“Any word on the chief engineer and his crew?”
“Negative, sir.”
X heard splashing behind him and spun about. General Forge and his team had arrived and were standing in the ankle-deep rainwater outside the chamber.
Forge put a hand on X’s shoulder.
It was the first time he had ever touched X.
“Have faith, my king,” said the general. “I have seen many miracles at sea over the years.”
“Damn straight,” Steve said. “Hell, the Vanguard Islands themselves are a miracle.”
Eleven
Michael stared through the front viewport at the roiling sea. They would need a miracle to get home. Low on gas, with a dead engine and a beacon that wouldn’t save them unless the drones got closer.
And in a hurricane, that wasn’t happening.
Cricket 2.0 couldn’t even connect to them now.
Michael tapped the screen and got the same “No signal” error message.
The storm continued to batter the lifeboat, pushing it farther and farther away from the islands and the drones.
On the one hand, it was good to be out of the worst of the storm, but on the other, it made getting home almost impossible.
At least, they seemed to have evaded whatever creature slammed into them hours earlier.
“How’s it coming?” Michael asked. “Anything I can do?”
“I think I almost got it,” Rodger said.
Michael hovered behind him, his stomach queasy with the boat’s constant rocking. For the past few hours, they had worked on an engine with a faulty coil and a loose drive belt.
They had fixed the latter, and Rodger had almost finished rewinding the coil, scrupulously counting every turn. He pulled his hand out of the compartment and wiped his glasses on his shirt.
“The moment of truth has come,” he said. “Go ahead and prime the engine.”
Michael switched places with Rodger, and Rodger took the starter pull.
“Let’s go, sweet baby,” he said, yanking on it.
The engine rumbled, groaned, and cut out.
“Come on, sweetness . . .” Rodger pulled it a second time.
The engine rumbled again but didn’t catch.
“Worthless fornicating pile of pot metal!” Rodger shouted.
“Take it easy, Rodge. You’ll break the magneto and then we’ll be really screwed!”
Michael took the T-grip rubber handle, and Rodger moved out of the way. Then, instead of yanking on the cord, Michael pulled it gently.
The engine turned over, this time with a chugging noise.
“Wow, how’d you do that?” Rodger asked.
“Having a kid teaches you to be patient and gentle.”
Michael ducked under the overhead and plopped down behind the steering wheel. He checked the map and punched in the coordinates of the Vanguard Islands.
“How far are we now?” Rodger asked anxiously.
“Sixty-seven knots to the north.”
“And how much gas?”
“Quarter tank, which might get us halfway there.”
Michael had scarcely belted in when a wave caught them broadside, and the lifeboat slid down it, listing steeply to port before its superlow center of gravity righted them.
Patience, he thought.
The engine had just enough speed to turn into the waves—most of the time. Timing his tack between swells, he got the boat turned all the way around toward the islands for the long journey back home.
But it also meant they were heading back into the storm. He held the wheel steady and kept it at half throttle to conserve gas.
“Better buckle in,” Michael said. He tried to keep his mind off his family by talking to Rodger as he settled into his seat. “You ever think about having kids with Magnolia?” Michael asked.
“We’re getting old.”
“Yeah, but you’re both healthy.”
“I don’t think she wants kids.”
Rodger frowned, and Michael could tell he had hit a sensitive spot.
“I do, though. I want a normal life with Mags, as normal as we can have, but I don’t care about getting married or all that. I just want to be with her.”
Turning back to the viewport, Michael said, “I understand. I think she wants that, too.”
“I don’t think she would ever give up diving, and as long as she’s a diver, I don’t think she’s ever going to settle down.”
Rodger coughed, then continued.
“If I do make it back to the islands, I’m going to have a talk with her and let her know how I feel.”
“Good, Rodge. And we will make it back.”
“You think she’d say yes if I did ask her to marry me?”
Michael turned around and met his friend’s gaze. “Of course I do.”
“She’s always kind of been her own person,” Rodger said, “and I’m not sure she has ever really, fully committed to the idea of us.”
“She has in her own way, Rodge, don’t worry.”
Rodger sighed again. “Thanks, Michael, you’re a good friend.”
“So are . . .”
Michael narrowed his eyes at something on the horizon that came and went in a flash of lightning.
Rodger huddled behind Michael to look. “What did you see?”
“Thought I saw something,” he said. “Must have been my eyes playing tricks.”
He stared for another moment and then glanced at the digital map to confirm they were still heading for the islands.
Michael concentrated on the ocean. All that mattered right now was getting home. Lightning flashed through the swollen storm clouds as the waves rose higher, coming at them in one long, endless set.
Rain hit the hard shell of the lifeboat with a sound like bullets.
He squinted as another flash of lightning illuminated a funnel shape on the horizon, reaching up into the clouds.
“Oh, shit,” he said.
“What now?”
“Things are about to get rough.”
He checked the fuel. They had already burned through half their supply and were still forty-two miles from the closest oil rig.
