"Just a piece a' pipe," said someone, sounding disappointed. The flashlight went out. Before he could think further they jerked him upright and shoved him roughly forward. A hatch opened — the same one, he recalled, he'd seen on his first visit, and how welcome the sight of that carelessly disrespectful sailor would be now — and he was shoved stumbling down a ladder and into a tiny cabin. He looked swiftly around. A mess table, couple of chairs, a rack of tools on the bulkhead. There was fresh blood on the floor. The man behind him shoved him again and he fell against the wall and turned, at bay.
Turner stood there, drenched with rain and with a darker stain on his sleeves. Turner, his scarred face twisted with rage. Towering, the top of his shaven head brushing the low ceiling. Quidley groped for pistol, sword. Gone, taken in the dark. He lifted his hands.
The first blow knocked them aside like a child's and crashed into his chest. He saw the second one coming but it was like lightning, too fast to dodge, too powerful to block.
It burst from nowhere into the side of his head, and the floor came up and slammed him in a burst of light. Then he was being hauled up. He lurched clumsily back. "Turner — no more—"
He didn't answer. From the fixed mad look in his eyes Quidley doubted he heard. He closed in again, shook him violently, then picked him up and threw him against the wall.
He tried to get up but couldn't. Instead Turner dragged him up again. The strength of the man was unbelievable; he felt like a child, like a doll, in his hands. From somewhere in his reeling mind the thought came: He wants revenge. He's going to kill me.
Again he was shaken, and thrown against the wall. Dazed, he raised his hands weakly. There was very little more left in him. He watched as Turner closed him again.
"Hey, Johnny. Johnny!"
The big man paused and looked toward the hatchway. He blinked, looked confused, as if awakened too suddenly. "What — what you want, Bo?"
"We're passin' the inlet. Where to now?"
"Ask Leo."
"Right."
The hatch slid closed again. Quidley licked his lips, tasting the salt sting of open cuts. Turner stared at the hatchway for a moment after it closed, then walked in a little circle around the room. When he saw Quidley he looked surprised.
"Who're you? What you doing here?”
He lifted his head warily. What was the man doing? He'd been about to kill him, and now he seemed taken aback to find him here. Well, he had no choice but to play it out. He tried to steady his voice. "I came with the — with the shell. What are you going to do with it?"
"Richmond," said Turner absently. "You take it off that Yankee freighter, man?"
"Yes," said Quidley aloud, but his mind was repeating: Richmond!
"You kill people to do it? You kill any Yankees?"
A shape in the starlight, a quick movement, as if reaching for a weapon — "Yes. I had to kill one."
Turner grunted, lowered his head, and continued his circular prowl of the room. Quidley lay in the corner and sweated, wondering what was going on inside the big man's mind.
There was an emptiness inside his head.
There was something missing — someone he'd once been. Something flowing. Deep blue? A random memory, chance hints and half remembrances tantalized him. Yet the thing itself he could not recapture. He walked and turned and felt air whistle in and out of him, and looked at the white man lying piss-frightened in the corner and could not remember.
Oh, yes, he remembered this thin prissy man in gray. Had known the instant he'd heard his voice and looked up to see his long stiff silhouette above them on the deck of the freighter, dark against the lights. Quidley he remembered, and Sanchez — but Sanchez did it all under orders. So it was Quidley who'd done this to him. Oh, yes, he remembered.
And remembering had sent him out of control, battering that pale ginger-mustached face, feeling that stiffly-held body solid under his fists. Good to hear the crunch of bone against bone. Good to feel him buckle and fall, to see him bleed.
But now, puzzled, he paused. He was pretty sure he knew where he was and who. He was Johnny Turner, and even now Finnick, topside, was steering this boat he was on into Lynnhaven to offload a special Railroad cargo bound for Richmond.
But there was something missing.
He stared at the white man. He saw the thin lips move hesitantly, and heard him speak.
"Turner—"
And at the sound of his voice something moved and snapped — from where did he remember that —
The sun, inside his head —
Turning and quietly faultlessly inside him snapping shut and then the flow —
Quidley saw the eyes change from bafflement to rage. It was instantaneous, like a switch that changed him from human to animal. He looked around the cabin wildly, searching for something to defend himself with — a stick — anything. Behind him his hand found the rack of tools. His fingers closed around a wrench. Too short, really, and too light. But there was nothing else, and Turner's hands were at his throat. He strained to keep his head down, but the powerful arms forced his chin up, his head back. The thumbs slid under his chin and in desperation he struck with the tool, struck as hard as he could. Again. Turner staggered. He mustered his strength and struck again and felt one hand leave his throat. Then his own arm was gripped, forced back, the wrist encircled by a hand that felt like steel.
The tool clattered to the floor. He was choking. The hand came back to his neck.
"Johnny!"
He heard the voice only faintly. He was sinking into a red-shot haze. He felt other hands, something soft against his body. But there was no more air, and he sank into a darkness that was somehow welcoming.
They'd told her to stay out of sight below; a woman on deck, no matter what her color, would have aroused instant suspicion. She'd waited in a berthing compartment, lying on one of the bunks. She'd heard the scrape of metal and the rattle of chains and heard the shouting and the sudden roar of engines. She'd stayed there, motionless, willing herself not to think. Not to think of Johnny and what he'd become, or of the men he'd killed. Or even what he, and Leo, planned for the largest city of the Confederacy.
Sitting there she'd heard the sounds coming through the thin bulkhead from the next compartment. The thud of blows, and then the sound of voices. But then she'd heard Johnny cry out, and she was up and through the door in a moment.
He was struggling with someone. His broad back was to her, but she saw his arm tighten on the other man's and saw a metal object fall free and clank hollowly on the deck. She had to help him. She snatched it up and raised it to strike.
Then she saw who the other man was.
When she screamed in his ear and tugged on him she saw he couldn't hear her. He was in that frenzy again — that killing frenzy —
She had no thoughts at that moment of loyalty or love. She only knew she had to stop what was happening. She hammered at his wrists with the wrench, clawed with her nails. Inch by inch, she wriggled herself between them.
"Johnny… Johnny-Jo… stop! Stop it!"
She felt him tense. "Johnny-Jo," she whispered again.
His lips formed a syllable. Vy?
"Yes, it's me. Let him go, Johnny. He hurt you, but… he saved my life, too. You didn't know, but you got to count that in." She spoke softly, quickly, pressing herself against him. If his mind didn't remember maybe his flesh would. "C'mon, Johnny-Jo. Come on with me. Come on." Relentlessly she pressed forward into him, a wedge between the two men, moving him back, forcing him off balance.
At last he had to step back. She felt his hands come down around her and felt the body behind her fold and slump to the floor.