Underwater Restorations

by Jeffrey A. Ballard

  "It looks better in here," I say.

  "It's clean, no bugs," he responds.

  "So what happened?"

  "The sculpture's hot, Charlie wouldn't take it. She gave me this." He slides over a federal stolen art sheet. "Look at the time stamp."

  A chill runs through me. It's hours after we took it—hours.

  Puo continues, "I went back and reprocessed the standard imagery the Seagull collects and look, the squiddies weren't just to the east along the old coast. They were waiting for someone to take it."

  An aerial map of the underwater site shows up on the wall monitor. It's zoomed out enough to display thirty nautical miles around the mansion. Squiddies are everywhere, forming a ring around the mansion. I start laughing. "This is fantastic."

  "What?" Puo asks, sharing a confused look with Winn.

  "Oh, you're still in trouble for missing this Puo, but they set up a perimeter to catch the thieves. They have no idea about our free-fall entry and exit. They probably think we enter the water outside of the monitoring zone and sneak in some other way."

  Puo flushes red. I'd get on him more about the squiddies, but it's better to let him stew. Sure enough, little beads of sweat start to form on his temples. Puo's a softie, wrapped in a large package. He'd never forgive himself if we got nabbed.

  "Oh, wonderful," Puo says. "What about the very hot, very expensive sculpture we gotta unload? We need the funds to prepare for the Jacksonville job."

  "I know, I know." Interesting, Puo doesn't trust Winn. The Jacksonville job is a pipe dream. We're not even close to the kind of resources we need to pull that off. I need time to think, to sort out our next move, and how to vet Winn further. He's been with us for over a month now and passed all the screening tests.

  Winn makes a suggestion only a newly defunct Laci could think of, "Well, what are the Feds offering?"

  ***

  "Isa," Puo says, "this is a bad idea."

  "We've been over this." And we have, extensively. The next payment to Paranoid Pete is coming up and we have nothing. At best he'll repossess the Seagull, at worst he'll live up to his name, become paranoid, and act accordingly. Our only chance is to get some sort of proof of future funds from the Feds that we can turn into liquid cash on the secondary market.

  Puo and I sit in the Island, monitoring Winn. Both of us are leaning over the table toward a speaker in the center.

  Winn was the natural choice to send into the viper's nest of the Federal building, claiming information leading to the stolen art. Up until a few weeks ago he was a pure Laci, so he has all the proper documentation of an upstanding citizen, and nothing on his record except the bad luck of the malpractice suit.

  Also, having him interact with the Feds will give us clues as to what side Winn's on. If Winn is a mole they may give us the cash more easily. In which case, we pay Pete and go deep.

  We put his citizen chip back in and outfitted him with a one-way audio that piggybacked off it. Puo and I could listen in to everything and the Feds would just see a citizen chip acting normally, emitting information like it should.

  The speaker picks up a woman's voice, "Dr. Roonse, I'm Special Agent Lowry, the lead agent assigned to the case. Let's find a quiet place to talk."

  Winn exchanges pleasantries and footsteps come through on the speaker.

  Puo and I immediately start searching for information on Special Agent Lowry.

  "How long have you been in Atlanta?" she asks.

  "I was born and raised here. I even went to medical school at Emory."

  "You look like a native, you have that genteel air about you. Sorry about that malpractice business."

  Winn stammers in surprise.

  "It's in your file. Rotten luck, I must say. Usually, the jury's predisposed toward tall handsome men."

  That cow. I know it's a ploy to soften Winn, but I start sorting through the search on Special Agent Lowry for a photo anyway.

  "You can understand then," Winn says, "why I'm interested in that reward."

  "Right through here."

  A door opens and closes, and chairs are pulled out.

  "Is this an interrogation room?" Winn asks.

  Puo and I both go still.

  "Technically, yes. It's really just a quiet place to talk away from interruption. Do you object to having this conversation recorded?" Winn doesn't object and she prattles off some identifying information for the recording. "So, Dr. Roonse, you have information that will lead to the recovery of the stolen sculpture Jug Self-portrait by Paul Gauguin?"

