Allegiance

SEVENTEEN

Rhino had planned to boat over to the trading-post rig to talk to his old teammate Mac. Instead, he found himself headed to the only maximum-security prison in Cazador territory—a place he loathed even more than the trading post.

The Shark’s Cage.

With news of the skinwalkers, he didn’t have much of a choice. Horn and his crew, whom most everyone had written off for dead, had him on edge, especially since the men likely had the warship Raven’s Claw.

Rhino pushed the throttle forward, speeding away from the Vanguard Islands.

X stood beside him, wearing Hell Diver armor and helmet. Rhino was also in full armor today, and not just because of the water.

The place they were going to was one of the most dangerous rigs—home to some of the worst Cazadores ever to draw breath—and the home of the only man to survive an encounter with the skinwalkers.

Two boats followed them to the rig. One was filled with militia soldiers, the other with Cazadores. Mercury was still patrolling the barrier, and Shadow would be back out there soon, but he wasn’t sure when Renegade would return to service.

Raven’s Claw was one of the best warships ever in the Cazadores’ fleet and could inflict a lot of damage on the islands if it returned.

The boat reached its top safe speed, its exhaust stacks jetting black smoke into the sky. They were approaching the invisible line between light and darkness.

A few minutes later, the boat broke through, and blackness swallowed them. Two miles into the darkness, rain pounded them, streaking down the windshield and his helmet.

“How much farther?” X yelled over the engine noise.

“Another twenty minutes, maybe,” Rhino said. The rig was far enough away that if anyone ever did escape from the prison, they wouldn’t be able to swim to the Vanguard Islands without being eaten by a shark first.

X folded his arms over his chest. Rhino didn’t need to see his face to know that the king’s mind was burdened with worry. He wasn’t the only one.

“King Xavier, there is something I need to tell you.”

“More bad news?” X said. “Sure, pour it on.”

Rhino took his eyes off the ocean and said, “Sir, I believe that if General Santiago does not return from Rio de Janeiro with Star Grazer, you will be overthrown in a bloody battle. A battle I can’t prevent unless drastic measures are taken—and a battle we can’t win, even if I manage to put together a team, unless we act first.”

“So you want me to kill Ada and start another war?” X said.

“This is not about Ada, King Xavier.” Rhino twisted the wheel to avoid a wave. “This is about striking first, before our enemies do.”

“Striking who, exactly?”

“Vargas, for starters. I almost killed him myself last night on Elysium. But Colonel Moreto is also a threat. She showed her hand at the Sky Arena, when she invoked the rights of the Black Order of Octopus Lords.”

“If I remove them, won’t that cause a war? Won’t the soldiers under your command all revolt?”

“Very possibly. I would not be surprised if their supporters came to avenge them.”

X uncrossed his arms. “So what would you have me do? Kill every Cazador soldier? Then what do we do when the defectors or these skinwalkers show up and start ripping people apart and stitching them into blankets?”

Rhino empathized. They both were warriors trying to be civilized in a barbaric world filled with monsters of every kind: mutant, metallic, and human.

“Tonight, I’m heading to the trading post to seek allies,” Rhino said. “Then, with your permission, I will slit Colonel Vargas’s throat in his sleep. No one will know who did it. I’ll start with him and then take out Colonel Moreto.”

“I don’t know,” X said. He stared ahead into the darkness, his knees flexing up and down, absorbing the shocks as the speedboat bounced over the swells. “Perhaps we should let the council weigh in when General Santiago, Magnolia, and Les return.”

“King Xavier, I don’t know how you did things in the sky, but on the Metal—Vanguard—Islands, we do not vote on matters such as this. And frankly, the odds of General Santiago returning are not good.”

X grabbed the gunwale railing to brace himself but didn’t respond.

“No one liked el Pulpo’s bastard,” Rhino said, “but if he still lives, he is a challenger to the throne. If he shows up, Colonel Vargas and others might join him. We must strike first.”

X let go of the railing and faced Rhino. “You do what you must, then, and let me deal with my people.”

A blue gash of lightning split the horizon. X gave a weary nod and stuck out his hand. Thunder boomed as they shook on it.

The bow lights finally picked out a shape rising above the waves. A lonely silo-shaped structure was the only oil rig outside the barrier of light. On the top of the flat roof, several rusted old-world helicopters perched like gargoyles, overlooking the tower walls.

