John Birmingham - Without warning

Fifi gave a quizzical look. ‘Like a hot tub, you mean?’

‘No, darlin’, it’s a little storage compartment for my Cuban friends here.’ The Rhino blew a thin stream of blue smoke into the sky.

Fifi shrugged. ‘I reckon so. It has everything else.’ The last thing she heard as the Rhino signified his approval and disappeared into the shed was, ‘Oh yeah, it’s good to be the Rhino.’

The lambent glow of Acapulco, a soft dome of light defining a horizon at the edge of the world in the absolute blackness of night at sea, had changed character to Jules’s eye. It looked less artificial now, less fixed. Suffused by a burnt-orange tincture, it flickered and even flared at times.

‘Another high-rise going up,’ said Fifi.

‘I imagine so.’

They worked by starlight and the pale illumination of a red moon. It had been that bloodstained colour since the Wave appeared. The Aussie Rules remained blacked out, a precaution against more attacks, as the new crew members that Fifi and Mr Lee had chosen helped to move supplies from the sport fisher to its mother ship.

Jules was generally pleased with the haul of men and cargo. She’d been a bit taken aback by the Rhino when she’d first met him, especially by the perpetual wreath of cigar smoke that preceded and followed him like London fog, but had quickly come to accept his bluster and bullshit as a well-polished routine. He’d probably been practising it on tourists for years and had forgotten how not to be in character. She couldn’t fault his work ethic or his skill sets, however. He’d fired up whole suites of sensors and arrays in the bridge that had proven completely impenetrable to everyone else. And having done so, he’d gone right back to hauling sacks of rice and freshly killed meat – very expensive, freshly killed meat – onto the boat deck of the Rules and from there off to the freezers. Another odd thing: every so often he would stop one of the other workers, point to one of his enormous biceps and say, ‘You don’t get these from pettin’ kitty cats’, whatever that meant. Odd, very odd.

He stayed out of the ice room with Pete’s body in, though. For now, that was sealed off.

‘I’m glad Miguel kicked the shit out of those assholes,’ said Fifi as she picked up an LNG canister and hoisted it over her shoulder.

Jules grunted after catching a sack of potatoes that had been tossed up by Thapa as though it was no heavier than a bag of fairy floss. ‘Bloody hell,’ she cursed, struggling not to fall over.

A German man, short but powerful-looking, caught her gently by the elbow. ‘Not so good to be falling overboard, no?’ He grinned, his teeth standing out in the wine-red light.

‘No. Thank you…’ replied Jules, reaching for his name. The yacht was beginning to fill up with strangers, and although she tried to commit all their names and potted histories to memory, there was just so much for her to do each day that she never really felt as if she was getting on top of any one job.

‘This is Dietmar,’ Fifi said, rescuing her. ‘He’s German, you know, like hot-dogs used to be. He’s our navigator now. Used to work on a container ship.’

The German, who looked to be in his thirties, nodded enthusiastically as he wrestled the heavy bag of potatoes off Jules, before flinging them over his shoulder with as little apparent trouble as Thapa had experienced.

‘Okay,’ she said. ‘You’ll do.’

‘Yo, Boss Jules!’ called out a hoarse, rasping voice. The Rhino. ‘Where do you want me to stow your boom sticks?’

Jules smiled and nodded at Dietmar, to thank him for his help. She peered down onto the boat deck, swarming with Gurkhas and new crew-mates, and found the Rhino shouldering a wooden box of Mexican Army rifles that Shah had secured from somewhere.

The number of things she didn’t know about on this yacht was growing bigger and bigger every minute.

‘Take them through to the gym, Rhino,’ she called down. ‘We’re using that as an armoury for now. One of the Gurkhas will show you where it is, if you need.’

‘Don’t worry. I’ll follow my horn, it always knows the way,’ he replied. ‘Oh, and where the hell is the humidor that Cap’n Fifi told me about? I’ve got four boxes of Davidoff Anniversario number 1s in my ruck and if they dry out, you’ll find out up close and personal why rhinos are such surly beasts.’

