Wolves

TWO

A violent shaking startled Magnolia awake. She coughed up a mouthful of salt water, gagged, coughed again. A curtain of short-cropped blue hair hung over her face, blocking her view. She pulled it back and looked up at the blinking emergency light spreading its pulsing red glow over the room.

Between blinks, she spotted the wet, furry heap that was Miles. The dog lay a few feet away, curled up, unmoving.

“Miles,” she whispered. Reaching out, she nudged him, and he let out a whimper and moved a leg.

That was good. At least, he was still alive and could move.

But where was X?

Magnolia touched the goose egg on the back of her head and winced. She pulled away fingers slick with blood. She had taken a beating and had no idea how long she was out.

“Timothy, do you copy?” Magnolia said.

There was no answer but the creaking of bulkheads.

At first, she couldn’t remember why she was inside her quarters with Miles, but an otherworldly call reminded her.

The screeches of the giant octopus carried through the small vessel. But something about this melancholy sound was different from the one she had heard in the command center.

The scent of smoke drifted belowdecks. That got her attention.

She pushed herself up in the puddle of cold water, cursing a blue streak that would have made X proud.

X… Where the hell are you?

Miles tried to get up, too, but slipped and fell in the water, splashing it over Magnolia’s black fatigues. She helped him up onto a bunk and told him to stay put.

Then she fumbled her way over to the hatch and opened it to a passageway that was ankle-deep in seawater. Another emergency light winked outside the command center.

The hatch was ajar, providing a view inside the room. The red swirl from the light fell over standing water and a shattered windshield. A failsafe mechanism had activated, covering the broken glass with a metal hatch to keep the water out and at the same time blocking her view of the dark sea.

“Timothy?” she said.

The AI did not respond.

She closed the hatch and sealed it to keep the rest of the boat from flooding, then began her search for X.

The ladder to the upper deck was slick, and a quick glance revealed that it wasn’t just water.

Blood coated the rungs.

She climbed to the staging area and stepped cautiously into the dark space. There were no emergency lights up here, and all the porthole windows were sealed off with metal hatches.

“X,” she said quietly but firmly.

There was no response.

She reached into her cargo pocket and pulled out a small flashlight, which she pointed at the floor. A trail of blood led to the hatch.

“X, you son of a…”

She hurried over to a gun rack, freed her carbine, and slapped a full magazine into it. The gun felt good in her hands, but she wasn’t sure the rounds were going to do much against such a massive beast.

The hatch opened to darkness and a spray of cold water that hit her face. Howling wind greeted her as she stepped onto the deck with her rifle shouldered and the flashlight clamped against the stock.

The trail of blood ended on the deck, where the ocean water had washed away any further evidence. She played the beam back and forth, but X was nowhere to be seen.

“X!” she shouted, but her voice was lost in the howling wind.

The Sea Wolf swayed as she took her first step out. The engines continued to propel the craft through the mountainous waves that crashed and rose, over and over.

“X!” she yelled again.

Her light fell on a limp arm lined with suction cups, nailed by a spear to the rail.

Another sucker-covered arm hung off the cabin behind her, severed and dripping red off the second deck.

Her flashlight moved to the gore spattered behind the mainmast. Smoke rose away from a charred spot and a gaping rent in the deck.

“Oh, shit,” she whispered. The damage was, without a doubt, the result of a grenade. The blast had blown off two more of the creature’s arms, and a hunk of meat that she didn’t recognize.

“X, where are you!” she yelled, frantic now.

A reply came over the wind.

“Mags!”

The voice was faint but recognizable.

She hurried over to the side of the boat, cautious not to slide into the razor wire. Lowering her rifle, she used her flashlight to scan the ocean.

“Mags!” X yelled again.

But this wasn’t coming from over the side.

She looked up at the top of the bent mast and spotted X, hanging on to the crow’s nest. Another torn snaky arm was wrapped around the metal lookout, part of it coiled around his leg.

“You crazy bastard,” Magnolia whispered.

