Burnt Sea: A Seabound Prequel (Seabound Chronicles Book 0) (15 page)

“I agree,
Ren
,” Simon said quickly. “Don’t
worry. Fire up the engines, but wait for my signal.”

“Aye
aye
, captain,”
Ren
said. She scowled at
Vinny
before turning her attention back to the looming storm.

“Wait a minute. That’s what we need,” Simon said. He clapped
Ren
on the shoulder and headed for the exit.

Captain
Martinelli’s
quarters were located
just behind the bridge. His spacious accommodations included his cabin,
accessible from the bridge in an emergency, and the elegant Captain’s Lounge.
There, he would entertain VIPs and perform the public relations part of a
cruise captain’s duties.

Since being forcibly removed from duty six days ago, Captain
Martinelli
had been locked in his quarters.
Vinny
had been bringing him his meals and making sure he
had plenty of water. He hadn’t been allowed to speak to anyone else. They had
left the entryway between his room and the Captain’s Lounge open to give him
more space, but metal taken from room service trolleys barred the other
entrances. Simon removed the interlocking pieces one by one and knocked on the
door to the lounge.

“Enter.”

“Captain
Martinelli
? The ship is in danger,
and we need your help.”

“Simon, how good of you to visit. A drink?”

The captain stood before the huge picture windows spanning one wall of
the lounge, swirling cognac in a glass. His uniform was soiled, but every
button and fringe was in place. He’d combed down his hair since the last time
Simon saw him, but this only served to accentuate the madness in his eyes.
There was a stale, putrid scent in the room, like rotting food and illness.

“There’s no time, sir. We need you to get us out of the path of a big
storm. We’re near an atoll, so we don’t have much room to maneuver between the
shallow water and the storm.”

“It’s magnificent, cognac. Don’t you think so, Simon? My father
abhorred the stuff, but my elder brother introduced me to its finer points. Do
close the door. No need to let in a draft.”

“We have to go now.
Ren
can’t do it on her
own.”

Simon crossed to the window and looked down at the beach. The people
from the
Catalina
gathered around the
broken cargo ship, and some had climbed up to its main deck. A huge tank swung
dangerously from a crane clinging to the top of the wreck. Another tank was
already in the water, with another group holding it steady in the breakers. One
of the lifeboats approached, already piled high with salvage. Judith stood a
little apart from the crowd, directing the lifeboat into position. The crew
moved forward and began securing the first tank to the lifeboat with some sort
of chain. They must be planning to tug it toward the
Catalina
. It looked like a very slow process. Didn’t they see the
storm approaching?

“My elder brother was a ship’s captain too, you know.” The captain took
a sip of his cognac and reached for a cigarette. It must be one of his last
ones. “He got me my first job. That was with Galaxy Cruises on one of their
smaller models. I worked my way up from there, for half a dozen different
lines, and now here I am. My own ship.”

“Your ship is going to run aground if you don’t help us sail it away
from here,” Simon said. He couldn’t see the hulking storm cloud from these
windows. The sky had grown darker above the atoll. A flash of lightning sent
shivers across the water.

“I got her through the Sack of San Diego,” Captain
Martinelli
said. “That has a nice ring, doesn’t it?
A suitable legacy.
If people ever write about these days, I hope that’s what they’ll call it.
Sacked by the insides of our own planet rising up to obliterate us. It’s a
wonder the human race has lasted this long. If I were Mother Nature, I’d have
wiped us off the surface ages ago.”

“Sir, we still have a chance to survive,” Simon said, turning away from
the window. He couldn’t believe he’d once thought this man looked
like
a hero.

“Survive?” Captain
Martinelli
chuckled. “What
is the point of this survival you speak of? The world is ruined. We should go
down with dignity.”

“I’m not ready for that,” Simon said. “There’s nothing dignified about
sinking in a storm after our own military refused to help us. We have to fight
for ourselves for as long as we can. Will you help us?”

The captain sighed and turned away from the window. Lightning flashed
behind him.

“What exactly do you expect me to do?” he said.

Judith

The
salvage team loaded up their spoils and brought the lifeboats closer to the
wrecked cargo ship. They secured the first huge fuel tank to it with the chains
they’d found on the cargo ship. Then one group gathered around the tank to hold
it still while the second tank was being brought forward and secured. Judith
stood apart from the group and directed the operation. The tank was too big for
the people on either side to see each other. They stood knee-deep in the water,
holding it steady until the second tank was in position. It was a miracle they
could get the huge things to move through the water at all.

When the two tanks were secured, the first group piled into the
lifeboat and fired up the motor. The tanks bobbed heavily in the waves, creaking
against their chains. The lines tightened. Would it work?

Water and spray churned around the motor. Judith held her breath. Then
the lifeboat began to move. It chugged slowly away from the beach, pulling the
tanks behind it like a pair of trailers. Its progress was laborious, but it was
moving. The teams remaining on the beach cheered.

Judith kept an eye on the storm and the
Catalina
lurching just beyond the surf. The weather was getting
worse by the minute, and they still had a lot of work to do.

While the first lifeboat inched toward the
Catalina
, everyone else returned to the cargo ship to start the
process over again. Reggie’s crew was already lifting the third tank off the
deck with the crane.

It took ages, but eventually they got two more fuel tanks down from the
cargo ship and secured to the second lifeboat. Another group sailed slowly
toward the
Catalina
, their precious
cargo in tow.

The storm was larger now, floating like an evil presence above the
waves. Waterspouts rose from the sea. A wall of rain swept across the beach, instantly
blurring the world. There were twenty people and one lifeboat left on the
atoll. They sheltered from the rain in the shadow of the cargo ship.

