Rising Tides

CHAPTER 13

North of Tjilatjap (Chill-chaap)

T he expedition’s first task had been to clear off just enough of Santa Catalina to construct a camp for those who’d be remaining, and then hoist their tools and equipment aboard. The heavy work was accomplished with the old ship’s own cargo booms and plenty of hard labor by men and dozens of ’Cats, heaving on lines with a high-ratio block-and-tackle. Once there was nothing left on the barges that some monster might eat, they were sent back downriver for more supplies, equipment, and personnel. The ship was an ungodly mess. Her decks were tangled with roots and vines, and some had even gained purchase between the very planks. There were nasty, biting insects, and feces of every imaginable shape, smell, and consistency was smeared all over everything. A large proportion was lizard-bird droppings, but a lot-perhaps most-was from something else, bigger, that dumped turds the size of ostrich eggs. Either whatever left those things rolling around pooped more than anything had a right to or there were a bunch of them.

That first night they camped with a heavy guard. They’d closed every hatch leading to the interior of the ship they could find, so hopefully all they had to worry about was creatures from the water or shore. They couldn’t build an open fire, of course, but Lemurian tinsmiths had come a long way with directional gri-kakka oil lamps, inspired by the shape of Navy battle lanterns. Plenty of these were rigged facing outward. They’d brought a gas-powered generator, based on one of the four-cylinder airplane engines, and intended to eventually power some of Santa Catalina ’s lights if they weren’t too corroded.

Plenty of spooky, ill-defined things crept around in the dark that night, and nobody really got any sleep. Nothing attacked them, though, except bugs, some of which had a painful sting. Unlike the giant “gekkogator” (Isak, of all people, coined the name, in honor of the Philippine geckos he remembered), they were familiar with most of the insects. As for the shadowy creatures that lurked and screeched indignantly just beyond the lights, Chapelle was still inclined to leave things alone as long as things left them alone. The benign visitations probably wouldn’t last. Their presence couldn’t be welcome, and once they started clearing the ship properly, they were bound to aggravate the various denizens that had claimed it as their home.

With the dawn, the clearing began in earnest. Work parties, flanked by armed Marines, hacked away the vines that seemed to clutch the ship to the shore. One Marine blew a splintered gash in the wooden deck with a musket ball when he saw the first snake any of them, ’Cat or human, had ever seen on this world. In his initial panic, he missed the snake, but then managed to poke it with his bayonet and pitch the writhing thing over the side. It was colored kind of like a coral snake, with purple, orange, and lime green instead of yellow, red, white, and black. Several spectators gathered and watched it try to swim to shore. When it was almost there, something slick-skinned, like a catfish, but blotchycolored with bulging eyes, rose and gulped it down.

Other parties started clearing the ship’s decks, and Major Mallory was having kittens to get a look inside the large crates arranged there. All the containers were about six feet wide by ten feet tall, but some were thirty-five feet long, and others forty. They were darkened with mold, and roots had invaded a few seams, but even after all this time they were largely intact. Even the one Gilbert said he and Commodore Ellis had cracked open to identify the contents didn’t appear to have deteriorated appreciably. Having seen crates just like these at Pearl Harbor before he’d shipped for Java, and then again aboard the old Langley, Ben knew exactly what was in each one. If it was possible, his excitement only grew. He was like a kid staring at the presents under the tree, waiting for his parents to wake up on Christmas Day.

“Hurry up, fellas,” he murmured now and then to the party that was clearing debris from around the once opened crate, not really caring if they heard him or not. When that box and the one just next to it were completely exposed, and the deck around them was clear and swept, leaving only the damp, dark, mushy wood, he finally advanced on the crate with a wrecking bar. Ellis had opened it carefully before, and once he discovered what was inside, he’d closed it up as best he could. To Ben, it looked like the seam had survived okay. If anything, the constant humidity might have swelled the crate even more tightly shut. He hoped so, anyway. He jammed the wrecking bar between the reinforcing planks and then drove it in deeper with a heavy mallet somebody handed him. He soon had a gap, and he worked the iron bar up and down, wrenching the nails from their holes.

He didn’t want to damage the crate too much. One way or the other, he’d decided he wasn’t leaving this place without its contents, but regardless of how he managed it, the salvage party would eventually have to offload the crates and so they needed to be structurally sound. He decided to use the same method Ellis had before, simply pry one panel away far enough to form a gap he could squeeze through. Gilbert appeared at his elbow, offering advice on how they’d done it before. He also brought one of the lanterns and set it down protectively beside him, implying that he intended to get a look inside this time as well. With a final, rending scree! the left panel released enough to allow one of the’Cats to hold it aside for them. Mallory knocked a few of the nails out, just as Ellis had done before, and after the slightest, rueful hesitation, allowed Gilbert to precede him into the crate.

“Je-hoshaphat, there she is,” came the muffled exclamation. “First time I seen one o’ these babies since those stupid Army A-A goons guardin’ Cavite shot one down by mistake. Like that really looks like a goddamn Zee-ro!” Unable to contain himself any longer, Ben shoved his way through as well. Inside the crate, the air smelled musty, and there was definitely some mildew, but the strong scent of fresh wood, oily steel, aluminum, new rubber, and fresh paint still predominated. Gilbert was flashing the lantern in all directions, almost spastically, creating a kaleidoscope of images. He seemed most intent on surveying the dark reaches of the crate to ensure that no vermin waited to spring at them.

