Chapter 52
Wendy walked down the deserted corridor to Medbay. She'd spent the last hour helping science staff pack up what they could and board shuttles to Galapagos Colony. While most everyone felt a pang of regret to leave seaQuest, they were grateful they had been given time to save their work and grab belongings. Wendy had grown used to the background noise caused by other people's emotions. It took mental energy to block them out, both for their privacy and her own sanity, so it should have been a relief to be nearly alone, but it wasn't. The quiet was eerie, like a graveyard, or like that soundproof cell had been in Beauregard's prison.
History had already been changed, hadn't it? The original outcome couldn't happen now that more than half of the people originally abducted were no longer aboard. They couldn't die or lose ten years of Earth time if they were safe in an undersea colony. And if that had changed, wasn't it reasonable to assume her fate didn't have to be the same either? Somehow, logic wasn't winning over her emotions like it should. Nathan was right. She needed a nice long shore leave.
But she couldn't have rested at all if she'd left now. Both Nathan and Jonathan had already declared war in their minds. Yes, they wanted to play cat-and-mouse rather than fight, but she didn't have to scan them to know that they would not pull punches if they were forced into a corner. And if things got ugly, a few Navy medics, no matter how well-trained they were, were just not going to cut it. Until another CMO was hired, she was it and she wasn't going to run off just because it was dangerous.
Wendy fired up her computer, mainly out of habit. If Medbay wasn't in need of attention (it wasn't), there was always work to be found in requisitions and record-keeping. When the screen flashed on, she heard a tone she recognized, yet hadn't heard in ages. Her inbox had messages! It shouldn't have surprised her. Back in their own time, she should have known they'd reconnect with the Internex and email and vid-mail would automatically update. She clicked over to the combined menu. 1375 new messages. And that was just a week? What if the TGA had given them the six weeks she pleaded for?
With a sigh, she opened her email list first. A quick scan revealed at least two thirds of it was spam. She set to work deleting all the junk without opening. As she was perusing the list, she mentally tagged the mail she didn't delete, prioritizing it for what to read now and what she could put in a folder for later. She certainly wasn't going to drool over the latest fall lab-coat designs if she might not be on Earth to take delivery, but she didn't want to delete it and miss a chance at ordering later. One of the notes she'd written herself before her mindwipe had said, "Several of the male crewmembers think you dress like a slut. Don't worry about who. Just fix it." She was taking her own advice to heart.
Amidst all the spam and useful advertisements, she found something personal. The return address was mswatkins at podunkhermitage dot net. That domain name was Mary Sue's idea of a joke. There was not one but three emails from her. Wendy opened the first one.
Wendy? What's going on? I can't feel either you or Tim. I wasn't spying. I swear. I often sweep by to make sure you're there and okay. Please just tell me you're doing some top-secret parapsychology experiment or something. I'm worried about you.
Mary
Sweep by? That was worth a question when she wrote back. Wendy opened the next mail.
Wendy, this isn't funny. Now I hear seaQuest is supposedly missing? How can it be missing? A ship that big can't get lost! Look, I know you're probably working on some kind of anti-detection technology. You don't have to give me any details. And if they shut off your email and vid-link, fine. Have Tim do a quick Transmit. I won't make him chat or anything. You know how paranoid I am. Please just tell me you're okay.
Mary
Wendy was about to compose a reply right then, but she decided to read the last message first. She clicked on the third message from the same address.
Dear Wendy,
I don't know why I'm writing this. Father Baker tells me that the UEO really doesn't know where seaQuest is and since you're not answering me, you're probably at the bottom of some dark, cold trench with a hull breach the size of Montana. I'm sorry I wasn't there for you when it happened. I hope you didn't die alone. You can't imagine how much I will miss you. You were one of the very few people who understood why I am the way I am. I will never forget you.
Love, Mary
Wendy let her finger hover over the reply button for no more than a second before she closed her email program completely and opened up her vid-link. She punched up Mary and waited while the call connected. They'd been back in 2022 for a good ninety minutes now, so the official calls had finally died down. It probably wouldn't be too hard to get a line out.
The screen opened with Mary's standard floral arrangement picture. She almost always used the vid-link like an old-fashioned voice phone. "Hello?" Mary's voice was tentative, guarded.
"Mary, it's me."
"Wendy!" She heard her voice at the same time as she felt Mary's mind slam into hers, nearly knocking her out with overwhelming joy and relief. Sorry, Mary mindspoke.
It's okay. I'm sorry you thought I was dead. SeaQuest got pulled into a Mobius Hole and we were stuck in the past. We just got back.
That explains it. No emails in the past, I assume.
No, but everything piled up and downloaded when we got back.
Mary cringed inwardly. You can delete the ones from me. They're just asking where you were.
