Sea of Greed

by Clive Cussler

  Volke pushed the stick to the side, but the attacking submersible refused to let go and it continued to shove Volke deeper and deeper. Only at the last second did Volke realize the danger.

  He yanked the controls in the other direction, trying to twist free, but it was too late. The NUMA vessel drove him into the sandy bottom and kept pushing. The water intakes for his propulsion system gulped huge helpings of silt and the turbine cried out with a painful screech before shutting down.

  He was trapped, with the nose of his sub buried and the engine drowned in sediment.

  “Woods,” he called out on the radio. “Where are you? We’re under attack. I need help . . . Woods!”

  The NUMA submersible gave him one last shove, pushing the front end of the Discus even farther down before releasing its grip and speeding away.

  “A little late to call Triple A,” a voice told him over the radio.

  Volke could hardly believe what he was hearing, but as the NUMA submersible raced by, his eyes confirmed it. Kurt Austin was alive and well and manning the controls of the submarine that had just bested him.

  * * *

  • • •

  A FEW HUNDRED YARDS from where the Discus lay stranded on the bottom, a different type of battle was being fought. It was more ballet than brute force.

  The divers with the explosives-tipped spears were spinning and turning and kicking furiously. The drones, controlled by Paul from within his suit, were buzzing around them like humming birds, too fast and too small to grab and way too close to hit with an explosives-tipped spear.

  One of the divers found himself getting dizzy. Another took a direct hit to the stomach, doubling him over, knocking the wind out of him.

  “Smash them when they come in,” the team leader said, demonstrating with the butt of his weapon.

  This method proved effective at deflecting the drones, but they were hardy little machines and they kept coming back for more.

  Finally, the lead diver had had enough. He stopped fighting and dived back toward the Minerve. As soon as he had clear shot, he leveled the speargun and fired.

  The explosives-tipped spear tracked downward and just off target, hitting several feet behind the conning tower and blasting a cloud of silt through the water. Though he’d missed, the explosion was effective. The drones stopped their maddening attacks and buzzed off in opposite directions.

  “Hit the submarine,” he ordered. “Hit it hard.”

  As he loaded a second spear into his gun, his men launched their attack. One spear hit near the stern of the Minerve while the second exploded only inches from the opening. The rolling shock waves rattled the divers and had to be absolutely debilitating to the people inside the Minerve.

  Proof came as a wave of bubbles erupted from the opening, followed by a yellow lifting bag that squeezed through the gap, expanded and then floated toward the surface. Dangling beneath that bag was a three-foot-long metal cylinder, with bands around each end.

  “That’s the canister,” the lead diver shouted. “Grab it.”

  Breaking into a furious swim, the diver led his comrades toward the slowly rising bag.

  Before he could reach it, the NUMA submersible that had forced the Discus into the bottom emerged from the opaque blue background. It raced toward the lifting bag, grasped the lines stretching between it and the canister and continued forward. The bag folded over the top of the submersible while the forward motion caused the canister to be pulled up beneath it.

  The lead diver reacted on instinct, firing his speargun and being blown backward as the explosives-tipped shaft hit the NUMA sub and detonated.

  69

  JOE ZAVALA had spent hours crawling around the hold of the Monarch as it flew from Kazakhstan to wherever they were now. He’d explored the maintenance conduits and found they ran the entire length of the plane.

  As the aircraft climbed into the cold layers of the upper atmosphere, he’d found a warm spot to hide. As it descended toward the water, he’d resumed his mission, probing for a weakness he could exploit.

  The truth was, there were several ways he could damage the plane, hydraulic lines, electrical systems, fuel systems. The problem was redundancy. The Monarch had it. All those systems had backups. And backups to the backups.

  Ruining any one of them would be no more than a minor inconvenience. But there was one system on Tessa’s plane that no other aircraft possessed. And while it wasn’t critical for flying, it was absolutely necessary for getting off the ground—or, more accurately, the water.

  Working his way along the inspection conduit, Joe had come across the high-pressure lines that fed air from the engines into the cavitation system. Without the cushion of air to separate it from the water, the giant aircraft could never overcome the drag, suction and surface tension of the sea.

  Tracking the main high-pressure line to a splitter, Joe began to do his worst, disconnecting fittings, ripping trunk lines from the feeder valves, smashing pressure release valves so that they would vent any air that came through them.

  By the time he was done, Joe had crawled half the length of the plane and back. He was dirty, grimy, bleeding from several cuts and grinning from ear to ear. A true gremlin.

  Now all he needed to do was find a way off the plane before it attempted to fly again.

  * * *

  • • •

  TESSA STOOD AT the aft end of the Monarch, watching for any signs of success. One after another, her men surfaced, bleeding, unconscious or in obvious pain. This was not the type of progress she’d hoped for.

  She held the radio up to her mouth. “Volke,” she called. “What’s going on down there?”

  The response was almost inaudible, but it made perfect sense. “Austin,” Volke said. “He’s alive.”

  “We blew his ship up,” she said. “It has to be someone else.”

