Crusade Page 2

  “Is it not grand?”

  Esshk bared his teeth and hissed appreciatively. “I would like to meet these New Hunters.”

  “And so you shall. They are quite amazing, really, if all I hear is true . . .”

  Just then, the two guards that had escorted Righ into the regent’s chamber appeared on the balcony. Between them was an emaciated, freakish creature with long, gangly arms and legs. It was naked and filthy and had only a stringy tuft of fur on the top of its head and a shorter growth on its face. The rest of its body was as pale and smooth as a just-hatched Uul. Only its eyes did not seem utterly wrong. They were small, but blazed with the universal expression of terrified hate. Both Hij had seen that before. They looked at the creature with revulsion.

  To their surprise, it managed to stand up straight. Blinking in the light, it spoke a few scratchy words in its own tongue. It sounded like . . . something . . . “kaphmaan.” Then, amazingly, it uttered a short series of numbers! Numbers they understood! Then it promptly closed its mouth and said nothing more.

  “Remarkable!” Tsalka exclaimed. “Do you think it knew what it was saying? Or was that a trick Righ taught it on the long voyage home?”

  “I cannot say,” Esshk replied. “But it will be interesting to find out.” He coughed a laugh. “It might provide conversation over dinner.”

  “Converse with food? What an appalling thought!”

  “I agree. But if Righ may be believed, they are at least Worthy Prey, are they not?”

  Tsalka snorted noncommittally. “Perhaps, but I have never spoken to any prey—regardless how worthy it might be.”

  Esshk replied with a hint of humor. “I beg to differ! Did you not just speak to Righ? Was he not made prey? Besides, what is the difference between Worthy Prey and our very pack-mates? One has joined the Hunt; one has not. That is all.”

  Tsalka regarded the general with keen speculation. “You’re a philosopher, General Esshk. I have long thought it so. No wonder you’re so popular at court. But that is . . . a dangerous thought. I urge you to keep it to yourself.”

  They were startled when the filthy, talking prey suddenly made a strangled cry and flailed madly against its restraints. In its weakened condition, it was quickly reduced to a sobbing, sagging shell; until then, it at least showed some courage. They realized it was the sight of the New Hunters that upset it.

  “Well!” hissed Tsalka, pleased. “It must know the New Hunters after all! It reacted as prey to its natural enemy! Fascinating!” He paced to the edge of the balcony, clasping his hands behind his back, tail swishing speculatively. The Grik vessels looked tiny compared to the massive, dark gray ship the New Hunters called their home. It was nearly as large as one of the ridiculous Homes of the Tree Prey. Only this ship was iron, he was told, and bristled with huge, magic weapons. He wondered what its flag signified—the curious white flag with bloodred streaks radiating outward from the center.

  “What do they call it?” asked the general.

  “Hmm? Oh, the ship? I’m told it is called Amagi . . . whatever that means!” They both hissed amusement.

  CHAPTER 1

  The morning general quarters alarm woke Lieutenant Commander Matthew Reddy, and he automatically reached for the little chain beside his sweat-soaked bunk and pulled it. The cramped stateroom was bathed in a harsh white light as he sat up, rubbing his eyes. Awareness came quickly, not instantly. He always took a mome to get his bearings when he’d been having the Dream, and he’d been right in the middle of it. The same one. It came almost every night and he knew it at the time, almost consciously, but he could never remember it when he woke. He just knew he’d had it again. Even while he dreamed, his subconscious seemed to blot out each sequence of events as soon as they occurred so he was aware only of what was happening at that very moment and, of course, the crippling dread of . . . something he knew was yet to come. Sometimes, like now, if he was disturbed before the Dream reached its horrible, inevitable conclusion, he’d carry a sense of it with him for a while. But, as usual, details vanished as soon as he opened his eyes, like roaches when the lights came on. Even now, the last vestiges of . . . whatever the Dream was diminished like a wisp of smoke in a gale. All he really knew for sure was that the Squall was involved. The Squall that had somehow delivered them from destruction at the hands of the Japanese, but only by marooning them in this twisted, alternate . . . alien world. A world geographically little different from the one they knew, but utterly different in every other conceivable way.

