Ultra Deep

by William H. Lovejoy

  The roar of the aircraft engines diminished as the drogue chute streamed out of the pack with a whistle, then jerked the canopy after it.

  He began to come upright with the drag of the drogue chute, and when the canopy popped and filled with air, he was ready for the abrupt slowing in his descent.

  Reaching upward, he fumbled in the dark for the steering handles, found them, and got a grip on them with both of his hands.

  Ahead, he could see the lights of the vessel, the single parachute supporting Turtle, and the three canopies clustered above Gargantua. Since he was above them, he did not have a direct view of the strobe lights. The canopies illuminated with each pulse of the strobe.

  Brande tugged his right steering handle, side-slipped to the right, then added pressure to the left handle, picking up forward speed, closing in on Gargantua.

  When he was fifty feet away, and saw that the tubing around the ROV had inflated, he eased up on the handles and tried to determine his altitude.

  He could not do it.

  The darkness of the sea kept that secret.

  Turtle splashed down.

  Brande braced himself.

  Gargantua tapped a few wave tops before settling into the water, raising spigots of white water.

  Brande saw the potential for slamming himself into the ROV, dumped air from the chute, and crashed into the surface a little harder than he had planned.

  He went deep under, tumbling a bit as he slowed. The water was mildly cool on his face, and felt saline fresh. He pulled the flashlight loose, slapped the quick-release buckle on the harness, then pulled the cord on the Mae West. He resisted struggling with the harness and methodically worked his way out of it.

  As the vest filled, he began to rise, aided by strong kicks with the fins. When his head cleared the surface, he took a deep breath and shook his head. The water drained from his hair. He felt good and was halfway sorry he had not jumped from a higher altitude. Almost three years had passed by since his last parachute jump.

  Gargantua was less than twenty feet away, riding low in the water, rising and falling on three-foot seas. His strobe light made him think of ambulances, and he was happy he did not have to call for one.

  His own parachute was collapsed behind him, floating on the sea. There were a couple million more stars in the clear sky than in the skies over San Diego. Venus was bright.

  Brande rolled onto his stomach and swam until he reached the ROV and got a grip on one of the lines holding the inflation pod in place. Releasing the chin strap, he slipped the helmet off and let it go to the bottom. Someday, some salvage diver might find it and spend two or three weeks looking for the rest of the wreckage.

  Reaching under the water, Brande got a thumb under one, then the other, of the fin straps and pushed them off his feet. He tossed the fins on top of the flotation pod, then using the retaining line, pulled himself out of the water. Gargantua heeled sharply as a wave went under her. He stood up and released the parachute rigging, then leaned against the ROV while waiting for the Orion to close on him.

  She was coming hard, not backing off the throttles until she was a quarter-mile away.

  As she slowed and came alongside, searchlights flared. Do-key yelled down at him from the main deck, “Nice of you to drop in, Chief!”

  “I had a free weekend,” Brande called back.

  The port side of the research vessel eased up against the flotation pod, and Brande caught the crane cable Dokey swung toward him, slipped the hook under Gargantua’s lift ring, and stood back as the winch groaned and the cable tautened.

  Turtle’s strobe light was beating about fifty yards away, and Brande shoved the flashlight inside his belt, pulled his fins on, then dove back into the sea, surfaced, and used a strong crawl to swim toward her.

  By the time he reached the robot and looked back, Gargantua was in the air, causing the Orion to heel a trifle. The vessel came around, heading toward him, as the big ROV was settled slowly to the deck next to DepthFinder and tied down.

  Brande released the parachute rigging and sat on Turtle’s back as she was raised from the sea and then lowered to the deck to the right of the submersible, behind Atlas. When she was in place, Brande released the cable of the starboard crane, then slid off to the deck.

  Most of the crew was in attendance, as were Dokey, Otsuka, Emry and Dankelov. Brande released his unweighted weight belt and freed the pouch containing his clothes. He unclipped the Mae West and shrugged out of it.

