Kong: Skull Island - The Official Movie Novelization

SEVEN

Randa grabbed a drink from the bar and dropped into a seat beside Nieves and the rest of his team. At least the ship had an officers’ lounge. On this voyage, it had been reserved for the passengers, no crew allowed. Randa had expected Packard to attend on his own, perhaps bringing Major Chapman along, but it seemed that the colonel was happy with his grunts drinking here too. Randa didn’t mind. It gave the place some much-needed atmosphere.

Now, though, he hadn’t come for fun, and Nieves knew it. He was here because there was a stranger on their ship, and all his thorough planning and secrecy might be under threat.

“So?” Randa asked. Nieves knew exactly what he was talking about.

“Bill, look, it seems the guy we hired dropped out at the last minute. I wasn’t made aware until now.”

“She hasn’t been cleared. No background check.”

“I don’t see what the problem is,” Nieves replied. “It’s our standard protocol to have a photographer on these expeditions.”

Randa sighed heavily, trying to hold in his anger. Everything could be put at risk by Weaver’s arrival. Chim had been in Randa’s pocket, as reliable as a journalist could be. The woman was not. He didn’t like having a wild card on board, and this was his party.

“Her resume is impressive,” San said.

“I don’t care how impressive it is, she’s a journalist!” Randa said, and when San and Nieves looked past his shoulder he knew that Weaver was standing right behind him. He didn’t really care. His skin was too thick for him to be guilted by social faux pas. Nevertheless, he tried on a smile as he stood and turned around. “Ah, Miss Weaver. I’m Bill Randa, leader of this expedition. Glad to have you along.”

“So what government agency are you with exactly?” she asked. No preamble, no greeting. Straight down to business. “Didn’t catch the acronym.”

“I didn’t drop one,” Randa said, smile slipping. “We’re explorers.”

“Exploring.” Weaver looked around at them all, as if taking pictures with her eyes. She’d probably already researched background on most of them. “I thought that ended with the pioneers. The ideals of Manifest Destiny aren’t too highly regarded anymore.”

“We live in a cynical age,” Randa said, meaning every word.

“After five years of military briefings, your bullshit meter gets finely tuned.”

“Listen, Miss—”

“Ms Weaver.”

“Right, Ms Weaver. Did the Europeans set out into unknown waters in search of gold? Or was it the mystery that was more enticing.”

“Gold, I’m pretty sure,” Conrad said. He raised his beer from where he’d been watching and listening at the bar, then quickly downed it and walked off, Weaver watching. Randa so wanted to spin around and berate him. But he knew what the man could do—it was why he’d hired him, after all—and the last thing he wanted was to piss him off. If things went south once they got on the island, Conrad was the person he wanted by his side.

Packard approached the bar and poured himself another whiskey, his presence forcing his way into the conversation.

“Colonel, have you met Ms Weaver?” Randa asked.

“I know her work.” The soldier joined them, his expression unchanging. “I don’t like it.” He downed the whiskey in one, touched his brow, then stalked from the room.

Weaver leaned in close to Randa and muttered, “Nice party you put together.” Then she walked to the bar and grabbed herself a drink.

Conrad liked being on a ship. He sometimes thought it was the isolation, cutting him off from all the things he had done and promising new experiences over the horizon. Or sometimes he guessed it was the idea of looking back along the ship’s wake, phosphorescence glimmering in the waves left behind like the remnants of past deeds.

He saw the little girl Jenny in that wake. He often saw her face.

It had taken a long time, but Conrad was quite at peace with his life. He’d chosen his paths, and even when he’d killed, it had always been essential in some aspect. Either kill or be killed, or kill because to not do so would put others at risk. He’d killed men fighting. He’d murdered a man in his sleep. He’d burned a woman alive in a car. All bad people.

His choices were all his own, and he lived with them well enough. The only choice that had not been his own had been the death of the little girl, and he had taken many years to put that in a place where he could deal with it. Perhaps it was selfish, or even cowardly, but he had come to accept that it had not been his fault. He couldn’t save everyone. Every time he saw her face or remembered her sad voice, he tried to offset the memory with the face or voice of someone he’d saved. Downed pilots, lost soldiers, inept civilians getting into situations way over their heads there were many people alive today who would be dead if it were not for him. It was ironic that a death he had not caused troubled him much more than those he had.

Yet today, steaming across the endless Pacific Ocean towards a new, unknown future still felt good. Even though he knew he was being deceived.

Snooping around to uncover that deceit felt good, too.

The hold wasn’t as dark as it could have been. A few small lights remained on, diffusing a soft glow here and there that helped him navigate his way through the stacks of tied-down boxes, crates and piles of equipment. There were no guards that he could see, yet he remained low and quiet, just in case. He’d already checked to make sure there were no cameras covering the hold. Security was lax, and he hoped that meant there was little to hide. But he thought not. It was more likely that those hiding secrets didn’t think that anyone would come looking.

