The Beast of Cretacea (12 page)

“Battle stations! All hands! Battle stations!”

The next day the nippers are in the middle of cleaning up lunch when Starbuck’s strident voice blares over the speakers, followed by a steady, pulsing alarm.

“Cadwallader’s cuticles! Not again!” Fleece gripes as he and the other kitchen staff strip off their aprons and hurry out of the galley, leaving the bewildered nippers behind.

“Battle stations?” Queequeg repeats.

A sudden
rat-a-tat-tat!
of gunfire rings out, and those in the galley flinch and duck. Their ears fill with the sharp
ping
s and
plang
s of what must be bullets ricocheting off the ship’s hull. It’s clear that they’re under attack, but from whom? The nippers dash to the portholes and peer out. At first there’s only endless blue ocean, but then a fast-moving black skiff speeds into view. Half a dozen men crouch in the seats.

Bam-bam-bam-bam!
From the deck above them, the drum of heavy machine-gun fire rips through the air, and the sea around the skiff begins to dance and splash. The skiff cuts hard to starboard and peels out of range, leaving an ever-spreading white wake. Now there’s the loud trampling of feet, and gunfire erupts from the other side of the
Pequod.
Is the crew firing at another vessel?

“Who are they?” Gwen gasps.

Ka-blam!
An explosion on the port side makes the entire vessel shudder. Plates and pots crash to the floor, and everyone grabs the nearest handhold.

“T-torpedo?” Billy asks, shaking.

“Or some kind of cannon.” Queequeg squints out the porthole. “Nothing on this side. Must be a gunboat on the port side.”

Rat-a-tat-tat!
The heavy machine-gun fire resumes. Whoever these raiders are, they’ve smartly picked the middle of the day, when the chase boats are far away hunting and the
Pequod
is running with a skeleton crew.

Blam!
Another shell slams into the port side. More plates crash.

“Look!” Gwen points. Through a porthole they see a crudely made rope ladder. It’s being pulled taut, the strands slowly twisting under the weight of someone climbing up.

“They’re tr-trying to b-board!” Billy cries.

Suddenly Ishmael realizes what’s happening. The firefight on the port side of the ship is meant to distract everyone while raiders sneak up on the starboard side. He sticks his head out the porthole. Five feet below, a grizzled face covered with crude black tattoos glares up at him from the rope ladder. Ishmael is momentarily transfixed by the man’s eyes, the whites of which are bloodred, making him look like some kind of demon. The man sneers. The few teeth he has are discolored stumps.

Other raiders are climbing up rope ladders to the left and right. Ishmael ducks back inside and grabs a plate from the floor to fling at the raider, but when he sticks his head out the porthole, he finds himself staring down into the black barrel of a gun.

BLAM!
Ishmael jerks back, the bullet whistling past just inches from his face. Next to him, Queequeg has opened another porthole and is throwing everything he can find down on the raiders, who respond by firing pistols.
Bang! Bang!

PIT-CHOING!
A bullet ricochets off the rim of the porthole. Queequeg staggers backward, and for an instant Ishmael fears that he’s been hit, but his friend steadies himself and waves that he’s okay.

A hand grabs the lower edge of the porthole. Ishmael smacks it with a pan. The hand slides off but returns an instant later with a gun, waving it around blindly. Ishmael grabs the man’s wrist and forces his arm upward.

BANG! PIT-CHOING!
The gun fires and a bullet ricochets off the galley ceiling. Ishmael’s ears ring painfully from the sharp, impossibly loud report.

Gwen rushes over and helps him force the man’s arm back.

BANG! PIT-CHOING!
The gun fires again, the bullet ricocheting dangerously close. The blast is a hundred times louder than the loudest thunderclap. Gwen clamps her hands overs her ears, and the raider yanks his arm free.

“O-over here!” Billy yells. A meaty, tattooed arm has reached through a porthole and closed around Queequeg’s throat. Queequeg’s hands are clamped on the raider’s wrist, and he’s gagging while the man tries to choke him.

Gwen and Ishmael dash over and try to pry the thick, mangled-looking fingers from their friend’s neck.

