Ted Bell - Hawke

“I am Julio,” Tallboy said. “Like we told you, amigo.”

“I am Iglesias,” Wideload said.

Gomez looked at them for a second, shaking his head. What were you going to do?

“Right, Julio and Iglesias. Okay, fine, and I’m Elvis and Presley. Split personality, get it? So, if it ain’t too much trouble, how about bringing me up to speed on what, exactly, is the big plan? You guys were kinda vague on the phone, know what I mean? Julio?”

“Necesario, seсor. Is very simple plan, Seсor Elvis,” Julio said with a smile. He had a gold tooth right up front that was catching the morning sun bouncing off. the windows big time. Made it hard to concentrate on what the guy was saying. The tooth and the fact that there might be a million bucks in that suitcase.

“Simple is good,” Gomez said, feeling his heart pumping. He’d started shaking again, only from the inside out now. He was going to have to, what, whack somebody? Would he do that for a million smacks? Maybe.

He’d killed a guy once. Accident. Fed him to the gators late one night in the big ditch along Alligator Alley. Way the hell out the Tamiami Trail in the deep ’glades. Nobody ever knew nothing.

No biggie, he thought, remembering.

“Man, it’s hot in here. Anybody for a brewski?” They both shook their heads. “No? Man, I could go for one. Breakfast of champions, man, the King of Beers.”

Thing about these guys, no sense of humor whatsoever.

“All you have to do, Seсor Presley, is take this fine piece of luggage home to Guantanamo with you tomorrow.” The guy picked up the suitcase and placed it on the table.

“That’s it?”

“That’s it.”

“You guys aren’t going to believe this,” Gomez said, “but that suitcase looks exactly like my suitcase. Exactly.”

“Maybe that’s because it is your suitcase, seсor,” Julio said.

“What? No way, man. My suitcase is under my bed at my aunt’s place.”

“Really? When was the last time you checked?”

Gomez looked at all the old stickers and shit on the Samsonite. Old United bag tags from when he was flying back and forth from Cecil Field, N.A.S. JAX all the time. Sonofabitch. It was his suitcase.

“What’s inside my suitcase, you don’t mind me asking?”

“It’s difficult to describe, seсor,” Iglesias said. “You’ve heard of a Roach Motel?”

“Yeah. The bugs check in but they don’t check out.”

“Well, inside that suitcase is a kind of reverse Roach Motel,” Julio said.

“ Sн , he’s right,” Iglesias chimed in. “In this motel, the bugs they are already checked in, but they can’t wait to check out. Check out and kick some gringo ass.”

“But here’s the good part, seсor,” Julio added. “The bugs? Decoys. The real killer is some kind of bitchin’ new nerve toxin, man. It’s a deadly combo, one-two punch, I’m serious.”

“The hell you guys talking about?” Gomez said. He was getting shaky again. He could really use a cold one right now. But, and it was a big but, all right, he knew he had to keep his cool if he was ever going to see one million smackers up close and personal.

“It’s a new kind of bug bomb, Elvis,” Iglesias said. “The very latest in modern biological technology. Cause some very serious fuckage, man.”

Julio and Iglesias both looked at him. Hard.

“Bug bomb,” Gomez said. “What the fuck’s a bug bomb?”

Hawke perched on the gunwale in his mask and flippers, waiting impatiently for Congreve and the Russians. All were struggling to get their gear on properly.

“You’ve got your mask on upside down, Ambrose,” he said. “That’s why the snorkel’s mouthpiece is above your head instead of below it. Quite useless, the way you’re wearing it. Don’t forget to spit in it, before you put it on.”

“Spit in it? Bloody hell,” Congreve muttered, and reversed the thing.

“You only need the mask and snorkel until we’re through the underwater entrance. Once we surface inside Thunderball, there’s plenty of air. Tell your little friends to hurry it up, please. The tide waits for no man, Constable.”

“You know, of course, that those are sharks in the water,” Ambrose said.

“Hmm, yes,” Hawke said. “The vast majority of sharks around here generally prefer plankton to people, old boy. The poison coral is what you need to watch out for. Here, put these gloves on.”

“And what about the vast minority of sharks?” Ambrose asked, but Hawke had neatly executed a frogman’s backflip into the water and he was gone.

He kicked down, a few feet below the surface, looking for the entrance. It was right where he remembered it would be. Only now, some very large sharks guarded it. Luckily, they were mostly of the nurse variety, timid and easily frightened by man.

Ignoring them, Hawke swam straight for the opening.

One particularly resolute shark stood his ground as Hawke approached. There was no getting around him. He was hovering directly in front of the entrance and wasn’t planning to budge. Hawke hovered a foot or so away, eye-to-eye with the blackest pair of eyes he’d ever seen. Hawke patted him on the snout, and the fish bolted like a scalded cat.

Hawke smiled. Ambrose and the Russkies were probably going to encounter this very same fellow. Ambrose, he hoped, would recognize him as strictly a sushi devotee.

Kicking forward, he carefully avoided the jagged coral surrounding the entrance. Some of the coral, he knew, was poisonous. Problem was, he had no idea which coral. Glad of his diving gloves, he had to grab the jagged outcroppings to pull himself through fairly tight quarters. In a moment, he was inside the grotto and bobbing up to the surface, floating in the pure beam of sunlight from the blowhole some fifteen feet above his head.

It was staggeringly beautiful inside, he saw, pulling off his dive mask. Far more stunning than in the early-morning light he’d seen earlier. A natural cathedral of coral and stone; sunlight shimmering on the sculptured walls and turning the water inside a most amazing shade of clear green. Hawke replaced his mask and ducked his head back underwater. There were dozens of fish of every size and description, including a school of yellow and black striped creatures packed so tightly they seemed a single, darting mass.

Sergeant-Majors.

That’s what the striped fish were called. The name had just popped into his head. He flashed on himself as a child, reaching out to touch the fish. Odd. How the hell would he know that name? Must have been a documentary he’d seen on that BBC nature program.

Diving down to the rocky floor, exploring a forest of stalagmites, he came upon a massive dark shape lurking in the shadows. Swimming closer, he was just about to reach out to rouse the creature, when the thing darted upward toward his outstretched hand, opening its jaws. All Hawke saw as he yanked his hand back were the spiky fangs filling the wide mouth and he spun around, kicking hard for the surface of the grotto. A moray eel. Powerful jaws, razor-sharp teeth. Reflexes almost as good as his own. But, thank God, not quite.

Thinking about introducing Ambrose to this truly scary character, Hawke was surprised to see the man himself when he reached the surface.

“Smashing, isn’t it, Constable?” Hawke said, lifting the mask from his face. “Welcome to Thunderball!”

Congreve mumbled something in reply, but he still had his snorkel mouthpiece in place. Hawke reached over and popped it out of his friend’s mouth. “I’m sorry, what were you saying?”

“I was saying that I will get you for this,” Ambrose Congreve spouted, spewing seawater and coughing.