  "Yes."

  There's an awkward pause before she asks, "Can you please tell me what that information is?"

  "Right, sorry." Winn clears his throat. "I rent a storage locker. I...often have to spend the night. The malpractice suit left me with very little. Anyway, last night there was some activity in the locker next to mine. They were talking about a sculpture that was hot and in need of restoration before they could move it. I put two and two together and searched your page for stolen art and called." The best lies are the ones that toe the line of truth. Winn does have a storage locker but he's never spent the night there.

  "Where's the storage locker?"

  Winn taps his fingers on the table before speaking. "You'll have to forgive me, but I have reason to distrust authorities." Winn's voice increases a notch in intensity. "The people that are allegedly supposed to help you. The insurance company bailed on me on a technicality—" The scraping of a chair being pushed back comes through the speaker. "—and the chief of surgery even said there was nothing I could've done. Instead—"

  "Dr. Roonse, please, calm down. You came to us claiming information."

  I'm not sure how much Winn is acting and how much is real frustration.

  "That reward money can turn my life around. What guarantee do I have you won't find some technicality not to pay?"

  The reward isn't bad for a deteriorated Nineteenth-century piece of art. We could get a lot more if we cleaned it up and sold it through Charlie, but that isn't possible. The reward should be enough to cover our next payment.

  "You don't," Agent Lowry answers. "But there's no reason we wouldn't pay. It's in our best interest to reward informants. Bad press otherwise. What do you do the other nights when you're not in the storage locker?"

  "Motel. I work odd jobs for cash. When I can, I get a room to feel like a human again." Winn scoots his chair presumably closer to the table.

  "Odd jobs? With your abilities? Why haven't you found something better?"

  "One, I can't practice medicine anymore, and two, liquidating all my assets and selling all my stuff barely covered enough to keep me out of debtor's prison." Winn is almost shouting. "The IRS garnishes my wages so much to pay off the rest, that they're pointless."

  "I see. What places have you worked?"

  "Bars, restaurants, any place that needs an extra set of hands. I doubt they'd remember me."

  "A pretty man like you? I find that hard to believe. But here is something I don't quite understand, Dr. Roonse. According to our financial people, you couldn't have sold everything off and covered the part of the debt you paid. Can you explain that discrepancy?" The sound of shuffling papers and then of papers being slid across a table echo through the speaker.

  Oh, shit. There's no way they worked that up that fast. They were ready.

  "Here's the thing, Dr. Roonse, no loan officer would cover that amount for a doctor that could no longer practice. Well, sorry. I meant no legitimate loan officer, a loan shark on the other hand..."

  Winn needs to get out of there right now. They were waiting for him, they knew all about him. He needs to leave, now. Move, Winn, move!

  "Isa!" Puo says. "Winn can't hear you, stop shouting."

  I'm standing at the edge of the table with the speaker in my hands. I'm not sure when I grabbed it or what I yelled.

  "I don't like where this is going," Winn says. "Am I free to leave?"

  "No, you're not."

 
"Am I under arrest?" Smart man, thank God we prepped him.

  "No. We're holding you for questioning for suspicious activity."

  "I want a lawyer."

  "We'll get you one. In the meantime, tell me about Ruby."

  There it is. Puo and I lock eyes. It doesn't need to be said. Paranoid Pete got paranoid much sooner than we anticipated. Ruby is the cover name I use when dealing with him.

  "Isa," Puo says, "we got to burn the Island and go deep."

  I can't believe it. Pete broke the only rule we criminals have. We have to torch everything, cut all ties, disappear. Lose everything we've built.

  And burn Winn.

  If they release him, they'll tag him. He won't even know where we went. I got him into this mess. I agreed to send him in there. This will probably destroy the last of Winn's innocence, turning him into another jaded criminal. And I'm responsible.

  "Isa!" Puo's already shoving discs and hard drives into the arc furnace. "C'mon, we gotta go!"

  My body responds mechanically and I start loading what I can onto the Seagull. All I can think is, we'll have to change its name, but to what?

