It had been an interesting experience to see Rulio on Obelisk, after so long. Seeing Rulio again, however, was something Roland could have done without.

He stared at Rulio as the man continued to prattle on about rescuing Beck. His former friend was difficult to read. Did he really have Roland surrounded, or was he bluffing?

The rain drummed gently against the brim of Roland’s cap, falling down in small streams on either side of it. His finger twitched; it wanted to go for his gun. This whole scenario was making him uneasy. This should have been an easy job… but now here he was, having to deal with Rulio once more. How had Rulio even found him? He was fast growing tired of this incessant back-and-forth. It had gone on for long enough.

He didn’t dare shoot Rulio – not with Don breathing down his neck, and especially not if Robert Sterling was involved. There were still margins he had to operate within, and that would be one conversation he really didn’t want to have. Still, out here, far away from Port Authority and any tangible oversight, the feeling of freedom and immunity was enticing, almost overwhelming. This was a changing world, and one that he knew he had to bend to his advantage.

Yes, he would err on the side of caution, and spare Rulio. But the boy standing next to him – Marek, he recalled – was fair game, at least for the purposes of teaching his old friend another lesson. Rulio really should have gotten the message after Obelisk, but his presence here demonstrated that a tougher warning was necessary; something decisive enough to bring an end to this cat-and-mouse game they were playing.

Roland could sense the precipice in front of him, but he could not see its depth.

What was it that Tobias had always said? Savour the act, suffer the consequences.

Roland steeled himself, pressing his boots deeper into the squelching mud. “Enough!” he shouted. “I don’t care if you have two dozen of your useless people scattered around this jungle, it’ll make no fucking difference to your chances.” His hand twitched again. “Are you really going to persist in challenging me?”

The rain swept down around and between them as Rulio’s face hardened and he replied “I am.”

Roland was already visualising the movement he would need to make. Clean, fast, precise. “And you’ve thought through the consequences?”

Rulio nodded.

Graves smiled again, but his head had started to pound. It was time to step into the chasm. “Well, alright then,” he said. “Here’s the first one.”

It was all muscle memory, fluid. He drew his gun in a blur, swung it up, aimed it at Marek, and squeezed the trigger; the tension built, then released with a heavy kick of thunder, and he saw red spray from the boy’s side as he fell backwards onto the muddy earth.

There was a frozen moment, where it seemed as if nobody could quite process what had happened.

Then Roland heard a sharp crack from the trees behind him, and a fraction of a second later the back of Jonny’s head burst out through his face in crimson chunks of brain and bone. The man teetered for a moment, and then his heavy machine gun dropped into the mud as he toppled over and thudded to the ground.

Then everything kicked into life; Roland saw Rulio run over to Marek, grab the boy by his arms, and drag him away towards the trees. Roland decided it was not a bad idea to move as well, and both he and Daziel darted back towards the cover of the jungle. Another shot rang out from behind them, but it kicked harmlessly into the dirt just beyond where they had been standing. As Roland entered the trees, he glanced up at Rulio, and smiled as they made eye contact. Then he was swallowed by the jungle, and disappeared into safety within its dense foliage.

He and Daziel raced through the thick, sodden plants that covered the jungle floor and swiped at their legs, arms, and faces. His head was still heavy, swimming with adrenaline.

After about a minute he reckoned they must have distanced themselves enough. He called to Daziel under his breath, and they stopped, crouching against a mossy, splintered log. He took a few deep breaths. His hand scrambled for his canteen, found it, and he gulped down a few mouthfuls of warm water. The pounding in his head began to subside.

“What happened to Jonny?” Daziel’s voice was as thin as ever, but Roland detected a hint of something there – concern, shock, maybe just curiousity. He wasn’t sure.

“Well,” he replied, “he got shot in the head.”

Daziel’s already small eyes narrowed further. “Yes. But by who?”

A valid question. Roland didn’t know who the third person in Rulio’s posse was. And there had also been a fourth now that he thought back on it – though whoever that was hadn’t seemed to have done anything else after they fired their warning shot. “Hell if I know,” he said brusquely. “Did you see anyone?”

Daziel shook his head.

“Well, whoever it was, they got Jonny real nice,” Roland continued. The reality of it was starting to hit him now. Jonny was dead and gone, shot dead like an animal. Just blown away right next to him.

Roland picked up a stone and hefted it as hard as he could at the trunk of a tree opposite.

Around them, the jungle had settles into its subdued, natural rhythms once again, while the rain kept falling with its endless, uneven cadence.

Once Roland was fairly sure that Rulio and his crew had departed, he and Daziel returned to the path where Jonny lay dead. The ground was scattered with bits of flesh and brain and splinters of bone.