Rhino eased the throttle back and steered toward the pier, where several spotlights raked back and forth, turning the dark surface bright as day.

“Why do you even have a prison?” X asked. “I thought you guys liked killing each other in the Sky Arena.”

“Some people are too crazy even for that,” Rhino said. “Besides, the people here contribute to the economy by making our bombs and bullets.”

“Has anyone ever escaped?”

“Once, a prisoner found a way to sneak explosive powder back to his cell. He saved up enough that he eventually blew his way out,” Rhino said. “He got pretty torn up in the razor wire but managed to get to the water.”

“And then?”

“No one saw him again. As you will see, this place was built to keep people inside.”

“Can’t wait.”

A Cazador soldier in full armor slung his assault rifle over his shoulder, grabbed the side of the boat, and pulled it in.

X jumped out first, and the soldier standing sentry pounded his chest armor. While he tethered the boat, a second guard walked down to meet the other two boats. The group followed the two guards toward a gate blocking off a secondary steel door twice Rhino’s height. The soldiers unlocked the first gate and pushed the double doors open. An alarm blared and red lights swirled over the metal decks.

Inside, a central guard tower rose all the way to the ceiling. Windows gave the guards inside a view of the prisoners on all ten levels.

Rhino looked up at the circular mezzanines bordering the barred cells of each level, patrolled by guards with cattle prods. The double doors sealed behind the visitors with a thud, and the Klaxons and red lights clicked off.

“This level is for the guards,” Rhino said. He pointed to one of two doors in the bulkhead. “That’s the mess and barracks.”

“Wonderful,” X said, “but I came to see the prisoner that’s going to tell me about the skinwalkers.”

“Yes, of course, we’ll head up in a moment,” Rhino said. He took off his helmet, breathing in the steamy air and waiting while his eyes adjusted to the dim lightning.

Now, with the sirens off, nothing blocked out the bedlam of screams and howls. The guards shocked some of the more unruly inmates away from the bars, but they wailed on in Spanish and other tongues.

“Everyone but Sloan and Rhino is to stay here,” X said to the militia guards. They fanned out on the open first floor, looking up at the prisoners, who gawked back at them from behind the bars.

Rhino ordered his team to stay behind, too. He followed the two main guards into a stairwell, and the sounds faded once the door closed behind them.

“The best workers are kept on these lower floors,” Rhino said. “They are the most valuable to us.”

“Let me guess, then,” X said. “We’re going to the top.”

“Indeed.”

As they went up, the shouting from the prisoners grew louder until Rhino could hear them over the pounding of boots on stair treads.

On the ninth floor, the guards opened the door to a rusty mezzanine. Rhino nodded at the guard behind the tower glass. A ten-foot gap and an electric mesh fence separated the tower windows from the mezzanine.

Another guard gave an electric zap to a prisoner who tried to get a view of Rhino’s team. The two guards accompanying the three visitors moved out toward their comrade at once, hitting the bars of the cells as the group passed. One man didn’t let go in time and took a jolt. He hit the floor, baring his teeth like a wild beast.

The guards continued around the circular walkway. Many of the prisoners inside the cells were missing fingers, and a few had even lost a limb to the ordnance and bullets they made.

Halfway around the platform, the group stopped in front of a cell. The prisoner gripped the bars, looking at them in turn with sad, dark eyes. Both guards shouted for him to get back, and when he didn’t, they used their prods. The electrical current didn’t have the same effect on this sinewy Cazador. He made a grunting noise but did not scream like the others.

“What the hell is wrong with this guy?” Sloan asked.

The prisoner finally stepped back and opened his mouth as if to yell, but all they heard was another flurry of grunting noises. It was then that Rhino knew, they had their man.

“Gael, estamos aquí para discutir a los cueros andantes,” Rhino said. To X, he said, “I told him we’re here to talk about the skinwalkers.”

“The guy’s got no tongue,” X observed. “How’s he going to tell us anything?”

Rhino reached into his pack and pulled out a map and a pencil. Then he pulled out an apple and an orange.

“Fresh fruit,” Rhino said. “Works like a charm.” He held them up to the bars for the prisoner to sniff. “Now, get back and do as I say, and I’ll give them to you.”

Gael hesitated, then shook his head.

“You don’t want this?” Rhino asked. He brought the apple up to his mouth but stopped shy of taking a bite.

Gael reached out for it, letting out another guttural noise.

