The Abyss Surrounds Us (16 page)

25

When we rush back up the ramp and onto the ship, Santa Elena is waiting for us. She keeps her arms folded, and a sleek pair of sunglasses shade her eyes. “No one else spotted you, then?” she asks, sizing us up. Lemon and Chuck lurk just behind her, leaning on a railing that looks out over the bay.

Swift nods. We're soaking wet and panting, but at least we didn't run into Murphy or any of his goons on the way back to the ship.

“Cas, you wanna explain who that was?” Swift asks, and I notice the harsh edge she's forced into her tone.

I stare at the shiny black discs where the captain's eyes should be. “Fabian Murphy. Works as a liaison between Reckoner stables and the International Genetically Engineered Organisms Council. He's an old friend of my parents.”

“He's powerful,” Santa Elena says, but it's not quite a question.

“He's well-connected.”

“Boss,” Swift says. “He made the connection. Cas to Bao. Bao to the
Minnow
.”

“He'd be an idiot not to.” The captain shrugs. “Welcome back to the land of the living, Cassandra. Come here.” She draws the handcuffs key from her pocket, and a shudder of relief courses through me. Swift and I stick our wrists out, and she pops the metal loops open one at a time, tucking the cuffs back into her belt once we're free.

I shake my hand, wincing as the sea wind cuts across the chafed skin. I almost thank her right then and there.

“Stow her,” Santa Elena snaps.

And suddenly Chuck's at my side, wrenching my arms behind my back as Lemon grabs my hair. My eyes roll back in my head as they yank, the pain searing through my scalp like wildfire.

Swift steps forward, but the captain snares her by the wrist. “You and I are going to have words. Right. Now,” Santa Elena snarls.

I watch, helpless, as she drags Swift toward the bridge. Chuck and Lemon haul me into the ship's interior and throw me down a ladder. I hit the ground in a heap and pain shoots through my hip. They don't bother waiting for me to get up; Lemon takes my right wrist, Chuck takes my left, and together they tow me down the shadowy hall.

This is all feeling very familiar. So familiar, in fact, that I know exactly where they're taking me. I can almost smell the janitorial closet before I see it, and when they yank the door open and toss me in, it feels unnaturally homelike.

“You guys really need to invest in a proper brig,” I say as I roll onto my back, glaring up at the two of them.

Chuck grins. “I'll put in a word with the captain.” She slams the door, and the lock clicks into place. Seconds later, the engines rumble to life.

A laugh nearly bubbles out of me. I spent the whole day chained to a pirate, and only
now
do I feel like a proper prisoner. Santa Elena was counting on word about Bao getting out, but she didn't think I would be part of the news. She wanted the word to be that pirates were raising Reckoners on their own.

Murphy's changing that. He's letting the world know that the pirates didn't hatch and rear the beast—that there's a professional trainer behind it all.

That without me, Santa Elena has nothing.

I just went from an absolute nobody on this ship to its most protected resource. The captain can't lose her Reckoner after putting him on display like that. But now word's gotten out that she has a hostage, and the hunt is going to start. They can't take out the
Minnow
without attempting to extract me first. I'm both the reason we'll have a pursuit on our tail and the only thing keeping them from blowing the ship out of the water.

And somewhere in this closet, there's probably that little pill I was supposed to take, a little pill my parents now know never made it down my throat. I failed in my duty as a trainer, and now they'll see just how bad the consequences are. They'll be so disappointed.

I scoot into the corner and hug my knees, trying to preserve my body heat. Night's fallen, the cold has set in, and I'm still soaking wet.

I must fall asleep like that, because the next thing I know it's morning, and Varma is throwing the door open. “Rise and shine,
rani
,” he says. “Big day today. Captain's got a surprise for you.”

“Oh, she shouldn't have,” I simper as I crawl to my feet. When I pass through the door, I notice that Varma's grin stretches the tattoo on his cheek. I wonder if the artist had to knock him out to put it on him.

Varma escorts me down to the trainer deck, where Santa Elena and a very rumpled-looking Swift wait. She lurks behind the captain, and as we draw near, I spot the bruise shining on her cheek. Whatever she and Santa Elena discussed last night, it doesn't look like it was friendly.

