The Jennifer Morgue - Charles Stross [130]
“Mission accomplished.” McMurray looks self-satisfied. “Ramona’s on her way back up with the goods.”
“But, the—” I stop. Hunt around in my head. “You put the block back,” I accuse.
“Why wouldn’t I?” He steps out of the way to let the nurse or paramedic or whoever pass me another cup of water. This time I manage to lift a hand and take hold of it without making a mess of things. “It’s going to take another twelve hours or so to bring her up, and I don’t want you deepening the entanglement while that’s happening.”
I stare into his pale blue eyes and think, Got you, you bastard. Even though it’s treachery against Billington, who thinks he owns McMurray body and soul, I get the picture. “Did she get the, the thing?” I ask. Because that’s when I blacked out, right after we entered the zone of the death spell or curse or force field or whatever it is around the wrecked chthonian war machine on the seabed. Right when Ramona recognized what she was looking for, bang in the middle of the periscope, and opened my mouth to announce, “I’ve got it. Give me three more meters, and stand by for contact.”
“Yes, she got it.”
“When, when are you going to unhook us?”
“When Ramona’s back up and decompressed—tomorrow. She has to be physically present, you know.” His expression turns sour. “So it’s back to your room for the duration.”
“Agh.” I try to sit up and nearly fall off the chair. He puts one hand on my shoulder to steady me. I glance around, my vision still blurry. Billington’s across the room conversing with his wife and the ship’s officers; I’m all on my own over here with McMurray and the medic. Icy fear clamps around my stomach. “How long have I been under?”
McMurray glances at his watch, then chuckles. “About six hours.” He raises one eyebrow. “Are you going to come quietly or am I going to have to have you sedated?”
I shake my head. Quietly I say, “I know about Charlie Victor.” His fingers dig into my shoulder like claws. “You want to settle with Billington, that’s none of my business,” I add hastily. “But give me back my phone first.”
“Why?” he asks sharply. Heads turn, halfway across the control room floor: his face slides into an effortless smile and he waves at them then turns back to me. “Blow my cover and I’ll take you down with me,” he hisses.
“No fear.” I swallow. How much can I safely reveal . . . ? At least Ramona isn’t listening in; I don’t need to doublethink around McMurray right now. “She told me about the Jet Skis, I know how we’re getting out of here.” I know that there’s a seat reserved for you, but no room for me. It’s time to lie like a rug: “The phone isn’t official issue, it’s mine. I bought it unlocked, not on contract. Cost me close to a month’s wages, I really can’t afford to lose it when the shit hits the fan.” I put a whine in my voice: “They’ll take that expenses packet you made me gamble away out of my pay for the next year and I am going to be so screwed—”
“We’re out of range of land,” he says absentmindedly, and his grip relaxes. I swing my legs over the floor and steady myself until the world stops spinning around my head.
“Doesn’t matter: I’m not planning on phoning home. But can I have it back anyway?” I get one foot on the deck outside the ward.
McMurray cocks his head to one side and stares at me. “Okay,” he says, after a moment, during which I feel none of the weirdly otherworldly sense of strangeness that came over me while I was putting one across Eileen in the monitoring center. “You can have your damned phone back tomorrow, before Ramona surfaces. Now stand up—you’re going back to the Mabuse.”
MCMURRAY DETAILS FOUR BLACK BERETS TO ESCORT me back to my room aboard the Mabuse, and it takes all of their combined efforts to get me there. I’m limp as a dishcloth, hungover from whatever drugs Billington’s tame Mengele pumped into me. I can barely walk, much less climb into a Zodiac.
It’s dark outside—past sunset, anyway—and the sky is black but for a faint red haze on the western horizon.