He sighed heavily then left the bridge, grabbed onto the ladder by the hatch, and pulled himself up to the small observation deck above.
“Shoot it out of the air,” Espanoza said to one of the men standing by the railing.
“Excuse me, sir?” the man asked. “Did you say to fire on the helicopter?”
“I did.”
The man looked at Espanoza then over at the helicopter.
“Is that an American government helicopter?” the man asked.
“No, it’s a private vehicle,” Espanoza replied. “Does it matter?”
“No, sir,” the man said as he put the rifle to his shoulder and sighted on the helicopter’s top rotor. “I just like to know how to classify my kills.”
Espanoza smiled. “Good man.”
***
Warning lights flashed and bells and alarms rang out in the cockpit as the Wyrm II took a sudden lurch to the side and started to spin out of control.
“What’s happening?” Lucy cried. “Ballantine! What’s wrong?”
“I don’t know!” Ballantine yelled back.
“I thought you said you knew how to fly this thing!” Lucy shouted.
“I do!” Ballantine replied as he fought the stick for control. “It just went wild! It’s like the rotor has been damaged or…”
He trailed off and looked over at Espanoza’s ship.
“That asshole,” Ballantine said. Then he saw the half dozen Zodiacs filled with armed men that sped from the ship towards the B3. “Motherfucker.”
Ballantine used all of his skills to keep control of the helo, but the thing didn’t want to obey. The best he could do was aim it in the direction he wanted to go.
He just prayed he could land it without killing himself and Lucy.
***
“What the fuck is he doing?” Lake muttered as he watched the smoking helo come at the Beowulf III fast.
Too fast. And obviously not in Ballantine’s control. The helo spun about in two circles then crashed hard on one of the helipads. Flaming fuel exploded everywhere.
“Fuck!” Lake shouted as he slammed his hand down on the emergency warning system.
An ear splitting claxon filled the deck and an electronic voice began to warn the entire ship, deck to deck, of “Fire! Fire! All crew to stations! Fire!”
Then Lake saw the Zodiacs that were coming for the Beowulf III.
“Son of a bitch,” Lake said and overrode the electronic voice as he put a PA handset to his mouth. “Fuck the fire, people! We’re being boarded!”
He tossed the handset aside and grabbed the Desert Eagle and started to leave the bridge. Then he stopped and reached out, grabbing a fire axe off the wall.
Darren had never been so thankful to have his head above water. Until he saw what the surface held in store.
One of the Zodiacs was missing, there was smoke and flame coming from the deck of the Beowulf III, and he was floating in blood and gore. Then there were the Zodiacs that were maneuvering up against the B3’s hull. And armed men tossing up lines to board her.
“Hey!” Darren shouted as he saw Shane’s Zodiac near by.
He grabbed the tabs and yanked the rebreather from his face. He puked up more seawater and struggled to remember how to breathe normally again. Once he had a lungful of real air, he turned towards the one Zodiac he saw.
“Hey!” he yelled. “HEY! Over here! Fucking over here you ass muncher!”
“Ditcher!” Shane yelled as he turned the Zodiac towards him and raced over.
Shane was able to pull him up into the Zodiac, and Darren found himself tumbling next to Kinsey who was splayed out on the bottom of the boat.
“Welcome to the hospital ship,” Shane said. “We’re a small, regional outfit, only set up for two patients at a time.”
“What’s going on?” Darren asked. “What the fuck is going on?”
“I don’t know,” Shane said as he gunned the motor, heading the opposite direction from the Beowulf II. He gave Darren a strange look, not liking the sound of the man’s voice.
“Where are you going?” Darren asked. “Where are you flying this fish boat?”
“Uh...to get my brother,” Shane said. “Fucking shark hit his boat.”
“The sharks are high on coke, man,” Darren said. “Kinsey was right. So right. Flying in a high kite with boats!”
“Fucking A I was,” Kinsey whispered as she reached out and grabbed Darren’s hand. “Ow.” She took a breath and looked at Darren. “Did you just scream about a boat kite?”
“Ow is right,” Darren replied. “Ow is hurt. How are you? Hurting much too? Too? Too?”
Kinsey studied Darren and laughed. “You’re high as that boat kite you’re jabbering about.” She held a compression bandage to her ribs. “I think I’ll live, but I need stitches. And rum. Lots of rum.”
“You can’t drink,” Darren laughed. It was a thin, reedy noise. “No drinking for high boats a flying flyer!”
“Whoa, Ditcher,” Shane said. “As much as I enjoy a good psychedelic freak out, I think you should just close your eyes and chill.”
“Do you see him?” Darren asked. “Do you see the boat shark fish flyer kite?”
