by Ted Bell
“Easy . . . easy . . . she’s almost down!”
One crewman grabbed the bow while another steered the stern. The yellow sub slowly dropped until the hull nestled into a cradle on the deck. With a hydraulic hiss, two gull-wing doors to either side of the sub’s hull rose up. Inside was a gleaming high-tech interior, a cross between a Ferrari and the starship Enterprise. There were two black leather seats, mounted abreast of each other and one pilot’s seat mounted slightly forward, the center one, which gave access to the control panels and joystick.
“We’ll communicate through headphones,” Volodya said, slipping a pair of bright red Beats over his ears. Hawke did the same. He suppressed a laugh at what he heard being played over the audio system: the Beatles’ “Yellow Submarine.”
Of course. Putin was Putin, nothing more to it than that.
After Putin hit a button that caused the gull-wing doors to hiss shut and gave a thumbs-up to the crewman standing at the sub’s bow, Hawke felt the sub lifting beneath him.
Slowly, suspended from the overhead track, the sub moved outboard until it was hanging about six feet above the wave-tossed surface of the sea.
“All buckled in?” he heard Putin say in his headphones.
“Affirmative.”
Frothy seawater was soon washing up over the sub’s bulbous forward plexi hatches, resembling nothing so much as the bulging eyes of a fly enlarged by a factor of ten thousand.
“You’ve been deep before, Alex?”
“Nothing like this.”
Their descent seemed rapid, though without casting a glance at the depth instruments, Hawke really had no idea. He contented himself by peering out into the briny stew of life in the biosphere beyond his world and the thin web of pearlescent streams of tiny bubbles rising before his eyes. String theory, he thought, and it made sense in the state he was in . . .
Mesmerizing . . . hypnotic. Drug induced? He banished such thoughts immediately as to admit that paranoid notion into current circumstances would seriously . . . impair his ability to fight. . . . to resist whatever . . . besides, would Putin really go to this much trouble to simply dispose of him? Well—best not go there.
Sputnik II dropped into the abyss.
Occasionally his host would comment on what they were seeing.
“See that little goggle-eyed monster?” Putin said, out of the blue-tinged darkness of the sub’s interior. “With eyes on the ends of his stalks?”
“How could I miss it?”
“For centuries scientists believed life was impossible down here. The total absence of light, extreme cold, the unbelievable pressure . . . all would have combined to extinguish any form of life. Or so they thought. In fact the reverse is true. We will be soon passing through the two-hundred-meter mark into the Mesopelagic wonderland. It’s the ‘Twilight Zone.’ Faint sunlight but no photosynthesis. Most of the light you’ll see will be nonsolar, bioluminescence.”
“Life at this depth?” Hawke said, peering out into the murk. “I can’t imagine.”
“You have to learn to see with new eyes, Alex.”
“Obviously. . . . What the hell is that?”
“I call it the ‘Death Star Jelly.’ Stunning, isn’t it?”
“Hollywood couldn’t come up with that monster if it tried.”
“Alex, you may find this hard to believe, but the zone below two hundred meters is the most prolific home to organic life on the entire planet. It took the invention of machines like this one to make that discovery.”
“Fascinating. Seriously, Volodya, I’m indebted to you for sharing all this with me.”
He looked over at Putin and saw a grin split his mask of forward-looking concentration.
“As the American darkies down south say, ‘You ain’t seen nothin’ yet’ . . .”
They plunged even deeper into the abyss.
CHAPTER 32
Five thousand yards and closing,” Alex heard Putin say in his headphones, “Let’s light it up . . .”
He reached forward and flipped down four toggle switches on the main panel. The world outside exploded into pure white light as the sub’s surrounding halo of high-intensity lanterns illuminated. Hawke instinctively leaned forward scanning his eyes back and forth, looking for the silhouette of the sunken Arkhangel waiting for him somewhere out there on the undulating plain of the seabed.