“Here,” Ben said, snatching the lantern, “give me that!” He focused the flickering beam on the nearest shape and experienced a sense of almost religious joy. Dark grease still covered a bright steel prop shaft. More surface rust than Ellis had probably seen when he was there had taken hold where the grease was thin, but it wasn’t nearly as bad as he’d feared when he saw the ship. For this crate at least, the expedition seemed to have arrived just in time. Any longer and the roots would have opened it to the salt air and the tropical rains and heat; just a few weeks of such exposure would have ruined everything. He knew some of the crates in the hold were actually in the water and the submerged aluminum and steel would be corroded beyond repair, but some spare parts would be salvageable. Maybe even more than that. Regardless, a huge grin split his bearded face as he gazed at the shiny Curtiss green color, the flared exhaust stacks, the distinctive intake and lack of nose-mounted guns that confirmed the fuselage as that of a P-40E-the most advanced fighter he’d ever flown-instead of a B, which had still been the more common aircraft.

He knew the P-40s, and especially the Es, had been getting a bad rep out of the Philippines, but they were heavier than the Bs, and the guys there had just received them when the war started and hadn’t had time to get used to them. He’d flown both, and knew the E was better. Hell, Claire Chennault’s AVG had been kicking Jap ass with Bs in China, while The poor guys in The Philippines were cracking up more planes Trying To Take off and land in clouds of dust Than They were losing in combat. He stroked the intake fairing like he might caress a woman’s chin. They just weren’t used To Them. They’d never had a chance. He took a piece of chalk out of his pocket that he’d brought to mark the crates and drew something on the plane.

“What’s that?” Gilbert asked.

“An M.”

“What’s it for?”

Ben shrugged. “M for ‘Mallory.’ M for ‘mine.’ Whichever. But that’s my plane!”

Ben didn’t open any more crates that day as the clearing proceeded, but he did find a couple that were damaged and he marked them accordingly. Presumably those would need the quickest attention when they were offloaded to determine if they could be salvaged as planes or parts. By midafternoon, most of the ship’s upper works were cleared, and the work party almost wished they’d waited, since the sun beat down on them unmercifully. Chapelle was right, though. Once they went belowdecks, they didn’t want to leave any hiding places up top for anything they flushed from below. Hopefully, if they encountered anything and it made it past them, it would see the lack of cover and abandon the ship for the water or the jungle. After all the ruckus and banging around they’d done during the day, they expected something akin to a disturbed hornet’s nest when they cracked the hatches, so everyone was prepared for anything when the first party entered the superstructure.

To their surprise, nothing flushed out of the pilothouse, radio shack, or the officers’ quarters but a few of the “lizard bats” Gilbert had told them to expect. The interior furnishings were considerably more deteriorated than when he’d been there before, but as they cleared away the rubbish and filth, they discovered a number of useful items. They’d taken some long guns with them after their first visit, mostly civilian models, but all worthwhile specimens for Bernie Sandison’s guys to look at for ideas. This time they discovered a few handguns in drawers or other places that were in various stages of preservation. There was an old Mauser that something had dropped a turd right on top of and Chapelle was tempted to just throw it over the side. It was so badly corroded, he doubted it could even be disassembled. Laney found a pitted but serviceable 1911 Colt between a pair of rotting mattresses and Chapelle said he could keep it. The real prize, from a technical, and perhaps sentimental perspective, was a nickel-plated single-action Colt “Frontier Six Shooter,” in. 44-40 caliber, that they found wrapped in oilcloth inside what was probably the captain’s desk. Chapelle figured it would make a good pattern for simple revolvers they could make at Baalkpan, as well as a fitting gift for Captain Reddy. The Skipper was a Texan, after all.

The ship’s radio equipment was all badly corroded, but some of the components were probably salvageable. Riggs and Rodriguez would be happy just to get their hands on the resisters and capacitors. Even Bakelite knobs and insulators would be welcome. A work party entered a large compartment in the aft superstructure, just at deck level, that Gilbert said they’d never explored during their brief prior visit. Chapelle was summoned and Mallory joined him in what appeared to be a dining room or lounge of some sort. As a freighter, Santa Catalina would have had at least limited accommodations for passengers. With her cargo of aircraft, she’d probably been transporting air crews, and possibly ground crews, for the planes. The earlier expedition had been unable to even speculate upon the fate of those people or the crew of the ship. The presence of firearms, still locked in a cabinet, argued that not only had no one ever made it off the ship, but they hadn’t even known they were in danger before “something” got them. Now a little better explanation emerged.

“Say,” Russ said, looking around the ruined lounge, “that solves one mystery, anyway.”

In the center of the compartment, partially concealed beneath overturned chairs, rotting rugs, and the detritus of marauding denizens, were a number of short, still vaguely olive-drab crates. A ’Cat kicked one open; inside was nothing but a heap of crinkled brown wax paper.

“Tommy gun boxes,” Ben observed. “Ten each. And there’s four crates that size. That’s about right. These other boxes had ammo and twenty round sticks in ’em.”

