The cabin door creaked open as Hassan let himself in without knocking. The doctor looked no worse for wear himself. His face was covered with a number of small adhesive bandages and still-blossoming purple bruises. He carried a tablet computer in one hand, and his well-worn medical kit in the other.
“I’m happy to see you awake,” Hassan said with a smile. He spoke slowly, careful not to presume that all of Jonah’s faculties had returned. “You’ve been out for nearly three hours.”
“And I’m happy you managed to drag my broken-down ass back to the Scorpion.” Jonah could barely get the words out through his half-crushed windpipe. “We’re still floating, so I’ll take that as a good sign. What’s the latest?”
“We’ll soon exit Tokyo harbor,” said Hassan. “Between the commotion created by the storm and the gathering fleet, Vitaly believes we will not be detected as we slip out to sea.”
“So what happened to me? One minute I couldn’t quite catch my breath — and the next I was out cold.”
“Broken rib and punctured lung,” said Hassan. “Your chest cavity was filling up with leaking air with every inhalation — you were essentially suffocating from the inside out. I managed to release the pressure before your lung collapsed. I took the further liberty of administering a general anesthetic to keep you under while I added a plastic dressing to your upper thorax that would prevent the cavity from re-filling. The dressing should suffice for now; at least until the wound begins to naturally heal. You’ll need a thorough course of antibiotics as soon as you’re able to eat. I’ll prescribe some painkillers as well. The punctured lung was far from the only injury you sustained.”
Jonah’s eyes closed momentarily and then opened, refocusing on the doctor. “Bottom line is that you poked a new hole in me. Is that about right?”
“Indeed. And as I did not have the medically correct implement on hand, I’d rather not go into how the procedure was performed.”
Jonah wrinkled his nose, trying not to imagine. If Hassan didn’t want to tell him, he was probably better off not knowing. “Any other updates?” His voice was no more than a rough croak, and his chest hurt with every spoken syllable.
“There’s a woman with us. She calls herself Freya, not that we could verify that — or anything about her, for that matter.”
“Freya.” Jonah awkwardly rolled the name around his mouth, his words lost to the gentle hum of the submarine’s electric engines. “Fre-ya. Freeeeeeeeya.”
“I must admit, she strikes a rather unconventional figure.”
“Where is she now?”
“She’s been confined to your quarters.”
“Good. Locked from the outside, I assume.”
“Of course. And Dalmar has been stationed on the other side of the door. I didn’t want to take any chances after seeing what she’d done to you — and with bare hands alone — a fact that Dalmar found quite amusing.”
Jonah ignored the last part of the update. “I don’t suppose we managed to get the SABC CEO aboard? You know, the whole point of coming to Tokyo?”
“Unfortunately, no. Freya carried you out of the penthouse alone. It’s the only reason we allowed her aboard the Scorpion.”
“I remember sirens — did the escape back to the sub go okay? And were you able to return the sedan to the yakuza? I hope you didn’t just abandon it on some corner where it’d get towed or stolen or whatever.”
The doctor shot him a pained look and pulled the tablet computer out from behind his back. “I’m not sure if I can adequately explain what happened. The Scorpion recorded some footage of the chase — perhaps you’d best see for yourself.”
A soundless video flashed into view, a fish-eyed perspective shot from one of the conning tower cameras. The Scorpion plunged headlong through a narrow canal with roadway on either side. The borrowed yakuza sedan slid into view on the left, pursued by black SUVs, as more police cars paralleled on the other side, firing at their quarry through open windows. The powerful sedan hesitated for a moment before surging forward over the curb, wheel yanked hard over as it smashed through a metal railing. Soaring through the air over the canal, the car did a hard belly flop onto the deck of the Scorpion, sliding to a stop with wheels hanging over either side of the hull.
Jonah’s eyes went wide as he watched Alexis stagger from the driver’s seat and to the deck hatch. Dalmar and Freya followed, dragging Jonah’s unconscious body with them. Hassan barely escaped a tidal wave of white foam as the submarine began to dive, the surge hurling the badly damaged sedan across the deck and off the side moments after the hatch closed.
“You don’t see that every day,” Jonah marveled as the tablet went dark once more. He caught a glimpse of himself in the blank, reflective glass — his eyes were both black and puffy, his splinted, tape-covered nose bloody and nearly twice its usual size.
“Quite. I believe it may be some time before any of the crew is comfortable allowing Alexis to drive again.” The doctor reached down and disconnected the long IV line, securing the hollow needle embedded in the back of Jonah’s hand with a strip of medical tape. He silently prepared a shot, lifted Jonah’s arm and pressed the syringe directly into Jonah’s injured ribs. “I gave you something to counteract the pain,” he said. “You’ll feel fairly well for the next few hours.”
“And then?”
“You’ll feel terrible. I recommend as much bed rest as is possible under the present circumstances. I took the liberty of re-aligning your nasal septum while you were unconscious as well — it was quite badly broken.”
“Thanks,” said Jonah. He unconsciously reached up with one hand to touch the tape over the bridge of his nose; it still felt loose, swollen. It’d take time to heal, time he wasn’t sure he had. “Did Freya say anything to the crew?”
“Barely a word. She stated in no uncertain terms she’d only speak with you, and that she was quite happy to wait until you were awake, however long that might be.”
“Gotcha,” said Jonah. “But she’s not my first priority right now. I’m going to need to check in with the rest of the crew first. It’s too bad our mutual kidnapping plans failed. It was a decent enough idea.”
“Given the amount of attention our presence attracted, the man was no doubt quite valuable.”
“It’s not a total loss. I’m willing to guess she has pieces of the puzzle that we don’t. Maybe we can put our heads together and come up with a clearer picture what we’re up against.”
“I’m not certain I would be quite so forgiving — the woman beat you to within an inch of your life.”
“It’s not forgiveness,” said Jonah as he gently touched his still-swelling black eyes. “It’s pragmatism. We’re pawns in this game — not players — and by the looks of things, she was just as played as we were.”
The doctor shrugged. “I could only speculate.”
Jonah drew himself up to a sitting position with a grunt. He allowed himself a few moments of dizziness, eyes closed once more, before grasping at the narrow doorframe and dragging himself to his feet. With the doctor at his side, he staggered over the cabin threshold and into the narrow corridor that connected the length of the submarine.
“Steady on!” said Hassan, throwing a supportive hand underneath Jonah’s armpit, holding him up as he swayed from side to side.