  For a while he sat there, struggling to classify the dark, lingering emotional perceptions and taking inventory of the things he knew. They were under way; he could feel the vibration of the warm, dank deck beneath his bare feet. The unusual strain he perceived in the fibers of the ship indicated the “prize” was still under tow. That meant all the terrifying events leading to its capture weren’t remnant nightmare threads of the Dream, so everything else he suddenly recalled must have really happened. Damn. He didn’t know why the Dream eluded him so. It couldn’t be subconscious fear. Nothing could be as scary as the things they’d actually endured since the Squall.

  Shaking his head, he stood and moistened a towel in his wash-basin. They were already low on fresh water again so he couldn’t indulge in a shower. He had to be content with a quick, unrefreshing wipe-down. Finished, he sparingly lathered his face with his last cake of soap and quickly scraped away the stubble. After wiping his face again, he ran a comb through greasy hair and briefly examined the results in his mirror.

  “You look like hell,” he muttered to himself, then shrugged. “But you’ve looked worse.” There were puffy bags beneath his tired green eyes, and his once embarrassingly boyish face didn’t look so boyish now, two months before his thirty-third birthday. A few silver strands had emerged in his light brown hair, certainly due to stress; neither of his parents began to turn gray until their late fifties. The stress was curiously lessened now, however, even if the danger wasn’t. They’d fought a battle against a terrifying foe and learned their enemy was even more horrible than they’d imagined. Exponentially worse than the Japanese who had almost destroyed them. But the ship wasn’t sinking and they had a steady source of fuel. They had good friends and allies in the Lemurians and if the Grik were a greater threat than they’d feared, the fact they’d finally learned something about them, even if it was bad, was a relief of sorts.

  When Matt and his crew of Asiatic Fleet destroyermen aboard the old “four-stacker” USS Walker (DD-163) had been fighting the Japanese, they’d been outnumbered, outgunned, and on the run. Ridiculously outgunned at the end, when they and their sister ship, Mahan, slugged it out with the mighty Japanese battle cruiser Amagi right before they’d been swallowed by the Squall. During the two months between Pearl Harbor and their ultimate “escape,” Matt’s greatest frustration was the way the dwindling remnants of the Asiatic Fleet had been used merely to plug holes in the collapsing Dutch East Indies dike. Even outclassed as they were, the fight needn’t have been so lopsided, but an utter lack of air cover, total ignorance of the enemy’s strength, dispositions, and intentions, and inept, uncoordinated planning by ABDA’s (American, British, Dutch, Australian) multinational leadership had meant they were doomed from the start. They knew they were threatened by an avalanche, but they never knew how big it was or where it would fall.

  Until the recent battle, he’d felt much the same frustration about the Grik. They were the Lemurians’ “Ancient Enemy,” but their allies didn’t really know much about them. The incredibly hostile sea had kept them separated for countless generations. After they captured the Grik ship and the wealth of intelligence aboard it, they finally knew what they faced. It was horrible and it was huge, but at least now they knew. The Grik were savage monsters, as numberless as ants, and they were coming to wipe the Lemurians out. They were another looming avalanche that made the threat once posed by the Japanese seem almost insignificant. Since they’d lost track of Mahan, all that stood in their
way was a single battered Great War-vintage destroyer and a flimsy alliance of disparate and often contentious Lemurian “sea folk” and “land folk” who were torn between fighting and running away. Perhaps unreasonably, however, for the first time since they came through the Squall, Matt actually felt guardedly optimistic.

  His ship and her crew had a purpose again, other than simple survival, and the men were united in their determination to help their friends resist the Grik beyond even their earlier determination to resist the Japanese. After all, the Japanese—hated as they were—didn’t eat those they conquered. With the discovery of a human skull on the Grik ship, a skull that could have come only from Mahan, the war against the Grik became an American war as much as a Lemurian one. That they were the only Americans around, besides those they hoped still survived aboard Mahan, was immaterial. Walker would lead the struggle. The weary iron ship and her tired iron crew would drag the Lemurians out of the Bronze Age and build an army and whatever else was needed to take the fight to the enemy. Some progress had already been made, but much more would be required before they were ready to begin the crusade Matt had in mind.

