The egg was held precariously by one strap and he wanted to try to get it by at least two for security. “How secure is that knot?”
“I don’t know. It’s a knot. It’s held so far, hasn’t it?”
“I guess so. I’m going to try to… damn it!”
Without the sense of touch, he had no way of knowing how delicately he was holding the egg. With the slightest retraction of the claw, the egg fell free. Before he could grab it, the padded packet rolled behind him. Instantly he turned the sub to retrieve it. “Where is it? Do you see it?”
“Nothing,” Aisling said. “It must be sinking!”
John turned the nose downward to chase it blindly into the depths. “Got to catch it!”
“Are you sure it doesn’t float?” she asked. Looking up and behind her she saw the bundle. “John! We got it!”
John turned his head to see the egg caught on the center tail fin of the sub. It looked to be fairly secure so they angled back up and toward the Princess. As he accelerated upward, he took notice of the sonar. The lio was coming to meet them.
“Not good! It must’ve picked up the scent already.”
“Is that it?” she said, desperately suppressing her terror.
John banked and headed westward at full throttle. “That’s our boy! Now let’s see what this baby can do.”
The Liopleurodon’s sense of smell far exceeded their expectations and it immediately turned away from Beau at the first scent of the egg. It swam in stalking mode until it caught sight of the tiny vessel. The scent lined up with this sleek thing and the beast now had visual on its target. It kicked hard with its front flippers and gave chase.
“John, I think it’s gaining on us. Was that your plan?”
“Yes. Except for the part about it gaining on us.”
“What can we do?”
John could think of only one response and he couldn’t bring himself to ask her to pray. He had the sub flat out and the powerful hunter was gaining on them. “Incredible. They’re not supposed to go that fast. Nothing that big is.” There was an undeniable tone of admiration as he watched the monster close in on the man-made pod.
“If I told you I loved you, would it mean anything at all under the circumstances?” he asked her.
Aisling realized she had been digging her fingernails into his shoulders for several minutes. She eased her grip and almost smiled. “Not really. Your timing stinks.”
“In that case I was talking to the sub.”
A dark shadow whizzed over his head large enough to blanket the entire sub and fast enough to be past in a blink. They looked back, stunned at the unbelievable sight. The Loch Ness Plesiosaur had picked up the scent from miles away and made unnatural speed to get there. The sixty-foot ples struck the unsuspecting lio from above and bit hard on the back of its neck. The lio turned and writhed against the grip. The larger beast twisted and bit the ples by her front flipper.
It had her and surely would have finished her had it not been attacked by a second ples. The larger male grasped it by the front fin and it immediately released the female. It lashed at him with its massive jaws but the lithe reptile arched its neck out of reach.
The two smaller hunters circled the lio. Their necks were coiled like rattlesnakes as they parried for a drop in the giant’s defenses. It looked at the male to be sure it was a safe distance, and then turned to threaten the female. The male straightened his long neck and clamped down on the lio’s throat just behind his jaw. It reeled and tried to twist out but the female attacked from behind.
“The big one is having trouble,” Aisling said.
“The gas,” John thought aloud. “I bet the gas is slowing it down. It would have killed one of them by now.” John watched the epic clash of titans in awe until he realized that no matter who wins, they would lose. “We have to get out of here. The first one that’s free is coming after us.”
“Can you drop the egg? Aisling asked.
“I can’t shake it loose.”
“Can the arm reach it?” Aisling asked.
“No. It’s too far back. I’ll have to hook it on something. Or just make for shore and beach it.”
“If that means we get out of the water, I’m for it.”
As they neared the coast and shallower waters, John steered the mini-sub along the bottom, maneuvering around the rocks and protrusions. “Keep an eye out for anything that comes after us.”
Aisling scanned the sea fearfully. “Wouldn’t it be faster to go up?”
“It would. But would you be able to see it coming from below us?”
“No. I can barely see up.”
“There you go. Our only hope is to see it and duck. Besides, I’m still trying to knock this egg off our tail.”
Aisling looked directly above them. Somewhere closer to the surface she watched the ominous silhouette of the Plesiosaur snaking through the water. Its head rocked back and forth as it paddled along. It was searching for them.
“Any chance of losing that egg?”
“Nah. It’s staying just behind us. I can’t get it hooked on anything.”
“Then I think our time is about up.”
John looked and she pointed to the giant predator just as it turned and dove toward them. “It picked us up!”
Aisling looked up to see the silhouette coming down toward them. John opened the throttle full wide and the mini-sub cut through the water and sped toward the shoreline.
“How fast is this thing?”
John was focused on navigating the rocky ocean floor at top speed. “Twenty-two knots. Maybe more.”
“How fast is that thing?”
“At least that. This sub was designed to chase that animal. Not the other way around.” John swung around a large jutting rock. The ocean shallowed ahead but the shore was still nearly a mile off. “Where is it?”
Aisling bent her neck to find the ples. It was above them and descending at an angle. “Closer, but still not on us.”
