Black sails to sunward, p.14
Black Sails to Sunward, page 14
He pulled the vent handle and the port gave its characteristic whoosh. “Torpedo away. If there were one. No wonder the gun drills were such a disaster. We should have had the Martian crew show the rest of us.”
While his back was still turned, I slipped my hand into his bag and took a screwdriver. It went up my shirtsleeve. “You should have been doing them before now,” I said. “What if you’d come upon an enemy and half your crew didn’t know how to fire the guns?”
“Moira wants us doing them every watch from now on.” He swept the rest of his tools out of the air and shoved them inside his bag.
I fought a pang of disappointment. Finally, someone I could talk to about the thing that was eating me most, and the conversation would be over. Back to my box.
But instead, he perched on the number six, bearded chin on his hands. “I don’t get it,” he said. “Why were you so angry at her for asking? I mean, it does no harm for her to just ask.”
“It ruined everything,” I said. “As long as nobody said anything, it wasn’t real.”
“Sounds like it was real,” he said. “On both sides.”
“But if neither of us knew...” I trailed off, frustrated. “I had my life all planned out. I was going to marry somebody, like I had to. But she and I always would have been best friends. We could have ridden out together every day, just like before. Nothing had to change if only nobody had said anything. I’d decided that years before, just never say a word and she would never know; and that way, I knew I’d never do anything.”
He eyed me skeptically. “Yeah, but you would have sooner or later.”
“I wouldn’t! I take things like promises very seriously. I never would have been unfaithful to whoever I married.”
“Uh-huh. You really think you could keep that shit up for fifty years or however long it was? You gotta be more realistic. You’re a person, not a saint. Either the secret was eventually going to come out and you guys would have given in, or the pressure would have been so impossible to bear that you would have had some ridiculous fight and parted ways. Trust me.” He tapped his broad chest. “I’ve been around a few times.”
I pondered on that for a bit. Of course, I had imagined a thousand ways that it could have come out. Perhaps we would be riding far out by the fjords, and stop for a break. Lying in the long grass, watching the clouds sail by, like we did so often. And one of us would hitch up on our elbow, look down at the other, and be drawn to her lips like a magnet. I had lain awake many nights with thoughts like that. But I had never intended to put them into action. And hadn’t I managed years of keeping the secret, after I fell for her?
“The pressure was already impossible to bear,” I said at last. “I felt a little angry with her all the time. Like she was making it hard for me on purpose, even though she didn’t know.”
“So, when she made her move, that all came out.”
When she had kissed me, I had had to jerk back, to jump to my feet, to start a fight. If I hadn’t, if I had delayed a single second, I wouldn’t have been able to stop. That had been clear to me in a flash. I would have kissed back, buried my fingers in her hair, and—well, never mind the rest. I had thought through that idea enough times, as I lay awake the entire night, haunted by the ghost of that truncated kiss.
“We’d fought before,” I said. “I thought maybe she’d apologize in the morning. And then I could take back what I’d said.”
“She doesn’t owe you an apology for liking you.”
I folded my lips together. “She didn’t have to leave the whole planet to get away from me.”
“It sounds to me like she did.” He pushed off the gun, took his bag, and headed forward. “Nothing had changed. She still loved you. You still loved her, which she might have guessed. Either you were going to get together or she was going to leave, and you didn’t want to get together. So, she left you the whole planet to yourself.” He shook his head as he reached the hatch of my berth. “I like you, Lucy. Pure Martian class. But you do not deserve that woman.”
On the way to Deimos, Moira closeted herself with her best officers, trying to work out a plan. Maggie had moved out of our berth to sleep between the guns with the others, so I spent a great deal of time alone, pushing back and forth along the walls. I watched the planets crawl across the constellations of the zodiac, day by day; memorized more astronomical tables; wrote letters home.
