Plague Ship by Clive Cussler Read Free Book Online Page A

than a minute.
    Without the need for an alarm clock, he awoke an hour before he was to report to the moon pool.
    His sleep had been dreamless.
    He strode into the bathroom, sat on a mahogany stool to remove his artificial leg, and hopped into the shower. With such a surplus of electricity, the Oregon ’s water-heating system ensured that the lag time between turning the taps and a steaming shower was measured in seconds. Cabrillo stood under the near-scalding spray with his head bowed and water pounding his body. He’d accumulated a dozen lifetimes of scars over the years, and he vividly recalled the circumstances behind every one. It was the blunt pad of his stump that he thought the least about.
    For most people, losing a limb would likely be a defining moment in their lives. And during the long months of rehab, it had been for Juan as well. But, after that, he barely gave it a moment’s consideration. He had trained his body to accept the prosthesis and his mind to ignore it. As he’d told Dr. Huxley early on in his physical therapy, “I may be crippled, but I won’t allow myself to be handicapped.”
    The prosthetic leg he’d worn throughout the day was designed like a human limb, with a covering of flesh-toned rubber to match his own skin color and a foot with toes that even had nails and hair to match those of his left foot. After toweling off, and finally shaving off the itchy beard, he went to his closet to retrieve a very different limb.
    There was a section on the Oregon dubbed the Magic Shop, and it was overseen by an award-winning Hollywood effects master named Kevin Nixon. It had been Nixon, working in secret, who had developed what Juan called his combat leg. Unlike the natural-looking prosthesis, this one looked like it had been left over from the Terminator movies. Constructed of titanium and carbon fiber, combat leg version 3.0 was a virtual arsenal in itself. A Kel-Tek .380 pistol was secreted in the calf, along with a perfectly balanced throwing knife. The leg also contained a wire garrote, a single-shot .50 caliber gun that fired through the heel, and storage compartments for all manner of equipment Cabrillo might need.
    Just fitting it over his stump and attaching a set of reinforcing straps helped Juan prepare himself mentally for the mission.
    There were two reasons he’d started the Corporation. One, of course, was as a moneymaking venture. And, from that perspective, it had done better than his wildest dreams. Each member could retire with what they had earned in the years since joining, and Cabrillo himself could buy a small Caribbean island, if he so chose. But it was the second reason for forming his own security force that kept him at it long after a normal man would have hung up his guns. The need for such a group was so great that his conscience wouldn’t allow him to stop.
    In just the past year, he and the crew of the Oregon had broken up a piracy ring that had been targeting ships carrying illegal Chinese immigrants and using them as slave labor at a remote gold mine, and they disrupted an ecoterrorist’s plan to steer a poison-laden hurricane into the United States.
    It seemed that as soon as one job was complete there were two more equally deserving of the Corporation’s unique abilities. Evil was running rampant all over the globe, and the world powers were stymied to prevent its spread by the very morality that made them great. Though they worked under the guidance of Cabrillo’s own moral compass, he and his crew weren’t hampered by politicians, of any ilk, who were more concerned with reelections than results.
    As Juan was dressing, the chief steward knocked on the cabin door and entered quietly.
    “Breakfast, Captain,” Maurice said in his mournful English accent.
    The steward was a veteran of the Royal Navy, having been forced into retirement because of his age. A rail-thin man with a shock of pure white hair, he carried himself ramrod straight, and remained unflappable