This had to be the conflict Lektereenah had been referring to.
Chase told Likteek to replay the recording again, then made a decision. “Lik, I need to go there…now. We need to get a small team together, some from every kel, and make the trip. I can talk with the Tailless, and the Ponkti too. Maybe I can defuse the situation, before it gets out of hand.”
Mokleeoh seemed moderately incensed that Chase was bypassing her but the Kel’metah could do that, in an emergency. She offered the help of the Omtorish court.
“You shall have all the kip’ts and supplies you need, Kel’metah. My engineers and technicians will provide everything.”
“Come on,” Chase said to Likteek. “Let’s go to the Lab. I need navigators and pilots too. We’ve got to plot a course to the South China Sea...the fastest possible route.”
Likteek gathered up his bulbs into a sack. “Is this a great distance, Kel’metah Chase? Many days?”
“Many, many days,” Chase told him. It’s on the other side of the world.”
Chapter 6
The South China Sea
Reed Banks
July 15, 2115
0800 hours
Chase and the Kel’metah’s force entered the South China Sea two weeks after leaving Keenomsh’pont, following repeater signals steadily broadcast from the new Ponkti settlement, now being built off a reef called Reed Banks. They found the sea a land of varied topography, with an oblong bowl-shaped depression in the center--a sub-basin it was called on the charts, dotted by a scattering of seamounts in the center, and ringed by hills, ridges, mountains, reefs and banks around the periphery. In places, the central basins were four to five thousand meters deep.
The Chinese had long called the sea Nan Zhongguo Hai. They viewed it as Chinese territory and when the Ponkti started erecting a small settlement near the Reed Banks, they decided to act.
The Seomish expedition consisted of three kip’ts. One was piloted by Chase, with Likteek along to sample and study the seas for Omt’or. A second kip’t was driven by Loptoheen, at the insistence of Lektereenah. “Ponkti will talk with Ponkti,” the Metah had said, “and no one else.” Chase found it expedient not to argue. The third kip’t was piloted by Manklu tel kel: Om’t, a long-time acquaintance of Chase and a veteran kip’t driver whose knowledge and experience would surely come in handy.
The trip from Keenomsh’pont to T’kel’rok, as the Ponkti called their crude encampment, took nearly two weeks. Here, Manklu’s experience paid dividends, as he was able to sniff out the faint trail of scent from the Ponkti and Skortish explorers and unerringly navigate through unfamiliar waters all the way into the South China Sea. Sea conditions varied from near polar ice south of Africa to temperate, even tropical waters across the Indian Ocean and through the Malacca Straits. Turning north along the Malay archipelago brought them into waters heavily populated with clownfish, puffer, roundhead and jack and thick with fantastic and colorful beds of brain coral and intricate reefs thick with anemone.
They homed on the scent of the Ponkti settlers…” smells like tillet in heat,” Loptoheen liked to say and found the settlement wedged at the base of a massive sandbank that the human maps called Iroquis Reef. The small fleet of kip’ts nosed down and warily circled the scattering of tents, berthpods and canopies before alighting outside the camp onto the sandy seabed, among dense swarms of black and orange angelfish.
Loptoheen got out and nuzzled his kelmates and they talked for awhile. There were five Ponkti and several others at T’kel’rok. Loptoheen said they were Skortish. The camp commander was called Gozu…a distant relative of Loptoheen’s, in fact.
Gozu described their predicament. Loptoheen translated from the Ponkti dialect, but Chase’s echopod had trouble keeping up.
“The Tailless harass us constantly. Even now…there, you can see it—” Gozu pointed off beyond a gently waving bed of sea grass. Chase hadn’t noticed the small sub before. “—they watch us. Sometimes, they approach with their strange craft and try to interfere with construction…Kezmek here-“he indicated one of the Skortish, “lost two fingers the other day. The craft has arms that grab and pinch. You can’t get away. We had to amputate Kezmek’s fingers to free him.”
Likteek drifted closer to the sub, against strict warnings from Gozu and Loptoheen. It resembled the craft they had encountered near Keenomsh’pont weeks before, the one that had ultimately grabbed Chase. Chase went after the scientist to keep him from doing anything stupid.
