The Black: A Deep Sea Thriller

by Paul E. Cooley

  After reports were done and roll call was confirmed, Vraebel headed to his cabin. The adrenaline dump from the incident had left him shaking and exhausted. He’d done his best to hide it from the crew, but he thought for sure Gomez noticed.

  Vraebel stripped off his khakis and work shirt and lay down on the bed. He closed his eyes and let himself drift. Focusing on his breathing and heart beat, he managed to calm himself. After ten minutes, he headed to the bathroom and washed his face with cold water. It helped more than he believed it would. After that, he dressed and headed back to the bridge.

  Gomez had been waiting for him, a concerned smile on his face. “Okay, Jefe?”

  Vraebel managed a grim smile. “Yeah, Steve. As soon as I figure out what the fuck caused that, I’ll be much better.”

  “No shit,” Gomez said. “Why didn’t we get a warning?”

  That was the question. The big question. A rumble large enough to create a disturbance that size should have set off the seismic sensors. Instead? Nothing.

  Once he squared things in the bridge, he headed for the drilling office. He clenched and unclenched his fists as he walked. He forced a smile as he greeted his crew in the hallways. It helped ground him and he knew the crew needed to see him confident and in control. If the crew didn’t think he was on top of things, another such incident could really cause problems.

  The drilling office’s air conditioners were a low whoosh below the hum of the computers. He listened to Calhoun, Standlee, and Sigler as they scanned a page of data.

  “Here,” Standlee said and pointed to the screen. “That’s where AUV 2 sent out the alert.”

  Vraebel leaned forward in his chair. “What alert?”

  The tech glanced at him and then back to the screen. “When the bot hit 18k, it started streaming data. One of those packets was an alert.”

  “What kind of alert?” Vraebel asked. “Alert about the ocean floor jumping?” Standlee nodded. Vraebel stifled the urge to leap at the man. “And why the fuck didn’t we get the warning?”

  Calhoun cleared his throat. “The alert came in just after I sent him to find Shawna.”

  Clench. Unclench. He was afraid to look at his knuckles. The rig chief wanted to beat someone’s ass. Calhoun’s or Standlee’s, it didn’t matter. He pushed down the anger. “So no one was manning the station?”

  “No,” Calhoun said. “But look here,” he said pointing to the screen. “The alert came in and less than two minutes later, we were hit. We wouldn’t exactly have had a lot of time to do anything.”

  “Bullshit,” Vraebel said. “Fucking bullshit. I could have had Gomez readjust the ballasts. We could have made sure no one was going to go flying over the railing! So don’t give me that.”

  Standlee’s face was flushed. “Mr. Vraebel, can we please focus on what caused the problem? We missed an alert, yes. But if the AUV hadn’t been down there to begin with, we would never gotten it anyway.”

  The rig chief opened his mouth, and then closed it. Goddammit, the fucker was right. If he hadn’t agreed to let Standlee send the thing down there, they would have been even worse off. At least now they had a chance of figuring out what happened.

  “Okay,” Vraebel said. “Sorry. It’s been a rough day and I guess I’m looking for someone to blame.”

  Calhoun nodded. “Understood. Craig? Have you examined the sample case yet?”

  He shook his head. “No. JP said they retrieved AUV 2. It’s down there waiting for me, but I wanted to make sure we analyzed the reports first.”

  “You’re getting intelligent finally,” Sigler grinned.

  Standlee lifted his middle finger and shook it in front of her before smiling back. “That said, AUV 2 didn’t notice anything odd as it approached the beds. We need to go through the camera footage, but there was no seismic activity whatsoever.”

  “Until when?” Vraebel asked.

  “Until there,” he said and stabbed a key. The screen switched to a time/depth graph. “The spike lasted about ten seconds and then fell off. But AUV 2 was already heading to the surface, so the duration and timing may be a bit off.”

  Calhoun sucked his teeth. “Can we pull up the camera footage?”

  Standlee shook his head. “I still need to transfer it. AUV 2 sent the data, but not the pictures. It’s a result of the malfunction.”

  Vraebel raised his eyes. “What malfunction?”

