“Three minutes.”
The tension in the control room, already high, was spiking. But at least it was controlled. The atmosphere throughout the rest of the ship was not. Already, Gideon had seen restless, angry knots of people talking among themselves, many calling for the mission to be aborted and the ship steered to Ushuaia, Argentina, the nearest port.
Glinn wasn’t in mission control. Gideon wondered briefly what he could be up to that was more important than monitoring what they were about to do, but dismissed the thought. He was probably putting out fires all over the ship. The man had a unique ability to calm people down and project a feeling of unshakable competence and success. Gideon knew it was a mask, one of many Glinn put on.
“Two minutes.”
Gideon transferred his attention to the screen of the Baobab. It sat there, swollen, ominous, the branches swaying almost imperceptibly. George, the crushed DSV, remained in place on the seabed, unmoving.
“One minute.”
“Arming,” McFarlane said. His thin hand unlatched and lifted the cage covering a red button on the console.
“All systems go.”
Now Garza began to count down by voice: ten, nine, eight…
Gideon waited, staring at the screen.
“Fire in the hole,” said McFarlane.
On the monitor, Gideon saw a dozen silt clouds erupt from the seafloor in a geometric array around the Baobab. A moment later the muffled sound was picked up by the sonobuoys on the surface—sound traveling faster in water than in air.
The Baobab reacted violently, the branches abruptly whipping and snapping about as if searching for an invader, the mouth extruding and opening, apparently sucking in vast amounts of seawater. The trunk swelled grotesquely, to the point that it became almost spherical, looking as though it might burst. At the same time, the creature’s coloration underwent a swift, rippling change, turning from light green to an angry red, mottled with darker spots of purple.
And then an immense boom rocked the ship: a thunderous blast like a small earthquake that threw Gideon to the floor. The lights flickered and the ship shuddered strongly for a moment. There were some scattered screams. A shower of sparks spit out of a nearby console, and the sound of falling glass echoed from shattered monitors.
Gideon rose to his knees, but was thrown back to the deck again by another massive, booming noise. The lights flickered and this time went out, along with all the monitors, plunging mission control—which had no windows—into darkness. A second later the emergency lights came on, along with a series of alarms—including the fire-alarm siren.
A third thundering vibration struck the ship, weaker this time. Gideon rose to his feet, pulling himself up by a console. The monitors were still out, the dim emergency lighting barely adequate to illuminate the space.
McFarlane struggled up beside him, both of them bracing for the next attack. Nothing happened. Others were now getting up around them. Smoke was pouring out of a nearby console, and Gideon grabbed one of the ubiquitous fire extinguishers strapped to the walls and gave it a blast, extinguishing the embryonic fire.
Lennart’s voice came over the intercom system. “General quarters. All crew to general quarters. Seal all bulkheads, security to bridge and engineering…”
As the emergency announcement went on, McFarlane said: “There’s our reaction.”
“It felt like an explosion. Must have been some kind of sonic attack.”
“Yes. An ultra-low-frequency sonic attack with a remarkably high amplitude.”
Gideon’s radio buzzed and he pulled it out. It was Glinn. “I want you on the bridge,” he said. While Glinn was speaking, Gideon could feel the engines coming to life, along with the incipient movement of the ship.
McFarlane overheard. “I’m coming, too.”
Gideon did not argue.
47
IT WAS NOT a quick trip from the mission control room, deep inside the ship, to the bridge at the top of the superstructure. Gideon had only been on the bridge once before. It was a spacious area, far above the maindeck, with floor-to-ceiling windows giving sweeping views of the surrounding water and the ship itself, fore and aft. There was no internal illumination save a dull-red glow from the nighttime bridge lights and from a few hooded chartplotters and monitors. A gibbous moon hung in the sky, casting a remarkably bright light over the scattered icebergs, which looked like ghosts on the dark water. Bright stars bristled in the overhead dome of night.
As he stared at the moonlit view, Gideon saw something puzzling. The sea, as far as the eye could reach, was covered with shapes, big and small. It took him a moment to realize they were thousands upon thousands of dead fish, along with much larger shapes of what looked like sharks and porpoises. And, about a quarter mile away, he made out a cluster of huge white corpses, some fifty feet or longer each, just beginning to drift to the surface: dead whales.
The ship was gaining speed. The scene on the bridge was one of tight efficiency underlain with an intense urgency. First Officer Lennart was at the conn, relaying the captain’s orders regarding heading, engine, and rudder. Captain Tulley stood next to her, a ramrod-straight fireplug of a man, murmuring his orders. Garza was nowhere in sight: he had gone off to oversee the security teams searching the ship for the missing worms.
Glinn was speaking to the officer of the watch, Warrant Officer Lund. Glinn turned and waved them over.
“Why are we under way?” asked McFarlane. “Are we running?”
Glinn looked at McFarlane. “No. We’ve been attacked, and we’re moving out of range in order to effect repairs.”
“The amplitude drops by the square of the distance,” said Gideon. “Which means we probably don’t have to go very far.”
“Correct. The calculation was four miles. Mr. Lund, please brief them on the condition of the ship.”
“Yes, sir.” Lund, pale and blond, turned his narrow face to them. “We’re taking on water. The bulkheads were sealed and the bilge pumps can handle it. The electricity generators are offline—fuel leaks—but should be fixed in an hour or so. The ship’s navigational and engine equipment survived in pretty good shape. Ringo, which was at a depth of a thousand meters at the time of the sonic attacks, is a complete loss. The other major damage was to mission control, which is full of delicate and sensitive electronics. The damage appears to be severe but not catastrophic: monitors smashed, motherboards shaken loose, contacts broken. But the stand-alone computers, laptops and desktops mostly survived intact. They were shaken up but seem to be fine.”
“Thank you, Mr. Lund,” said Glinn. The warrant officer stepped back.
“And the nuke?” asked McFarlane.
“We haven’t checked on it yet,” said Glinn.
“Don’t worry about the nuke,” said Gideon. “Nuclear weapons are designed to be robust—built to be manhandled before being dropped.”
“Please make an examination, just to be sure,” said Glinn. “Now we have a decision to make: abort, or proceed?”
Gideon knew what he was going to say, but he waited. McFarlane looked at Glinn. “Let’s hear your views first.”
At this, a bitter smile gathered on Glinn’s face. “Ah, Sam. For once, you want to hear my views. My apologies, but I’m not giving you the opportunity to disagree with me just for the sake of it. You two make the decision. If it’s a tie, I’ll break it.”