She stared for a second but quickly moved away from the side of the boat. Judging by the spatter around her, the beast was dead, but if she had learned one thing over her years of diving and fighting, it was never to turn her back on a monster.

With the rifle up and trained on the starboard rail, she backpedaled to the mizzenmast, boots slapping in the constant wash. “That thing still out there?” she called up.

“Nope, nothing but fish bait now!” he shouted.

She stopped when she got to the mast.

“You need me to come get you, or you coming down from there?”

X swung his legs over the side of the crow’s nest and kicked the hanging arm, but the suction cups had him and wouldn’t let go, even in death.

She kept an eye on the rails on both sides of the Sea Wolf as X made his way down the bent mainmast. One of the engines was still running, but if they continued losing power they would be forced to use the sails, which was going to be difficult with the mainmast so severely compromised. The mizzenmast looked fine, but if they lost the engines, they would need both sails.

A beeping came from her wrist monitor, and she held up the cracked screen to see the radar come online. The small computer was synced with the boat, and she had manually created a program to go off if the radar picked up anything.

Her heart leaped at the small green bleeps east of their position.

“X, uh, we got a problem,” she said.

“Yeah, I accidentally blew a small hole in the boat, I know, but I had no choice… and the mast is bent.”

He jumped to the deck and, pulling a machete from the sheath on his back, cut away the yard of octopus arm still clinging to his leg.

“No, we got other problems.”

“I know this already, Mags!”

Magnolia held her monitor in his face.

“Ah, damn!” he shouted.

“Either that thing was just a baby or it brought a lot of friends,” she said.

“I’m going to need more grenades.”

The boat swayed from side to side as they rushed back across the deck to the staging area and armory. Magnolia followed him down the ladder and into the passageway.

“Where’s Miles?” X shouted.

“In my bunk.”

Magnolia opened the hatch.

“You okay, boy?” X said, bending down by his dog. Tail whipping, Miles confirmed that he was just fine.

X led them back to the command center and took a seat in front of a console dripping with water. The metal hatch now covered the cracked and shattered windshield.

“Timothy must be offline,” she said.

“Shit, just when we need him.” X punched at the screen to reboot the system while Magnolia checked the navigation screen and the contacts to the east.

Timothy’s voice suddenly cracked from the console. “Sir, I am unable to retract the mainmast.”

“That’s because it’s bent,” X said. He looked over to Magnolia. “Those contacts seem funny to you?”

“What do you mean?” Mags asked.

“They aren’t moving toward us… We’re moving toward them.” X reached forward and flipped the metal hatch off the windshield. Another flip of a switch activated the searchlight beams. They penetrated deep into the darkness, capturing mountains above the waves on the horizon. These mountains weren’t more waves or giant sea creatures, or anything else that moved.

“Dry land,” Timothy said. “We’ve found another island chain.”

Magnolia studied the jagged silhouettes.

“You think this is the Metal Islands?” she asked.

X shook his head. “I don’t see the sun, and it’s only five o’clock.”

Magnolia picked up the radio handset. “I’ll inform the captain.” She pushed the button several times, but it wouldn’t come on.

“The radio has been damaged,” Timothy said. “I’ve activated the distress beacon, but we have no way of contacting the airships.”

“Why the hell did you do that?” X said. “Now they’re going to worry about us and possibly even send help—help that we don’t need.”

Magnolia didn’t reply right away, but she couldn’t hold back her thoughts. “X, I hate to break it to you, but we do need help. The boat has some serious damage.”

“I do not want them sending anyone. It was my decision to come out here, and you made your choice, too, Mags.”

She put down the radio handset, realization setting in. “You don’t want Michael to come after you, do you?”

“You just figured this out?”

“So what if we find the Metal Islands? Then what?”

X didn’t reply. He grumbled to himself under his breath. Magnolia was used to that; X still acted crazy from time to time. She had been fine with his rants and his conversations with himself, even when he screamed at night, but it was happening more often, and he was really starting to scare her.

She looked back at the islands. She wasn’t sure what was out there, but whatever it was, they would have to face it on their own.

