Relaxing and flying at the same time turned out to be surprisingly easy over water. With no unexpected buildings or trees to leap into his path, Ralph found that he could actually think about other things and fly on automatic.
He watched the waves flicker by below. The rising moon picked out each white crest in sliver.
He passed over a flight of pale, slender fish flitting inches below the waves. He tugged the communicator out of his sleeve and pressed it in his palm.
He let his eyes relax. The sliver waves blurred and blended. A picture formed of a huge ship, bounding over heaving swells far out to sea. On instinct, he arched, changing course by a few degrees.
Below, the waves flicked by like frames of a movie.
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Gray light was staining the Eastern sky when the ship came into view. It was unmistakable. There were the stacked containers, the high conning tower, the steering deck with windows on three sides.
He had hoped to make it before light. He had little hope of being mistaken for a scarlet ibis with a navigational disorder.
He opted for coming in low over the water in the hope that his cape would provide some camouflage. At the last instant, he pulled up, his eyes watering in the rapid ascent up the side of the giant ship. He reached the top deck and twisted into his planned roll.
The first couple of revolutions were perfect. He clamped his teeth down hard on his lower lip to stop his trademark collision-alert yodel. He tucked his head and hit the deck shoulder first, bouncing once and twice and on the third bounce his cape caught on a railing.
His head snapped back, then his leg flew out in front and up and over, landing him sprawled face first on the deck.
He lay on his belly, staring at the rivets that, he decided, had probably left a permanent perforation line down his chest.
"Fold here," he thought muzzily. Then he gave his head a hard shake.
He did a swift push up, tucked his knees up to his chest and eased into a low crouch. The deck was quiet except for the gentle slap of the ropes against their moorings.
He straightened and crossed to the nearest visible stairwell in three strides. The hours he'd spent studying the ship's image in the waves would pay off now. He knew he could find his way to the crew decks with no difficulty. Finding the cargo hold from there would just be a matter of applying pressure firmly and judiciously.
--------------------
Ralph gripped the sailor by his faded collar and pushed him hard against the bulkhead. The man's shoes beat against the wall a foot from the ground.
"Where is the cargo hold?" Ralph said firmly.
He blinked at the stream of frantic Russian that blurred past his ears.
"Okay," he said, when the tide of words seemed to ebb.
"Lu-gaz," he enunciated carefully.
The sailor blinked.
"Lugaz," he repeated. Before Ralph could resort to charades, the man pointed down and to his left.
"Lu-gaz," he said, his face curiously calm. Clearly he thought if Ralph was foolish enough to seek out Lugaz he deserved what he got.
"Thank you," said Ralph and reached up with his free hand to tap the sailor's head lightly against the bulkhead.
He relaxed his grip and the man slumped to the ground unconscious.
Ralph started down the companionway. Lugaz, it seemed, would be easy to find.
--------------------
Twenty minutes later he admitted he'd been wrong. The ship was a maze of corridors stacked a dozen deep. Each corridor was lined with hundreds of plain, metal doors – either unmarked or marked very clearly for the use of the average Russian.
There were surprisingly few crewmen for a ship this size. The three he'd encountered had been uniformly unhelpful.
And there were no maps anywhere.
He felt his blood pressure rising and forced himself to take slow, even breaths. He turned to the nearest unmarked door, pressed his palm against it and pushed.
It fell in with a dull clang that reverberated down the hall.
In the tiny room, a man in a black watch cap and boxer shorts sat up quickly and lay down just as quickly when Ralph's fist tapped him lightly on the chin.
A moment's searching turned up what he was looking for. Ralph pulled a scratched shaving mirror out of the sailor's shower bag. He'd been having good luck with reflective surfaces lately and didn't want to tempt his luck.
It was getting easier to sink into the light trance that showed him the ship. After a few deep breaths, the familiar gray bulkheads shimmered into focus.
He eased his mind down through the decks until he found the cavernous hold. Every instinct called him to move toward the cage against the wall, but he forced himself to travel over to the door and up the corridor outside, plotting a mental schematic of his route by tracing back to this sailor's bunk room.
Within a minute he was trotting down the corridor two decks below. That's where he found Lugaz.
--------------------
Lugaz was even more ugly in person, Ralph decided.
His squashed nose was red and swollen. Wads of bloodstained packing hung from his nostrils. His hands were particularly appalling with blackened and broken fingernails on short, club-shaped fingers.