‘Library,’ she called back at his retreating form as another newcomer, an Indian by the look of him, smiled and nodded shyly.

‘Engine room, please?’ he asked.

‘Follow the Rhino, sailor, but take the second stairwell down two decks. You won’t miss it.’

She turned around to ask Fifi if she could spare a few minutes to take her through the crew manifest again, but she was gone. Probably chatting up Dietmar on the way to the galley. Julianne took a few moments to just lean on the starboard rail and stare back towards the coastline. They were still a good twenty miles out from shore, giving them enough time to see anyone coming at them. The radar, which was now working much more effectively thanks to the Rhino, was showing dozens of vessels within a few nautical miles, but Mr Lee constantly adjusted their position to maintain a safe distance from any possible contacts. And, she had to admit, she felt much more secure with Shah’s men and all the new arrivals on board.

Not that she’d be staying tonight. They had to take the smaller boat back to the marina later, stay the night there, and then pick up their passengers and the Pieraro clan in the morning.

Although, looking at the baleful light of the burning city, she had to wonder what sort of fresh hell she’d be sailing into, and whether Miguel would even make it back in time. He had a 400-mile round trip to retrieve his family, and the night-time roads, if not choked with refugees, would almost certainly be stalked by brigands and highwaymen. She wondered whether he’d make it, and how long she could afford to wait.

College students. More than a thousand of them.

They formed a moat around the entrance of the Fairmont when Jules returned with Shah to pick up her passengers and Pieraro. Security had deteriorated all over Acapulco during the night, as though news of the Israeli attack had somehow finally uncapped all the base animal fears stirred up by the Disappearance.

While Mr Lee and three of Shah’s men supervised her newly hired crew in final preparations on board the Aussie Rules, now ten miles offshore, at the marina Fifi and Thapa prepped the launch for a quick dash across the bay. Jules had chosen a rendezvous point much closer to the Fairmont, to avoid a confrontation with the mob that had gathered at the gates of the marina demanding to be let in. Driving through the city, she could understand their motivation. Anarchy was loose.

Whatever remnant of order had prevailed until yesterday was gone and the madness she had been expecting was finally upon them. It was like moving through a city at war with itself. No, it was worse than that, because there were no sides, just a general eruption, a battle of all against all. Packs of young men fell on individuals caught out alone. Larger gangs fell on them in turn. There had been no uniformed police or city authorities visible for days, but even the sort of organised private muscle that had protected places like the marina and Acapulco Diamante were much less in evidence, either hunkered down behind high walls and barricades, or simply dissipated as men flaked away to protect their own immediate interests and families. Gunfire, thick oily smoke, occasional explosions and the mob sounds of fear and rage lay over the entire city.

Driving was a nightmare, with streets frequently choked and impassable. Only Shah’s handling of the all-terrain SUV had allowed them any headway through the worst of the snarls. At times he simply mounted the kerb and rolled through private homes to dodge some of the blockages. When the roads opened up, the former soldier drove fast and aggressively, twice knocking down small groups of men armed with improvised weapons who attempted to bar their passage along the Escenica carriageway as it ran through scrubland in the hills to the west of Revolcadero Beach. The thud of impact as the Toyota struck human flesh made her shudder and close her eyes. It was somehow much worse sitting passively in the seat beside Shah. The situation eased somewhat as they came down out of the hills and drove onto the long strip of dual laneway of the Costero de Las Palmas. Sprinklers still sprayed long arcs of recycled water over the empty, bright green golf courses to their left, and the beach-front resorts of Revolcadero on the right had not yet been touched by the violence that gripped the centre of Acapulco, but the evidence of accelerating collapse was everywhere. In the long lines of slow-moving cars piled high with personal goods. In the swarms of people sitting on the tarmac at the aeropuerto international, desperate for flights out, even though no aircraft remained there and none were flying in. And in the mob of seething, chanting American college students now laying siege to the gates of the Fairmont, where resort security led a grim effort to hold them at bay.