Half-flooded was an understatement. Lacey and Rivet didn’t realize they’d arrived at the dock until the nose of Rivet’s canoe bumped into a submerged pylon.
Rivet cursed and stopped the canoe. The hose wrapped around their waist restricted the motion to a quick jerk of their paddle. “Fuck my luck. Should’ve brought Wrench.”
They weren’t wrong. Between the two siblings, Wrench was objectively the better paddler. Lacey definitely could have used her help: she was currently stuck maneuvering a two-seater by herself. Turned out to be harder than she’d thought. Hex had forbidden Wrench from leaving the warehouse, though, and Norba had driven the point home with some well-placed insinuating remarks. Rivet was the one to go instead.
Wrench handled the news better than Rivet or Lacey had expected. She did throw a few tools, but that was it. She’d even finished the false-bottom gas tank in record time.
Time to see if it actually worked.
While Rivet taxied their canoe toward the shore, Lacey took a break to wipe sweat out of her eyes. The gear-laden jacket Wrench had forced her to wear was going to send her into hyperthermia.
“Hurry up, jackass,” Rivet yelled.
Lacey obeyed, avoiding the chunks of debris sticking out of the water. Lumps of rotten wood and rusted metal struts lay a few feet below the surface. Up ahead, the remnants of a building poked out of the water. The flooding had really done a number on this place, but it wasn’t nearly as flooded as Norba had made it out to be. Lacey silently cursed herself for not asking questions during that shitty briefing.
“We can take cover in there,” Lacey said as she pulled up alongside Rivet. She motioned toward the crumbling walls in front of them.
“You sure no one will see us?” Rivet narrowed their eyes skeptically.
Lacey shook her head. “Not unless they’re looking.”
With a sigh, Rivet lifted their paddle. Together, they made their way toward a gap in the walls.
Inside, the water was cool from the shade. Clusters of plants floated on the surface and climbed up the concrete. The building hadn’t been huge and the floor plan seemed simple. This was probably an office or a checkpoint for whoever came through this port.
Lacey pulled her canoe to a halt and steadied herself against a nearby piece of used-to-be-wall. Her paddle trailed through the still and algae-green water Although the dock wasn’t far from Norba’s warehouse, the area felt different. Stiller.
Rivet glanced up at the sun. “Three hours,” they estimated. “You wanna check the kit?”
“Is that really necessary?” Lacey asked. Wrench had given her a quick explanation before they left: how to check for tears in the hose, where to connect it to the false-bottom tank, which dry bag had the first aid kit and which one held a pistol. She wouldn’t call herself an expert, but at least she was useful for something.
Rivet rolled their eyes. “Duh. Always check before a job.”
“Fine,” Lacey huffed. “I’ll go over there, then. Just to keep an eye out.” She jutted her chin toward the gap.
“Don’t gotta tell me twice,” Rivet said as they reached below their bench.
Lacey left them to it. When she’d taxied into a high-visibility, max-cover spot near the entryway, she started checking her own canoe the way Wrench had explained to her hours before.
As she moved the emergency dry bag to check for holes, something weighty in her breast pocket smacked into her knee. She swore. Leave it to Wrench to put the heaviest stuff in the most inconvenient places.
She reached into her pocket to move the whatever-it-was, frowning when she grasped a familiar shape. Before she withdrew it, Lacey knew what it was. A walkie-talkie transceiver, scuffed and dented on the corners, so she could talk to Rivet.
Lacey’s mouth curled in delight. Objective forgotten, she hunkered down in her canoe and switched the thing on.
This model was different than what she was used to and Wrench hadn’t bothered to explain how it worked, but Lacey knew enough to get by. Rede had been the one with the license. She just talked about it often enough that Lacey had picked up the basics.
Her fingers moved as if on their own, tuning to a frequency Lacey had memorized shortly after the quake. She wasn’t sure what she expected to hear. A voice, maybe. A code she’d somehow recognize. Instead, all she got was silence.
This was stupid. She was way out of range and this was a terrible idea anyway. Lacey flicked the radio off and stowed it back underneath the diving suits. She rested her elbows on her knees, let her head fall forward and stared blankly at the floor. Her throat felt strangely tight.
It was a good thing no one was using the Barn’s radio at the same time, she told herself. She didn’t want them to find out about her. They deserved that much.
A job needed doing, Lacey reminded herself. No time for this. She tilted her head back and pinched the bridge of her nose.
Once she was ready, she leaned forward and scanned the river, leaving the rest of her gear unchecked. It was probably fine anyway.
If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
#
Six hours passed quickly. Lacey and Rivet took turns watching the dock in silence. When night fell, they stuck close together. Their conversations were brief and quiet. Lacey could sense the tension in Rivet’s body. Their eyes constantly skipped around the river in search of a boat. She tried to mirror their focus.
They heard the boat before they saw it: a faint echo of displaced water alerted them both. Rivet and Lacey sat up straighter, peering through the darkness until the silhouette of a hull started to take shape.
It was smaller than the commercial barges she’d seen before the quake, but bigger than the ones the Red Cross had used shortly after. Fifteen feet high and a hundred feet long, by Lacey’s estimate. She couldn’t see any searchlights, just the faint glow from the cockpit at the bow. The deck was clear. Most of the cargo would be in the hold.
Rivet caught her attention and gestured toward the stern. “Outboard engine,” they muttered.
Lacey nodded. The fuel tank would be somewhere in that area, then.
Faint ripples of displaced water rocked the canoes as the barge drew closer. Rivet grimaced and tried to steady themself with their paddle.
Lacey jerked her head to the side and raised an eyebrow. Rivet, understanding her wordless question, nodded.