His bulk filled the corridor like an overcoat-wearing tank. That's why his speed came as such a surprise.
Lugaz's heavy fist shot out and grabbed Ralph around the throat with the reflexes of a cobra. Ralph realized with dawning horror that the protection of the suit didn't extend as high as Lugaz's meaty thumb and forefinger.
Bright dots swarmed in his vision as he struggled to pry the massive fingers apart. Then, as the rushing in his ears rose to a deafening pitch, Ralph saw the answer. He raised his fist and brought it down on the overcoated arm right at the elbow.
Ralph heard a loud snap and the pressure on his Adam's apple vanished. He staggered back and leaned against the bulkhead, panting and rubbing his throat.
Lugaz cradled his useless arm and bared his teeth in a feral snarl. His next move came as no surprise to Ralph who was used to encountering men who mistook bravery for a loaded gun.
Lugaz reached into his overcoat with his good hand and drew out a long-barreled revolver. He sighted down the barrel, directly at the emblem on Ralph's chest. Ralph grinned as three bullets pinged off the suit and ricocheted down the hall.
Lugaz's fourth shot bounced off, hit a rivet in the floor and knocked the gun out of his hand. He stood blinking foolishly at his empty palm while Ralph bent and scooped up the weapon.
Ralph studied the gun for a longer moment than was strictly necessary. He looked up at Lugaz who regarded him with slack-jawed amazement.
As Ralph watched, he saw the man's pupils dilate and sweat break out on his forehead and upper lip as amazement turned into fear. Ralph didn't' move.
He wanted this man to fear him. He wanted to give this man a reason to fear him. He could, he knew. He could break every bone in this monster's body, then pick up the gun and shoot him. And then, only very much later, kill him.
The whole thing played like a movie in Ralph's head while Lugaz's breath whistled in and out through his slack mouth. Ralph stared down at the gun in his hand and closed his fingers around it.
He listened to the squeal of the metal as the barrel ground into the stock and the pop as the grip snapped and shattered. He opened his hand and the pieces rained down to the floor.
Lugaz was still staring at the wreckage of the gun when Ralph stepped across and backhanded him across the face. Lugaz spun away, slammed into the bulkhead and sagged to the floor.
Ralph stood looking down at him, breathing heavily. Then he stepped over the fallen body and continued down the hall.
--------------------
He found the cargo hold on the next level below. The wide door was marked with an international caution symbol that seemed to Ralph very appropriate. Anyone who encountered him now, he thought, should use extreme caution.
Ralph crossed the distance to the cage at a run. He skidded to a stop and gripped the nearest bars in both hands. With a high, rending whine of distressed metal the bars twisted and gapped open. He slipped inside and knelt by the huddled shape on the floor.
Bill lay on his side, his broken arm draped across his chest. In the dim light, Ralph thought the fingers on that hand looked blue. Bill's face was slick with sweat and his chest heaved with labored breath. The sound beat on Ralph's ears.
"Bill?" he said, reaching out to lay his hand along Bill's cheek. He touched the cool, damp skin and gasped as a thousand images exploded in his mind.
His brain tried to process them, flashing each up in a random, blinding rattle of sound and light, but they weren't sequential, they were simultaneous.
Colors - red, green, white, red – blew across this mind's eye, yet struck at once in a white/black blaze.
Sounds – rattle of bullets, explosion, gasping breath – chased one another and blared in a burst of deafening static.
Ralph was falling backward through space, twisting, tumbling, until he landed with a thud that drove the air from his lungs. He sat up in a damp cellar. Icy water ran in rivulets down the stone walls. Somewhere above was the roar of a river, then the sound faded and Ralph knew it was a passing train.
He looked up the shaking ladder that ran to the ceiling. Bill was climbing down, his hands slipping on the slimy rungs. This Bill was the oldest of the three in the dreams. His face was losing the sharp edges of youth and his hair was flecked with gray.
He jumped down the last few rungs and landed in a crouch on the cold floor. There was a body sprawled at the base of the ladder. Its deep blue suit was torn. Underneath it, a white shirt, now stained with blood, was open to the waist showing a crisscross of burns gouged into the skin.
The man's coffee-dark eyes were dim and unfocused. Black hair clung to his face in damp strands. As his chest heaved, each breath was punctuated by a wet rattle in his throat.
As Bill laid a hand lightly on his forehead, the man sighed heavily and the corners of his mouth turned up in the ghost of a smile. Then his eyes lost focus and stared sightlessly at the ceiling. A train roared overhead and Bill took his hand away.
