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  The sailor gritted his teeth in a tight smile as he moved toward Jake. ‘Either you give me some of that sugar, or McDermott here loses a finger.’

  ‘This is insane,’ Cody snapped. ‘Even Denton wouldn’t do this.’

  Seth smiled. ‘Who says so?’

  Cody stared at Seth for a long moment and then called out toward the galley. ‘Charlotte?’

  The silence said it all. Cody looked at Seth, who grinned at them. ‘You girls have got to pay for your bed and board, don’t y’think? Denton’s probably humping her right now down in the galley and…’

  Seth’s knife tumbled from his grasp as Taylor lurched out of his seat and punched a huge fist straight into Seth’s face. Seth flew like a rag doll into the wall of the cabin and slumped out cold onto the deck.

  ‘This ain’t right!’ Taylor boomed.

  Cody did not wait to see what happened. As Seth was hurled aside he leaped over his body and made for the galley door.

  *

  Charlotte twisted away from the blade and sought a weapon, but the table had been cleared and Denton was too heavy to hurl off her. He jabbed the tip of the blade into her flesh and she felt a sharp pain.

  ‘Don’t you move,’ he hissed and then chuckled again. ‘You only want one weapon inside you, right?’

  Denton, one hand still gripping her bound wrists, brought the blade down with a thump. The weapon pinned the excess canvas to the table, fixing her wrists in place. Denton leaned forward further, his chest pressing against her breasts as he pulled her zip down and began yanking at her jeans. She felt his hands rasp against the soft skin of her thighs, and then he yanked her panties down.

  Denton gasped as he unhitched his own jeans, his breath rasping in his throat and his heart thumping in his chest. Charlotte could feel it reverberating inside him as she tried to shut her mind off to what was coming.

  Denton shuffled out of his pants and grabbed at his manhood with his free hand and shoved it against her. Charlotte winced as she felt the tip thrust painfully inside her body as the door to the galley burst open with a deafening crash and Cody charged inside with Jake right behind him.

  Denton lurched away from her and yanked the knife from the table, the blade whipping around toward Cody.

  Cody grabbed a heavy steel pan from a hook on the wall and swung it with all of his strength into Denton’s hand. The heavy pan smashed into his wrist and Denton cried out in pain as the knife spun from his grasp.

  Jake ploughed into him and swung a punch that knocked the sailor off his feet and sent him sprawling across the galley as pans and cutlery clattered down around him.

  Denton scrambled backwards on his knees away from Jake as Charlotte pulled her panties up and saw the sailor grab his knife from where it had fallen and lunge at Jake. Cody hit Denton again with the pan, smashing the weapon aside. Cody slammed his boot down across Denton’s wrist, pinning the knife against the deck as he raised the pan to bring it crashing down on the sailor’s head.

  Cody froze, unable to move as he stared down at Denton laying on his back with one arm desperately shielding his panicked face.

  ‘What are you waiting for?’ Charlotte snapped. ‘Finish him!’

  A gunshot burst out loud enough to hurt Cody’s ears. Everybody whirled to see Hank Mears standing in the doorway of the galley with a heavy pistol in his hand. Wisps of blue smoke spilled from the barrel. Behind him stood Taylor, clearly out of breath after what Cody assumed was a mad dash for assistance.

  ‘Drop the knife,’ Hank growled at Denton.

  The sailor dropped the blade, his flaccid penis still dangling from his open jeans. Hank took in the scene and glared at Cody. ‘And you, drop it!’

  Cody lowered the pan and lifted his boot off Denton’s arm. The sailor scrambled to his feet and back away from Cody, pointing and shrieking.

  ‘They’re insane, all of them!’

  ‘What the hell is going on?’ Hank demanded.

  ‘Rape,’ Cody uttered.

  ‘That’s bullshit!’ Denton screamed. ‘They’ve had it in for me since they got here. They did this, were going to cut me up and say I attacked her!’

  Cody stared at Denton in amazement. ‘Seriously?’ he uttered. ‘You’re going with that?’

  Denton looked past the captain to where Seth stood, blood trickling from his nose. The seaman nodded slowly.