“So,” the captain says, clapping her hands with a flourish. “The news is out. An unregulated Reckoner is escorting the
Minnow
and Cassandra Leung is training it. It's time to move our operation into its next stages.” She sweeps over to the door controls and jams down the button. As the doors wheel up to let the sunlight in, a prickling sensation creeps over the back of my neck.

Chained to the back of the
Minnow
is a decommissioned tug.

“I trust you know how to make the most of this,” Santa Elena says, gesturing at the smaller ship. “And there's one more thing.” She lifts a duffle bag from the counter and lobs it at my chest.

I catch it with a grunt and unzip it. Lying there, waiting for me, is a pair of Otachi. Wrist-mounted laser projectors with blazing beams a hundred times more powerful than the flashing lights of beacons. The tools of a real Reckoner trainer.

I used to dream about using them in battle. Watching my dad throw beams across the waves was like watching a swordsman at his craft, and I'd stand at his side, counting the seconds until the day that I would get to do the same. But in my fantasies, it was always Durga who followed me as I slashed the lights across her targets.

And it was always pirates at the other end.

I turn on the captain. Something's broken loose inside me, and as I meet her narrowed eyes, I finally ask the question that's been burning in me for three months. “Where are you getting this shit?” I snap, throwing the duffle at her feet. “These tools are only sold to Reckoner trainers. The cull serum, Bao—how the hell are you—”

Santa Elena raises an eyebrow. “You have all of the pieces, Cassandra. Put them together.”

“What pieces?” I sputter. There's no rational explanation for why high-end Reckoner gear and a Reckoner itself ended up on a pirate ship. Even if the pirates were willing to pay through the nose. Even if the broker had access to every facet of the industry. Even if—

Cold gray eyes. A man who had no reason to be on the Flotilla. Unless …

“Fabian Murphy,” I spit through gritted teeth, fists clenched at my sides. The pieces fall into place.

“When you want to run counter to an imbalanced system, you have two options,” the captain says, her voice grave. “Either you find the pure of heart willing to fight for your cause, or you find the most corrupt willing to forsake their own. Fabian Murphy is the latter.” She says it with a note of bitterness, as if she'd hoped for better things from him.

“Money?” I hazard.

“The only reason men of his mold do anything,” she says with a nod. “Murphy is willing to sell his industry for a cut from ours.”

I think back to that morning in Mom's lab. The security concerns he'd mentioned with hesitancy. He was throwing us off his scent, ensuring his access to the inner sanctum of the Reckoner industry.

And then there was the pup himself. A chill rushes through me as I remember the cyro-crate Murphy hauled out of our lab, the unusually high number of unviable embryos he'd found, my mother's hesitation. He was stealing pups right out from under our noses, under the guise of protecting the industry's investors.

Yet Bao clearly isn't one of my mother's monsters. Murphy must have been preying on dozens of stables.

“So he was the one who poisoned Durga,” I blurt. Murphy had access to the observation bays—he easily could have slipped in and dosed her with some IGEOC serum. Maybe he didn't expect them to take me alive. Maybe that's why he seemed so surprised to see me.

“If you say so,” Santa Elena drawls, her lips edging into a lopsided smile. It's not an answer, and I hate that it's not an answer. The agony of Durga's death is still raw inside me, and all I want, all I need to close the wound, is somewhere for the blame to fall.

My gaze falls on the duffle I've unceremoniously deposited at the captain's feet. “But if he's your broker, why would he try to get me rescued?”

“Who knows? He's a friend of your parents. He has an inkling of a conscience. He never anticipated uneducated pirates successfully hatching and training one of the monsters he sold us. Or maybe we're not his most valuable clients.”

The last thou
ght sends a shiver down my spine.

“Go ahead,” Santa Elena prompts, indicating the Otachi. “Give 'em a spin.”

