Crossbones (33 page)

Nimitz

Maya raced at Evan as he climbed from the chopper. She saw that he was injured, and so she resisted the urge to leap into his arms and wrap her legs around him, instead simply holding him tight and covering his face in kisses. Then she held his cheeks and stared at him as if he might not be real. Evan laughed and held her, feeling no pain, never wanting to let go.

Sophia and Ben were there to meet Vladimir, and after hugging his lady and kissing her deeply, the towering Russian lifted his boy into the air and spun him in a circle.

“Papa!” Ben cried.

Xavier hugged everyone and told the Russian that the ship's deck lights and communications were knocked out during the attack. Vlad thanked him for the flares, and told him he would have landed even if the carrier had been belly-up.

The priest crouched and introduced himself to a suddenly shy Leah West. She hesitated, eyes wide as she stared at the big black man whose face had been so marred by brutality. With a tiny finger
she traced the line of the scar that ran from his hairline to his chin, then kissed him on the cheek. “Kisses make it better,” she said.

Rosa and Tommy organized a stretcher team to take Dean down to medical, as Halsey introduced himself to those gathered on deck. Xavier walked with Angie, their arms around one another, the priest gritting his teeth against both the pain of the fresh wound in his chest and the older grenade fragment in his thigh.

“You did it,” he said. “Your family's safe.”

Angie nodded. “Carney died. Skye too, I think. We couldn't find her.”

The priest thought about the girl, a troubled soul if ever he'd encountered one. Then he told Angie about the boarders, the earthquake, the shelling from the pirate vessel. He listed those lost, ending with Calvin's sacrifice. There was an emotional moment, and they both cried for a time.

Chief Liebs joined them, and Angie looked at his bandages and the weariness on his face. “Must have been a hell of a fight,” she said.

The gunner's mate nodded. “We're not done yet.” He pointed to the bridge remains not far away. “There's a whole bunch of bad news that's going to drop on us when this ship breaks free from whatever's holding it back. Good thing you showed up when you did. We were going to abandon ship in the morning.”

“And go where?” the woman asked.

He shrugged. “The father and I haven't come up with a good answer for that.”

Aboard aircraft carriers, there is a constant, subtle vibration so unobtrusive it is generally not even noticed until it is absent. At that moment, the gentle vibration in
Nimitz
ceased. All three of them felt the change and looked at one another.

“What was that?” Xavier asked the Navy man.

“I don't know,” said Liebs, “I've never felt that before.”

Several minutes later, a tall, thin young man in Navy coveralls
appeared at the top of a catwalk ladderway on the edge of the flight deck. He looked around, then sprinted toward the trio.

“Holy shit!” Chief Liebs exclaimed, recognizing his nuc, the young nuclear engineer rescued with him from the dry-goods locker so many months ago. In the Navy, nucs belonged to their own odd little tribe, keeping to themselves and only emerging from the deep for a quick meal before vanishing again. This boy had been no different, usually unseen. “I figured you were dead,” the chief said.

The boy ignored the remark, his eyes intense. “The reactors shut themselves down. Did you feel it?”

That was the missing vibration, Xavier thought. “Why?” He noticed the boy was soaking wet.

“Because of the flooding. All power is out now.”

“Can you get it restarted?” Angie asked.

The nuc shook his head impatiently. “You can't just flip a switch and turn on a nuclear reactor. Besides, they're underwater by now.”

“Can't we pump them dry?” Xavier said, looking at the chief.

The man was pale. “No power,” he said, “means no pumps. There's nothing to keep the sea out.”

Nimitz
gave a long groan and shifted, the current pushing its keel free from the submerged ridge of rock. At once, the deck made a great creaking sound and tilted several more degrees to port. Slowly, the aircraft carrier began to move again.

“We're going to sink fast,” the gunner's mate said, then looked west, up at the remains of the Golden Gate Bridge. In the darkness above, the dead grew agitated, many stepping off the side as they noticed the ship drifting toward them. Thousands more were packed on the high roadway.

“But first,” Liebs said, “we're going to have
company.”

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