Bill stood and took a step back. When Ralph looked back at the man on the floor, he saw his own face.
Ralph climbed to his feet and crossed the damp floor in two steps. He reached for Bill's shoulder and was surprised to feel fabric under his fingers. He stepped around until they were face to face.
"Bill," he said, forcing himself to speak slowly and clearly, "It's a dream. Wake up now. We need to go."
Bill blinked. He stared into Ralph's face, then looked down at the body on the floor. The dark-eyed man lay at the base of the ladder, his black hair clinging to his skin.
Ladder, walls, and roaring sound all faded. Last to fade was the man on the floor. Ralph stared into Bill's wide eyes, then moved his hand to the shoulder of Bill's unbroken arm and gently guided him to a sitting position on the floor of the cargo hold. Ralph felt a giddy smile curl his lips.
"That," he said, "Was really weird."
Bill's cracked lips moved; his eyebrows rose.
"R-ralph?" he breathed.
Ralph grinned.
"In the flesh," he said.
--------------------
Bill couldn't stand on his own, but he leaned against the wall and stayed upright when Ralph propped him against it.
"You," Ralph said gripping the bent bars, "Are not going to believe how hard it was to find you."
He tugged the protesting metal, widening the gap enough for Bill's larger frame.
"And I want to tell you right now," said Ralph, half-lifting, half-carrying Bill between the bars. "Just because I can fly across the Pacific, it doesn't mean I'm going to spy on Russian missile silos."
He stood outside the cage with Bill leaning heavily on his shoulder. He was weighing the options for long-range passenger flights, when the door on the other side of the cavernous room opened.
The peacoated Doctor stepped in and started across the floor. Some thirty crewmen, armed with various heavy implements from crow bars to industrial wrenches, filed in and fanned out behind him. The group crossed the floor, the Doctor out front as though leading a delegation. Ralph felt Bill raise his head and heard his breath quicken.
"And you must be Ralph," the Doctor said amiably as he crossed the floor toward the cage. "You created quite a trail of destruction on your journey here."
For the first time, Ralph got a clear look at the man. In other circumstances, Ralph thought, he would be called "fastidious".
The Doctor was pale, with smooth, almost waxy, skin. His dark hair was plastered down on either side of a razor-sharp part. He might have been 35 or 55; it was difficult to tell from his face. The only indication that he wasn't some self-satisfied businessman was the hard glitter in his watery eyes.
He came to a halt less than a yard away. The sailors hung back, standing loose-limbed and ready in a broad semi-circle.
"I admit," the Doctor said. "I thought your friend was raving."
As the Doctor reached into his pocket, Ralph shifted his weight to block Bill's body. The Doctor gave a thin smile and pulled out Bill's silver communicator. He turned it idly in his hand as he spoke.
"When I asked him about this instrument under-"
The Doctor smiled thinly. "-medication, he talked about someone named Ralph and a 'super suit'."
"I am afraid I owe him an apology," he went on. "I might not have been quite so harsh, had I known he was telling the truth."
The man shrugged.
"But that is water under the bridge, as you say."
He thrust both hands into the pockets of his woolen coat and rocked back on his heels.
"Possibly I am feeling generous," the Doctor said. "Because I know my buyer will agree, that you, Ralph, are a much better catch than a broken down Federal agent, no matter the - "
He grinned, showing a row of straight, white teeth. "Entertainment value."
Ralph felt Bill stir against his shoulder and tightened his grip on the man's good arm.
The Doctor chuckled.
"Your friend is annoyed with me," he said. "I do not blame him."
Bill moved again. Ralph heard him draw in a shuddering breath.
"I am afraid," said the Doctor, "Beyond my search for information, I was bored. My mother always said I was a terror when I was bored."
He shrugged.
"Perhaps she was right."
Ralph heard a rasping whisper in his ear.
"Up."
Despite himself, Ralph felt his eyes widen. The Doctor didn't miss the slip.
"Your friend continues to entertain, Mr. Hero," he said. Again, he flashed the tight smile. "Is he even now attempting a stratagem? So full of surprises. I would hate to lose the pleasure of his company."
The Doctor turned on his heel with crisp precision and marched toward the door. Ralph felt Bill tense beside him. As he reached the door, the Doctor barked out a command in Russian. The ring of sailors started forward.
-continued-