Somewhere above, someone needed him, or something was waiting. The rope bit into Elias’s palms as he pulled himself higher. The freighter loomed above him like a wall, its rain-slick sides gleaming whenever lightning cracked across the sky. Each flash lit up the rust and broken metal in blinding white, then left him in suffocating darkness again.
The ship groaned with the waves, tilting one way and then the other. The motion sent the rope swinging, jerking Elias hard against the hull. Pain shot through his shoulder as his arm slammed against the metal. He clung tighter, teeth clenched, boots scrabbling against the slippery surface. For a moment, he thought he would lose his grip entirely.