“So they left,” Russ said. “Well armed. No wonder they left the civvy stuff. You know? I bet those poor guys pulled in here, ship taking water, and figured their navigation was off. They might’ve thought they missed Tjilatjap somehow and went up some other river. Maybe they set out to reach where they thought it was overland and… just didn’t find it.”

Ben gestured around. “It doesn’t look like they came back, so either they found someplace better to hole up, or something did get them.” He sighed. “Either way, at least they weren’t helpless!”

“Yeah,” Russ agreed. “Somehow that makes me feel better too. Say, I wonder if there’s any more of those tommy gun boxes around. If they were freighting them in to Java to fight the Japs, I bet they would’ve had more than four crates!”

By the end of the day, the ship’s upper works and most of her superstructure had been cleared away and Chapelle thought the Santa Catalina looked like a new ship. Well, not a new ship, of course, but certainly a different one. She was utterly hideous with rust and most of her deck was already badly rotted, but she did look like a ship again instead of just a bump in the jungle. They’d exhumed several machine guns, a five-inch dual-purpose, and a three-inch antiaircraft gun, but all had been disabled, probably by the crew before they left. The cannon’s breechblocks were missing and the bolts had been removed from the machine guns. Maybe the missing parts were hidden aboard, but it didn’t really matter. All the guns were badly corroded.

Gilbert, Isak, and Laney had poked their heads below during the day, accompanied by a heavy guard. Much remained as it had been when Gilbert was there before. The forward hold was a little more flooded and the aft hold was full to the outside water level. The engine room had more water in the bilge, but nothing serious seemed submerged. The fireroom was still full up to the bottom of the boilers. The entire salvage crew moved into the now cleared but still moldy and reeking lounge and the hallway beyond, except for two squad-size guards left outside to provide security for their generators, pumps, and other heavy equipment. It seemed like a good idea. Since all the internal hatches closed, nothing could get to them from below, and they should have plenty of warning if anything tried to crawl aboard. With nearly everyone together as the sun began to set, Chapelle decided it was a good time to determine their next course of action.

They’d arrived prepared for three possibilities. The one Mallory favored at first hadn’t involved any restorative work to the ship itself, beyond possibly getting her cargo cranes operating again. They were steam-powered, and despite the flooding it looked like they could probably return the boilers to their duty. He’d envisioned using most of Tolson ’s crew to clear an airstrip in the jungle and simply setting the crates over the side, assembling the planes, and flying them out. There were several logistical problems with that plan, not least of which being that he was the only one who knew how to fly a P-40. The other pilots he’d brought along would require extensive training just to get one of the hot ships off the ground. They’d also discovered that, of the twenty-eight planes aboard Santa Catalina, only twelve of the crates were actually in the water. It depended a lot on which ones they were-for example, if they were all fuselage or all wing crates, that was twelve planes that were almost surely write-offs to start with. If they were evenly distributed, that could mean only six were ruined. Then there were the extra engine crates, the tires, spare propellers and drop tanks… There was just too much to leave behind, even if all his pilots could fly. Best case, they’d probably get four planes out and flown to Baalkpan, and then have to ferry the pilots all the way back to Chill-chaap. Even if they managed to salvage only sixteen planes, the process might take months. The final coup de grace was administered to that plan when Ben went ashore and inspected the ground.

“What’s the deal?” Chapelle asked.

“There’s no way, that’s what the deal is. Look, even if the ground was flat enough-which it’s not-and even if we could clear enough of the jungle-which I don’t think we can-the dirt here will never make an airstrip. Even if we had heavy equipment, bulldozers, rollers, you name it, there’s nothing to pack down but a billion years of rotten loam. Even if you could pack it down hard enough to get a plane off, it would rut the stuff up so bad you’d have to start all over for the next one.”

“So basically that’s out?”

“Afraid so,” Ben replied. “The only interesting thing we found was a bunch of crunched-up ’Cat bones with a few weapons lying around.” He looked at Gilbert. “Didn’t you fellas turn Rasik-Alcas loose near here?” Gilbert nodded. “Well, it doesn’t look like he made it very far.”

“A shockin’ tragidee,” Gilbert said matter-of-factly. “An’ he was such a nice fella too. I s’pect ol’ Rolak an’ Queen Maraan’ll be plumb heartbroke ta learn o’ his dee-mise.”

Nearly everyone looked at Gilbert. Most had never suspected the “mouse” was capable of such… profound sarcasm. He returned their stares with raised eyebrows. “Hey,” he said, “he was alive an’ happy as a clam last time I seen him. What’s his name, Koratin, put him ashore with food an’ weapons. He didn’t kill-eem either.”

“Well… anyway,” Chapelle continued, “that leaves us with Plan B. We offload the crates onto barges and float them downriver. You say they’re about four tons apiece? We should be able to put two crates, a complete plane, aboard Tolson, and take it to Baalkpan. Certainly not my first choice either because of the time involved, not to mention I’m not positive we can even hoist them aboard. The heaviest thing we’ve ever lifted is cannons. The crates weigh a little over half again as much. Then there’s the trim to consider. The ship’ll be top-heavy as hell.”

“Yeah. I’m not keen on that one for a lot of reasons,” Mallory agreed. “It might be quicker than building an airstrip and flying them out two or three or four at a time, but it’s even more dangerous to a lot more people.”

