The Inside Passage (Ted Higuera Series Book 1) (31 page)

Johnstone Straits, Canada

9:25 am

“Meooow.”

What was that?
From somewhere far, far away, Ted felt the vibrations in his skull.

“Meoow!”

Oscar is not
happy
, Ted thought.

“Meoooooow!”

Light slowly
returned to the world. The quiet was deafening. No, not quiet. Ted’s head was
filled with a loud buzzing sound, excluding all else. Then he felt it again.

“Meooooooooow!”

Ted opened his
eyes. He was in the water, surrounded by bits and pieces of the two vessels.
Time ceased to exist. All color faded from the day, Ted gazed, stunned at the
gray tableau. He felt the cold water prickling his skin. His life vest tugged
at his chin.

He sensed more
than saw a movement.

There, a short
distance to his right was Oscar, soaking wet, clinging to a hatch cover.

“Meoooooooooow!”

“Just a minute,
little man. Old Ted’ll help you.”

Something bumped
against him. He turned to see the yellow hair floating in the water.

“Chris!” He pulled
Chris towards him. Chris was motionless, blood from the wound in his chest spreading
out in a pink pattern on the water. “Chris!”

There, just beyond
Chris, Meagan bobbled motionless in her life jacket.

“Meagan!
Chica
,
can you hear me?” Ted couldn’t hear the sound of his own voice.

He grabbed Chris’
collar and swam towards Meagan. He managed to grab her with one hand and Chris
with the other.

“Oh God. Please,
God, let them be okay.”

He hugged them
both to him. He wrapped his arms around them. He willed them back to life.

“Come on, you’ve
got to be okay.
En el nombre sea de Dios
.”

He wasn’t aware of
when he first felt the thump-thump-thumping in the air above him. Was it an
hour or a second? He didn’t see the divers drop from the hovering helicopter;
they just suddenly appeared in the water.

“Are you okay?”
the diver shouted.

Ted could see the
diver’s lips move, but couldn’t make out what he was saying.

“Help, you’ve got
to help. They’re hurt. They’ve been shot.”

“It’s okay, now,
sir. We’ve got them.” The diver rigged a sling under Meagan’s arms. He made a
hand signal to the chopper and it lowered a steel cable to them. Hooking the
cable onto Meagan’s sling, the chopper hoisted her into the air.

“Let’s get him
next.” The diver pointed towards Chris.

The buzzing in
Ted’s head began to recede. He slowly focused on the problem. It felt like he
was waking from a heavy sleep, his movements slow and heavy. The water felt
like molasses. He realized that he could make out what the diver was saying.

The divers
repeated the procedure with Chris. The chopper lifted his twirling body from
the water.

“You’re next,
buddy,”

“No. We can’t go
yet. We have to get Oscar.”

“Where’s Oscar?” 

“On a hatch cover.
He was right over there.”

“I didn’t see
anyone else. Tom, can you check it out?”

“Roger that.” The
second diver began swimming in the direction Ted indicated.

“Let’s get the
sling on you, sir.”

“No, I’m not going
anywhere without Oscar. You’ve got to find Oscar first.”

“I don’t see
anyone over here,” Tom shouted. “Just a scared cat.”

“Oscar! That’s
Oscar. I’m not going without him.”

“Tom, bring the cat,
will you. We can’t leave him out here anyway.”

Tom handed the
wet, complaining Burmese to Ted as the helicopter lifted him from the water.

Seattle

Ted stood with his
hands on the window sill, looking out at the gray Seattle day. It had rained
incessantly since his return. Behind him he was dimly aware of the steady beep
of the heart monitor. The gray hospital room exuded gloom and desperation. He
existed in his own personal hell.

“Any new word?”
Sarah asked, entering the doorway.

“No,” Candace
answered. “It’s the same as before.”

Harry sat in a
chair next to the hospital bed, his elbows on his knees, his head in his hands.
Candace wrapped her arm around Harry and held her head against his, her long
black hair draping over his face. Sarah came over and put her hand on Harry’s
shoulder.

“It’s only been a
couple of weeks, Dad. He’ll come out of it.”

“This is my fault.
I never should have sent him on that trip.”

“Harry, it’s
nobody’s fault. It’s just one of those things that happen. Chris was in the
wrong place at the wrong time.” Candace took her husband’s hand in hers.