Captain DaVita wouldn’t be coming to help them, nor would Tin and Layla. The storms in this area made a rescue mission impossible, and diving through the clouds was a death sentence.

“Pepper, shut that distress signal off,” X ordered.

“Sir, if we do that, they won’t be able to track us.”

“That’s the point,” X replied. “We can fix the boat on our own. Now, do it, or I’m shutting you off for good.”

Magnolia saw the anger in X’s face, and for the first time on the journey, she felt the tendrils of despair creeping in. What had started off as a new adventure to locate a place for humanity to call home—and a chance to avenge Rodger—was turning into a nightmare. She just hoped she could trust X to do the right thing if they found the Metal Islands.

Les Mitchells pulled on the cuffs of his white uniform as he approached the brig with his wife, Katherine, and seven-year-old daughter, Phyl. Both of them had recovered from their cough weeks ago and were slowly regaining their strength. But they both had a long way to go, especially Phyl, who had lost almost ten pounds and looked like a stick. Katherine brushed back a strand of dirty-blond hair and heaved a sigh as they stopped outside the brig.

Today was a big day for the Mitchells family, for today they were to be reunited with Trey, who had spent nearly a year in the brig for stealing from the trading post. Captain DaVita had greatly reduced his sentence after Trey’s vital help in overthrowing Captain Jordan, but they couldn’t just let him out, even with his father now serving as executive officer on Deliverance.

To keep the system working as it was designed to work, the rule of law had to be respected.

Les rapped the hatch with his fist, and Lauren Sloan, the recently promoted sergeant of the militia, opened it, her lazy eye moving from Les to Katherine to Phyl.

“Wait out here,” she grumbled, clearly unimpressed with Les’ new rank as lieutenant of Deliverance.

Les smiled at his wife and bent down slightly to wrap his tall daughter in a hug.

“Is Trey really coming home with us?” Phyl asked, looking up with her hazel eyes.

“He sure is.”

Katherine returned the smile with one of her contagious grins and put her arms around Les and Phyl. They were still huddled together when Trey finally emerged. Two months shy of his eighteenth birthday, and the boy was the thinnest Les had ever seen him—even thinner than Phyl.

“Hi,” Trey said, his voice timid.

“My baby,” Katherine said, pulling away from Les to hug her son.

“Trey, you look really—” Phyl said, but Sloan interrupted her.

“Sign here, and you can be on your way, kid,” she said, handing Trey a clipboard. He let go of his mother long enough to sign his name to the page.

And just like that, Trey Mitchells was a free…

Man. Your boy is a man, Les thought. He exchanged a nod with Sloan. He respected her for helping them take down Captain Jordan, and she had treated Trey with dignity. It wasn’t her fault the rations for prisoners were barely enough to survive on.

“Congratulations again on your promotion,” he said.

She shrugged. “Just means more work for me.” She gave a mirthless grin. “Congratulations on your promotion as well, LT.”

“Thanks,” Les replied.

Her lazy eye stopped on Trey. “Stay out of trouble, kid,” she said.

“I plan to, Sergeant.”

Les put his hand on his son’s back and herded his family away from the brig on the Hive, anxious to get them all together around the small table in their quarters.

Although he worked on Deliverance now, he, like many of the other Hell Divers and officers, had opted to remain living on the Hive. Something about deserting the airship had felt wrong, and when given the opportunity for a new cabin on Deliverance, he had politely declined.

A smile broke across his face at the sight of fresh paint on the bulkheads. Trey grinned, too, seeing the fresh artwork covering the metal with images of the Old World: fluffy clouds, exotic animals, and cities.

“How are you feeling?” Katherine asked Trey.

His smile broadened. “I’m just glad to be out of that hellhole and back with my family.”

They arrived at their home a few minutes later, where a meal of guinea pig stew, fresh bread, and warm potatoes waited. They even had a healthy spread of butter.

Les hadn’t eaten butter for as long as he could remember.

“I bet you’re hungry,” Phyl said. “You look like a beanpole.”

