Read Dominion for Free Online Page A

bracelet off before it boils?”
    “Gotcha,” he agreed, lowering the tool into the water.
    “Where are we and why does my head hurt?” Hawke asked.
    The man focused on getting the teeth of the tool around the edge of the bracelet.  Hawke looked around the room, trying to figure out where he was.  The walls, floor, and ceiling were all formed of dark wood beams.  One of the three walls was braced every meter or so with thick six-by-six beams of wood.  The ceiling had a center support beam of six-by-six giving off the image that Hawke was currently inside a sturdy log cabin or an ancient wooden frigate from the early American wars.
    Another explosion shook the room, causing the man to drop his tool in the water.  Hawke couldn’t tell if the bracelet was heating up or if it was just his imagination. 
    “Hurry up,” Hawke insisted, “What are all those explosions?”
    “Six-inch shells,” the man replied, recovering his tool and quickly attempting to regain purchase on the bracelet, “ Our shells, of course.  The Shomani are not going to accept that we recovered both you and your ship, but not to worry.  We came prepared for that.”
    “Is this a ship?  An ocean vessel?” Hawke asked.
    “Indeed,” he replied, growling as he squeezed the handle of the tool, “One of the best in the Cheronook fleet.”
    Suddenly the bracelet snapped.  Hawke felt a little sting as a sharp edge of the broken bracelet nicked his wrist.  Hawke lifted his hand from the water and twisted the warm mangled bracelet off.
    “Thanks for the help, bud,” Hawke said, tossing the piece of metal into the tub of water and rising up from the floor.
    He suddenly felt uneasy as he looked around.  He stumbled forward, but the man caught him to keep him from falling.
    “You’d better find a way to get your sea legs quick, spaceboy,” he said, “We’ve got quite a trip ahead of us.”
    “Sea legs,” Hawke repeated, “Yeah, I guess I should have seen that one coming.”
    The man retrieved his tools and departed the room as quickly as he had arrived.  He offered no advice or instruction for Hawke and the open door suggested that he was no prisoner of those who had kidnapped him and Kashuba. 
    He turned quickly; inspecting the room for any sign that Kashuba had been in there with him.  There was nothing beyond what he’d seen earlier.  He rushed out into the corridor and hollered Kashuba’s name.  A sweaty man rushed past him, nearly knocking Hawke to the floor.
    “Why don’t you make yourself useful and see if the gunners need any help?” the man snapped at him, rushing up the stairwell at the end of the hall.
    “Gunners?” he muttered.
    Another explosion rumbled from above. 
    “Kashuba!” he shouted, heading toward the stairwell.
    He looked up the stairs and immediately verified that they led to the sunlit world outside.  He quickly rose from the bowels of the ship to discover a busy world that he most certainly did not fit into.  He found himself standing near the stern of a massive 19 th century schooner decked out in full sails.  That alone would have been enough to give him a moment of pause, but then he saw the three giant cannons.
    The cannons were definitely not like those found on 19 th century ships but rather they resembled the howitzers of the mid 20 th century.  The cannon to his right was being loaded from the rear with something that resembled a giant bullet still attached to its shell.  It took two burly men to load the cannon and only one to fire it.  The explosion was deafening.
    He looked off to the right side of the ship to see what they were firing at just in time to see the bow of a more modern ship exploding.  The other ship, now sinking in the distance looked very similar to a modern day destroyer or frigate.  He was impressed to see an older wooden ship holding her own against a modern navy vessel.
    The sound of rapid gunfire erupted from the other side of the ship.  He turned to see a