually Cuban, posing as Puerto Rican. She's also Restonovich's niece. He lived and got married in Cuba during the missile crisis in the early sixties."

  "Jesus..." sighed Kyle.

  "Right," Cooper had agreed, "double Jesus... Unofficially, her hand had been promised to Marcus Vasquez to solidify the deal between the Soviets and the cartel. She disappeared the same day as Jack, and Marcus was hopping mad. We only knew about her because Puerto Rico is basically American soil. Our fifty-first state, if you will, and we have agents there. The DEA was tracking Vasquez and as a co-op, asked us to watch a few players for them. Marianna was one of them." He took a moment to light a cigarette, then continued. "Somehow, information about Jack's cargo leaked out, and someone on the island decided they wanted it. Or maybe it was the plane they wanted, doesn't really matter at this point. But it happened so fast our people couldn't do anything about it. And nobody's talking after the fact."

  Cooper took a long drag on the cigarette and watched the smoke rise for a moment. "Your kid held a good account of himself though. As far as we can tell, he got out without a scratch. Final score, Kid: 12, Bad Guys: Zip. Hell of a kid, Steele... hell of a kid." He seemed to be thinking.

  Kyle studied him for a moment. "What happened then?"

  Cooper shrugged as he stubbed out the cigarette in an ashtray. "It gets iffy here. They headed south, probably to avoid air traffic and were sighted off the coast of Brazil by a couple of F-18s on patrol from the Shenandoah. The B25 was visually confirmed, so we know the Hornets were up close, but communications between the carrier and the planes were problematic. Maybe storm interference. The three planes entered the weather front together... None came out. Or at least none were se
en to come out."

  Kyle threw up his hands. "So they wrote it off as UFOs? The Bermuda Triangle? Ghosts, gremlins? What..?"

  Cooper shook his head. "The Navy doesn't take the loss of two multimillion dollar aircraft lightly. There's got to be an explanation, we just don't know what it is yet. Nobody's stopped looking... that's the dangerous part. Jack's officially cleared of the incident at the airport, I've seen to that. But Vasquez wants his bride back, the Soviets want their agent and Restonovich wants his niece. All one in the same, of course, but still, it's a lot of people looking. Not to mention the Navy and the CIA. Any one of these groups might kill him for any number of reasons."

  Kyle had his hands steepled and was supporting his chin on his fingertips. "What are his chances if he's still alive?"

  "Hard to say," said Cooper lighting another cigarette.

  "Try," said Kyle.

  “Honestly,” said Cooper, inhaling on the cigarette, “there are so many variables it's impossible to tell. And that kid of yours is the biggest wild card in the deck. He's resourceful, and it appears... very lucky.” The conversation turned to a series of situational comparisons. A myriad of ifs and what ifs. The bottom line was the odds could swing wildly in any number of directions, but the safest place was with the FBI. Or so that's what they'd have the Steeles believe. Kyle wasn't sure if Jack wasn't better off staying invisible somewhere.

  That's when the nightmares started, about a month ago. Lynnette hadn't said one word through the whole conversation. Sitting quietly, sipping her coffee, she watched with detachment as the two men discussed her only son's fate.

  ■ ■ ■

  Shortly after that, the dreams and visions. He was far away. Very far, farther than he'd ever been. But he was alive, she knew that. Then the never ending darkness. At first she thought this meant death. But no, there were other things, wondrous things. Now there was distress. He was in trouble. And pain, that was the latest one. Blinding pain.

  Lynnette took a deep breath and finished the brandy as she watched the wind swirl the snow around the cars parked at the curb. Neither she nor Kyle took notice of the dark blue sedan sitting down the street with its motor running, the only vehicle for blocks without a blanket of snow covering it. It, or the gray one, which was always around somewhere.

  "Let's go back to bed," said Kyle. She nodded. He decided then, they'd go to Florida and spend the rest of the winter at Jack's. Maybe she'll feel better there, he thought. The Winter had come early and the cold weather was already wearing on them both.

  CHAPTER TWENTY EIGHT

  FREEDOM: TULOCHAH SYSTEM, GEO ZEE - PIRATE SALVAGE YARD

  Jack drifted in and out, one day running into the next. Inseparable and imperceptible in their passing except for the lessening of pain in his skull. Sometimes he would wake to feel a hand holding his, sometimes to voices, speaking softly. He came to the realization his bunk mates were disappearing one by one. But almost always, Fritz was there.

  Alité sat in a chair at the side of the bed, her head resting on the edge of the mattress, her eyes closed. One hand held Jack's, their fingers intertwined, her other rested on Fritz's shoulder as he slept on the bed alongside his master.

  She was awake the instant his hand squeezed hers, watching his face. The bandages, tubes, wires, all were gone now. All that remained was the surgical patch over his left eye socket. He would be in pain when he woke, the doctor had ended his medications. She moved her chair closer and hovered over him, squeezing his hand and kissing his arm. "C'mon, Jack, c'mon. Come back. We're waiting, we need you..."

  "Sssshhh..." he whispered, "my head hurts."

  "Oooh!" She squealed and jumped out of her chair. She leaned over and kissed his face over and over. Fritz was licking his chin.

