Nautica

Chapter One

A Girl Named Jim

It was so incredibly dark that Delilah could not see a thing. There were no spider webs brushing her face, but she expected there to be, and so she cringed harder with every step. She had stopped worrying about the subsequent wrinkles she was subjecting herself to about ten minutes ago when she had decided that, if she made it out of here alive, she would start saving up for that face lift when she turned thirty. It took the worry away, or at least the worry about that particular subject. It didn’t seem so important now that she was alone in what felt like a dungeon, cut off from the rest of the group and completely without survival skills.

Why had she paid her own money for this? She hadn’t wanted to ask her mother for anything after their fight, so she’d just written the check herself, but now she regretted that stubbornness, because it was costing her $345 that she could not afford to miss now that she was going to be having cosmetic surgery. Granted she had thirteen years before it became an issue, but still.

She had never gone on school field trips, and extra credit hardly seemed a real motivational tool to go on an “undersea adventure”. Those sorts of things usually involved the cheapest scuba diving available or glass-bottom boats, and she had no real interest in either unless they took place in Barbados or something equally exotic to a girl from Maryland. Right now she would be hard pressed to say what had gotten into her to make her agree to come to Nautica.

Nautica. The word itself sounded corny and not nearly as awe-inspiring as it had when she’d first read it on the field-trip permission slip that she’d never gotten signed. Nautica was a fairly recent discovery, and had only been opened to public excursions about nine months before. Mr. Bozwik had made Legacy High one of the first schools to schedule a visit there, so there were few precedents, and that was intriguing to Delilah, who had so far only experienced the magic of Disney, and one would be hard-pressed to find a school that had not gone there on some lame field-trip. And the teachers always, always spent precious time on an educational foray, to make the trip “worthwhile” to those buzzards who didn’t know that the trip was already boring enough. What self-respecting high-schooler wanted to go to Disneyland? Especially when the Chorus was going on a cruise? And more to the point, why did said high-schoolers always buy those Goofy hats? It didn’t make sense.

“Nautica,” Mr. Bozwik croaked as he stood in front of the chalkboard in his damnable sweater-vest and slacks (oh, how Delilah hated that word). “No doubt you’ve heard of Nautica on the news, and if you haven’t, well, that doesn’t really surprise me since half of you take no interest in the world.” Not fair. True, but not fair. Generalizations were mostly false, they’d been taught that in the 5th grade.

Delilah had heard of Nautica, but hadn’t really paid attention to the news reports.

“Nautica is a gigantic pyramid that was discovered almost five years ago, built by a mysterious ancient civilization of which we have no real knowledge. And what is even more mysterious is how this pyramid came to be built underwater. An ocean could not have formed there after the pyramid was built because the Earth has not changed that much since humans were first able to build. This is only one of the mysteries of Nautica. In addition, no scientists or archeologists have been able to find a way into this pyramid, despite all attempts, and they are extremely eager to, because technology has made available the fact that there are twenty-five hundred room within this structure.”

Even the uninterested Juniors and Seniors to whom he was preaching this uninteresting information pulled expressions of surprise.

“This is the century of discovery. This is history at our fingertips, and as the classes of 2024 and 2025, I’m sure you’re all very excited to be a part of this changing world. Perhaps you might change it in the future. Even you, Mister Carlyle.” The class chuckled as Matt sat up straighter and self-consciously tugged bits of his hair forward to cover his face.

Mr. Bozwik reveled in pushing Matt’s buttons; he had held this grudge since the first day of freshman year when Matt, who was in Delilah’s grade, had knocked over Mr. Bozwik’s precious trophy and broke it. It had been glued back together, but the wings of the winged-man on the pedestal would always be crooked. It didn’t help that someone had super-glued on a devils-tail. Mr. Bozwik’s nickname had thenceforth been “Lucifer” or “fallen angel”, and though as a scientist he claimed to believe in the existence of neither, it upset him greatly. Especially when Principle Cutter slipped and called him Mr. Lucifer Bozwik at the Sophomore assembly the next year. It let Mr. Bozwik know that the nickname was there to stay and that it wasn’t as harmless as he had hoped.