“So that pretty much leaves us with Plan C,” Chapelle said, looking speculatively around the compartment at the others present, mostly’Cats. They had the manpower and the knowledge to do the job. Most of those present had been involved in salvaging Walker, and there were a lot more workers still with the squadron waiting to come upriver. But it would be dangerous. His gaze settled on the Mice and Laney. It would be up to them, and Lieutenant Monk when he arrived, to figure out if it was mechanically feasible. “We refloat the ship and steam the whole damn thing the hell out of here.”

That night the “natives” grew restless. They’d been restless the night before, but hadn’t been prepared to do anything about it. The weird creatures with glowing things had slain the Great Mother, after all, so surely they were stronger than they appeared. The death of the Great Mother frightened them, but stirred no desire for revenge; another female would eventually rise to take her place out of necessity. None ever aspired to, for those that bred grew to such proportions they could never leave the water again except to lay eggs. Besides, she couldn’t help but eat her young just as readily as any other predator, so her social life was inevitably somewhat limited.

No, the natives were not particularly angry, though the strangers had disturbed their repose. But during the day, while they swam the shallows, hunting mud-grubbers, walking birds, bugs, and small shore creatures, the visitors didn’t go away. The natives assumed they would. Some were old enough to remember the strangers that had brought the Warren to this place. They had looked much like some of those now here and They had gone away. Others that came later went away as well. It was expected that these would also leave. Instead, in a single day these had completely remodeled their cozy home! They’d destroyed much long and careful labor; the redirection of vines and limbs that had ultimately formed the lush, comfortable, life-sustaining canopy that allowed the natives to move about upon the surface of their Warren even while the moisture-sucking orb traversed the empty sky. That did anger them, and collectively they decided they must make these strangers go. Or destroy them. Besides, perhaps they tasted good.

Moe heard something. Kind of a slurp-thump in the gloom. None of the other guards nearby seemed to have noticed, but then they hadn’t spent their entire lives listening to the dark, straining to hear things that would eat them. They were good warriors, he knew that. Show them something to fight and they would do well. But they were often far too “civilized” to notice things on their own. He heard the sound again and tensed, more firmly grasping the musket he’d been given. He liked the musket for the dark. It didn’t reload much faster than his heavy crossbow, but the wicked bayonet on the end might be quite handy. He strained his ears and heard more slurp-thumps in quick succession. Numerous… things were coming aboard, and they weren’t coming to stare. The sounds the night before had possessed a tentative, skittish quality. These were deliberately stealthy, purposeful. He knew the difference well. One was the sound of uncertainty, fear. The sound of prey. This was the sound of a predator.

Quietly, he hissed, drawing the attention of the other guards. “Show no fear. Move slow, but not scared-like. Stand-to careful.”

Lieutenant Bekiaa-Sab-At nodded and motioned for the others to rise. The guard here consisted of 2nd Squad, with six Marines-not counting Moe and herself. They were basically protecting the doorway to the lounge, while 4th Squad was forward, guarding the equipment just aft of the fo’c’sle. “Bayonets fixed?” she whispered. “Very well. Slowly bring your cartridge boxes around to the front. You two”-she gestured at a couple of Marines-“pick up a couple of lanterns, but don’t point them aft until I give the word. Also, no one is to fire without orders. Understood? ”

There were nods, and the Marines hefted the lanterns almost casually. Bekiaa noted that one was shaking just a little. “Mr… ah, Moe?” she asked. No one knew what Moe’s real name was-least of all Moe. Before Silva started calling him that, he’d simply been known as “the Hunter.”

Moe nodded.

“Now!” Bekiaa said.

The Marines pointed the directional lanterns aft, and the first thing Bekiaa saw was a swarm of bright yellow eyes that not only reflected the light but almost seemed to intensify it. There was a collective shriek that sounded like the big circular saw at the Baalkpan shipyard hitting a knot, and slim, webbed, almost grotesquely clawed hands moved to protect the brilliant eyes. The whole aft part of the ship was working with the things! She couldn’t see much, but they were shaped like a cross between the huge monster they’d killed the day before and some kind of furless, slimy-skinned Grik! They weren’t as large as Grik-they didn’t seem quite as big as she was-but they’d gathered with sufficient stealth that clearly even Moe hadn’t caught on for a while.

“What do we do, Lieuten-aant?” a Marine nervously asked.

“Hold your fire!” The things had recoiled from the light and for the moment just stood there, blinking huge eyelids. Her own vision was clearing a little. The sudden glare of the lanterns and the even brighter yellow orbs had left afterimages swimming through her sight. Like Grik, she concluded, but not. Webbed feet and hands; a longer, slimmer tail with something like a fin down its back. Their coloring was dark, with lighter splotches, and they weren’t as heavily muscled as Grik. Their handclaws were even longer, as she’d first observed, but their teeth not as wicked.

“What are we going to do?” the Marine demanded again.

“I don’t know!” Bekiaa almost shouted. The creatures stirred at her harsh voice, but didn’t advance.

“I think, of a sudden, they not know either,” Moe said.

Bekiaa took a deep breath and advanced a single step. “Hello,” she said, hoping her voice was firm but nonthreatening. The creatures babbled excitedly among themselves in a croaking, grunting gibberish, punctuated with high-pitched exclamations.