  ‘Been talk of mutiny,’ Seth said to the captain. ‘They want to take the ship from us. McDermott hit me, tried to take my knife.’

  Cody looked at the captain. ‘We survived for six months in the high Arctic without attacking Bethany, Charlotte or anybody else, but now you believe that we’d suddenly turn against the very people who got us out of there?’

  ‘They want to head for Boston,’ Denton uttered, ‘get us ashore and then take the ship.’

  Hank’s gaze skipped from Seth to Denton and Cody as if unsure of who to believe.

  ‘You saw what happened,’ Cody said, pointing at Taylor. ‘You stopped it.’

  Hank looked across at the big man, who remained immobile and impassive.

  ‘I ain’t no part of this,’ he uttered.

  ‘Is anybody going to ask me what goddamned happened?!’ Charlotte snapped in disgust.

  The captain considered her for a moment but then Bethany spoke up. ‘Seth claimed that he was going to take the ship from you. He had a knife at Jake’s belly until Taylor floored him.’

  Hank looked at Saunders, who shrugged but remained silent. The captain lowered the pistol and looked at the first mate.

  ‘Irons for two,’ he murmured.

  Cody did not understand what the captain meant until Saunders hurried off and returned with two sets of steel hand cuffs.

  ‘Denton and Ryan,’ the captain instructed him.

  ‘What the hell are you doing?’ Charlotte demanded. ‘Cody protected me from Denton!’

  ‘They attacked us!’ Denton snapped in outrage.

  The captain said nothing, watching as Saunders cuffed Cody and Denton. Cody noticed a change in the atmosphere in the galley, a hunger in the eyes of the rest of the crew as they stared at Cody.

  Charlotte stepped up to the captain. ‘Your goddamned crew are all enemies,’ she hissed. ‘They’ll kill you and all of us if it suits them.’

  Hank smiled at her without warmth.

  ‘Then it’s time to find out who I can really rely on.’

  *

  Cody was jostled out of the galley and through the ‘tween decks to a large hatch, aft of where the mainmast descended through the ship and down through the hold to the keel.

  The hatch was yanked open by the crew, who then stood back eagerly as Cody and Denton were shoved to the edge of the hatch. Jake, Charlotte, Bethany, Reece and Sauri followed just as Bradley burst into the deck.

  ‘What the hell’s going on?’

  Cody had felt the Phoenix heave to in the darkness, the watch bustling down as word spread of whatever was about to happen. Denton stood on the opposite side of the hatch to Cody, his features twisted with a volatile fusion of excitement and rage.

  Below, the hatch opened into the hold, which was largely empty but for some barrels and rope cordage. Most of the diesel taken from Alert was stored in the aft hold, beyond the bulkheads that sealed one section from the next. The abyss below was perhaps fifteen feet square and dimly illuminated.

  The captain walked onto the deck, the crew parting for him as he passed through. In his hand he held a silver pistol that looked to Cody like some kind of ceremonial weapon. Into it, he loaded a single bullet as he stopped at the side of the hatch and looked at Cody and Denton.

  ‘We no longer have the luxury of court martial, of due process or the Geneva Convention,’ Hank announced. ‘These are difficult times and though none of us chose to be here and none of us can be blamed for what has befallen us, we all must learn to work together. We cannot risk the lives of those around us in our own pursuit of power.’

  The captain paused as he lo
oked at each and every person on the deck.

  ‘Our lives, our futures, will be judged by what we do in the here and now. I have no time to delve into what really happened tonight. Frankly, I don’t care. All that matters to me is the survival of this ship and its company and for that I need the strongest, the fittest and the most honourable of human beings alongside me. Only Providence can judge us, for there is no greater power remaining.’

  The captain nodded to Saunders, who moved behind Denton and unlocked his cuffs before shoving him forwards. Denton jumped and dropped into the hold below, landing like a cat in the dim light.

  Bradley stood forward. ‘Put me in there,’ he ordered the captain.

  ‘My beef ain’t with you,’ Denton shouted at the soldier with false bravado, ‘so stay out of it, Canuck!’

  ‘You stay here,’ Hank replied to Bradley, and rested a hand on a pistol at his side. ‘You interfere, I’ll shoot you myself.’