“This trip will not be cheap, but I trust that, in the name of history, you will perhaps forgo those more exciting trips to New York and Orlando. Or maybe in the name of four extra credit test grades. I shouldn’t say this, but this trip almost guarantees you an A, which some of you sorely need.” And Mr. Bozwik looked directly at Delilah.

So maybe that explained why she was here.

She brushed her hair back from her face, wondering when it had come loose of her ponytail. She felt so dirty and she wasn’t sure if that warmth on her leg was blood from where she’d banged her knee falling through that trap door.

Delilah had never felt so scared and alone in her life. Her shirt was sticking to her because of her intense perspiration and it restricted her movements, and she just wanted to tear off her clothes and run around in her underwear. She tugged at her shirt for what felt like the nine hundredth time to pull the seams away from her armpits and just wanted to cry.

“Why, why, why, why?” she muttered to herself, feeling the constriction in her throat and not bothering to swallow the tears back. Who was here to see her?

There was a sudden scraping sound, and the first thing she did was screech, even though common sense told her to shut the Hell up and not make a sound. Despite her intentions, she found herself stumbling forward.

“Hello? Hello? Is someone there? Laura? Chaz? Please come get me. I hurt my leg.” She bit back what else she had to say when she heard a chuckle.

“She’s hurt her leg, she says. Better luck than some, I says. Better luck than the little girl back at the entrance, eh Chich? I bets she knew that little girl, too. I bets she’ll soon be thinking ‘better her than I’, eh? You want to ask her why she’s here, Chich? I wants to know how she got in. I wants to know how they all got in.” The voice was raspy and deep and the laughter was harsh. Delilah’s imagination conjured up a giant man with tattoos and leather and she almost sobbed in fear, knowing nothing except that she had to get away, and that the man couldn’t find her or she would die.

She stumbled backwards and hit her arm on a corner hard, scraping her arm on rough stone. The pain was immense and she cried out. She fell and drowned in it, just wanting to stay on the ground and not move. She wanted to wait until someone found her. She just wanted to go home.

“Aw, and here’s the little one now.” Boots were at her eye level and all she could make herself do was edge back a little and curl tightly into a ball, hiding her eyes so that the man didn’t exist. “Girls her age should be able to do more than hide and blubber.”

“Zet, we’ve got more to do than waste time on a foundling in the maze. We’ve got to check the outside.”

“Yes, yes, and find out how they got in. D’ya not thing she could help us, then?”

“She’s good for nothing. She’s not even made it past the first turn; you think she’ll be useful to us for anything other than barter? Nay, I think not, and we’ve enough to barter with. Leave her here to die. We’ve got a job to do.”

“But look at ‘er, Chich. Does she not look pitiful?” Zet cackled.

“She does. Utterly useless.”

“She does at that.” There was another scraping sound as the owner of the boots turned on his heels. She didn’t know what demon possessed her then.

“Wait, please. You can’t leave me here. Where am I? Please help me. I just need to find my friends. They…they left me. Do you know where…?”

“Eh, Chich. She says we can’t leave her. D’ya think we should help the princess, then?”

“I think you’d better shut your fat mouth and get a move on. We’ve only got half a candle left and we’ve got the whole west side to walk down. She’s a mangy dog. You leave mangy dogs out in the streets where they belong,” Chich growled, clearly at his limit.

“I’m not a dog,” she muttered petulantly as they began to walk away. She got a shocking kick in the ribs for that, and she gasped in pain and horror and astonishment.

“She’s not, at that,” Zet said, his voice echoing as the two men walked away. “She’d a pure breed that’s been tossed out to learn a lesson.”

Delilah was stiff with shock and she held her stomach, praying that the pain would go away. Men were not supposed to hit girls. Even in prison, the rapists were looked down on, because they had preyed on helpless females. Who were these people? More tears squeezed from her eyes. Why had they been so horrible? What had she done to them?

These were not people she knew, and the significance of that finally hit her as she heard the footsteps disappearing. Had some other country found a way in and not shared their discovery with the rest of the world? It sounded like something the Italians would do.

