Voyage (Powerless Nation #2) (9 page)

“How many containers are filled with food usually?” asked one student.

“I don’t know, you’d have to see the ship’s manifest, but not even the captain of a container ship gets to see the manifest.”

“What’s a manifest?” asked Sena.

“It’s a list of all of the goods being transported on a ship. Most ships don’t have any idea what they’re carrying, unless it’s flammable or dangerous. They don’t always declare that either. A few years ago a news team wanted to make a point about the lack of oversight in the shipping industry and they actually shipped a container of spent uranium to Los Angeles.”

“Isn’t that the stuff they make bombs out of?”

“Yes, and run nuclear reactors. Of course, after 9/11, security was improved, but shipping is still probably the biggest industry that no one knows anything about. Do you guys think you own anything that was ever on a transport ship?”

The students looked at themselves and at each other.

“Maybe our phones?” asked someone.

“Yes. What else?”

“Our clothes?”

“What about back home? How many things in your houses got there via container ship?”

The class was silent, thinking of their homes and families. Sena heard a few sniffles, and thought to herself that Mr. Stoddard’s lecture probably wasn’t having the intended effect.

“Would you be surprised if I told you almost everything in your homes, at your jobs, and in the classroom came to the U.S. on a boat like that? Ninety percent of all goods in the world are shipped on container boats.”

Charity rolled her eyes. “Not my Ray-Bans. They were made in Italy.”

Sena was kind of glad that Charity was back to normal.

“As nice as it is to imagine your designer sunglasses flying first class from Italy and enjoying the in-flight movie, most Ray-Bans are made in China and cross the ocean on a slow-moving boat piled high with boxes.”

“What-
ev
-er,” said Charity under her breath. “Do you guys want to get out of here?”

Sena looked around and realized Charity was including her. Maybe she wasn’t completely back to normal.

“Come on,” she whispered, and moved slowly away from the lecture and into the crowd of passengers. They regrouped at the buffet and Sena stepped in something slippery.

“Ew,” she said, stepping back. Rivulets of cooking oil and grease flowed from the shutdown hamburger bar and across the deck. She got out her camera and took a picture.

A woman in a crumpled house dress and floppy hat said, “The boat is listing so much, the grease spilled out of the fryers.” She wrinkled her nose. “I hope they get it cleaned up by lunch time, it really stinks.”

Sena didn’t see anyone dealing with it, and figured the crew wasn’t going to keep doing all the menial tasks onboard for much longer. They probably weren’t going to get paid for this trip, so there wasn’t any compelling reason for them to spend the morning cleaning up someone else’s greasy mess. 

She saw an Asian man in a white crew uniform arrive with a cleaning cart. She tried to tell him thanks but he refused to meet her eyes. She took a photo of him as he scrubbed to document how hardworking the crew was through the ordeal.

“What do you guys want to do?” Charity said. Sena moved to rejoin the group.

Jessica said, “I heard there’s bingo this morning.”

“Tell me you did not just suggest we play bingo with the old folks.” Charity rolled her eyes.

“Have you ever tried it? They are like striking cobras with those stampers.”

“I don’t think I even want to know what you’re talking about,” said Charity. “Come on, who else has an idea? Something inside, it’s freezing up here.”

Sena looked at the sky and saw a mass of gray clouds on the northern horizon. She hoped it wasn’t heading towards them. The thought of cold rain soaking all of the mattresses and bedding on deck made her shiver.

Spending another afternoon in the library sounded like fun to her, though she wasn’t about to suggest it. She was still trying to take in the fact she’d been invited to join Charity’s circle and didn’t want to risk spoiling it.

“Did you have something in mind?” That was Kade.

“I was thinking we could go exploring,” Sena suggested.

“Like where? Maybe the crew only area? I’ve got a keycard,” said Paris. “I was flirting with one of the cabin boys and he gave it to me along with directions to his room.” She rolled her eyes. “As
if
.”

“Do you want to see something creepy?” Charity said. “I heard there’s a morgue on the ship.”

“I’m sure that’s off-limits,” Kade said.

“Exactly,” said Charity. “It’s perfect. Who’s in?”