I crouch, pull one of the devices out of the bag, and set it over my forearm. There's a set of straps that I have to adjust to keep the Otachi in place and some loops that go over my fingers. It takes a few minutes to get everything where it should be. I roll my shoulder, adjusting to the weight, then switch the device on. As the dials beneath my fingers glow to life, a rare sensation takes hold of me, something I haven't felt since that night on Bao's back.

I feel powerful.

With a few twists of the dials, I set the Otachi to project Bao's signal set and call up the homing signal. The tech responds at the lightest touch, a far cry from the heavy switches I'm used to. I step up to the edge of the trainer deck and raise my teched-up arm, pointing it at the tug's side as my fingers hover over the triggers.

I pull them, light blazes from my wrists, and the tug's side lights up with the familiar pattern. Speakers on the Otachi ring with the low noise that draws our Reckoner to the ship, and somewhere off in the blue, a puff of steam rises as Bao hearkens to the call.

The devices are heavy. The beams waver in the air as I keep them fixed at the spot I projected to. I duck my elbows down to compensate.

A minute later, Bao surges out of the sea, his nose pointed right at the projections on the tug's side. I draw them down the ship's hull, and he follows. It's like a cat with a laser pointer, but with a beast the size of a house. Varma chuckles from somewhere behind me. I click off the projections and let my arms fall to my sides.

“Optimistically, we've got about three days before some sort of shitstorm comes raining down on us,” Santa Elena says. “Less, if SRC politicians by some miracle deliberate relatively quickly. Either way, whenever our reckoning comes, we'd better have a Reckoner of our own.”

Swift snorts, and Santa Elena aims a kick at her.

“I'll … ” I start, but I don't know what to say. It takes months to train Reckoners into aggression, but then again, that's with safety considerations. That's with standards and regulations, with pacing that avoids stressing out the beasts. If I push Bao, maybe we can get somewhere in three days. Maybe I can make him lethal.

He's already lethal
, I remind myself, thinking of Code's bright green eyes.

“You'll do your damndest, Cassandra, or dear Swift will be that thing's next meal,” Santa Elena snarls.

For a moment I think she's kidding, but I see the way Swift's jaw clenches, the way her body leans slightly away from the captain's side. That must have been what they talked about last night, and suddenly I feel stupid—so completely and utterly stupid—because this was Santa Elena's plan all along.

When I was alone on this ship with nothing to lose, she could barely control me. It was a stroke of luck for her that I felt the need to uncover the mystery behind Bao's origins. But she gave me a companion, a protector, a friend, and she bided her time until it became clear to her that I'd been snared by her trap. That's why she didn't seem bothered by my revelation that Bao was still docile. It wasn't because she thought that he'd instinctively fight when the time came.

No, she knew about that idea stewing away in the back of my head. The one where once I'd gotten what I needed to know, I'd take the beast she gave me and turn him on the ship that had taken everything away. The one where I used Bao to crush the
Minnow
into oblivion.

The one that's impossible now, because I care too much about Swift. I can't take her life, her livelihood; I can't let her family starve.

And not once in this conversation have I questioned using Bao to fight the pursuit. Not once have I doubted that I can turn my monster against the people coming to rescue me. Santa Elena has worked her magic.

“I'll do everything I can,” I tell her, hating how much I mean it.

26

In the first few hours with the Otachi, I've been able to bait Bao into ramming the tug enough that he now associates the flashing pattern with charging. When I project out against a wave, the beams cutting into the murky ocean waters, he surges after them, throwing the full force of his body after the bright lights.

My arms are sore. I've been switching between them, trying to keep myself going, but by noon I've hit a point where I can barely lift either of them.

Swift brings down a tray of food from the mess just as the sun reaches its high point in the sky. She avoids my gaze when she hands it to me.

“Hey,” I say when she turns her back without a word.

Swift freezes. Her neck stiffens, as if the tattoo branded there has nailed her in place.

“Captain says we've been getting too chummy,” she mutters. “Says we shouldn't talk as much. Says we'll both pay if we do.”

Telling her exactly what the captain can go do seems unwise in this situation, so I simply say, “Shame,” and try to mask the fact that her words have set something boiling in my stomach. I guess there's no need for me to be guarded on this ship anymore, not after what happened to Code. Everyone's too afraid of the captain to try anything, Swift included.

