Behind and to the left, the water frothed white and he could make out the hull once again; the ship was backing engines. Preparing to be boarded? Already? No way of knowing. He kicked, exhaled slowly—spread out the bubbles—and took another breath from the regulator. He pushed his legs into long, sinuous, deep-digging kicks, looked up to attempt to gauge his depth.
Back in the direction of the ship, through the faint jade green of the water, he saw a bright, orange flash where its weed-trailing keel had been. Then the shock and muffled boom—as much felt as heard—hit and deafened him. Clones, Pak Sumadi, rotting fish—all gone as though they had never existed. And now, going down farther than he should, Caine was heading into the depths where Ulysses had met his deceased comrades. But, as he had in college, Caine rejected Virgil’s version in favor of Homer’s. Like his code-namesake Odysseus, Caine had no desire to visit the dead, much less join them—not if he could help it.
Correcting for the mild current, Caine set himself back on course for Ringit, resolving to come up in five minutes to check his deviation from that heading. He held his breath. No bubbles for at least a minute. As he resumed his slow kicking, Caine resolved that this day, the sea-god Poseidon—ever the enemy of Odysseus—would not be the final arbiter of his fate.
From the moment the oversized and ancient commercial fishing boat drew alongside Captain Ong’s small Taiwanese bulk container ship, he knew that the encounter was going to be a peculiar one. The fishing boat was too small to be authorized for passage over the fifty-klick blockade line just ahead, and hadn’t managed to get a new radio yet. That, or she was choosing not to advertise she had a set that hadn’t been fried by the invader EMP strikes of three weeks ago. Instead, she signaled her intents by semaphore and hand gestures. Although piracy had decreased since the invasion, Ong still took the precaution of putting an armed team aboard the boat before he agreed to go over for the requested meeting.
As he stepped off the accommodation stairs onto the swaying and somewhat grimy deck, Ong discovered a second, and far more profound, peculiarity: a woman with fair skin, jet black hair, and glass-green eyes emerged from the pilot house. She was taller than any of the men around her, shapely, and projected an air of certainty that she would not be trifled with simply because she was not to be trifled with.
The master of the fishing boat remarked that the lady had asked to speak to the captain in private, and they could have the use of the master’s quarters, if they wished. His deference suggested the woman had shown him impeccable proof of generous payment, the evidence of powerful familial connections, or the certainty of dire penalties if compliance was not forthcoming. Given the man’s tendency to bow whenever it might be vaguely appropriate, Ong guessed her bona fides might have included all three.
But instead, the woman invited Ong to accompany her to the taffrail, where the stink of the engine’s fumes and the racket of its operation seemed sure to discourage eavesdropping.
She did not bother with preamble, or even niceties. “I am told, Captain Ong, that you are a man who may be relied upon.”
“I am pleased to be spoken of so highly, Ms.—”
“Smith. Elena Smith.”
“—Ms. Smith. However, without knowing who has been so complimentary regarding my character, I am at a loss to—”
“Captain, there are individuals in Singapore with whom you share information about what you observe during your food runs to Indonesia. I understand from them that you served in the Taiwanese military, and even, briefly, in the National Security Bureau.”
Ong blinked. “Ms. Smith, I cannot—”
“Please. Neither you nor I have the time to engage in denials that cannot be sustained. I can recite the many things I’ve heard about you. But you already know that I wouldn’t be on a broken-down fishing boat just outside the Indonesian blockade line to wheedle information. That’s not why I trailed you here all the way from Singapore.”
“So why did you trail me from Singapore, Ms. Smith?”
“To solicit your help in reaching Indonesia. Of course.”
Ong was a polite man by both upbringing and inclination and so nodded slowly. “You are, I take it, familiar with the impediments?”
“Many of them, but news is not easy to come by, and I have been traveling for some time.”
“Traveling from where, if I may ask?”
She surveyed him levelly. “The eastern coast of the United States down to the Panama Canal. Once there, I—changed ships to a high-speed liner, bound for Singapore.”
Hmmm. With every passing second, Ms. Smith sounded more and more like an operative. Except, where was her support staff and/or equipment, why was she traveling alone, and why had she scrambled after his ship, sight unseen, to attempt to make infiltration arrangements on the high seas? Something was not right. But it might be professionally dangerous to attempt to find out what that something was, so Ong followed her lead. “Very well. I take it you did not stay long in Singapore?”
“Just long enough to get in contact with a family friend. Who told me about you and your ship.”
And who also told you that I am debriefed by military intelligence there, after every food run. And who is just the sort of friend every American family has in Singapore. “So I take it you did not have time to apprise yourself of the new conditions of the blockade?”
“I did not, but I know that there are hundreds of ships porting in Java with food every week, so the border must be porous.”
“Not as porous as you might think, madam.”
“But they’ve opened up the approach channel and porting restrictions, haven’t they?”
How long has this woman been traveling? “Yes, madam. We still must cross the fifty-kilometer boundary using one of five designated navigation lanes: Jakarta, Semarang, Surabaya, Cilacap, and Banywangi. But after that, smaller ships such as mine may disperse to another seven smaller ports. However, government boats follow and monitor us all the way to our destination, stand guard while we unload, and then escort us out. I believe we are occasionally followed by alien submersibles, as well.”
“So the invaders determined that it was too difficult to coordinate all the shipping of foodstuffs into the five big ports?”
“No, they determined that their situation might become untenable if people started starving. Which some of them did, after the first week. So, fearing a more general revolt, the invaders opened up the seven other distribution points along the coastline.”
“And have things been easier since then?”
“On the contrary, they have been much worse. After the initial restrictions were lifted, the Sloths became more difficult than ever, stopping ships for the smallest infractions, shooting anyone who disagreed or refused to obey immediately.”
“It sounds as though the Hkh’Rkh didn’t like the open-coastline rule, then.”
“No. Clearly, that humanitarian decision must have come from the Roaches. They seem to have some kind of conscience, even though they’re bugs.”