A quick glance to check for chase boats — none that she could see — and to judge the cockpit window’s visual field — decent, but if they stayed low, they should be fine. Satisfied, Lacey pushed away from the wall and guided the canoe forward with slow, gentle strokes.
Before long, she’d reached the barge’s stern. She steered herself behind a snarl of roots poking out of the water to wait.
No one was standing on the deck, but Lacey didn’t want to take any chances. She slipped off her bench and knelt in the bottom of the canoe. The gunnel shielded her legs and the better part of her torso. Not ideal, but it’d work.
She pulled out the radio and pressed TALK. “Rivet, come in,” she whispered.
Static, then: “I think you’re supposed to say ‘over.’”
Shit, that was loud. Lacey scrambled for the volume. Once her pulse had slowed, she replied, “Shut up and move. We’re all clear.”
“Over,” said Rivet.
Lacey turned the volume to zero.
Several long minutes passed. Lacey turned the volume back up almost immediately, but Rivet didn’t have much to say. All she could do was watch and shift occasionally to keep her legs from going to sleep.
She wished Norba had let her bring a gun. She’d feel much more useful that way.
“Can’t come this way,” Rivet said. “They’re putting down the ramp.”
Lacey cursed under her breath. “Come around the other side, then.”
“Roger,” Rivet replied. They didn’t say it, but Lacey knew they’d been waiting to use that one.
A blurry silhouette of a canoe rounded the prow of the barge and drifted toward her through the wreckage. While it passed behind a log high enough to block the barge’s view, Rivet’s silhouette lifted a hand in a two-fingered salute mid-stroke.
Not bad, Lacey noted.
Her part was simple. She waited for Rivet to pull up alongside her, hands outstretched. Rivet gave her one end of the hose. Already kneeling, Lacey didn’t have far to reach before her fingers rammed into the fuel tank’s valve. She pinched the tabs on the hose’s connector and slid it into place. It clicked audibly, just like Wrench said it would. A couple extra tugs on the hose to make sure it wouldn’t come loose, then Lacey gave Rivet the thumbs up.
She helped Rivet push their canoes apart and watched their tail to make sure it didn’t bump into anything. They made remarkably little noise as they paddled toward the barge.
All Lacey had to do now was keep watch. She unzipped her jacket and withdrew the handgun strapped to her side. It might not have enough range to hit someone on the deck, but it would at least make noise. Better to threaten than to do nothing at all.
Swiveling the pistol to follow her gaze, Lacey checked the deck again. No one was manning the stern, which worried Lacey. Maybe they were expecting trouble. Or maybe they weren’t very cautious. It would have been nice to know which to expect ahead of time. It would also have been nice to know that the barge would be unloading — though, then again, Norba hadn’t given any explanation at all for its stopping here.
Lacey almost reached for her radio, but thought better of it. She was being ridiculous. Anyhow, Rivet could handle themself.
Rivet pulled up alongside the barge. By now, the hose was fully extended, trailing in the water behind them. The sharp darkness of it faded into the smudgy gray of Rivet’s outline. They and their canoe were just another dark spot on the water behind the barge. Lacey kept them in the corner of her eye while she monitored the deck. She couldn’t let down her guard, but watching them work was something else.
Rivet stood up shakily, the canoe wobbling with their movements. Lacey was amazed they didn’t huli. Her amazement turned to outright disbelief as they tied a length of rope to their bench and threw the other end up toward the deck, looping it around the railing like a cowboy’s lasso. The free end tumbled toward them. Rivet caught it just before it hit the water. The canoe rocked dangerously, but they miraculously kept their balance. They pulled the rope taut and secured the other end to the bench.
When they were satisfied, Rivet shimmied up the rope like a monkey, slipping a couple times as the canoe drifted with the current and tugged the rope along with it.
Even with the added motion, they reached the deck in record time. They stayed low and moved quickly. The darkness and their height rendered them invisible to Lacey.
She had a rough idea of what they were doing: finding the hose linking the belowdecks fuel tank to the engine, replacing the single-hose connector with a double-hose quickly enough that most pilots would chalk up the stall to an engine glitch, connecting the illegal line to the second port and waiting for Lacey’s signal.
Lacey knew Rivet was successful when she heard the liquid fuel splatter against bottom of the tank. The wet metallic thunk was music to her ears.
Wrench had explained that, since there was no real capacity gauge on the tank, Lacey would just have to wait until the pitch went high enough. “Like filling up a water bottle,” she’d said.
With that vague instruction in mind, Lacey wasn’t sure if she’d called it too soon when she radioed Rivet. “Cut the line,” she said. She kept her voice low and hoped they’d turned the volume on their walkie talkie down.
Rivet didn’t respond, but within a few seconds the flow of gasoline stopped. Lacey scanned the deck with bated breath. Still no one. Rivet appeared from behind the engine and climbed back down the rope, cut it away from the barge and picked up their paddle.
Lacey didn’t put down the gun even when Rivet pulled up next to them. They raised their eyebrows but looked otherwise unsurprised. Maybe Wrench was like this, too. Someone had to be the cautious one.
“Did you see anyone?” Rivet whispered.
“Nope,” Lacey replied, just as quietly. “You?”
They shook their head. “The crew was all moving cargo onto shore. No one even came my way.”
Lacey didn’t think to process how strange that was. She just nodded, uncocked the pistol and put it back in the dry bag. Rivet pulled away from her canoe just in time for her to pick up her own paddle. The canoe had grown a thousand times heavier, but Lacey managed.
She followed Rivet around the edge of the old marina and into the main channel, sticking to the shoreline just in case anyone was watching. Lacey stared at Rivet’s shadowy outline in front of her, heart racing as she struggled to believe their luck.