When Hawke finally saw it, it loomed up so suddenly that he feared Sputnik II’s impact was imminent. For some curious reason, they had come upon it at such a high rate of speed Putin had to haul back on the yoke and execute a steep vertical climb up the side of the corroded hull before leveling off and diving hell-bent between the two smokestacks, flipping the boat over onto one side to squeeze through.
“Fun, no?” Putin said, glancing over at him.
“Stunt like that would stiffen the back of a jellyfish.”
“Ha.”
By the look on Putin’s face, Hawke believed the near miss had been intentional. Volodya was just having a little fun with the veteran flyboy captive in his jump seat. Even without visual contact with the freighter, Putin had been watching their rapid approach on his radar screen. He’d known exactly what he was doing.
“That was fun, actually,” Hawke said mildly. “You enjoy all this, don’t you, screaming around down here in the darkness all by yourself?”
“I do. It’s as close as I’ll ever get to flying.”
“I suppose so. I must say doing it while getting shot at adds immeasurably to the fun.”
Putin laughed. “I’m terribly jealous of all you combat flyboys. My eyes weren’t good enough. I was good at judo, that’s all. You had quite an aerial career, Alex. Some said you had a perfect genius for air combat.”
“Owe it to my grandfather, I suppose. He flew Sopwith Camels with the Flying Corps over the Ardennes in the first war. There were plenty of trick flyers around in those early days, and plenty who knew more about the science of the new game than he did, but there was no one else with quite his magic for an actual scrap. The old fellow was as full of dodges a couple of miles up in the sky as he’d been among the rocks in the Berg. He knew how to hide in the empty air as cleverly as in the long grass of the Serengeti.”
“What was his secret?”
“Secret? He was a right brave young bastard, not sure that he had a secret. But he had this theory he explained to me when I first set out to earn my wings. ‘Every man has a blind spot,’ he said, and he knew just how to find that blind spot up there in the world of air. The best cover, he maintained, was not in a cloud or a wisp of fog, but in the elusive unseeing patch in the eye of your enemy.”
“I like that.”
“Me, too. Somehow, I recognized all that talk of his for the real thing. It was on a par with his theory of the ‘perfect atmosphere’ and ‘the double bluff’ and all the other air combat principles that his queer old mind had cogitated out of his rickety military life . . . but it worked for him. And I guess a bit of it rubbed off on me.”
Hawke’s mind drifted off, watching Putin deftly maneuver the craft through, around, and inside the narrow crevices between the upper reaches of the giant ship’s superstructure. When he tired of that game, he angled upward until they were floating a few hundred feet above the moldering monolith stretched out below.
Putin throttled back even more, and they hovered there above the sunken giant. She was remarkably intact, although submersion at this depth had done its best to eradicate her. Her hull was a deep iron red, and the superstructure appeared to be slowly melting toward the broad decks. Her railings were mostly intact and one could imagine what a prize she must have been as viewed through the periscope of an attacking U-boat.
“I’ll give you a quick stem to stern tour, Alex. It’s quite something to see, is it not?” Putin put the sub over to port and circled just beneath the bowsprit before cruising down the length of the vessel, remaining about twenty feet just off her port-side hull . . .
It was a sight. But Hawke coul
d not imagine Putin would go to all this trouble just to show him a forgotten and rusty relic of the Second World War. Five minutes later, the tour was over. Putin slowly allowed Sputnik II to drift upward until they arrived amidships, hovering directly above the two towering smokestacks.
When he was centered about thirty feet over the forward-most of the two stacks, he brought the sub to a stop, setting the propulsion system to maintain their position against the strong and shifting currents. He got very busy all of a sudden, adjusting the angle of the halo lights, turning on all the sub’s many sound recorders and video cameras and adjusting their positions—
“What’s going on?” Hawke asked, although he had a fair suspicion.
“We’ve finally come to the demonstration portion of today’s adventure.”
“Let me guess. The Feuerwasser?”
