“Is it enough for the other to catch up?”
“Who knows, but I can balance them now. Move off.”
Cally gave her thrusters another nudge, but in her hurry to move out of the box’s way, she overdid it, moving sluggishly at first, then abruptly kicked backward. A loud clang vibrated through the suit as she struck a rock behind her, and she swallowed a yelp, her heart rate spiking.
“Are you all right?”
“I’m fine, my pride isn’t.” A red light began flashing on her HUD. “Might have a problem though. Middle-left of my display—that’s a thruster, right?”
“Yeah.”
She fought to keep her voice composed. “I may have just knocked one out.”
“Shit. Okay, we can still recover this.” Brent’s tone lacked the reassurance she’d come to expect. “I’ll take a look.”
“You focus on Antoine.” The box had lifted free of the rocks, but the second bag filled faster than the first, rising more swiftly. It skewed high on one side, and would only get worse as they inflated.
“But—”
“Brent. I can do this. Focus on Antoine.”
A grumble of discontent came over the speakers, but with a burst of his thrusters, he rose up toward the lift bags. Cally watched for a moment, then turned her attention to her controls.
The thrusters didn’t respond when she turned to the left, but that wasn’t so bad. She could rotate in circles to the right if that’s what was called for. At least it hadn’t affected her pitch and yaw. She followed Brent at a distance, rising up to his depth, keeping Antoine’s box in her lights. Both bags were filling quickly, and the box rose further from the ocean floor with each passing minute. Brent kept busy, making careful adjustments between the two bags to level out their ascent.
Until at last, the box held steady.
“That looks good,” Cally said.
“Yeah, I think we’ve got it.” Brent drew back, watching critically for a moment. “That’s it, isn’t it?”
Antoine’s steel prison continued to rise, level and steady, its pace increasing with each passing minute.
Her breath hitched, and tears pricked her eyes. He was rising. He was coming back to her.
We’ve done it.We’ve got him out.“Thank you, Brent. That’s amazing.”
“My pleasure. My HUD has failed completely, by the way. What depth do you have?”
Cally checked her screen. “725 feet.”
“Good. Let’s head up, nice and steady.”
The box surged ahead of them. “We can’t keep up with him, can we?”
“Don’t worry, the bags have sensors on them. Gabe knows to look for them.”
“Wait.Gabeis picking him up? Not Ryan?”
“Uh, yeah. Things got switched around, because Ryan used the tranqs on Noah.”
If Gabe had the chattel, was that his plan? To feed Antoine before Cally could arrive and stop him?
No, not the chattel, the human.Damn, was she thinking like a vampire?
“Gabe has been talking to you, right? You tell him it won’t work. Tell him to leave Antoine in his box until I arrive.”
“We’ll be out soon, Cally, but it’s better if Antoine has… a little bite to eat first.”