“Don’t get too close,” he warned Likteek.
“I’m just studying their ship,” he replied. “Plus, I’ve got this—” He held up a small pod in his forepaddles. Chase recognized the signaler.
“What are you planning to do?”
Likteek paused at some sea grass and they partially hid themselves in the undulating stalks, as the Tailless craft had started up. Now it was coming directly at them.
“I was hoping to give them this, so we could begin to communicate. We can’t have relations if we can’t talk.”
They both hovered nervously as the sub approached. Likteek was right; it did resemble the one they had seen at Keenomsh’pont. It was a small craft, with a stubby sail atop a teardrop hull, enclosing a pressure sphere, with portholes. Both of them could see faces and movement inside; there seemed to be several creatures operating the sub. The bow was festooned with all manner of effectors, manipulators, grabbers and claws surrounding an intricate sample basket below the ‘chin’ of the sphere.
Ten meters separated them from the ship when it stopped. Cautiously, against Chase’ wishes, Likteek edged out of his hiding place and stroked toward the sub. In one motion, he flippered by at a tangent and dropped the signaler pod in the sample basket and scooted off, diving back into the sea grass as fast as he could. Chase breathed easier when Likteek returned. It had been a courageous, even foolhardy, thing to do, but it had worked.
They watched in fascination as the sub’s manipulator arms closed on the pod, lifted it out of the basket and brought the device up to a porthole. Faces peered in the porthole.
“They’re examining it,” Chase said. “Wondering what it is.”
“Here, I’ll turn it on,” Likteek said. He had the sister signaler in his other hand and honked sharply at the thing, activating it with sound commands. It whirred, vibrated and then hummed. Ten meters away, the signaler in the sub’s manipulator did the same thing.
It so startled the humans that the manipulator nearly dropped the pod. Presently, the sub turned about and motored off, its propulsors spinning gently, trailing bubbles in its wake. Soon it was gone.
“I just sent a message,” Likteek said. “I used the Tailless language algorithms you recorded a long time ago and sent this: WE MEET. Several times. I don’t know if they’ll understand.”
“Come on,” Chase said. He guided Likteek out of the sea grass. “Let’s get back. We may be getting a signal from them soon.”
They didn’t have long to wait. As the settlers and the visitors were dining on a catch of red-breasted wrasse, Likteek’s signaler went off. It hummed and beeped several times, a series of whistles and grunts and barks that Chase’s echopod could barely translate.
“What does it say?” he asked. He wiped fish entrails from his mouth, sucked on gisu fruit for the juice and dove back into what was left of the meal.
Likteek checked with Loptoheen on the message. “I think it says something like FOLLOW SUB…or FOLLOW KIP’T. It seems they want us to accompany some craft to their own kel.”
It was Gozu who heard the familiar whir of the little sub nearby. Startled, he grabbed a prod while the Skortish grabbed sound grenades and they slipped out from beneath the canopy. They halted when they realized the little sub was scarcely fifty meters away, easing forward, its manipulator arms retracted.
Gozu was already waving his comrades to take up flanking positions but Likteek warned them off. “I think they want us to follow. Chase—”
Chase came up. “Why
me? I’ve already been snagged by one of these bastards once.”
Likteek said, “You’re half Tailless. You know how they think. Why don’t you get a kip’t started up? I think they want us to follow them…at least, that’s what the signaler said.”
Loptoheen was opposed. “It’s a trap. They want us where they can grab us, just like eekoti Chase.”
Likteek corrected him. “Kel’metah Chase, Loptoheen. Remember who you’re talking to. Even the Ponkti agreed to this.”
That reminder brought only a savage growl from the Ponkti tukmaster. “We don’t recognize such things out here. These are Ponkti waters now. But to keep everything calm, I’ll get a kip’t.” He waved Gozu and his men back. Two kip’ts were brought up, as they watched the sub hovering. The humans made no effort to move any closer.
They boarded the kip’ts, Chase and Likteek in one, Loptoheen and Gozu in the other. Kezmet and the rest would stay behind to guard the settlement and their supplies and weapons.
