Chapter Eighty Four
The mouth of the cave opened up in front of them and Sam piloted the Sea Witch II inside. “Now we just have to see if your theory’s right.”
The cavern was completely dark. It felt like the walls sucked away the small amount of light at the front of Sea Witch II.
Tom maneuvered a floodlight towards the cave floor. The light reflected straight back at him. It was as though he was shining it towards a mirror. Then his eyes settled as he pointed the light slightly to the side so it wasn’t reflecting directly off the metallic seabed. “Tell me that’s not what I think it is?”
Veyron moved towards the front of the submarine. “No. They’re not living nanobots. You can’t see them, remember. Even in great numbers, you see the plankton not the microscopic machines.”
“Then what the hell is that?” Sam asked pointing towards the silvery floor below the cave.
Veyron swallowed. Hard. “Do you remember when we tested the most stable colony in a Petri dish? What we found was that one out of every hundred plankton cells fail to divide correctly, resulting in the death of the nanobot.”
Tom scanned the light along the seafloor. The metallic surface appeared to continue forever. He dug a mechanical arm into the seafloor. It was covered in millions of small metallic spheres. Small enough to fit in the palm of a person’s hand. The entire seafloor inside the cavern was filled with them. And the cavern was massive. He followed it to the end and even then, it stretched his eyesight to see if it really finished there. “Are you saying those spheres are dead nanobots?”
“Yes,” Veyron replied. “For some reason they seem to bind together as spheres. There must be a few thousand of them joined to form each sphere.”
Tom looked up — into the dark void above. The ceiling seemed to suck the light away from it. “If it takes thousands of dead nanobots to make a sphere and only every hundred or so nanobot dies, are you telling me there are at least a million times these fucking creatures above us?”
Sam flicked on the massive flood lights. “Holy shit! Where did they all go?”
Chapter Eighty Five
The entire roof of the monstrous cavern was completely empty. Not a single glow of bioluminescence could be seen. The seafloor glistened as it reflected the powerful lights. Sam gave the motors in the left hull a slight burst of power. Sea Witch II turned slowly to the right. Somehow the entire place now appeared more frightening than when they were certain it contained their enemy.
No one spoke.
On the far side of the cavern the roof height reached further upwards. At the top of it and above the water, Sam could make out a steel deck. It was as though someone had been coming here from the surface. If nothing else, it provided the means for a person to view the nest close up without the requirement of SCUBA equipment.
Veyron removed the plastic safety cover over a red switch then flicked the switch downwards. The pitch of the intense hum changed to a much sharper howl, followed by a series of wavelike echoes that hurt their ears. The electromagnetic pulse activated. The floodlights at the front of the submersible along with the rest of their instruments went completely blank And the cavern was once more filled with darkness.
“What the hell did you do that for?” Sam asked.
The submarine bubble was completely dark, but Sam could hear Veyron’s voice. “In case it was a trap. I didn’t want to get caught out in here. Besides, I wanted to be certain there weren’t any stragglers who were going to repopulate the colony.”
“Okay, so now what do we do about the lights?” Sam asked.
Veyron patted him on his shoulder. “Relax. The EMP wave lasts less than a minute.”
“Then the power comes back on?”
“Should do.”
Next to him, Tom shuffled in the copilot seat. “And until then we’re sitting blind ducks.”
Veyron laughed. “Do you see any green glow outside our bubble?”
Sam silently looked around in a world devoid of all light. A moment later the power returned to his controls. The backlighting in a series of instruments started up. The headlights flickered on. He carefully powered the craft around to face the entrance.
Where the light from outside the cavern glowed green.
Chapter Eighty Six
Sam pushed the electric motors to their top speed and Sea Witch II sped towards the opening. He reached it and his eyes began to adjust to the strange color. It was similar to the green bioluminescence, but not quite the same.
“What is that?” he asked.
Veyron shuffled forwards in his seat. “That, my friend, is another submarine.”
Sam approached it. The entire thing glowed green. Tom gritted his teeth. “Is this wise? I mean, we were set up to fight a gazillion microscopic machines, not another submarine.”
“It’s all right Tom, I doubt very much they are either,” Sam replied.
“Right, so what are you planning on doing? Going right up to it and then asking the pilot to the surface for some coffee and a chat?”
Sam moved in close to the submarine. “Not a bad idea. Why not?”
It was a similar shaped submarine to the Sea Witch II with two small hulls and a bubble like dome that protected the pilot. Only the one in front of them was only just big enough for its single occupant.
They were no more than twenty feet away and Sam could quite clearly see the man in the pilot seat. There was something familiar about him. Using the diver’s thumbs up signal, he asked the other submariner to surface. The man acknowledged in return and slowly raised his submarine to the surface.
Sam expelled the remaining water from the Sea Witch’s ballast and began to surface. “See Tom, that wasn’t too hard.”
Tom shook his head. “This will be good to see.”
The Sea Witch broke the surface of the calm waters. Sam popped the hatch and climbed on to the left hull of the submarine. Tom and Veyron followed him. They waited less than a minute for the man from the second submersible to climb out. He was tall. Brown hair. A kind smile and a thick cleft chin that some women would consider attractive.
Sam smiled. It had been a long time. “It’s good to see you Luke. You’re looking a lot better than I was led to believe. You’d better come aboard. There’s a lot to explain.”
Chapter Eighty Seven
Sam stepped on board the side of Luke’s submarine. He shook his old high school friend’s hand and then passed him a rope to tie the two hulls of the submarines together. “It’s good to see you. And you’re alive!”
Luke took the rope. “It’s good to see you too.”
“This is Tom Bower my Deep Sea Projects Director. And this is Veyron Blanc. No relationship to the supercar — he’s my chief engineer.”
“Pleased to meet you both.” Luke shook their hands warmly. “I hear you’ve been busy, Sam. Found a lost Nazi aircraft or something? Then, found the remains of some old ship in a country somewhere on the other side of the planet — where was it… Austria?”
“Australia,” Sam corrected him.
“That’s it.” Luke smiled warmly. “Located Atlantis… and then lost it again. Oops. It’s good to see you’ve been using that keen mind of yours, and not just using it to squander your father’s fortune.”
“Thanks. On that subject. I hear you’ve been busy too. Do you want to tell me your story and what you were doing here tonight?”
“Of course. It might take some time.”
Tom looked curiously at the glowing paint covering the submarine. It looked like an off colored phosphorescence. “Luke, I have to ask, what’s with the paint job?”