  Bradley glared at the captain but remained still as Saunders moved around the hatch and unlocked Cody’s cuffs. Cody looked at the captain.

  ‘I told you, it’s cooperation that helped us survive, not conflict.’

  ‘Then cooperate,’ Hank replied.

  ‘This is insane,’ Cody said. ‘This won’t achieve anything but…’

  Saunders shoved him hard in the back and Cody tumbled into the hold. He hit the deck hard, managed to roll a bit and came up on his knees to see Denton standing over him.

  ‘You’re a madman,’ Cody heard Bethany whisper to the captain above.

  ‘No,’ Hank replied. ‘It is insanity to bring war to this ship when mankind may now exist in such small numbers. And that insanity must be removed. Providence will save the righteous man.’

  ‘That’s not a higher power you’re invoking,’ Charlotte cried at him. ‘That’s avoiding responsibility for your own actions!’

  The captain ignored her as he stood at the edge of the hatch and looked down at Cody and Denton.

  ‘May the best man, win.’

  The captain tossed the pistol out into the hold. Cody stared as the silver weapon spun in a graceful arc down toward the deck and Denton leaped across the hold for it.

  Cody’s legs felt as though they had been evacuated of life, rigid and unbending beneath him as he watched Denton catch the pistol in mid-air and swing it toward Cody. He heard shouts from above and the crew roared with a sudden and deafening bloodlust that sounded like something out of a war movie, the hymn of mankind’s hatred of himself.

  Cody saw the pistol whip around and he finally found the strength to move. He ducked back and sideways and hid behind one of several thick stanchions that supported the deck above.

  He saw Denton’s shadow shift across the hull as he moved.

  ‘Come out, come out, Doctor,’ the sailor sneered. ‘There’s nowhere to hide.’

  Cody tucked in behind the stanchion as he called out to the captain.

  ‘This isn’t the way to solve problems, Hank!’

  Any reply that might have come from above was drowned out by the shouts and sneers of the crew as Cody sought desperately for a weapon in the hold. Barrels made of both wood and aluminium were stacked and braced against the hull walls, and he could see a pair of iron belaying pins sitting in racks on the opposite side of the hold. But he knew that Denton would shoot him long before he got to them.

  Denton’s shadow edged closer as Cody huddled out of sight.

  ‘Where do you want the bullet, Doc’?’ he asked, ‘nice and quick in the head or slow and painful in the belly?’

  Cody packed himself tighter against the pillar as he thought of Maria and tears filled his eyes as he realised that this may be the last moment of his life. That he would never see her again, never be able to hold her again, be unable to help her. He didn’t deserve this.

  Rage spilled from his heart into his belly.

  ‘I don’t deserve this!’ he roared.

  The crew above burst into laughter as they watched and Cody heard Denton’s chuckles from just the other side of the pillar.

  ‘Poor Doctor, are you afraid?’

  Cody saw the shadow of the pistol on the deck before him as Denton tried to edge around the pillar for a clear shot while staying out of Cody’s reach. The illumination from the dim light in the hold betrayed Denton’s position. Cody turned and pressed his face against the stanchion.

  ‘Come out, come out, wherever you are,’ Denton chuckled as he shifted further around the pillar.

  Cody swung his fist hard overarm, the belt that he had un-slipped from his waist flashing as the heavy buckle whipped down across Denton’s face. The sailor flinched away from the unexpected blow as Cody burst from behind the pillar with a scream of something alien, a fearsome anger surging inside of him that felt like a brother he had rarely met.

  Denton tried to aim at him but Cody lunged inside the weapon as he swung a wild right hook that shattered Denton’s nasal bridge with a dull crunch. The crew roared as they saw blood and bayed for more. Denton staggered backwards and sideways, pivoting around the pistol that Cody had now clenched in his fist, twisting it over for all he was worth.

  Denton fell across a small barrel that shattered beneath him into wooden splinters that plunged into the flesh of his thigh.

  Denton cried out in pain as he struggled to hang on to the weapon and landed hard on his knees on the deck. Cody turned and with a grunt of effort slammed his knee into the sailor’s face. Pain bolted down Cody’s leg as his bones smashed across Denton’s jaw. The crewman’s head snapped sideways and he sprawled onto his back as his eyes rolled in their sockets.