  “Coffee’s on,” Dokey told him. He was wearing a T-shirt depicting an artistic shark with beret and palette and brush and easel, painting a picture of a porpoise. Brande assumed the porpoise was nude. It was difficult to tell the difference between formal and casual porpoise wardrobes.

  “Let’s get some of it,” Brande said.

  They went forward and entered the superstructure by a side door. Halfway across the cross-corridor, Brande turned into the wardroom.

  Sorenson, Mayberry, Roskens, Polodka and Thomas had three tables pulled together, mugs, coffeepots and plates of Danish scattered across them.

  The chatter was lively, similar to that on the start of many expeditions they had all undertaken. Underlying the dialogue this time, though, was an undercurrent of tension. Then, too, while there had been many expeditions in seven years, this was the first time all of them had shipped together on a single outing.

  Brande went into the galley, stripped out of his wet suit, and pulled on jeans and a sweatshirt. He carried his running shoes and socks back into the wardroom, sat down, and pulled them on.

  “How we doing, Mel?”

  The captain said, “We’re five hundred and ninety nautical miles out of San Diego, Dane. On course, and flying.”

  That was about 300 nautical miles more — over ten hours — than they would have been if the Orion had detoured to Harbor One to retrieve the robots.

  The thrum of the diesels could be felt in the steel deck, despite the carpeting.

  The television set in one corner of the wardroom was tuned to CNN, with the sound off and Bernard Shaw mute, capturing the signal with a satellite antenna.

  Brande reached out for a coffeepot and poured a mug full. He asked, “Anything new on the tube?”

  “The White House confirmed that the rocket carried a nuclear reactor,” Thomas said. “I think they’re trying to contain all the rumors that are flying around.”

  “Did they downplay it?”

  “What else?” she said. “Indirectly, anyway. The spokesman offered a comparison between the Topaz’s estimated fifteen megawatts and San Onofre in California at over eleven hundred megawatts”

  “Also,” Larry Emry added, “about ten thousand college kids breached the CIS Embassy in Tokyo. The Japanese Defense Forces retrieved the embassy personnel in the nick of time by helicopter. The last we heard, something similar is happening in Seoul.”

  “Ten thousand?”

  “Somebody may be exaggerating. Then again, maybe not. There’s a little hysteria in the air.”

  Brande recalled images of the Saigon Embassy in 1975, with choppers lifting off the roof. He could not help but think that the Russians deserved having their turn, too.

  “I guess I’m going to worry about only the things over which I might have some control,” he said. “Kim, did you talk to your consulate?”

  She nodded, her dark, shining hair reflecting the overhead lights. “Yes, Dane. They were not extremely happy, but they acquiesced.”

  ‘Valeri? Svetlana?”

  Dankelov, as moody, as deep in thought as ever, only bobbed his head in affirmation.

  Under the harsh lights of the wardroom, Polodka’s face appeared flushed. She said, “We offered our services, but apparently they were not needed. I was assured that CIS naval forces have everything well in hand.”

  Dankelov looked over at her, but quite impassively. Brande wondered what was going on between the two of them now. He knew there had been a short-lived affair, and he had hoped at t
he time that it would blossom for them. It had not, and it had not affected their work, but he was certain there was some strain between them.

  “All right, then. I guess we’re a team again. Larry, you’re in charge of exploration. What are we going to do when we get there?”

  Emry wiped a trace of coffee from his mustache, then leaned forward in his chair and put his arms on the table. “I’ve installed our best oceanographic maps of the area back in the lab. Bob and I have been going over what’s known about the depths and the temperatures and calculating our sonar coverage at various depths. We should have final figures in the morning, which we’ll double-check with the Navy, and then I’ll lay out a search grid on top of the map. After we have some consensus, we’ll put it up on the computer.”

  “Starting where, Larry?”

