Chapter 30: Sailing

Shit! Grace watched a yacht deciding to come and sail almost into their cove. A big catamaran with white sails. Were they allowed to? Grace had been assuming the US military would be keeping everyone away; but perhaps not, or not straight away?

She’d better get dressed anyway, though her orange overalls weren’t exactly the best camouflage and they probably made her look exactly like an escaped prisoner! She stepped into her panties, left her bra to save time, slipped on her tee and struggled into the awkward stiff, outsize overalls. As for the girls, they’d better be ready to hide ... she focused, trying to transmit that idea, as she’d been practising with them.

She peered through the gap in the rocks with the girls ... there were several people on board, milling about. They messed about for a bit then they dropped its anchor.

Now they were lowering the dinghy. Shit! A girl was getting into it. Just the one. Starting the outboard and setting off already, heading for the beach. Shit. She looked a bit purposeful, though even at this distance she was hot, in a bikini, with long brown hair blowing around; athletic and confident ... shoulders, waist, those movements decisive and ... MIA! What was she doing on that catamaran? Oh, and was that small, slim one on the yacht her mum?

“Quick!” Grace gestured to the girls. “It’s Mia! It’s her. Them! Get the stuff.” The girls got the message, even though Grace was too excited to project properly. They rushed round gathering their few items, including the various guns. They arrived down on the beach and waited impatiently for Mia.

“We’ve got to paddle out a bit,” said Grace, so that the dinghy’s still floating when we’ve got in it. She tried to project that thought too, and got back an approving kind of signal. She was getting better with practice already.

The dinghy reached the surf and Grace waded out to help Mia hold it while everyone clambered in, in the waves. Mia restarted the engine and they were off. Off and away from Cuba. In two or three minutes they were getting out onto the steps at the back of the yacht.

“Gracie!” her mum was hugging her and kissing her cheek.

“Mum,” Grace wriggled, “we’ve got to get going, before somebody comes.”

“Gracie, honestly!” Zara smiled proudly, but got back to the helm. “The autopilot seems to be working, let’s have a destination. Anchor up, please somebody.”

“An island?” suggested Grace as they got under way, being kissed by Mia now. “It needs to be somewhere the girls can be safe, but go outside too. They have to be free, but they mustn’t be discovered.”

“There won’t be any uninhabited ones, around here,” Paul stated the obvious - though apparently that could be more useful than you might have thought, sometimes.

“Are there islands for sale?” Grace asked. “I bet there are, doesn’t Richard Branson own one? And that billionaire who got locked up for flying twelve-year-old French girls to it. Have we got internet?”

“There’s a satellite receiver,” said Mo, “but no service. It must need a subscription.”

“Oh. Cyan, how many bitcoins have you got left?” Grace tried sending the thought as a concept, as she’d been practising: a pile of coins with ‘B’ on them, and ‘remainder’. Hopefully her hair wasn’t that wet.

“Infinity,” the answer floated into her head, and some other images which somehow translated themselves in her head.

“Cyan says,” Grace relayed, “she can hack any amount of bitcoin, or just mine some, as the spaceship has more computing than we even have words for. I suppose lots of criminals have ill-gotten piles of it. So we can go anywhere, land and get a satnav subscription.”

“Okay. So.” Zara was getting into being captain of the ship. “Navigation Team,” she grinned at Claude and Mo, “find us a port that might have wifi, then give me a bearing. Grace, would you go below and choose a cabin for the girls please? In fact choose everybody’s. There are three, I think, and probably a bunk in the saloon. Mia and Paul, go forward on the hulls and see what’s in the sail lockers. A skull and crossbones flag, perhaps,” she giggled.

“Where should we try?” Mo asked Claude, at the nav station in the saloon. Without Internet he was bereft of knowledge. He’d only had a sketchy idea where Cuba was even, and was right now using the navigation screen to find out.

“What do you think? Somewhere near, to start with, that we can navigate to with maps and the compass? Then we can get the satnav going. Jamaica? It can be rather easy to get robbed there, apparently. Haiti? Or perhaps the Dominican Republic?”

Mo had no idea. Claude seemed to think the Dominican Republic was best though. “Dominican Republic? I don’t know.”

“Okay, yes, good choice I agree, let’s pick a port, and then plot the route. How is your chest feeling?”

“Better, thanks.”

“Good, that was a close call. So, would you plot us a course? You are rather good with such things I think.”

“Oh ... okay. Should we go to the north side or the south?”

“How about Puerto Plata, on the north coast?”

“Good idea,” Zara agreed, “then once we’ve got satnav and Internet we can go on to Antigua and sort out bank accounts.”

Down in the port hull, Grace was trying to work out the sleeping arrangements. This side was just one luxury suite, with shower room and everything. In the other hull there were two bedrooms, or cabins or whatever they were called. There could be a bed in the saloon, but only after everyone else had gone to bed. Someone would be steering...

Claude and her mum would have to sleep together. She herself was sleeping with Mia come what may and she couldn’t wait. The girls would be together of course, and then there were the boys, preferably without a visit from Mia; or at least, not on this first night. On a ship guys could share a room couldn’t they? It wasn’t gay. And anyway she had an idea it was only a matter of time before the aliens would feel like trying them.

She went up to see what her mum thought. For one thing, someone else would have to be steering while her mum got some sleep. Though she wasn’t actually steering at the moment, just sitting watching the huge wheel turn itself. “Gracie!” she held her arms out and grabbed her, “I’ve been missing you. Oh, but change out of these wet overalls! What else have you got to wear? Oh, nothing I suppose, you were too focused, unlike me. You and Pirate Girl make a right deadly duo. You were quite right by the way: you did the right thing and I love you. But I can lend you something. Anyway let’s get these wet overalls off ... Mia’s in a bikini isn’t she, what’s the difference? It’s warm, but not warm enough to be in these soaking wet clothes.”