The oncoming waves beat them for another hour. Michael could barely see anything through the viewports.
“I feel like Arlo last time he mouthed off to Mags,” Rodger said. “She slapped him around good.”
Michael chuckled. “What did he do to deserve that?”
“Something about having big dick energy, I don’t know.”
“That guy is something else.”
Another half hour passed, bringing them another five miles closer to the islands. But the closer they got, the stronger the storm grew.
Sweat dripped down Michael’s forehead, stinging his eyes and further impairing his vision. They crested a wave—the largest yet, giving a momentary view of the horizon. Was this an optical illusion?
“Brace yourself,” Michael said.
“What? Why . . .”
Before Rodger could finish, the boat skidded down the wave and was halfway up the next. This time, there was nothing Michael could do to keep them steady.
“Hold on!” he shouted.
The bow went up, up, until there was no more up.
Michael felt the sensation of being topsy-turvy as they kept tilting backward and splashed into the ocean upside down. The water swallowed them, submerging the entire vessel.
Rodger screamed, but Michael said, “No worries. She’ll right herself.”
And sure enough, in what seemed like slow motion, the lifeboat popped back up through the water and rolled over, righting itself.
It took him most of a minute to get them pointed back into the waves. Immediately, something slammed into the boat.
“What was
that?” Rodger asked.
Something long and gray moved past the viewport. Michael held his gaze on the water, searching the darkness.
“Tin, what was—”
“Shh!” Michael hissed.
“What? Why?”
“I saw something.”
“What kind of something?”
Michael wasn’t sure what he had seen, but something had hit the lifeboat. Maybe a huge fish, or perhaps a shark . . .
He checked the map again and the fuel gauge.
“No,” he said quietly, staring to confirm what he already knew.
They were heading away from the islands again, farther from their loved ones.
An expanse of gray flesh filled the viewports.
His gut tightened.
They weren’t alone after all.
“Tin . . .” Rodger said.
Michael held a breath in his chest as an eye the size of a dinner plate peered inside, right at the two men.
* * * * *
Ada still didn’t have any idea what the strange glowing beast was that she had shot in the skull. Part of her wondered if she was going crazy down here.
For the past few hours, she and Jo-Jo had trekked through the tunnels, hiding from the creatures that dwelled in the darkness. Once again, they stopped to listen for shrieks or skittering claws.
Hearing nothing, they continued down the passage, which narrowed into a bottleneck up ahead. Jo-Jo moved on all fours with hair lying flat, indicating that she detected no immediate threats.
Ada needed a real break. Finding a corner with a view in both directions, she motioned for Jo-Jo to sit and rest. After making sure they were alone, she pulled out her second water bottle and handed it to the monkey, who drank it greedily.
That was okay. Ada had a reserve supply that she could access from the straw in her helmet. As long as they weren’t down here for too long, they would be fine.
She took a moment to get her bearings by scrolling through the minimap on her wrist computer. They were four miles from their original landing zone at the canal, and right beneath the outskirts of Panama City.
Even if Edgar or Magnolia had somehow survived and their beacons came back online, she was too far out of range to see it on her HUD—not just because of the distance, but also because she was underground.
Switching to the environmental data on her minicomputer, Ada saw that the radiation readings had climbed. That made sense, considering her proximity to the blast zone.
They must head back toward the canal, even if that meant running into those hellish turtle monsters.
Normally, she wasn’t the claustrophobic type. After all, she had grown up on an airship, packed with too many people in too small a space.
This was different, though. Being trapped underground, in a high-rad zone, with a fire monster and carnivorous turtles, was enough to drive fear into the boldest, craziest warriors she had encountered over the years.
Not even Sirens had survived in these tunnels.
This was a nightmare, the hell below the hell that was earth.
Ada had to remind herself, You’ve survived worse.
The solo voyage to Florida, finding Jo-Jo, the journey back. The memories reminded her that she was strong. That she could survive this.
But maybe this was cosmic justice—another punishment for her sin of killing the Cazadores in that container after the war.
The hair on Jo-Jo’s back spiked.
Ada shut off her headlamps, leaving them in darkness her night vision couldn’t penetrate. She could hear something, though. A clicking. Scratching.
Deep but faint rumbles in the ground. It had to be the chitinous beasts that made these tunnels.
Standing, she flicked on her light and started down the narrowing passage with Jo-Jo. At the next intersection, she went left, toward the canal.
They trekked for the next hour. The noises had long since faded, and the hair on the monkey’s back was flat again.
Still, Ada kept her rifle up, sweeping the darkness for hostiles.
Three miles from the landing zone, a faint dot pulsed on her HUD. Then two . . . three.
Beacons. The other divers!
Kade, Sofia, and Gran Jefe had come back for her and the others.
Ada turned on the second light and ran harder, the rifle clacking against her chest armor. They made it another mile before the tunnel widened. A ramp of scree sloped down into a cavernous passage. This was more chamber than tunnel.
