Nemo Rising

by C. Courtney Joyner

  * * *

  The rising sun streaked orange as the flankers broke their horses down the waterfront pier, hooves clattering on the planking. Running full out, slipping rifles from their shoulders as they pulled up to the old livery, where the President’s Coach was already tied.

  They dropped from their mounts, and found positions around the pier as Grant and Duncan walked toward the last pilings, where Sara was standing, hurling bread to the gulls. Maston, hand bandaged and without a gun, stood watch from behind a stack of anchor chains.

  The sun was higher now, the night erased, and throwing clean light across the rows of tall-mast schooners and small fishing boats casting off.

  Fishermen pointed to Grant, waved their caps, as he marched for Sara, calling out before reaching her: “You should be on board; what about the launch?”

  Sara hurled the last of the bread, letting the gulls fight for it. “Nemo declared me unworthy. The launch should be any minute.”

  Grant said to Duncan, “Your damn scheme’s already going awry.”

  “He has a new weapon, by the way,” Sara said.

  * * *

  Nemo was on his bridge, sea horse key in place, all indicators lit, all dials reading. He took his chair, his station, at the Captain’s podium.

  Specialized handlebars, rather than a ship’s wheel, steered the rudders. Mounted at an angle, the touch on the bars was sensitive by design, allowing near-instant changes in the Nautilus’ direction. Holding the bar steady with his left, Nemo slipped his right into a glove-like opening beneath the main indicators in front of him.

  All fabric and wires, it manipulated hidden switches, reacting only to the specific length and spread of his fingers. Electric pulses confirmed identity as Nemo adjusted rudder tension, power flow, and steering with smooth movements of hands, as if playing a concerto. The electric nerves of the Nautilus were now his nerves, guiding every aspect of the submarine; man and machine, spliced.

  Jess called out from the stairs, “Permission to enter the bridge, sir!”

  “Granted.”

  Jess, sporting a uniform of sea denims, gave Nemo an admiring nod before moving to the control banks, all of which were preset. He squinted at the dials. “Looks like there’s nothin’ for me to do, Captain!”

  “Responsibility is a gift earned. You’ve a talent for brawling, and decent with tools, but you’ll need more to be First Mate. But, necessity dictates that’s who you are. For the moment.”

  “Just as well; I ain’t never sailed a turtle a’fore.”

  “And I’ve never had a first whose blood was pure rum.”

  “Then, we’re both sailin’ into uncharted waters.”

  “Just do your job, Mr. Jess. Preparing engines.” Nemo switched power to the engine room. “All hatches ready for cast-off?”

  Jess smiled wide. “Oh, yes, sir! All crew aboard!”

  The Whalers charged both sides of the submarine pen, machete-slashing the ties of the large disguising canvas between the Nautilus and the ocean. The top hatch started closing. Whalers jumped for it, giant hands grabbing for the crew ladder, their great weight rolling them inside the submarine, moments before the hatch slammed shut.

  Other crew moved onto the bridge, ragtags doing their duties as Nemo ordered, “All ahead, quarter speed, Mr. Jess.”

  Jess echoed the order.

  Nemo felt a small burst of energy as the engines pulsed, gears engaged, and the Nautilus began moving. A glove-command opened the shutters covering the bridge’s domed observation port, the iron plates folding back from the glass, as the Nautilus cut through the curtain into Norfolk Harbor. Out of hiding, they were now surrounded by ships, men, and an ocean, stretching wide. New sunlight flooded through portals on all decks, completing the feeling of the Nautilus’ resurrection.

  Jess caught the Captain with eyes closed, as if thanking for a prayer answered. It was a half-moment; Jess not sure what Nemo was truly thinking, and being met with a sudden glare. He snapped about, toward the open view ahead, standing a little straighter, ready for orders.

  * * *

  Sara, her father, and Grant were on the pier’s edge, the Nautilus churning from the submarine pen. Splitting the waters with its amplified-swordfish design, it moved as a graceful living creature, not something clumsily man-made, its long shadow falling across every ship moored in the harbor, with crews rushing their railings for a look.