The last was the most difficult. I wrote them up in my notebook, scratched lines out. Who knew when I would have any chance to mail them, or what information I could safely give them. I had a draft from months ago, which I hadn’t bothered mailing at Aphrodite Station, since radio rates were so expensive and paper mail so slow. “I was surprised to see Moira Singh is a member of the crew as well. You may tell her parents she appears to be in good health.” It was true, so far as that went, but I couldn’t very well ever send it. What would I write now? “You may tell her parents she is a traitor to the Empire and is never coming home”? I wrote the words anyway, just to scratch them out again.
Maggie’s absence also left me time to consider my options for escape or sabotage. I inspected every inch of our berth for possible weapons or a way out. I had Marron’s screwdriver, but my first idea, attempting to repair the bowchaser in our room, proved impossible. The whole firing mechanism was gone, and without it, I couldn’t so much as open up the tube.
I could, however, unscrew any panel I wanted in the walls. Each wall, except the metal of the outer hull, was the same densified wood—thin but strong, and lighter than metal would have been.
The decks above and below were the same. Wood panels, about a foot and a half square, secured at the four corners with screws. Going up, I ruled out immediately. Above me was the sail deck, right where the forecastle began. Someone was always there, without fail. The walls weren’t much better; they opened on the gun deck where the men slept and messed and played cards, when they weren’t exercising the guns. But below was only the store level. Hopefully there wouldn’t be anyone in the different storerooms.
Twenty minutes of careful unscrewing later, I eased one edge of the panel upward. It was dim down there—promising. I put one eye to the crack and peered down.
Below was the gun room, where the gunner was stationed during a battle, ready with repair tools. The room aft of it held all the ammunition, where it could be passed up the hatch right outside my berth.
Either room would be perfect for my purposes. In the gun room, I could find the necessary tools to fix the bowchaser in my room. Or I could go through it to the ammunition room, strike a spark, and blow the ship to pieces.
It was hard to force myself to keep moving after that thought. I didn’t want to die. I didn’t want Moira to die. But I had a duty, so I slid the panel a little farther open.
And stopped. Because now I could see a shape against the port wall, and another on the forward wall. A lumpy shadow as long as a man.
I held my breath and listened. I heard the faint whooshing of a crank fan, the kind every berth has, to keep the air circulating so the carbon dioxide won’t pool around our heads as we sleep. And under that sound, very faint, I heard a snore.
I eased back the panel, heart pounding, and screwed it in. If the gun room had been taken over for a berth, there went any hope of a stealthy exit from my prison. I supposed the pirates didn’t like the Navy notion of berthing all the men in rows, between the guns. They’d want to spread out, take their privacy, and why not in the gun room when no one was using it?
After I stowed my screwdriver out of sight, I turned slowly, heels overhead, and let myself drift with my feet toward the sun. I should be disappointed. I should be eagerly searching for a new plan, a way to redeem myself after my craven betrayal when I corrected Maggie’s navigation error. Instead, I felt only relief.
Then anger rushed in after it, turning my stomach hot and my limbs ice cold. I knew why I had turned traitor over the navigation, and why I was tempted to give up now. Moira was why. Because she had turned traitor first, and because she was influencing me. I kept trying to remind her—and myself—that we were enemies. But she was getting in my head, and I hated her for it.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
The mood on the ship as we approached Deimos was cheerful. Nobody slacked in their work, despite an end to floggings. They all had their share of the future profits calculated to the last decimal point—and a plan for how to spend it. Some would go a circuitous route from Earth Corp’s bankers, through independent bankers at Halfpoint Station, to discreet contacts on Mars who could deliver it to loved ones, along with letters. The rest, the sailors would keep, though I wasn’t entirely sure when or where they’d get a chance to spend it. Perhaps a blowout weekend on Luna when all this was through.
I caught snatches of their plan, as they worked on costumes and makeshift weapons. Moira was going to put on the captain’s uniform and epaulets, passing herself off as “Captain Wang-Hawking.” Maggie had supplied the name; a family connection of hers whom she was quite sure had never gone to space. A real noble name was essential; no one could fool Martian nobility by referencing nonexistent Houses.