“What else? Now watch closely. I’m going to engage the articulating arm nestled above our heads. You can see everything through the twin overhead portholes . . .”
Putin used the thrusters to maneuver into the desired position, slightly above and roughly thirty feet from the forward stack. Only then did he take control of the forty-foot arm.
Hawke craned his head back and took a look. As he watched, the articulated arm slowly unfolded and extended itself upward and to the right. Putin used the most delicate of corrections until the small pincerlike mechanism at the very tip of the armature was where he wanted it. It was now positioned over the yawning black opening of the forward smokestack.
“Notice the object grasped by the pincers,” Putin said.
In the fierce cold white light, Hawke could see the tiny vial of explosive gripped in the steel claws.
“Why here?” Hawke said, though he already had a pretty good idea. Bomber pilots had long tried to drop their loads down the stacks of enemy vessels at sea, because they fell all the way to the engine room and keel before detonating.
“It’s a straight shot down to the bowels of the ship where the explosion will be most effective.”
“So I can expect to see more than a puff of smoke rising from the stack?” Hawke said, not being able to help himself.
“Considerably more. We’re a hundred miles offshore. Were we at fifty, the mushroom of water on the surface would terrify the pedestrians marching along the Croisette. As it is, we’ll cause a blip on the undersea seismographers’ screens comparable to a minor earthquake.”
It was still difficult to believe that this substance, in such a minute quantity of clear liquid, could have any such dramatic effect as Putin was describing. On the other hand, Hawke knew Volodya was not the type to drag him all the way out here to the bottom of the sea just to embarrass himself. Maybe, Hawke thought, the Russian scientists actually had created the perfect explosive.
“Oh, yes. I think you’ll see a great deal more. Here goes—”
Putin carefully made minute adjustments that adjusted the articulated arm and twisted the slender pincers in a counterclockwise motion.
“That should do it,” he said, a strong note of anticipation in his voice. Not until the explosive device was upright and dead center did he toggle the switch that released it. Not until just before the glass vial dropped out of sight, down into the bowels of the ship, did Hawke notice that some sort of tiny electrical mechanism had been screwed into the mouth of the tube. The fuse, no doubt. What had Putin called it? The lead azide blasting plug, whatever the hell that was.
The sub shot forward and away from the wreck.
“All right,” Putin said, throttling up and giving a series of short bursts of the stern thrusters. “Let’s get the hell out of here. The tiniest bit of electric leakage could trigger that little fucker and we don’t want to be anywhere near Arkhangel when she goes up, believe me.”
“You’ve done this before, I take it?”
“Blown up sunken ships? No, no. I didn’t have to. I know exactly what my little love potion is capable of, Alex. In a few moments, so shall you. By the way, the French naval authorities are well aware that we’re out here today. Not only do we have their permission, we are receiving some kind of official commendation from the Cousteau Society for creating a massive artificial reef to encourage more sea life out here. I asked that your name be inscribed on the citation of merit beside my own.”
Hawke shook his head in wonder.
“You are really something, Volodya. I have to say that.”
CHAPTER 33
It took thirty minutes to get safely out of the Arkhangel blast zone. According to Putin, if they remained any closer, the explosion’s pressure wave, and the resulting shock wave, would implode Sputnik II instantly. Underwater explosions, called UNDEX by scientists, were far more lethal than the equivalent aboveground. Underwater, the surrounding water doesn’t absorb the pressure like air does, but moves with it. As a result, undersea explosions transmit pressure with far greater intensity over far longer distances.
There were two large monitors on the control panel and Putin was surveying the scene using the high-powered telescopic lenses. The picture wasn’t crystal clear, but Hawke could easily make out the massive red freighter standing stolidly atop the vast undersea plain.
Putin was busy making sure all his photographic needs had been attended to: lighting, focus, all film and video cameras locked in on the impending scene of destruction.
Putin looked over at him, his face expressionless.
“Ready?” he said.
“Ready,” Hawke replied.
