Shadows Of Innocence

Chapter 3: The Depths of Vantar Bay

The jungle gave way to jagged cliffs as the twin suns climbed higher, turning the humid air into a steaming haze. We’d been moving non-stop since dawn—six hours of forced march through vine-choked trails and across swollen streams. My legs burned, my lungs ached, and every muscle screamed for rest, but the woman beside me showed no sign of slowing.

She’d told me her name at last, during a brief pause to refill canteens.

“Rhea.”

Just that. One word. No surname, no callsign, no explanation. I took it and didn’t push.

Nix scouted ahead in drone form, a silent black speck against the sky, relaying terrain data directly to the small earpiece she’d given me. Its voice was genderless, clipped, efficient.

“Coastal drop-off in four hundred meters. High probability of hostiles at Vantar Bay settlement.”

Rhea nodded as if she’d expected it. “They’ll have the secondary cache there. Underwater.”

“Underwater?” I panted. “You didn’t mention swimming.”

“You can swim, can’t you?”

“Yes, but not while being shot at.”

She glanced at me, the ghost of a smirk on her lips. “Then don’t get shot.”

We reached the cliffs just as Nix reported movement below: two patrol boats slicing through the turquoise water of Vantar Bay, black hulls gleaming, mounted weapons swiveling. The settlement itself clung to the shoreline a mix of legitimate fishing docks and less-legitimate smuggling piers, half-hidden by overhanging rock formations and clusters of bioluminescent coral.

Rhea dropped to a crouch behind a boulder outcrop, pulling me down with her. She produced compact macro-binoculars and scanned the bay.

“Three warehouses on the eastern pier. Middle one has sub-level access. That’s our target.”

I followed her gaze. The middle warehouse looked abandoned—rusted roof, broken windows but armed guards patrolled the dock in pairs, and a sleek submersible was moored alongside.

“How many?” I asked.

“Twelve visible. Probably twice that inside. Plus automated defenses.”

I swallowed. After the safehouse firefight, I wasn’t eager for round two.

“We can’t just walk in.”

“We’re not walking.” She reached into her pack and pulled out two rebreather masks—sleek, full-face models with extended oxygen cartridges. “We’re swimming.”

She stripped off her outer tactical layer without hesitation, revealing a form-fitting divesuit underneath black, flexible, laced with micro-circuitry that shimmered faintly. I tried not to stare as I fumbled with my own clothes, down to the resort swim trunks I’d been wearing under my pants. Not exactly tactical gear.

Rhea handed me a belt rig: knife, small breaching charges, a waterproof sidearm, and a wrist-mounted mini-harpoon launcher.

“You’re arming the accountant now?”

“You shot a man yesterday. You’re promoted.”

I clipped the belt on, feeling the weight settle. “What’s the plan?”

“We go in low along the reef, surface under the pier. Nix disables the motion sensors. I breach the sub-level hatch. You watch my back.”

“That’s it?”

“That’s phase one.”

“There’s a phase two?”

“There’s always a phase two.”

Nix returned, folding mid-air into backpack mode and attaching itself to Rhea’s rig. We descended the cliff path a narrow, treacherous trail carved by smugglers over decades until we reached a hidden cove below the sightlines of the patrols.

The water was warm, clear, alive with darting fish and swaying anemones. We slipped in silently.

The swim was brutal.

Currents tugged at us, and the reef was sharper than it looked coral edges slicing at exposed skin. I stayed close to Rhea, following her lead as she navigated through gaps and under overhangs. Nix detached at one point, transforming into a sleek aquatic drone and vanishing ahead to scout.

Twenty minutes later, we surfaced beneath the eastern pier, clinging to barnacle-crusted pilings. The warehouse loomed above us, its underside dripping seawater and fuel residue. Patrol boats thrummed past overhead, close enough to feel the vibration.

Rhea motioned: wait.

Nix’s voice whispered in my earpiece. “Sensors disabled. Window: eight minutes.”

She pulled herself onto a maintenance ledge beneath the warehouse floor, water streaming off her. I followed, nearly slipping on algae. We moved along the narrow beam until we reached a sealed hatch circular, reinforced, with a biometric lock.

Rhea attached a small device to the panel. It whirred softly, cycling through codes.

“Thirty seconds,” Nix reported.

Boots thudded overhead two guards walking the pier.

We froze.

They stopped directly above us, voices muffled but tense.

“…confirmed the safehouse hit. She’s here. Has to be.”

“Orders are shoot on sight. No captives.”

My blood ran cold. They were talking about Rhea.

The lock clicked open.

Rhea eased the hatch upward just enough to peer inside a dark sub-level chamber, ankle-deep in seawater, lit by red emergency strips. Crates lined the walls. In the center: three more canisters identical to the one from my bag, suspended in a refrigerated cradle.

She slipped inside. I followed.

The hatch closed silently above us.

We moved fast Rhea to the cradle, me covering the only interior door. She worked the controls, downloading data while prepping charges.

That’s when the lights snapped to full white.

Alarms screamed.

The interior door blasted open.

Six armored figures poured in, rifles raised.

“Drop it!” the lead shouted.

Rhea spun, pistol already in hand.

Hell broke loose.