New powers were always jealously, selfishly secretive, and the Italians, especially now that they were out to prove they didn’t need the Pope to have status, were the worst of the lot. Worse even than the Swedes, who had invaded Norway and Finland and fancied themselves a superpower. The United States weren’t even tolerant of the Swedish Empire. Great Britain regarded them as a somewhat annoying younger sibling just because of the proximity and the fact that Britain didn’t have the time to shove them back in their borders. The United States didn’t recognize the Swedish Empire. The Italians were another matter, though. They were already recognized, they already had some degree of power, and now they were using that and going crazy.

Delilah sat up, slowly, painfully, thinking, irreverently, that she obviously had been paying some attention during World Government class.

Those men definitely hadn’t sounded like Italians. They sounded more Scottish than anything. Perhaps the HCC had gotten funding again, despite the USA’s threats. The Highland Court Coalition had gotten a lot bigger in the last decade. Delilah remembered the backlash after they first went public and committed their first terrorist act. Scotland was small, but there was a lot of sympathy for them after England took over again.

Delilah couldn’t breath without a catch, but she gingerly clambered to her feet, unbuttoning her shirt and prodding her ribs. Tears returned to her eyes and she pulled down the tank top she wore under the shirt, wishing she had some ice.

The water was very blue, and the sky was clear, but all Delilah could think of as the ship navigated its way through the ice flows was that she was so sick she could die. She snapped at Cam whenever he asked if he could help, and even Laura had given up. Only Portia stayed beside her, and she occasionally refilled Delilah’s cup of water and rubbed her back soothingly. Delilah had never been a sailor.

“Jim, we’ll be there soon. I hear the Divets are a lot better than ships or submarines. You won’t even know you’re moving.” Portia handed her the cup for the seventh time. Delilah counted to ten to make sure she wasn’t going to throw up while she was drinking and then took a small sip.

“Gee, that’s a relief. Right now, as I’m losing my paltry lunch on top of the water you try to relieve me with the fact that I will soon be thousands of feet underneath it. Thanks. You’re an immense help, Port.”

“Why do you keep calling me that? It makes me feel like a porker.”

Delilah found herself muttering something horrible under her breath and she saw Portia stiffen and move away. She was sorry, but she was also sorry for herself and how she had to suffer when Portia was sitting there pink and healthy. She resented her weak constitution even though she often capitalized on it.

“Portia, you know I didn’t mean it. I’m sorry,” she felt she had to say.

“No you’re not,” Portia mumbled, her tan face unnaturally red and her brow drawn low. And now Delilah felt really bad and tried to reach out, but Portia pulled back and said something about going to the bathroom.

And being alone and miserably sick was worse than being with a compassionate friend and being miserable. Delilah became even grumpier as she looked over the icy water.

“We’re almost at the surface base,” Cam said cheerfully as he leaned against the wall next to the window that gave her that cursed view, clearly having regained what little courage he had. Why was she even looking outside when it was making her sick?

“Great. Then this grand adventure can start. Why are you here?” she snapped unappreciatively. Cam looked a little hurt, and Delilah sneered mentally at him for being such a baby. Why couldn’t he be more of a guy? Sure, he was the nicest guy she knew, but he was also annoying with it.

“I just thought you needed some company. I saw Portia…”

She silenced him with a wave of her hand that seemed far too imperial, even to her. But right then she didn’t care, because she had seen the shadow on the horizon that looked suspiciously like a giant scientific facility floating on the surface thousands of meters above a giant pyramid. Or so she fancied.

“There it is.”

Cam turned and looked, squinting and not appearing very awed. “It doesn’t look very impressive, does it? Kind of old and dingy.”

Delilah whimpered again as she edged her way down the hall, thinking that she might as well stand up straight. There was no one here to look pathetic for. And it didn’t appear that men here suffered from a white-knight complex.

She kept moving, slowly, haltingly, until she came to another bend and felt a gust of cold air. After she turned, she found two passages branching off in separate directions, twisting and turning into darkness and cobwebs. It didn’t take her long to understand where she was.

She was in an enormous maze.