“A knife!” Ishmael shouts to Billy, who stands openmouthed, staring. Ishmael starts to bend one of the raider’s fingers back until he hears a sharp
crack!
But the man’s grip on Queequeg’s throat remains tight.

“Here!” Billy holds out a dinner knife.

Ishmael does a double take, but there’s no time to argue. He grabs the knife and tries to stab the attacker, but manages only a glancing blow. The man’s grip still doesn’t loosen.

Queequeg’s eyes are bulging and his face has turned bright red. Ishmael rears back with the knife and strikes again, this time burying the dull blade in the man’s forearm.

The raider lets go. Queequeg collapses to the floor, gagging and coughing. While Ishmael kneels to make sure his friend is okay, he sees that the wounded raider has climbed up the rope ladder past them, the dinner knife still embedded in his arm.

From the deck above comes the scuffling of hand-to-hand combat. Closer by, a door slams in the mess, followed by rapid footsteps. Billy peeks out the galley door. “It’s Pip!” he cries. “Someone’s after him!”

Ishmael and Gwen sprint into the mess. Pip’s on one side of a table, a tall, rail-thin raider on the other. The man’s long hair is jet-black and greasy, his black clothes tattered, and his eyes are that eerie bloodred. He chases Pip around the table once, twice, and then they stop and face each other, breathing hard.

“Well, now, what a plump little marsupial you are.” The raider cackles. “Surrender, Pudgy. You’ll make a suitiful hostage.”

Pip responds by hurling a handful of salt in the man’s face. When the raider squeezes his eyes shut, Ishmael sees a crossbones tattoo on each of his eyelids. The man grabs the edge of the table and heaves it over. Plates, mugs, and silverware crash to the floor, and the chase begins anew.

“Hey!” Ishmael shouts.

The raider pivots and draws his gun. Ishmael and Gwen spring out of the way.

BANG! PIT-CHOING!
A shot rings out and ricochets off the wall.

“Decrease, Pudgy. You’re worth a fortunate ransom!” The raider chortles as he chases Pip.

Crouched under a table, Ishmael catches Gwen’s eye and signals to a pair of chairs. A moment later, after Pip rushes past them, they both jump to their feet, grab the chairs, and swing as hard as they can.

Smack! Wham!
Gwen gets the man square in the face, while Ishmael’s chair smashes into his chest. The raider goes down on his back with a thud and lies there stunned, the gun still in his hand.

But a moment later he’s up again, blood rushing from his nose. Spitting a disgusting glob of blood and short, blackened teeth onto the floor, he aims his gun at Gwen, who dives away.

BANG! PIT-CHING-CHING!
A bullet ricochets off the leg of a table inches from Gwen’s face. Having missed her, the man points the gun at Ishmael, who also dives.

BANG!

The bullet whizzes by as he hits the floor.

“Wheresh Pudgy?” the raider slurs, now almost completely toothless. A door slams on the other side of the room. Ishmael hopes it’s Pip escaping. The man starts to follow but suddenly grunts and falls face-first; Gwen’s grabbed his ankle and tripped him.

On the floor, the attacker rolls over and aims his gun at her.

Only a few feet away, Gwen’s eyes widen with terror. She starts to crab backward on heels and hands, but this time the man with the gun is too close to miss.

Sweeeeee!!!!
A shrill whistle pierces the air. In the mess, the raider with the gun looks up. There’s a second whistle, and he jumps to his feet and dashes away, squeezing through a porthole and dropping out of sight.

Rat-a-tat-tat . . .
A fusillade of machine-gun fire strikes the
Pequod
’s hull again, and the whine of drones is in the air. Ishmael helps a trembling Gwen to her feet, and they hurry into the galley, where Billy’s kneeling beside Queequeg on the floor. Queequeg gingerly traces the red choke marks on his throat with his fingertips. Through a porthole, Ishmael watches as black-clad raiders fire from the skiff to provide cover while their comrades jump off the ship and swim back.

“Hold your fire! Don’t shoot!”
Starbuck’s voice roars out of loudspeakers all over the
Pequod.
Through the porthole Ishmael sees why: In the raiders’ skiff, a big man yanks a drenched Charity to her feet and presses a gun against her head. The skiff starts to speed away.

