Emerald Sea

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

“Great day to be sailing,” Commander Mbeki said as he reached the quarterdeck.

“Sure, if we were sailing the right way,” the skipper said sourly. The ship was currently on the northerly tack, as it had been for a good half the morning. To sail to the east required turning first one way and then the other, tacking, so that the winds could be caught by the sails. They had been taking long tacks, far out to sea, to ensure that they avoided the shoals along the north side of the isles and the voyage was, unfortunately, taking longer than anticipated. “At this rate it’ll be a week before we get to Whale Point. And what happens if they’ve hared off somewhere else by then?”

“We’ll deal with it,” Mbeki said.

“Sail off the starboard bow!”

They were well off from the islands so it was unlikely to be some stray fishing vessel. Chang and Mbeki both shrugged almost simultaneously.

“We’ll stay on this tack,” the skipper said. “We’ll come up on it.”

“If it’s hostile, it will have the weather gauge,” Mbeki pointed out.

“We’ll figure that out soon enough. Get Donahue up on the mast with a pair of binoculars; I want to know what we’re dealing with as soon as possible.”

In no more than thirty minutes the midshipman called down.

“Square-rigged ship,” he yelled. “Looks something like a caravel. No flags that I can see. Looks like some dolphins swimming around it.”

“If it’s a caravel we can sail rings around it,” Mbeki said.

“Sure, but we don’t have so much as bowmen on board,” the skipper replied. “Get me Evan.”

When the engineer was shown onto the bridge he nodded at the news and frowned.

“I’ve been working on something, but I don’t know that you’d want to use it on the ship,” he admitted.

“What is it then?” Mbeki said impatiently.

“It was an idea that Lieutenant Herzer had,” the engineer temporized.

“The materials he asked to bring on board?” the skipper asked.

“Yes, sir,” the engineer said. “He wanted a way to make the dragons an offensive weapon. He was working on that but I thought I’d make something else.”

“What is it, man?” Mbeki snapped.

“A flamethrower,” the engineer said nervously.

“Shit,” the skipper said, looking around at the tinder-dry wood of the ship. “You’re right, I don’t want that used on my ship.”

“Sir!” the midshipman called down. “Sir! There’s a flag hoisted now, I can’t make it out exactly but it’s red and blue! And they’ve changed course towards us!” The New Destiny flag was blue field with red ND on it.

“That caps it,” the skipper said. “Clear for action, all hands stand by to repel boarders.”

“I have an idea, sir,” the engineer said after a moment. “But we’ll have to have them to port.”

“We’ll figure that out later,” the captain replied. “Get moving on it. And don’t you dare fire that damned thing on my ship.”

“Yes, sir. I mean, no sir!” the engineer said, hurrying to the companionway.

The two ships continued on nearly reciprocal courses, the caravel bearing down on the clipper. Normally it would be no contest; the clipper was far and away the faster ship. But the skipper kept her on her course, headed towards the other ship. After a few minutes he climbed up to the rigging for his own look and returned shaking his head.

“They’ve got a ballista,” he said. “And those are orcas around their ship.”

“Changed?” Mbeki asked.

“Probably.” He stood there with his hands clasped behind his back, feet spread to counter the roll of the ship. “We should show them our heels. We could outrun even the orca over time.”

“With all due respect, sir,” the commander said. “That would look like hell on our report.”

“It would look worse if we lost the carrier,” the skipper said. “We should have brought armed sloops with us, I said it at the time.”

“Yes, sir,” the commander replied.

“But you’re absolutely correct that it would look like hell,” the skipper frowned. “I wonder if our wonder-boy has come up with anything.”

“You want me to what?” the rabbit said. “No way in hell.”

“You said one favor,” Evan replied. “This is it.”

“And I also said ‘nothing unreasonable,’ ” the rabbit replied. “This is clearly unreasonable.”

“No it’s not,” Evan said, doggedly. “It’s more than likely that you’ll survive. Especially if you have the flamethrower.”

“I can do a lot of impossible things,” the bunny said. “But I cannot swim with the flamethrower on my back! Well.”

“You’re not going to swim.”

“This is your plan?” the skipper said, looking at the rabbit at Evan’s feet.

“Yes, sir,” the engineer replied, nervously. “This is all I could come up with on the spur of the moment.”

