Apocalypso x-3 Read online

  “So we’re supposed to be grateful, is that it? You think you’re actually saving our lives.”

  “Not exactly. It’s more like you’re being preserved for future reference. We all are.”

  “Ah. Sounds pleasant.”

  “Barrel o’ monkeys!” Cowper’s head cackled.

  “I know it’s hard to understand right now, but in a minute you’ll see everything.”

  “I’ll see you in Hell, bitch. My boat will nuke us all before it will let you get away with this… ”

  Parminter’s voice trailed off as Bobby’s upper torso split apart, unfolding like a great, trembling orchid. A glossy blue protuberance shot forward like a chameleon’s tongue, flaring wide and engulfing the man’s face. He had no time to scream.

  The guests left by the first light of dawn, climbing aboard their ship and issuing orders to cast off. The Virginia’s XO had already been busy; the work there was done.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  FATHER KNOWS BEST

  Bobby came to me after we parted from the other sub. I could tell he wanted to say something, but it made him deeply uncomfortable.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  “I don’t like doing it this way. Why do we have to talk to them so much?”

  “To let them know we are not thieves or killers.”

  “They don’t care. It just makes them hate us even more.”

  “They just don’t know. They can’t imagine. Could you imagine before you were changed?”

  “I don’t ’member being changed. I just was.”

  Bobby was our Mystery Boy. He had still never explained to any of us exactly how or when he acquired his unusual abilities. He was brought aboard the boat as a helpless refugee, and forty-eight hours later every human being on board was converted to his peculiar species of ultraplastic, nonspastic, completely human-looking Xombie. If they were even Xombies. As a Maenad myself, one of the ship’s original Blue Meanies, I had my doubts.

  “Okay,” I said. “But you remember before that. Being human.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Would you have wanted to be changed?”

  Bobby didn’t have to think twice. “Yes.”

  “Well, not everybody feels that way. That’s why we try to prepare them.”

  “But even after we tell them, they’re still upset.”

  “Sure, but they know. Knowing is important. You heard the man-they want to know.”

  “They still fight, though.”

  “Not after the change.”

  “No, not after the change. But why do we have to tell them beforehand? Why can’t we just do it and get it over with?”

  This was something I had wrestled with myself. I had never been completely convinced that our so-called mission was anything more than wishful thinking. The visions were powerful, yet they could easily be some mass hallucination. It was very possible we were all insane. Just as with the wild Xombies ashore, we had a deep need to convert people, but our more-lucid brains required elaborate justifications for doing so. Or at least mine did.

  I said, “I think it’s necessary and right to reveal our purpose to those we are about to change. I don’t like hiding it as if we’re ashamed. If what we’re doing is the most important work on the planet, then we should say so.”

  “Even if it they don’t believe us?”

  “Even if they don’t believe us.”

  “Okay. Can I ask you something else?”

  “Yes.”

  “You know that head on the table?”

  “You mean Fred Cowper.”

  “Isn’t he your father?”

  “That’s what I thought… but I just found out my dad was someone named Despineau.”

  “Then why is your name Lulu Pangloss?”

  “He and my mother were never married. Her name was Grace Pangloss.”

  “Oh. There was somebody else named Despineau when I was in Providence. A lady.”

  This was the first time Bobby had ever mentioned Providence. Something very traumatic had happened to him there. Trying not to look overly interested, I said, “A lady named Despineau?”

  “Uh-huh. Her first name was Brenda.”

  Brenda. Brenda Despineau. I remembered what Mummy had told me, and wondered if I had just discovered an unknown relative.

  “What happened to her?” I asked.

  “She got all shot up.”

  “Shot up? How?”

  “There were these guys looking for immune women. They caught her, but Mr. Miska got her out.”

  “Really,” I said. Immune women. Well, it made a kind of sense. For a long time I thought I might be immune… until I turned into a Xombie. There were rumors of Immunes wandering the landscape, but the thought that some of them might be lost relatives of mine was unexpectedly disturbing. If what we believed was true, then Immunes were inherently doomed. We were helpless to save them. “How do you know all this?”

  “I was there.”

  “Bobby, was Uri Miska the one who changed you?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Were you human before you met him, though?”

  “I don’t know. Shut up!”

  “But if Miska changed you, that means he must be a Clear. Maybe the original Clear.”

  “I don’t care! So what?”

  I could think of nothing to say to that. So what indeed? It suddenly all seemed so obvious: Of course it had to be Miska. Changing tack, I asked, “So did Miska turn this Brenda woman into a Clear?”

  “Yes.”

  Thinking about what Bobby had told me, I went to the CO quarters and opened the captain’s safe.

  “About time,” squawked Fred Cowper’s head. “I was beginnin’ to think you might have forgotten about me.”

  Cowper’s head had developed the ability to form crude words, wheezing like a bagpipe, but he could also actually talk to me without speaking, his voice buzzing inside my head as if broadcast to my brain. All of us on the boat had learned by now that we shared some degree of telepathy, but in most cases it was not as clear, or as consistent, as my connection to Cowper. Otherwise, it would drive us batty-who could tolerate such an inescapable chorus? There was no volume control on thoughts, no on/off switch, hence most Xombies preferred less invasive means of communication. Cowper only did it as a matter of necessity, but even he preferred that I reply aloud.