I already read them and they're sweet. Why would you want me to delete them?
I was being paranoid. You weren't dead, so I was wrong.
Tell me something. Did you notice me or Tim missing first?
There was a long hesitation and Wendy felt Mary's embarrassment before her self-control mechanism caught up and blocked it. Her mindvoice was meek when she admitted, Tim. It's not what you think. I just check to see nothing's wrong. Two seconds, max. I checked you too, right after. It would be no different than driving by your house and making sure your lights were on.
A house. Right. How often?
Another hesitation. Once or twice a day.
You check on Tim every day?
A deep sigh. Well, before he vanished into thin air…er… thin water. Please don't tell him, Wendy. All I did was make sure he wasn't feeling any distress. Honestly.
It's too bad you couldn't feel him in 1504. He had distress then, believe me. But you weren't born yet.
Wendy felt Mary aching to ask about Tim's distress, but stifling her interest for appearances' sake. Do you think it's unethical? I'll stop doing it.
Why don't you just try talking to him?
Oh, come on. He doesn't want to talk to me. Besides, I wouldn't know what to say.
You could start by telling him what you've been doing.
Panic flooded her mind before she got a good handle on it. Clearly, the emotions she was experiencing were more challenging for her to keep under control than she was used to. He'd think I'm stalking him.
He'd think you care. Would that be so bad?
Would you want some stranger checking up on you? I don't think so.
Stranger? Mary, he owes you his life!
What, so that gives me the right to stalk him like some crazy nincompoop? Okay. You've convinced me it's wrong. I'll quit. Happy?
No, I'm not. You care so much it's taking huge amounts of your psychic energy to hide it from me and you won't even give him a chance.
A chance for what?
A chance to get to know you. A chance to have someone to talk to about something other than his job. You're not going to believe this, but he's very insecure.
Are we talking about the same Tim? The sweet communications officer that jumped out of a plane carrying two unconscious friends?
Yes. One and the same. Sweet, brave, and insecure. I know you've never scanned him or you'd know this.
I told you I wasn't scanning him. But you have?
With his permission, yes. And I've probably already told you more than I should have.
Okay, I'll email him and come clean, but then it's up to him. He'll probably be so creeped out that he puts up blocks so I'll never be able to feel if he's okay anymore. But I guess I deserve that.
Listen, Mary. I can't go into a lot of detail, but seaQuest is in danger right now. If we disappear like we did a week ago, we'll probably be gone at least ten years. Wendy said 'we' generically, knowing the chances were good that she wouldn't be returning, but leaving enough doubt that it wasn't an outright lie. I'm really glad you wrote those emails, especially the last one, because there's still a chance I won't ever see you or talk to you again after today. I love you too. Mary would know she meant it in the platonic sense, same as Mary had meant it in her email.
Mary didn't mindspeak what she was thinking, but Wendy felt her teeter between doubt (why would you be making vid-link calls in the middle of a crisis?) and utter despair (no! I can't go through the loss again). All she could bring herself to put into words was, Still in danger?
We have good reason to believe some aliens want seaQuest and they're going to try to swoop in with a huge spaceship and yank her out of the water. Admiral Noyce has an aircraft carrier standing by, but somehow I doubt fighter jets will be any match for a mothership that's big enough to suck seaQuest out of the ocean and carry her off. Was she saying too much? Perhaps. Then again, if things went badly, Mary might be one of the very few who would know the truth about what happened. Wendy felt it was important that someone knew, that an event this monumental didn't get hidden by the military and politicians. If you can't find me or Tim, just know it wasn't by our choice.
Though shocked by the mention of alien abduction, Mary knew Wendy wasn't lying and didn't waste time discussing how preposterous it sounded. I suppose it would be futile to suggest you just get off and let them have the darned submarine?
Captain Bridger already has an evacuation plan in place and we've practiced it. He has no intention of letting them take anyone. But sometimes things happen that we have no control over. I tell you what, if I ever plan to get involved with any telepathic experiments that would put us out of touch, I promise I'll notify you ahead of time. That way, if you ever can't find me, you'll know it's because something is really wrong.
Thank you, Wendy. I appreciate that.
If I'm still around after all this, I'm going to be switching my focus from medicine to parapsychology. Would you consider collaborating with me?
C-collaborating? Where are you going to be, Chatton? Mary couldn't hold down all the negative feelings associated with that place, but she tried to sound casual.
No, here on seaQuest. If it's still here, of course. I'm going to be Chief Psychologist and assistant to the new CMO. But I should have plenty of time to explore parapsychology.
Did Captain Bridger demote you?
Wendy laughed. No. He tried to talk me out of it. It was my idea.
Oh. Good. He better not try to demote you.
