by Myke Cole
‘So? They just jump in the water.’
‘It doesn’t wash off, sir. The only thing that helps is time, and while they’re flailing, we’re shooting.’
Now it was Bookbinder’s smile that widened. ‘I like the way you think. But I’m guessing you’re going to have to get closer than you’d like to be able to blast them in the face with it.’
‘Well, they’re aquatic, right? Like fish or frogs or whatever?’
Bookbinder shrugged. ‘Looked like it.’
‘That means membranous skin, gills. A puff of this stuff anywhere on their bodies should drive them fucking insane.’
Bookbinder nodded. ‘Again, how much do we have?’
‘Not nearly enough, but the canisters have a . . . thirty-foot range or so. Provided we’re watching the wind, we can shower them with it.’
‘Area-effect weapon.’
‘It’s crude, but I think it could work.’
Bookbinder glanced over Bonhomme’s shoulder and through the bridge windows. The Giffords’s overturned hull was streaked with blood where sailors had climbed up and been dragged back down. The aft lifted slightly higher out of the water, the giant bladed screws of the azipod thrusters sticking up in the air.
The water around the overturned vessel had stopped churning, the goblins having dealt with their prey and now turning toward the Breakwater. As Bookbinder watched, the first of them began to swim their way. The huge shape of the leviathan rotated slowly toward them.
‘Skipper, I don’t think we’ve got a whole lot of time here,’ Bookbinder said.
Marks and Rodriguez ran onto the bridge. ‘Number two motor is down,’ she rattled out breathlessly. ‘There’s some flooding in the stores, and the bilges overflowed, but they’re pumping it out. We’re leveling the ballast tanks now.’ Even as she spoke, Bookbinder could feel the Breakwater trimming up beneath him, the giant crane boom pointing straighter into the air.
Marks glanced over at the console and tapped the radios. ‘That wave must have banged up the mast. VHF is down. No comms. The radar antennae are still spinning.’
Bonhomme nodded. ‘Get us underway and back to Sector, fast as she can go.’ He turned to Bookbinder. ‘That won’t be very fast, limping on one engine.’
Marks nodded and shouted out into the passageway. A moment later, boots banged outside, and a helmsman ran onto the bridge, taking up position. Bookbinder felt the muscles in his back relax ever so slightly as the bridge regained the attitude of a command center. They were still in trouble, but at least now they had a chance.
‘Skipper, you said you were going to put shooters in the radar mast?’ Bookbinder asked.
‘That’s right, to cover the bow,’ Bonhomme said distractedly, busy conferring with Rodriguez and Marks.
‘I’ll go aloft with them if you don’t mind.’
Bonhomme looked up now. ‘What? Sir, I’m not sure if that’s fitting given your rank.’
‘We both know that my rank was a political maneuver. You need all hands on deck, and I’m the one person on this vessel who has experience fighting goblins.’
Bonhomme cocked an eyebrow. ‘On the water?’
‘I’ve been in combat.’
Bonhomme looked embarrassed, and Bookbinder added, ‘If they put a sorcerer aboard, I can deal with it. I’m no good to you sitting around here twiddling my thumbs.’
Bonhomme lowered his voice. ‘Respectfully, sir, you’ve been a lot of good to me.’
Bookbinder smiled uncomfortably. ‘Yes, well. Let me do some more.’
Bonhomme nodded. ‘Marks’ll go with you.’
Bookbinder followed the young lieutenant through the maze of ship’s passages, getting hopelessly lost yet again. Marks led him around a corner and into a tight space dominated by a thick, metal gear locker with the words PYRO stenciled on the white doors. The boarding teams had already opened it and were equipping themselves with armloads of foot-long metal cylinders. Marks handed Bookbinder a bright orange vest that looked like a deflated life jacket.
‘Search-and-rescue vest,’ Marks said. ‘It’s got your flares, among other things. I’ll show you how to use it all once we get in position.’
‘Lieutenant’ – Bookbinder stopped him with a hand on his elbow – ‘it’d help if I could have a rifle and armor, too. I’m in this fight, same as you.’
