Page 77 of Soul on Fire
He grabbed a lifejacket from the back and shoved it over his head. His hands shook, trembled as he tried to buckle it closed. A countdown in his head kept track of the seconds he was wasting.Twenty, nineteen, eighteen, seventeen…
Snap. The buckle closed. He climbed to the side of the RHIB and flung himself over. No points for style or for correct water insertion. Elliot hit the surface like he was in the belly flopping championships, all arms and legs and stomach smacking the water at the same time. Water slammed up his nose and went down his throat, and he sputtered as he came up and a wave smacked him the face.
Too close, he was too close. He wasn’t far enough from the blast zone. He had to swim away. No, not away,down. The blast would be blunted by the water, but anything close to the surface and inside the blast radius would vaporize.
He had to dive.
Taking a choked breath on the surface, Elliot plunged back underwater, swimming down and into the darkness. His lungs were wet, and he’d only managed a quarter of what he usually took for a deep free dive.Blood in my lungs, there’s blood in my lungs. There’s not enough air and I’m going to die down here.
He twirled on his back and looked up as a sunrise split the midnight above and a golden glow broke over the sea, fracturing the ocean like the sun itself had reached down to the Gulf and parted the waters. A billion tiny bubbles erupted, the sea turned to champagne, a flood of it that rocked and weaved on the swells.
Elliot reached out, tried to touch the light, tried to grab those bubbles of air that he needed. His hands swept through empty water, reaching nothing.Ikolo, he thought.At least I loved you before I died.
The glow faded from his eyes, replaced with a darkness he tumbled face-first into, right before a hand grabbed his wrist and pulled.
* * *
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Waves lappedat the bleached sand, a fine grain that clung to his skin like powder. He was naked, sitting in the surf, looking left and right.
He was alone. There was nothing and no one, not for miles. Just him and the waves, the steady tumble and slip of the ocean creeping up the sand, its fingers trying to tickle his toes.
Someone sat beside him, a dark shape that appeared out of nothing. He spun, reared back—
Ikolo’s perfect smile beamed at him, that radiant, happy smile that lit Elliot’s world on fire. “Hey,” Ikolo said, jostling their shoulders. “I was wondering when you’d arrive.”
“Arrive?” Elliot looked beyond Ikolo and then over his own shoulder. “Arrive from where? Where the hell are we?”
Ikolo gazed at him. He cupped Elliot’s face and brushed his thumb over his cheekbone. “We’re where we are meant to be,” he said simply. He was still smiling, still gazing at Elliot like Elliot was the sun in his sky. No, he had that backwards, Ikolo was the one who was the sun. “We are together,” Ikolo said.
“How long are we here for?” Elliot reached for him and pulled him close. Their foreheads brushed, their noses. He kissed Ikolo slowly, tasting him, savoring him. He smiled, and felt Ikolo’s smile on his lips.
“As long as we want,” Ikolo whispered. “I have so much I want to do with you—”
Consciousness came at him like a slap. Elliot jerked, gasped like he was taking his first breath after drowning, and flew forward.
“Easy, easy!” Doctor Ramirez, wearing a protective mask and a Tyvek suit, grabbed his shoulders and pushed him back on the mattress. “Easy, Lieutenant! I’ve brought you out of sedation. We put you in a coma while we were treating you.”
“Treating me?” Confusion tangled his thoughts, made him slow. He tried to reach for Ramirez and barely managed to lift his hand. “I was on a beach—”
No, he was on a boat. A RHIB sailing out to sea. But not out to sea, he was jumping overboard, and then the nuke detonated, he’d seen it from underwater. He’d watched it blow, and he’d felt the air squeeze out of his lungs.
He’d died.
“What happened?” he croaked.
“You took your sweet time jumping, that’s what happened.” Admiral Mallory’s voice, on his left. He turned his head—slowly, agonizingly slowly—and found her there. She was in an isolation mask as well, and wore a Tyvek suit and gloves over her uniform. “And you executed improper vessel dismounting procedures, Lieutenant. You cracked three ribs on your belly flop.”
“I believe we call that the ‘concrete slap’,” Ramirez said. Her dark skin crinkled around her eyes, laugh lines. He couldn’t see her smile, but he felt it. “The water hits you like you’ve gone face-first into concrete.”
Wasn’t that the truth. He tried to sit up. Even the thought sapped him of his strength. He gave up without trying. “You pulled me out?”
Mallory nodded. “I told you, Lieutenant. I donotlet my sailors die, not even the idiot ones.”
He blinked past the tears, or tried to. One escaped, sliding down his cheek. Was it filled with blood still? Was he still sick? “Nah, Admiral,” he choked out, trying to move past the moment. “You just didn’t want me taking all the glory for saving the world.”
“You did save the world. You and Doctor Ngondu.”