“I don’t trust the Tailless at all,” Loptoheen spat over the comm circuit. “I’d sooner trust a mah’jeet plague. At least, you know what you’re getting into.”
Despite their concerns and suspicions, the kip’ts approached the sub, which turned about and motored off toward the northwest. Chase and Loptoheen drove their kip’ts at a respectful distance, but kept in contact. It wasn’t hard for the kip’t’s sniffers to follow the scent of the Tailless craft.
“Smells like dead pal’penk,” said Loptoheen sourly.
They traveled for what seemed like several hours, saying little, but keeping a watchful eye on everything around them.
Chase nervously eyed the seabed rising steadily as they maneuvered toward what he had no idea. The topography became rougher, less sandy, with fewer plants and grass, and was noticeably more rugged and folded, the terrain dotted with pillows and boulders and slabs of dark rock streaked with veins of a white substance.
“We’re heading for some large land mass,” he told Likteek. “I don’t know exactly where we are but whatever it is, it’s big. Maybe an island.”
“Surface traffic is increasing too,” Likteek observed. “Quite noisy around here.”
But they kept in contact with the small sub and continued on.
Presently, Likteek noticed his small beatscope at the bottom of the cockpit going haywire. “There’s a strong magnetic field nearby, very strong.”
The little sub headed for the surface and Chase did likewise, after making Likteek climb awkwardly into his mobilitor. He had to remind himself that the scientist was no amphibian as he was, no em’took procedure had ever been done on the researcher and, if Likteek had his way, none ever would.
Notwater, even proximity to Notwater, was deadly to Seomish. Even Loptoheen would have to be mindful of that. The other kip’t stayed well below the surface, while Chase let the bow of his own kip’t breach and looked around, as they wallowed in the wake of the sub.
They were approaching an island, a major naval base, from the looks of it. Later, he would learn that the Chinese called the base Longpo. It seemed to be a submarine base. Astern of them lay a small enclosed jetty with low buildings. Had he been able to read the Hanyu script of the Chinese characters, he would have learned that the jetty was a submarine de-magnetizing facility. To his left, submarines were moored at several piers, a huge open-truss bridge crane hovering over one as supplies and stores were loaded onboard.
He had let Likteek steer the kip’t, always keeping the sound and scent of the small sub ahead of them. As they steered through the harbor area, they passed several small patrol craft, which circled and followed them from astern, like a dog herding sheep. Sailors manned deck guns on each patrol boat.
Escorts, Chase realized. We’re being escorted somewhere. He told Likteek to stay on course and maintain speed and distance. “Don’t do anything stupid…or sudden. Tell Loptoheen that, too.”
Likteek’s voice was sardonic. “Perhaps you should tell Loptoheen this. You are Kel’metah, after all.”
They were being steadily escorted and when he studied their surroundings, he saw where. Looming ahead of them was large hill covered in green vegetation and at the base of the hill, right at water’s edge, were two tunnel openings.
An underground tunnel, Chase muttered. “There must be a submarine base inside that mountain.”
He dropped back to his seat and took back control of the kip’t from Likteek, who relinquished it gladly.
They submerged and then Loptoheen called up on the comm circuit.
“This is a trap. We shouldn’t go in there,” he warned.
“You may be right, but we don’t have much choice,” Chase replied. “Keep your weapons primed and ready. We just want to talk, if they’re willing to listen.
The two kip’ts entered the tunnel, warily, slowly, still following in the wake of the little sub.
The tunnel was hewn right out of the rock bowels of the mountain, with stalactites reaching down from the ceiling above and up from the seabed below. A series of closely-spaced straight lines striped the rugged walls of the tunnel. Coring lines for explosive charges, Chase realized. The tunnel had been blasted and excavated right out of the innards of the mountain.
The light level had fallen off inside the tunnel but was now brightening again. They were coming to some kind of open space. The little sub surfaced. Chase and Loptoheen elected to stay below, but even through the shimmer of the water above them, they could tell that they had entered a vast cavern hewn right out of the interior rock of the hill.