Wendy let her avoidance of the question slide. Why get in an argument when everything was so uncertain? Mary could think about it for now and it wouldn't be so much of a shock if Wendy lived long enough to ask another time. And if she disappeared or died, well, she certainly didn't want their last contact to be tainted with notes of discord. Mary had already let her walls down far more than she usually did.
I have to go. You wouldn't believe how much imminent alien abduction adds to my paperwork.
Mary laughed. Thank you for calling, Wendy. I really was worried. Mary broke their mindlink. The vid-link screen was blank and probably had been since the second Mary recognized her caller and established alternate communication.
Wendy leaned back in her chair, reflecting on their chat. It was rather nice to know that someone besides her family would miss her if she disappeared. Speaking of family… Wendy clicked back to her email to see if her mother or father had sent any messages. No emails from them. A brief glance at her vid-link messages and she saw one from her parents' home number. She watched it and it sounded like they weren't worried at all. She checked the date stamp. It had come the day the Mobius Hole appeared; Wendy just never got around to listening to it.
She consulted her computer for the time zone conversion. It was still way too early back home. She'd have to try to remember to call later. In case there wasn't a later, Wendy composed an email and sent it off. She finished deleting and sorting the rest of her messages. Most of what remained wasn't important enough to even open.
She clicked into her work programs and sent off requisitions and reports that had been sitting for months, just waiting for an Internex connection. She had hoped there was more needing her attention, but there really wasn't. She shut down her monitor and sighed. Now what? She stared at the wall for several long moments. She really only had three choices: stay here with nothing to do but worry, go to her quarters with nothing to do but worry and try to rest, or go to the bridge and hope the crew could keep her distracted enough that she could get her mind off herself.
It wasn't even difficult to choose. Wendy left the emergency lights on, but shut down everything else and hurried out. A trip up the spiral staircase and a short ride on the mag-lev and she arrived at the clamshell doors which separated the bridge from the corridor. Although she'd been eager to come, she now hesitated. Besides Lucas and her, there were no other civilians left on board. The bridge crew would be incredibly busy and she'd just be in the way. Or would she? She pulled out the PAL she kept on her belt. "Smith to Captain Bridger."
"Go ahead, Doctor."
"Medbay is ready for anything."
"Thank you. Why don't you get some shut-eye?"
"Captain, I can't sleep. I was wondering if I'd be in the way if I came to the bridge."
"Not at all. You're welcome any time."
She hit the button to open the clam doors and put her PAL away.
"That was fast," the captain said with a smirk. But there was a sparkle in his eyes. He wasn't even mildly annoyed.
Wendy stepped inside, advancing slowly. She could feel the energy radiating off everyone on the bridge. It was well after midnight where they were, but all of them were running off Black Sea time. They'd barely been at their stations for three hours yet. She could feel the undercurrent of tension, but they were all professionals, holding their anxiety at bay while they focused on their tasks. She made a conscious effort to block her psychic senses lest she violate anyone's privacy, but she could still read body language.
Miguel looked as relaxed as he always did. Not that he wasn't serious about his work. He just enjoyed it so much that it was hard to tell at any given time whether he was playing with the WSKRS or actually working. Brody looked like he was running tactical scenarios through the computer, tweaking variables and grinning at the screen. Jonathan was briefing the relief officers that had been on shore leave when they hit the Mobius Hole. Six supply launches had come in while civilians were leaving, bringing personnel as well as food and other assorted items they'd run out of during their extended absence. Now they had their full military complement again.
Wendy took a second to wonder how differently everything might have turned out if those officers had been aboard and Darwin hadn't been named acting captain. Would anyone have listened to the rants of a dolphin without the turn of events that gave him unique power? The thought made her shudder.
Nathan leaned in toward her. "Are you all right?"
"Just letting my mind wander too much. The whole boat is too quiet for me. That's why I came up here."
He smiled warmly. "Well, if it's noise you want, try Lucas and O'Neill," he said, curling his thumb to the upper level of stations where the two of them were glued to a single computer screen and kibitzing over one of Professor LeConte's recorded lectures which they were fast-forwarding, presumably to see if there was anything but English ever spoken. Wendy couldn't imagine how they could tell—his voice was so high-pitched from being sped up and he talked a mile a minute. At first she thought they were ridiculing the silliness of his squeaky voice, but she soon discovered they were actually following the content of the speech and ridiculing the class for not recognizing they were being taught by an alien. Of course, it was a lot easier to recognize looking back with that knowledge as a given.
They were a bit on the loud side, talking to each other and thinking out loud, and doing it over the fast-forwarded lecture, but it also sounded like they were absorbing important clues in his physics and astronomy lessons, even if they weren't getting anywhere with the Hyberion language. Every once in a while, Lucas would do a palm-to-forehead "duh" and grin like a maniac. Both he and Tim were scribbling notes furiously. That's probably good, Wendy thought. Whether for good or ill, not even the captain suggested they lower their volume.
