Eee-ooo-eee-ooo-eee-ooo-eee-ooo-eee-ooo-eee-ooo-eee-ooo . . .
Nio rocked back and forth under sonic assault, clutching her face to her knees to free her eyes from the too-bright lights of her cell. Her mind struggled to contain thoughts for very long, and she kept starting over at the same place: what she had done once wouldn’t work again. She wouldn’t be able to stop the interrogation so easily next time. From here, it would be physical rather than mental torture. Waterboarding, maybe. Or something worse.
Rocking, rocking.
What could she do? What would they come at her with next time? What she had done once wouldn’t work again.
Eee-ooo-eee-ooo-eee-ooo-eee-ooo-eee-ooo-eee-ooo-eee-ooo . . .
What could she do?
Eee-ooo-eee-ooo-eee-ooo-eee-ooo-eee-ooo-eee-ooo-eee-ooo . . .
Rocking, rocking. What could she—
Rumble.
Out of the endless shriek, a pause.
The ship shook, and for a moment’s distraction, Nio’s mind was whole.
She looked up as the lights flickered and went out. The siren stopped. But something else took its place. A faint warning klaxon. Something was wrong.
She stood and listened.
In between the klaxon wails, there were small, staccato cracks that came in ones and twos.
Gunfire.
“Shit.”
Nio pressed her ear flat to the door. She didn’t dare when the siren was blaring. It might’ve deafened her. But now, it augmented her perception of everything distant. The vibrations of the metal ship got louder, as did the klaxon and the periodic cracks of gunfire.
Whoever was shooting certainly seemed to be getting closer.
“Shit, shit, shit.”
Nio pushed the door, but it was fixed solid. There wasn’t even a latch on the inside. She was trapped.
She heard shouting. Not in some distant part of the ship. This was right outside her door. It was followed quickly by rapid, single-shot gunfire. A handgun, maybe. It stopped and Nio heard a man’s muffled scream. Not two seconds later, she heard the latch of her door scrape against the metal, and she hopped to the back wall with zip-tied feet.
There was no cover. Nowhere to hide. She was trapped.
A man in black military gear opened the door. His outfit covered every inch of his body, even his face. He saw by means of the electronic eyes in his skull-like cowl, which was black with vertical slats in place of a nose and mouth. He seemed to be alone. He walked forward confidently and grabbed her throat. Nio watched him pull a knife from his utility harness and hold it over her. In a flash, the soldier cut the ties that bound her hands and feet and dragged her into the hall.
He was strong and pulled her easily with one hand, even over her resistance. But then, her feet were covered in blue booties, which did little but slide over the floor. The intruder threw her against the wall opposite the door, where she noticed a downed soldier at the left end of the hall. He wore a red maple leaf on the arm of his camo uniform. His eyes were open and his neck was cracked. He looked no older than 20.
Two more Canadians appeared then from the right wearing full combat gear, including clear riot shields. By the sound, more were coming behind them, but the hall was only wide enough for the pair. The man with the black skull barely noticed as he took a step back inside the room to avoid a bullet at the very last second. It ricocheted and Nio ducked. But in gauging the distance to the safety of her cell, she realized the man in black was too far away to stop her from running.
So she did.
Nio sprang to her feet, slipping once, and ran left toward the fallen man at the other end. There was an automatic handgun on the ground near his head, but the stock was locked to the rear: empty. The poor kid had emptied the clip and hit nothing. Nio turned the corner and saw a sign marked EXIT. Stairs. She had no idea where she was, but since she was on a boat, she could safely assume there was no escape from the lower decks. She went up and ran out the side hatch when she heard and smelled water. It was night. Everything but the ship was dark, save for the Moon’s shifting reflection on the water. The air was cold—not so cold that Nio would freeze, but cold enough that she knew diving into the water that far from shore would be suicide. She needed some kind of craft, a lifeboat or a canoe. And a big head start.
As she trotted swiftly along the starboard deck, looking for a way out, Nio realized she might be able to kill two birds with one stone. Whoever the man in the skull mask was, he had to have gotten aboard the ship without being seen. That probably meant a wet suit or small craft. If she could steal it, then not only would she have transportation, she would ensure he had no way of following.
Nio immediately grabbed the railing and peered along the length of the ship.
