Burning Woman and the Ghost Lance

South Atlantic. January 15, 1993 CY

The Guhnage Uktena surfaced shortly after dawn. The water still sparkled with whitecaps, but visibility was improving as the tropical sun drove off the remaining mist. The hurricane had passed, and Captain Huyáné checked with the chief bo’sun to make sure his boat and crew were safe and secure before ascending the conning tower. From there, he searched the entire broad horizon for any sign of his prey, muttering various curses in Tsalagi as his binoculars revealed nothing but the vast rolling plain of the sea.

“Continue previous course, Captain?” asked Chief Bo’sun Akeha’shæ’, who had become bored with their mission and had begun to look for any excuse to abandon it and return to port.

“Shut up, Chief. Begin the quick search pattern. It sounded like she had gone down in the storm, which means we need to locate possible survivors.”

The CSS Guhnage Uktena was a high endurance fleet submarine of the Hundred Nations of the Kanonsionni Confederacy, currently on a mission to shadow the enemy frigate ISS Sipaktlantli, of the Sacred Empire of the Obsidian Jaguar. After chasing her across the full breadth of the Western Ocean, he nearly lost the large warship passing through the Java Straights, when they had been forced to refuel, but caught up easily when their prey spent several days surveying the Seychelles Archipelago. Captain Huyáné suspected there had been atrocities committed against the natives of those islands, but dared not break cover to investigate.

The Sipaktlantli left the Seychelles and proceeded around the Golden Horn and Cape of Good Hope, then North-by-Northwest across the Eastern Ocean, obviously heading back to port in the Gulf of Anahuac. The hurricane struck just two weeks out, off the coast of Southern Semanahuak.

If the storm had separated them, there was little hope of catching up. The Guhnage Uktena was not fast enough to search this region and then regain the stealthy chase undetected before they entered waters controlled by the SEOJ.

It was possible that the storm caused some damage, in which case the enemy ironclad would make for the nearest port, which could have been one of her own ports in Southern Semanahuak, or an Ottoman city on the African coast. The Guhnage Uktena would not be welcomed in either location.

The best option was to search for signs that the ironclad had sunk in the storm. The unmistakable sounds of an iron ship breaking up had been clearly heard by the Guhnage Uktena’s sonar technician, Ama’gitli, as they had safely ridden out the storm from below. Such massive iron vessels were notorious for capsizing when broadsided by an errant wave in such circumstances, but it was possible the ironclad had survived. If no wreckage was found, the only remaining course of action would be to head at best surface speed to the Gulf of Anahuac, hoping to intercept her before she returned to port.

The sonar tech had reported another sound during the storm that was unexplainable. A rhythmic thrumming sound, too steady to be sea-life or geologic in nature. It bothered the technician for some reason, but the rest of the crew accepted the idea that it was simply an artifact of the storm.

Captain Huyáné lowered the binoculars and shook his head in frustration. There was nothing but cresting waves in all directions. A watery wasteland as empty as a desert. He removed his hat and ran his fingers through his graying hair. Time was growing short. It was possible that the Sipaktlantli was already ahead of them and well on her way home. The elders of the council would not be pleased at this failure.

Still, due diligence was required. Bringing up the binoculars once more, the searching continued.

There! He could see a small shape bobbing in the waves. Focus. Yes. It was a person in a life ring, waving frantically.

“Survivor in the water! All hands on deck!” he called out. “Chief, gather a rescue team to recover the survivor.”

Chief Akeha’shæ′ sighed heavily before responding: “Aye, Captain.”

After some fussing and prodding by the corpsman, the woman was given a change of clothes, a baggy uniform blouse and dungarees over men’s undergarments. While there were women serving in the Navy of the Hundred Nations, none were typically allowed on submarines, so they tried to accommodate their guest with what they had available.

The woman looked up from her cup of hot tea and turned expressive brown eyes to Captain Huyáné when he entered the ward room. She was still shivering, though wrapped in a heavy wool blanket. The cold Atlantic had left her chilled, even this close to the equator. He took a moment to turn up the adjustment of the electric heater, which had been installed as a luxury for the officers. The crew were normally expected to bundle up against the cold of the depths.

Turning once again to the prisoner, he could see that her dark face was thin and angular, with pronounced high cheekbones and aquiline nose. Her hair was pulled back and wrapped in a towel like a turban, in the fashion of the Turks. Despite this affectation, her features were typical of a member of the Aztec noble caste, though she lacked the usual jewelry, piercings, or tattoos normally associated with high status.

She seemed merely a lost waif, tossed by storm and circumstance into his care.

In any case, he had already decided to treat her as an enemy combatant, since it was clear she had been on board the Sipaktlantli. The name of that ship on the life ring supported this theory.

Her attitude, strangely enough, was boldly prepossessed for a shipwreck survivor, despite the shackles that bound her to the chair. She seemed open and friendly, if tired and cold from having been recently plucked from the ocean. There was none of the usual hostility that he had come to expect from Aztecs.