Sena reached into her pocket for her book light. When she touched it, she said, “I’m in, and I know where it is.”

The stairs were still lit by glow sticks, so they weren’t too dark. At the bottom, they found the crew door and Paris opened it with her keycard. Sena had half hoped the batteries in the lock would be dead, but the green light blinked on with a cheerful chirp, and they pushed the door open. The hallway loomed in front of them like a gaping black maw, and Sena flicked on her little light.

Everyone spoke in whispers, despite the fact that the area looked deserted except for them. A few of the kids had mini flashlights on their keychains, and they led the way, tiny beams of light slicing into the darkness.

Jessica screamed, and Sena about jumped out of her skin, while one of the guys laughed. “Got ya,” he said to Jessica.

“I’m going to kill you!” she said, laughing too.

The bumpy rubber flooring beneath Sena’s feet reminded her how the stainless steel had looked in full light, stretching endlessly ahead of her. She tried to remember which door led to the morgue. The teens passed several doors until they came to the area with the walk-in freezers. 

“Check this out,” one of the guys said. He motioned for them to follow him into one of the smaller freezers. It was barely cooler inside than in the hallway.

“What is it?” asked Charity.

“Heaven,” he said. Flashlights revealed shelves and shelves of ice cream. It dripped from cardboard boxes, forming sticky puddles on the ground.

“More like hell. It’s all melted.”

They looked around the freezer, hoping to find one last carton that was still frozen.

Kade found a container of whipped topping and opened it. He glanced over at Charity, and then scooped out some of the fluff onto his finger and held it to Sena. 

She wasn’t sure what she was supposed to do. 

“It’s okay, try it,” he said.

She hesitated and then licked a tiny bit from his finger. It was rich and sweet.

Kade traced her lips with the rest of the whipped cream on his finger. She opened her mouth slightly, wanting more. In the darkness she felt him lean toward her and thought he was about to kiss her. She’d never been kissed, and she closed her eyes in anxious expectation. 

A loud crash startled them apart, and Sena looked over to see Charity staring at them. Next to Charity, one of the guys stood up from where he’d fallen. He held out a container and said sheepishly, “Sorry, I slipped. A guy’s gotta have his Rocky Road.”

“Come on, let’s go find the morgue,” Charity said in a clipped voice. “Which way, Sena?”

With reluctance and some relief, Sena stepped away from Kade and toward the door, the sweet taste of whipped cream on her lips.

Not far down the hallway, Sena was surprised to see a door standing ajar. She caught a whiff of a terrible, fishy smell and knew she’d found the seafood freezer.

As they approached, the smell of fish and other seafood beginning to decay was thick and cloying. Kids groaned and gagged and Sena wasn’t sure if they were serious or faking. She pulled the neck of her t-shirt up over her nose and mouth to try to block some of the smell, and pointed to the door of the morgue.

Paris’s keycard didn’t work the first time, and Sena hoped they would all want to leave. Paris realized she had the card upside down, and on the second try, the green light blinked, the lock chirped, and they opened the door.

It was forbiddingly dark in the next room, and the air had a smoky tang to it. It wasn’t bad, exactly. More ominous. She was sure the bodies of the people who’d been killed in the fire were inside and she didn’t want to be there anymore, regardless of what Charity or her friends thought of her. She decided to wait out in the hallway. 

She hoped Kade would want to wait out in the hallway with her, but he followed his friends into the morgue without so much as glancing at her.

Sena stood alone by the partially open door and tried to ignore the fishy smell. Instead she thought about what had almost happened in the ice cream freezer; Kade McGuire had been about to kiss her.

She touched her lips with her fingers and let herself imagine what it would have been like to feel his mouth on hers. She floated away in daydreams involving her and Kade and a field of daisies in the warm sunshine.

Then she heard a sound that snapped her back to reality. The lock at the far end of the hall chirped, signaling that someone had opened the door and was heading their way.

She stepped quickly into the morgue, trying to see through the gloom in the faint glow of her book light. 

Someone jumped out from behind the door at her and grabbed her arm.

She stifled a scream and almost burst into tears. “That wasn’t funny!” she said, nearly forgetting why she was there.