  But Sara only saw Nemo, protected by the large glass dome, at his Captain’s station and in command.

  She repeated, “Unworthy.”

  Then she tore from her dress, clamped the tube-and-shell breather in her mouth, and dove into the water.

  21

  BENEATH THE WAVES

  Sara angled herself in mid-dive, cutting deep through the ocean’s surface, and propelling instantly forward with her arms and legs. Before diving, she saw how the water fell off the Nautilus at cruising speed, creating a wake, and swam to the right, keeping clear of the powerful draft while dodging sunken pieces of the old, bombed-out pier.

  She knew the harbor from the months of work on the submarine, and kept her eyes closed against the burning salt water, but still expertly swimming ahead, seeing with her memory, the shell-breather working as naturally as her own lungs.

  She pulled her elbows in, then glided with her lean-muscled legs, making good distance before going to the surface. Sara cleared her eyes, then dove, getting ahead of the Nautilus’ bow, then straightened as if skimming the water, while the submarine passed, letting herself be pulled backward into its wake. She started swimming again, keeping steady against the current, while being drawn closer to the hull.

  She challenged the wake with a strong breaststroke, literally swimming in place, so not to get yanked into the large propellers, but still maneuvering. She scissor-kicked as she reached out, trying to grab hold of one of the portals just below the submarine’s waterline. The ones she’d retrofitted, and knew their location.

  Fingers slipped. The wake gripped her stronger, yanking her toward the engine and rudder works.

  Sara grabbed again, getting hold of a small view port as it moved past. She hung on, clinging, hands tight around the brass fittings, before hoisting herself up. Finding a grip on the hull’s riveted surface, she climbed, rolling onto the top deck, raising a triumphant fist.

  * * *

  Duncan was at the farthest point of the pier, keening over the end, watching, then he waved both arms as his daughter stood on the Nautilus. The tiny figure that was Sara waved back, and Duncan’s pride, and relief, were in his words: “That’s the kind of courage you give medals for.”

  “Point taken. Now let’s get her off that thing,” Grant said. “No telling what Nemo’ll do if she’s seen.”

  Duncan’s voice dropped. “Ulysses…”

  The Nautilus was diving.

  Sara’s name was choked helpless in Duncan’s throat as she scrambled up the conning tower, staying above the water, the submarine continuing its descent.

  He squeezed Grant’s arm.

  Sara got to the tower’s perch, holding onto a mounted telescope, whitecaps to her knees, and rising, before swan-diving into the rolling ocean. She vanished beneath, along with the last traces of the submarine.

  “I knew this was riding to hell,” Grant spit.

  He barked to Maston, who was already charging for the small boats in the outside slips, “As planned!”

  The fishermen, trained Navy in disguise, jumped into skiffs, oars chopping the water, quick-rowing to where Sara had been. They prepped cork life jackets, called her name through megaphones.

  Maston’s crew cast off, while atop a piling, a signalman flagged the frigates and gunboats anchored half a mile offshore to be “Armed and Ready.”

  From Grant’s command, all action had taken moments.

  Duncan was heaving, running fast as he could for the coach, Oliver, the driver, already bringing it around.

  He got out, “Nemo, we’ve got to raise him on the com
municator—”

  “To tell him he’s signed his own death warrant,” Grant said.

  Rescue boats formed a wide circle on the edge of the harbor, bows-to-sterns, tossing life rings, while Navy skin-divers powered under the water. Diving, coming up, forming a search grid.

  By the livery, the Rifle Guards mounted. Grant and Duncan made it to the coach, Grant hoisting him in, saying, “Nemo’s a lunatic, always has been.”

  Oliver snapped the team into a run, the Rifle Guards galloping alongside.

  * * *

  Sara clung to the side of the Nautilus like a remora on a whale’s belly, feeling the vibration of the water being drawn into the ballast tanks. The submarine was taking on a rush of weight, meaning it was quick-diving at least another hundred feet, as the shallow of the harbor dropped off and the bow aimed for the ocean bottom.

  She measured her breathing through the brassed shell, keeping herself flat against the hull while crawling forward on it, a foot at a time.

