Tunnel Rat

"You damned bitches shot her full of holes!" Mako seethed as she examined the outer hull of the bottom third of her ship. There were indeed a lot of holes, many of them from sixteen-pound balls, but at least half were from the smaller ammunition used by the steam cannons on the Iron Orca. Mako was glaring at Annie. "Why'd you do it, Annie? I thought we were friends. Fellow captains who saw things eye to eye and had each other's backs!"

This was news to Annie and to anyone else listening. But Mako was just looking for an excuse to fight, and Annie wasn't going to give it to her. "Ah, it's not that way at all! It was the damned eels! They were swarming and would have eaten every ship on the docks if we didn't fight back. They were frenzied and crazy. We shot where the eels were thickest and one of those places was that old hulk of a ship you had glued to the top of the Silver Shark! Just bad luck, or maybe they smelled all that gold, or that nasty cologne your mate liked to slather on before she went beard hunting."

"Eels! Look at my ship!"

"Which part? It's sort of scattered all over."

Mako pointed, "There, where she broke apart! You mean to say that wasn't from your steam cannons pummeling the hull until she broke?"

"Hmm, maybe a couple of those holes? We were shooting at eels and you know my steam cannon ain't something you aim. It's better to sort of point in the direction of what you want to hit and move the gun back and forth. The rest of that looks like dents the big eels did when they rammed the ship. Heck, maybe they were chewing on it. Some of them have HUGE teeth! Like, like a walrus. They'd make that type of hole."

"Walrus?"

"Sort of. Eels with big tusky things. You'd have seen them if you were down here during the battle, and not hiding up in your casino. I don't blame you. I mean, those eels were scary, what with those HUGE teeth. I'd have hid, but Stompy would have laughed at me. Couldn't have that."

"I'm not happy about this, Annie."

"Oh, I can tell, and I don't blame you. It's why, as an old friend and fellow captain, I gave you a good deal on the cost of salvaging that wreck. Speaking of which, my girls are signaling they've pumped it out. Why don't I head down with you and we can see how much gold we have?"

Mako glared at her. "My gold, you mean."

"Sure, except part of it is mine, and part yours. So ours. But I'll take my share quick and then it can be all yours. I've got a contract here, tucked in my pocket, just to remind us of the deal. You do remember the deal, Captain Makko?"

Mako didn't have much choice. Annie wouldn't take the bait and fight, and there were too many witnesses around. Not to mention a lot of the Orca's guns were pointed this way. Time to pay her off, kick her off the ship, and then check on the real treasure hidden in her vaults.

"Of course, I remember the deal, Captain Annie. Grab two crew to match the two I bring, and let's go split up our gold." It hurt Makko even to say it.

The wreck was roughly level, with the vault slightly lower. The crew of the Iron Orca had pumped out as much of the water as they could. There was no sense in doing a thorough job, when the tide came in the lower part would flood again. Mako led the way through the wreckage, squeezing her heavy body through hatchways and dented compartments. The room outside the vault was a mess of seaweed, small crabs, and piles of gold coins.

Annie whistled, "Isn't that a pretty pile? Makes you want to just lay in it and wriggle around. I need to get rich like you, Mako. Maybe I should open a casino."

Mako barely heard her. This wasn't right, there was too much gold sitting here. What had the idiots done? Just dumped the chests in a pile and left? She wasn't going to get answers from them. She'd already seen her old mate, Varska, lying dead off to the side of the corridor. She looked like the eels had torn her up. "Start scooping all this up and get a count. We'll clear this and then we'll open the vault and count the ingots." Bucket by bucket the coins were scooped up and passed outside to there Stompy and Izzy, one of Mako's new mates, weighed the coins and kept a tally. Half an hour later, Izzy brought the tally to the captains. "We've got twelve thousand and six gold, Captain, and there were ten ingots on the bottom."

Annie lit a short cigar and puffed away, grinning at Mako. Mako knew she had to give up the gold, but it hurt! Finally, the Captain of the Sharks said, "Well, a contract is a contract. That makes 3602 coins and three ingots to the Iron Orca for services rendered."

