Tapping O’Keefe on his shoulder, Gordon then pointed his thumb back to himself. “Let me do the first shift, Don.”
O’Keefe raised his eyebrows. It was supposed to be his turn. “You sure?”
“Yeah. This is most probably my second to last dive, so I want to get it over with.”
O’Keefe stood up, reached for Gordon’s dive helmet and held it over the other man’s head. “Okay, partner. Let’s get you suited up.”
GORDON QUICKLY SENSED something was amiss the moment he climbed down from the open hatch and into the water. The entire diving bell had been swaying back and forth on the way down, and now he felt the powerful currents buffeting the clump weight as he made the short leap to land on top of it.
“What’s going on?” he asked.
Mullins’s voice on the intercom carried a lot of static. “Sorry about this, but the swells around the ship have just picked up all of a sudden. Our stabilization thrusters are working overtime this evening.”
Gordon was immediately concerned. It was imperative that the Skandi Aurora maintain a stable position over the work area, in order to keep the diving bell steady. With his umbilical and the cabling of the capsule leading all the way back up into the boat, any deviation would be extremely hazardous for both him and O’Keefe.
Looking around, Gordon could tell that Langley had been right. The location’s already murky visibility had gotten even worse. Everywhere he looked, there were swarms of krill swimming all around, and he felt like he was trapped inside a blizzard of tiny shrimp.
“Check for leaks, check for leaks,” Mullins said. “You okay?”
Gordon kept a tight grip on the left cable supporting the clump weight. “Currents are the strongest I’ve ever felt. There’s tons of krill all around me. I can barely see.”
“Sorry about that. We’re nearly done with the job though. Can you tough it out?”
“I’ve never failed yet,” Gordon said in between taking great gulps of air. “Where’s the damned ROV?”
“Sorry, but Izzy’s team are having problems topside. It ought to be there in about ten minutes.”
Gordon silently cursed to himself. “What else needs to be done?”
“Not much, actually,” Mullins said. “I just need you to do a visual inspection on the structure and check and make sure the bolts around the framework are tight.”
“Oh heck, I don’t need the ROV for that.”
“Izzy was supposed to guide you, but if you can get started on your own that would be even better.”
Crouching down, Gordon opened the tool basket and took out an industrial wrench before attaching the large tool to his harness. “Okay, I’ll just jump down.”
“Roger that. Be careful.”
Leaping away from the base of the clump weight, Gordon held on to his umbilical with his right hand, making sure the hose wouldn’t get caught in any of the other cables. The moment he began drifting down onto the roof of the structure, a sudden strong current shifted him sideways and began pulling him into the darkness.
Mullins had been watching through his helmet camera. “Whoa, whoa! Steady there, Gordy.”
Using his umbilical as a belaying line, Gordon grasped the hose with both hands as he twisted his body back to an upright position. He could barely see the dim lights of the diving bell above, and the small lamp on his diving helmet was nothing more than a faint amber glow, scarcely penetrating the thick watery darkness that was all around him.
After a minute he could now see the sloping sides of the structure as he continued to descend. If he maintained his position he would undoubtedly slip over the side of the roof and sink deeper into the black abyss.
Seeing one of the rusty metal rods jutting out from the building’s concrete foundation, Gordon stretched out and made a grab for it. The moment he clasped the pole, a shot of electricity surged into his body, making him cry out in pain.
Mullins’s frantic voice was heard over the intercom. “Shut off the damned power to those rods! Gordy’s hanging on to one of them.”
More muffled voices and shouts came from the control room. Gordon was certain one of them belonged to Mr. Sandor as he clenched his teeth in agony, the electric shock coursing through his body, nearly stunning him.
Without warning, the painful, burning current suddenly stopped, and Gordon could feel his arms coming back to life once more. He kept breathing heavily as he tried to regain his senses.
O’Keefe’s voice came over the intercom circuit. “Gordy, you okay? I’ll come down and get you!”
After a few painful seconds of tactical breathing, Gordon was able to recover somewhat. The pain was mostly gone now. “I’m… okay. I’m okay.”
“Jesus, you scared the hell out of me,” O’Keefe said. “Mullins, your crew up there needs to get their act together, goddamn it!”
“Don, stay off the line,” Mullins said tersely. “I’m really sorry about what happened there, Gordy. Everything alright with you?”
Gordon shook his head slowly as his feet touched the top of the structure. “I-I’m okay. Wh-why are these metal rods electrified?”
Mr. Sandor’s voice was now clearly heard over the communications channel. “That’s classified. Please continue with your work.”
Gordon cursed as he let go of the rod and began to slowly walk up the sloped roof. Screw that guy, he thought. Using his free hand to push aside the swarms of krill in front of his faceplate, Gordon tried to find his bearings. “I’m on top of whatever this thing is right now.”
“Okay,” Mullins said. “Just walk around, then do a visual inspection. The ROV is still being worked on.”
Gordon rolled his eyes, even though he knew nobody could see it. “Visibility is so poor I’ll need to crawl in order to see anything.”
“I understand,” Mullins said. “Just do what you can.”
Gordon crouched down and saw a slightly raised bolt jutting out from the floor in the faint distance. After making his way towards it, he bent down and used the wrench he carried to tighten the large industrial screw.
“That’s good,” Mullins said. “Just keep it up until your tool can’t turn anymore.”
“As long as there’s gonna be no more surprises then I’ll be fine,” Gordon said.
“I guarantee you there won’t—”
His supervisor’s words were cut off when Gordon experienced a powerful current surging behind him. Cursing out loud, he held on to the wrench with both hands to keep himself in position as his umbilical suddenly jerked up and became taut.
“What the hell?” he cried out, turning his head to see what had just happened.
A monstrous shape, bigger than any whale he had ever seen, loomed just above him as it swam alongside the diving bell before casually brushing it aside with one of its rapidly moving segmented limbs. The creature’s partially transparent body seemed to have a silver sheen, due to the reflection of the lights around it, giving its chitinous cylindrical torso a ghostly appearance as it made its ascent towards the diving support vessel on the surface.
Gordon screamed as his umbilical wrenched him away from the undersea building’s rooftop, tossing him around in the watery darkness like a dangling, helpless puppet on a long string.
25
MATT MULLINS HAD BEEN sitting inside the control room, deep in the heart of the Skandi Aurora, when all hell broke loose. Like the divers, he had been working twelve hour days, keeping his eyes on the remote control camera feeds, coordinating the team and making sure his people were safe from all the various hazards the sea could provide.