Jeffrey Fuller #01 - Deep Sound Channel by Joe Buff

Author:Joe Buff [Buff, Joe]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2010-02-26T00:00:00+00:00

DOWNTOWN DURBAN

Gunther Van Gelder ordered another straight gin. This wasn't recommended for people recovering from heatstroke, but he needed something to deaden his mind. The cabaret was noisy and crowded, full of tobacco smoke and wild people, and the raunchy floor show music blared. Given the late hour and very strict curfew, the customers were all military officers, high-powered politicos, and women they'd brought as their dates. Several people had offered to buy Van Gelder a drink. His naval uniform with gold submarine badge did the trick. But each time he politely refused. He needed to be alone. Several whores who worked the bar had approached him aggressively too. Again he refused, not because he didn't like girls. He was just in the wrong sort of mood. He'd been at sea too long. The changes around him were shocking.

The war was going so well, everyone said. Axis strength was increasing, the Allies a mere empty shell, right thinking had total control. Was this, then, why the nightly news on the one TV station still working—government-owned—always opened with more executions? Was this why even right-thinking Boers averted their eyes from the sky, wearing dark sunglasses outdoors even at night, afraid of an infernal nuclear flash? Was this why children were starving, white children, and people were eating their dogs?

Careful, Gunther, he told himself. This is dangerous talk, even alone in your mind. Van Gelder laughed, chiding himself at the irony, that he'd come here of all places for solitude. But a submariner made his own privacy wherever he went, internally. Duty, patriotism, glory, and honor. Disaffection, dissent, treason, and death. There was no middle ground anymore. Slavery, oppression, environmental destruction, all were common currency of this New Order that wanted to run half the world. It was becoming too much like the last New Order, the torchlight parades and the terror, the fearful or eager obedience, abdicating all moral standards, the marching bands and the slaughter. He could see it much too clearly now—how could everyone else be so blind?

Another woman approached him. She wasn't bad-looking, this one, nice clothes and subtle makeup—but then the resurgent Union of South Africa's brave fighting men deserved the best of the best. She fingered Van Gelder's qualification badge, the diesel boat over oak leaves and trident which he'd striven so hard to deserve. She couldn't possibly know what it stood for, the sacrifices, the risks. She offered to party for free. Van Gelder told her to leave him alone, and looked at his watch. He was due back on Voortrekker, inside the bluff, in barely a couple of hours, and he knew he was getting intoxicated. He had a responsibility, to his captain and ship and his crew. Van Gelder sighed. When push came to shove, there really was no escape. The navy was his life, his family, the underwater world was his home, the sea his most passionate mistress.

The hooker was very persistent. She told him he was

cute and snuggled against him. She said she'd do whatever he wanted, and reached for his crotch.

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