She slowed as she entered, raking her light over a ceiling that had to be twenty to thirty feet overhead. It stretched as far as she could see.
Mud sloshed under her boots as she started across the terrain. Rock lay strewn about, but upon closer examination, she noticed they weren’t all rocks. Orange shells and pincer claws littered the rock floor.
This place seemed to be some sort of graveyard.
Jo-Jo stuck at Ada’s side all the way across until they came to a narrowing part. The entrance was not of dirt, but of stone.
No, that wasn’t right, either, she realized. The walls were concrete.
Cautiously she stepped up under the broken entrance to what appeared to be an old-world subway. Using her helmet light, she flitted the beams over mangled train tracks and hunks of concrete rubble.
According to her minimap, they led back to the canal.
Jo-Jo followed her into the tunnel, and on they went until they came across an overturned train car. There were three of them: one on its side, one on its back, and the other crushed like a tin can.
Ada ducked inside the first railcar but found nothing besides the filthy plastic seats. In the next, she found a bent pair of eyeglasses and a broken bottle.
She pushed on. The beacons on her HUD were also moving. Kade, Sofia, and Gran Jefe were all on the surface and heading in her direction.
She tried the comms.
“Calling any divers on the surface. This is Hell Diver Ada Winslow. Do you copy? Over.”
Static hissed over the channel.
She would have to get closer.
Jo-Jo climbed up onto a platform that ran alongside the tracks. They followed it for another few hundred feet. She almost missed the door in the concrete wall.
Ada held up her hand to Jo-Jo and reached for the handle. A rusted sign hung sideways.
She turned the handle. Locked.
Jo-Jo kept going, and Ada brought her rifle back up as they came across another hole in the tunnel walls.
Through the opening was another set of rails. Ada scanned them with her light but decided to stay on the current route.
After another five minutes of walking, she tried the comms again. Still nothing but static.
All three beacons had stopped. The other divers were probably trying to figure out what had happened to Team Raptor.
Ada thought again of Edgar and Magnolia. Maybe they were still alive. But after all she had seen down here, it was a long shot.
Cold dread sank into her gut.
Jo-Jo let out a whine, every hair on her body spiking at once.
It took Ada a moment to see what had spooked the monkey.
A greenish-yellowish glow pulsated down the passage.
The radioactive beast had returned.
Jo-Jo darted through the black, guiding them with her night vision. Behind her, Ada ran blind, heart thrumming, sweat stinging her eyes.
Fighting was not an option. Only fleeing could save them now.
Ada ran hard until her boot snagged on something and she crashed to the concrete. Rolling off the platform, she landed between the tracks, her armor taking most of the impact.
A long echo clattered down the tunnel.
The noise sustained like a gong.
As if in answer, the tremors returned, rumbling through th
e ground, sifting dust from above.
Jo-Jo hopped down, frantic. Though Ada couldn’t see her, she felt Jo-Jo’s breath only inches from her face.
Pain shot up her ankle when she tried to stand.
“No, damn it!” she hissed.
The tremors grew louder and seemed to be coming from the canal, where she was headed.
They were about to be cornered.
And then the light was gone, leaving them in the darkness. Whatever was coming had spooked the glowing creature.
She hobbled over to the concrete platform and climbed up, then started along it, back the way they had come. Maybe they could hide in the trains. If they could get there.
The noises grew louder, tremors rattling the passage.
A shriek roared through like a tornado, bringing with it a wave of hot air that spiked the temperature gauge on her HUD by thirty degrees.
She watched as the source of the noise and heat squeezed through a hole in the tunnel wall. Dirt and rock rolled down from a wicked curved beak. Clawed legs slashed through the wall, dumping rubble and dirt over the tracks. A mammoth yellow and black shell took shape.
Behind the snapping jaws, a dozen bulbous eyes stared.
Ada lowered her rifle. It would be like trying to shoot a mountain. She turned and ran on her injured ankle, crying out in pain. She kept hopping, but the beast was gaining easily.
They would never make it to the train cars.
She searched the tracks for a place to hide, but there was nothing within view of her beams. She considered shutting them off, but she doubted that would save her and Jo-Jo. Anything that lived down here doubtless had night vision as acute as the monkey’s, and without her lights, she would fall again.
The tunnel curved ahead, and Ada made it around before the creature caught up with them. Around the bend, she saw the door that she couldn’t get open earlier.
Ada hobbled toward it as fast as she could, motioning for Jo-Jo. Using the shoulder stock of her laser rifle, she bashed the handle, but the lock wouldn’t give.
Taking a step back, she fired at the door, blasting it open just as the monster came around the corner. Her light captured crablike figures dropping from the bottom of the carapace.
The merely human-size spawn skittered ahead.
Ada moved into the room with Jo-Jo and closed the door, backing away as the first of the babies slammed into the other side.
Hell Divers Series | Book 8 | King of the Wastes Page 16