  He dressed quickly and pushed aside the pea green curtain that separated his stateroom from the short passageway through “officers’ country” between the wardroom and the companionway to the deck above. As he strode to the ladder, he almost collided with Nurse Lieutenant Sandra Tucker as she emerged from her quarters, headed for her battle station in the wardroom/surgery. They maneuvered around each other in the confined space, each aware of the electric response that proximity aroused between them. Sandra was short, barely coming to Matt’s chin, but even with her sandy brown hair wrapped in a somewhat disheveled bun and her own eyes still puffy with sleep, she was the prettiest woman Matt had ever seen. Not beautiful, but pretty in a wholesome, practical, heart-melting way.

  Sandra and five other Navy nurses had come aboard as refugees before Walker, Mahan, and three other ships abandoned Surabaya with the Japanese on their heels after the disastrous Battle of the Java Sea. In the running fight that followed, the British cruiser Exeter and the destroyers HMS Encounter and USS Pope were sunk by the remorselessly pursuing enemy, leaving Walker and Mahan to face Amagi—and the Squall—alone. In the frenzied action with the battle cruiser, the two destroyers were mauled, but they’d put at least two torpedoes into Amagi and when they came through the Squall, she was gone. They hoped they’d sunk her. Also gone, however, were half of Mahan’s crew and a quarter of Walker’s—including one of the nurses, killed in action.

  Three of the surviving nurses went aboard Mahan to care for her many wounded and so, like the ship, they were lost to them. Only Sandra Tucker and Karen Theimer remained—on a ship full of rambunctiously male Asiatic Fleet destroyermen. So far, there’d been few problems, other than a mysterious altercation between some of Matt’s junior officers over Nurse Theimer’s affections, but Matt and Sandra had both early recognized a growing mutual attraction. They had, in fact, finally declared their love for one another just after the recent battle. But both knew, for the sake of morale, they had to remain aloof in front of the crew. The tension aboard caused by the “dame famine” would only be inflamed, they thought, if they openly acknowledged their affection. Matt was convinced there were other humans in this “new” world—there was too much evidence of previous contact—but he thought “taking” one of the only females known to exist for himself might erode the only real authority he had left: moral example. Matt and Sandra would have been surprised and chagrined to know how poorly kept their “secret” was—the men had eyes, after all—but they’d have been equally surprised by how much real authority Matt still possessed. In spite of the dame famine, his crew would follow him into hell. They already had. They’d done it because when they went, he always personally led them there.

  As they turned sideway to pass each other, Sandra’s breasts brushed against Matt, and he had to restrain a powerful urge to embrace her. Instead, he merely smiled.

  “Morning, Lieutenant.”

  “Good morning, Captain,” she replied, her face darkening slightly.

  As quick as that, the moment was past, but Matt had a springier step as he trotted up the companionway stairs to the exposed deck and climbed the ladder to the bridge above.

  “Captain on the bridge!” cried Lieutenant Garrett, the tall gunnery officer. He had the deck.

  “As you were. Status?”

  “Reports are still coming in, but we’re under time.”

  Matt nodded and went to his chair, bolted to the forward part of the starboard side of the pilothouse. Sitting, he stared out at the blackness of the lingering, moonless night.

  “All stations report manned and ready,” announced the bridge talker, Seaman Fred Reynolds. His voice cracked. The seaman was so young-looking that Matt suspected puberty was to blame. He glanced at his watch in the dim reddish light. 0422.

  “Not the best time, Mr. Garrett, but not the worst by a long shot.”

  “No, sir.” In spite of the fact the Japanese were no longer a threat, it had become clear that other threats were still very real. Because of that, Matt insisted they maintain all wartime procedures, including predawn battle stations. It was during that time when the sky began to gray but the sea remained black that ships were most vulnerable to submarines, because the ship was silhouetted but the sub’s periscope was invisible. Matt wasn’t afraid of submarines, but there were other, even more terrifying things in the sea and it was always best to be prepared. Besides, even as the men groused and complained, it was a comforting routine and a clear sign that discipline would be maintained, regardless of their circumstances.

  Slowly, the gray light came and lookouts, mostly Lemurian “cadets” because of their keen eyesight, scanned the sea from each bridgewing and the iron bucket “crow’s nest” halfway up the tall, skinny mast behind the bridge. As time passed, there were no cries of alarm. Ahead, on the horizon, like a jagged line of stubborn night, rose the coast of Borneo—called “Borno” by the natives—and at their present pace they should raise Balikpapan—“Baalkpan”—by early afternoon. Astern, at the end of the tow-cable, the Grik ship they’d captured began to take shape. She was dismasted, but the red-painted hull still clearly reflected the shape of the long-ago-captured British East Indiaman she was patterned after. Bluff bow, elevated quarterdeck, three masts, and a bowsprit that had all gone by the board in the fighting. Just looking at her, Matt felt his skin crawl.