“Well,” Putin said quietly, “hold on to your hat, Lord Hawke.”
With that, he reached forward with his index finger pointed at the “Fire Control” panel and pushed a single flashing yellow button in the middle.
There was a millisecond of hesitation before the whole undersea world was transformed into an ever-expanding field of white-hot light emanating from the disintegrating Arkhangel. The big red hulk had already disappeared from view on the monitors, but a dangerous glare remained inside Sputnik II’s tiny cabin and Hawke reflexively covered his eyes for fear of being blinded.
“Shock wave coming,” Putin said. “Brace yourself.”
It hit them hard.
The sub’s bow was lifted straight up and flipped over on its back; thrown violently backward, the craft tumbled end over end inside the pressure wave, helplessly twisting and turning in the maelstrom of enormous shock created by the epic blast.
There was simply nothing for Hawke to do, except hold on to the handhold atop the control panel with both hands, trying to avoid a head injury if possible. Helmets? Why the hell hadn’t they donned helmets? Putin fought the controls, trying desperately to use the thrusters to regain stability. But it was hopeless . . . and getting worse. Soon, tiny jet streams of water began to spout, streaming from the edges of the thick glass portholes . . . and the fierce screeching noises of the hull being compressed to the breaking point were sufficient to cause Hawke to fear the worst.
And the most alarming part? They were in uncharted waters. A thousand feet down in a damaged machine that was out of control. He could remember a few times feeling this helpless, at the mercy of events, but not often. He cursed himself for allowing Putin to talk him into this insane experiment in underwater demolition. The sub was nothing but a hobby. And Putin had clearly not employed experts to predict the power of the heretofore untested new explosive.
Alex had had a niggling notion, an almost psychic premonition that Putin might try something stupid during this visit. He’d try to disable him or even take him out . . . but . . . a murder-suicide? No. This was just an utter lack of understanding of the surreal power of the explosive he was playing with at this ridiculous depth. And Hawke, well, he was simply unlucky enough or stupid enough to have gone along for the ride.
Putin’s struggles continued for an eternity that probably lasted all of five minutes. But eventually he regained control of the systems. And, miraculously, he finally managed to actually right the ship. Once that was accomplished, he align
ed all the thrusters on the same vector—out of the blast current—and he gave it one final blast . . . they shot forward . . .
And ended up in calm water.
“Jesus Christ,” Hawke said, as soon as he could speak.
“I had no idea,” Putin said. “Are you hurt?”
“No. But for God’s sake, Volodya!”
“Do you want to return to the mother ship? Or go back and have a look at the debris field?”
“I want a bloody rum is what I want. But to hell with it. Let’s go see what’s left of the monster. Maybe the next guy will have a better idea what the hell he’s dealing with regarding this stuff you’ve invented. Because you didn’t, Volodya. You clearly had no idea.”
“Yeah,” Putin said, bristling. He was not a man used to criticism from any quarter, let alone a tall and good-looking enemy British intelligence officer.
Hawke said, “Look. I’ve got a son. I’m all he’s got. As you well know, his poor mother’s practically a prisoner in one of your KGB training camps. So, for better or worse, I’m it. He cannot afford to lose his father.”
“You want me to apologize?”
“I want to see if you’re man enough.”
“I’m sorry, Alex. I made a stupid mistake.”
Hawke made no reply.
THERE WAS A CRATER WHERE the freighter had been.
Maybe a quarter of a mile across and a hundred feet deep. The ship itself was gone. Utterly obliterated. Tiny glittering bits of scrap metal were scattered for miles across the seabed for as far as they could see in any direction. There were a few objects of any size at all out there, only a smattering of crumpled hunks of metal about the size of a Volkswagen. But they were few and far between.
Most of Arkhangel?
Vaporized.
By less than a fluid ounce of something called Feuerwasser.
The two men spent the return voyage to Tsar in silence, each man alone with his thoughts about what he had just witnessed, and what it meant.