MoonRush (6 page)

Oh,
seriously. Who was she kidding?

* * *

Buton watched as Cleo raged back onto the bridge. She was a tropical storm incarnate. She walked straight through the holographic image of the ocean floor, swiping her arms as if to disrupt the seabed itself.

“Your concerns were not taken seriously?” he queried.

Cleo at first shrugged, as if to dismiss the obvious fight, but then grabbed a chair, picked it up, and slammed it back down with a sharp
bang
. It ricocheted off the floor and bumped into the console. Normally, he would have reminded her of how expensive the advanced equipment was
.
H
owever, he thought that now was perhaps not the best time.

“I see,” he gently murmured.

“It’s just…” Cleo said through clenched teeth, and then she sighed, plopping down next to him in the chair she’d just thrown. “They both want to pretend that it never happened.”

“Perhaps they are processing the events in a different—”

“You weren’t down there, Buton. There’s no different way to process a…Process a…”

She was right. He was not there. Their shared experience of that horrible dive kept him separated from truly becoming a Rogue team member. He knew most of the events of that dark day, but not having been there…He moved closer to Cleo, wanting to do something…anything…to soothe the hurt he saw there. His hand hovered, unsure.

“Tragedy informs each in their own way.”

“You sound just like them,” she snorted. Buton’s hand withdrew as Cleo railed on, “This wasn’t some generic tragedy
!
This was Chuck and Rob being torn apart like rag dolls right in front…”

Her voice trailed off. Her eyes gazed past the hologram, as if seeing the events live. With a start, she shook her head, and then began again. “If Jarod hadn’t fought off…” She stumbled, searching her way through the landscape of the past. Buton found himself moving in once more, seeking to fix the unfixable.

“Without Jarod, what was a tragedy would have been a calamity.” Buton
said,
shudder
ing
to think of what his life would be right now without Rogues Incorporated. Without Cleo.

“If Jarod hadn’t stepped up, we would have all been…” Cleo’s voice broke.

Buton was so close to her that he could feel her warmth. Her scent of sun and salt and something deeper, earthier, surrounded him.

Cleo sniffed, brushing away the half-formed tears. Her voice hardened along with her features. “Well. Anyway. We’ve got fourteen million dollars
’
worth of bullion to—”

“Fourteen million,” Buton reflexively corrected, “seven hundred fifty nine thousand—”

Cleo chuckled, the tears seeming a distant memory. “Like I said, a
lot
of bullion to find.” She grabbed a shark prod from the counter and headed out to the deck.

Buton watched her leave from inside his
cocoon of monitors.

* * *

Brandi put the final touches on her B roll with the now fully clothed and equipped Jarod. Pity. She watched the treasure hunter as he spoke directly to the levitating, blinking circle like an old pro.

“And if our readings are correct, this will be the largest find of the century.”

Brandi stepped in on his heels, finishing off the shot so that the camera swept past the railing and out to the stunning ocean.

“That’s the Rogues, ‘Striking It Rich.’ ”

Their timing together was perfect. Flawless. She need
ed
a quick cigarette. Just as she cut the camera, the rest of the motley crew clamored out onto the deck, all noise and excitement.

The young one with the fake legs called out to Jarod from the dive deck, “Hey! If we’re going, let’s go!”

“
After
we run through safety procedures.” Cleo, however, seemed to be the wet blanket of the group.

“This is it, folks!” Jarod yelled, slapping his mask onto his face before tipping backward into the water. The teenage boy followed suit, right on Jarod’s heels.

One moment they were there
.
T
he next, only a splash was left.

Clearly irked, the African princess finished shoving in her hair and joined the other two in the swirling waters. One second after her submersion, no trace of any of the divers
was
anywhere to be seen.

Brandi turned to the Indian man beside her, noting once more how out of place he seemed on this ship. The wind whipped his shiny, dark hair into his face as he attempted to push it away. His mind clearly seemed elsewhere.

“You’re not going down?” she asked, always on the lookout for a new angle.

The dark-skinned man looked at her in apparent surprise. “Into the
water
? With all of its variables?” He snorted. “I think not.”

Brandi gazed into the churning waves and could only agree with him.

CHAPTER 3

Tongue of the Ocean

Mar
ch 18, 2049

1100 hours
,
EST

Cleo swam through a different universe from anything anyone could barely imagine topside. The crystalline waters were so clear that if not for the familiar varieties of fish skimming back and forth across her vision, she might be on the surface of some foreign planet dealing with a poisonous atmosphere, feeling the pull of a different gravitational quotient.