  The Nautilus leveled, the engines upped their speed.

  A sandbar shark swam in close, nudging Sara from behind, and she kicked at his sharp snout, sandpaper skin against the soles of her feet. Knocking him away.

  A large, iris-formed hatchway opened mid-hull.

  There was a burst of water pressure from the hatch, and then, a reverse force, as she was sucked into a vacuum tube, the iris closing down behind her. A frenzy of sharks swam in fast, mouths open for Sara, but missing, their heads butting against iron.

  Sara was now standing in a polished steel tube, the cold water rapidly swirling out, warm air wafting in, before a glassed side opened, and she saw Jess holding a blanket.

  He said, “You look like the spaniel what fell down the well.”

  Sara stepped into the Sea Exploration chamber that housed four other pressure tubes in cases, and all the Nautilus’ diving technologies.

  She pulled her wet hair back from her eyes. “Nemo, he really tried to kill me?”

  “If he had done, you’d be washing up on the beach.” Jess wrapped her shoulders. “You’re here because the Cap knew what you could handle.”

  He snatched the shell-breather from the floor and said, “Dry off, you’re ordered to the bridge.”

  * * *

  In the harbor, Maston hauled a Navy diver into his flat-boat, the Diver saying, “Nope, she’s gone.”

  Maston winced with pain from his laser-burned hand. “Your meaning is, the Nautilus is gone, the ship. Not Miss Duncan. I have to be absolutely clear for the President.”

  The Diver had a mouth of brandy, then said, “You figure the phrasing. I took the emergency plan to be blow up the submarine with cannon fire, and if Miss Duncan’s on it—”

  “That’s not for your conjecture, or comment.”

  The Diver laughed. “All I’m saying, if you’re firing on the underwater boat, do it now, so we can fish out the bodies before the sun goes down.”

  Another drink, and, “It’s too damn cold at night.”

  * * *

  Sara cleared the last of the spiral staircase to the bridge, her voice catching as she saw a maze of fifty underwater mines, set between the harbor and the ocean lanes, surrounding the observation dome from all sides.

  Bombs anchored by chains, challenging the Nautilus.

  She moved past Nemo, and the helm, to the center of the glass dome over the bridge, its open curve magnifying all details around it. Rows of salt-rotten barrels, with cased explosives packed in chambers, were feet from the prow. They drifted close, almost colliding with the submarine.

  “They’re known as Raine’s Kegs, and were very effective against Union ships,” Nemo said. “A damaged bomb, Miss Duncan, almost as dangerous as a damaged man.”

  He then called out, “Track my actions, Mr. Jess!”

  Nemo quick-moved the handlebars and glove-controller, angling the ship suddenly upward, ballast water jetting from side tanks, pushing the bombs back with their force. The massive submarine behaved as if spring-loaded, perfectly responding to his hand commands.

  Jess scrambled at the valves, cutting water from the tanks, then re-flooding to level the ship’s trajectory. The Nautilus was now moving arrow-straight, parallel, and feet-close to the bottom, the engines churning up fine sand from the ocean floor, fogging their view.

  Through the swirling gray, a row of Confederate torpedoes emerged: giant, iron-clad insect cocoons, fluted, and chained together as a blockade wider than the Nautilus. Nemo knew them capable of blowing the hull of a destroyer, or a submarine, in half.

  He said, “Blood in the water,” through clenched teeth, then pulled back the engines. “Mr. Jess, cutting speed!”

  Jess echoed the order to the lower decks, then said to Sara, “I’ve prayed never to see one of them bastards again, and there’s a baker’s dozen.”

  Nemo said, “Your attention, Mr. Jess!”

  Behind Sara, the spinning mirrors of the Phono-tele-Photo pieced together Duncan’s face on the screen, his voice crackling: “Daughter—Sara—is that you, you’re all right?”

  Sara didn’t answer.

  Nemo called out, “Side avoidance tactic!”

  Jess said, “I ain’t sure which that is—”

  Sara charged the large railway hand switches on the other side of the bridge, watching Nemo’s moves as he jolted the bow away from the blockade of torpedoes, but angling close. He threw a hand signal.