Marks and the boarding team members exchanged a quick glance. ‘Of course, sir.’ The gear was pressed into Bookbinder’s hands, along with a black utility belt. Bookbinder raced to don it all as he followed Marks back through the passageways, then out another hatch and into the air before mounting a ladder that led above the bridge. The radar mast stood before them, looking thin and rickety, the mustard-colored metal leaning dangerously to port despite the trimming up. Bookbinder swallowed, then followed Marks up.
The ship rolled, taking the horizon with it. Bookbinder’s gorge rose, and he clung to the rungs for dear life. Marks paused above him. ‘Everything okay, sir?’
‘Fine,’ Bookbinder said. ‘Just . . . fine.’
Marks climbed up the rest of the way, and Bookbinder finally joined him, cramming onto the tiny metal shelf underneath the ship’s spinning radar antennae. The boomer had protected the ship from the worst of the giant wave, but much of the radar mast had still been swept away. Jagged nubs of metal marked where the VHF antennae used to stand. Bookbinder clung to the railing for dear life, the world pitching around him. Marks and the other sailors looked like they’d been born on a pitching deck, not even bothering to hold on to anything. Bookbinder felt as if they were a thousand feet off the water’s surface, the tiniest swell of the water making the metal beneath his feet slip so dramatically that he could see himself tumbling off it at any moment.
‘You sure you’re okay, sir?’ Marks asked again.
‘I said I’m fine,’ Bookbinder groused, knuckles still white on the rail.
He glanced at the radar antennae behind him. ‘That bad for us?’
Marks looked up at the spinning antennae. ‘Hmm. Yeah. We’re not supposed to be this close for any extended period.’
‘So what happens?’
‘Nothing. For a few years at any rate.’
‘Wait. What happens after a few years?’ Bookbinder asked, his vertigo and seasickness momentarily gone.
But Marks was already focusing on the water around the ship’s bow, churning white again as the goblins swarmed the Breakwater’s bow in earnest. Their suckered fingers found purchase even as the giant ship shuddered, the hull groaning a complaint against the thrusters roaring suddenly into life. The engineers were driving the vessel to its limit, judging from the sudden spray of water flying from the Breakwater’s stern and shooting so high that Bookbinder could see it over the smokestack behind him. Black smoke belched, and the Breakwater began to lumber forward.
Marks tapped a thin canister hanging from Bookbinder’s belt. ‘That’s your OC. Snap that orange safety tab off before you push the button.’ Marks licked his finger and held it up. ‘Wind’s out of the east. Maybe five knots? Aim this way.’ He held his own canister off the platform’s starboard edge. Bookbinder moved to join him, forcing his fingers to unclench from the railing and taking tiny, shuffling steps.
The lieutenant suppressed a smile. ‘You’ll be okay, sir. Just take care, this stuff blows back in your face, and you are going to be out of the fight.’
Bookbinder nodded as the first goblins swarmed up over the gunwales and perched on the buoy deck. ‘Hold your fire!’ Marks called out. ‘Let’s see how the pyro and the spray does before we go wasting bullets.’
Short cracks from the boat-crane platforms behind them told Bookbinder that the other sailors weren’t being so careful.
‘Go with the flares first!’ Marks said, pulling one of the metal cylinders out of the case o
ne of the sailors had set on the platform. Bookbinder followed suit, popping the canister head off and seating it at the tube’s bottom. He followed Marks as he pointed the tube at the massing goblins, then punched the base, driving the head in. His arm thrummed as the tube spit out a streaking missile. It shone sparking white even in the daylight, a gathered parachute failing to deploy at the steep angle, catching fire as it went, trailing smoke.
The goblins looked up as the flares streaked into them, eyes wide with hatred and surprise. They were packed densely on the deck, and while a few jumped back over the side, the majority threw up their hands as the flares struck and rolled, scattering burning fragments among them. A few of the creatures shouted, the flare shards and bits of shredded parachute smoldering against their wet skin.
The Breakwater was making way now, up to her limping top speed. One of the sailors reached into his vest pocket and brought out a pencil-sized flare launcher. Bookbinder watched as he screwed a flare into it, then aimed and fired into the churning mass of goblins on the buoy deck. Bookbinder copied him. These flares were red and lacked parachutes, but the pencil launcher kicked, and the flares sped off like gunshots, at least one of them holing and dropping a goblin, every bit as effective as a bullet.