“No way . . .”
She didn’t want to believe her own luck. An inflatable dingie with an outboard motor was moored to the side of the ship just down from her location. Nio ran again amid shouts and approaching gunfire, but she barely got twenty yards before the very floor gave way under her feet. There was a flash and an explosion and an irregular oval of the deck she trod was blasted free and fell with a thud to the floor below. It happened so quickly, she had already hit the lower deck before she even realized what had happened. She looked up. Someone had planted detcord on the section above, meaning it had been set beforehand. She couldn’t see any more of it elsewhere.
Before she could even express incredulity, the nearby hatch opened and the skull soldier appeared and grabbed her again. He had the same idea. He was taking her straight to his vessel.
Nio struggled. “No . . .” But it was no use.
The attractive woman appeared then, shaking and crying. Her suit was torn and she was missing a shoe. She had a smear of blood on her cheek. She was inconsolable. Without missing a step, the skull pulled a sidearm and shot her in the head, and as her body fell back, the small gun she’d concealed with her shaking hands bounced free. It had been a ruse. She was counting on the big, strong soldier not to think of her a threat—long enough for one clean shot, at least. But he hadn’t fallen for it. No, that wasn’t right. There wasn’t even time for him to consider it. He had simply shot her as he would a rabid dog.
After another few strides, they stopped near the shipping vessel’s central loading receptacle, and the black skull shoved Nio against the wall next to a wound fire hose. From the looks of the enormous hatch that yawned from a lower deck, the boat had once hauled ore of some kind. Nio guessed they were now directly above the black skull’s raft. Sure enough, he began pulling a length of fire hose free. That was how they were going to get down. Was that luck or exceptional planning? Nio thought he was awfully exposed, standing there pulling on the heavy hose with both hands, and she wondered if he wasn’t about to get shot. Was this her chance to run free? She decided to bolt as soon as she heard any sound that might mean someone was approaching. When the man in black turned his gaze, she would run the other way.
But she had no chance. Before she could move, soldiers opened fire. They had lined up on a higher deck across the wide gap of the hold and opened fire. With no cover, Nio knew that if she stayed still, she would be shot. But as soon as she pushed up to run, the black skull stuck out an armored forearm and knocked her to the floor.
Bullets ricocheted all around.
Ping! Ping! Bang!
Nio screamed once and covered her head. There was no way either of them would survive.
The far deck exploded. The concussive wave hit and Nio was pushed. The whole boat shook as fire and glass rained everywhere. Lights flickered and went out, and she was left in the dark with the black skull, who she could only see by the thin line of his armor that reflected the light of the moon. She looked back along the deck to where the attractive woman lay. He hadn’t hesitated.
This is it! She thought. If you don’t escape here, you idiot, you’re not going to!
Quickly, she tried to sweep the black skull’s leg as she’d been taught years ago, but he merely lifted his leg like he knew exactly what she was going to do even before she did it. It didn’t break his concentration. He threw the hose over the side, and there was a small splash.
He grabbed her neck and pulled her to her feet and she grabbed his knife from his belt, the one she had seen him use to cut her free. But he rolled his arm around hers in a circle, intending to knock the blade away, but Nio was desperately hanging on, and as her arm was forced down, the black skull pushed the blade into her abdomen, all the way to the hilt.
Nio’s eyes got big.
The skull stopped as if he were waiting for something else to happen. When her legs wobbled underneath her, he grabbed her ams and held her desperately.
“?what did you do to mE” he demanded.
His voice was strange. Nio couldn’t place it, but it sounded like he had some kind of speech impediment. Or maybe he was deaf. He spoke with a kind of backward pronunciation that was difficult to understand. Her face squinted as she tried to concentrate and breathe at the same time.
“?what did you do to meeE” he demanded again, shaking her violently.
“Nothing.”
“?where is my familY ?why are you hunting mE”
“I’m not,” she said weakly. “Please. Help me.”
Nio could feel blood coursing down her thigh. It was warm—much warmer than the cold night air.
“!i just diD”
A soldier rolled onto the deck from a hatchway and shot the skull with an automatic rifle. But he had already jumped. The fire hose went taut, as if he had grabbed it during the descent. Then the housing broke free with a clatter, and there was another splash, louder this time, but Nio’s body had already given out.