“No,” Shane said, looking over at Kinsey. “Don’t see that. Don’t see my brother either. But he’s out there somewhere. I know it.”
“Right on, man,” Darren said, pumping a fist into the air. “Fish kite boat power!”
***
Thorne grabbed the unconscious Max around the shoulders and then spun about in the water, his channel gun in hand, and fired at the shark that came at them.
The round hit the beast in the nose and exploded, ripping a huge gouge out of the monster’s snout, sending it diving down past the two men. Its dorsal fin clipped Thorne and he lost his grip on Max. And his channel gun.
He reached out for the weapon, but it sank too quickly. He had his channel pistol, but he couldn’t get to it and also Max at the same time. The decision was easy as he swam to his nephew and grabbed the man about the shoulders again.
Thorne reached for the surface and pulled Max with him as his head broke into the air above. He quickly yanked his rebreather off, sick of the stupid thing, and took in a lungful of fresh air.
But the air wasn’t as fresh as he’d hope. He could smell burning fuel and scorched metal and he looked about for the source. The Beowulf III. Thorne saw flames and thick, black smoke on its deck and shook his head.
“Now what?” he snarled. “Never a fucking break, huh?”
Max began to come around then he struggled and thrashed, but a quick slap to the face stopped that.
“Knock it off!” Thorne ordered. “Maxwell, stop it!”
Max grabbed at his rebreather and Thorne helped it off of him.
“Maxwell?” Max asked, his voice barely a rasp. “Only Mom calls me Maxwell.”
“It got your attention,” Thorne said. “Just like your mom used to.”
“What happened?” Max asked, his eyes looking about as the two men floated. “Whoa, what’s burning?”
“The B3,” Thorne said. “And don’t ask why. I don’t know.”
“Where’s the shark?” Max asked. “Did you see it?”
“I saw it,” Thorne said. “And shot it. It went below, but probably not for long.”
“MAX!” Shane yelled over the Zodiac’s motor as he zipped towards the men. “Over here!”
“Yeah, we see you,” Max said, waving. “Don’t run us over.”
The Zodiac came about and Shane reached over and helped Max inside then held out a hand for his uncle, but Thorne was already grabbing on and climbing in.
“Hey, the gang’s all here,” Max said as he sat up and checked himself out. “And I’m in pretty good shape, considering how you two look.”
“I blew up a shark,” Kinsey said. “And got a little blown up too. It’s not bad. Just a big scratch.”
“I was shoved to the bottom of the ocean and did coke with a shark,” Darren said. “Then we danced the tango. There were kites. High and flying.”
Max and Thorne stared at him.
“Come again?” Thorne said. “You did what now?”
“I did coke with the shark,” Darren said. “Well, not really with it since the thing had its snort and took off, where Kinsey then was able to blow it the fuck up. Way to go ‘Sey!” He held up a hand and Kinsey gave him a high five, just happy the man wasn’t talking about kites. “Then I swallowed half the ocean, since it was mixed with cocaine, and swam my ass to the surface! Hold on.”
He turned his head puked. Then puked again.
“I need water!” Darren said. “Seriously! Who’s running this airship full of pickles? I need fresh water or my kidneys will attack my body! ATTACK IT!”
“You aren’t supposed to drink a ton of water when high on cocaine,” Max replied.
“That’s extasy,” Shane said. “Not coke.”
“My bad,” Max said. “Drink all the water you want.”
“We don’t have any,” Shane frowned.
“Bummer.”
“I was right,” Kinsey said. “The sharks are on coke.”
“And lovin’ it!” Darren said. “The fucker was just going for it down there! Gotta get me some more of that!”
“Yeah, you do,” Thorne said as he shook his head. “How about we focus and find the other one?”
“Where’d it go, Uncle Vinny?” Max said. “After you shot it, did you see where it went?”
“No,” Thorne said. “But it probably dove deep since I wounded it. Sharks go to the bottom when they’re hurt.”
“Maybe,” Shane said. “This one isn’t in its right shark mind, remember?”
“We need to get out of the water,” Darren said. “Get back to the B3! They have fresh water! No flying boat kites!”
“I’m really not getting what’s going on,” Max said.
“Don’t think too hard about it,” Kinsey said. “He’s tripping balls.”
“Coke does that?” Max asked.
“Not the coke I’ve tried,” Kinsey said. “But maybe there was something else in there.”
“Doesn’t matter,” Thorne said. “We do need to get to the B3.”
“Not with those men scaling the side,” Shane said, pointing at the ship. “That’s a fucking cartel strike force if I ever saw one.”
“Fuck,” Thorne growled. “I’m open to suggestions.”
“I said we need to get out of the water!” Darren shouted. “Coats of boats of kites of fights!”
