Jon Merz - Raider X

“Power is always… something,” said Cyra.

Thatcher eyed her. “And you? What’s your story? I can’t place your accent and your hair is simply beautiful.”

Cyra touched her hair and then smiled again. “Do you like it?”

“Very much.”

“It’s rather obvious though, isn’t it? I could have it colored to a more neutral tone, but I do so love the depth of its blackness. It’s like light vanishes within it.”

“If it’s natural then I would be fascinated to learn where you call home.”

“Where do you think I’m from? At least in part?”

Thatcher leaned forward and stared into her eyes. Cyra held his gaze and didn’t blink which Thatcher found even more tantalizing than he wanted to admit. “Given your tresses, I would say there is Mongolian stock somewhere in your past. But your eyes aren’t missing their epicanthal folds so that means there are other genetics at play within your family line. More powerful genetics at that. Your accent is vaguely Teutonic but not from northern Germany or Prussia but more southern, perhaps Austrian or even Swiss.” He leaned back. “If I had to guess, you were probably educated at a prestigious girls’ school in Switzerland where you were exposed to any number of languages, resulting in your accent being slightly diluted as it is, rather than unmuddled like someone else.”

“Unmuddled,” said Cyra. “An interesting turn of phrase.”

“Makes you more intriguing,” said Thatcher. “Well, at least to me.”

Cyra leaned forward and smiled at Thatcher again. “Do you enjoy intriguing women, Harrison?”

“Ever so much more than boring ones,” said Thatcher. “You’ve been all over the world, perhaps even more than me I would think.”

Cyra leaned back. “You have a keen eye for details, don’t you?”

“It’s a necessary part of my life,” said Thatcher. “Being able to spot details helps me to survive in this world.”

“That’s never been more true than it is these days I would hazard to guess,” said Cyra. “What with the world at war now.”

“Not yet,” said Thatcher. “The world, I mean. But I suspect that won’t be the case for too much longer.”

“The United States is not yet involved.” Cyra fixed her gaze on him again. “Do you think that will ever change?”

Thatcher nodded grimly. “I wouldn’t be surprised. There’s no way Britain can continue on her own as she’s been doing for the last few years. She needs the US in the war. And without them, she probably has under another year before Hitler brings them under his heel.”

“But the US is full of people who don’t want war. What could prompt them to ever enter it?”

Thatcher finished his meal and wiped his mouth. “There is always a way to manipulate people into seeing a new path forward, provided they are stimulated toward a certain belief. In this case, I would suspect some sort of precipitous attack would nudge the general population into accepting the necessity of war. But it would have to be a rather spectacular affair. Something enormous and the losses would need to be huge for the masses to really get behind the war effort. I don’t know that Hitler has the means to do so, but if he were to somehow reach New York or Washington with a flight of bombers, that would probably be enough.”

“That would indeed be something,” said Cyra. “To see Lady Liberty bombed… I imagine the US would go crazy with the desire for vengeance.”

Thatcher nodded. “But that’s neither here nor there, is it? I mean, after all, we’re simply here on a ship steaming toward Portugal.”

“And what happens in Portugal?” asked Cyra. “Will you vanish off into the wilds of the Basque countryside or will you set up shop on the shores of the Mediterranean and bathe in the warm waters therein?”

Thatcher smiled. “I will need to first find a way to support myself. A man can’t very well enjoy any of the Spanish delights without some sort of income, now, can he?”

“You don’t strike me as the type who will want for money for long.”

“No?”

Cyra shook her head. “I have a feeling that money has a way of finding you whether you want it to or not. You are one of those rare individuals for whom money is not an issue. You may have other challenges throughout the course of your life, but money is not one of them.” She winked at him. “Nor, it would seem, are women.”

Cyra left Thatcher a few moments later with plans to meet later for a proper dinner. As he watched her walk away, Thatcher marveled at the styling of her skirt across her backside and appreciated the view just long enough before turning back to the cup of tea before him. He took a moment to look into his teacup at the amber liquid it contained and allowed a small smile to play across his face.

This was it, he thought. The moments of peace that he had to remind himself to appreciate. The simplicity of a cup of tea when all the world around you was in the midst of chaos could not be underestimated in its ability to evoke bliss. He lifted the cup to his lips and sipped the tea, tasting its warmth as it rolled back across his tongue and down his throat. It had cooled only slightly which made it the perfect temperature to consume. Thatcher remembered his father instructing him that he should never bend his head to drink the tea but rather lift the cup to his lips. That was how the aristocracy would do it; commoners would bend their heads forward.

Thatcher finished his tea and thanked the staff of the mess deck for their attention. Satisfied and in need of a walk, Thatcher strolled outside on the main deck and paid attention to the Archimedes for the first time. She was about four hundred and sixty feet long and roughly sixty feet at her beam. A pair of stacks jutted from her and belched steam into the sky as she plied ahead at a speed Thatcher estimated was somewhere around fourteen knots. Given her size and speed, he figured they had one more day at sea before they docked. After all, the ship had already been at sea for over a day even though Thatcher had slept through the majority of it.

There weren’t many passengers that he could see. Not that he could blame anyone. A cruise meant you were taking your chances on the open ocean with German U-boats prowling the waters. And apparently, commerce raiders. Thatcher had only managed to get bits and pieces of the news when he was in prison. He knew from his discussion with Hewitt that the commerce raiders were severely affecting British shipping. And if Raider X was their newest and most lethal addition to their fleet then once it reached the Indian Ocean, it would wreak havoc on any shipping it could find.

But in order to reach the Indian Ocean, it would need to set out from the North Sea ports the Germans operated. It would sail south then through the English Channel perhaps, or even around to the west of Ireland to better avoid British patrols. Once it reached the open Atlantic, it would immediately head south. That was where the Archimedes was right then. Thatcher assumed Raider X would have a U-boat escort until she could be relatively assured that she wouldn’t encounter any British naval vessels. It would be open season then.

Thatcher put his hands on the rail and looked off into the distance where he saw nothing but the blue ocean meeting the blue of the sky, which had broken out into sunlight from the earlier clouds. He was sitting on a massive pile of bait, he reasoned. And he wondered what Adamson would say if Thatcher told him what the plan was. Could he convince the captain to steam for the coast and pretend that Thatcher had gone overboard? Would he do Thatcher a favor in order to save his ship?

Thatcher sighed. Probably not. Adamson seemed a strictly by-the-book sort. Worse, he would probably voluntarily sacrifice his ship if he knew of the plan to destroy the German raider. He would love to be part of the Crown’s effort to hurt the Germans. No, thought Thatcher, Adamson was no help to him at all.