  He opened his eye and tried to focus in the dim light. "Where are we?"

  "In our quarters," she replied. "CABL M7 thought you'd be more comfortable here. Besides, he needed the room."

  "He likes it better when you call him Doc," mumbled Jack. "Why does he need more room?"

  "For the refugees..."

  "Refugees? What refugees? How long have I been here?"

  "Look," she began, "I'm doing this badly. Let me start over..." She went on to explain that after the collision, the Freedom was adrift for almost a week, carried by the currents of the ether storm. After about a week the engineers were able to make sufficient enough repairs to restart two of the thrust engines.

  Jack turned to look at her. "I guess I made a pretty good mess of things, haven't I?"

  "Don't be silly," she scolded gently, "you did what you had to do to keep us all safe. If we would have surrendered, over half the crew could have been imprisoned. They knew that. The ones who used to be pirates would likely have faced life in a work prison... maybe even execution. You saved them and they know it. They speak of you in hushed tones, whispers. They almost worship you. You risked your life for them, they don't look at it the other way around. No one else has ever done that for them. No one else has ever cared..."

  "But so many hurt..." He thought of Trigoss and swallowed hard.

  “We lost two people... and saved a hundred...”

  “The refugees?"

  “Yes, you saved them too, without even knowing you did. If we had simply surrendered they would have starved to death, trapped here on a derelict ship with failing systems...”

  “How did we find them...?”

  "Well, all our sensors were useless in the storm, so when we got the engines started, we just went the direction we were pointed in. No destination, just go. When the storm cleared, we were here."

  "Where's here?"

  "The salvage depot you were looking for, of course." She kissed his hand.

  “Of course,” he mumbled, his mind reeling.

  "We've been here since, making repairs."

  "And the people?"

  "We found them on one of the ships while we were looking for parts. Thirty seven of them, all good people. They've been stranded here for several months, but they're ours now." She smiled like they were her own children. "You would be so proud of the crew... your crew. They've worked so hard. I think they're trying to repay you. I just can't believe they're almost finished..."

  Jack was puzzled. "Finished... With what?"

  "The ship, sweetheart." She touched his face.

  She must be talking about some other ship, thought Jack. He couldn't believe there was enough of the Freedom left to work on. "Our ship?"

  "Yes. This ship, your ship."

  "Good Lord, how long have I been here... A year?" He realized he'd asked that before but couldn't remember if there had been an answer.

  "Well you've been here in our quarters about four days," she paused, "but it's been over four weeks since the collision.

  "Collision... oh yeah...” he remembered it vaguely, or was it that he remembered being told about it... it was hard to separate the two. “Wait, did you say four weeks?"

  She nodded, "More. Doc had to induce you into a coma for your own good..."

  "Geez," he groaned, "all I did was fall down... I think."

  Alité smiled, "Walt said you were thrown over ten feet. M7, er, Doc, said he couldn't believe your neck wasn't broken. When you landed, a broken piece of the console went through your eye and into your brain. You would have died if Ragnaar hadn't carried you straight into surgery. I heard he told Doc if he let you die, his life wasn't worth a plugged Ulurian nickel."

  Jack smiled for the first time. "The Lieutenant has such a way with words..." As he stared at Alité's face and thanked whatever God was responsible for her presence, she held his hand to her lips and he saw the gold band on the ring finger of his own left hand. "What's that?" He asked tryi
ng to focus on it fully.

  She lowered her eyes pensively. "I... I was so afraid you wouldn't come back to me... and I didn't think I could bare to live without at least a part of you." She sniffed. "So I took your name..." She held up her left hand to display her own ring. "You aren't angry, are you?"

  “We're married...?” She nodded silently and Jack smiled, he felt warm all over. "How could I be angry with the most precious, beautiful creature in the known universe..." She held his hand against the smooth skin of her cheek and he could feel her blush. He smiled again, her eyes staring down into his, a warm amber, swimming with swirls of liquid chocolate. Mesmerizing.

  "Besides," she cooed, "our baby needed a sir name."

  "Baby?"

  ■ ■ ■

  "Flight One to bridge..."

  "This is Walt, go ahead Pappy."

  "We've got company..."

  "The UFW carrier again?"

  "Negative. Definitely pirate. Looks like a cross between a destroyer and a small cruiser. There's another smaller ship with it."

  "Right. Go to blackout status." He thumbed the comm button to address the Freedom's crew, ship-wide. "This is an alert, all crew to battle stations. All systems to blackout status." He repeated the announcement.

  "Flight leader to all flights, blackout status, we've got company!"

  The depot was nothing more than a vast field of ships, most of them wrecks, held by a harmonic-pulse stasis field around an automated central generator plant. The Freedom had found it by luck in an asteroid belt orbiting a planet called Geo Zee. The depot was easily two hundred miles across in any direction, being shaped as a sphere. When the Freedom had maneuvered in and shut down her engines, the depot's automatic system locked on and held them in place. There were ships of almost every shape, size, type and origin. Some were nothing more than hollow skeletons looking like a zebra carcass after the jackals and vultures had picked it clean. But there were just as many that were fairly intact with full bellies, ripe for the picking... it was these that the Freedom needed to salvage parts, supplies and equipment from.