The goblins flailed and fell over one another, crowding around the crane, surging toward the superstructure. Two of them held a thick piece of metal plating, probably scavenged off the Giffords. They wedged it into the seam of the entry hatch, grunting as they tried to find purchase to pry it open.
‘Go with the OC!’ Marks shouted. He held his canister as far over the railing as he could without leaning, compensating for the wind, and fired. The stream of liquid arced twenty feet before the wind caught it and spread it out in a light cloud that drifted toward the buoy deck. Bookbinder extended his arm and pressed his own trigger along with the other sailors, adding to the blanket of spray. The high-vinegary smell of cayenne pepper filled his nose, and he blinked, eyes watering painfully. ‘Careful!’ Marks called to him. ‘Don’t breathe!’
Don’t breathe? Bookbinder thought, closing his mouth. How the hell am I supposed to not breathe?
The cloud was pushed gently by the easterly breeze, but Marks had clearly used this weapon before and compensated well. By the time the cloud of OC settled over the buoy deck, it was near dead center.
The goblins paused, looking up at the strange mist drifting over them. A few licked their lips. Some swatted at the cloud. Their canisters empty, Bookbinder, Marks, and the sailors unslung their rifles, took aim and waited.
The goblins crouched, blinking. A few who had jumped off the buoy deck now climbed back aboard, their nostrils flaring at the vapor. It didn’t work, Bookbinder thought. They’re immune somehow. He looked down at his rifle, braced against the rail. At FOB Frontier, they’d used carbines with extended magazines, holding thirty rounds. These magazines looked about half the size. Not nearly enough ammunition to last against the numbers crowding the deck.
Then, as one body, the goblins howled.
Their skin began to bubble, going yellow, lumpen. One by one, the creatures began to dance, tearing at their bodies, clawing at their faces. Within seconds, the entire buoy deck was jumping, the goblins throwing themselves down, at one another, over the side. The scream was earsplitting. One goblin dropped to its knees, plunging its brine-covered claws into its own eyes, tearing them out of their sockets. Another hefted a small axe made from some ship’s wreckage, and began to lay about among its own fellows, cutting them down as it wept thick, black tears.
A chorus of shrieking came over the smokestack as the same scene repeated on the ship’s stern.
Bookbinder couldn’t help but feel a small spot of pity for them. ‘Jesus,’ he whispered. ‘I guess Bonhomme was right about the mucus membranes.’
Marks nodded along with him, equally horrified. ‘Guess so.’
A few of the creatures plunged into the water, but only continued to thrash, beating themselves against the Breakwater’s sides. A light, oily sheen settled across the surface, broken apart by the ripples of squirming goblins and the forward momentum of the ship’s hull. Bookbinder marveled as more and more of the goblins succumbed to flailing agony.
Many, but not all. As the mist began to clear, Bookbinder saw that more were unaffected or bulled through the pain, crying defiance as they threw themselves at the entry hatches. They pounded on them with spear butts and clubs, prised their fingers into the seams, worked the bit of metal they had wedged in, yanked on the wheel. Bookbinder imagined the sailors on the other side, struggling to keep the hatches shut. They couldn’t hold forever.
‘Shoot ’em now, sir?’ one of the sailors asked.
It wouldn’t matter. Despite the spray’s work, the deck was still crowded with goblins. They could empty every round in every magazine and still not deal with them all. Once they gained the superstructure, it would be over.
He steadied his rifle and aimed into the press. Make each shot count, he thought. Every goblin down was one less they’d have to fight once those hatches gave way.
The throng was packed so thickly that it would be hard to miss, but he steadied himself anyway, controlling his breathing as he tensed his trigger finger.
‘Where do we start?’ asked one of the sailors.
‘Just shoot until you’re empty,’ Marks answered. Bookbinder set his teeth.
Then he felt something. A current, first a trickle, but growing stronger. His own current reached out toward it instinctively.
‘Hold fire,’ he said.
‘What?’ Marks asked, but Bookbinder had closed his eyes, concentrating.