“Aw, I’m sorry. I wish I could’ve seen your face though. Talk about the right time and the right place,” said the guy that liked Rocky Road ice cream.

“Be quiet,” she hissed. “Someone’s coming.”

“Probably getting lunch supplies,” said Charity quietly. “They won’t come in here.”

“We should still hide,” said Sena. “Do you know how much trouble we’ll be in if we’re caught?” The thought of being caught breaking the rules made her stomach clench tightly.

It was too dark for Sena to tell if Charity shrugged or rolled her eyes; she suspected both.

“Fine,” Charity said. “We’ll hide. Come on guys, behind the counter.”

In the back of the room was a long, low counter that acted as a divider between the morgue shelves and a large desk. It probably wasn’t much of a hiding place with the lights on, but in the complete dark Sena hoped it would be enough if someone came in.

The whispers and giggles quieted immediately when they all heard voices outside the door of the morgue, and then the quick beep as the door was unlocked. Sena flicked off her light and willed herself to breathe silently. Being discovered would be worse than being in the dark for a few minutes, she tried to convince herself.

She couldn’t make out the low-spoken male voices because her heart was pounding in her ears and practically out of her chest. Why had she come along with Charity? She should be reading in the library or watching the sea for dolphins. If they were caught in here, the captain would probably put them in the brig for breaking and entering.

Sena tried to calm down so she could hear what was being said. When her brain finally sorted out what she was hearing she was dizzy with real fear. 

The voices were speaking Korean.

She tried to listen but could only pick out a few words, and none of them made any sense. 

Why were the Koreans in here? They moved some of the rolling morgue shelves around, and then spoke quietly about… a plan? 

Their voices were frustratingly soft. They only spoke for a few minutes and then they left.

The high schoolers remained hidden behind the low counter, making sure they were really gone. Finally, Kade stood and whispered, “I don’t know what they were saying, but it didn’t sound friendly.”

A few of the others murmured their agreement. Sena turned her light back on and looked around to try and figure out why the men had chosen the morgue for their covert meeting. Maybe something to do with the morgue shelves.

Instead of having body drawers like the morgues she’d seen on TV, the ship’s morgue had shelves on one side of the room with pull-out pans for bodies. She was sorry to see so many silver body bags on the shelves. A lot of people had died on the cruise so far. She’d known about the ones in the fire, but that didn’t account for the number of body bags she saw now.

Then she noticed that one of the bodies wasn’t in a bag.

“Was that here earlier?” she asked Charity, pointing at the body.

“No,” said Charity. “Hey, shine your light over there, would you?”

The Rocky Road guy pointed his flashlight at the body. It was wearing a crew uniform, and it wasn’t burned.

“Holy crap,” said someone. Sena took a step forward and felt sick when she thought she recognized the body. 

The drawer pulled out with a creak and one of the girls screamed. Sena wanted to scream, but couldn’t. Her mouth had gone completely dry with fear. 

The body on the shelf belonged to Captain Brady.

CHAPTER TEN

“I
S
HE
REALLY
DEAD
?” asked Jessica.

Paris made an exasperated noise. “Duh. Look at his throat. We’ve got to tell someone.”

“Good one, brainiac,” said Charity. “Let’s go find Captain Crane.”

“Wait,” said Sena.

“Now what?” asked Charity.

“What if he’s in on it?”

“Captain Crane? Come on.”

“No really,” said Sena. “Captain Brady was going to get Crane in trouble for abandoning the ship.”

“Hmm,” said Charity, thinking aloud. “And he’s the one that brought the Koreans onboard in the first place, right?”

“That’s what I’m thinking,” said Sena. “He’s not even next in line for captain.”

“Who is then?”

“I don’t know. Maybe Chief Huang, the head of Engineering? I really have no idea.”

“Then who do we tell?” asked Jessica. Her voice had taken on a new shrillness, and Sena thought she was close to panic.

“Let’s go up to the bridge and see who’s in charge.”

The wind outside was icy after the warmer, stuffy air below decks. Any hope Sena had that the storm was going to bypass them was dashed when she came out of the stairwell and saw angry gray clouds thick overhead. The motion of the ship underfoot was more noticeable as well. The surf was getting rougher.