“Back up, and I’ll give you this,” Rhino said.

Gael retreated to his bunk.

“Open it,” Rhino said.

“Sir, that goes against procedure,” one of the guards replied in English.

“Do it,” X said.

The guard looked at X, then fiddled with the key chain on his belt. He opened the door, and Rhino and X went in, leaving Sloan outside. The small space was furnished only with a bunk covered in straw, and a small desk and stool.

Rhino tossed Gael the apple. He caught it midair and bit into it like a Siren with a fresh carcass.

“Why is he a prisoner?” X asked while the man inhaled the fruit.

“For fleeing the battle with Horn,” Rhino said. “He deserted his comrades, which is normally punishable by death. But we kept him alive since he’s the only one who knows anything about Horn. And he was a mechanic—knows how to make bullets.”

“But he’s never said what happened that day?”

“Only to el Pulpo,” Rhino said. “And to my knowledge, el Pulpo never told anyone.”

“Give me the orange,” X said.

Rhino handed it over, and X peeled off the skin while Gael watched. That seemed to agitate the prisoner, and he reared away.

It then struck X that he was doing to the orange basically what the skinwalkers did to their enemies. As soon as he stopped, Gael stepped back to the bars.

“Show us what happened out there and where Raven’s Claw went, and you get the orange,” Rhino said in Spanish, holding up the pencil.

“Tell him if he does that, he can have a bucket full of oranges,” X said.

Rhino relayed the message.

The prisoner’s gaze flitted from Rhino to X. His hand darted out and snatched the pencil. Then he picked up the pad of paper and scribbled for several moments, drawing what appeared to be a crude map with a few lines of illegible text. With a shaky hand, he drew a line on the map, and then a circle. He glanced up, like a child looking for approval.

Rhino picked up the paper.

“What’s it say?” X asked.

“Something about a great journey,” Rhino said. “Horn took the warship to…” He held up the paper and pointed to what looked like a skull. “Then what is…”

Rhino looked closer at the map. The line did indeed go where he suspected.

“What?” X asked.

“He says Horn took Raven’s Claw to the former colony that we abandoned many years ago,” Rhino said. “A place we call la Escolta—the Outrider.”

X pointed at the circle on the map.

“And what’s that?” he asked.

Rhino swallowed. “The Vanguard Islands,” he said. “Just as I feared, the bastard must be planning to come back for his throne.”

Magnolia sat in the hot lower compartment of Star Grazer with six half-naked Cazador warriors. Sofia sat beside her on a crate, trying to explain the complicated game that involved dice, a deck of dog-eared cards, and a lighter.

So far, Magnolia wasn’t having much luck, and not because of intimidation. The Cazadores had certainly tried clacking their teeth, pounding their chests, and yelling, but she didn’t fear them. She had decided yesterday that if she was going to fight alongside them, she would get to know them. And what better way than by playing cards?

Rodger, by contrast, had no desire to know these people or join in their games. He sat in a chair across the open barracks, tongue sticking out in rapt concentration as he carved a wood figurine.

That was fine. She didn’t want him to see her lose, and so far, she was doing little else.

“How about poker?” Magnolia said. “This shit is rigged.”

“It’s not rigged just because you suck,” Sofia said.

Magnolia sighed. “You know, I was happy when Les sent you down here to make sure nothing happened to us, but now I’m not so sure.” She squinted at Sofia’s cards. “Are you cheating?”

Sofia laughed. “no!”

“We shall see…” Magnolia said. She was glad to have Sofia down here with them, but it wouldn’t be for the entire journey. When they reached the destination, Sofia would return to the airship and join Michael’s team.

Sudden shouting interrupted the game. Across the room, a Cazador pounded down the ladder, waving. He wasn’t here to play cards.

“¡Vengan rápido!” he shouted.

The Cazador warriors all hopped off their crates and chairs.

“What’s going on?” she asked Sofia.

Sofia shrugged. “No—”

Automatic gunfire jolted Rodger out of his chair.

“Armor up,” Magnolia said. “We must be under attack.”

The three divers threw on their armor and helmets, grabbed their weapons, and headed up the ladder.

The sounds of battle reminded Magnolia of the day the sky people had shown up at the Metal Islands to save her. Machine guns barked from the turrets, firing into the water as Cazadores ran across the deck toward their stations.

“What’s going on?” she shouted.

“No clue!” Rodger yelled back.