  ***

  The next seventeen hours are a blur—the frantic flush of the Island, the transformation of the Seagull, disavowing Underwater Restorations, scrambling to determine the extent of the betrayal. Seventeen hours in seventeen minutes, that's what it felt like.

  I'm driving loops around the Airway 10 at two thirty in the morning in the newly minted Pelican, trying to figure a way out of this mess. Puo's in the next seat snoring. I'm not sure if he realizes how screwed we are or if it's a skill he's acquired being able to sleep anywhere at any time. I suspect it's a bit of both. I can't sleep, I know how screwed we are.

  Almost in concert with Puo's are Winn's snores coming through the Pelican's speakers. The Feds never found the audio bug. We've been able to monitor everything. Winn hasn't said a word, not one to the Feds the entire time they've had him. Even to the lawyer he only said one sentence, "I intend not to say anything." And I'm pretty sure that was meant for me.

  The only silver lining to this colossal stupidity is that I'm ninety-five percent certain Winn isn't a mole. He knew several of our contacts and none were being monitored by the Feds when Puo and I visited them to call in last favors.

  Even so, the knowledge that Winn likely isn't a mole isn't particularly comforting. The only two outcomes I can see for Winn are either thirty years in prison or becoming a slave to Pete. If the Feds don't arrest Winn, Pete will get his hands on him. Winn's medical skills are too valuable. He'll go back to patching up thugs for Pete's conscripted army. Pete will never let him go.

  The only outcome I can see that will turn out well for Winn, is if he is a mole. Of course if that's true, then he deserves to be gutted like a fish.

  And around and around I go on the Airway 10.

  Puo snorts and shakes awake. He wipes away some drool and sits up, looking groggy. "So, what's the plan?"

  "Winn hasn't said anything to the Feds yet. They'll either arrest him or release him in seven hours. I'm not sure how to play it."

  "I meant about Pete." Puo stretches, cracking various appendages. He sinks back into the seat and looks at me expectantly.

  Oh, right. Why should I have to bail us out of this? Didn't I just prove my plans are epic failures? "I don't know, Puo. What is the plan? You got a plan?"

  "No."

  "'Cause I don't have a plan, Puo. So maybe you should pull your weight around here and come up with one for a change."

  Puo doesn't say anything in return. I know I'm being a bitch, but I don't care. I abandoned Winn, burned everything I've built, cut myself off from the only world I know and, unless we take care of Pete first, he'll definitely have us killed so no one will know what he did. And Puo just sits there, calmly expecting some grand plan to set it all straight.

  Puo says, "Pete busted the only rule, we could call—"

  "No, absolutely not. That's a stupid idea and you know it." Calling the Boss from a position of weakness is a sure-fire way to end up working for him. Oh, he'll sort it all out, but remind you of that every time he wants something. It took a year last time to get his claws out of us. I'd rather take my chances with Pete, than end up working for him again. "Any other bright ideas?"

  Puo mumbles something.

  "What was that? Speak up, Puo."

  "I said, you're the brains of the outfit. You always got a plan."

  "Damn it, Puo. Not this time. And why the hell are you so calm?"

  Puo smiles. "You always get like this before some really clever idea comes out. It's how you work. So go ahead and yell, it frees up your mind."

  I nearly punch him. Puo is nothing if not loyal. I'm not entirely sure how I got to deserve that loyalty. Which gets me to thinking about loyalty and the situation with Pete. An idea starts to form.

  Out of spite, I toy with the idea of not telling Puo, to discourage him from thinking he's got me figured out. But we have a small window before Pete finds out what happened.

  "Pete's men only serve him," I say, "because they're either indebted to him, or because he provides steady pay."

  "Right." Puo mulls this over. "So, we steal his stash and his men turn on him. I like it. Simple, plays to our strengths, lets others do the dirty work. So, what's the game?"

  "We don't have time for a game."

  "All right, old-fashioned, straightforward thievery it is. Classic. Where's the stash?"

  "I don't know, Puo. Up your ass?" I'm still frustrated with him.