“Maker!” Bekiaa hissed. “I wish Mister Braad-furd was here!”

The door behind them opened suddenly, and Dean Laney came out, groggy eyed, already fumbling with his belt. Apparently he’d been awakened by a call of nature. Noticing that the guard was all silent and standing, he looked aft at the scene illuminated by the lantern. “Jumpin’ Jesus!” he practically squealed as he pulled his “new”. 45 from his pocket.

“No, Laay-nee!” Bekiaa yelled.

“Help!” Laney screeched over his shoulder, at the lounge. “There’s Grik-toads takin’ over the ship!”

“No!” Bekiaa screamed again, just as Laney began firing as fast as he could pull the trigger.

Lieutenant Bekiaa-Sab-At was a veteran of fierce fighting; she had to be to have become a Marine officer. She’d never led before, however, beyond an NCO level. She’d never been “in charge.” Still, she knew Captain Chapelle would back her up regardless of her decision, and she couldn’t possibly screw things up any worse than Laney had just done. Over the next eternally long split seconds, she contemplated several alternatives. With Laney’s shots, several of the creatures fell writhing on the deck and quite a few others simply leaped over the side in panic. Most seemed stunned. A few crouched and advanced purposefully, either armed just with their amazingly long, curved claws or clutching a stone or jagged piece of bone.

Feeling the heft of the musket in her hands, she was sorely tempted to shoot Laney down, or at least bayonet him… a little. She’d established that the creatures could communicate among themselves, and she might have been able to make some kind of nonviolent contact with them. If they saw her kill or wound the one who’d harmed some of them, the… opportunity… she’d sensed might be restored. That was a serious gamble. It was obvious the creatures had come to kill them. Only discovery and the bright lights had given them pause. Maybe a hasty defensive formation, strengthened by the others as they awakened and emerged from the lounge would work? Perhaps the creatures would respect the threat and the reluctance to harm more of them implied by that? Impossible. That would leave the work group backed up against the superstructure with dwindling options. There was no telling how many of the things there were, how many more might come, the longer this confrontation lasted. If they could climb the hull-how did they do that?-they could climb amidships too, and drop on them from above.

A ragged volley from forward cinched her decision. Mere seconds after Laney’s shots, they were coming over the bow as well. It no longer really mattered what difference Laney’s shots had made, if any. The expedition to recover Santa Catalina now had an enemy all its own.

“Marines!” she shouted. “Pre-sent! Take care not to hit the crates,” she reminded them. The first attackers, still visible in the light of the lanterns that had hastily been set on the deck, were only a few strides away. “Fire!” Tongues of flame stabbed out from the muskets and the building charge shattered under the onslaught of eight loads of “buck and ball” and a sudden cloud of choking smoke. Bodies flopped on the deck and writhed and thudded with spastic, distinct, fishlike sounds. An eerie groan swept through the attackers and more splashes were heard as others abandoned the fight. “Mister Laay-nee, get back inside,” Bekiaa ordered. “No one is to come out in ones and twos. They must form squads of at least six or more and come out together. Everyone at once would be nice. Send squads to relieve the forward guard as well. We cannot let them inside.” Forgetting Laney, she turned back to the front.

“Reload!”

“What the hell’s going on out there?” Chapelle demanded when Laney staggered, wide-eyed, back into the lounge. Lanterns were being lit and Marines and Navy salvage workers were snatching weapons and clambering for the door.

“Monsters!” Laney declared. “Slimy, toadlike, Grik-lookin’ bastards! There must be thousands of ’em!” They heard muffled firing from forward. “Oh, yeah, that ’Cat Marine said to send help to the other guards. They’re attackin’ all over the ship!” Amazingly, the big man seemed close to panic. “God a’mighty, all I wanted was a whiz over the side!”

Isak and Gilbert appeared, grimly holding two of the long, heavy Krags they always bitched about, and Ben had his pistol and an ’03 Springfield.

“You, Gilbert, go forward with Jannik-Fas and two squads of Marines.” Russ said. “They may need your help with a repeating rifle.” Another volley crashed outside, punctuated by weird cries. “Isak, you come with me and the rest of the Marines.”

“What about me?” Ben asked angrily.

“You stay out of it, hear? This whole trip’s for nothing if you get yourself killed! Know anybody else that can fly a P-40? You stay back with the rest of the Navy ’Cats. Send a runner forward with Gilbert. You’ll have to send reserves wherever they’re needed.”

“Goddamn it, Russ!”

“Just do as you’re told, flyboy.” Chapelle grinned. “Everybody knows you got plenty of guts. You can break your neck later in an airplane, and it’s none of my business. Right now you’re my responsibility!” He looked around. There were about seventeen with him, not counting Isak and Laney. Laney had an ’03 now, bayonet fixed. “Let’s go!”

They poured out the door yelling like fiends, just as Bekiaa, Moe, and the four remaining outside Marines charged, bloody bayonets lowered. Russ and his reinforcements flowed around her, firing independently as soon as their front was clear. Russ immediately saw that there weren’t “thousands” of the bizarre creatures, as Laney said, but there were more than a hundred. Quite a few lay dead, and a steady trickle of the remainder was jumping over the side, but a cohesive mass was still fighting determinedly, even in the face of their assault. If they were similar to Grik in other ways, they apparently didn’t panic en masse.