Moira had Captain Kim’s code book also. It was a captain’s duty to destroy it before surrendering, but the pirates’ attack had been so rapid that he hadn’t the chance. Between that and the ship itself—freshly repainted with the Martian rust, green, and blue—we would have no trouble getting close.
Getting out was the more difficult part. The crew prepared makeshift grenades full of shrapnel to clear out rooms of guards. The team would fight their way to a service airlock intended for waste removal where, with luck, the launch would be waiting. Then the Mariposa would ignite our emergency fuel and make our escape, hopefully long before another ship could get after us.
It sounded simple enough when they explained it. Privately, I thought there were far too many points where it could go wrong. But of course, I wasn’t going to try to think of a better one for them. Best if it went wrong, preferably in a way I got to survive.
We approached Mars with the sails reversed, to catch the braking laser from Phobos Station, which they obligingly fired. As we drew closer, Moira took to standing on the quarterdeck in her captain’s uniform, Maggie by her side, so that any glimpse from outside would show a proper Martian display.
The snowy neckcloth set off her dark skin beautifully and the coat hung well on her angular figure. But, much as I loved the Navy uniform, I didn’t care for it on her. The pirate get-up suited her better.
“A braid,” said Maggie immediately, looking her up and down. “The officers never have short hair.”
“Shit,” she said, trying to pull her cropped hair around to the back. It made a tight pigtail, no more. “Anyone have any spare black hair?”
One of the men donated his long, dark beard to the cause. It was wiry and not quite the right shade, but braided tightly and smeared with black machine oil, it looked close enough.
A day closer, they switched on the radio. Phobos requested passwords; Moira read them out in her most cultured accent. We were allowed to proceed.
“I didn’t know you could talk like that,” I told Moira.
“You were the main person I talked to growing up. Of course I can.”
We slid into orbit not far from Deimos and obtained radio clearance to approach. I swallowed hard as Moira and her chosen team boarded the launch.
“Aren’t you going to wish me luck?” Moira asked me.
I stammered, at a loss. Of course, I didn’t want her to succeed. That would be disastrous for Mars. But even I wasn’t so heartless I could actually say such a thing.
“It isn’t too late to back out,” I said at last.
“Chin up,” she said. “I’ll be back soon.”
When the airlock shut behind them, Marron gave me a nod. “Time to shut you up. I can’t watch the radio and you.”
I preceded him forward to my berth, weighing the risks of attacking him. On the one hand, he was unarmed and had stopped taking his escorting duties very seriously, since I always obeyed him meekly. On the other hand, he had shoulders like an ox. In an unarmed fight, he was more than a match for me. And there were still a dozen men left behind on the ship. Even if I could overpower Marron, there wasn’t much I could do before one of them caught up to me.
No. This wasn’t my moment. But in my room, I still had the screwdriver I had palmed when I was watching Marron fix the guns. I was never going to have a more perfect diversion. Half the crew was off the ship, and the rest would be standing by to make a quick escape. And right here, in Mars orbit, I didn’t have to destroy the Mariposa. All I had to do was somehow disable it, or send out a signal.
I waited until Marron would be out of earshot before getting out my screwdriver, then I crept to the panel I’d opened before. I had it off and was down in the gun room in a few seconds.
As I’d hoped, no one was down there. I uncovered the fiber-optic light, letting it brighten the room. Everything I needed to fix the gun in my berth would be here. I rifled through lockers while turning over plans in my mind. What could I do with that gun? Fire it for a signal, at least. But for that, I’d need some kind of signal flare and there was nothing like that in here. Probably in the ammunition room next door.
But among the supplies, I spotted something much simpler. Every gun had an ignition switch, and there were any number of spares here. I grabbed one, a round disk the size of my palm, and put it in my pocket. A packet of explosive powder, too, and some tape. That was enough to make a bomb adequate for anything I might want.