  The tech leaned back in his chair. “One of the propellers was severely damaged,” he said. “I haven’t taken a look yet, but JP told me it looks like it’s been hit with a sledgehammer. Also, one of the ballast tanks is dented.”

  “What the hell could have done that?” the chief asked. The three eggheads shared a glance. Vraebel rolled his eyes. “Would you guys please tell me what the hell is going on?”

  Calhoun sighed. “We would if we could,” he said. “Until we get the footage and the data lined up, it’s going to be damned difficult to answer that question.”

  “We’re going to reach the site for the second well in five hours,” Vraebel said. “Is there any reason we shouldn’t set up a drill string, assuming the rig inspection checks out?”

  “No,” Sigler said. “Besides the fact we ought to wait for the report from Houston.”

  “Why the hell would we do that?” Vraebel asked.

  She blinked and then cast her eyes at the floor. “I’d just feel better if— I’d just feel better if we had a chance to get all the readings. I don’t exactly have the best equipment to test here.”

  The chief stood and put his hands on his hips. “Look, is it oil or isn’t it?”

  Calhoun narrowed his eyes and stared at him. “It’s oil, Martin. All the readings show it as being damned sweet crude. But Shawna’s analysis proves the stuff is, well, unique.”

  “Right,” Vraebel said. “Unique. Normal. I don’t care. If there’s no danger to Leaguer, then we’re going to drill. Let me know when you get the data from AUV 2, Standlee. And preferably before we drop the drill string.”

  Martin spun headed out of the office. His shift was over. He wasn’t due back on the bridge until five am. He desperately needed sleep. If he was lucky, he’d pass out when he lay on the bed again. If not, then he was sure he’d still be awake when Belmont and the dive crew began their inspection.

  #

  With all the lights off and the porthole shade drawn, the room was a tomb. JP shivered and wrapped his legs in the blankets. He normally slept beneath a single sheet with the comforter and blankets kicked off the bed, but that wasn’t the case tonight.

  He should have been sweating beneath a sheet, two blankets, and a comforter. He should have been miserable and hot enough to set the room on fire. Instead, he was freezing.

  The last time he checked the clock, it was 1 am. He’d taken a load of acetaminophen and it seemed to drop the fever a bit. Other than that, the stuff had been fucking useless.

  Goddamned oil. Goddamned fucking oil. Three scorching hot showers and he’d barely managed to get the shit off his skin.

  When AUV 2 surfaced after the rig nearly capsized, he and Belmont had headed out in the Zodiac to retrieve it. Vraebel had only authorized the trip after he canceled action stations. Which meant, of course, they had to search for the damned thing at dusk. Although it was painted in yellow and reds, the paint wasn’t at all fluorescent. They’d had to rely on the GPS beacon.

  Catfish had called him on the radio. “JP?”

  “Yeah?” he’d asked as they loaded the Zodiac with tow ropes.

  There was a brief moment of silence and JP knew Catfish was puffing away on his e-cig. Considering how shaken the tech had been after the bubble hit the rig, he wasn’t surprised.

  “I’m looking at the reports, and AUV 2 appears to have lost some power to the starboard screw. Can you please check before you hook it up? I don’t want to get something even more damaged.”

  JP and Belmont exchanged a glance. “Damaged?” he asked. “You think it hit something down the
re?”

  “Possibly,” Catfish said. “Willing to bet Macully was off in her calculations and it ran into something a little more massive than I’d planned for. Maybe too much speed.”

  “Roger that,” JP said.

  “Now we are mechanics,” Belmont said in his clipped accent. “How long have you known this man?”

  JP chuckled. “Longer than I’d care to admit.”

  “He is like a father worried about his children,” the diver said.

  “He is at that.”

  In silence, they finished loading the Zodiac. JP made sure to bring an extra bumper just in case they had to secure the two ropes to something other than the ballast tanks. He didn’t want to tell Belmont, but he was sure they’d have to go extra slow on the return trip.

  Luckily, AUV 2 wasn’t far from where it was supposed to be. Unlike AUV 5 which was always blowing its approach, the damaged robot was a mere twenty meters from its planned ascent spot. The problem was the rig had been under thrust for several hours. In all the commotion, Catfish had forgotten to reprogram the AUV to compensate for the additional distance.