Russ fired his Springfield, careful of his shots in the dark with the precious ammunition. One of the creatures he’d thought was dead suddenly latched onto his foot with a long, sticky tongue, and he shook his leg violently as a primal revulsion coursed through him. He stabbed down with his bayonet, pinning the thing’s head to the deck, and finally managed to pry his foot free.

“Watch out for their damn tongues!” he warned, perhaps a little shrilly. “They’re just like the one that big monster had!”

“EEEE W W W W W!” squealed Isak, as he started jumping in circles. He’d stepped on an entirely dead tongue that had glued his shoe to the deck.

Laney shoved him forward, out of his shoe and back into the press. “This ain’t no time for ballerina tryouts, you nitwit!” he growled. Apparently he’d gotten over his own initial shock.

The weight of the attack, and possibly the unexpected violence and remorselessness of it all, not to mention the now steady hail of bullets that shredded bodies far beyond the natives’ ability to inflict any harm, backed the dwindling horde of slimy creatures up onto the fantail. They continued to resist, slashing at bayonets with their unnaturally long handclaws with an almost metallic shkink sound, but the steady fire and the bristling wall of bayonets kept those foreclaws from reaching much flesh. Russ did see one of the creatures dart its tongue out and snatch a musket right from the hands of a Marine-and then drive the bayonet through its own head when the tongue retracted. It was probably the most bizarre thing he’d ever seen, and he imagined the macabre humor of the image would stay with him the rest of his days.

From within the milling mass, a thrumming bellow arose, like the steady roar of a thousand frogs. The creatures fighting on the fantail seemed to pay it no heed, but suddenly there was firing from the direction of the lounge again! Behind them! Chapelle risked a glance, and there was Ben Mallory with about twenty Navy ’Cats armed with muskets, shooting at more of the monsters trying to clear the rail.

“Son of a bitch!” Russ murmured. “They sucked us in and tried to flank us!” He raised his voice. “Bekiaa, keep up the pressure! We got company!”

Lieutenant Bekiaa also risked a glance. “We will. Take that damn Laay-nee and a couple Marines. We can spare them here, but those things must not get between us!”

Russ pushed another stripper clip full of. 30-06 shells into his rifle’s magazine. The clip fell away and he closed the bolt. “Yeah,” he said. “C’mon, Laney!”

Together with two lightly wounded Marines, reloading as they ran, Russ and Laney sprinted around the wide cargo hatch and the big crates cradled upon it. Yellow eyes peeked over the rail in front of him and Russ fired low, between them. The eyes disappeared. As he neared, Russ saw that Ben and his reserves were doing essentially the same thing. Few of the creatures were reaching the deck, and those that did died almost instantly. Ben was firing carefully, aiming his pistol with every round, each shot pitching one of the creatures backward as soon as it showed itself.

“I thought I told you to stay out of it!” Russ said breathlessly.

“I did stay out of it,” Ben replied. “As long as possible. I decided I was perfectly happy to let you deal with these nasty frog-lizards, or whatever the hell they are.” He fired again. “It isn’t possible now. Sneaky bastards tried to come up from below! They undogged the hatches, Russ! I’ve got some guys watching them now, but it came as a hell of a surprise. I also sent half the reserves forward when I saw what they were trying to pull back here.” He shook his head. “A hell of a thing. They aren’t running either, not like Grik, and they don’t really even have weapons. God help us if the Grik ever learn to fight like this!”

“God help us tonight!” Russ replied.

Ben shook his head. “They’re about done, I think. Their scheme didn’t work, and isn’t going to. If they’re as smart as I’m afraid they are, they’ll figure that out pretty quick. Back here, we’re just killing them.”

Ben was right. A few moments later, the thrumming roar sounded again from aft, followed by another one forward. No more heads appeared over the bulwarks, and toward the fantail they heard almost continuous splashes as the creatures there suddenly jumped over the side. Ben dropped the magazine out of his Colt and pushed down on the remaining cartridges with his thumb. Taking a few loose rounds from his pocket, he refilled the magazine and shoved it back into the pistol. Only his slightly trembling fingers betrayed the fact that he’d been nervous at all. Flipping the thumb safety up, he dropped the pistol back in its holster. “It was a tough fight, Maw, but we won,” he said softly.

Bekiaa, Isak, and Bekiaa’s remaining Marines slowly, carefully, worked their way back across the corpse-strewn deck. Only now, in the light of more lanterns, could Russ see that nearly all of them were at least lightly wounded. God, he thought, I hope Those damn Things’ claws aren’t poisonous!

“Double the guard for the remainder of the night,” Russ said. “No wounded, though. If you even got a scratch, get it looked at now. Pass the word.” He sighed. “First priority tomorrow is getting the generator up and running; power every bulb on this bucket we can get to light up! We need to send a message to Tolson too. Tell them we need reinforcements and the rest of our salvage crew…” He paused. “But what if those slimy devils gang up on the barges? Hell. Lieutenant Monk’ll be in charge of the next bunch. He’ll have to make sure they’re ready for anything, that’s all.”

“What about the wounded, Cap-i-taan Chaapelle?” Bekiaa asked.

“I already said I want them looked at,” Russ repeated tiredly.

“No, I mean the ‘enemy’ wounded.”

