Atomic Underworld: Part One (19 page)

“Oh,
no …”

Ghostly
and phosphorescent, she materialized from around a bend. She was as beautiful
as before—lovely, shimmering, floating across the water on a bed of white vapor
that curled around her, enfolding her slender, naked body in phantasmagorical
clouds. Her hair stirred to the currents of some sea or wind that Tavlin could
not fathom, and her luminous eyes gazed straight at him, searing his soul with
their power.

“No
no
no
,” he said. His voice came out in a choke. “You
... you
do
see her?”

“Yes,”
said Sophia, her voice a throaty rasp. “I see her.”

“Who
is she?” said Vassas. "What is she?"

As
the girl drifted closer, her eyes drank in Tavlin and the briefcase.

“You,”
she said. “You took it!”

He
opened and closed his mouth. “Yes, of c-course I did. You said that last time.”

“Why?
Why did you take it?” It was as if he had committed some grievous wrong, a
personal affront to her. As she spoke, the anger visibly built up in her.

“I-I—”

Suddenly
the anger overwhelmed her and she shot forward. One of her hands wrapped around
Tavlin’s throat. Her touch was like ice, but it burned, and he screamed as she
wrenched him upward. He flailed and beat at her. Below, Vassas shot the girl,
or rather through her, trying to aim around Tavlin, while Sophia struck at her
with an oar. The oar passed right through.

“Why did you take it?”
the girl screamed, staring
straight into Tavlin’s eyes, his soul. As she spoke, she continued to choke
him, shaking him like a dog would shake a bird

Tavlin
started to lose consciousness. His grip on the briefcase loosened, but he
retained enough awareness to keep hold of it. He was dimly aware of Sophia and
Vassas fighting the girl, trying to get him back, but she was apparently immune
to their efforts, and their blows just passed through her. Tavlin gagged,
unable to breathe, feeling his skull pound.

Behind
the girl, boats appeared, lantern-light winking through the mist. Vaguely
Tavlin saw mutants in robes crowding the vessels, many of them armed. When they
saw the ghost-girl, their eyes filled with reverence—but not surprise, or at
least not
complete
surprise;
something about this was strange to them, but she at least was known somehow.
Had they been following her? Had she led them here? In any case, they saw
Tavlin and the others, and immediately they lifted their guns toward Sophia and
Vassas.

“Run!”
Tavlin choked. “Run!”

“We
can’t leave you!” Sophia said. She grabbed Vassas’s gun and fired a burst at
the mutants. They ducked down as bullets whizzed over their heads.

Vassas
was more pragmatic. “We’ll come back for you,” he said as he started the motor.
“We’ll get these bastards, see if we don’t.”

“No,”
Sophia said. “We can’t leave him, you bastard.”

“Take
this,” Tavlin wheezed, and hurled the briefcase to them. He almost missed.
Sophia had to stretch herself out to catch it, and even so she almost tumbled
into the filthy channel.

Vassas
opened the motor, and the boat sped away, Sophia righting herself as they went.
The newly arrived mutants fired at them, and bullets struck the wall behind
them, sending fragments everywhere. Enraged, Sophia fired back. Tavlin saw her
out of the corner of his vision, her eyes aflame, standing on the pitching deck
of the boat firing the submachine gun even as bullets kicked the water around
her and flashed off the pillars behind her—then she was gone. Vassas piloted
the boat down a tunnel and out of sight.

The
robed people gave chase, howling as they roared down the hall after the two.
Tavlin heard gunshots. Some of the infected people, however, gathered around
Tavlin and the girl.

He
had stopped flailing and fighting. All the strength had left him, and he felt
himself beginning to fade. Helplessly, he stared into the face of the girl.

The
rage seemed to have left her, leaving her full of pity. She was very beautiful,
like an angel, almost. She set him down in one of the boats.

As
darkness came over him, Tavlin heard one of the infected people ask, “What
shall we do with him, Lady?”

“To
the Temple,” she said, her voice seeming to come from far away. “Take him to
the Temple.”

THE
END

of

ATOMIC
UNDERWORD: VOLUME ONE

FROM THE AUTHOR:

If you
enjoyed
Atomic Underworld: Part One
,
it would be greatly appreciated if you left a review so others can, too. It
will not only help new readers discover
Atomic
Underworld
but is incredibly rewarding to me to see how people liked it, as
well as learning any ways I can improve.