The
Pequod’s
all-hands bell rings. Ishmael turns away from the porthole. Gwen and Billy are helping Queequeg to his feet.

“You all right?” Ishmael asks.

Queequeg nods, and winces when he tries to swallow. “May not be saying much for a while,” he rasps.

“Is that a promise?” Gwen asks archly.

The door swings open, and Fleece waddles in, mopping his broad, sweaty brow with a dish towel and breathing hard. “From up on deck, it appeared as though someone down here was engaged in hand-to-hand combat with those carnal criminals.”

“Th-those three.” Billy points at Ishmael, Gwen, and Queequeg.

Fleece raises his eyebrows. “Well, I’ll be Melville’s mother!”

The door opens again, and Starbuck sticks his head in. “Everyone okay?”

“Aye-aye, sir.” Fleece points at Ishmael and the others. “These’re the brave young souls who slowed those slimy savages down.”

Starbuck gives them a surprised look, then hurries off.

“Wh-who were they?” Billy asks the cook.

“Pirates.” Fleece positions himself on his stool. “Good-for-nothing scum of the oceans.”

“Where’d they come from?” Queequeg croaks painfully.

“Mostly ship deserters who’d rather maim and plunder than toil for an honest wage,” the cook says. “I must say, I’m glad this is my final voyage. I’m too far along in years and belt loops for this nonsense.”

“What about Charity?” asks Ishmael.

“I imagine that’s what Starbuck’s attending to right about now,” Fleece replies grimly, then aims a plump finger toward the mess. “Better start straightening up. They’re always extra ravenous after a good melee.”

Out in the mess, the nippers straighten tables and chairs and sweep up the broken plates.

“Anyone notice that those pirates didn’t seem to feel pain?” Ishmael asks. “I’m sure I broke that one guy’s finger, and he still kept choking Queequeg. I stabbed him in the arm, and he just kept climbing.”

Billy points at Gwen. “Sh-she practically broke a chair on the f-face of the one chasing Pip. And it barely stunned him.”

“Back on Earth, I used to hear stories about planets that were so overrun with deserters and renegades that we stopped sending missions to them,” Queequeg adds, a fraction above a whisper.

“Y-you think
this
planet’s overrun with them?” Billy asks nervously.

Before anyone can respond, the galley doors swing open and Fleece pushes a cart with two trays toward Ishmael. “One tray goes up to the first mate’s quarters. Take the officers’ lift. Knock first. If he’s not there, go in and leave his meal on his desk. The other tray goes to the A level. You’ll find a black door up there. Knock and say, ‘Your meal is here, sir.’ Then leave the cart. No dawdling. Proceed back here pronto.”

“Yes, sir.”

Fleece focuses on the other nippers. “Who said you could loll around yakking, you malingering mollusks? Back to your drudgery!”

Ishmael takes the cart and heads abovedecks. The ship’s superstructure has four levels — C, B, A, and topmost, the bridge. On the B level he knocks on Starbuck’s door. When there is no answer, he lets himself in and places the tray on the desk.

A low humming from beneath the desk draws his attention. Ishmael ducks down and finds a square lockbox about the size of a low stool. The light on the optical thumbprint scanner is glowing red. He wonders what’s in it; what sorts of things a man like Starbuck holds dear.

Before leaving, he pauses by the shelf to look more closely at the woman and children in the static holograph. They are smiling, and the woman wears a wedding ring. If ever there was a portrait of a happy wife and children, this is it. But didn’t he hear Starbuck say this was his sixth voyage with Stubb?
Why would the first mate stay away from his family for so long?

When Ishmael pushes the cart back out into the passageway, old Tarnmoor is there with his mop and bucket. The bent blind man presses himself against the wall. “The meal cart, aye, but who’s pushin’ it? Who? Not Charity, not hers. Poor lass’s at them pirates’ mercy. Who, then? Who?”

“Guess.”

The old man’s face lights up. “Ah, a fine, brave lad, I heared. Fought off them pirates, he did.” The light fades from Tarnmoor’s face. “And here’s how they rewards him? Pushin’ the dinner cart about? I’ll tells ya, lad, there’s queer times in this strange mixed affair we calls life. Times when a man takes this whole universe for a vast practical joke, is there nots?”