Chapter Six

 

There was very little that I actually had to do, so I found myself pulling up the ship’s security system, watching the hall outside of the med bay. The Captain and Ceely exited not five minutes after I had, and I followed them to the galley. He did not leave her at the door, instead leading her inside and back to the kitchen, checking inside for villains, I was sure. Once satisfied, he did go, and she walked with him to the door. They said something, and I wished the cameras picked up sound, or that I could read lips.

With the door closed, the Captain checked the handle to ensure that it was locked. Then he headed up the hallway, up the stairs, out of frame. I was touched by his concern for her, even though he did not trust her or want her on his ship.

Humoring a hunch, I went back in the camera’s memory, to dinner. I had left before most, I had not known how the meal had ended. As I suspected, the Captain had stayed until the last crewman had left, then had helped Ceely to bring back the serving trays and pans, and they had washed dishes together without much conversation. Then he had walked her to her room. And just like he had, moments ago, he had ensured the door was locked before leaving her.

I let the video play even as he left the frame, thinking. He must have asked Perry to take the day shift, said that he would take the night. It truly was inconveniencing him to have her onboard. I felt my respect for him grow. My bosses back home would have delegated the extra work to anybody else, not lifted a finger, let alone gotten their hands dirty.

Movement in the frame caught my attention. The door to Ceely’s room had opened. Her grey head poked out. She looked both ways, then went down the hall, alone. To the stairs leading down to the ship’s lowest level, where the engine room, her submarine, the unmanned repair sub, and many other things were. Just the sight of it made my heart start to pound.

It was worry for her, at first. I reminded myself I had seen her just minutes ago; the video was old. She was fine.

There were cameras down below, and I fiddled with the system until I found the one which showed her entering the engine room. I had no view inside, could only wait for her to reemerge with an armful of things. Seemingly random bits and bobs I could only make out some of. I saw metal wire on a spool, some little tools and a white box that contained I knew not what, sturdy gloves, what I thought to be a torch of some kind…

The engine room contained all kinds of extra supplies. Anything an engineer could need to fix an engine, or really any component of the ship that could break. There was even a massive, spare propellor.

I knew that the Captain had taken Ceely down to collect some tools and supplies needed to begin tuning up her ship. Why feel the need to sneak back down, and help herself -putting herself in serious danger- if she was not hiding something sinister?

She was doing it right up the hall from where I laid my head at night! The Captain needed to be shown… I had little doubt he would take swift action, was only unsure as to whether Ceely would be immediately exiled from the ship, her sub flagged for collection and her wanted for questioning, or be thrown in the brig to await trial. Maybe they would send her back on the first flight rig to come out to us.

I would probably be commended.

I could unravel the whole thing, her plot, and probably impress even the Captain. If I were brave enough to go snooping. Her room would be unlocked, they could only be locked from the inside or by the Captain’s master key from the outside. Her submarine would be unguarded. I knew which one appealed to me more. It was a breach of the law, of ethics, and of company policy, too…

But to make an omelet, one must break a few eggs.

The Captain would go below deck, search the submarine himself, if he knew her to be sneaking around, if he had even an inkling that the ship and crew were in real peril. He would consider it not only his right, but his duty.

I found my feet. In the largest compartment of my desk, I had a kit in case of emergencies. Tsunami, creature attack, plain old power outage. I collected the flashlight and gave it a test, on off, on off. My feet carried me to my door. My hand rested on the knob.

Everyone would be impressed with me. Nobody would be cross. Roshin would have a reason to come to me again, to offer praise, to hear the thrilling story. Puffing up my chest as big as I could, I launched myself into the hallway, and my legs wobbled as I went, but I did go, almost fell on the stairs down but caught myself with a grip on the railing.

The engines were working, a constant thrum of noise not very loud out in the main cavern of the ship’s bowels, but enough that my movements were largely silent. It smelled of cleaning chemicals -probably the floor had been cleaned recently- and it smelled of combustion, too. There was nobody below that I could see. Still, I felt the eyes on me of the camera system. I hurried to the back of the room where Ceely’s yellow submarine was dry-docked.

It loomed above, rusting in a few places where plates were welded together, more intimidating than it had been in my mind. She had gotten a boost up. I could probably haul myself halfway up and scramble the rest, but my nice leather shoes would not help me much, their flat soles…

There was a table not far away. I gave it a pull, and it hardly budged. The thing must weigh almost a hundred pounds. Of course. The company couldn’t have equipment sliding around with the rocking of the ship in harsher weather. I dragged it, its legs shrieking on the metal floor the entire way and my ears aching from it, my entire being sure that the hellish sound would bring some curious passerby down on me. By the time I got it in place, my heart was pounding harder than it ever had. I was damp under the arms.

My legs felt like jelly as I mounted the table, then stood. I had to catch my breath, scan the room one more time. A small part of me was hoping I would be discovered. Marched before the Captain before I could commit this justified crime. Surely, they would respect me just for trying...

But there was still nobody. The Captain ran a tight ship; everyone was where they were supposed to be, keeping busy. Everyone except for me.

Not allowing myself another second of doubt, I jumped and swung one leg over the huge arch of the submarine’s round body. Although the thing didn’t budge a single centimeter, I still felt unsteady. I thought of the mechanical bull friends from college had ridden at a western-themed bar… I had been too bashful. If they could see me, now!