I fired first instinct, panic, muscle memory from yesterday. My shot took the lead in the visor; he dropped.

Rhea was a blur rolling behind a crate, returning fire in controlled bursts. Two more went down.

The remaining three spread out, using cover.

One lobbed a flashbang.

I dove, covering my eyes.

The detonation was deafening in the enclosed space light, sound, disorientation.

I came up blind, firing wildly.

Rhea wasn’t disoriented. She was already moving vaulting a crate, closing distance. Knife flashed. One down.

Another swung his rifle butt at her. She ducked, swept his legs, finished him with a point-blank shot.

The last one backed toward the exit, firing full auto.

Bullets sparked off metal around me.

I aimed through the ringing in my ears and pulled the trigger.

He fell.

Silence except for the alarms and rushing water somewhere.

Rhea stood amid the bodies, breathing hard, checking angles.

“You good?” she called.

I nodded, shaking.

She returned to the cradle, slapped charges onto the canisters.

“Nix exfil route?”

“Surface compromised. Patrol boats converging. Alternate: maintenance tunnel west. Leads to open water.”

We ran.

The tunnel was narrow, flooded knee-deep, lit only by our wrist lights. Behind us, more boots reinforcements.

Rhea sealed the hatch we’d come through and set a timed charge.

We splashed onward.

The tunnel ended at a submerged grate.

Nix transformed again this time into a cutting tool, slicing through the bars in seconds.

We swam out into open water just as the charge behind us detonated muffled boom, pressure wave shoving us forward.

But we weren’t clear.

Two patrol boats roared overhead, searchlights stabbing down into the depths.

Divers dropped in four of them, fast-attack suits, spearguns.

Rhea grabbed my arm, pointed down.

We dove.

The water darkened as we descended along the reef wall. My lungs burned, but the rebreather held.

The divers followed.

First contact: one diver broke left, speargun firing.

The bolt shot past my head.

Rhea twisted, returned fire with her harpoon launcher. Direct hit center mass. The diver convulsed and sank.

Another closed fast, knife out.

I fired my sidearm underwater rounds, short range. Missed.

He was on me.

Blade flashed.

I blocked with the gun, metal clanging. He grabbed my rebreather hose.

Panic surged.

I drove my knee up, caught him in the gut. He recoiled.

Rhea appeared, knife slashing across his throat seal. Bubbles erupted.

The last two divers hesitated then retreated as something larger moved in the depths.

Not us.

Something else.

A shadow massive, serpentine glided past below. Native predator. Drawn by blood.

The divers bolted for the surface.

We didn’t wait.

Rhea pointed upward, toward a distant cave opening in the reef wall.

We swam for it.

Inside the cave, bioluminescent algae lit the space in eerie blue. Air pocket above blessed oxygen.

We surfaced, gasping.

Nix hovered at the entrance, scanning.

“Clear for now,” it reported.

Rhea pulled off her mask, hair plastered to her face. Blood trickled from a shallow cut on her forearm.

I removed mine, coughing.

“You’re bleeding.”

“It’s fine.”

I tore a strip from my shirt, tied it around the wound.

She watched me, expression unreadable.

“You saved my life back there,” I said.

“You saved mine first.”

A long moment passed.

Then Nix chirped urgently.

“Incoming submersible. Armed. ETA three minutes.”

Rhea cursed. “They’re sealing the bay.”

We looked around the cave only one exit, back the way we came.

Trapped.

Or not.

High on the cave wall, a narrow fissure glowed faintly daylight.

Rhea nodded. “We climb.”

The fissure was tight, jagged, barely wide enough for shoulders. We squeezed through, scraping skin, muscles screaming.

It opened onto a ledge halfway up the outer cliff face exposed, waves crashing below, jungle above.

No way down. Only up.

We climbed.

Hand over hand, using vines and rock holds. Salt spray stung cuts. Wind howled.

Halfway up, the submersible surfaced in the bay below, launching drones.

Nix intercepted two, ramming them out of the sky in kamikaze bursts.

But more came.

One locked onto us.

Rhea saw it first.

“Jump!”

We leaped outward as the drone fired missile streaking past, detonating against the cliff where we’d been.

The blast loosened rock.

We fell.

Not far into thick jungle canopy that broke our fall in a tangle of branches and leaves.

Bruised, battered, but alive.

We lay there for seconds, stunned.

Then laughter hers first, low and incredulous. Mine followed, shaky.

We crawled out of the foliage onto solid ground.

In the distance, smoke rose from Vantar Bay.secondary explosions as the charges in the warehouse finally cooked off.

The cache was gone.

But they’d know we did it.

Rhea stood, offered her hand again.

I took it.

“Where now?” I asked.

“Off-planet. There’s a shuttle port north of here. Black market. We steal a ride.”

“And then?”

“Then we find out who’s really behind this. Because it’s bigger than smugglers and cleaners.”

She looked at me really looked.

“You still in?”

I thought of my old life. The cabana. The quiet beaches. The safety.

Gone forever.

I nodded.

“I’m in.”

Nix reformed beside us, damaged but functional.

We vanished into the jungle once more.

Behind us, sirens wailed across Vantar Bay.

Ahead: the next fight.

And whatever came after.