The bow cannons boomed, and twin geysers erupted and then fell back to the surface.

After the next shot came a flurry of loud clicking sounds. But this noise wasn’t from the weapons. It came from whatever they were shooting at.

Magnolia watched tracer rounds lance into the water. Whatever they were firing at was big. The possibilities raced across her mind.

“Come on!” Sofia yelled.

They ran up to the command center. General Santiago and Lieutenant Alejo were on the bridge, monitoring the battle.

“Sofia, find out what they’re firing at!” Magnolia shouted.

As Sofia crossed the busy bridge, Magnolia and Rodger went to the port windows, where she switched on her infrared optics.

A red mass flashed across a large section of water.

That reading couldn’t be real. The beast would be almost as long as the warship.

Magnolia bumped on her comm channel. “Captain Mitchells, do you copy?”

Static crackled in her helmet.

Les’s voice came over the channel, faint but recognizable. “Copy. Mags, are you okay?” he said.

“What’s in the water?” she shouted.

The gunfire outside made hearing difficult. She hunkered down to listen.

“Come again, I didn’t catch your last,” she said.

A momentary letup in the gunfire allowed her to hear the next response.

“Timothy believes it’s some mutant version of a sperm whale,” Les replied.

Magnolia stared at the gargantuan creature cutting through the water on the port side. She remembered reading about them when she was a kid and wondering what one might look like in real life.

But this wasn’t what she had imagined, and she doubted this beast ate only fish and squid. It wanted to eat everyone aboard Star Grazer.

“There are more—”

The crack of gunfire made it impossible to hear the captain, and she stood back up just as the whale slammed into the hull.

Glass shattered from the portholes, and a computer exploded in a shower of sparks and electronics. Two Cazador officers fell to the deck.

As Magnolia pushed herself up, the vessel got slammed again, this time from the other side. Now she understood what the captain was trying to say.

There was more than one whale out there.

“We have to get to the Sea Wolf!” Rodger yelled.

Sofia looked down at a monitor next to Santiago. “We’re taking on water,” she said.

The general yelled at his crew, giving what looked like orders to abandon ship.

Another message came over the open channel with Discovery. “Get away from the windows!” Les yelled.

Magnolia pulled Rodger to the deck just as a missile came streaking through the sky. She didn’t see the explosion, but she heard it. A few beats later, a curtain of seawater deluged the ship, and she heard thuds against the windows. Looking up, she saw that it wasn’t just water. Blood and lumps of pink gore flecked the cracked glass.

General Santiago raised a fist in defiance at the whale bits sliding down the glass.

Rodger helped Magnolia to her feet. Two turrets on the bow rained machine-gun fire into the water, punching into the flesh of the biggest living beast Magnolia had ever seen.

The bullets seemed only to peck at the thick flesh covered in orange barnacles and scars from what looked like tentacles. The creature slipped back under. On the way down, it slapped the weather deck with a tail fluke, crushing one of the turrets like an old-world beverage can.

Santiago yelled something—a curse, no doubt—at the whale. He turned to one of his men and shouted more orders. Then he looked at Magnolia and Rodger and again waved them off the bridge.

This time, Magnolia obeyed. She pulled on Rodger and ran outside with him and Sofia. A ladder took them back to the deck where the Sea Wolf was secured to a davit.

Another missile streaked through the sky and hit the water on the port side. This time, she saw the geyser of water. And this time, no bits of flesh or blood rained down on the ship. Discovery had missed.

Not entirely, she realized. The missile had angered the giant cetacean. She braced herself as the beast speared toward them, its barnacled back above the surface.

“Incoming!” Sofia yelled.

Magnolia reached out to Rodger just before they both went flying through the air. She lost her grip on Rodger’s hand and saw him slam into the rail, but she kept flying.

Right over the side of the ship.

She hit the water on her back, and darkness rushed around her.

Panic gripped her as she tried to move, and for a moment, she simply sank into the ocean. She could see the rusty hull of the ship cruising past.

Then she snapped alert and managed to bring her body vertical. She kicked toward the surface and pulled with her hands, all the while watching Star Grazer sail away.

Her heart skipped at the sight of the giant twin screws. They churned the water in front of her as the warship passed, and she went cartwheeling away into the depths.

Habits learned from years of Hell Diving kicked in, and she forced herself to relax. At last, she stopped spinning. After getting her bearings, she started kicking and pulling toward the surface.