“We should go now,” Judith said. “There’s no time for two more tanks.”

“If we leave all this fuel behind, we won’t get far,” Reggie said.

“But when that storm hits we’ll never reach the ship,” Judith said. She
didn’t like the look of those funnel clouds.

“Come on, people, don’t just stand around arguing,” Michael said.
“Let’s move one more tank and then get the heck out of here.”

“Fine,” Judith said. “But hurry!”

Reggie climbed back up to the crane to get the fifth
nine-thousand-gallon tank. Nora finally emerged from the deckhouse and darted
to the last lifeboat, arms laden with circuit boards. Wires trailed behind her.
Soon she was running back through the rain to assist the team guiding the final
fuel tank off the cargo ship.

“Got enough hardware to build the ship a new brain!” she called. “I
think I can fix our communication problem.”

The wind picked up, driving the rain horizontally. It couldn’t be past
four in the afternoon, but the sky was growing progressively darker. The team
freed the next tank from the deck above and worked to secure it to the crane.
It was becoming harder for them to hear each other above the wind.

Beyond the waterline the
Catalina
was a stark shape against the darkened sky. The first lifeboat was already
being lifted up the side of the ship with the winch. Judith had forgotten how
tall it was. How were they going to get all the fuel tanks up there?

“Wait! Something’s wrong!” Michael shouted, bringing her attention back
to the cargo ship.

The fifth tank was teetering over the edge of the ship above them,
swaying dangerously. The crane strained, trying to lift it high enough to make
it over the rail. The crew struggled to keep it steady in the strengthening
wind.

“The crane is stuck,” someone shouted.

“A little higher.”

“It’s slipping!”

“Shit!”

There was a loud crack. The tank lurched and slammed into the deck of
the cargo ship. Then it seesawed over the edge and plummeted downward.

“Look out!”

Michael leapt back, flinging out his arm to push Judith further away.
The tank hit the water with a huge splash, drenching everyone within twenty
feet.

Judith picked herself up off the beach, an angry retort on her lips.
She hadn’t been underneath the thing! But Michael was gritting his teeth, and a
muscle throbbed in his jaw.

“You okay?” Judith asked.

“Landed on my foot wrong,” he said. He tried putting some weight on it.
“Damn, that hurts.” Sweat coated his forehead.

“I was fine, you know,” Judith said. “But thank you. Can you walk?”

“If I have to, I’ll run.”

Michael nodded at the sea. The heart of the storm was closer. The
funnel clouds whirled, sucking water up from the sea in spouts. The second lifeboat
had reached the
Catalina
, and it was
being lifted up the side of the hull. The four fuel tanks bobbed in the roughening
waves, apparently tethered to the ship somehow.

“Let’s push this thing into position,” Reggie said, jumping out of the
cargo ship with the last of the crane crew. Veins stood out on his forehead.

“How are we going to get the tanks onto the ship?” Nora asked, wiping
the rainwater out of her own eyes.

“We’re not for now,” Reggie said. “We need to get away from the atoll
before the storm hits.”

The final tank had landed closer to the waterline than the others, and
it had become wedged in the sand. The team worked together to push it further
out into the water as the last lifeboat motored forward.

Once it was out of the sand, they had to hold on to the tank to keep it
from moving in the waves. Michael took over manager duty, and Judith went down
to the water to help the others hold it still against the increasingly rough
waves. Reggie brought the lifeboat in closer. It was getting harder to maneuver
against the tossing of the waves.

“Steady!” Michael called.

“It’s too rough!”

“We can’t hold it.”

The lifeboat got closer. Judith moved forward to make sure the chain
was ready. A few of the men released their grip on the tank to help her with
it.

“Come on, guys,” Judith said. “We can do this.”

Lightning cracked across the sky. The waves battered the team around
the tank. They dug their feet into the sand, bracing their shoulders against
the rivets and slick edges. The men were having trouble securing the chain
around the tank so they could link it to the lifeboat.

“Almost . . . there . . .” Judith said.

Suddenly, a harsh wave knocked some of the team off their feet. The
tank slipped sideways. It began to roll, pushed off balance by the waves. More
people lost their hold. Then it was loose, tumbling in the breakers. It slammed
back against the hull of the cargo ship. The team shouted, stumbling over each
other to try to get a grip on it without being crushed.

The waves crashed. Then the tank was being sucked back toward the sea,
pulled along by the current rushing dangerously around the hull of the broken
ship.

“We’re losing it!” Michael shouted.

But Judith wasn’t going to let that happen. She dashed through the
water, staying even with the tank as the waves pushed it to and fro. There was
nothing she could do to stop it. It was far too heavy
.
But they couldn’t lose it now. She would not let it float away
when they were so close.

She darted past the tank. She would win this race. The cold shock of a
wave doused her face. She splashed through the surf until she was waist deep.
She found the dangling edge of the chain and clung to it, trying to keep her
grip without allowing it to bowl over her.

Then the natural pressure of the waves slowed the tank’s momentum. If
it hadn’t, Judith would certainly have been crushed. She held on to the chain
around the tank and planted her feet deep in the mud, trying to keep it from
floating further out to sea. The waves pushed her back and forth like a rag
doll.

Michael appeared beside her. “Easy. Let’s keep hold of this thing.”

“I’ve got it,” Judith said.

A wave filled her mouth with salt and sand. As she spluttered and
coughed, Michael stayed calm.

“You’re a champ,” he said. “
Reg
! Bring that
boat closer, will you? The girls are doing all the work.”