In fact,
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Amazon, just email me at
[email protected]
and I’ll thank you with a free copy of
Nightmare
City, The Atomic Sea
or
City of
Shadows
, some of the other books set in that same world. Your choice.

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Meanwhile
you might enjoy other tales set in the same world, such as the epic, globe-spanning
The Atomic Sea
series, or the two-
parters
(like
Atomic
Underworld
)
City of Shadows
and
Nightmare City.

Keep
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The
Atomic Sea
, or simply grab Part One here:

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, you
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And you
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Nightmare City
here ...

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http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00HZOTUIC

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Turn the
page to read the first chapter of
The
Atomic Sea
.

THE ATOMIC SEA:

by Jack Conner

Copyright 2014

All rights reserved

Cover image used with permission

Whale
songs groaned through the hull of the ship as Dr. Avery and the sailors played
cards. The cabin reverberated to the sounds—long, tapering peals that stood
hairs on end—and alchemical lanterns threw drunken green shadows against the
walls. Sailors glanced around uneasily.

Avery
tossed his cards face-down and said, “Well, then, lads, if no one will match
me, I believe that pot is mine.”

The
seamen muttered as he raked in his winnings. Some were big men, whalers, hairy
and covered in tattoos. The Navy men and women tended to be slimmer, neater.
The room smelled of oil, leather and cigar smoke, some of which curled up from
Avery’s own cigar clamped between his teeth. He was not a large man, but
somehow that made him stand out all the more. His smoke drifted around his
balding head with its black comb-over and joined the cloud that stirred against
the ceiling.

“That’s
your fourth haul tonight,” said Janx, one of the whalers, tall and rawboned.
His nose had been torn off in a whaling catastrophe years ago, and a piece of
leather covered the hole where it had been, held in place by straps that went
round his head. “And three without showin’ your cards.”

“Feel
free to match my bet next time,” Avery said. “It has been an unusually good
night, I must admit.”

It
was Janx’s turn to deal, and the cards fluttered with surprising grace through
his rough, scarred hands. Scars and tattoos seemed to mark every inch of his
body. His shaven head gleamed in the light.

“Your
luck’ll turn, Doc,” he said. “See if it don’t.”

Avery
raised his eyebrows. After a look at his cards, he said, “I think not.”

“You’re
bluff—”

The
door burst open. Lt. Hinis stormed in, dressed in her environment suit, huge
and bulky with its bronze helmet and grilled visor. “Doctor, come quick, we
need your help. There’s been a killing.”

“Another
one?” Janx said. “Damn.”

“Has
the killer been caught?” Avery asked.

“No,”
Hinis said. “But the patrols are out. The murder happened outside.”

Avery
crossed to the wall, where with Hinis’s assistance he donned an environment
suit of his own. Like hers, it resembled a diving suit of antiquity, all
treated canvas, brass
joinings
and big brass helm.
There were no true diving suits anymore, of course; no one was insane enough to
use one, not for a thousand years. In the background, the whale songs bellowed
louder—closer—and whalers glanced at each other soberly.

As
Avery reached the door, Janx grunted, and the doctor looked back to see that
Janx had flipped over Avery’s cards. A two of jades nestled against a three of
fates.

Janx
shook his head. “Never saw a worse hand.” He hesitated, then said, “Y’know,
Doc, the killer could still be out there. Might be I should come with you.”

Avery
waited while Janx shrugged on an environment suit, and they followed Hinis out
into the night.

*

Avery
braced himself against the wind.
Shouldn’t
have had that second bourbon
, he thought as the wind battered him, dragging
at his legs, tugging at his arms. It gusted up from the south, whipping mist
off the waves that pitched and flung the ship like a cork. Huge and
metal-hulled, a fully-armed warship in a time of war, the
GS Maul
plowed the dark waters, and the ocean responded with fury.

As
Avery inched his way toward the stern behind Lt. Hinis, their lifelines
connecting them to the gunwale, he gazed out over the sea—the eerie sea, the
infamous sea. The Atomic Sea. Ever since research had begun into atomic energy
some twenty years ago, people had slapped that label on it, accurate or not.
Finally, more than a thousand years after the sea’s transformation, people had
a name for it that wasn’t mired in superstition. And the ocean did emit
radiation, at least in certain quarters. But that wasn’t why people had named
it what they had. One glance explained it.

