Duke cut the wheel, and the FRC turned right and traveled down one side of the vessel. As they passed the end of the derelict, Duke took them up along the other side.
“Rounded end,” Paul said. “This is the stern.”
“It’s not a barge,” Gamay added, “it’s a ship.”
“A dark, dead ship,” Elena said.
“A ghost ship,” Gamay replied.
Even Paul had to admit there was something ominous about the vessel, something the grainy gangrene-tinted view through the night vision goggles only added to. Mist shrouding the ship, backlit by the stars and the sliver moon, gave it a spectral aura.
“Ghost ship,” Gamay whispered.
Paul had seen enough. He pulled off the goggles and went to the FRC’s small mast. As a rescue boat, the FRC was equipped with a row of powerful lights. Paul switched the main flood on and turned it toward the target’s hull.
The garish light spread across heavy steel plate, rusted and corroded as if the ship had been drifting for years. The ship’s portholes appeared to be sealed shut and were opaque with a tawny scale. A line of them ran just above the waterline.
As Paul panned the light, it revealed tangled lines running across the hull, strands of brown and green. It took a moment for any of them to realize what they were looking at.
Gamay was first. “Vines,” she said.
Duke brought the throttle back to idle, and Paul angled the spotlight, tracking a tangled group of the vines that ran up the side of the hull past what should have been the sharp edge of the main deck but what was, in fact, an eroding slope of tancolored sediment.
“What in the world . . .”
Up on top, the vines ran everywhere like ivy draping an old stone wall. Dying grasses, weeds, and tangled scrub brush grew where the superstructure should have been.
Duke shook his head at the sight. “I’ve found some strange things floating out at sea before, but I’ve never seen anything like this.”
They passed the bow without sighting any markings, and Duke brought them back amidships.
“I think we should go back to the Condor,” Gamay said abruptly.
Paul turned. “Aren’t you curious about what we’ve found here?”
“Of course,” she said, “I’m as intrigued as you are. But we came here to see if the target was a threat or a vessel in need of our help. It’s obviously neither. With that established, we should get back home before anything strange occurs.”
Paul studied his wife. “Not like you to be the voice of reason,” he said. “Where’s your sense of adventure?”
“On the nightstand back home with my car keys,” she said.
He laughed. “We’ve come this far. Might as well go aboard.”
“And how do you propose we do that?” she asked.
Paul looked at her as if it was obvious. “Tarzan style of course,” he said, pointing to the vines.
With calm precision, Duke brought the launch up against the hull where a thick group of creeper vines hung. Paul grabbed them and pulled with all his might.
“I’m going first,” he said. “If these hold me, they’ll certainly hold the rest of you.”
Using the rim of a porthole as a foothold, he went up, climbing hand over hand, like he was going over the obstacle course wall in basic training. Eventually, he made it up onto the deck, which was covered with sediment.
Gamay came up next, and Elena followed right behind her. Duke remained on the launch.
“Feel like we’ve discovered a deserted island,” Elena said.