There was a splash off the ship’s starboard beam and a creature burst out of the water. It was bigger than the goblins on the buoy deck, its surface sleek with patterned scales. A long, dorsal ridge ran from its head to its buttocks, translucent bone tips peeking above the stretched skin. Huge yellow eyes bugged from its wedge-shaped head. It trailed water, bursting through the remaining wisps of the OC cloud, gaining elevation, banking sharply to come back at them.
Bookbinder could see that it was a goblin, the features unmistakable in spite of whatever forces below the waves had twisted it into its present form. He could feel its Aeromancy, sharp and pungent. Maybe the damage done by the OC had forced the enemy to deploy their big guns, but it made no difference. Bookbinder could deal with Aeromancy, no matter what fishy package it came in.
Dark clouds boiled around the creature. The air hummed with electricity and Bookbinder smelled ozone over the chemical reek of the OC. Marks and his sailors crouched on the platform.
‘Oh, shit.’ One of the sailors began to make for the ladder down to the bridge.
‘Hang on,’ Bookbinder said, stepping to the railing. ‘I’ve got this.’
The thing in the sky hissed and dove, the clouds gathering around it, pulsing, glowing at the edges. At last they unseamed, long tendrils of lightning arcing toward the radar mast. Marks shut his eyes. The sailors shouted and ducked.
Bookbinder reached out a hand. His own magic hungrily seized the Aeromancy, hauling it in until Bookbinder felt the double tide thrumming in his veins. He bit down, tasting blood in his mouth, grunting as he wrestled the sorcery under control.
The creature blinked, hissed again, flailed fins as the magic supporting its flight drained away.
Then it fell to the deck, thrashing among the goblins as they fought to clear away.
Bookbinder pointed, focused on the deck at the base of the crane, and Bound.
The doubled tide surged out of him, the torrent of electricity pouring into the deck, his magic tying the lightning into the ship’s structure until the molecules shivered with it, sparking across the metal beams and carlins, rippling through the steel. Bookbinder sighed with relief as his body released the extra magic, his veins contracting.
The metal surface rippled, pulsed, came alive. The goblins shrieked, then danced a second time.
Blue lightning shot across the buoy deck, conducted by the water streaming off the creatures’ skins, sizzling until it finally attenuated at the base of the superstructure. Ozone stink competed with the smell of cooked meat as the goblins shuddered and shook, smoking in a garden of dancing lightning. They fell away from the hatches, twitching. The combined stink of OC, seared flesh, and cooking brine billowed up from the still shuddering corpses, writhing across the deck in a macabre waltz before flopping at the base of the crane or pitching over the side.
When he finally looked up, the buoy deck was still, layered with a light haze of drifting smoke. The stink was unholy. Marks gripped the railing and vomited. He sagged, wiping his mouth and shivering, looking up at Bookbinder. ‘Holy shit, sir.’
Bookbinder nodded. ‘Sometimes, you win.’
Marks’s radio crackled into life, Rodriguez’s voice sounded worried. ‘Are you seeing this, sir? Starboard quarter.’
Marks craned his head. ‘Negative, smokestack’s in the way. What’s up?’
‘Come to the bridge, sir. You can see from here. You might want to hurry.’
Marks double-timed it back down the ladder, his sailors in tow. Bookbinder followed suit, shutting his eyes tight and trying to avoid looking down. He noticed the ship straightening as he went, which made the going easier, righting out the bad list to port faster than he expected.
By the time he hit the passageway outside the bridge hatch, he realized it was too fast. The deck was starting to cant in the other direction.
Rodriguez and Bonhomme stood by the farthest starboard window, looking out over the water, eyes wide with concern.
‘We’ve got a problem,’ Rodriguez said.
‘Another problem,’ Bonhomme added.
‘Let’s call it a challenge,’ Bookbinder said as he reached the window and looked out. ‘What’s up?’
But neither Bonhomme nor Rodriguez needed to answer. The dark bulk of the leviathan was closer to the surface now, its truck-sized tail waving gently under the water. Bookbinder could see a few goblins crawling over its surface, holding on to tangles of seaweed, and clumps of the limpetlike creatures clustering on its skin.