The bruise on her face has gotten a little bit worse. It must have been fresh this morning, and it makes me wonder just how long the captain interviewed her. I want to ask her what they talked about, but she's already through the hatch, slamming the latch in place behind her.

I eat slowly, the food tasteless in my mouth. Out across the waves, I spot Bao rising out of the water, a neocete held delicately in his jaws. Seems I'm not the only one who needed a lunch break.

When I call him back, he's sluggish to respond. I can see the tension that coils and uncoils in his muscles when he draws up alongside the trainer deck. He's already feeling cranky and overworked. If I push him, he might push back in a way I can't control, but I can't afford to lose any time.

“Sorry, little shit,” I tell him, and strap on the Otachi again.

I try to go easier on him in the second round, letting him take a few minutes to shake out his limbs before calling him back in to have another go at the tug. With each hollow thud of his plated snout against the ship's metal side, I can feel the frustration building inside him. He can't make sense of why he's being asked to repeat the action, and he's gotten too big for any sort of reward to be effective every time he strikes true. I can't exactly furnish a host of carved-up neocete carcasses like we do back home, and red meat is the only sure way to get a Reckoner's favor. As his frustration mounts, I start to worry that he'll remember Code, that eventually he'll just stick his head onto the trainer deck and snap me up.

But I'm frustrated and overworked too. It doesn't mean he gets off the hook. I blaze the lasers again, and again, and again, conducting a hundred-and-fifty-ton orchestra with wrists trembling from exhaustion. There's something I want to try, something I've never been able to attempt within the confines of regulated Reckoner training.

I want to see how far he'll go to get me off his case.

So I keep on throwing up the same signal. The lights I project are so bright and sharp that they leave streaks across my vision in their wake, and I know they must be burned into Bao's retinas by now. The lasers mounted on the Otachi are powerful enough to scorch things that get too close, and though the smudges in my vision make it difficult to tell, I think they've already started to wear a dark spot on the tug's hull.

I wait for the moment I feel certain.

It doesn't come until nearly evening. When I throw the Otachi's beams against the tug's side, Bao lets out a groan so loud that the ocean around him vibrates, and when he wheels, it's with a burst of energy far stronger than anything he's done in the past hour. He cuts through the waves like a freight train, his thick limbs kicking up a froth in his wake. I wait until he's half a body-length from the tug's side.

Then I twist one of the knobs, switching the signal from
charge
to
destroy
.

He doesn't know what it means. He doesn't need to. Something clicks, something falls into place, and his fury unlocks. Bao hits the tug with a roar, but instead of glancing off, he keeps going. His forearm crashes down on the deck as he locks his beak around the cockpit, and the shriek of tearing metal echoes across the waves.

I stagger back a few steps.

Bao's neck muscles snap taut as he wrenches his head back, ripping the cockpit from the ship. His weight crashes down on the tug's deck, and the boat's hull warps. With a high-pitched keen, he thrusts his head back down, and when his jaws snap shut, it's like a thunderclap. The tug cracks cleanly in two, the pieces bobbing up on either side of him as he sinks between them. Bao chases one of them, locks it in his beak, and starts swatting at it with his foreleg. His massive claws shred the hull like tissue as both he and the fragment of the ship sink into the depths beneath us.

My work here is done. A pup's training ends when they devastate their first tug. From here on out, it's instinct. It takes months to properly train a Reckoner.

But I did it improperly, and I did it in a day.

There's a sudden roar from the decks above me, and I realize that we had an audience all along. Somewhere up there, Santa Elena must be watching. Somewhere up there, she's seeing exactly the kind of beast she has on her side.

I hope she's impressed.

As for me, I'm terrified and just a little bit proud. A Reckoner's strength comes from careful practice, from routine and comfort and precision. What I just saw Bao do was nothing like that. Proper training is tai chi; this was a backstreet knife fight. Now not only does our beast have a taste for blood, but he's also got a knack for savaging ships that's unlike anything I've ever seen.

Bao is, without a doubt, the most dangerous thing in the NeoPacific.

And he answers to me.