“Maybe somebody ought’a throw some water on ’em,” Gilbert said, looking at the half dozen “frog-lizards” gasping in the meager shade offered by one of the crates. “They’re gonna dry out like a smushed toad in the road.”

Isak shrugged. “Let ’em. Nasty bastards!” Isak was missing a patch from his scruffy beard on the left side of his face, courtesy of one of the sticky tongues the night before. He also had a bandage around his left hand where a couple of claws had “barely” touched him. He hadn’t even felt the “scratch,” but it nearly severed two of the tendons in his hand. A little polta paste and the company corpsman, or “corpscat”-whatever-had absolutely, positively assured him he’d be okay. Maybe. Twenty-odd Marines had worse injuries, and three had died. Two of the dead would be burnt in the Lemurian way. One would be buried, the “Navy” way, per his dying wish. All their names would be added to the growing tablet monument on the parade ground in Baalkpan. The dead frog-lizards had been thrown over the side.

“What’re you two doin’ here?” Laney snarled. “I been lookin’ all over for ya. We gotta raise steam today and check for leaks.”

“You ain’t my boss no more, Laney,” Isak declared. “Lieutenant Monk’s over all of us. Far as I’m concerned, until he gets here-today, I hope-we’re on ‘official terms’ only. I don’t even gotta talk to you ’cept in the line o’ dooty.”

“This is duty, you moron. Cap’n Chapelle’s orders. ’Sides, we’re all still snipes, and I’m King Snipe… unless you want to strike for the job.”

Isak took a step back. Laney probably had a hundred pounds on him. “I ain’t goin’ down there where them tongue-grabbin’ buggers can get me,” he insisted. He held up his hand. “And besides, my best flipper’s wounded.”

“Since when are you left-handed? Don’t worry about it. A squad o’ Marines has already been below, checking stuff out.” He grinned savagely. “Found some more crates of them tommy guns too. Anyway, all the frog-lizards is gone-and there weren’t none in the fireroom anyway.”

They heard a splash near the “prisoners” and turned to see that someone else had had the same idea as Gilbert. Chapelle, Bekiaa, Jannik, Moe, and Sammy were standing near the dripping prisoners. Mallory was there too, but keeping his distance. Probably under orders. He had his pistol out, though.

“Oh, well,” Isak sighed. “Since I ain’t gonna get to watch them bastards desiccate, I might as well get some work done.”

“Now what?” Bekiaa asked.

“You said you got the ‘feeling’ you might have communicated with them last night. Somehow. What made you think that?”

“I don’t know if I ‘thought’ it, really,” Bekiaa replied. Her tail twitched irritation, but from her blinks Chapelle knew she was irritated with herself. “Whatever it was, the feeling was gone as soon as Laay-nee started shooting.”

“Shooting make no difference,” Moe said. “They come to kill, not talk. No can talk. They come all over ship. Even we talk to these”-he indicated the area aft where his group had fought-“we not talk to others… ah… for-ord.”

“He’s right,” Chapelle said. “Maybe you startled them, or even got the group aft wondering a little, but they hit the guards forward at the same time. One way or another, the fight was on. There was nothing you could have done. They did come to kill us.” He paused, looking at the creatures. The dark color he’d noticed the night before was a brownish purple and the light was a yellowish orange. Weird, but probably well suited to the dingy water they lived in. They wore no clothes and had no implements, no ornaments of any kind. There was no physical evidence that they harbored any intelligence whatsoever. But last night they’d employed what could have been a damned effective tactic, and their “operation” had been well coordinated. “Throw some more water on them,” he said, and when it was done, he watched the creatures’ reactions closely. Four of the six didn’t seem badly injured, and they continued staring at him with their weird, almost fluorescent eyes, but it seemed to him that the water did give them some relief. They weren’t gasping as much, anyway.

“I wonder,” Russ said quietly. There were still a few dead monsters on the fo’c’sle that hadn’t been dumped yet. He called for one. When it arrived, carried between two disgust-blinking Marines, he had them lay it down in front of the prisoners. They showed no reaction, but of course there were several weapons pointed at them. “Jannik,” Russ said, “I want you to poke your sword in that thing’s tongue and make it flop around. Make it look like it’s striking.”

Jannik looked at him and blinked, but then did as he was told.

“Ben, shoot it in the head.”

For a moment, Mallory didn’t think he’d heard right, then he grinned. As soon as Jannik stepped back, he blasted away one of the still dully glowing eyes. The report of the pistol and what it did to the corpse caused the creatures to flinch, but that was all.

“Now, Jannik, grab its arm and make like it’s clawing the deck.” He did so, understanding beginning to dawn. Again, after he’d done it for a moment, Russ had Ben shoot it again, nearly blowing the dead skull apart this time.

Taking a breath, Russ pulled his own pistol out and pointed it at the creatures. He took a couple of steps forward, within easy range of their tongues, and squatted down to face them.

“Are you nuts?” Ben exclaimed, pointing his Colt, ready to fire if any of them even twitched.

“I think I know what I’m doing,” Russ said. Still staring into the closest huge yellow eyes, he pointed the pistol away. For an instant, while the thing’s eyes followed the pistol, he figured he’d just committed suicide, but then the eyes came back to rest on his and he knew it understood. “Well,” he said, a little shakily. “Bring some polta paste. Sammy, let them see you smear some on your arm before you try to put any on them.”