The handle of the hatch twisted with a small squeak, opened easily enough, and then I was climbing down into the cool dark with the lit flashlight clenched between my teeth. I whipped my head each way to ensure that there was nobody and no-thing waiting in the dark corners of the sub to grab me and drag me down. It was just an empty tube.

The only things taking up space were the ripped old office chair welded at the legs to the floor, a refrigerator for provisions, the small console opened at the vertical panel underneath the simple controls, and wires sticking out. That didn’t surprise me. She had said that she needed to work on reconditioning the ship, tuning it up. Probably that was half of the truth, at least.

Still, I needed to check it out. I got down on my hands and knees, and shining the light, I stuck my whole head inside the console. There were no sticks of dynamite, no bricks of C-4, which I thought I would surely recognize. I wasn’t surprised; it wasn’t what I was expecting to find anyway. I didn’t think that Ceely had violent intentions, and neither did the Captain… we just believed she could be hiding something which could turn out to be dangerous.

Electronics were not my forte, and I soon decided that if there were anything wrong with the wiring or mechanical components in front of me, I would never know it. I stood up and studied the controls more closely. A steering column. The two joysticks which controlled the ship’s mechanical arms, and a switch on each one which probably launched the harpoons which had once been mounted there.

There was another access panel in the back which lead to the single engine. I would have to check there, too, see if anything was tucked away in the corners, or could there be something inside of the engine itself? Perry had already investigated the ship at a glance, read for chemicals, and found nothing. It didn’t make sense.

I started toward the other end of the ship and my hand reached out automatically to trace the top of the white refrigerator unit. I stopped. Empty, probably, a too conspicuous place to hide anything, and she had been out of provisions and starving when we found her. But if I couldn’t exactly feel it running, I could sense the energy coming off of it, the hum in my ears was that unit going, not the ship’s engine anymore. Keep the sub hooked up to the ship’s power, that had been one of Ceely’s requirements when securing her position with the Captain. ‘Pay me what you want, but keep my sub hooked up to your grid’ she had said.

Maybe she was spiriting away provisions already, and that was all…

I felt dread sitting heavy in my stomach. What if there was something inside? What if it was some sort of trap on a weighted trigger, and the moment I opened the refrigerated chest’s lid, I was pierced with projectiles, sprayed with acid?

But that was ridiculous. Ceely was a woman, probably seventy-years-old, not an ancient pharaoh protecting his treasures from beyond the grave. Whatever she was hiding, she would need access to it, too, eventually. I tucked the flashlight between my lips again.

I got both hands on the lid and heaved it open impulsively. Leaning on the edge, bending over to peer down in, the lights illuminated something inside, pale beige and rippled in texture, a tangled mess that I squinted and leaned closer to decipher. And as my eyes roamed, the beam of light from the flashlight in my mouth roamed, too, and fell on something that gave me a start, for it almost looked like a face. My skin taught, my heart racing, I looked again, and when I realized that it was in fact a face, sunken and shriveled but a human face, the yelp that escaped from me echoed around the sub and knocked my legs clean out from under me.

I hit the floor of the submarine with a thud. Pain flared. I scrambled and banged my head on the round side of the tube, and there was more pain, enough to scramble my already wheeling mind. I didn’t know anything except that there were bodies in that ice chest -a freezer, not a refrigerator- I needed to get away from. I shoved myself to my feet and snagged the lid, dragging it closed. I had dropped the flashlight inside with the bodies, it was dead to me.

In the dark I stumbled to the other wall, finding the ladder with only my hands and starting to pull myself up. My foot slipped off the first rung and my stomach lurched as I fell, then I was going up again and my head poked out of the suddenly claustrophobic tube and its foully tainted air. It didn’t actually reek, that was just my body reacting to the horrible truth of death so close, my breakfast rising back up my throat. I choked and clenched and slid down the side of the submarine, hit the table going fast and toppled it over as I flung myself away.

My eyes were prickling, seeping, I hadn’t actually puked but was dangerously close, my guts curling and coiling around themselves. I was banged up all over, but I found my feet and ran, steps getting longer, more confident, I made the stairs and went up.

The Captain.

Another flight of stairs to gain the upper deck. The open air helped calm my nausea just a bit, I felt pierced by the daylight and became aware of the rocking of the ship, the sweat warm and itchy all over my body. Several crewmen were around and noticed my sudden appearance.

Roshin was one of them. “Jacob?”

“The Captain?”

“Went below. Probably in his office.”

And back down I went. I was sure I would not feel another moment’s peace, but if it were possible, it would be getting this responsibility off my chest, unburdening myself to the Captain. The moments leading to his office were a fervor, then I was pounding on the door.

After a moment, he appeared. His eyes took me in, he processed the state of me in only a moment. “What is it?” He swept me inside, closed the door.

“I- I was looking at security camera footage, earlier.” I froze, unsure how to tell him that I had been watching him and Ceely together, not really sure what had possessed me and definitely not knowing how to put it to words.

He guided me to a chair opposite his, and pulled the bottle of whiskey and one glass out of a lower desk drawer, pouring me a generous portion. I could not turn it down, didn’t want to. I had never liked the drink, but then, I had never been in such a state before. I threw the liquor back and swallowed, gasping at the burn that sprung up the back of my throat.

“-God…” I slumped back in the chair. My exhausted and damp body suddenly felt like it weighed a thousand pounds.

The Captain’s face was stern and inquisitive. He was leaning forward. “Go on.”