The rabbit was wearing a black suit with a smoked-visor helmet. Attached to his harness, in place of the pistol crossbow, was a small circular tank with a, yes, rabbit-sized nozzle attached. But the harness still held all his knives.

“This is insane,” Commander Mbeki commented.

“You’re right,” the rabbit said, hopping towards the companionway. “It’s crazy. I shouldn’t do it.”

“Come back here,” Evan said. “I don’t know what happens to you if you go back on your promises, but I’m willing to find out.”

“Damn,” the rabbit said. “Does anyone think that this constitutes unreasonable as well as insane?” he asked hopefully.

“Nooo,” the skipper said, thoughtfully. “Insane, yes. Unreasonable, no.”

“But insanity is defined as unreason,” the rabbit said.

“Not really,” Commander Mbeki said. “Psychotics are, by definition, insane. But they can be quite reasonable people.”

“You’re really going to make me do this?” the rabbit asked. “That’s unreasonable.”

“But it doesn’t matter, if the task is not. If it’s stupid, but it works, it’s not stupid,” Evan replied with the logic of an engineer.

“We really don’t have time to debate this,” the skipper said. “Either you’re going or you’re not. On the other hand, you’re an AI. I don’t feel that I can, with conscience, force you to do something that is clearly insane.”

“Damn,” the rabbit said, trying to scratch through the suit. “I can’t even get to my damned ear. Okay, put me on the catapult.”

Evan had even rigged a small launching seat.

“How long have you been contemplating this?” the rabbit asked.

“When did you board the ship?” Evan said as the clipper fell off to starboard. A ballista bolt from the oncoming ship whistled through the air with an evil hiss and poked a hole in the mainsail.

“You made this suit, this helmet and this seat in that time?” the rabbit asked. “I’m impressed.”

“No, I made the seat then,” Evan said, stepping into the launching pit. “I made the suit and the helmet when I made the flamethrower. Have fun.”

“If I end up in the drink I’m coming for you, Evan Mayerle,” the rabbit hissed as Evan timed the roll and hit the launcher.

The black blob was fired into the air and as it flew across the gap two knives appeared in its hands. It hit the mainsail of the oncoming caravel face first but the knives went through the canvas like butter and it slid downward leaving two gaping wounds in the black sail. The last that could be seen of it was as it flipped off the base of the sail and into the crowd below it. As it landed, there was an inhuman scream.

“Poor bunny,” Commander Mbeki said. “He didn’t last long.”

“I think that was whoever he landed on,” Evan said, as a spurt of flame licked upward and caught the sail. It was quickly involved and turned to ash before their eyes. “You might want to have the captain sail out of range for the time being.”

The wind was fair from the caravel and it carried the occasional sounds of screaming, pleas for help and from time to time someone leapt over the side, apparently preferring the briny deeps to whatever was going on on board. The ship had almost immediately lost way and now rocked from side to side in the waves, its helm clearly not manned.

The captain joined them and shook his head when blood started running from the scuppers.

“I’m glad he’s on our side,” the skipper commented.

“I don’t think he is,” Evan replied. “But he owed me a favor.”

“Shall we send over a prize crew?” Commander Mbeki asked. The last, badly aimed, ballista bolt had sailed off into the distance some time before.

“No…” the commander said after a moment’s thought. “I’m not sure that any sane human should see what is on board that ship.” He eyed the orcas and an occasional raylike thing that were coming up and glancing at the ship they were supposed to be following. “But I’m not sure that he should have to swim back.” There were flames licking from the aft of the craft by then and he shook his head again. “Let’s lay her alongside, near the bow, and recover our… friend.”

They jockeyed the ship over, carefully, and threw grapnels onto its bow to pull it alongside. Fire parties stood by because the aft had become fully involved, but shifted as they were that was downwind and for the time being the fire was held there.

As they pulled alongside the rabbit jumped from one ship to the other, a gap of more than three meters, which should have been impossible.

“Well,” he said brightly, taking off his helmet, “that was fun. Let’s go find me some more orcs to play with!”

“It was crewed by orcs?” Commander Mbeki asked as a division under Chief Brooks boomed the caravel away and the clipper got back under way. Some of the crew from the burning ship had climbed aboard and were lined up against the starboard rail under guard.

“No, they were their marines,” the rabbit replied, pulling off the fire-scorched black suit. “I just kept telling myself it was a cruise of telemarketers and there just didn’t seem to be enough of them. I haven’t had that much fun since the last real telemarketer died of old age. I didn’t track the bastard down until he’d keeled over from the heart attack. They said he’d seen a rabbit and that was it for him. The bastard.”