  “I calculated a trajectory for the rocket, Dane. Knowing that it was at ninety thousand feet when it went over Tokyo helps to define its attitude when it hit the sea. All stages were apparently still attached, including the offset booster rockets. Anything could have happened immediately after it splashed down, and I suspect that it broke up. Still, my best guess is that it was nose down at about one hundred ten degrees from the vertical. It went in at one-seventy-six degrees, ten minutes, twenty-three seconds east, and my first judgment is that it drifted east as it sank. We’ll start there and work our way eastward first. Our north and south legs will get longer as we go east, anticipating that the wreckage could have veered farther north or south the farther east it went. Tomorrow, I’ll tell you how far apart our legs will be.”

  Brande knew the problems involved. Robert Ballard found the Titanic some twelve nautical miles from her last reported position before she went down, and that was in water depths of 13,000 feet. Poorly reported navigational positions, wind and water currents all contributed to the fact that she lay undiscovered for seventy-three years.

  “We’ll have to fly sonar from the DepthFinder,” Brande said.

  “Oh, I think so, with those depths,” Emry agreed.

  “I’ll make up crew lists and work shifts,” Brande said. “Let’s all get a good night’s sleep, and crank off in the morning. Okey, Valeri, Svetlana and Kim, your first priority is going to be Gargantua. If we don’t have an operable robot, it won’t much matter whether or not we find the Topaz.”

  The team members finished their coffee and stood, drifting from the wardroom. Dokey said, “You lucked out, Chief. You’re rooming with me in Cabin A.”

  “I’ll try not to feel honored, Okey.”

  Thomas stayed at the table across from him and waited until the others had departed. She had a fresh tinge of sun on her normally pale skin, and her platinum hair was windblown. Despite her long day, she looked as fresh as the sea had felt to Brande when he parachuted into it.

  “Bad news,” she said.

  “I don’t want to hear it.” He grinned. “You’re the president. You deal with it.”

  “You’re chairman. You need to know.”

  “Tell me.”

  “Jim Word called. They ran out of debris field.”

  “Already?”

  “Already. He and George Dawson recovered fourteen ingots, one cannon barrel, six goblets, and two plates. That’s it.”

  “Damn, Rae. That won’t go far, will it?”

  “No.”

  “There must be some good news,” he suggested.

  “On some of the ingots, they’ve got numbers, and they’ve got the name of a manufacturer on the cannon barrel.”

  “So we can check the Spanish archives and maybe determine the ship that carried them.”

  “End of the good news,” she said.

  “Well, we know the rest of the ship must be in the same area.”

  “East, west, north, or south?” she asked.

  “One of those.”

  “Are we going to waste time looking?” Thomas put her emphasis on wasting time.

  “Your decision,” he said. He ached to make it himself, but knew he would opt for wasting time. And money.

  “Really?”

  “It’s what you wanted. I’m doing my damnedest to stay out of your hair.”

  “It hasn’t even been a full day yet,” she said.

  “See how good Iʼve been?”

  Thomas shook her head from side to side. “I don’t know if this is going to work out.”

  “Sure it will.”

  “I mean, I don’t know if the company is going to survive, assuming the chief personnel survive this escapade. You’re risking all of the prime principals, you know?”

  “I know, Rae. I know. If it looks like we won’t make it, I’ll pull out.”

  She studied his face for a very long moment, then asked, “Promise?”

  “Cross my heart.” He did, with his forefinger. “My grandma taught me that”

  “I’d like to have met your grandma.”

  “You’d have loved her”

  “I’d have told her about some of the things she missed in rearing you.”

  Brande smiled. “What things?”

  “Another time, Dane. How much cash will we realize from Dawson?”

  “Maybe a million-one.”

  “I had hoped for more.”

  “In this business, it’s hope that carries you forward, Rae. But you can’t hope for too much, either.”

  She gave him a strange look. “Don’t preach, Dane. I’m well aware of that.”

  *

  1845 HOURS LOCAL, 22° 21' NORTH, 173° 51' WEST

  The Los Angeles had been running at a depth of sixty feet, her antennas deployed, so she could exchange messages with CINCPAC and the Kane.

  As she returned to a hundred feet of depth, Cmdr. Alfred Taylor left the control center and went aft to the sonar room, located on the starboard side of the submarine, off the electronic warfare room.