I listened at the door before slipping out. There didn’t seem to be anyone on this level. This was simple stores: crates of the officers’ food packets, barrels of beans and of rice. Rum stores. The doors of all those rooms would be locked against theft, but I didn’t need any of that. I dived down a hatch to the level below.
This was where the fuel was kept, both rocket fuel and thruster propellant. Toward the aft were the engines. I didn’t want to go too far that way; if I were the pirates, I’d have a man ready at the engines right now, preparing for a quick escape.
But I had an idea in mind now, so I squeezed between the fuel tank and the outer hull, then headed aft. About two-thirds of the way down, there was a valve that connected the tank to the engine. When it was time to move, someone would need to crank the wheel and let the fuel pour into the engine before igniting.
I knew the system’s workings. It had been my duty to know the function and maintenance of every part of the ship. Here was the wheel. But here, behind it, was the actual piece that stopped the fuel from entering the engine when the valve was shut.
I could, of course, just turn the wheel, letting the fuel into the engine. Without ignition, it would bleed out into space. But someone would surely notice before too much had gone, and come back here to crank the valve shut again. I had to blow the whole mechanism.
The packet of explosive powder was far too much for what I wanted. I didn’t want to ignite the tank itself; that would likely destroy the ship. I suppressed a small shudder; I wanted to live. And I wanted, somehow, for Moira to live too. Her odds weren’t good if captured either, but I shut down that line of reasoning. I had to do my duty, didn’t I? And if Moira’s mission succeeded, that meant dangerous prisoners and Earth spies would be set loose. Spies with information that would harm the Empire. I couldn’t allow that.
I carefully shook the amount I wanted onto a piece of tape, waving the tape through the air to catch loose crumbs. Then I pressed the tape onto the back side of the ignition switch. A tiny little bomb, just like that. Wasn’t there a poem about a battle lost for a horseshoe nail? This was hardly bigger.
I cranked the dial as far as it would go, which was twenty minutes. Normally they only needed about ten seconds, to give the gun crew time to shove the torpedo out of the hatch. Once it was in space, the spring would wind down and a flint would strike, lighting the fuel inside the torpedo and sending it toward the enemy. The bigger explosion would come when it hit its target—a contact charge set that one off. But occasionally a longer timer was needed, for when we let loose a broadside meant for a ship that was far behind.
Twenty minutes was plenty of time to get back to my berth. I started to move through the narrow crawl space, but I was stopped by a shout. “Hey! Who’s there?”
I turned. It was Maggie.
While I was sneaking out of my berth, Moira was drinking to the health of the warden, a stout sad-eyed captain named Blake. “It’s really very kind of you to bring this, Captain Wang,” Blake said, not for the first time, as he brought the bulb to his lips. “If you don’t mind my saying so, you don’t look much like a Wang-Hawking.”
She drew up her head with a fine, noble air and said, “I do mind your saying so, as it happens.” No wasting her time explaining or making excuses for her dark skin. Why should she? Plenty of nobles didn’t look like their Chinese, English, or Russian Founder ancestors by now. “Are these the sort of manners that are acceptable here?”
Blake got flustered and dropped his brandy. Swiping it back out of the air, he said, “No, no, I do apologize. It’s rare enough I get the chance of a decent conversation, and there I go spoiling it.”
Hausmann, one of the Mariposa’s original crew, loomed behind Moira in a spacer’s uniform. She was a big woman, who had been there to manhandle the prisoner on board. Not that the prisoner, a slight, dark Earther named Foulet, had put up any real protest. She was supposed to be dejected, having no real hope of overpowering Hausmann.
Now Foulet was being led by two guards deeper inside Deimos, her tattered clothes and fake manacles a pitiful sight. The rest of the crew remained behind on the launch, packed in like sardines, waiting for their moment.
It came soon enough. Blake paused in the middle of the sad story of how he had lost his first command and been sent here, surely the worst posting in the entire Navy and the most thankless, and gave Moira a bleary look. “That stuff you brought is...” His eyes unfocused, refocused, lost it again. “Much stronger than...” He trailed off.