“No. He was
supposed to be there, Dad.” Sarah peeled off her black jacket. A picture of a
heart, being pierced by a bullet, covered the back of the jacket. The caption
read “A bullet for my valentine. “If Chris hadn’t been there, think of all the
people who would’ve died.
We would’ve died.
”

Harry lifted his
head. “I can’t believe that he would have willingly given up his life for us.”
His voice cracked. “You’re not supposed to outlive your children.”

 “It’s getting
late, you guys,” Ted said without turning from the window. “Why don’t you grab
something to eat? I’ll stay with Chris.”

It had become
their habit. Harry stopped by after work every day and met Candace in Chris’ room.
Candace came early in the afternoon. Sarah came and went though out the day as
her schedule permitted. Ted practically lived there.

Ted turned back to
the room. Chris lay there in the bed, hoses running out of his nose, tubes
attached to the back of his hand, wires disappearing under his gown.
God
damn it!
Once again, moisture swelled up in his eyes.

Chris had
survived. The Coast Guard plucked him out of the water and flew him to an
emergency room in Vancouver. After treatment there, he was airlifted to Harborview Medical Center in Seattle. He had been in a coma ever since.

The terrorist
story had been big news. For a week or so, it was in the newspapers and on TV.
“UW Grads Save Cruise Ship” the headlines shouted. Ted was tired of seeing the
same old footage of the cruise ship, the Coast Guard rescue, still photos of
the Canadian terrorist who had done this terrible thing.

For a brief moment,
Ted, Chris and Meagan’s pictures had been on the news every night. He was sick
of seeing the sound bites of himself, microphone shoved in his face.

“How does it feel
to be a hero?” the TV newswoman asked him as he climbed out of the Mercy Flight
helicopter.
Hero? Man was that ever wrong.
He was scared shitless. He
couldn’t even remember thinking. He had just been there.

Jack, all of the
Canadian soldiers, the two fishermen, the terrorists themselves. All dead. What
for? What had it proved?

“Mr. Higuera,” the
newswoman pleaded. “Why did you save the cruise ship?” Over five thousand
people had been aboard. The Exocet missile had suddenly flown straight up and
exploded in the sky. He didn’t know why, he had nothing to do with it. He
wasn’t a hero, just a
tanto
who had gotten his friends shot up.

The story quickly
faded from the public consciousness. A hurricane in the Gulf, oil prices, the
War in Iraq. Other things pushed the story from the headlines. Occasionally,
there would be a page-three article giving a little more background of one of
the terrorists or detailing the story of one of the JTF2 soldiers who had lost
their lives in the attack.

For Ted, the story
wouldn’t relegate itself to page three. Every day began and ended with the
guilt of surviving. He spent more time at the hospital than he did at home. He
couldn’t bring himself to get back into the swing of things with Chris hanging
on by a thread. His only purpose in life was caring for Oscar. Meagan’s cat
moved in with him and now ruled Chris and Ted’s house.

“Have you heard
back from InfoSec?” Sarah asked.

“No. I think
they’ve moved on. I guess I should too.” The lucrative offer that Ted had
waiting for him had dried up. He hadn’t been able to go back to work yet. They
wouldn’t wait for him.

“What are you
going to do now?” Sarah fussed unnecessarily with Chris’ blankets.

“I don’t know.”
Ted leaned back against the window and studied the ceiling. “I have this
feeling that I have to do something . . . make a difference. I feel like I’ve
been given a second chance at life and I need to use it wisely. I want to fight
people that do things like this.”

“Good for you,”
Harry stirred from his reverie. “I think you’re right. It’s time for all of us
to stand up for what we believe in. Do you have any idea how you’re going to do
that?”

Ted folded his
arms and looked down on Harry. “No. . .  Not yet. I have to think about it. I
want to be able to use what I’ve learned, studied for, in some positive way.
Guarding some corporation’s databases just doesn’t seem like enough anymore.”

“What can you do?”
Sarah asked.

“I don’t know. I
feel like I’ve got to stand up for the little guy. There were five thousand
little guys on that boat that almost got killed. If someone wasn’t there to
protect them, what would’ve happened?”

“Come on, Harry,
let’s go get some dinner.” Candace got up from her chair. “Do you want to come
with us, Sarah?”

Sarah reached for
her purse. “Sure. I’ll come back by after we eat so Ted can get out.”

****

Ted sat in the
chair with Chris’ hand in his. The local TV news magazine was running a
follow-up story on the attack. He hated it, but he couldn’t turn the channel.
The TV camera crew that had been aboard the cruise ship captured much of the
incident on film.