The instruments on the control panel in front of John were lit and functioning. He came up just enough to clear some of the obstructions and make navigating a bit easier. He dared glance down to the ultra-sonic monitor. This gave a readout of the terrain without the water. It created a 3-D graphic image showing rocks, caves and tunnels.
“Look out!” Aisling screamed.
John looked up and narrowly missed a jagged peak. “Too close. Can you see this monitor?”
Aisling leaned forward and tried to see around him. “Which one?”
“The one with the green lines. U-S-G. See it?”
“Yes! What am I looking for?”
“It’s giving you a shape of the floor. Look for a narrow tunnel or hole that we can get in but that thing can’t.” He skillfully piloted the speedy torpedo but the ples was beating him in a flat race. At this speed he could turn sharper but with nothing to turn around he had to hope to keep out of reach until they came to the shallow water.
“There!” Aisling shouted, pointing to the screen. “Is that a cave?”
John looked at the configuration she was pointing to. It was indeed a cave. Hidden by kelp and debris, the mouth was easily big enough for him to drive through. The scan showed it deep enough to outreach the scan.
“Do you see a smaller one?”
“Nothing we can fit in. What’s wrong with that one?”
“I can’t see how deep it is and the ples can fit in it too. If it follows us to a dead end we’re trapped.”
Aisling turned and shuddered at the sight of the Plesiosaur only fifty feet behind them. “It’s got us, John!”
John could see it on the sonar and that was good enough. He banked to the right and dove into the mouth of the cave. His running lights lit the cave well ahead but he couldn’t move as fast as he needed to.
“Sweetheart. I need you to be my eyes. I’ll steer. You watch that monitor and tell me what’s coming.”
Aisling studied the USG monitor. “It curves up and to the left.”
r /> “Where?”
“Watch for it.”
The tunnel rose in front of them. Had John been navigating solely by sight, this would have appeared to be a solid wall until he was close enough to see up. He pulled up and veered left as she had instructed. The tunnel broadened ahead.
“There’s an opening to the right. Watch the floor.”
“There it is. I see it.”
“It’ll go down twenty feet then turn left and up again. It looks like it goes up for a while.”
“Gotcha!” John hit the narrow opening and executed the turn as directed. So fast did they shoot through that he dared look at the sonar for his tail. There was no trace of the beast.
They continued forward through the cave. The powerful Halogen lights revealed an ominous looking opening in the rock. It was twenty feet high in most places, though irregular on the upper and lower surfaces. The odd thing was the width. The cave seemed to go on forever in both directions. Aisling checked the monitor and confirmed the opening narrowed less than a hundred meters ahead and no traceable opening large enough to accommodate them. The USG could see no real end to the lateral walls of the cavern.
“This is almost unnatural,” Aisling gasped.
“To the contrary. This is the most natural, unspoiled piece of earth I’ve ever seen.”
“It looks like the earth got ripped open. Just torn apart.”
“Put together would be more like it. This is the fault line between two continental plates. They don’t quite fit everywhere but it doesn’t matter.”
“So we’re trapped between a rock and a hard continent?”
“We’re not trapped at all. We’re in the bottom of the loch.”
“Loch Ness?”
“This is what formed it. That rock below us is Scotland as it was a few hundred million years ago. The one up there is the other one that crashed into Scotland. It’s climbing over it at a rate of about an inch a century. That’s what formed the highlands.”
“Hey! God made the highlands. Don’t make me come up there.”
John cruised along the cave letting the instruments search for a way out. Anything but the way they came would work. The small zigzag entrance to this massive cave was blocked by the girth of the angry Plesiosaur. Her head and long neck were through and she could smell her egg being pulled away. She wrestled with all her might to free herself from the rock and force her bulk through. This chase was not over.
“There! What’s that?” John challenged, pointing to the monitor. The ultra-sound had detected a change in the density of the rock. What looked to them to be a rock basin was nothing more than loose shale, less than thirty feet deep.
“It looks like rocks.” Aisling was not getting it.
“It’s shale. Just like the basin of the loch. This is the way into the loch. It’s the concealed entrance.”
“So do we say open sesame? How do we get through it?”
“Same as the ples does. Did you ever have an aquarium?”
“At school. The kids have one they take care of.”
“Do you have any loaches or eels in it?”
“A few. We keep losing them.”
“They’re not lost. They’re in the gravel. They just stick their heads in and wiggle through.”
“Through that?”
“The nose of this thing is reinforced. If we get a good run at it, I think we should be able to get through. Watch this.” He powered the craft at a moderate speed at the gravel. Glancing off the bed with only some scratching sounds, he stirred up the loose shale and sent much of it swirling away. “See? It’s like a play ball pit.”
“The ball pit is plastic balls. These are rocks. Can we please keep looking?”
“Fraid not.” John turned the craft up and away from the pit to get a running start. From thirty yards away, he prepared to take the plunge. Aisling could not contain her concern.
“One quick question?”
“What?”
“You said the nose of this is reinforced. What about the glass?”
John was drawn to glance around him with newly shared concern.
“We’re about to throw a glass house at a pile of rocks. Is that really the only way?”