Not being able to see her surroundings fed her fear, but the only thing that mattered right now was getting to the surface. She could then radio Star Grazer or Discovery to come pick her up before one of the whales spotted her and swallowed her for an appetizer.

She broke through the waves, pulling herself up while treading water. The armor made it tough, but she was well rested, and the fall hadn’t injured her.

Turning in the water, she looked for the warship.

She spotted it to the west, but it continued to plow ahead. The one machine gun still operational rained lead into the ocean, piercing the vast surface with an audible shick, shick, shick.

Magnolia slipped back under the water and kicked back up, only to get slapped in the helmet by a wave. She fought back above the surface and glimpsed motion in the dark sky. A sudden beam shot away from the clouds as Discovery lowered.

The light covered the area off the ship’s starboard side, where the whale had sounded. Magnolia bumped on her chin pad.

“Captain Mitchells, do you copy? It’s Magnolia. I’ve fallen overboard!”

The only response was static.

Magnolia watched in horror as the monstrous sperm whale surfaced off Star Grazer’s port beam. A rising wake followed the creature as it swam toward the bow. She could hear the crunch that was the beginning of the end for the warship.

Star Grazer swung around from the collision, giving Magnolia a view of the starboard side. Several boats were already being lowered from their davits. One snapped loose and fell into the water.

She hit her chin pad again, opening a line to Rodger.

“Rodger, do you copy?” she said.

White noise crackled in her ear. Then a voice. “Mags…”

“Rodger!” she yelled.

She slipped under the water but could still hear his faint response. He sounded hurt.

She kicked back up over the waves in time to see the warship begin to founder. Soon, the compartments would fill with enough water that it would drop like an anchor.

Discovery hovered over the sinking vessel, and another missile streaked away from the launch tubes. The blast sent a red-tinted geyser into the air. Les had found his target.

“Target destroyed,” came a voice over the channel. “Magnolia, do you copy?”

“I’m here!” she yelled, raising her arms toward the sky. “South side of the ship, off the stern, a quarter-mile out.”

Discovery rotated over Star Grazer, its frontal beam flitting back and forth across the surface. Several rowboats moved away from the warship. As it dipped, she saw that the Sea Wolf was still on the deck.

“Get the Sea Wolf first!” she yelled.

She wasn’t sure there was time to save the boat, but it looked as if Les was going to try. Cables lowered from the belly of the airship.

“Rodger, where are you?” Magnolia said.

Panic whispered inside her as she treaded water, watching helplessly as Discovery tried to save the Sea Wolf before it sank with the warship.

She pulled herself into a front crawl, fighting the weight of her armor to keep above the waves. At least, she didn’t have to worry about swallowing any water.

“Rodger,” she said again. “Do you copy?”

“Mags,” came a reply. “Sofia… she has me… where…”

About halfway to the rowboats, Magnolia rolled onto her back to rest her muscles. She couldn’t make much sense of what Rodger was saying, only that he was with Sofia.

Seeing that Discovery had cables lowered and attached to the Sea Wolf also helped calm her thumping heart. She rolled over and began a front crawl when an expanse of warty, barnacled flesh slid through the water in front of her.

What in the wastes?

She flip-turned out of the crawl and kicked backward, away from the creature. What she saw under the surface was nowhere near the size of the whale that sank Star Grazer. The animal swimming parallel to her was the calf of one of the mutant sperm whales. It swam in a circle, coming back around.

Though much smaller than its parents, it was still big enough to swallow her whole. She didn’t have her laser rifle, and she had lost her blaster in the fall.

She pulled herself back above the surface, where she again treaded water as she reached over her back. Her two sickle-shaped blades were still sheathed. She grabbed the hilt of one and pulled it out. Then she ducked under the water to look for the creature.

The calf continued circling her, studying her with one huge eye. Magnolia tried to guess where in that bomb-shaped body she should thrust her blade, and waited for her moment.

The beast opened a long jaw of conical teeth and gave a long, clicking sigh that she could easily hear underwater.

This wasn’t the snarl of a predator. It was the sound of a baby that had just lost its mother. The orphan calf finally turned and swam away into the depths.

Magnolia kicked back up to the surface and sheathed her blade. She turned just in time to see the massive screw propellers of Star Grazer disappear below the surface.

A beam hit her from above. In the glow, she saw the hull of Sea Wolf locked against the belly of Discovery.

“Get me out of here!” she yelled.