Lightning
blasted from wave-top to wave-top, some bolts arcing high into the night,
lancing the very clouds overhead. The whole sea roiled and bubbled, as if
someone had turned up a giant stove burner on the sea floor. Occasionally a
bubble as big as a boat would burst from the depths. The gas alone was enough
to kill, but sometimes a stab of lightning would hit a pocket and the whole
thing would go up like an Uracuth candle. It was a frothing, mad, electric sea,
and the things that plied its waters were strange and dangerous.

“Look
at that,” Janx said, pointing to something in the distance.

Far
off, the geyser-like plumes of whales expelling water caught the
star-light—beautiful, strange, and too close for Avery’s liking.

“Gorgeous,
ain’t they?” said Janx. “You’d never guess what terrors they are.”

“I
can imagine.”

“I
remember one time years ago when one big bastard smashed me ship—killed
everyone aboard, but me. I was thrown up on a strange beach, and, oh, it was a
sight. Glittering black rocks far as you could see, great big mountains
stretching off into the distance.”

“An
island?” Avery almost smiled. Half of Janx’s stories began with him being
washed up on some island.

“Aye,”
Janx said. “Well, right off a band of fish-folk seizes me and drags me to their
village. Dead in the center of it—”

“Almost
there,” Hinis interrupted.

“Another
time,” Avery promised Janx. To Hinis, he said, “Has the Captain been notified?”

Hinis nodded. “She or the
X.O.’ll
likely be taking a look, same as you.”

“This
will be the second murder in two weeks,” Avery said. “You’re sure it wasn’t
accidental?”

“Take
a look for yourself.”

They
rounded the last of the three great chimney stacks, and Hinis raised her
lantern as she staggered up the ladder onto the poop deck. Avery’s feet slipped
on the wet surface as he followed, and he looked down to see that he’d stepped
on a starfish-like encrustation growing over the side of the ship. Around his
foot something spurted—moved. Though it had the texture of a starfish, it was
shapeless and ingrown into the deck. He didn’t pause—he was used to the various
things that came up from the sea—but yanked his foot free and forced himself to
go slower, reeling out the line behind him.

As
they crossed toward the rearmost section of gunwale, Hinis’s lantern threw back
the shadows to reveal a body lying twisted on the deck.

Avery
crouched over it, having to balance himself carefully in the environment suit.
The body laid on its side, back arched, blood weeping through holes in the suit
and thinning in the water that pooled all around.

Avery
rolled the body over and looked at the face-plate for signs of breathing, just
to be sure. Nothing. Then his own breath caught in his throat.

“
Paul
,” he said.

The
dead man stared back at him: broad-featured, clean-shaven, and familiar.

“Shit,”
Hinis said. “Should have told you. I forgot you two were friends.”

“Sorry,
Doc,” said Janx.

Avery
tried to cover the sudden swell of grief that rose in him. He blinked his eyes
rapidly.
Damn it, Paul.

Taking
refuge in his profession, Avery studied the holes in the suit to either side
and beneath Sgt. Paul
Bercka’s
canister of compressed
air.

“Stabbed,”
he said. “Something double-sided, maybe an inch-and-a-half wide. A ... A
modified fleshing knife, perhaps. Looks like the killer cut the air line first,
probably to disorient him. He locked him about the neck with one arm and
stabbed him with the other.” Avery sucked down a deep breath, smelling metal,
canvas and stale sweat—what Paul’s final gulp of air would’ve smelled like.
I'm so sorry, my friend. You deserved better
than this.
"The murderer must be a strong man to have overpowered
him," Avery added. "I wouldn’t be surprised if the knife thrusts
severed the spine. I expect that’s what I’ll find when I perform the autopsy.”

“You’ll
perform an autopsy?”

Avery
turned. The speaker was not Hinis or Janx but the Executive Officer, Commander
Lucas Hambry, tall and strange in his suit; some sort of barnacle-like growth
clung to the side of his helmet. Captain Sheridan must have sent him in her
stead.

“Of
course,” Avery said. “Protocol demands it.”

“You
didn’t perform an autopsy on the first body,” Hambry said.