  The fight when they took her was bad enough: the darkness, the shooting, the screams, and the blood. He vividly remembered the resistance he felt when he thrust his Academy sword into the throat of a ravening Grik. The exultation and the terror. Exultation that he’d stabbed it before it could rip him to shreds with its terrible teeth and claws; terror that he had only the ridiculous sword to prevent it from doing so. The first Grik he killed on the ship had been disarmed, but certainly not without weapons. They were like nothing he’d ever seen. Fuzzy, bipedal . . . lizards, with short tails and humanlike arms. But their teeth! They had the jaws of nightmare and claws much like a grizzly’s. So even though it lost its axe, he was lucky to survive. Then, and many times after. Of course, later it was different. When they chased the remnants of the Grik into the hold of the wallowing ship, they realized that the horror they’d felt before was nothing. Only then did the true nature of the Grik become clear to everyone, humans and Lemurians alike, and he wanted to use the sword. The hold was a slaughterhouse, where captives of every sort were butchered for food—while they were alive. Matt had wanted live Grik to study, but that became impossible. He couldn’t restrain the Lemurian “Marines” under his command. He didn’t even try to restrain himself.

  The horrible nature of their enemy should have made their victory that much more satisfying, but when they studied the captured charts and learned the extent and population of the empire they faced, Matt, Keje-Fris-Ar, and ultimately Keje’s Sky Priest, Adar, finally realized they must plan boldl
y or die.

  It was light enough now that he could see the distant, hazy shape of Keje’s great seagoing “Home.” Even miles astern, it still looked massive—because it was. The incredibly thick wooden hull with its ingenious diagonal bracing was as large as one of America’s new carriers, like the Hornet, and each of the three tripod masts rising around pagoda-like living areas supported immense junklike sails, or “wings,” as tall as Walker was long. Salissa—“Big Sal” to the Americans—was typical of her breed of seagoing Homes, but she was now armed with ten 32-pounder cannons that had performed with murderous effect against another Grik ship and all the boarders from three. The cannons were the result of the efforts of the suddenly tireless supply officer, Alan Letts, whom Matt had left behind in Baalkpan to continue overseeing the production of more guns and other things. Also, to keep him away from his other officers, since he seemed to be the one Nurse Theimer had chosen. He hoped the period of “out of sight and out of mind” might help his officers reconcile when they met again.

  He sighed and looked at his watch. Speaking of reconciliation and discipline . . . As soon as the men were released from morning GQ, the ship would continue steaming at condition III, as she always did now, with half the guns manned at all times. Some of the men would try to go back to sleep and others would remain to fulfill their morning watch duties. But the forenoon watch, at 0800, would begin with a session of “captain’s mast,” where he’d have to decide punishment for two of the most valuable members of the crew. For the sake of morale, he didn’t want to break them—besides, he needed them too badly. But he couldn’t be seen as just slapping their wrists either. He’d have to walk a fine line.

  Eventually 0530 rolled around and visibility was sufficient to secure from general quarters. Lieutenant Garrett was replaced by Lieutenant Dowden, Matt’s new exec. He’d been at his battle station on the auxiliary conn, aft, before arriving to relieve Mr. Garrett. The former officer to hold his position was James Ellis, but he’d been given Mahan after the Squall because most of her officers were killed when a ten-inch shell shattered her bridge. They’d learned from Lieutenant Ben Mallory, U.S. Army Air Corps, and Lieutenant Brister, Mahan’s engineering officer, that Mallory’s superior, Captain Kaufman, had shot Jim Ellis and taken over the ship. That’s why she hadn’t been at the rally point after they split up. Mallory, Brister, and Signalman Ed Palmer had arrived in a “found” PBY Catalina after a harrowing escape from the Grik. That was the only reason they knew anything at all about what happened to the other ship. The last information had her off the west coast of Sumatra, heading for Ceylon, a place they now knew teemed with Grik. All they could do at present was hope Jim had survived and managed to retake the ship before the Grik wound up with her. The discovery of the human skull aboard the prize made that seem unlikely. So in addition to their other problems, they also had to either rescue Mahan or destroy her.