Not a sound was heard from the ship as they sailed away, leaving behind a crowd of confused orcas.

Joel had watched the entire “battle,” more of a massacre, from his battle station on the quarterdeck. He found it interesting, and instructive, that the enemy ship was there. Finding one ship at sea was not easy; as sailors said: “Lord, the sea is so large and my boat is so small.”

It was an unlikely coincidence to find one of the New Destiny fleet placed right across their path. About as likely as rounding out a busted flush on a one card draw.

Which meant that it probably wasn’t coincidence. Which meant that the vague possibility that there was an agent on board had gone from “vague possibility” to “high probability.”

Furthermore, they had known more or less the ship’s exact location and plans. That meant that the probable agent was among the officers, probably one of the primary navigational officers, either the captain, Commander Mbeki, Major Freund the navigator or one of the three lieutenants.

The rabbit was an outside possibility, as well. As an AI it could have an internal navigational system and even communications. He wished that he knew more about it, but everyone with prior experience had left with the dragons.

His hunch was still Commander Mbeki. But it was only a hunch and while he was willing to pay attention to his hunches, he wasn’t willing to concentrate on them.

He needed more information.

“Orcas approaching to port,” the masthead lookout called.

Martin had been pacing up and down the quarterdeck, waiting for word on the attack upon the UFS ship. He had spread the ships on a long line across the anticipated course of the dragon carrier and the caravels had only had occasional visual contact for the past three days. The lookout had reported possibly seeing some smoke early in the morning, but from what was impossible to determine.

Each of the ships, though, had a small pod of orcas attached. The orca sonar could transmit across significant distances and he was using that to keep in communication with the dispersed fleet. Why some were returning to his ship, however, remained to be seen.

He walked to the front of the ship and looked down at the pod that was riding in the bow wave. Suddenly he saw Shanol veer off and head in the direction of the oncoming orcas.

He waited impatiently for the leader whale to return and then walked back to the maindeck as Shanol and a smaller orca coasted to the side of the slow-moving vessel.

“What’s up, Shanol?” he asked, leaning over the side of the gently heeling caravel.

“Your ‘unarmed carrier’ just took out the ship that was in its way like it wasn’t even there,” Shanol replied.

“What could have happened?” Martin asked. “They didn’t even have the dragons with them!”

“Well, it’s pretty hard to tell from down here,” the orca leader said, sarcastically. “I had Maniillat report back in person.”

“They didn’t board or anything,” Maniillat squealed. “The carrier never got near them until the ship was already st-stopped. Some of the sailors jumped over the side but they were just screaming about a fire-breathing imp.”

“They couldn’t have summoned anything,” Martin snapped. “They don’t have the power available. The only one that might have is Talbot, and he’s already at the mer-town.”

“Well, whatever it is took your ship out and the carrier is already past your line,” Shanol replied. “What now, fearless leader?”

“Head to the mer-town,” Martin said after a moment. “Time to start phase two.”

“Yeah, well I hope phase two works out better than phase one,” Shanol replied.

“Yeah,” Maniillat squealed. “And no fire-breathing imps.”

The skipper was walking down a lower deck corridor when he saw sailors bracing themselves against the bulkhead ahead of him. He wasn’t close enough to have caused the reaction and he didn’t understand the beads of sweat on their faces until he saw the rabbit coming around a corner.

“Mr. Rabbit,” Chang said. “Just the bunny I was looking for.”

“What do you want, Spiffy?” the rabbit asked.

“I wanted to show you something,” the skipper replied, waving at him. He led the rabbit down the corridor to a locked storeroom and opened it from a ring of keys.

“The ships of the UFS Navy are dry…”

“Not something you have to tell me,” the rabbit said, bitterly. “And no alfalfa either. And your women are mostly dogs.”

“Well, I can’t help you there,” the skipper said, opening the door. Inside there was a large barrel, already tapped. He took down a half-liter pewter mug and held it under the tap until it was full. “But there are times, as the Navy recognizes, when it’s medicinal to administer a small belt. For just such occasions it maintains the means.”

He bent down and handed the mug to the rabbit, who peered into its depths suspiciously then took a sip.

“Rum, by God!” the rabbit said happily, drinking half the mug in one draught.