He couldn’t stop
watching the Coast Guard plucking them from the sea, the field of wreckage that
had once been two boats floating in the water, bodies bobbing up and down. He
re-lived those few horrible moments again and again. He saw Jack’s body,
pierced by bullets lying on the cockpit floor, Chris crumpled under the
helmsman’s seat, the neat, single hole in his chest. But the biggest horror of
all was the blood running into his eyes. He couldn’t sleep at night because he
dreamed about Meagan, her life oozing out into his eyes.

He felt a slight
squeeze on his hand.

“Dude?” Ted didn’t
believe what he was seeing.

Chris’ eyes
fluttered. Slowly, those deep blue eyes opened. They showed no sign of
recognition.

“Mom?”

“Dude! You’re
awake.”

“Mom. . . I was
with my Mom. . . Where am I?”

Ted threw himself
on Chris and wrapped his arms around him.

“Uhh.”

“Sorry, dude.
You’re in Harborview. Back in Seattle.”

“Did. . . did we
make it?”

“Yeah, man. We
made it. We stopped them.”

“What happened? I
don’t remember anything.”

“The Mounties
arrived just in time, dude. They came from under the water and swarmed over the
boat. There was a big gun fight and the missile was launched, but it flew
straight up and exploded. It missed the ship.”

“Dad? Sarah?”

“They’re OK.” Ted
could see the relief in Chris’ eyes.

“Jack, I remember
Jack.”

“Jack didn’t make
it.” Ted felt his heart constricting. “He was shot up pretty bad.”

Chris digested
this news for a moment. “Meagan, where’s Meagan?”

How do I tell
him?
“She . . .” Ted couldn’t bring himself to verbalize the words. “Didn’t
make it either . . .”
How do I live with this?
“I’m really sorry.”

“Meagan . . .”

****

Ottawa, Canada

Pierre Chasson was
particularly full of himself. He had copies of all the major metropolitan
newspapers on his desk. The headlines screamed “JTF2 Thwarts Terrorist Attack.”

He owned JTF2. He
had lost six men, but saved thousands.

“I think you and
your team are owed a big thank you,” Chasson said.

“We got lucky,
sir,” Jean Broussard replied, pulling the ubiquitous manila folder from her red
leather brief case. “If not for those American kids . . .”

“I’ll take lucky.
What else do you have for me?”

“We’re just
wrapping this up now.” Jean sat across from his desk. “We found evidence in the
camp that you’ll want to see.” She handed him the folder.

“The first picture
is our old friend Qayyum ali Adham. He was there. We think he was the leader of
this attack. We have forensic evidence placing him in the camp. He financed it,
planned it, did everything but die in it. We have a report of him meeting this
man,” she handed Chasson a second folder, “in the Philippines.”

“This isn’t an
Arab.”

“No sir. That is
Yves Bouhier. We suspect he’s an arms dealer. His cover is buying and selling
used industrial equipment. He was in BC most of the summer. We think he may have
supplied the missiles.”

“Can we nail him?”

“We don’t have
enough evidence. He’s very careful, very smart. He never gets his hands dirty.
Works through a series of intermediaries. We don’t have anything we can bring
him in on.”

“We can’t issue a
warrant?”

 “There’s nothing
we can charge him with. We have enough on ali Adham for a conviction. If we can
ever get our hands on him. He’s as slippery as bin Laden.”

“But this Bouhier?
He’s been seen with ali Adham?”

“Yes sir.”

“And you’re sure
he supplied the materiel?”

“Yes sir.”

“And you can find
him”

“Yes sir.”

“Make him
disappear.”

I hope you enjoyed
your first foray into Ted Higuera’s world.

Reviews are the
life blood of independent writers. I need your reviews to give my work
credibility and convince new readers to take a chance on an unknown author. I
ask you to write a review of
The Inside Passage
on Amazon.com, GoodReads
or where ever you go for your book information. Thank you so much, it means the
world to me.

I’d love to hear
your comments and criticisms. Who knows, maybe some of your ideas will appear
in a future Ted Higuera novel. To contact me
click here
or use the
contact form at
http://www.pennwallace.com/contact-penn.html
.

Ted and Chris will
be back in
Hacker for Hire
.

For now, if you
liked this story, you can browse my other books and short stories at
www.pennwallace.com
.