“You think they’ll let him?” Ben asked. Sammy was clearly keenly interested in his answer as well.

“Yeah. Like I said, let them see you put it on your wound, then point at one of theirs. Do it slow and gentle. Easy does it.”

“Easy does it, you betcha!” Sammy said sincerely.

After the wounded creatures were successfully doctored, Ben stepped over to Chapelle. “So. Now what? We’ve gotten them to let us smear some ooze on their oozy skins. You think that’ll make a difference?”

“No.” Russ shrugged. “I don’t know. It would to me, but we can’t think like that. Look, I ain’t a philosopher, I’m just a torpedoman at heart. You’re the one born with the big officer brain, but it just so happens I’m not a bad sailor, so they gave me a ship. That doesn’t mean I feel qualified to speculate on stuff like this.” He paused, still staring at the “frog-lizards.” “You know, we never could really figure out how the Japs think, even with Shinya to try and explain it to us, and at least they were humans. We still don’t have a clue what makes the Grik tick. I think it’s pretty amazing that us and the ’Cats are on the same wavelength on most things.” He nodded at the strange creatures. “For all we know, not killing them and doctoring them up might make them hate us even more.”

“So what do we do with ’em now?” Ben asked. “It’s going to be a hot day, as usual. We can’t just keep throwing water on ’em. The guys have too much work to do, both guarding and trying to refloat this tub. I guess we could put ’em down in the forward hold, but I was kind of hoping, if we raise steam, we might get it pumped out a little.”

Russ rubbed his eyes. “Let ’em go,” he said.

“Let them go?”

“Yeah. We might have a whole other batch to deal with tonight. But we know they talk to each other… sort of.” He shook his head and smiled. “Sorry. Tired. I’m rambling, I guess. Maybe what I’m hoping is that they’ll think things over. They came at us and got creamed. We treat their wounded and turn ’em loose, maybe that’ll at least confuse them enough to leave us alone for a while.”

Ben chuckled. “So you are hoping they think a little like us?”

“I guess. At least on the basic, ‘don’t sit on the blowtorch twice’ level.”

The natives were still restless, but now they were afraid, and somewhat perplexed. The attempt to recover the Warren had gone horribly wrong. The strange creatures that infested it possessed inconceivable magic, and capable notions of the art of territorial conquest and defense. The natives considered themselves practiced students of that art. They used it every day to hunt and simply survive. How else had they managed to maintain complete control of such a vast body of water as their lake for so long? Now, after the terrible losses of the night before, their very hegemony over the lake itself might be at risk. They couldn’t possibly mount another such attempt to retrieve the Warren. They’d be hardpressed just to defend their territory from others of their own kind. They had no doubt they would succeed; they practiced the art well, but it would be difficult for a time-and they would, of course, require a new Great Mother sooner than they’d hoped. It was all so inconvenient.

Their perplexity had more to do with the behavior of the strange creatures after the combat was over than anything else. First, to their amazement, the strange creatures-clear victors in the contest-did not consume the dead, as was their right. Instead, they threw them into the water for the natives to claim, almost as an offering to a respected adversary. The corpses were duly retrieved. Food was food, after all, and it wouldn’t do to refuse such an odd but flattering gift. The most perplexing thing of all, however, was that the strange creatures also released the wounded. This had almost never been done before. Ancient legends told of such deeds, often recounted when the natives gathered together in times of plenty to softly croak and wheeze their tales of mythic heroes. A favorite of these, and one of the oldest remembered, recounted the tale of a supreme Hunter and practitioner of the art who, after rending their own earliest ancestors in fair and honorable combat, displayed a barely remembered and vaguely understood virtue known as Mercy, before guiding their ancestors to this very lake and gifting them with its bounty.

Evidently, the strange creatures were not only consummate practitioners and students of the art, but they understood the mythic virtue of Mercy, even when they were the victors after a combat they did not start. Most odd.

That night, virtually every native of the lake gathered around the Warren, their bright yellow eyes staring in wonder at the magical spectacle before them. The strange creatures had somehow literally brought the Warren to life! It gasped in the darkness with luminous smoke and sparks spiraling upward like the distant burning mountains! Many bright white eyes glared from it in all directions, and the strange creatures moved about beneath them, tending the living Warren’s needs. Another string of floating things arrived, shortly after dark, bearing even more of the strange creatures, but the floating things were left in peace. The natives conversed in a muted rumble, so many voices at once, and came to the consensus that they’d been wrong to combat the strange creatures.

When the Warren first arrived, it had been sickly and wounded. The strange creatures had left it here. Presuming it to be a corpse, the natives had used it as they used all things in the world-for whatever it seemed best suited. They turned it into a shelter. It never occurred to any of them that it might be still alive, suffering the indignity of their trespass. Now the strange creatures had returned to what might even be Their Great Mother, with the sole intention of healing it-as they’d attempted to heal the wounded natives that attacked them!

Slowly, as the night wore on, yellow eyes dipped beneath the surface of the water and disappeared. Food was not a problem, thanks to the benevolence of the strange creatures, but a new Warren, of a more traditional style, would have to be begun. It would not be as convenient or enduring, but it would be theirs. Most would begin the work in a somber, meditative mood.