Roland stared down at the limp body splayed in the mud. Most of the back of Jonny’s head was now hollow, a dark red pit fringed with fragments of shattered skull. Roland slipped his foot underneath Jonny’s torso and, with some effort, flipped the man onto his back. The front of Jonny’s head didn’t look much better; indeed, the only thing that distinguished it was Jonny’s ever-present smile, now frozen in death beneath the gaping hole left by the exiting bullet. Dark blood was still dribbling out of Jonny’s mangled skull, flowing downhill and joining up with the streams of rainwater carving channels through the path to create a pulsing network of snaking red rivers.

Roland’s adrenaline had subsided, and he realised he might have overstepped. It was a pity that Jonny had been caught in the middle, a real waste of a useful crew member.

Still, far better for Jonny to go than him.

Daziel, standing a few metres away from him, bent down and picked something up from the dirt. It was half of a pair of sunglasses, in surprisingly good condition apart from the cracked lens. Daziel stared at it pensively.

Roland couldn’t believe what he was seeing. Daziel looked… emotional. Barely, yes – but it was there. A first time for everything, Roland supposed.

The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

“What’s going on here?”

Roland turned to see a soldier walking down the hill along the path, chewing a piece of gum and blinking hard against the rain. Roland had forgotten the man’s name already, but he was the soldier currently in charge of the outpost.

“Oh, it’s you,” the man said between chews of his gum. He removed his hand from the gun holstered at his hip and looked down at Jonny’s body. “Heard shots.” He pointed at the dead man. “One of yours?”

Roland nodded.

“What happened?”

“Just some… interlopers.” Roland didn’t want to go into any specifics. “All dealt with now.”

“No more trouble?” The man’s question was as much a tacit imperative as a genuine query.

“No.”

“Good,” the soldier said with an icy smile, and then he strolled back up the hill towards the outpost.

Once the man had disappeared around the bend, Roland and Daziel dragged Jonny’s body a few meters into the jungle and left it propped up inside the hollow of a large, splintered tree stump. Someone else could figure out what to do with the body if they ever came across it. He didn’t think Jonny would care much what happened to him now.

Daziel looked at Jonny for a few moments longer, his face unreadable, and then they both walked back to the path, heading for their ship.

Roland could see no sign of Rulio as he walked across the beach. Once they were aboard the Rapide Heurt, Daziel disappeared into the bunkroom, and the ship soon echoed with the sounds of scraping metal as he set about sharpening his knives.

Roland headed to the wheelhouse, feeling restless. This was another island he wanted well behind him. He took a seat behind the wheel and his foot began tapping away at the metal floor.

Outside the windows, the weather was clearing, the thick blanket of dark stormcloud rolling away to take its trouble northwards. He fired up the four twelve-cylinder Packard engines and felt the ship start to rumble around him as he gently eased away from the beach.

He didn’t want to head straight back to Port Authority; no doubt that’s where Rulio was speeding back to, and Roland didn’t want to cause another scene just yet. He was feeling unnerved by what had happened, though he would never admit it to anyone else. Outside the heat of the moment, and with his mind now free of adrenaline, he realised he had crossed a line. His impulsiveness would no doubt come back to bite him, although he couldn’t yet say in what ways. For a start, though, Don was liable to have a fit once he found out. The bastard. Roland would love to put a bullet in him, too, but for the time being their partnership was still necessary, and beneficial. But once it wasn’t…

Yes, best to avoid Port Authority until things had settled down and he could clearly see the nature of the situation again. The mission was done, and so he had attained the necessary EP for Gold Class. There was no rush to return. In light of that, the question of where to go now was clear.

He swung the wheel, pushing the throttle forward, and the Rapide Heurt surged northwards onto a course towards Heart’s Reach. Back to Don, and the girl with the mismatched eyes.

After setting the throttle and confirming the heading, he stepped outside onto the deck. Immediately, the warmth of the late afternoon sun enveloped him as the mellow sea breeze brushed across his face and flicked at his hair. The dismal weather from earlier in the day, and the events on the muddy path, were already fading into the distance behind him. He leaned against the railing and breathed in.

There was a change in the air, a subtle shift from behind him carrying a perfumed timbre.

“We could have used your help back there,” he said, turning away from the railing.

Akino crossed her slender arms. “Oh? Did something happen? I heard shots.”

Roland narrowed his eyes at her. “Why do you always do that?” He turned to look back down over the railing at the iridescent teal sea. “You don’t have to stay here.”

“Don’t you want me to stay?” Her voice had a petulant edge.

“Of course. But you haven’t been of much use lately.”

“Much use? Is that how you see people now, in terms of their use?”

He tilted his head to glance at her. “You know what I meant.”