“Greetings, Captain! I am immensely grateful for your timely rescue.”

The Captain grunted acknowledgment as he took a seat across the table. The woman’s use of the Tsalagi language was good, only slightly accented, but he expected as much of the enemy’s educated elite.

“My name is Captain Huyáné, and you are on the CSS Guhnage Uktena of the Hundred Nations. You appear to be a citizen of the Obsidian Jaguar, is this true? In any case, I will treat you as a prisoner of war until we reach our base and I turn you over to my superiors. Do you understand?”

“Yes, of course. Is this truly a submersible?”

“I will ask the questions...”

“It appears to be, and quite new judging by the level of technology I have seen so far. At a guess, I would say your primary power-plant is a heavy-petroleum fueled internal-combustion engine driving a dynamo, which, in series with lead-acid voltaic piles (I could smell the petroleum and sulfuric acid as soon as I was brought aboard), provides direct current for the electric motors of the screws. Is it of British or Norwegian manufacture?”

“Let us start with your name, madam.”

She seemed to transform before his eyes at this question. Her expression of rapt curiosity combined with weary exhaustion instantly became a kind of rigid formality. Her spine straightened in her chair. Her shoulders pulled back. Her dark eyes took on an obsidian sharp focus, as though daring him to return her stare. Any doubt of her noble background was gone.

“I am Doctor Matla Tlatlasihuatl, and I hereby renounce my citizenship and allegiance to the Sacred Empire of the Obsidian Jaguar. I humbly request asylum with the Hundred Nations.”

Captain Huyáné blinked and then blinked again. In every encounter he had experienced with the enemy, from the lowliest sailors to the highest-ranking officers, the Aztecs he had met were all fanatical to the death. They often killed themselves by the most gruesome means rather than reveal their own names, much less renounce loyalty to their beloved nation.

“Madam… I mean Doctor.” Captain Huyáné cleared his throat. “Um... Medical Doctor?”

“I am a dentist, by trade, sir.”

He blinked again. “A dentist?”

“Indeed,” she said, smiling proudly, displaying teeth that were very even and glaringly white, as if to support her claim.

Submarine crews tend to be superstitious, and mysterious events often needed to be downplayed to prevent dangerous rumors from disrupting morale. This was why he had suggested to the sonar tech that the unusual sounds were just an aberration, an artifact that could be safely ignored.

This was obviously another one of those things. An Aztec dentist. He decided to move on. “Am I to understand, Doctor…”

“Please, call me Matla.” She had lost her formal bearing and returned to being a hapless waif.

“Doctor. Is it your intention to defect?”

“Yes, Captain.”

Captain Huyáné sat back in his chair and regarded the enigmatic Aztec as though she were a stubborn stain on his formal dress uniform. Her smile held firm through the awkward pause. It was obvious, now, that he was dealing with a madwoman. He considered a string of alternatives to asking the next question, including shooting himself, or her, in the head with his service revolver. But, there was no escaping it. The question had to be asked.

“Why?”

“Because I am a person of conscience,” Matla said. “If you knew what I have been through, having seen what I have seen, you would understand.”

When faced with inevitable doom, his father had once told him, there was nothing to be done but carry on and accept your fate. Captain Huyáné sighed and shrugged. “Alright. Go ahead.”

“Captain?”

“Tell me your tale of woe and despair. If I believe any of it, and you don’t bore me to death, I might pass along my recommendation to the high council to grant you clemency. Your possible defection is their decision, however, not mine.”

“I see. You have my word…”

“Spare me your pledges, Doctor. I have been lied to by sailors under my own command, enough to make trusting anyone difficult. For an enemy prisoner, impossible. In any case it might be an interesting diversion, if your tale is engaging enough.”

“Oh, it is,” Matla said, without blinking.

Captain Huyáné grunted with disbelief, then stood and opened the hatch to the passageway.

“As you are a prisoner of war, I have a duty to treat you fairly. I guarantee you will not be assaulted or harassed in any way, and are hereby under my protection, on my honor as a naval officer of the Hundred Nations. You will be released from your bonds, but will not be allowed to leave this section of the boat. I can make some accommodations to privacy, but we are on a submarine, so keep your expectations to a minimum. For now, I will have the steward’s mate bring more refreshments, then he will show you to my stateroom, as it is the only private sleeping area on the boat, where you can get some rest. I will be sleeping in the officers’ quarters for the rest of this journey. There will be a marine standing guard outside your door at all times. We will meet here again tomorrow morning at 0800 hours, after first watch has finished breakfast. I will bring a yeoman to record your statement, and you may tell me whatever lies you wish to tell. You will have three days, so you may want to keep your story brief.”

“Thank you, Captain,” said Matla. “Just one more thing, if you please?”

About to close the hatch, Captain Huyáné hesitated and turned to regard the prisoner.

“British or Norwegian?” she asked cheerfully.

He stared at her again. A stubborn stain indeed. “That is classified information. Ask the council when we reach port.”

The hatch slammed shut with metallic finality.