“Takes one to know one,” Trey replied. He brushed his long hair out of his face and pulled out the familiar creaky wooden chair he had always sat on for meals.

“We need to get you a haircut and a bath,” Katherine said.

“I’ll eat, bathe, and then I’m off. I want to see Commander Everhart,” Trey said.

Les took a seat at the head of the table, studying his son in the glow of the single bulb dangling from the overhead. The friendship between the two young men went way back but Les found it odd his son would want to see Michael right after leaving the brig, unless…

“For what?” Les asked.

“I’ve had a lot of time to think about what I’m going to do with my life,” Trey said. He looked over at his mother, who had stopped scooping stew into bowls.

She looked just as nervous as Les felt about whatever this was that Trey had decided behind bars. He was hoping his son would reapply to engineering school or come to work on the bridge with him, but his gut told him Trey wasn’t interested in either of those opportunities.

“I’ll tell you after we eat,” Trey said, licking his lips. “I’m starving.”

Katherine finished pouring the stew and distributed the bowls one by one. They bowed their heads together and held hands just as humans had done centuries earlier.

“I’m thankful today to have my son Trey back home, and our entire family together once again,” Les said. “Today, I pray to whatever God might be out there, to keep the Hive and Deliverance in the sky long enough for Xavier and Magnolia to find us a new home.”

He let go of Trey’s and Phyl’s hands and waited for Trey to tell them of his decision, but the boy was busy shoveling food into his mouth.

“Mom,” he said with his mouth full of stew, “this is so-o-o-o-o good.”

“We were lucky to get a guinea pig. First time we’ve had meat in months.”

Phyl took a bite of bread, but she still hadn’t touched her stew.

“What’s wrong, sweetheart?” Katherine asked.

“I don’t feel so good.” Phyl looked up at her brother.

“Your stomach feels sick?” Les asked.

Phyl shook her head and put her hand on her chest. “It’s my heart. It hurts. I missed Trey really bad, and now I’m worried he’s going to leave us again.”

Trey laid his hand on Phyl’s. “I’m not going to leave you guys again. I promise.”

“But you told me you want to be a Hell Diver,” Phyl said. “And Hell Divers die.”

Les suddenly felt his own heart grow heavy. “Is this true, son?”

“Yes.” Trey laid his fork, with a skewered new potato, down on the table. “I’ve decided it’s the best way to give back to the ship and my family. We’ll get more rations, and—”

“I’m the XO now, Trey,” Les said, cutting him off. “You don’t have to risk your life.”

Trey’s lip quivered. “We can’t afford to lose you, Dad. And I know for a fact you’ll keep diving despite your new title. I heard Sloan talking about it.”

Les couldn’t dispute that. He had agreed to remain a Hell Diver when he accepted the position of XO.

“It’s time for me to be a man,” Trey said. “It’s time for me to take your place as a Hell Diver.”

Katherine looked across the table at Les, her eyes pleading with him to talk some sense into the boy.

But his son was no longer a child. He had helped overthrow Jordan, had served his time in the brig, and was now free to do what he wanted.

Les wiped the corner of his mouth and put his handkerchief on the table. Today was supposed to be a joyful reunion and a wonderful meal with his family, but he had lost his appetite. After finally getting his son back, the thought of him diving into the apocalypse made him feel sick.

Katrina DaVita was starting to feel at home on the bridge of Deliverance. All around her, officers worked at their stations in the circular space, monitoring the skies for storms, watching the life-support systems on the ship, and communicating with the crew of the Hive.

Technically, she was the captain of both ships, but she had chosen to lead from this control room. For the first few weeks, she had tried to work on the clean white bridge of the Hive. It was larger and comfortably familiar, but that familiarity was the problem.

Memories of her former lover, Captain Leon Jordan, made working there too painful. If she was going to focus on saving the human race and leaving a positive legacy as captain, she needed to do it aboard Deliverance. The Hive would always be her home, but she needed a fresh start.