  Since losing his body at Thule, Fred Cowper had learned to function quite well, cinching off the ragged stump of his neck and sprouting a nest of rootlike tendrils with which he could scuttle around like a hermit crab. His mouth had widened to accommodate the enlarged manipulating organ that was his tongue, and this sensitive member was guarded by a phalanx of oversized, jagged teeth.

  Cowper’s head was somewhat terrifying, but to me he was still Dad-the only dad I ever knew. Angry as I once was at him, I had made peace with the past and now was simply grateful to have him in my eternal life. Whether he really was my father or not, he was a piece of my former humanity, a part of me. A fragment of living memory I clung to like a security blanket. Having found him, I would never lose him again.

  “Fred, I need to ask you something. About our past lives.”

  “I know,” he said. “Grace told me she spoke to you.”

  “She did?”

  “Yeah, about me not being your real father. It’s true… but that’s not all of it. There’s something I gotta get off my chest, too.”

  “You don’t have a chest.”

  “Whatever. There’s something I been meaning to tell you.”

  “What?”

  “I know I was never much of a father to you.”

  “I had no basis for comparison.”

  “Still, you must’ve thought I was a real bastard all those years. I felt like one.”

  “Then why didn’t you do something to change it?”

  “I was human. Humans are fuckups, and I fucked up big-time. See, there’s something else your mother and I never told you.”

&nbs
p; “What?”

  “I’m gay… Or rather, I was gay. Now I’m just a head.”

  I stopped. “Excuse me?”

  “I shoulda told you while we were both still alive, and it woulda meant something.” His black eyes rolled back in his skull, lubricated by their greasy lids; his mouth worked like a gasping fish. “I’m-I’m… sorry.”

  At Fred’s unexpected confession, I did something I hadn’t done since becoming a Xombie.

  I laughed.

  “It ain’t that funny,” he said.

  Testing him, I asked, “So if you weren’t my father, who was?”

  “Another Navy man-a NATO officer named Alaric Despineau. She met him while we were stationed in Europe.”

  “So she cheated on you?”

  “It ain’t that simple and you know it. We were all… confused. I was at sea for months at a time, which made it easy for me to pretend I had no part in it. Truth was, Grace needed something I couldn’t give her. He could.”

  “You mean children.”

  “Among other things. I had no understanding at the time and hung her out to dry. Now I see how she had no choice… any more than I did. Biology is a bastard.”

  “What caused them to break up?”

  “Your mother had an unfortunate attraction to men who weren’t available. It was her independent streak. Alaric was always away at sea, so Grace was stuck raising you alone. Over time they just drifted apart.”

  “Who was Brenda?”

  He blinked. “Brenda?”

  “I just heard of a woman named Brenda Despineau.”

  He paused a long time. “That was Grace’s first child. Your sister.”

  “Sister. How come I never knew about her?”

  “She was a good bit older. At first she helped raise you, but eventually she and your mother had a falling-out. Grace had troubles, as you know. Brenda left home as soon as it was humanly possible… and took your brother with her. She woulda taken you, too, if she could have.”

  A brother now, too. I felt a long-dead nerve throb to life in my skull. “What happened to them?”

  He shook his head. “Brenda didn’t want my help, or anybody’s. She was a real tough cookie. What she really wanted was you, but your mother took you and went on the run. After that, we all lost touch with each other for years. That is, until you and your mother found me.”

  “You never heard from any of the others? Or bothered looking?”

  “Honey, I don’t go where I’m not wanted. Just a little fatherly advice.”

  “You’re not my father.”

  “I can dream, can’t I?”

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  PETROPOLIS

  As we approached the north channel of the great Chesapeake Bay Bridge Tunnel, the hydrophones detected curiously subterranean noises, rushing from one shore to the other. This wasn’t the clear swish of boat propellers but a deeper rumble, like bowling balls hurtling through a pipe.

  “Traffic,” said Phil Tran, listening over the headset.

  “Ship traffic?” asked Coombs.

  “Traffic traffic-there’s some heavy machinery passing through the Bridge Tunnel. Big rigs.”

  “I told you so,” said Alton Webb. “We should have come here in the first place.”

  “Hindsight is twenty-twenty.” To me, Coombs asked, “Want to take a sighting?”

  “A sighting… sure.”

  “Periscope depth.” The command flitted through the ship like a dead leaf. Flesh and metal moved fluidly to comply.

  “Periscope depth, aye.”

  “Raise periscope. She’s all yours, Lulu.”

  My stone-cold hands seized stone-cold handles, my stone black eyes drank in daylight. I walked the periscope in a circle, taking a series of pictures, then quickly lowered it.

  “Anything to report?”

  “Just that bridge causeway, about zero ten degrees. Visibility is bad.”

  Coombs said, “It’s gonna take a miracle to get past that thing.”

  “What exactly is the Bridge Tunnel?” I asked.

