Chapter 100

CHAPTER 100

THE NEXT LIGHT I saw was the sun.

It was blazing hot, burning down on me as I floated in greenish-blue water. My arm was wrapped around some kind of plastic bolster, and my whole body was in pain. I tried to shake my head clear. The water was coated with a slick of oil. It was on my skin and down my throat. My stomach heaved. I lifted my head and screamed out, "Kira!"

Silence.

I churned my legs to whip myself around in a circle. I was bleeding from my head and my arm. Shards of fiberglass and small bits of wood floated by. I was surrounded by the Prizrak —in pieces. I felt something bang against my leg. I reached down. My cutlass! My clothes were in shreds but somehow the blade was still stuck through my belt.

The glare on the water was blinding, but I had to get moving. I had to start searching. I picked a direction and started kicking, shouting out between strokes. "Kira!… Kira!"

No response.

I was gasping and choking. My throat was burning. My mind was reeling. I couldn't absorb the reality of my situation. I couldn't accept that I'd lost her again. But it was true. And her death was on my hands.

It was my plan to attack the ship on our own. We could have asked for help. We could have brought the giants. What the hell made me think we were so invincible? Pride? Arrogance? My damned Doc Savage genes?

I pushed through a patch of blackened plastic debris. I ducked under again and tried to rub the oil off my face.

When I resurfaced, I was in a whole new mass of flotsam. The bolster was losing its buoyancy. I looked for a beam, a life jacket, anything that would help keep me afloat. Or should I just admit defeat and give up? Start thrashing and let the sharks come for me? Without Kira, what the hell did it matter?

I spotted something squarish and beige in the distance. Maybe part of a wooden chair, mostly underwater. As I stared, the current started to turn it away from me. Behind it, I caught a flash of color.

Bright. Like copper.

Kira!

I took a gulp of air and made a surface dive. I left the bolster behind and started kicking and stroking underwater with everything I had. No more pain. Every sensation faded except for the feeling of the water pulsing past me. My eyes were wide open now. I didn't even feel the sting of the saltwater. I refused to lose sight of the figure ahead of me. It was getting clearer through the green ripples. Pale skin. Blue shorts. Long, dangling legs.

It was her! It had to be her! Please, God, let her be alive…

I surfaced about three feet away and grabbed her. Her eyes were closed. Her lips were crusted. Her shoulders were sunburned to a bright red. There was a gash on her forehead. One arm was wrapped around the legs of the wooden bar chair. The other dangled loosely in the water. I shook it. "Kira! It's me! Wake up!"

She was limp. Lifeless.

Then, suddenly, her head twitched and her legs started moving. I felt a surge of hope. I shook her again. Her eyes half opened, then immediately clamped shut again from the glare. But she saw me and heard me. I knew it! She grabbed my arm and squeezed it. Her cracked lips curled into a slight smile.

"Sorry," she mumbled. "This seat is taken."

I wrapped myself around her. I kissed her neck, her hair, her sunburned shoulders, every part of her that I could reach. "I love you, Kira Sunlight," I said.

I realized that I'd never actually said it before. Not in so many words.

"What a coincidence," she rasped. "I love you, too."

She lifted her head out of the water and wrapped one arm around my neck. We were alive and we were together, but we were still in big trouble—bleeding, exhausted, and in the middle of the Arabian Sea.

"Uh-oh," Kira said softly. "Look." She was squinting into the distance. I followed her line of sight. Then I saw it.

A low shape was headed straight for us, kicking up a small wake.

Kira barely had enough energy to speak. "If those are pirates," she mumbled, "I'll be really pissed off."