Pauncharillo wore a grin from ear to ear. Caleb's shoulders slumped, he couldn't meet his uncle's eyes. The boy was defeated. Bones let the engines idle and jumped down to the stern deck waiting for the fat little porker to get within reach.
He looked around everywhere for anything that could help them, scanning for any chance, any opportunity to smash the vicious little man's face in.
Pauncharillo kept his distance from Bones and he kept his gun against Caleb's head until the cavalry arrived. The last thing Bones saw was the butt end of a rifle smashing into his temple.
Bones awoke to a jarring sensation and the sound of waves smacking against a polymer hull. He couldn't see anything. There was a black bag made of thick cloth over his head. His arms were tied behind his back, which made it impossible to cushion himself against the up and down jarring of the boat as it careened across the waves. The bag made breathing difficult.
He thought he could feel another body banging along next to him—Caleb. It felt like the boy was unconscious given how he flopped around uncontrollably. Bones surmised they were in one of the rigid hulls banging their way back to Cuba. He settled in for the ride, trying to loosen the ropes tying his hands and to cushion Caleb's flopping body as best he could.
The banging and jarring felt like it went on for hours. He wasn't having any luck loosening the ropes tying his hands, when Caleb suddenly awoke. The boy jolted up and started to scream: "Help me! Help!"
"Stop, Caleb, stop! Shhhh! It's me! Your uncle!" Bones didn't want another rifle butt to the head for either of them. They would be safer once on shore.
"Uncle? Uncle Stu? Is that you? I have a bag over my head! My hands are tied behind my back?!!!" Caleb was clearly terrified.
"I know. I know. So do I. Let's just wait this one out until we get to shore. Their supervisor will be on shore and he will not be comfortable treating American citizens like this." Bones tried to turn into Caleb to comfort him somehow. "I just do not want you to get hit in the head again."
"I'm scared." Caleb sounded like he had tears in his throat.
"That is okay. It is going to be okay as soon as we get to shore." Bones didn't know that for sure, but he wasn't going to say anything different.
"I'm scared for Joshua and Dad. What are they going to do when they surface and we are not there?" Caleb struggled to take his eyes off himself.
"I tethered the lifeboat to the dive line before all this started. They will be fine. We will go back and get them once we can explain to the authorities." Bones thought again about their situation. They had fired on Cuban police, granted, the police had fired on them as well—it didn't really matter—he already knew their situation wasn't going to be settled by a local magistrate.
As if to confirm his thoughts, the boat slowed and docked. A lot of Spanish was thrown around, but nothing that didn't sound like men loading and unloading cargo on an ordinary day. He was picked up by hands and feet and unceremoniously tossed into the bed of a very hard truck. He felt and heard Caleb land next to him.
"Ugh! I am an American citizen!" Caleb cried out.
"Quiet, Caleb! Quiet! We do not know if these guys hate Americans!" Caleb seemed to understand. At least, he went quiet. Bones wasn't sure if it was acquiescence or despair.
The truck bumped along for what felt like hours but was probably only thirty minutes. Bones had no way of tracking time. "Caleb?"
"What?"
"Can you loosen your ropes?" Bones thought now, on the road, was the best time to try and break loose but he couldn't budge his own coils.
"No. I've been trying since I woke up. I feel like it is a little looser, but that may just be my imagination. You?" Caleb sounded a note of hope.
"Nothing. Sorry. Keep your ears peeled. We will get our chance soon." Again, the truck stopped as if on cue. Bones heard a chain link fence sliding back, some words exchanged in Spanish and the truck drove through a gate. Bones could hear the gate sliding shut as they went through.
When the truck stopped, he had just pulled a bit of the knot loose. He wanted to tell Caleb, but he didn't dare now that the truck wasn't moving. All was quiet, when suddenly he was pulled by his feet to the end of the bed and yanked viciously to the ground. His head pounded from the knock it took on the way down. He listened as Caleb got the same treatment. They both understood the message: Do not resist us.
Gentle hands grabbed his shoulders and pulled him into a sitting position. The same hands tugged on his armpits indicating that they would help him up. He got on one knee and stood shakily, slowly straightening himself out. The hands helped him up the whole way. He straightened out and was beginning to stretch his back when a fist slammed into his stomach doubling him over.
The gentle hands slowly guided him backwards still doubled over, prompting him to step up into the seat of a cart of some kind. He couldn't tell if it had been the gentle hands or someone else who had pummeled him. The affect was very disorienting. Gladly, he didn't hear Caleb receive the same treatment. The boy was prodded onto the seat next to him as the gentle hands clicked a seatbelt around his waist.
He heard the whirring of an electric motor and they proceeded to move backward. It was some kind of golf cart they were on. He wanted desperately to confer with Caleb, but he could hear a driver and guard talking in hushed tones up front. Anything he said to the boy would be overheard. Instead, he continued to work at the knots holding his hands together.
The cart slowed and entered a room—Bones could feel the closeness of the walls—yellow lights flashed and the floor dropped out from under them. They were in an elevator, still strapped in the cart. The elevator seemed to descend for a long time, but he had no way of knowing how long. Another loop of the knot loosened and his spirits lifted.
When the elevator stopped, yellow lights flashed and the cart started moving again. He could hear the electric whirring of the motor reverberating off walls and ceiling that were very close. He guessed they were in a tunnel or underground corridor of some type. Their captors had gone eerily silent. The cart would slow occasionally, then proceed, and he heard doorways opening and closing.
The smell was the first thing he noticed when they came to a stop. Caleb sat straighter in his seat. "What's that?" He whispered, but Bones didn't answer. It was the smell of a locker room, sweat mixed with stale food—humanity. There were quiet noises, movement, murmuring, smacking and licking… interrupted by the easily recognizable scrape of a jail cell door being opened.
Bones was pulled from his seat and shoved forward, his every sense reaching… Caleb stumbled into him thankfully as he was also pushed forward. Praise God! Bones wasn't one to sing out, but he desired with every ounce of his being to stay together with Caleb. If he had to, he'd die for the boy as he would for one of his own children.
Bones turned slowly trying to reach out with his senses to understand his environment. He could hear some scuffling next to him and Caleb bumped into him softly when the cell door clanged shut. He was trying to listen to the strange sounds all around him, the murmuring, purring, licking, shuffling and sighing when he felt Caleb start to untie his ropes.
Yanking the bag off his head, he saw the boy's face: unhurt. Bones grabbed him in a great bear hug and turned him around and around. As they turned, his eyes took in their surroundings.
They were in a massive room filled with a network of steel barred jail cells one right next to another. The room was completely white with some kind of plastic paneling on the walls. Even the cell bars were white. Bones felt like he was locked inside a spaceship.
Inside the cells were dozens and dozens of people all staring peacefully back at them as far as the eye could see.
The ceiling was lit with fluorescent lights, the floor was bare rock and the bars were hardened steel. Some cells had stainless steel toilets, many had large open trays filled with some kind of wood chips or shredded newspaper. Here and there stainless steel bowls lay about with the remnants of food and water remaining in them.
The oddest thing was: nobody was talking.