But Pokari Sweat was not long in my thoughts, because I observed something pale and geometric protruding from the after hatch, and when I kicked toward the object, I discovered that it was a brilliant white pyramid.
No, I corrected on further inspection, not a pyramid- a tetrahedron, a four-sided figure with each side making an equilateral triangle. It had broken out of the hatch, and its colorless tip had shoved aside the mast and was reaching for the surface, sixty meters above. The brilliant whiteness of the tetrahedron was so striking that it looked like a belated iceberg turned up too late for the sinking.
So fascinated was I by this object that I let myself drift toward it, only to be checked by Sztephen, who seized my arm and drew me back. There was an expression of horror on his face.
I decided that Sztephen had a point. Whatever this thing was, it wasn’t in our dive plan, and it might be in some way hostile.
It occurred to me to wonder whether it was a surprise that Fidel Perugachi had left for us.
I made a careful circuit of the after hatch to judge the object’s size- a proper estimate was difficult, as the tetrahedron’s base was in the darkness of the hold, but it seemed about eight or nine meters per side. Then my heart lurched as I saw another, tiny tetrahedron- about the size of my palm- on the deck near the rail. I drifted downward to get a look at it, and this time saw a number of even smaller pyramids on the ship’s hull, leading down to a cluster of them on the muddy bottom, none of them larger than my fingernail.
I began to have a feeling that all of them would be Giza-sized, given time.
I made a circuit of Goldfish Fairy in order to see how far the pyramid plague had spread and found a smaller number of the four-sided items on the other side of the barge. I checked the forward hold, and there I saw the cause of it all. Fidel Perugachi’s crew, when they realized that the forehold didn’t have what they were looking for, and that they didn’t have time to open the rear hold, had tried to break into the after hold through a hatch high in the bulkhead. But the hatch hadn’t opened because the cargo in the aft hold had been thrown forward when the Goldfish Fairy hit the bottom, and Perugachi’s raiders had tried to force it open with the jacks they’d brought to shift the fallen mast.
They’d ended up opening more than the hatch, I thought. Their attempt to shove the hatch open had broken whatever contained Jesse’s biotech.
It wasn’t Fidel Perugachi who had created these objects. These pyramids now growing silently beneath the sea were what we’d been hired to prevent.
I reckoned I’d seen enough, so I signaled to Sztephen that it was time to head for the surface, and he agreed with wide-eyed relief.
It took some time to rise, as we had to pause every three meters or so for a decompression stop, and at certain intervals we had to shift to a different gas mixture, first to Nitrox 36 and then to O2, making use of the cylinders we’d tethered to our line. Sztephen assisted with the unfamiliar procedures, and I managed them without trouble.
We were at a depth of twenty meters, hovering at our decompression stop while juggling a formidable number of depleted cylinders, when we heard the rumble of a boat approaching and looked up to see the twin hulls of a catamaran cutting the water toward our launch.
My overtaxed nerves gave a sustained quaver as the jet-powered catamaran cut its impellers and drifted up to the launch. I could only imagine what was happening on the surface- Pearl River pirates slitting the throats of everyone aboard; water police from the People’s Republic putting everyone under arrest for disturbing the wreck; Fidel Perugachi sneering as he brandished automatic weapons at the hapless Apollos of the water ballet; ninjas feathering everyone aboard with blowgun darts …
Whatever was happening, I wasn’t going to be a part of it. I probably wouldn’t actually die if I bolted to the surface from a depth of twenty meters, but ere long I’d be damned sick with a case of the bends, and hardly in a condition to aid my cause.
So Sztephen and I sat in the heavy silence, both our imaginations and our nerves running amok, while we made our regulation number of decompression stops, the last being at ten meters. A myriad of schemes whirled through my mind, all of them useless until I actually knew what was going on above our heads.
The last seconds of our decompression stop ticked away. While Sztephen watched with puzzled interest, I reached for one of the Nitrox cylinders and removed the first-stage regulator, the device through which a diver actually breathes the contents of the cylinder. I then turned the valve to crack open the cylinder slightly and produced a satisfying stream of bubbles that rose unbroken to the surface. Then I did the same to another cylinder.
Anyone on the surface, looking for divers, would be able to track us simply by observing our exhaust bubbles rising. I had now given them a false bubble trail to watch.
Gesturing for Sztephen to follow, I kicked off from our line, positioned myself beneath the catamaran, and at slow, deliberate speed rose to the surface, my head breaking water between the twin hulls. Once there, I dropped my weight belt to the ocean bottom, then climbed out of my scuba gear, leaving myself just the mask, flippers, and snorkel.
And my dive knife, which was strapped to my leg. Many divers- usually the beginners- buy knives the length of their forearm, formidable enough to fight the U.S. Marines singlehanded.
Unfortunately for my current dilemma, I had developed a more realistic appraisal of the circumstances under which I might need a knife underwater, and my own blade was about the length of my little finger. It was unlikely to stop a sufficiently determined Pekingese, let alone the U.S. Marines. I whispered a query to Sztephen, and like a true professional he produced one no larger than my own.
I sighed inwardly and explained my plan, such as it was. Sztephen, who liked my plan no more than I did but couldn’t think of a better, likewise climbed out of his gear. We then inflated the B.C.s just enough to float and tied them together with B.C. straps. It was unlikely we’d need the gear again, but it didn’t seem right to sink it.
I listened carefully all the while, but all I heard was the rumble of the idling engines and the surge and slap of waves against the white fiberglass hull- no screams, no shots, no maniacal cackling from a sadistic enemy.
It was time to do it, whatever it was. Those bubbles rising from the decoy cylinders wouldn’t last forever.
The catamaran’s port hull was moored to our launch, so I swam to the starboard hull, took a breath, and swam beneath the hull to surface cautiously on the other side. No one seemed to be looking for me, and by this point I was hearing nothing but the throbbing of my own heart. The ocean chop lifted me most of the way up the hull, and with a strong kick with my flippers I managed to get a hand around a chrome stanchion used to support the double safety line that ran around the fore part of the boat. The stanchion was strong enough to support my weight, and I pulled myself up, crawled under the safety line, and lay on the deck for a moment gathering my wits and my breath.
I was lying against the pilothouse of what clearly was a dedicated dive boat. The wide platform between the two hulls was ideal for moving gear around, and divers could simply jump off the back when they wanted to enter the sea. Cylinders were set in racks aft of me, and when I blinked up against the bright sun, I could see the silhouette of a crane intended to raise salvage from the depths.
I pulled my mask down around my neck and worked my flippers off my feet. At this point Sztephan’s sun- bleached head appeared above the deck, looking at me wide eyed: I’d told him to wait a moment or two before following me, and wait to hear if there was gunfire. Apparently this warning had made an impression on him.