  "Is that what that is?" Puo leans over and farts repeatedly in rapid succession. He settles back into his seat, smiling, his eyes half closed. "Mmmm...the stash is...lumpy."

  Despite myself, I'm laughing. Ever since we were nine, Puo has been able to make me laugh. I vent the cabin.

  "Fine," I say. "Here's my plan. Pete keeps his records in a tan ledger that he loves to lord over people. After several years in business, he's filled up quite a few of them. We need a recent one that he isn't using anymore. That'll tell us where his stash is, and since he isn't using it, he won't notice it missing."

  "Right."

  "He keeps them in a waist-high safe in the corner of his office."

  "What kind of safe?" Safe cracking is Puo's gig. I've never had the patience for it.

  "Don't know. A green one? There were five audible clicks when he opened it during one of my visits."

  Puo rolls his eyes. "Isa, that's useless."

  "Yeah, you're going to have come with me."

  "How we gonna get in?"

  Pete's office is on the top floor of a three-story building. Pete controls the area, which leaves coming in from above the only option. I smile at Puo.

  "No, no way!" Puo shifts away from me as far as he can get. "I'm not wearing one of those stupid vomiting suits again."

  I laugh, then mime puke exploding inside of a helmet and down my face.

  "Isa, no." Puo's not above whining to get his way, but before he starts his face breaks into relief. "Besides all my tools are here, and since we don't know what kind of safe it is, I don't know what to bring."

  "What? So, you want me to bring you the whole damn safe?"

  Puo looks thoughtful for a second and says, "Yep, that's exactly what you should do."

  ***

  This is not my favorite part. I love the free-fall descent, and tolerate the unnatural ascent. But bouncing between the two for the purposes of hovering—not so much. It's not even hovering, it's jerking me up and down, mixing the contents of my stomach up like some Rube Goldberg blender.

  We designed the suits to work in the ocean. The extra force from buoyancy helps smooth out the motion. Buoyancy is negligible in air—it makes for a bumpy ride. There wasn't time to see if we could modify the subroutine. Even worse, the reverse-gravity modules work on a closed system, which means I'm in the full gravity suit, helmet included, jammed over my night vision goggles. My peripheral vision's cut off and what I can see is
distorted through a curved glass plate. Plus, everything I hear sounds distant. I'm going in almost deaf with tunnel vision. Maybe I should've shoved nose plugs up my nose to match the motif.

  I oscillate outside a window that's been filled in with brick to match the rest of the side of the three-story building. Pete's office is on the other side. I have no idea if he's in there. For this to work, Pete can't have any clue something is amiss and that means setting the laser cutter on the narrowest setting. So narrow, that I can't even fit a scope-wire through to see if the office is occupied.

  I have to time the laser cutter with my mini-ascents, as I cut through the mortar. Thankfully, the brick in the window was added later so all the edges around the window are straight. There's a slight dip in the cut along the left edge, where I realized this would've been a perfect task for Winn's steady surgeon hands.

  I put the laser cutter in my pack and take out handles, which I attach to the center of the brick window. I push the brick forward into the office. It slides smoothly but not easily. Two hundred pounds of brick isn't trivial to move. The moment of truth is when the brick is halfway into the office. I need to push the brick in, get into the office and reverse the gravity enough not to slam the brick on the floor. If Pete's in there, I'm a sitting duck. If I drop it, without the additional weight I'll hit the ceiling.

  The gravity subroutine will help with lowering the two-hundred pound block, but I still have to hold it, it's still two hundred pounds. Holding a cannon ball descending or ascending is still holding a cannon ball. I check my gravity subroutine and get ready to push.

  I pause to see if I can detect any clue about what's on the other side. I can't.

  I push the block the rest of the way.

  Several things happen. My arms are seriously considering life without my body. It's dark and I feel more than see that I'm descending too fast. I try to get my legs down toward the floor, but it's all I can do to keep ahold of the damn block of bricks. My legs end up parallel to the floor behind me, with the block of bricks leading the charge.