“High-proof rum,” the skipper noted. “Royal Navy grog to be exact. I can’t leave the room open, but if you’ll step inside I’ll come back in a couple of hours and have you carried to your bunk. You’ll forgive me if I don’t want you wandering the ship under the influence of alcohol, what with one thing and another.”

“Nah, believe it or not I’m a happy drunk,” the rabbit said. “Just let me fill up one more of these mugs and I’ll let you lock back up.” He beamed up at the skipper as he took another swig. “You know, for a stuffy son of a bitch you ain’t all bad.”

“I was thinking something similar, myself,” the skipper said.

“Don’t kid yourself,” the rabbit said, taking another swig. “I’m all bad.”

“Mistress Sheida,” Joel said to the avatar. He had chosen the cable tier for the meeting on the assumption that there were multiple exits and hardly anyone ever came down there.

“How is your mission going, Mister Travante?” Sheida asked. Her avatar looked tired, which meant it was projecting “her” current state.

“Not fun, but that’s not important,” Joel said. “We were attacked today. The ship apparently knew our estimated course, location and speed.”

“I see,” Sheida sighed. “I guess sending you out wasn’t just insurance, was it?”

“No, ma’am,” the inspector replied. “I have a suspicion who the agent is, and even a feel for motivation. Could you give me some information on Commander Owen Mbeki’s family?”

Sheida’s avatar looked distant for a moment, then shrugged.

“The usual story. A wife, Sharon, daughter Sara. No last known location but his primary residence was in Ropasa. You think New Destiny has them?”

“Given one single comment, ma’am,” Joel said, nodding. “I’d say that they have one or both and are using them as hostages.”

“What do you intend to do?”

“I need to have more proof, even for myself, than one unguarded comment, ma’am,” Joel admitted. “And I also need to know more about an AI rabbit that accompanied an elf to the ship. The attack took place after the rabbit’s arrival. And while he was instrumental in destroying the New Destiny craft, I don’t discount him being the agent.”

“That rabbit, he is a scamp, isn’t he?” Sheida said with a faint grin. “I’d love to hear more of the story at another time. He’s another distinct possibility,” she added with a frown. “I’ll give you two items,” she continued, holding out her hand and floating a pair of disks across the compartment to him. “I can ken those with very little power usage. Place them in strategic locations. If an avatar appears near them but not in the same room they’ll indicate direction when you touch them. If an avatar has appeared in the room, they will record the conversation. Will that do?”

“Perfectly,” Joel said, pocketing the disks.

“What do you intend to do?” Sheida asked. “Take the information to Duke Edmund?”

“The duke is currently at the mer-town,” Joel told her. “We’re sailing there at the moment. But, no, I don’t intend to do that. With your concurrence, as soon as I’m sure who the leak is I’ll take action. If it’s the rabbit we will have to act quickly and decisively; he is a dangerous AI. If it is the commander I intend to turn him.”

“What do you mean by that?” Sheida asked warily.

“It is often useful to let an enemy think they have perfect intelligence,” Joel replied. “I would suggest that the commander be moved to a very important shore post where he can pick up various useful items of information. Most of them relatively low level, as, frankly, the movement of this ship is. But from time to time he’ll forward important bits of information that are higher level. Some of them will be real information that we don’t mind the other side having. I’m sure there are things that you wished you knew that New Destiny knew.”

“Indeed,” Sheida said, her eyes narrowing.

“Other things will be carefully crafted falsehoods. Carefully crafted because you don’t want to burn an agent that good.”

Sheida frowned. “And I certainly don’t want to ‘burn’ his wife and daughter.”

Joel paused and shrugged after a moment. “The time may come when that choice has to be made. The preference is to ensure the safety of the agent and their close kin. For example, if we catch someone that they don’t want to lose, and if the commander has lost his utility, we could attempt to trade ‘their’ person for ours. But, sometimes, you have to cut your losses. If it meant harm to Commander Mbeki’s family to prevent, oh, Paul winning the war, would you do it?”

Sheida frowned and shook her head. “I hate questions like that.”

“You need to think about them, ma’am.” Joel shrugged, his face hard. “I certainly do. Several times a day.”

“Still no word on your wife and daughter,” Sheida said, sadly. “I take it you haven’t ‘heard’ anything.”

“No, ma’am,” Joel replied. “But if I do, you’ll be the second person to know.”