"So far."

"Yes, dammit, so far. Let's go count the ingots. I have a casino to run. Hope to see you up there tonight, Annie. Come celebrate our grand reopening."

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"Oh, wouldn't miss it for the world. But about those ingots..."

"I'm going! Since when were you in such a hurry?"

"Since you owed me 30% of a stack of ingots."

Mako quit talking. Annie was having too much fun today. Tonight though, she'd have fun taking all this gold back. Crawling back into the wreck, she unlocked the vault while Annie covered her eyes. Then she and Mako grabbed the door and heaved. Not budging it at all.

"Dammit, this thing is heavy! Without the power on, it might take a few of us to open it."

Annie pointed to a badly twisted hinge. "More than a few. Look at that top hinge. And the others are out of line as well. Why'd you use a circular hatch? A vault isn't a damned halfling-house. You can use square doors. And there are dents where you were hammering on the damned thing."

"I didn't design the thing. And it's been fine all these years! We need equipment!"

Annie sighed theatrically, "And I suppose you don't have any lines or come-along or block and tackle. Up to hardworking Annie to fix the problem. I suppose that's why you'll be giving me enough ingots that I go bowlegged packing them home." The gear was brought from her ship, taking multiple lines and two hours of work to finally pull the door loose. When it was three feet open, Mako looked inside and froze. Annie saw her back and shoulders stiffen and her hands were clenched in fists. Then the Captain of the Sharks shook with fury and screamed hard enough to send both crews running and even make Annie back off and put her hand on her cutlass.

Mako turned, glared at her, and said loudly, "Someone is going to die. Slowly while I laugh and they beg for a quick death!" She stalked out of the wrecked ship, leaving a very confused Captain Annie behind. When Mako was gone for a full minute, she crept forward and looked into the vault. Not a coin or ingot was to be seen. The shelving was empty, and three rectangular holes showed where chests had been stored. Annie was pissed at first, feeling cheated of her promised gold. That went away when she saw what someone had scrawled on the floor with a tool, "SHARKS SUCK BILGEWATER!" Chuckling, she left the wreck, eager to tell Whale the story.

On the beach, Mako was fuming and cursing, while her crew packed up the gold. One of the Scavenger Captains had beaten her to her vault, but she had no idea who. It wasn't Annie. She had the pressure suits to find it, but not enough people to haul out the gold and walk it to shore. That was the real work. A strong girl in a suit could maybe carry a bucket of gold or a few ingots up the cliff and get it to shore, but they'd be wrecked and exhausted. A bucket brigade was out of the question, too many suits were needed, and still too much work. None of the riff-raff could have pulled it off, they had shitty boats and crap for equipment. That left Whale. Leviathan might be a wreck, but she had some of the best suits ever made and plenty of crew. They were specialists in deep sea scavenging and could work for hours in their suits.

But even if it was Whale, how the hell could she get the gold up to the docks? She must be working with someone else. She'd brought in another submersible. And if she was prepared for that, then Whale had planned the whole caper. Rile up the eels, bait them to the docks, then Annie and the others 'accidentally' shoot up her ship. Which meant Annie had been in on it all along. Probably getting a healthy split of everything! That lying curly-haired witch! And they'd been friends almost!

The more she thought about it, the more it fit. Only another Captain could steal the two smaller chests. And Whale had the most experience in finding them. She'd looted a dozen of them from wrecks even before they found the Iron Queen. But what really twisted her butt was the center chest. She'd never been able to even open the damned thing!! Black Eddy had told everyone including his loving wife that it was off-limits. Private Engineer stuff!

Of course...the deal with the Engineers. That was why Whale had cozied up to them. She'd planned for this. Lured the Sharks here by spreading rumors about the Iron Queen and building a shipyard. She'd known that Clan Shark would show up. Then she let her fill the Silver Shark with gold and bided her time, used the eels and Annie to wreck her ship, and then her hidden submersible full of Engineers showed up to loot it.

She didn't know how, but she was going to get her revenge. Right after she got her casino back! "Load it up, girls. Time to make that rat an offer he can't refuse!"

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