Kevin Anderson - The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen

When Nemo entered, Quatermain lifted the needle. He could see immediately that the captain did not have good news.

"Skinner's signal has stopped," Nemo said. "We no longer have any way to track them."

Outside, on the ship's observation deck under mockingly sunny skies, Sawyer stood staring at the horizon, as if hoping to see the distant and still-fleeing nautiloid.

Mina Harker came up to him in full green skirt and petticoats, with a bright red scarf wrapped primly around her pale throat. "Thank you," she said.

The young American turned to her, startled. "For what, Ma'am?"

"Your fearlessness." Mina stopped close beside him and looked out at the sea. "I've lived such a life of sorrow and regret — a long life — that I've always been rather afraid to step into tomorrow."

Sawyers chest swelled. "Shucks, tomorrows where I live and breathe, Ma'am."

"Yes. I see it's not so bad a place at all." The Nautilus struck a set of heavy waves, and spray hissed from its bow, but none of the water droplets splashed them. Mina gripped the rail to steady herself against the choppy motion.

Sawyer touched her gloved hand with a fingertip. "Hey, if my earlier… attentions offended you in any way, I'm sorry."

"I am disappointed." Mina smiled up at him again. "I didn't think Americans gave up so easily."

Sawyer blinked his blue eyes again, liking what he heard.

Off to one side, Allan Quatermain lay in a deck chair beside which he had stacked his research books and files. Lying in the warm sunlight, the old adventurer appeared to have dozed off, but as he eavesdropped and watched them through half-opened eyes, he allowed himself a small grin.

Later, in the thrumming communications room, the radio operator settled his headphones in place again and continued to adjust the frequency, listening for the telltale clicks of a coded signal.

Behind him, Nemo waited patiently, silently, watching with his coal-dark eyes. Quatermain tried to match the captains calm, but found it extremely difficult.

The radio operator suddenly sat up straight with his full attention. He gave the communication knobs a delicate twist, then gathered his paper and lead pencil. He spared only a fraction of his attention to glance back up at the captain. "It's Mr. Skinner, sir."

Then he began marking the dots and dashes of the Morse code signal, translating letter by letter. Finally, he read the message. "Sorry. Took a nap. Sea of Okhotsk. Tartar Strait. Amur River. Mongolia west of Hailar."

Nemo turned to hurry back to his bridge. "Come, Quatermain. We must set a course."

The engines continued to chug, nursed along by the uneasy engineers. The propellers drove the armored vessel forward through the waves. They were closing in.

Quatermain and Nemo surveyed gigantic map books that the dark captain had compiled over his years of exploration. Nemo's finger traced a line on the charts. "Our route will take us past the Kuril Islands into the Sea of Okhotsk. The communal waters of China, Japan, and Russia where many cultures merge and shift." He stroked his dark beard. "Then south through the Tartar Strait between Russia and the island of Sakhalin, entering the Amur River at Nikolayev."

Quatermain nodded, following the long and convoluted route. The names sounded strange and exotic, like the lands and tribes he himself had encountered in darkest Africa. Many of the places on the map remained mysteries, uncharted blanks. He almost expected to see the handwritten notation, Here Be Monsters .

Nemo now traced the dark line of a river leading deep into the wildest parts of East Asia. "The Amur will take us inland to remote Mongolia, which was once ruled by ruthless Cossacks. Their fortresses still stand as arrogant monuments to power and cruelty. No doubt, that is where M has built his lair."

"I can hardly wait," Quatermain said. "Let's go."

As silent as a sea monster, the Nautilus cruised the water's surface along far-flung shorelines, past the snowy land masses of Eastern Russia, where smoky and firelit port towns were visible on the horizon. Small fishing boats braved leaden, wintry currents and the fog, never noticing the armored vessel that passed so close.

At first the ports were substantial towns, the last bastions of civilization on the fringes of the primitive wastes. Seen from the Nautilus , the prominent architecture included Russian spires along with touches of Japanese influence; a webwork of docks spread out, holding scores of boats.

But as the vessel passed farther northward, the ports took on the more primitive look of remote China, with rough-hewn wooden walls or stacked stones, woven roofs, and pointed arches. All of it was blanketed by snow.

Concerned about being seen as they drew closer to their quarry, Captain Nemo ordered the Nautilus to submerge and proceed along its course. It wouldn't be long now before they found where Dorian Gray and M had gone to ground.

At the Amur River at dawn, a curving silver-blue line of frozen water cut through a windswept landscape of snow and jutting gray rock. A few gnarled trees, bent low from the ever-blowing wind of the constant winter, dotted the monotonous steppe.

Today, even the ravens had taken shelter in the scrub brush, too miserable to search for carrion. Silence pervaded the frigid atmosphere.

Suddenly, with a cracking roar and the creak of broken slabs of ice, the Nautilus 's reinforced conning tower hammered through the frozen surface and rose into the air with a shower of snow and a spray of icy river water.

The vessel's upper hatch opened with a clang, and five people emerged, climbing up into the chill northern air. They all wore thick arctic clothing, heavy gloves, and hooded jackets. The wind whistling across the steppes carried with it a deeper chill, but even the biting cold could not bring a rosy flush to Mina Harkers pale cheeks. The others shaded their eyes from the glare of sun on endless ice and snow.

Skittish Jekyll slipped on the slick coating of fresh-frozen ice that covered the armored upper deck, but Quatermain caught him. "Careful, man. You wouldn't last a minute in water that cold." The slushy Amur knocked ice chunks against the side of the Nautilus , and Jekyll looked down wide-eyed at where he had almost fallen.

Nemo took his binocular device and scanned the landscape. "According to my charts, we should be very near to our destination."

Sawyer, Jekyll, and Mina shared a telescope that First Mate Patel had brought up for them. Jekyll peered toward a distant rocky ridge. "Aren't the Fantoms' manufactories over there?" He had a difficult time holding the eyepiece steady in his trembling hands. His teeth chattered.

Nemo nodded. "We may have to set off overland."

Quatermain took the binoculars to see for himself. He focused on snow-frosted piles of rock and stripped logs that had once been clustered homes, but had now fallen into complete disrepair. "Deserted peasant settlements."

Mina took the telescope from Jekyll. "Completely empty, no sign of life. They're close to a river, probably on a trade route. The houses themselves seem habitable."

"Well, with a bit of fixing up," Sawyer agreed, lowering the binoculars.

Mina continued to stare, using only her sharp green eyes. "Still, why would an entire village be deserted?"

Then oily smoke rose up in angry black whorls over the rim of the jagged rise, accompanied by a fiery glow, as if a doorway to Hell itself had been opened — just a crack.

"Fear, no doubt," Nemo said.

The icy plains of Mongolia were a far cry from the African veldt, but Quatermain still led the expedition.

Sawyer, Jekyll, and Mina trudged after him, picking a path over the treacherous ground: slick ice, uncertain rocks, deep snow. Nemo brought up the rear with a squad of Nautilus crewmen, all of them warmly dressed and well-armed. They ascended the steep hillside to the top of the rocky ridge beyond the abandoned peasant village. Behind them, the conning tower of the submarine vessel protruded from the Amur ice, like the ruins of a castle battlement.