She turned her attention back to him. "Is everyone holding up okay? Anything I can do?" Everyone seemed fine to her, but Nathan knew them better than she did, at least in this domain. He could probably tell who woke up with a crick in their neck just by the nuance in their aye-ayes.
"I think Brody has a hangnail," Nathan jested in a loud whisper.
She rolled her eyes and shook her head, chuckling lightly. "Call for a stretcher and someone type and crossmatch him," she answered in the same tone.
Brody looked up from his hypothetical sims with a humorous gleam in his eyes. "It's bad, Doc. But whatever you do, don't amputate."
Everyone in earshot laughed, including an amused chuckle from Jonathan. It struck Wendy how loose and calm everyone appeared. Well, most of them anyway. Lucas and Tim didn't even notice there was laughing occurring outside their tiny tunnel of vision. They had to be concentrating pretty hard to absorb alien physics lectures in super overdrive.
Now that the relief officers had been brought up to speed on the situation and the plan, they'd all dispersed to secondary stations throughout the boat, most of them to Life Support and Engineering. Jonathan sidled up to Nathan and whispered in his ear and then the two entered a quiet conversation. It was apparent by their body language that it was private and neither Wendy nor anyone else tried to eavesdrop. Brody donned his headset rather than chance overhearing them by accident, at least, that was what it looked like to Wendy. It was possible he was just trying to hear his own work over Lucas and Tim's noise.
Wendy backed against the wall so she wouldn't be in anyone's way.
Just then, Commander Scott Keller appeared out of nowhere, right in the center of the bridge. It was his spitting image and the voice was perfect, but it was also evident that it was a projection or hologram. It wasn't as wispy as the images caught in mist on the captain's program of Professor Martinson, but it wasn't opaque enough to be solid either.
Everyone dropped their work to listen, Miguel ribbing Lucas and then Lucas alerting Tim. The hologram spoke with a desperate, pleading tone, appealing to Nathan, but when Nathan tried to address Scott, the hologram didn't even acknowledge him. It wasn't interactive, like Martinson. It was a recording. Still, it was easy to see how Nathan could have been enticed into a trap with that pleading as bait.
When the image of Scott vanished, everyone stared at the empty space, silent and dumbstruck. "Captain, I've got reports coming from all over the boat," Brody said. "This image appeared to everyone who ever met Commander Keller."
Nathan stood tall and stepped forward to address the bridge. "All right, people. We knew this was coming. We hoped it would be later rather than sooner, but this is it. He said meet him at the Christmas Tree, which was our inside joke about the Andaman Sea. Time for us to move in the opposite direction. Mr. O'Neill, get me Admiral Noyce on a secured channel. Helm, plot a course toward the Peru-Chile Trench. What's the deepest we can get in there, Commander?"
Jonathan answered without consulting a computer. "Eight thousand meters at Richards Deep."
"Richards Deep it is." Nathan leaned over to the communications station, since Tim was still making his way down from Lucas's station. A flick of the switch lit up the light that indicated he was on shipwide speakers. "Attention all decks. Prepare for deep submergence. Repeat, all hands to deep submergence stations." He flipped the switch and was out of Tim's way again just as he slid into the communications station. "Doctor, the bridge is going to be sealed off in about a minute. You'll be stuck with us once the clam doors are shut."
"There's no point being in Medbay if the injured can't get there. I may as well stay."
Nathan rewarded her with a smile and a nod.
"Admiral Noyce on Tac One," Tim reported.
"Put him on the main screen, Mr. O'Neill."
"Aye, sir." A button depressed and Admiral Noyce's face irised into focus. He looked much better to Wendy than when she'd first spoken to him, several hours earlier.
Nathan was cool as a cucumber when he spoke. "The game's afoot, Admiral. They baited the hook for Andaman Sea. We're headed off to Richards Deep."
"Understood. Ronald Reagan will be cruising directly above you and USS Gerald Ford is going to stake out the Andaman."
"Uh… Admiral, you realize if they can grab a submarine, they can probably grab an aircraft carrier."
"Maybe so, but I'm betting they can't grab both at once. And if they came for seaQuest, we're going to stand in their way. Take care, Nathan."
"You too, Bill. SeaQuest out."
Commander Ford waited for the captain to look away from the viewscreen. "All stations report ready for deep submergence, Captain."
"Thank you, Commander." He looked out over the bridge. "All right, everyone. This is not a drill. Deep submergence protocol now."
The clamshell doors hissed shut. Wendy felt her ears pop as the room pressurized. The captain gave orders about angles, depths, and courses—just a bunch of numbers that Wendy couldn't comprehend. But there was no mistaking the steep incline of the floor downward. The mouse was going down the hole.