She had considered adding a new captain to the Hive but had no one she could entrust with the job quite yet. Former Lieutenant Hunt and Ensign Ryan were serving time in the brig for conspiracy convictions, and everyone else was too green.

Humans continued to let her down.

That was why she had transferred the AI Timothy Pepper from the Hilltop Bastion to the other airship, to serve as her cocaptain.

She knew that the ship was in good hands with the AI, and being able to trust Timothy allowed her to concentrate on the most important part of her job: keeping the two airships in the air.

Today, she had a few things on her plate. Shortly, she would check the finished renovations of forty new living quarters on the ship. When finished, they would house over a hundred people from the Hive, bringing the total occupancy on Deliverance to just shy of two hundred. The other 273 passengers would remain on the Hive.

But now she had a bigger problem on her hand than just angry civilians chafing under what they saw as unequal treatment.

Katrina made her way over to the comms stations, where Ada Winslow, a twenty-year-old engineering student turned communications officer, sat in a chair facing the radio equipment.

After losing the experience of Ensign Ryan and Lieutenant Hunt, Katrina had been forced to pull several new staff members straight from the school. Ada was at the top of her class, and though she hadn’t majored in communications, she learned quickly.

“Ensign Winslow, have we heard anything from Commander Rodriguez or Miss Katib?”

Ada twisted, her brown eyes eager to help. “Negative, Captain. I’ve been combing the channels all evening just in case they are trying to broadcast on a different frequency, but nothing so far.”

“Keep trying.” Katrina gave her a reassuring nod. She made her way down the line of new crew members. Ensign Dave Connor, a forty-year-old engineer who had lost his leg in an accident involving one of the Hive’s turbofans, manned the navigation system, tapping his prosthetic leg on the deck. He also doubled as a weatherman and was an expert at reading the storms, which made him invaluable to her.

“How are the skies looking?” she asked.

“Ma’am,” Dave said, exposing a mostly full set of yellowed teeth, “winds out of the south at eight knots. Barometer has dropped slightly. I’m detecting an electrical storm that appears to be along a fifty-mile front. We’re keeping our distance, but if we get any closer, we’re in for a rocky ride.”

“Keep an eye on that storm and let me know if anything changes.”

“Will do, ma’am.”

Katrina continued to the next officer, Ensign Bronson White. By far the oldest man on the ship, he seemed to be named for the color of his thick hair and beard. Thick spectacles magnified his pale blue eyes. He was the former chief engineer of the ship, replaced by Samson upon his retirement ten years ago.

“Ensign,” Katrina said.

Bronson nodded politely. “How are you this evening, Captain?”

“I’m well. How are our ships?”

He shifted his glasses down his nose to look at the display. “Gas bladders on the Hive are all functioning properly, and the engines on Deliverance are fully operational. We haven’t had to use a turbofan on the Hive for several days.”

“And the supports are holding firmly?” she asked, referring to the aluminum struts that Engineering had used to tie the two ships together.

“Yes, Captain.”

Katrina patted White’s shoulder before walking away.

Layla Brower was the other crew member working the night shift, and by her slouched posture and tired eyes, it was obvious she missed Michael.

But Katrina needed Layla on deck tonight. Her job was an important one: using the new archives from Deliverance to restore the archives that Jordan had destroyed. Tonight, she was also working with Sergeant Sloan of the militia to keep the peace on the airship.

“How’s it going?” Katrina asked.

Layla shook her head. “It’s been quiet so far, but the night is still young. We have four soldiers on patrol throughout Deliverance, and another ten on the Hive.”

Not a lot of boots, but to Katrina’s thinking, the fewer the better—especially since the militia had willingly carried out Captain Jordan’s orders to kill Janga, Ty Parker, and many others.

The passengers didn’t trust the militia, and that made Katrina’s job as captain difficult. Very difficult. It did help that she had been the one to kill Jordan, but even this had not gained her the trust of everyone—especially former lower-deckers.