  “It’s him,” Volke said. “He must have been in the water when we attacked. He’s operating a submersible. He’s taken the counteragent.”

  Tessa grew angry at herself for underestimating Austin yet again. What lengths did she have to go to to rid herself of this man?

  She held the transmit switch down once again. “Woods, where are you? Volke needs help. NUMA has the counteragent.”

  “Forget Volke,” Woods replied. “I’m going after the canister. Stand by.”

  * * *

  • • •

  AS THE CONVERSATION between Tessa, Volke and Woods played out, Kurt found himself trying to clear his head and wondering exactly where he was.

  The truth was disturbing. He was upside down in a submersible that was filling with water and sinking. Rudi was beside him.

  “One of these days, I’m going to wake up to a beautiful blonde, brunette or redhead,” he mused.

  “Don’t I count?” Rudi asked.

  “Not by a mile.”

  Kurt could see from the damage that there was no hope in restarting the submersible. “Time for us to exit the vehicle.”

  The two of them had prepared for this and were already wearing the power-assisted wetsuits. They pulled dive helmets on and attached small oxygen bottles.

  Rudi offered the thumbs-up, Kurt pulled the release handle. It opened a series of valves, allowing the cockpit to fill rapidly with water and also disconnecting the canopy.

  When the pressure equalized, Kurt gave the glass a powerful shove. It tilted upward and floated away.

  Rudi went out first, pulling himself forward and swimming free. Kurt followed, careful to avoid the yellow bag and the lines connecting it to the canister. He pulled out a diving knife and went to cut it free.

  “Look out!” Rudi shouted.

  Kurt glanced up. At first, all he saw was the yellow plastic wafting in the current. But as it swept to the side, a blunt gray shape came into view. From this angle, it resembled the square snout of a
sperm whale, but made of metal.

  Kurt dived out of the way and the bulky vehicle swept in above him. It grabbed the canister with a robotic arm and continued on its way without ever slowing down.

  70

  AS PLANNED, Kurt swam after the submersible. But even with the power assist from the suit, he was losing the race. The ungainly sub was still faster than the fastest swimmer. It pulled away on a direct line to the Monarch.

  Kurt realized he could never catch it. He turned and swam the other way, heading for one of the powerboats still bobbing on the swells above the Minerve.

  He reached it, found it empty and climbed in. By the time he started the engine, the submersible had reached the Monarch. He saw the crewmen gather around, pull the canister free and discard the submersible as if it was nothing.

  They didn’t bother trying to haul the sub aboard. They hadn’t sent any help for the injured divers and they’d abandoned Volke at the bottom of the sea. They were about to hightail it out of there.

  Kurt gunned the engine and turned the wheel. His last chance to stop the Monarch and grab the canister was fading fast.

  * * *

  • • •

  TESSA WATCHED as Woods brought the canister on board.

  “Is that it?”

  “Looks like the one we found on the Dakar,” Woods said.

  Tessa used a crowbar to knock the accumulated salts and rust from the latches. “Open it,” she ordered.

  Woods dropped down and pried the canister open, revealing two smaller, hermetically sealed containers. They were untouched by corrosion. “The seals are good,” he announced. “The cultures should be intact.”

  “Great work,” Tessa said. She immediately contacted the pilots. “Power up. Get us into takeoff position.”

  Woods looked out the back. “What about the rest of the men?”

  “We don’t have time to wait,” she said. “Austin may have called for help. We don’t want to be here if any arrives.”

  Woods hesitated for a second and then nodded. “So long, Volke. Looks like you’re the one being left behind.”

  Tessa thought about rescuing Volke, but even that effort would have been too time-consuming. “Secure the canister,” she ordered. “I’m going to the cockpit.”

  She rushed forward and up the ladder, never looking down. Had she even glanced below, she would have seen a figure emerging from the hatch that led to the maintenance tunnel beneath the bottom deck. She might even have recognized him as one of her former captives.

  * * *

  • • •

  JOE HAD ALREADY OPENED the hatch when he heard Tessa running his way. Pulling it down, he waited for her to pass by and go up the ladder. He could feel the plane moving and picking up speed and had no desire to be on it when it tried to get airborne again.

  Glancing along the bottom deck, he was surprised to see it completely empty. No cars, no boats, no submersibles, just a vast, cavernous space and the bearded man named Woods working to secure a metal cylinder.

  Joe stepped onto the deck, began moving aft and then rushed at Woods.

  Woods looked up from the cylinder at the last moment just as Joe swung his leg. The blow caught Woods on the side of the face and sent him tumbling. Before the big man could get to his feet, Joe dropped down on him and threw a knockout punch. “That’s for Priya.”

  The punch left Woods unconscious and sprawled on the deck. Now he needed to get off the plane. Joe rushed to the back of the aircraft, rolling the container along with him.

  It banged against the upraised tail ramp and stopped. Joe didn’t bother with the regular controls. He went right for the emergency release, pulled it down and watched the ramp fall.