  Sara pulled the switches. “There—now!” Jess grabbed hold, cranking back the stabilizing fins, so torpedo chains and triggers wouldn’t snag against the hull.

  Again, on the Phono: “Sara?”

  Nemo starboard-set the rudders, passing the last group of mines suspended by their own buoyancy. Under his control, the Nautilus had moved as gracefully as a dolphin skimming the waves, leaving the torpedoes behind.

  He gave her a nod.

  Sara let out the breath she’d been holding, and said, “Yes, Father, I’m here. And I’m well.”

  In the bunker, Duncan grabbed the Phono-horn as if grabbing his daughter, swallowing his panic when he heard her voice. “Dear, can you speak? You’re all right? Truthfully now.”

  “I’m all right, honestly.”

  Duncan said, “Thank God.”

  “Hardly God.”

  Nemo’s eyes sliced the Phono from the captain’s station, his voice rising. “If you’ve built my device correctly, then the lens showed I was navigating your damnable mines. And now this ill-timed communication. Why this crude parlay, this game?”

  Duncan was angry static: “You were charted safe passage, then attempted to drown my daughter!”

  “Father—”

  “Miss Duncan had nothing to do with it. I was forced to dive when I spied your Navy ships set as floating bombs.”

  Grant’s voice: “What in hell are you referring to?”

  Nemo said, “Your ships, General, rigged with explosives, forcing us into an undersea trap of mines—avoiding one, colliding with the other.”

  Grant, leaning across the map table littered with war strategies, exchanged a dark look with Duncan before speaking into the Phono-horn: “Those ships were to escort you to the shipping lanes. That’s all.”

  “It’s small comfort you weren’t trying to sink the Nautilus in that obviously foolish way,” Nemo said, his submarine now directly below the Naval ships laced with charges and impact detonators, hulls and rudders clearly visible through the observation deck.

  Grant said, “Your intentions, Nemo. Now.”

  Nemo gave it a moment, then, “To reach the open sea.”

  Duncan’s voice stammered. “A route was charted, you must adhere to it. As agreed. That’s the safest passage.”

  Sara looked up at the ships through the glass dome, now seeming so close she could count the rivets that held them together. “We’re passing beneath those frigates, sir, and I’m seeing cases of explosives, what could be timers, attached to the bottom of every single one. The Captain is right.”


  Grant said, “You’re saying this on your own, girl?”

  “I am, Mr. Grant.”

  Nemo said, “If the bombs aren’t Nautilus intended, you’ve a saboteur eager to send your Navy to the bottom.” He looked ahead at the ocean clearing before his ship. “You may not trust my motives, General, but you can trust my word. Your mission will be completed, one way or t’other.”

  Duncan’s voice: “My daughter—what about Sara?”

  “Stowaways aren’t tolerated on the Nautilus.”

  “Boarded, not stowed away,” Sara said to the Phono, then to Nemo, “and I know this ship. Bow to stern.”

  Nemo was at the edge of the dome, a school of blue-striped barracuda swarming. “You’ve practical knowledge that might be of use.”

  Sara was whisper-close to the Phono: “Father, I’ll remain.”

  “You’re sure about this, dear? Truly?”

  Sara touched Duncan’s image on the screen before shutting the Phono’s current, his face and voice breaking apart, repeating her name.

  Her ringed hand hidden in the folds of the blanket, she said, “Captain, now you know I’m here of my own accord. And it seems I’m, somewhat, seaworthy.”

  “If that Secret Service agent had made one more attempt toward the Nautilus, I would’ve burned him to ashes.”

  “We were never together, sir.”

  Nemo let Sara’s words settle, considering them. “I didn’t know what advantage you’d take of the breathing device, but you did better than most.” He called out, “Navigation!” and Jess handed Sara the relief map made of tin sections, folded into the leather wallet.

  Nemo said, “Decipher that information. I’ll determine its value.”

  A grin tugged at her. “Yes, sir.”

  “There’s only one crew quarters on this ship.”

  Jess said, “I’ll protect her modesty, Cap.”

  “Get into dry things. An ill woman suits no one’s purpose.”