  Cody wrenched the pistol from Denton’s grasp and staggered back, turning the weapon around and aiming it at the sailor.

  ‘Kill him!’ Bradley yelled above the shouts of the crew.

  The raging, competing voices swirled in a maelstrom through Cody’s mind as he watched Denton recover his senses. He crawled onto his hands and knees and looked up. The sailor saw the pistol pointed at him, saw the rage blazing in Cody’s expression, and all at once Denton’s bladder gave way and spilled onto the deck beneath him as he raised his hands.

  Cody could not hear his voice above the roaring of the crew, but he could see Denton’s lips move as tears spilled from his eyes.

  ‘Please, no.’

  Cody’s anger changed shape, mutated within him. It seethed within its prison deep inside his chest, seeking an escape but finding none until he looked up out of the hatch and saw Hank Mears watching him with that uncaring, uncompromising gaze.

  Cody pointed the pistol at Hank as the rage found its way out of him in a rush and a scream.

  ‘We’re not animals! Do you understand? We’re not animals!’

  ‘Cody!’

  Bethany’s scream rose above the hollering of the crew just as Cody saw a shadow flicker behind him.

  The belaying pin hit him across the back of the neck. There was no pain, just a momentary loss of vision and sensation as he saw the hold tilt over sideways and then shudder as he landed on the deck. The sounds of the crew became distant and muted and he felt a tingling in his legs as the shocked nerve endings came back to life. He rolled onto his back as a deep, dull ache throbbed inside his skull.

  The crew looked down upon him from the hatch above, pink mouths agape as they cheered, fingers pointing, eyes filled with malice. He saw Bethany’s face, flushed with horror and tears.

  Then Denton appeared to stand over him. He took the pistol from beside Cody’s useless hand and pointed it at Cody. His lips moved again.

  ‘Good bye, Doctor.’

  Cody thought he heard Maria’s little voice in his mind as sadness heavier than all of the world’s many burdens weighed down upon him.

  The gun fired a bright flash of flame and smoke. Cody felt his chest shudder as the world heaved beneath him, and then all was silent.

  ***

  HOMECOMING

  22

  Traffic.

  Lights spille
d across the Harvard Bridge like a river of bright white orbs flowing through the darkness. The lights of Boston’s financial district shimmered on the black waters of the Charles River below as Cody drove his beloved Buick Riviera, a ‘66 he’d bought from a collector two years previously.

  The late fall weather was warm enough for him to keep the window down as he drove, the brisk night air flushed with the saline scent of the nearby Atlantic. Horns blared, tail lights glowed and engines hummed as he crawled across the bridge toward home. Cody had worked late, as he often did: part and parcel of being at the prestigious Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Despite the workload he had managed to get out early enough to see Maria before Danielle put her to bed, only to hit the damned traffic.

  Hazard lights ahead hinted at a wreck near the southern end of the bridge, and Cody passed a truck that had hit the barriers after a tyre had blown out. Nobody had been hurt as far as he could tell, just a few fenders bent as the traffic stream had come to an abrupt and unexpected halt. And yet cars crawled past the wreck, drivers straining for a glimpse of what was happening.

  Cody felt something in his guts twist in disgust. There was no obstacle to the traffic, the truck having been already towed clear of the road. Yet still people slowed as they passed by, enslaved to a macabre fascination with the misfortune of others.

  Cody glanced at the wreck but he did not slow. As the traffic began to move more freely he instead moved up closer to the car in front and hurried them along.

  ‘Get out and take a damned photograph if you’re that interested,’ he muttered.

  Cody turned west off the bridge and out toward the suburbs. Rows of trees lined colonial-style homes with good sized gardens, patriotic flags in most of them softly illuminated by street lights that glowed amongst the leaves.

  Cody pulled into his drive and jumped out of the Buick. He hurried up to the front door and let himself in.

  ‘Dadda!’

  He heard Maria’s voice before he saw her, heard her feet thump quickly from the lounge out back and into the hall. Bright smile. Blonde hair. To-die-for brown eyes. Arms outstretched toward him as she ran. ‘Dadda!’