Looking down upon him, at what I’ve done, I gasp. My blood goes cold as the sea.
There’s no choice now. Nothing to be done. We have to act. A day early. We have to act now.
I go first to my bunk, to gather my small cache of victuals I’ve been able to stash away. A few bits of dried fish. Sour grey cake. Next, I must journey through the mess hall, past the elders’ wardroom in order to access the lower level of the chapel, where Adolphine is being kept. The mess is abuzz with activity. On the tables, bolts of fresh cloth have been unrolled—they must have been brought on board from the raid on Adolphine’s ship. Or kept in storage. New white robes are being sewn for all. Our final dive is coming soon.
I nod to those brothers who greet me, keep my eyes down. My bloodied knuckles, just barely hidden beneath the cuff of my robes.
No one will notice St. John is missing until well after the hour.
A few minutes. That’s all I need.
Further down the corridor, I peek through the hatchway into the chapel. Several brothers are congregated around the missile diagnostic panel with Brother Ernesto, just a few feet from Adolphine’s cell.
There’s no way I’ll be able to release her without being caught.
I couldn’t have chosen a worse time to set our plan into motion.
But I also can’t wait.
I’ll go to engineering first, then. Will go to Lazlo.
That’s the better plan, anyway, to give him time to figure out how to shut down the engine and hydraulics. Everything must happen fast if this is going to work.
I’ll come back to release Adolphine when the rest of the plan is in motion.
The auxiliary machine compartment is abandoned. No one sees me wheel open the hatch and pass through the tunnel, crossing a threshold I have never dared before now.
And so easy.
The first compartment through the tunnel is the aft machine room—a dim space, filled with the familiar blockish shapes of banks of corroded batteries. Generators. Secondary and backup systems for the boat.
The maneuvering shack is in the next compartment back, on the other side of the banks of generators. That’s where the reactor and engine functions are controlled. There, Brother Leighton will be on duty. Best to steer clear. Instead, I take the first ladder to the lowest level of engineering and find myself in what must be the main engine room. A great, long machine fills the low, narrow space, its two rows of pistons pumping in a rhythmic, deafening metallic concert. That thrum and rhythm I have known so well, now deafening, so close to the source.
I turn to find myself standing in front of what must be the reactor containment chamber, for the warning signs adorning the small hatch leading inside. It’s sealed, barred from the outside.
I pull aside the heavy lead shield obscuring the porthole-sized window.
Peering inside, a faint blue light emanates. His light. At the compartment’s center sits a tall metal cylinder, the top half only—the rest of the shape is clearly embedded in the deck. The reactor. All manner of small pipes and hoses sprout from it. What looks to be a pump wheel. But the post is unmanned. Empty. I turn, looking to the hatch at the far end of the compartment, on the other side of the hulking, humming engine.
This will be the bottommost aft compartment.
Where I’ll find Lazlo.
I waste no time.
Wheeling and swinging open the heavy hatch, a wave of reek assaults me.
Human effluence. Rancid fish oil and sick.
My eyes must adjust to the darkness. A few points of light here. Small grease wicks that seem to only accentuate the gloom.
I step in, and my eyes begin to adjust. Shapes move in that dimness. Figures begin stirring from the canvas hammocks that hang between the tall main seawater tanks. My feet are damp as I step deeper into the reeking, narrow, low, place.
The Forgotten.
Not boys but lean, starved young men who must have toiled back here, in these recesses, perhaps since even before I was fished out of the sea.
Shirtless. Ragged. Racks of ribs protruding like washboards. Gruesome and noisome, and hollow beings.
Faces I have forgotten completely until now. Names that were almost lost to me.
Edwin, with his brown eyes, his fringe of gunny-sack colored hair. Yes, of course I remember Edwin. A Demi sent aft years ago. Grown up now. But still alive. Perhaps too tall to work in the reactor chamber.
Chamberlain, with the missing pinky finger on his left hand. He had such a rich, warm voice. Before it broke.
And here is Francis, who could not remember his vocal assignments, no matter how many times we practiced them.
Jarod, with his fringe of red hair that always seemed to grow back within days of shearing.
Their names, their faces swimming back into memory.
Some I do not recognize at all. Some that have been brought aboard only to serve in engineering. Not even Forgotten. Not known.
They look at me as though I’m the ghost. As though I’m the one only half-living. Dark, lifeless eyes peering out at me from sunken sockets. I move deeper into the compartment.
“L-Lazlo,” I call out.
Some shrink back, as though they’ve never before heard a human voice.
And, finally, one small, skinny figure approaches. The others part, making a path for him. No, it can’t be Lazlo. This boy is too frail. Too short.
But, yes, it is. By the light, I see the gleam in his eye… the familiar face, though starved and warped almost beyond comprehension.
And he smiles.
Lazlo.
Such brightness. Such light doesn’t belong here, in this place. But it tells me that this ghost of a boy is, indeed, him.
My Lazlo.
I rush forward. Clutch him. Squeeze his body so tight, his bones press into me.
And he embraces me. Eventually. Carefully. Cautiously. And then fully, a grip so tight about my middle that my breath is almost taken from me.
I fight back the tears.
No time for that now.
“You received my message?” I ask, pulling away to look at him.
He nods, still bewildered. Still unbelieving. But he nods.
“Is it time?” Edwin asks, stepping forward. Yes, I remember his voice.
“It is! We’re going to get out…” I whisper. “All of us. We have to act fast.”
“I’ve prepared them,” Lazlo says, nodding behind him. “We’re ready to help.”
What at first seemed a weak rabble of figures now has transformed. Those who can, stand beside Lazlo in resolution. Stand tall.
There’s also a flurry of activity. Several of them have stepped into action, one moving a large canister, pulling out a concealed bundle. Another, moving aside bedding, searching.
“We’ve gathered a bit of food,” Lazlo says.
“And a few tools—they might do for weapons,” Francis says, taking out a hammer, a piece of lead pipe, and a thin, rusted strip of steel.
I almost want to cry. “You’ve all done… so well… okay—”
“Shhh!” someone says. “He’s coming.”
I look back to the hatchway, still hanging open.
“What’s this…” Brother Dormer begins as he barges in, but halts. He sees the tools—the weapons—hanging in hands.
Sees me.
Before I can speak, before I can even move, one of the Forgotten has sprung on top of him, clawing. Another, striking out with his fists. Brother Dormer, caught off his guard, is knocked to the deck in a stupor, fending off the attack best he can with his arms out in front of him.