By mutual consent, Chase and Loptoheen brought both kip’ts to a complete stop, hovering alongside a sheer cliff sculpted from rock that led up to a series of wharves and piers above them. A massive craft lay dead ahead.
“Probably a submarine,” Chase said. “And a big one. We’re inside an underground base.”
“Like being inside a seamother,” marveled Likteek. He studied his sounders, sniffers and the beatscope, trying to record everything. Chase smiled: a dedicated scientist to the end.
“What now, Kel’metah?” Loptoheen’s voice sneered at them from the other kip’t.
“Let’s get out and surface,” Chase decided. “Carefully…you and me. Bring your weapons. I’ll bring an echopod.”
The dock area was lined with machine shops, an optical shop, more workshops, a munitions bunker, well-guarded by marines, and more offices. Submersible operators Xi Zhilin and Guang Kejiang had finally emerged from the small sub—it was called Dragonfish…Long yu in Chinese…they wiped sweat from dirt-streaked faces and headed out along the pier, looking for something cold to drink. Just as they barged into the dock office, a commotion erupted from alongside the pier, somewhere aft of the boat. Xi stopped in the door, then stepped back out.
The waters at the entrance to the pen seemed to be boiling and foaming. Something was surfacing…Xi’s stomach did a backflip when he realized it was one of the tiny craft that had been following them for several hours. The Americans had followed them somehow, after days of playing cat and mouse with Dragonfish. They’d photographed the strange underwater base, pinged it with active sonar, sniffed the waters for telltale emissions. They’d even shot at the thing.
Then the creatures had dropped off some kind of signaling device. After some fumbling and cursing, they’d finally seen and understood the message, in English. WE MEET. After consulting with Commander Jiang at Ops, they had been given permission to try to draw the creatures out and escort them to Longpo base. And now they were here, right inside the main compound.
It had to be the Americans. Or maybe the British. And incredibly, they had followed Dragonfish right into the submarine pens at Longpo.
A nearby marine officer shouted. “Shoot! Fire! Drive them off!”
Even his comrade Guang was spooked by the sight, grabbing a pistol from a yeoman, and peppering the water with shots. Others joined in the fusillade and soon the sub pen echoed with weapons fire. Men yelled. Sailors and marines and d
ock hands scurried along both sides of the pier, raking the water with fire, seemingly with no effect.
The little craft submerged again but didn’t go far. It glided further into the pen, looking just like a small whale, dorsal fins, stubby forward flukes, its supple body whipping back and forth. It approached the larger boat, known as the Xichang. She was a fast-attack boat in the PLA Navy.
Xi had a thought. Maybe it was just a whale that had followed them, confused, hungry, lost. It had happened. Or maybe they were American saboteurs.
The craft or whale paused at a small diving platform, suspended over the edge of the dock. Already, inside the dive shop windows, two men half-clad in dive gear had poked their heads out; they would have been inspecting the outer hull of the Xichang in another hour, looking for leaks, dents, loose fittings, mangled valves. Now, they ducked back into the shop amidst the volley of rounds flying around the pen.
The water around the dive platform foamed vigorously and two heads poked above the water’s surface. The heads were beaked, rounded and plated as if armored.
Xi finally saw them and sucked in his breath. Qianshuiyuan, he decided. American frogmen, combat divers, carried to Longpo to sabotage the boats. They had to be stopped.
Others saw the frogmen. They scurried to the side where the dive platform was suspended, momentarily stunned at the sight of the divers hauling themselves up onto the partially submerged platform.
Only when the first diver came fully in view, standing erect, did Xi realize this was no American frogman.
“Wo de shangdi…Zhe shi shenme?” What the hell--?
The diver was much taller or longer than any human Xi had ever seen. Easily three meters, if not more. The dive suit resembled a dolphin from its mid-section up, complete with beak, eyeholes, forelimbs and odd appendages he had no idea what they were. Below the mid-section, were two legs, seemingly mechanized, for they moved with a jerky, mechanical action that belied the natural look of its forebody. One of the forelimbs held some kind of device. It was cylindrical with a horn-shaped opening at one end. The diver aimed the device at the startled men.
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