***
Lake tucked the Desert Eagle into his waistband, lifted Lucy up and threw her over his shoulder, getting her as far away from the flaming helo as possible. He dumped her against a wall and turned back as Popeye and most of the crew started spraying fire extinguishers every which way. Soon the deck was covered in thick foam and the fire was out.
“We have company,” Lake said, nodding towards the railing as he pulled the Desert Eagle back out form his pants. “Any second now.”
Popeye looked at the huge pistol in Lake’s hand. “Got an extra one for me?”
“No.”
“Damn.”
“You can have this,” Lake said and handed Popeye the fire axe.
“That’ll work,” Popeye said. He looked about. “Where’s Ballantine?”
“Here,” Ballantine said as two men helped him limp over. His hair was scorched and the skin on one arm looked like a science experiment of mutant bubbles. But his eyes burned with an anger and intensity that made Popeye gulp. “And we need to get everyone below and seal up the decks. Those men coming are not navy and they won’t hesitate to kill us all.”
Popeye looked at his axe. “This ain’t such a great gift now.”
“Come on,” Ballantine said. “We have to move.”
“Where are we going?” Lake asked.
“Where do you think?” Ballantine smiled. “The Toyshop.”
***
“Dude, relax,” Shane said. “We’ll get out of the water. We just have to figure out how. We can’t go to the B3 because-”
The kick was hard and swift and Shane’s head snapped back. He would have tumbled over the side if it wasn’t for the fact he was hanging onto the stick.
“What the fuck, Ditcher!” Shane shouted.
Darren clambered to his knees and took a swing at Shane. It missed as Shane ducked away, his eye wide with surprise and fear.
“Dude!” Max yelled and lunged at Darren, grabbing him about the waist. “Knock it off!”
Darren slammed his elbow down on the back of Max’s neck again and again until Max was forced to let go and shove away.
“We are getting out of the water!” Darren snarled, foam forming at the corners of his mouth. “That’s a fucking order!”
“Captain?” Thorne asked in a genial tone. “Should I throw them overboard?”
Darren’s chest was heaving and his pupils had gone pure black. He spun about and faced Thorne.
“What?” Darren snapped.
“Should I toss the traitors overboard?” Thorne asked. “Feed them to the shark?”
Darren seemed confused, but still raging pissed. He looked each person in the face and didn’t recognize a single one.
“I don’t know you,” he hissed, reaching for his dive knife on his ankle. But it wasn’t there.
“Yeah, first thing I did,” Max said as he tossed the knife overboard.
“That was mine!” Darren screamed as he dove at Max.
Instead of getting to the Reynolds brother, he met Thorne’s fist right between the eyes. He dropped to the bottom of the boat, his vision filled with floating motes of light. Darren shook his head a couple times then pushed up, ready to attack again.
So was Thorne. Another hit between the eyes.
Darren’s face slammed into the bottom of the boat, but he wouldn’t quit. Instead, he seemed to get angrier.
“What the fuck?” Thorne said.
“’Ren, stop it!” Kinsey yelled. “Stop it now!”
“Fuck you, whore!” Darren yelled, turning his attention on Kinsey. “I should have gutted you the day you left me! Ungrateful fucking whore bitch cunt of a-”
His words were choked off. Literally, as Thorne wrapped one arm around Darren’s neck and pressed the other against the side of his head. Darren fought, but Max was able to jump on him and pin his arms down, keeping Thorne from getting his eyes scratched out.
Thorne couldn’t believe the strength he felt coming from Darren. The man should have been unconscious from the chokehold, but he kept fighting and fighting. After what seemed like an eternity, Darren’s struggles started to slacken as his eyes rolled up in his head.
“Is he out?” Shane asked.
“I think so,” Thorne said. “But I’m not letting go anytime soon.”
He eased back the choke and Darren stayed still. Max reached up and double checked Darren’s pulse, just in case.
“Jesus,” Max said. “His heart is racing really fucking fast.”
“The coke,” Shane said. “He ingested too much. He’s whacked out of his brain.”
“No, it’s not that,” Kinsey said. “I mean, it is the coke, yeah, but if it’s pure, then it wouldn’t make him go all psycho. He’d be amped and bugfuck nuts, but not homicidal. That’s meth behavior. This shit is all wrong.”
Thorne looked off at the B3 then over at the Mexican Navy ships. A thought occurred to him, and he was about to express it, when the water around them exploded and the operators were sent flying into the air.
***
“We need to get to the upper deck!” Mike said as he wheeled towards the door.
“No, don’t,” Lake said as he stepped in front of Mike and blocked his way, Lucy still over his shoulder. “We’re going to the Toyshop. Come on.”
“We’re under attack,” Ballantine said as he limped into view, no longer helped by the deckhands. “Espanoza is boarding us.”