Chapter 6: Deck Two

At a quarter to midnight, Veda and Lois crouched in the dark beside a stack of linen carts on Deck Two.

The corridor smelled of diesel and damp wool.

At the far end, a steel door stood shut with a heavy padlock on it.

"They're late," Lois muttered.

"They'll come."

"How do you know?"

"Because he's a man who keeps a schedule."

Lois gave her a long look in the dark, and said nothing.

At midnight exactly, the elevator at the end of the corridor chimed.

Four of Damon's guards stepped out, pushing two carts.

On the carts were stacked grey sacks, fifty pounds each, stamped with the ship's name.

Veda counted twelve.

She stood up.

"Evening," she said.

The guards froze.

The one in front was the young lifeguard from the pharmacy.

He went white.

"Ma'am. We were just..."

"Moving rice."

"It's, uh, it's for emergency reserves."

"From the galley, at midnight, in secret."

"I don't know anything about that. I just do what I'm told."

"I know you do," Veda said. "That's the trouble."

She turned to Lois.

"Go."

Lois took a cast-iron pan off the linen cart and hit it against the wall.

The bang went down the corridor.

She hit it again, and again.

Doors opened along Deck Two.

Faces appeared in the doorways, sleepy and scared.

"Everyone up!" Lois bellowed. "Come and see where your dinner's been going!"

They came.

First a few, then a dozen, then fifty, in pajamas and blankets, with children on their hips.

Veda stood in front of the padlocked door with her arms folded.

The guards stood by their carts.

Damon arrived last.

He came down the corridor at an unhurried walk, with his jacket over his arm.

Keep reading free with an account. Start Reborn: Apocalypse Tyrant Endlessly Pampers Her Sickly Lover from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.