This was
her
world. This is what she was born for. Studying marine biology had told her heart nothing it hadn’t already known from the moment she slipped under ocean waters when she was six years old.

She soaked in the beauty around her, her mind automatically supplying scientific names for every plant and fish. Red lionfish,
Pterois volitans
. Queen conch,
Lobatus gigas
. Angelfish,
Pterophyllum scalare
. Agarophyte seaweed,
Gracilaria
was a species of various red algae genera. Name after name scrolled. It was a mental background noise that fit in perfect harmony with the sounds of her breathing and the
throb-throb-shush
of her heartbeat.

Sea anemones stirred in the current of their passage
.
M
ollusks closed up with the abrupt change in pressure. She brushed her hands through a bed of seaweed, feeling the tug of the plant life against her gloves. Her eyes scanned back and forth, missing nothing. A school of tiny
,
bright blue fish shimmered near, too fast for her to track or name,
and
then abruptly vanished. Were they just startled by her presence, or by something else?

She spoke into her mic
.
“Keep a sharp eye out for hammers.”

Rob’s voice popped and hissed in her ear. “I’ll do you one better. I’ll keep a
leg
out for them.” Both his and Jarod’s laughter sparkled over their connection.

“Har de har har,” Cleo responded. “Just watch, will you please?”

The boys continued to chuckle until they topped the rise that led to the galleon. At that point, even they were subdued into silence.

The sight was breathtaking.

The
San Rafael
lay wedged tightly into a coral reef system, its prow hanging over the edge of the ravine, where it had lodged itself many centuries ago. The reef itself
was
a mass of varying shapes and textures. Writhing. brain-like ripples interspersed with tubes and fans fought for space, different species bumping into one another.

The shallow waters right next to the colder streams seeping up from the Tongue of the Ocean created a riot of color. Lace coral, brain coral, and whip coral gave way to the deeper water black coral the nearer they got to the trench.

Once more, Cleo noticed the conspicuous lack of fish surrounding the coral. She would expect to see dozens of varieties squeezing in and out of the massive formation. Cleo felt their absence in a growing tension between her shoulder blades.

While she was busy studying the local fauna and flora, the boys were tearing their way into the hold of the ancient Spanish galleon, following the tether of the vid-cam. Silt billowed up, swirling in the wake of their hurry. Rapidly, they expanded the portholes just enough to allow them to wiggle in without granting access
to
any larger unwanted guests down here. Cleo had to swim hard to catch up.

She squeezed through the rough opening, cursing the men and their narrow hips. She swam past a partial wall into the hold as row after row of chests opened up to her view. The number of chests truly was staggering. Seeing them up close hit harder than any digital displays, no matter how detailed or three-dimensional, ever could. She peered through the dim light filtering through the portholes as well as the growing cracks in the decaying hull. Movement stirred in sluggish waves amongst the awaiting treasure. Sea snakes.

“Okay, guys, let’s take this slowly. We don’t want to excite the natives.” Cleo struggled to keep the worry out of her voice.

She needn’t have bothered, for all the notice Jarod and Rob gave her. Deadly snakes darted between the two men’s legs as they moved toward the nearest of the chests. The reptiles slithered away, seeking a safer retreat. Cleo released a breath she had not
realized that
she had been holding. The two men groaned as they lifted the lid of the aged box.

Inside, there was nothing but blackness until Jarod wiped a hand in the chest, clearing off the accumulated layer of slime. Gold reflections bounced off the two excited faces as they dug their hands into the coins inside.

Cheers and whoops sounded in Cleo’s ears as she realized that hers was one of the voices. After years of work, it was finally paying off. In gold.

A more staid voice interjected itself into the riot. “I would suggest a little less celebration and a touch more haste,” Buton suggested.

“Yeah, yeah,” Jarod rejoined.

“Radar shows five sharks heading your way.”

Cleo wanted to say, “I told you so,” a thousand times, but Rob made a raspberry sound.
“Party pooper.”

* * *

Buton ignored Rob. The teen’s response was typical of one whose brain had not yet created the cognitive ability to filter impulse from reasonable thought. What exactly was the redhead’s excuse, then?

After this most recent interaction, Buton decided that he didn’t just dislike some reporters. He now was not particularly fond of reporters in general.