John thought. “Look behind you. See that case? Open it.” She did. She found a large capsule with a wire extending from it and a glass jar of white powder.
“Nothing in here but a jar of coffee whitener and a giant Paracetamol.”
That was what John was looking for. “Give it to me. The big pill.”
She handed him the capsule and he loaded it into a sliding tray in the bottom of the console.
“Do I dare ask what that is?”
“The tray is a sample collector. We use it to collect things we find under water. We can place it in the tray outside with the mechanical arm. Then we pull it through a depressurizing chamber and can bring it in. I’m just reversing the process and putting this outside.”
“Like the drive-through banks in America?”
“Yeah. Like that.”
Aisling punched him in the back of the head for his tone. “Don’t you use that condescending tone with me, you cheeky git. And what is that we’re putting outside?”
“If my team was half as smart as they claimed they were, this should get us through the rock.” He cruised up and again hit the gravel, this time head on. The sub pushed in eight feet easily. John thrust another two before stopping. He pushed the sample tray open outside and reversed the sub. The giant pill was left in the loose shale as John pulled away to a safe distance. The long wire trailed out of the rock and up to the nose of their craft. John looked at the ultra-sound again.
“I should have put it deeper. We may have to hit it twice.”
“That was the only pill thingy. John!” She suddenly pointed to the monitor. Sonar showed a large body coming toward them from behind.
A quarter of a mile back, the ples had freed herself from the rock and was after her egg. She swam with a purpose and would not be denied.
“No time now,” John said. He pressed the button to run an electrical charge into a blasting cap in the center of the capsule. The blast came with a blinding white light that flared for over ten seconds. Steam bubbles foamed through the rocks as the powder incinerated all the matter near it. The water was vaporized and oxygen consumed at such a rate that the effect created a vacuum that pulled the sub forward like a black hole in space.
From its approaching distance, the Plesiosaur slowed her charge and veered slightly away from the unique sight of violent illumination so deep. She heard the hiss and smelled the sulphur. It was strong enough to fend off the most tenacious predator.
As the light faded, John aimed his craft at the heart of it and braced himself. “Hold on!”
“Wait!” Aisling shouted.
“Can’t!” He pressed the pistol grip controller forward and the streamlined projectile rocketed toward the rock. As they hit, the initial effect was like sneezing in a giant ashtray. The gray cloud blinded them to all but instruments, though they felt virtually nothing for the first ten feet. The ashes fell behind them as did the unburned shale. The path they opened was closed and they were only half way through. The powerful sub churned and pushed against the loose pack gravel. Some of the rocks were large enough to strike hard against the heavy glass shield. The lights on top were destroyed. Water sprayed in from the seam at Aisling’s left. The high-pressure made it seem to burn as it hit her in the chest and arm.
“We’re not going to make it!”
John looked down at the failing instruments. The USG flickered, and then went dark. “Like hell!” he shouted in defiance. He turned the thrusters hard left, then right. Then he pushed the pistol grip hard to the left while accelerating. In open water, this could make the sub execute a barrel roll. Here it merely gave it the side clearance to press on the remaining six feet. The sub burst out into open water.
Despite being yet two hundred feet deep, John cheered triumphantly. Aisling scream
ed with joy and relief and hugged him wildly. But their elation was short-lived. Another leak burst on the opposite side. The tiny spray hit John in the face, reminding him the fight was not over.
“Where are we?” Aisling asked, gazing about the odd-looking cave.
The instruments told them nothing other than the pressure in the cabin was increasing. John scanned his surroundings. They floated up over a jagged rock in the center of the cave. On the other side was a bed of more shale.
“I’m betting that’s the way into the loch.”
Aisling was wet and cold. “How deep is that one?”
“No way to know.”
“How sure are you we won’t get stuck in the middle?”
John looked in all directions for another option. The only opening left him was up. “Look. Up there.”
As Aisling followed his gaze up, John turned off the lights to reveal a dim but unmistakable glow of natural light emanating from above them. He didn’t need a committee decision; he instantly turned the lights back on and filled the ballast tanks with air. The craft began to rise toward what was most likely their only hope of surviving. He staggered his ascent for safety but time was not on their side. The frigid seawater was rushing in faster and from three sources. Aisling’s ears popped from the rising cabin pressure and she bit her lip to keep from voicing her fear. He knew. She knew he was doing everything in his power to get them both out of this. If it were possible, they would make it.
The light grew slightly brighter. She could almost sense hope until she moved her leg and realized the water was up to her hips. They were losing the race. “This is not how I saw myself dying.”
“Well, I hate to ruin a perfectly good complaint, but we’re not dead yet.”
“How much farther?” She knew he had no better idea than she.
“Seventy-five feet. Maybe less.” He knew she knew he was guessing. He just hoped she could draw some hope from it. Looking upward, he reached to his right and took a small oxygen tank from the compartment near his elbow. The tank had a plastic mouthpiece attached. He handed it over his shoulder to Aisling. “Here. Just in case.”
Loch Ness Page 26