  Neil Garrison, the executive officer, was conferring with the chief sonarman, CPO Jim Tsosie. The sonar expert was a full-blooded Navajo with hearing that could distinguish between a pin or a needle dropped on a linoleum floor, or close to it.

  The sonar room was crammed with a sophisticated computer used to analyze sounds and frequencies picked up by the submarine’s sensors. The waterfall display, a video screen mounted on one bulkhead, provided visual evidence — bright lines and dots — of bearings to potential targets.

  At the moment, the screen displayed six targets.

  “What have we got, Chief?” Taylor asked.

  “The Philadelphia is closest, Skipper. She’s running parallel to us at five thousand yards, and the blade count says she’s doing thirty-one knots.”

  Taylor would never have inquired into Tsosie’s accuracy. If he did not recognize it, the computer’s data banks could match the distinctive propeller signatures of thousands of friendly and hostile craft.

  “Farther to the north, and thirty nautical miles behind us, are the Kane and the Bartlett. With the speed these ships are making, Skipper, no one’s trying to hide a sound. It doesn’t make the reading a lot easier, of course, because of the noise we’re making ourselves.”

  “What about the other three targets?”

  “I have not identified them specifically, sir. To the south, that one has to be a supertanker. She’s on a heading for Japan. To the west, those are smaller boats, both twin props. They’re probably yachts of some kind, and they’re falling into our track”

  “Thanks, Chief. Neil?”

  “It looks as if we’re going to have a lot of company on-site, Captain.”

  “CINCPAC says there’s some forty private vessels in the area or on the way to it. Chief, one of the first things you’ll need to do, once we get there, is identify the nonessential vessels, so you can squelch them out.”

  “Aye aye, Skipper.”

  “Also, Neil, the Kane will be the operation commander.”

  “Do we know the captain?” Garrison asked.

  “John Cartwright. His background is in oceanographic research, so he should b
e helpful.”

  Taylor passed one of his messages to Garrison. “Then, it seems that CINCPAC is gathering a whole bunch of experts. This is the search grid they’ve laid out for us. I want you to plot it so we can get familiar with it.”

  “Are the Philadelphia and the Houston getting the same stuff?”

  “They’ll be getting similar instructions as they surface to receive them. At 2400 hours, we’re scheduled to make contact with them to establish coordination.”

  Garrison grinned. “Did you ever try to coordinate an orgy, Skipper?”

  Taylor grinned back. “It’s getting worse. There’s a CIS patrol ship with a submersible on the way, as well as a Japanese research vessel.”

  The executive officer glanced at his watch. “Eighteen hours to go, Skipper. Then it gets confused.”

  “The Russians will get there first,” Taylor said. “It may be all over in eighteen hours.”

  “You a betting man?” Garrison asked.

  *

  1920 HOURS LOCAL, 26° 20' 2" NORTH, 176° 9' 59" EAST

  “All stop,” Captain Mikhail Gurevenich said. He had decided to surface slowly by pumping out water ballast rather than driving up on the diving planes. There were too many surface vessels present.

  “All stop,” echoed the seaman manning the engine room telegraph.

  The captain felt the Winter Storm go sluggish as she lost headway. The silence seemed intense after so many hours at top speeds. When the speed log displayed five knots, he ordered, “Come to the surface, Lieutenant Mostovets.”

  “Blowing ballast, Captain.”

  The lines and tanks hissed as compressed air forced water from the ballast tanks, located between the pressure and outer hulls and in the bow.

  “Control Center, Sonar.”

  Gurevenich leaned toward the communications panel on the bulkhead next to him and depressed the intercom button. “Control Center.”

  “I now have thirty-one contacts within five kilometers, all around us,” Sonarman Paramanov said, “The closest is fifty meters off the port bow.”

  “Identifications?”

  “I estimate that they are primarily civilian vessels, Captain. The U.S. naval frigate Bronstein has been computer-identified. It is at one-one-thousand meters, bearing one-three-seven. There is a gunboat of the Antelope class a thousand meters beyond the frigate.”