Page 265

I felt fear in the way he held me, but I didn’t know how to help him with that, either. Nor did I blame him. What we were doing was pretty fucking stupid, actually.

Revik must have felt some of that, because he laughed, exuding bubbles.

It was growing dark overhead.

I looked up, confused at first. Hearing the difference in sound a few seconds later, and how it echoed underwater, I relaxed. The ship was entering one of the indoor docks.

We had to get ready to move.

Revik motioned with his hand. I followed his fingers via the infrared.

Looks like we’re on the north side. Middle dock. Going to be harder to get to the cleared area without being seen.

I nodded.

It’ll be okay.He gave me another half-smile through the regulator, massaging my shoulder through the wetsuit.You’re a good swimmer, right?

I did my best to smile back.

Maybe in part to distract myself, I returned my focus to our light, trying to get a sense of our impact on the construct without reaching out, or doing anything to make us visible to any infiltrators who might be working the port.

I still felt tendrils worming deeper into my light?and, more worryingly, into Revik’s?but I also felt the construct was designed to do that very thing.

So far, it seemed to be treating us like anyone else.

Revik pulled me out of my mono-focus right as the engines shut off, bringing the propellers to a final, grinding halt below us.

While the sound of more distant machinery continued to echo through the water, everything grew weirdly quiet without the deafening sound of the propellers. I just floated there for a few seconds next to Revik, fighting to adjust.

Then Revik pushed me lightly with his hands, indicating for me to head to the starboard side of the ship, where it rested against the dock. I realized only then that he’d already unbuckled both of us from the harnesses holding us to one another and the penguin.

I followed the prodding of his hands, nodding when he gestured we had to watch the bubbles we emitted now, at least while we were in view of the pier.

He had us under the dock a few seconds later, where we had a bit of breathing room. Once we were far enough under it, and away from any of the mapped surveillance, we breached, making as little noise as possible.

Luckily, the dock itself was loud.

As soon as I breached, even with the suit covering my head, I heard announcements echoing over loudspeakers, heavy equipment running above us, probably unloading cargo from the ship we’d just ridden in on. Electronic winches operated somewhere overhead, some humming smoothly and sounding more high-tech, some grinding through rust and salt like they’d been sitting there a lot longer.

I heard voices, too. Most spoke Arabic.

Revik pulled the regulator out of his mouth, motioning for me to do the same. Then, before he dealt with his own, he caught hold of the tank harness around me and started to unbuckle the front of it, meaning the part that held the oxygen tank to my back. He had everything unlocked in a matter of seconds, then pulled me around so that my back faced him, and worked to get the tank off me entirely, which was no mean feat, bobbing in the water.

Once he had it off, he weighted it, and let it drop.

I watched it sink below the dock through the dark water.

I pulled my goggles off then, too, weighted those with the pebble-sized organics Dante provided us, and let those go as well, tugging the hood of the wetsuit off my head before I started to writhe out of the rest of it. Revik held on to the waterproof pack I’d worn under the oxygen tanks while I got the suit off.

Then I was only wearing black biker shorts and a sports bra-like top.

Once I’d clicked the waterproof pack back around my body, we repeated the whole exercise on him. By then, a lot of pain was coming off both of our lights.

I had to smack his hands off me a few times as he took the opportunity to caress my bare skin under the water while I was fighting to get all the equipment off him. Fighting not to laugh, in nerves as much as anything, I shoved at his shoulder to get him to turn around, and wrangled the oxygen tank off him, too.

He tugged and struggled his way out of the wetsuit while I held his pack, and then he was only wearing shorts. And yeah, it was distracting, even with him wearing prosthetics so that I could barely make out the real outline of his face. The blond hair was a trip, and kept making me stare, even as I checked his body while he got out of the last of the wetsuit, making sure he hadn’t rubbed off any of the prosthetics covering scars and other identifying marks.

The prep team had done a good job.