Neal Stephenson - Reamde

One level below that was the bridge, and the narrow catwalk that surrounded it. Bracketed to the catwalk’s railing, directly in front of the bridge’s forward-facing windows, were two life preservers, formerly bright orange but sun faded to a sort of bilious caramel hue. Threadbare green-and-white poly ropes had been laced through the railing’s stanchions and used to support one edge of a plastic tarp that had been stretched across much of the foredeck; it had been under its cover, Yuxia explained, that much work had earlier been done packing and prepping whatever sort of cargo the vessel had been carrying. If the vessel were being used for its intended purpose, this was where the fishermen would work with the nets, pull the fish on board, and do whatever else it was that fishermen did.

They made a cursory tour of the cabins, mostly just checking for dangerous and/or useful articles, and then ventured belowdecks. Things looked different here from when Yuxia had been put through her ordeal. Then, the place had seemed larger, since its contents had been neatly stowed in boxes. But in the hours since, some kind of frenzied unpacking had taken place, and junk was strewn all over, interspersed with slashed-open cardboard boxes. Yuxia remarked on this, which led to a conversation with Marlon in which she explained, as curtly as she could, what had happened in this place during the afternoon. Yuxia held up her wrists to show the damage inflicted by the ropes as she had struggled. This seemed to affect Marlon deeply, and she was astonished to see tears beginning to come into his eyes.

They decided to get out of there and sort through the junk later.

Batu conducted them to the galley and, as a sort of automatic reflex, got busy making tea. Watching Batu fill a kettle from a spigot, Marlon asked him about the ship’s supply of potable water, and Batu assured him that there was plenty—hundreds of liters—in its storage tanks; he prided himself on keeping these topped up at all times. “Water is cheap—not like fuel!”

This prompted the obvious question—which, as soon as it was asked, made Marlon feel foolish for not having asked it before—of how much fuel the vessel might have on board.

Batu didn’t know the answer, but the look on his face made it obvious that this could be a serious problem.

“I’m going to go up to the bridge and look at the fuel gauge,” Marlon said, getting to his feet, but Batu waved him off, saying that there was no such thing on a boat like this; fuel level was estimated by dipping a stick into the tank and seeing how much of it came out wet. So Marlon sat down again, and he and Yuxia waited while the tea was prepared.

“That guy on the bridge,” Marlon said. “Mohammed. Was he one of the ones who—”

“Who what?”

“Did that thing to you?”

“Yes,” Yuxia said curtly.

That seemed to dampen the conversation, and so they began to sip at their tea, sitting back in their chairs a little. Yuxia’s eyes fell closed, then slowly opened. “I am going down,” she said in English. Switching back into Mandarin, she asked Batu to pour a larger cup of tea—not just a thimble—so that she could take it to Csongor, who might be having a hard time staying awake up there. Batu rummaged through his bungee-corded cabinets until he found a mug. Meanwhile Marlon asked him, “When was the last time they bought fuel?”

Batu had a difficult time remembering. “They brought out a ­couple of drums last week,” he said. He set the mug on the table, holding it down with one hand, since the boat had begun to roll as they got away from the coast and into higher seas offshore. He poured the mug full, pausing once to refill the little teapot.

“A couple of drums,” Marlon repeated. “That can’t be very much for a vessel this size.”

Batu made no comment.

“There’s really no reason to fill the tanks unless you’re going out on a long sea voyage,” Marlon said, working through the logic of it. “And this thing didn’t go out on long voyages, did it?”

“Not recently,” Batu said, meaning not since it became the floating headquarters of a terrorist cell.

Yuxia tossed back the last of her tea-thimble, then picked up Csongor’s mug and got carefully to her feet, stepping across the galley in a wide-based gait to compensate for the vessel’s movement beneath her. She passed out through the hatch and began ascending the stairs that led up to the bridge.

“What do you think the range of this boat is? Enough to make Taiwan?” Marlon asked.

Batu shrugged, as if to say, You’re asking a Mongolian about boats?

From above, they heard Yuxia asking a question, then flashing into anger and speaking in a raised voice. There was a massive thud, as of a body hitting the deck, and the crash of a shattering mug. Csongor cried out in a blurry voice. There was more crashing and banging, and then a series of very loud pops.

CSONGOR HAD KNOWN it was a mistake to sit down. The only way he could remain awake was by staying on his feet. But when the boat worked its way out into the big swells, and the deck began to heave and bank underneath him, he finally had the excuse he needed. Until then he’d been standing in the middle of the bridge, looking out the front windows over Mohammed’s shoulders. But along the aft bulkhead was a short bench that had been calling to Csongor for a while. Like everything else of consequence, it was welded to the deck; these ­people used welders as carpenters used nail guns. Csongor backed away from Mohammed, moving slowly as he compensated for the pitching of the deck, and let himself down to the bench.

Yuxia’s voice was in his ears, nearby. Odd, since Yuxia was not on the bridge.

Another oddity: Csongor’s eyes were closed. He didn’t remember allowing that to happen. He got them open and discovered Yuxia just inside the hatchway with a mug in her hand. She was looking across the bridge at Mohammed, whose posture seemed to indicate that he had just spun around to gaze at Yuxia in astonishment.

Astonishment, and fear.

Mohammed was holding something in one hand: a gray plastic microphone, connected by a coiling black cord to a small electronic box mounted on brackets above the control panel. This had been dark when Csongor’s eyes had closed, but glowing LEDs shone out of it now.

The pilot was talking on the two-way radio, or getting ready to.

Csongor reached for the pistol in his back waistband while using his other hand to push himself up off the bench. He noticed that his feet were slow to move. At about the same time, Yuxia was throwing the contents of the mug at Mohammed.

Csongor’s body weight was now well forward, but his feet still hadn’t budged. They were somehow trapped. He realized he was going to fall flat on his face. His hands came forward instinctively to stop his fall. One of these had achieved a partial grip on the pistol. His ankles were getting torqued in a bad way and he was going down in an extremely awkward fashion, and at some risk of taking Yuxia down with him. He came to rest painfully and in discrete sections, like a big tree breaking into chunks as it fell over in a windstorm. The pistol went sliding across the deck. He could not reach it. Mohammed was crying out in rage and wiping hot tea out of his face. Yuxia hurled the empty mug at him, then dropped to her knees and clawed the pistol up off the deck. She aimed it in his approximate direction and pulled the trigger, but nothing happened because the safety was on.

“Yuxia, give it to me!” Csongor cried, with a beckoning motion, and Yuxia turned and slid the pistol across the deck to him.

Mohammed had recovered enough to reel in the microphone, which had been dangling at the end of its cord. He lifted it to his mouth.