Chapter 3 - It's Not Goodbye, Just See You Later
x
Guilt.
"Captain plans to hit the sub quickly, before they can close the net around the James," Carlton said quietly, forcing himself to speak despite the lump in his throat. "Chances are that we'll be back long before you wake up."
God he hated leaving her here like this.
Carlton rubbed his thumb across Ravit's palm, hoping against hope that she would suddenly open her eyes so he could explain why he was leaving. Why he had to go. How important it was to keep Doctor Scott and the cure safe. Make her understand that he wasn't abandoning her – not now, not ever.
But there was no response, the hand in his lying limp and lifeless. Carlton knew from the machines beeping rhythmically by his head that Ravit was still alive, but Doctor Scott would make no promises about when, or if, she would wake up, a fact that Carlton had not missed.
"Time to go, Burk." Wolf's Aussie burr was muted, his voice reflecting Carlton's mood.
Carlton nodded towards Ravit. "You want some time alone?"
Wolf shook his head. "I already said my goodbyes."
Those words hung between them. His goodbyes. As though this really could be it. Wolf turned, leaving the cabin silently. Carlton straightened, folding Ravit's small hand between both of his. "I didn't leave you on Solace, and I'm not leaving you here. So this isn't a goodbye."
"I promise that I'll be back."
x
Pain.
Not the unbearable pain that she recalled from the last time she opened her eyes, more of a dull ache over her entire body.
Except for her legs, which felt numb and heavy, as though something heavy was laying on top of them.
Ravit fought to open her eyes as she tried to remember what had happened, the images sliding away from her like grains of sand through her hands until one stuck.
Carlton, walking up the stairs of an oil rig in those ridiculous green shoelaces, adorably befuddled at her teasing. Ravit found it both amusing and baffling that a man so confident in his role professionally could be so completely thrown by a little harmless razzing. At first she had actually thought his truly terrible attempts at flirtation were deliberate, his idiotic form of hazing the new girl. It was Kara, with a few rather telling stories about her disastrous attempts to set Carlton up on dates, who convinced Ravit that the clueless act was not an act. Carlton Burk, lieutenant in the U.S. Navy, graduate of the Academy, thirty-two year old man, and all-around good guy, really was a sixteen-year-old when it came to talking to women.
As the image of Carlton muttering about his shoes faded, another image rose, this one filled not with amusement but with fear. Ravit remembered hearing hissing from one of the gas lines, then searching for the source of the noise in a last-ditch attempt to save the oil rig. She had turned just before the pipe exploded, seeing Carlton and Wolf only feet away, her last memory the two of them being engulfed in a blaze of fire...
x
Suspicion.
Carlton stared out at a landscape that now looked as hospitable as the shoreline along the Persian Gulf, seeing every movement, every shadow, as a possible threat, his mind unable to reconcile the sight of a boat flying the American flag firing on him with the country he had fought for, shed blood for, been willing to die for.
"Whew. I can almost smell the jambalaya." Teylor Cruz said, exiting the hanger where the remainder of the team was preparing their packs. "You know, I grew up just twenty miles north of here."
"I remember. You figure you're getting a homecoming dinner?" Carlton bit out, regretting the words even as he said them. He didn't begrudge Teylor the excitement the man felt at being back where he was born and raised. He certainly didn't begrudge Teylor his hope that his family might have survived. Hell, two days ago Carlton couldn't wait to get to New Orleans either. But right now everyone - even the members of Cruz's family - felt like a threat.
If you aren't with us, you're against us.
Teylor turned, the concern on his face grating on Carlton's nerves. "What do you mean?"
Carlton's gaze swept the shoreline once again, wondering where the next shot would come from. How could you fight an enemy when you couldn't distinguish between friend and foe? "You got eyes, don't you? Even if we beat that sub, I don't recognize this country anymore."
"Well, I guess we'll just have to work a little harder to get it back. Know what I'm saying?" Teylor responded, his hand moving to Carlton's shoulder. "Ravit will be okay, man. Doctor Scott wouldn't leave unless she was confident that Doc Rios could handle things."
Carlton grunted.
Maybe.
Or maybe Doctor Scott, like Carlton himself, had no choice.
x
Panic.
Eyes popping open, Ravit expected to be surrounded by fire, but instead found herself facing the bottom of a bunk, her mind so foggy that it took her long seconds to figure out that she must be back on the Nathan James. Trying to clear the cobwebs she turned her head, almost passing out as a wave of crushing pain rolled through her. Squeezing her eyes closed, Ravit forced herself to breathe through it, waiting until the black fog receded before she attempted to open her eyes again, focusing on what she now knew. She was alive, and she was on the James, which meant that she must have gotten off the oil rig somehow.
