"What's going on?" he asked Spartan.
The admiral glanced at him for a moment before returning his gaze to the water lock. "There's been some kind of accident with Marble One."
"What kind of accident?"
"We've lost communication with the crew inside, there's no way to know for sure. Apparently, the robotic mechanism that pulls the Marble down the dig shaft malfunctioned. Rammed the Marble. And now, Marble One is rising out of control."
"Oh, Jesus. Did they lose pressure?"
"Exceedingly unlikely. Any injuries are more likely to result from…impact."
"Blunt trauma," Crane muttered. He glanced around, thinking quickly. "You said the Marble has a crew complement of three?"
"Correct."
"I don't have any medical equipment on hand."
"Emergency field kits are being brought as we speak."
A loudspeaker rasped, "Estimated time until impact, two minutes."
"A field kit's not enough, Admiral," Crane said. "I'm going to need to prep the site for emergency treatment. And I'll need Dr. Bishop to assist. Especially if there's triage to be done."
Spartan turned to look at him again. "Not in the Drilling Complex."
"But-" Crane began.
"You can use the temporary infirmary on deck four. I'll have Dr. Bishop brought there." Spartan beckoned to one of the numerous marines stationed nearby. "Locate Dr. Bishop and escort her to deck four," he ordered.
The marine saluted, then moved briskly away.
"What if there are neck injuries?" Crane demanded. "We can't just move those crewmen…" He fell silent when he saw the expression on the admiral's face.
A lab technician looked up from the nearby control console. "Admiral," he said. "Marble One's rate of ascent is slowing slightly."
"What's the current rate?"
"Thirty-four feet per second, sir."
"Equilibrium's off," said Spartan. "That's still too damn fast."
Crane waited, going over the stabilization procedures he'd need to follow once the Marble was secured. For all his specialized training, it would come down to the same procedure any trauma paramedic would follow. ABC: airway, breathing, circulation. If the collision with the robotic digger had been violent enough, there might be lacerations, contusions, possible concussions. Since he had to move the crew to deck 4, he'd need to get cervical collars fixed, place the men on short boards as a precaution against-
"Estimated time until impact, sixty seconds," came the disembodied voice from the loudspeaker.
"Isn't there any way to slow it?" Crane asked.
"Just before it impacts the water lock, we're going to discharge a cushion of CO2" Spartan said. "Theoretically, that will reduce the impact. But the timing has to be exact."
He walked over to the lab technician. "Release the gas at minus five seconds."
"Very good, sir." The tech looked pale.
Crane glanced around the large hangar. The frantic activity had ceased, and a hush had descended. Everybody was standing still-waiting.
"Thirty seconds," came the voice from the loudspeaker. "Pressure seal deactivated."
Spartan plucked a radio from the console. "All hands, brace for impact!"
Crane stepped over to a nearby bulkhead, took hold with both hands.
"Rate of ascent?" Spartan asked the tech.
"Steady at thirty-two feet per second, sir."
The loudspeaker crackled. "Fifteen seconds."
Spartan looked quickly around the Drilling Complex, pinning everyone in turn with a brief gaze, as if assuring himself all the necessary players were in place. Then he turned back to the tech. "Release the CO2."
The tech snapped a series of buttons. "Released, sir-"
At that moment, Crane felt a sharp thump beneath his feet. The Facility shuddered slightly.
It was as if an electrical circuit had abruptly been completed. Instantly, the Complex leapt back into activity. Orders were shouted; technicians in white lab coats and marines in fatigues ran to their stations. The metal floor rang with the sound of heavy footsteps.
"Water lock integrity?" Spartan asked the tech.
"One hundred percent, sir."
Spartan picked up the radio, punched in a frequency. "Open the hatch," he snapped. "Get my men up here."
"Outer water lock doors opening now," said the tech at the control console.
Crane saw three workers wheeling a bizarre-looking contraption into place beside the water lock: a steel scaffold about seven feet tall, onto which was set a large metal ring with a toothed circumference. What looked like a pair of industrial-strength lasers had been fastened onto the ring, in 180-degree opposition to each other. Clearly, this was the device that would cut a circular hole into the side of the Marble, creating an exit hatch and releasing the crew inside.
"Marble One's in the lock now," the tech said. "Closing outer doors."
"How long will it take the laser to cut an exit hatch?" Crane asked.
"Eight minutes," Spartan said. "That's at two hundred percent normal operating speed."
Crane's attention was distracted from the laser gantry by a commotion at the main entrance. Three marines entered, pushing makeshift gurneys ahead of them; another followed in their wake, medical field kits slung over his shoulder. Spartan looked over at Crane, made the slightest nod of his head in the direction of the Marble. You're on, the nod told him.
Crane walked over to the laser gantry, gesturing for the marines to wheel the gurneys and trauma equipment up behind him. He busied himself prepping the gurneys, opening the kits, and laying out instruments, readying the C collars and short boards for the upcoming extraction, running down mental checklists, preparing for the injuries that likely awaited.
"Lock sealed," said the tech. "Equalizing pressure."
"Bring the retractor into place," Spartan ordered.
There was a whirring noise, and Crane looked up to see a large robotic clamp being dollied into position over the water lock.
"Pressure equalized," said the tech.
"Open the lock," said Spartan.
For a moment, all fell silent again. Then Crane felt a rumbling beneath his feet. The two panels of the water lock drew back from the floor, revealing a surface of dark water. The clamp slowly descended with a mechanical whir, swaying back and forth beneath the heavy cable, jaws yawning wide. It reached the water and kept descending until fully submerged. The whirring noise ceased. Crane heard a muffled clunk. The cable began to rise again, more slowly this time. He saw the top of the clamp break the water's surface. Inch by inch it rose, revealing its webbing of hydraulics, its heavy jaws…and at last, very slowly, Marble One itself came into view, suspended between them.
There was a collective gasp from the assembled group; groans; a suppressed cry. Someone behind Crane started to weep.
He barely heard.
What lay between the jaws of the robotic clamp was not a shiny, gleaming sphere of transcendent beauty. It was a shrunken tangle of metal, horribly imploded, transformed by the appalling pressure into an unrecognizable grayish wad barely a third its former size. One section of the hull had been split apart explosively and petaled back against itself, exposing countless spike-like struts resembling the quills of a porcupine. Other sections had been compressed so violently they seemed almost to have melted. Not one of the torn and twisted lines was distinguishable as the Marble he'd seen before.
An awful pall of silence settled over the hanger, broken only by weeping. For a long moment, the clamp hung there, suspended over the water lock, the operator too shocked to act.
"Cut it down," Spartan ordered in a savage voice. Crane glanced over at him, but the expression on the admiral's face was too terrible to contemplate, and he returned his eyes to the Marble.
With a shriek of protesting metal and a clank of chains, the remains of Marble One were steered to one side of the water lock, where it sat suspended a foot over the floor of the Drilling Complex, seawater running from it in heavy streams. And not only seawater, Crane noticed with a visceral twinge of dismay: some of the streams that poured from the tangled ruin were thick and red.