Missing from the bridge was Lieutenant Les Mitchells, who was with his family, celebrating his son’s release from the brig. It was a happy day for the Mitchellses, and one that Katrina was glad to finally see. Ordering Trey back to his cell after he had helped overthrow Jordan was difficult, but she had to be fair. Shortening his sentence by a year was the best she could do without upsetting other passengers who had family members serving time.

Katrina went back to the captain’s chair and sat. Her crew was new, with both young and old officers, but they were her team, and she was proud to have them working with her.

They had been granted a new beginning with Deliverance. But no matter how well things were going in the sky, their future really depended on what was happening on the surface. If X and Magnolia were dead, then the one shot at finding the Metal Islands was over before it really began.

“Ensign Connor, bring up our current location on-screen,” she ordered.

The wall-mounted monitor in front of her chair flashed to life, showing an old-world map. The airships were still flying about fifty miles off the coast of Florida. A curved red line showed the location of the Sea Wolf ever since Deliverance dropped the vessel into the water.

X had sailed southeast from Florida, between Cuba and the Bahamas. They were just west of the Turks and Caicos Islands when the distress signal activated, but it had shut off not long after being turned on.

She wasn’t sure precisely where they were now, but it had to be close to those islands. Pushing another button on her monitor, she pulled up the weather overlay map.

A red cloud swallowed most of the screen, intensifying over Cuba and the Bahamas.

X had seen this map. He knew what he was getting himself into, and that was why he had opted for the route between the islands. Another dense fog of red covered most of Jamaica, Hispaniola, and Puerto Rico. Only a small chain called the Virgin Islands was visible in the blur.

In her mind’s eye, Katrina pictured the nuclear-tipped missiles striking each of the larger islands two and a half centuries ago, incinerating millions of people and destroying in minutes what had taken humanity an eon to create. But maybe the smaller groups like the one on the map hadn’t been touched. Maybe it was some sort of Goldilocks zone that had been deemed not worth destroying. And maybe the radiation and electrical storms never reached this place.

Or maybe it was just another mutated wasteland.

The sound of the hatches opening pulled her away from her reflections. Les ducked under the bulkhead and walked onto the bridge, his normally pale cheeks red. Katrina knew right away something was wrong.

She rose from her chair.

“Captain,” he said.

“That was a quick dinner,” she replied. “How’s Trey?”

Les sighed at his boots. “He wants to be a Hell Diver.”

Katrina stroked her jaw. She remembered the look on her father’s face when she had told him the same thing. He wasn’t happy about it, but he hadn’t lived long after she decided to join the ranks of the divers.

“Trey is a man now and has to make his own way,” she replied.

Les swallowed, his prominent Adam’s apple bobbing, and rubbed his tuft of red hair. “I know.”

“Try not to worry, Lieutenant. The next time we dive, it will be into a green zone, and even if Trey does decide to go through with this, it will be months before he dives. Besides, we have bigger problems right now.” She motioned for Les to follow her over to the central table.

“Listen up, everyone,” she said.

Layla, Dave, Ada, and Bronson all stood to attention at their stations. Even the older ensign, who had a natural slouch, stood ramrod straight.

“As a few of you already know, we have received a distress beacon from Commander Rodriguez and Miss Katib. The last ping we got from their distress beacon was just west of the Turks and Caicos Islands before it went offline. For now, only a few of us, including Commander Everhart, are privy to this information, and for now I want to keep it that way.”

“Should we change course, Captain?” Layla asked.

“No, we hold steady where we are. The electrical storms in this area are too dangerous to try mounting a rescue op. X and Magnolia are on their own for now.”

“The Sea Wolf is our best hope of finding a new home for humanity,” Layla said.

Katrina sighed. “I know this, but X and Magnolia can take care of themselves. Right now we need to focus on keeping our ships in the sky…”

Her words trailed off as realization set in. Her predecessor had often used that same line. The thought chilled her.

So this was how it felt to lead the final bastion of civilization. The burden of having so many lives in her hands wasn’t even the worst part of leading—it was the secrets she had uncovered on Deliverance that she still hadn’t told to anyone.