And that meant other people might have too.
Taking several more shallow breathes, Ravit pushed into her memory, searching for some memory of Carlton, of Wolf, of what had happened to them and whether they too had escaped the flames, but the only thing she could remember was Lynn being blown across the platform, his death a certainty.
Moving her head millimeter by millimeter, Ravit determined that she was in the small cabin off sick bay. From above her head she could hear the beeping of equipment and a glance down showed an IV taped to her hand. A chair sat wedged under the bunk, as though someone had recently been sitting there, causing Ravit to wonder who had been here and where they had gone. Allowing her eyes to drift shut, Ravit waited, counting to pass the time. Whoever had been here would come back.
And then she would get the answers to the questions tormenting her.
x
Anger.
"You get away from them!" The man snarled, running in front of the woman and child. Carlton took aim at the center of his chest, stopped from firing only when Doctor Scott moved, blocking his shot.
These people.
They were the reason that Ravit was lying in a bunk on the Nathan James barely alive, possibly dead even now. They were the reason that he was out here, protecting a scientist who cared more about her vaccine than her life, rather than holding Ravit's hand. They were the reason that the Nathan James was out there in pieces hunting a submarine rather than spreading the cure.
These people were the enemy.
"I can help her," Doctor Scott pleaded, her unpredictable movements making it impossible to get a clear shot, moving between him and the hostiles. "Please, let me help the girl."
"Not another step, or I'll shoot!"
The man was half crazed and Carlton tightened his finger on the trigger. Almost as though he knew what Carlton was about to do, the XO turned. "Hold your fire, Burk."
"I'm going to treat the child. If you want to stop me, you are going to have to shoot me." Doctor Scott took a step forward, and then another.
"Mase, let them help!"
Whether it was the woman's words or the tone of her voice, something got through to the man. He lowered his gun, allowing Doctor Scott to approach. Carlton watched as Doctor Scott placed her hands on the little girl, knowing that the simple motion was enough to save the child's life.
A miracle.
A cure spread simply by breathing.
If Doctor Scott could do that, maybe she could cure paralysis too.
X
Clarity.
After counting to a thousand - twice - Ravit admitted that whoever had been here was not coming back. Opening her eyes again, she noticed for the first time that she was secured to the bed, something that was not standard procedure. But before she could consider all of the reasons why she might be tied down, the ship heaved, the chair next to her clattering against the bed-frame where it was anchored. As the Nathan James shuddered beneath her, Ravit knew instantly what was happening.
The James had just launched her torpedoes.
Another shudder, longer and more jarring, as the Nathan James took a direct hit. As the alarms began blaring, Ravit closed her eyes and began to pray.
"Sh'ma Yisra'eil Adonai Eloheinu Adonai echad..."
Because if the Nathan James went down, this cabin would be her grave.
x
Terror.
Carlton paced back and forth across the small cabin where he, along with Wolf, Miller, Doctors Scott and Milwosky, President Michener, the kids, and the family he had seen as the enemy - only to learn that they were innocents, as much victims of the Immunes as Ravit - were hiding.
A ship killer.
That's what the XO called the weapon when he radioed in, telling Carlton to give them thirty minutes to disarm it and then break radio silence to warn the Nathan James – assuming she was still there to warn.
An ATACMS. Designed to be part of the missile defense system. It's purpose to take down enemy ships and weapons that reached the United States coast.
Now turned against one of their own ships.
If ones of those hit the James, anyone would be lucky to survive, leaving little hope for an unconcious woman strapped to a bunk.
If that gun hit, Ravit would be dead.
And there was nothing that Doctor Scott or Carlton or Wolf could do about it.
x
Relief.
Carlton stumbled into the cabin, shocked to see Ravit's eyes open.
"You're awake," he commented stupidly. Falling into the chair set by the bunk, Carlton reached for her hand. "I would have been here but the Captain ordered Doctor Scott off the ship just in case and she needed a guard. Sonar was down but Commander Garnett rigged something up and then Kara took the shot blind but the sub would have hit us again if the XO didn't take them out from the shore. It was all kind of nuts but we're back and the sub is sunk and now we're headed up the Mississippi..."
A low chuckle cut off his babbling even as Ravit's eyelids began to slide shut. "I should have known. It's like I said before. You're crazy."