Deadly Shores by Taylor Anderson

Author:Taylor Anderson [Anderson, Taylor]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Group US
Published: 2014-05-05T19:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 18

////// TFG-2

July 21, 1944

Captain Bekiaa-Sab-At sat perched on the topgallant yard, nearly as high on the foremast as she could get. She’d been a wing-runner on Salissa, like her cousins Chack and Risa, before her old Home gave up the wind and became a carrier of aircraft. Heights held no terror for her, particularly after her exciting flight in Donaghey’s Nancy. Her perch was more precarious than it had ever been on Salissa, and the motion of the much smaller ship kept her swooping all over the sky, but she felt . . . cleaner here, less disturbed by all the real terrors she’d known.

Donaghey had finally reached the point where she was supposed to rendezvous with First Fleet South a few days before, and had spent the time slowly cruising up and down a longitude just one hundred fifty miles east of Mauritius, across the fleet’s expected line of advance. There was no guarantee they’d meet; the Western Ocean was vast. But with the weather remaining mild and the visibility so good, there was an excellent chance they’d spot something the size of Salissa and her battle group spread across several miles of ocean, or Salissa’s planes would find Donaghey.

“Smoke!” came a cry behind her, from the main masthead. “Smoke on horizon! West-nor’west!”

Bekiaa squinted, noting the distant haze, and chastised herself for letting someone else spy what she should have seen first. Shouts came from below, but she paid them little mind at present. She supposed it was possible they’d spotted an enemy force of some kind, but they’d know that long before she needed to concern herself with preparations below. She caught a glimpse of a sunlit shape above that quickly resolved into a copy of the Nancy floatplane they’d finally struck back down into the hold. She blinked with a small sense of triumph as she hollered down: “Allied aar-craft approaching, twenty degrees off port bow!” She’d seen that one first!

Time passed, and soon dark shapes could be seen rising above the distant horizon to join the boiler smoke. It wasn’t dark smoke, but she expected Captain Garrett would tactfully rib Captain Reddy about it when they met, regardless. She reached back to grab a tarry backstay and slid down it, all the way to the bright deck below. “What’s wrong?” she asked Smitty, when she saw his troubled expression. “We’ve found First Fleet South.”

“Sure. But so did somebody else. The TBS is goin’ crazy.”

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