  Once they powered on the boat, Belmont pushed the engine to just twenty percent below the redline. The boat jumped and bumped against the waves as they headed out into the fading light. JP just knew there were fish below them. Would have been a fine night to go spear-fishing. Oh, well. Maybe later in the week, he and Catfish would have a chance. If, that was, Vraebel wasn’t still spooked about another seismic event.

  It took them nearly forty minutes to get to the AUV. When the GPS indicated they were almost on top of it, Belmont cut the engine and they glided past its position. The last of the sun was below the horizon. Bruised clouds filled the eastern sky. As they made their slow journey to the north, he could see starlight between the gaps.

  Belmont dropped the anchor in the water to slow their movement. He looked at JP. “You down this time?”

  JP smiled. “My turn in the drink.”

  Belmont shook his head. “In the drink? What drink?”

  “The ocean,” he said. “It’s an old idiom.”

  “Idiom?”

  “Forget it,” JP chuckled. He put on the air tanks and tested the mask. All the gear was working as expected. He attached a powerful halogen light. “Here we go,” he said and dropped backwards off the pontoon.

  As soon as he was in the water, JP raised a hand to the mask, found the switch, and turned on the headlamp. A tight cone of white light stabbed through the darkness. There were two splashes and more light flooded the area. Belmont had dropped the two portables into the water.

  At first, JP was blinded. When his eyes adjusted he realized Belmont had made the right call. The AUV was more than just a dark shape in the water now. The yellow paint reflected the light back at him. He smiled around his rebreather and swam beneath the AUV.

  When he turned his head upward toward its bottom, his eyes widened. Catfish hadn’t been kidding. The starboard ballast looked as though a fish had taken a sledgehammer to it. The metal around the screw was bent and there was some damage to its engine. Shaking his head, he ran his gloved hands over the surface.

  The metal was pitted from multiple impacts. Something scaly? he wondered. That didn’t make any sense. No fish he knew of had scales hard enough to dent and scrape metal. Not like this, anyway.

  JP surfaced beside the AUV and waved at Belmont. The Ukrainian threw the ropes into the water. Harvey nodded to him, gave him the okay sign, and then slipped back beneath the waves.

  He managed to secure the ropes without further disturbing the ballast or the screw housing. The starboard propeller had a bit of something wedged in it, but he wasn’t sure what it was. And that didn’t matter anyway.

  Once he finished making sure they could tow the beast, he swam toward the torpedo-shaped robot’s front. The scoop attachment was closed, but just barely. A thin trickle of black liquid drizzled out. Covered in the wet-suit, he was hardly worried about getting any on his skin.

  A chunk of flesh dangled and swayed from the scoop’s jaws. Even with the powerful halogen aimed at it, he couldn’t tell what it was. It twitched and moved upward. Well, he thought, that’s something new.

  Catfish had caught himself part of a tube worm and its head might still be alive. JP didn’t know they could live without the rest of their bodies, but he guessed it made sense. You could cut certain worms in half and they’d just regenerate. Maybe tube worms had the same kind of biology. JP finished inspecting the ropes and surfaced.

  Belmont blinked at him. “Everything okay?”

  He swam to the side of the Zodiac and lifted himself into the boat. He turned off the head lamp and pulled off his mask. “Yeah. The AUV took a hell of a hit from something, but I’ll be damned if I know what did it.”

  Belmont’s stoic face twitched. “Perhaps the worms were hungry.”

  “Um, was that a joke?” JP asked.

  A thin smile broke across the Ukrainian’s face. “Let’s hope so.”

  They towed the AUV back to Leaguer. Instead of keeping the engine near the red-line, Belmont held their speed to less than a quarter. It was a long, long trip. The rig was still under thruster power and while it didn’t move very fast, it had put even more distance between itself and their position.

  JP spent the time watching the moon as it rose over the eastern horizon and slowly made its way into the sky. The waxing gibbous colored the clouds in shades of yellow that accented their dark, moisture filled hues.