  “You’ve never seen the Chesapeake Bay Bridge Tunnel? It’s only one of the engineering wonders of the world: twenty miles of highway crossing the mouth of the Chesapeake, with three elevated bridge segments and two offshore tunnels. The center bridge is actually out of sight of land and has a rest stop on an artificial island. I’d bet dollars to donuts they’ve got the north passage netted and probably mined.”

  “Reapers again?”

  “Or somebody more legitimate. Either way, they’re bound to not like us.”

  “So what do you think?”

  “You speak for the skipper. What does he think?”

  “He thinks we don’t have any choice. They’re doomed if we leave them like this.”

  “Concur. So how do you propose we get past their defenses?”

  I consulted with Cowper, closing my eyes and putting my hand on my forehead like a cheap psychic communing with spirits. “The captain proposes that we look closer.”

  “It’s risky. We’re out of range of their sonar buoys out here, but any closer, and they might ping us.”

  “We need to know what we’re up against.”

  “Long as we don’t find out the hard way. Once they know we’re here, we lose all our advantage.”

  “Oh, not all our advantage… ”

  We proceeded south on the surface, the submarine’s fair-water silhouetted against the sun as it approached the bay’s south entrance. Coombs and Robles climbed up to the bridge cockpit and scanned the sea with binoculars. Neither shore was visible, but the elevated causeway crossed the horizon, abruptly cut short where it dipped underwater-a bridge to nowhere.

  Nearing the deep channel, we submerged, running silent right to the mouth of the bay. It was strange to think of that huge tunnel passing beneath us, cars and trucks driving beneath the bottom of the sea. Just beyond rose a strange black tower, jutting into the sky like a gigantic sentinel.

  Before we could discuss it, I heard a high-pitched whirring noise from outside the hull. The unmistakable whine of a high-speed propeller.

  “What is that?” I demanded.

  “Torpedo,” said Vic Noteiro. “MK-60. We must have triggered a CAPTOR mine.”

  “Everybody brace for impact,” said Robles.

  Before we could brace or do much of anything, a massive shock wave ran the length of the ship, causing floors to buckle and loose objects to go flying. We also went airborne, banging around the works like crash-test dummies, which probably would have killed some of us if we weren’t already dead. But everyone just got up and went back to work, leaning right to compensate for a sudden list to port.

  “Full reverse,” ordered Coombs.

  “Full reverse, aye.”

  “Won’t they hear us?” I asked.

  “Can’t possibly make more noise than we already have. Damage reports.”

  Phil Tran said, “Looks like we caught a torpedo broadside, port midships, between frames sixty and seventy. Pressure vessel is intact, but there’s a breach in the outer hull-we’ve lost the main port ballast tank. We’re also losing hydraulic pressure on the aft port stabilizer. Reactor efficiency is down by sixty percent and still dropping-looks like damage to the fuel rods.”

  “Any sign of pursuit?”

  “Not yet. The mine was probably a stray.”

  “Just in case, get us below the thermocline and play dead.”

  “If we go too deep in this shape, we won’t have to play dead.”

  “We have to risk it.”

  We stabilized the boat as much as was possible at the bottom of the sea. The damage was severe, but not immediately critical; we could still limp along.

  Under cover of darkness, we tested the buoyancy and hydraulic controls, surfacing the periscope and slowly cruising the northern Virginia coast, studying the barrier islands at full spectrum and full magnification. We knew from the charts that there were many quaint tourist towns and fishing villages all along
these shores, but not a single light was visible. The place looked deserted. It felt deserted.

  The only aura of human life came from the south entrance to Chesapeake Bay, a dim glow like an untended storm lantern. As we got closer, we could see the glow was coming from a black tower sticking out of the water. It was the giant structure we had seen just before being torpedoed. My thought was, One if by land, two if by sea.

  “Well, this is it,” said Lieutenant Robles. “Looks like somebody’s home.”

  “I recognize that thing,” said Alton Webb. “That’s Petropolis. What they call a spar platform-some thirty wellheads doing directional drilling. In normal operation, it can pump around sixty thousand barrels of oil a day. What you see there is only the tip of the iceberg; there’s a lot more of it underwater, fixed by catenary mooring lines to the bottom.”

  “Since when is there oil drilling at the mouth of Chesapeake Bay?”

  “There isn’t. It’s been moved here from the Gulf of Mexico.”

  “Why?”

  “Probably to guard the entrance to the bay.”

  Coombs said, “If there are sentries in that platform, I think we can assume the Chesapeake is being defended. We’ve already run into one torpedo, it would be foolhardy to go any closer.”

  “Concur,” said Robles. “So what’s next?”

  Robles and Coombs looked at me, though they were really looking through me to the invisible presence of Fred Cowper.

  I said, “We have to get to those guys in the tower.”

  Coombs was hesitant. “If we do anything to give ourselves away, their defenses will zero right in on us. They’re broadcasting on ULF, so we know they intend submarines to hear them. We should be prepared for a trap.”

  “I doubt they’re expecting anyone like us. Besides, we don’t have much choice at this point. What else are we here for? If we have to abandon the boat, this is as good a place as any.”