“Actually,
I tried, but there wasn’t enough left of Lt. Nyers to determine much.”
The sea will do that, X.O.
With a sigh,
Avery rose to his feet. “This time I’m afraid the cause of death is obvious.”

Commander
Hambry stared down at Paul’s remains. “So it’s murder.”

“As
was the case with Nyers, I’m sure of it.”

“Why?”

“Her
lifeline was unhooked, not severed by strain. Someone
unclipped
it.” Something pounded behind Avery’s right temple. He
needed a drink.

Janx
moved to the gunwale and examined the torn lifeline. “A clean cut,” he said.
“I’ve seen my share of torn lines, and this one was slashed by a blade. No
fraying.”

“Perhaps
the killer meant to make this one more realistic,” Avery said, “but was
disturbed before he could finish.”

“It
was Privates Barris and Wathin, Doctor, who found the body,” said Hinis. “They
were on patrol. The sergeant had come out to check on ‘em and make the rounds.
He’d already spoken with them and moved on. Wasn’t till they finished their
tour of the starboard boats—some drift-jellies had been nesting in ‘em again,
you know how it is; sometimes their poisons can eat through the metal—that they
headed back to stern and found ...”

She
gestured to Paul.

“Did
they see any sign of the killer?”

“No,
Doctor. I was there when they gave their report.”

Suddenly,
bells tolled throughout the ship. Avery’s head snapped up. His first horrified
thought was that Octunggen submarines had found them.

The
ship’s intercom blared: “ALL MEN TO YOUR STATIONS. THE WHALE MEET IS BREAKING
UP. REPEAT, THE WHALE MEET IS BREAKING UP. WHALERS PREPARE. GREATEST LEVIATHAN
BEARING PORT. TURNING BROADSIDE TO PORT. BOATS AWAY IN THREE MINUTES. REPEAT:
BOATS AWAY IN THREE MINUTES.”

“I
better get goin’,” said Janx, and lumbered off.

“Be
careful,” Avery called after him.

Hinis
flashed an excited smile. “Finally! We bag one of these bastards and we can go
home.”

“If
there’s any home left,” Commander Hambry said. “The Octunggen were advancing
through the Pass last we heard, remember.”

“There’s
still a home,” she insisted.

“I’m
sure there is,” Avery said. “And if we can bring back a whale, it’ll be there
for a little while longer. Lieutenant, I need you to move Sgt. Bercka to the
medical bay. I’ll perform the autopsy as soon as I can, but at present I need
to be on hand in case of injury.”

“Of
course, Doctor.”

Avery
set off toward amidships, Commander Hambry at his side.

“About
damned time, don’t you think?” Hambry said. “I thought that whale meet would
never end. How long can they sing their stupid songs to each other, anyway?”

In
his mind’s eye, Avery still saw the broad face and friendly eyes of Paul
Bercka. The eyes stared, glassy and still. He shook himself.

“Too
long,” he said.

The
Maul
and its sister ships had been
following the gathering of whales for weeks, waiting for them to disband so as
to make hunting one or more easier. Normally the whales that plied the Atomic Sea
were vicious and mad, driven by pain and fury, too irascible even to tolerate
members of their own species. But, every now and then, they would congregate.
They would sing, they would mate, and the bulls would fight each other for the
females, sometimes to the death. Avery knew Captain Sheridan had been hoping to
pick up just such a casualty in the meet’s wake, but the whales had not been
accommodating. The rest of the whaling fleet had followed along, too, vultures
after carrion. Part of Avery still found it strange that the Navy would devote
so much time and so many resources to whale hunting when Ghenisa was on the
verge of being overrun by Octung, but Octung’s advance was precisely why
harvesting a whale—and its precious energy-filled lard—was so important.

Hustling
whalers beset Avery and Hambry as they reached amidships, the whalers crossing
to the harpoon racks to retrieve their instruments. Janx, tall and broad even
among the other whalers, selected his own personal harpoon, the notorious Nancy, which boasted what
looked like but could not possibly be a bronze head. Its shaft had been
shattered and replaced countless times, but that head had slain dozens of
whales; their bones had chipped and pitted every bit of it.
Dead by Nancy
was such a common phrase
in the navy that in recent months it had extended to every walk of a sailor’s
life, not just on the
Maul
but the
fleet as a whole. Whether grievously tired, sore or hung-over, a sailor might
say “I’m dead by Nancy” or “Nancy take me”.