  When they finally reached Leaguer, they stowed the Zodiac and then raised the AUV using the crane. Out of the water and bathed by bright work lamps, he took pictures of the robot’s belly. The damage looked even worse than it had underwater.

  JP snapped dozens of close-up photos of the pitting, scrapes, and dents on the AUV’s ballast tanks and propeller housing. If he didn’t know better, he’d swear someone had taken a hacksaw to it. Only something really sharp and strong could have done that kind of damage.

  He sent Catfish an email describing the damage along with the photos. And then he’d done the dumbest thing of his life.

  JP moved to disconnect the sample scoop. Because the AUV was in the air and the scoop was directly in the middle, he had to duck under the damned thing. Because he was more concerned about hitting his head than what his hands were doing, he missed the scoop release and instead dragged his hands across its front.

  The scoop rattled as whatever inside it moved. Startled, he tried to pull back his hand just as whatever was in the scoop managed to bite him through the gap. He leaped upwards and slammed his head into the bottom of the ballast tanks. The world became a shade of grey punctured by starlight.

  His finger throbbed and he tried to see how bad the cut was. Through the fog, he made out two small puncture wounds. Bright red blood welled out of the holes. He brought it to his lips and sucked on the blood. The taste of copper and rancid castor oil filled his mouth. He spit as a wave of nausea threatened to spew dinner over the metal-grated deck.

  “You okay?” he dimly heard a voice say.

  Swaying a little, he looked over and saw Belmont. The Ukrainian was trying to hide a smile and failing. “Fuck no.”

  Belmont’s face broke into a grin. “Seriously. You bleeding?”

  “Only from my fucking hand,” JP said and held up his swollen index finger. He managed to shuffle out from beneath the AUV. Belmont stepped forward and looked down at the top of JP’s head.

  The Ukrainian shrugged. “No blood in the hair. But I think you need to go to the medic. Finger doesn’t look so good.”

  JP nodded and regretted it. The mental furniture was doing a bit more than moving around in there. He felt like his head was filled with shattered glass. “Fuck it. I’ll get Catfish’s goddamned monster later.”

  Belmont raised his brows. “Monster?”

  “Tubeworm sample,” JP said and pointed to the scoop. “Damned thing is still alive in there.”

  “Alive?” Belmont a
sked and swiveled his head toward the AUV. The color drained from his face. “That should not be. Maybe a fish got in there instead?”

  “This look like a fucking fish bite?” JP asked and shook the blood from his finger.

  Belmont grunted. “No. Looks like you got forked.”

  “Got that right,” JP said. “Completely forked.”

  At the time, he hadn’t known just how true that was. But now that he was shivering beneath a pile blankets, he knew he’d been poisoned.

  The damned rig doc was fucking useless. Dr. Sobkowiak had hit him with a tetanus shot. While the doc had been disinfecting the wounds, the short, balding man had studied the finger.

  “You sure you didn’t hit a piece of metal?” the doc had asked.

  JP had shaken his head. “No clue, man. But I don’t think so. The scoop doesn’t exactly have teeth. More like pincers.”

  Sobkowiak continued rubbing alcohol into the wounds. JP ignored the pain. The doctor’s fat, pudgy thumbs squeezed on either side of the bites. Blood trickled out, but it was extremely dark. The doc pursed his lips. “What the hell?”

  “What?” JP asked and looked down at the finger. A black dot of color rode the narrow stream of crimson. “What is that?” he asked.

  Sobkowiak shook his head. “No clue, Mr. Harvey.” The white-coated doctor swiveled in his rolling chair and reached for a brown bottle. He pulled off the cap and pointed to the stainless steel sink on the wall. “If you would, Mr. Harvey.”

  JP stood up and put his hand, palm up, over the sterile metal. The doctor put the bottle close to the finger and squeezed. Thick dark liquid poured out over the puncture wounds. The pain increased in his finger, but the blood stopped flowing.

  The doc reached for a sterile pad and slowly wiped off the excess. He grabbed a magnifying glass with a bright LED attached to it. One click, and JP’s finger was beneath blazing white light. His finger itched and then started to burn. He tried to ignore it, tried to damp it down. He had been trained to do so, but this was different. It felt like someone had stuck a red hot coal beneath his skin.