“No, I don’t. Is Jonny going to be of much use now?”

Roland almost lost control at that, but caught himself. “What happened with him was… unfortunate.” His voice was measured, carefully controlled to mask his frustration.

“That’s one word for it. I wonder if Daziel would describe it similarly.”

“Just why are you staying?” he snapped.

It was a few moments before she replied. “Why do you insist on continuing like this?” Her voice had softened. “Perhaps I stay because I see what you could become.” She shook her head. “But not like this.”

“Like what?”

Her expression grew serious. “You are not being true to yourself.”

“Oh? Is that right?” Roland scoffed. “And what would you know about it? You’re Japanese, fighting against your own people.”

Her eyes flashed, and she turned and left without a word. Roland winced. One more thing he’d have to pay for later.

His frustration now supplemented by a dose of glumness, he turned and leaned against the railing once more, but found that his mind was racing too much to appreciate the view. He stormed back to the wheelhouse, unsettled.

They were still on their heading; there was not much to do, but he didn’t want to talk to Akino or Daziel yet. Both he and them needed time to cool off. His stomach was in knots, and he could feel an uncomfortable, sharp pain developing there.

He gazed out of the window. Beyond the prow, the sea ahead was darkening; to his left he could just see the edge of the golden sunset throwing pastel bands across the sky.

Looking at the world around him, there was nothing to hint at the fury and chaos that was gripping it ever tighter. Eight hundred kilometres to the northeast, he knew that thousands of Japanese soldiers were furiously entrenching themselves on Guadalcanal, preparing to withstand the approaching American assault that was probably now only a few weeks away. The Pacific, already in flames in the north, was about to explode. There was also the hell far off in Fortress Europe, as Germany’s war of annihilation against the Soviets entered its second year. And somewhere ahead, the fog was drifting closer, a slowly ticking clock that only promised further perils, the nature and scope of which were still largely unknown. How long, he wondered, until that dark wall reached Heart’s Reach? Perhaps Don would know. He would have to ask him once they arrived.

Don’s revelation the other day that Robert Sterling was involved in Roland’s previous mission had been unexpected. Even Roland’s initial suspicions as to who might have been behind the mission to take Beck hadn’t gone quite that high. But with Don’s disclosure, things had begun to click into place. Rulio’s involvement in all this, anyway, although it still didn’t explain why Roland had been asked to take Beck specifically. He supposed it didn’t really matter – was completely outside the purview of his job description, actually – but he still chafed at being kept in the dark. But what could he do about it? Don usually wasn’t very open about things like this. It now also crossed Roland’s mind that Don might have been lying about Sterling’s involvement… but he had a feeling he wasn’t. Sterling seemed both too random and too specific an individual for Don to mention falsely.

Roland sighed. There were too many secrets floating around these days. He was privy to some, yes, but there were still more that he was completely in the dark about. He could only hope that none of them ended up disadvantaging him down the line.

Ahead of him, the surface of the sea had been draped in a blanket of darkness by the long-gone sun. The ship was silent now, save for the oddly melodious sound of the water slapping against the hull outside.

As his eyes grew heavier, his thoughts drifted to the girl, back at his base. She was so defiant, so sure of her greater purpose. Did she understand the situation she was in, truly? He couldn’t be sure. He could kill her at any point, should he wish to – it wouldn’t be difficult. She had to realise that. Not that he would, of course. There was something about her. Don had better not try anything while he was still a guest at Heart’s Reach. But once he took the girl to wherever they were going next… once she was out of Roland’s hands…

Roland jerked awake, swaying in his chair; had he dreamed the boat shuddering beneath him? They shouldn’t be anywhere near land yet.

He admonished himself for falling asleep as he got to his feet, rubbing at his eyes, and stumbled out onto the deck. A light breeze was cutting through the temperate night air, a vestige of the rainfront. He shivered and wrapped his cloak tighter. His head was still wobbling, heavy with sleep, and his legs unsteady. He scanned the water over the side of the ship through half-closed eyes. There was nothing there but the flat dark ocean, gulping down the bright moonlight. Here and there, the sliver of a whitecap crested into existence for a moment before shimmering away.

Then a subtle ripple slid out from under the ship along the surface of the gloomy water. It spread sideways into a deep, broad wake, nearly as wide as the ship itself from prow to stern, and moved steadily away from the ship like a dense murmuration, until whatever was creating it descended back into the depths with a deep groan, and the wake faded away into nothing as the ocean surface subsided again.

He blinked and shook his head. It must have been a whale, he told himself. Yes – a whale.

Still, when he returned to the wheelhouse it was impossible to fall back asleep, and he stared vacantly out the window for the next few hours until the sun rose.