Beside a pile of crates he flicked on his lighter. The two closest to him were heavy wooden constructions marked with the Monarch name. He moved on to the next pile. SEISMIC CHARGES was stencilled on the side of one box, and beside that another read EXPLOSIVES.

Conrad extinguished the lighter. “In case things go sideways,” he whispered. Explosives? Were they actually mining for something? He liked this less and less, but to pry open the boxes would reveal that someone had been investigating.

Right now, it was probably best to leave things alone. See how all this played out. He was being paid well, after all.

He heard a click and spun around. Weaver was aiming a camera at him. She shifted position, focused, snapped another picture, then lowered the camera.

“This trip’s getting more interesting by the mile,” she said.

“What are you doing down here?” Conrad asked. She’d surprised him, and he didn’t like that. He’d let his guard down.

“I could ask you the same thing.”

“Just killing time,” he said.

“Me too.” She aimed her camera at the crates behind him and took a shot. “Why does a geological mapping mission need explosives?” she asked.

“You weren’t listening in class,” Conrad said. “Seismic charges for the geology survey.”

“And you believe that?” She swung the camera and snapped a shot of Conrad, casual, matter of fact. The camera was almost part of her, an aid to communication. Perhaps some sort of shield, too. Even in the briefing she’d had it slung around her neck, though she’d taken no pictures.

“I’m not a geologist,” he said.

“Doesn’t take one to know something doesn’t smell right.” She looked around the loaded hold as if deciding what to photograph next. The ship rocked and groaned, never silent. Conrad kept half of his attention on their surroundings in case someone came to check on the cargo. If they were caught down here, he’d have to confront the truth of this mission before he was quite ready. Maybe it was Randa, maybe Packard, but whoever was running the show, there was definitely more to it than appeared on the surface.

“Says the eager photo-journalist. So who hired you for this?”

“Nieves. Landsat guy.” She came a step closer and looked him up and down. Examining him with her reporter’s eye. Conrad wondered what she saw, what conclusions she came to.

“Meet Colonel Packard yet?” she asked.

“Yeah.”

“He’s wound pretty tight.”

“The man’s a decorated war hero. That’s the package they come in. So, isn’t shooting a mapping mission a step down for you? I get the impression you’re someone who’s seen real action.”

“I begged for this gig,” she said. “The war’s over but there’s a sudden interest in a remote Pacific island and we’re going in with military choppers, machine guns and explosives? I see dirty Pentagon fingerprints all over this op.”

“And you want to expose it and win a Pulitzer?”

“If you’re not there you can’t get the shot,” she said. They were standing closer now, and hidden down in the hold it felt to Conrad like they were having the most important conversation on the ship. “The right photo can alter the course of things. It can shape opinions.”

“And win you a Pulitzer.”

She smiled. “So what about you? How did a British Special Forces legend get dragged into this?”

And there it is, thought Conrad. Of course she knows who I am. He’d suspected it anyway, and she’d probably followed him down here to corner him for this talk. He didn’t like the idea of someone stalking him like this without him knowing, but he guessed he wasn’t the first person she’d followed. She was as serious about her work as he was. He could only respect that. He was also pretty certain that they were on the same side, whatever side that was.

“You know more about me than I know about you,” he said.

“I’m a journalist. I ask questions, Captain Conrad.”

“Just Conrad. I’m retired.”

“Sure, it looks like it.”

He shrugged.

“So when I ask questions, more often than not people give an answer, even if they’re lying.” She waited. Conrad looked around, listened—still alone.

“They offered me money,” he said.

“Really? That’s it?”

“A lot of money.” She raised her eyebrows. Conrad continued, “I don’t get too invested in outcomes.”

“You don’t strike me as a mercenary,” she said.

“You don’t strike me as a war photographer.”

“Anti-war photographer.”

That surprised him. He’d rarely heard such distinctions from the correspondents he’d encountered, and he was about to ask her more about that when he heard the soft, regular tread of footsteps.

Conrad and Weaver crouched down between the crates. They were close now, so close that he could smell her subtle perfume and faint perspiration. He sensed that she had plenty of questions for him, and she intrigued him, too. She’d worked hard to get on this expedition, and was already more ahead of the game than him. He’d work hard to catch up.

Hidden in shadows, Conrad peered around the edge of a crate and watched two soldiers enter the hold. They seemed casual and relaxed, chatting and laughing. One of them picked up a small box, and after a quick look around they left the hold.

“They gone?” Weaver asked.

“Yeah. Don’t worry. We’re just killing time.”

Weaver smirked and left, stealing away across the hold, through shadows, and out through a different door.