  This time, it hit with the splash he’d been expecting before. It locked into place, creating an instant wake and pulling water back up onto itself in two swirling eddies.

  * * *

  • • •

  KURT HAD THE SPEEDBOAT running flat out, but with the Monarch’s engines spooling up to full thrust, he couldn’t close in. He ducked behind the tail, to avoid the jet blast and bring the boat up onto the Monarch’s wake.

  With the smooth wake of the aircraft to travel on and the suction effect caused by the Monarch’s forward progress, Kurt picked up more speed, drafting the big plane and nearing the tail.

  Now he needed some way to stop the plane. Looking around, he spotted one of the grenade-tipped spearguns. He reached down, grabbed it and brought it up to his shoulder.

  He was about to fire when the tail ramp dropped and a long-lost friend appeared.

  Dropping the speargun, Kurt nursed every last ounce of speed from the boat, closed in on the ramp and bumped up onto it.

  Joe shouted to him, “And they say there’s never a cab when you need one.”

  “Get in,” Kurt shouted back. “This ride’s on me.”

  Joe heaved the banded cylinder in the boat. “Have a feeling people might be looking for this.”

  “Only for the last fifty years.”

  Joe gave the boat a shove and jumped in the moment it began to move. As soon as they reached the water, Kurt turned away from the plane.

  “It’s too bad she’s going to get away,” Kurt said. “But we have what we need.”

  “I don’t think she’s going very far,” Joe said.

  * * *

  • • •

  SITTING IN THE COCKPIT, Tessa shouted at the pilots, who were slowing the plane after a warning light alerted them to the tail ramp’s position.

  “Override the emergency release,” she said. “Raise the aft door and get us out of here.”

  The copilot did as ordered, while the captain put the thrust levers back to full. The plane accelerated, but only to a point. “Fifty knots,” the pilot said. “Activate cavitation.”

  The correct switches were thrown, but the high-pressure air bleeding off the engines never reached the lower part of the hull.

  “We have multiple failures on the high-pressure air system,” the copilot said. “Low-pressure lines failing also.”

  As Tessa struggled to believe what was happening, a transmission came over the radio. In a reversal of the incident in Bermuda, Austin was talking to her on a captured transmitter.

  “It’s over, Tessa,” Kurt said. “We have military aircraft inbound and you’ll never get off the water.”

  The captain confirmed the last statement. “We can’t take off without the cavitation system. The drag is too high.”

  “You might as well stand down,” Austin said.

  His voice infuriated her. “Full power,” she demanded. “Turn into the swells. As we begin to pitch, we’ll break free of the water.”

  “But Tessa—”

  “Do as I say!”

  The pilots followed her commands and the Monarch turned slightly and began to accelerate once again.

  As it picked up speed, the plane rose and fell. It began to bounce across the swells, skipping and grasping at the air. Each new wave bumped them higher, each return to the sea brought a more painful impact than the last.

  “The vibration is too much,” the captain said. “The airframe is going to buckle.”

  “I built this plane,” Tessa shouted. “I know what it’s capable of.”

  The pilot shook his head and went to retard the throttles, but Tessa reached forward and leaned on them, keeping the power at full.

  The aircraft leapt again. Seventy knots . . . Eighty . . . With each jump, the plane picked up more speed and remained airborne a little longer.

  One more bounce, she thought. One more leap . . .

  The next impact was sudden and jarring, with the nose crashing through the top of the wave and the wing pylon bending.

  The pylon twisted and tore free. The plane tilted to the right, the wingtip hit the sea and the entire structure
buckled as it was torn away. The Monarch slewed to the side traveling at a hundred knots and billowing fuel from its ruptured tanks. The heat of the engines ignited the cloud of vapor, causing a chain reaction of explosions that blew the plane apart.

  * * *

  • • •

  KURT AND JOE watched the failed takeoff from well behind the aircraft. Reaching the crash zone, they found only wreckage, floating debris and a swath of burning kerosene that stretched for several hundred feet.

  They circled the inferno several times, but upon finding no survivors, they returned to the waters above the Minerve to pick up their own people.

  Rudi came aboard first, with Gamay next and—once he’d exited the ADS suit—Paul.

  The injured divers on the surface were kept at arm’s length, while the two divers trapped in the submarine below were released and allowed to surface. They were also forced to remain in the water until help arrived in the form of three Marine helicopters dispatched from Sicily.

  With two dozen Marines deployed in several inflatable boats and the helicopters circling, the situation was well in hand. Kurt and a pair of Marine divers swam down and released Volke from his half-buried submersible and brought him to the surface. He and the other survivors from Tessa’s crew were placed into custody and taken to a military base on Sicily.

  The NUMA crew flew to Malta, where a Gulfstream aircraft waited to take Rudi, the Trouts and the bacterial cultures of the counteragent back to the United States.

  Kurt and Joe had one more task to accomplish before they could rest. They took a different aircraft and flew eastward, landing at the abandoned air base in Kazakhstan and searching for Priya.