Omega Deep (Sam Reilly Book 12)

by Christopher Cartwright

  “I gave you the location, didn’t I?”

  “Sure, but you said you couldn’t move it.”

  “No. That’s right. It seems not everyone thought it important to abandon their ship.”

  The captain swore and threatened to renege on their original deal.

  The stranger said, “You’re not going to do that.”

  “Why shouldn’t I?”

  “Because I’ve brought you a small piece of the material used to line the hull.”

  “You brought me a piece of blackbody?”

  “Yes.”

  “I thought the U.S. military got the last piece?”

  “They did. That’s how they built the Omega Cloak. What’s more, I have the detailed engineering schematics for how they did it.”

  “And that’s all I need to camouflage my entire ship?”

  “Yes and no. I think you’ll find the device is a little more unstable than given credit for…”

  “All right. But what about my submarine?”

  “It appears someone’s insisted on staying on board and changing the access codes.”

  “So, override them!”

  “I’m afraid you underestimate the Americans. They didn’t just spend nearly 30 billion on research and development only to turn around and lose it!”

  “So what are you going to do?”

  “I’m happy to keep working the problem… but…”

  There was more silence before the stranger spoke again. “I’ve heard that some of your crew are still trained in some expert forms of interrogation, not necessarily recognized since the KGB’s changeover to FSB during the collapse of the Soviet Union.”

  Her captain didn’t remark on the stranger’s slur on what she knew he believed to be the Soviet Union’s glory days. Instead, her captain merely said, “So what is the location of this missing submarine – for assistance purposes only, of course.”

  “Of course.”

  “Where?”

  “At the gateway to the 8th Continent.”

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Somewhere Over the North Pacific

  Tom listened to the near-silent drone of the Gulfstream G650’s powerful Rolls Royce engines. They were softening, and he guessed, they were about to commence their descent into Oahu.

  He picked up the satellite phone and dialed a number by heart.

  A man picked up immediately. “Admiral Bower’s office, Lieutenant Gibbs speaking.”

  “Good morning, sir,” Tom said. “This is Tom Bower. Is the admiral available?”

  The man appeared to recognize his voice. “I’m sorry, Mr. Bower, I’m afraid the admiral is unavailable currently.”

  “Can you tell me when he will be?” Tom persisted.

  “I’m afraid not, sir.”

  “Right. When he gets into his office, can you please ask him to call me on my cell phone. It’s a matter of urgency.”

  “Can I pass on a message, sir?”

  “Afraid not. What I need to discuss with the admiral is private and needs to be done so in person. I’ll wait until he’s free today.”

  “He might not be available for quite some time.”

  “That’s fine. We’re staying at Holiday Inn at Waikiki. You can let him know we’ll come to him once he’s available.”

  “I’m very sorry, Mr. Bower…” there was the slightest of pauses on the line, as though the operator was covering the phone to speak to someone else. Then, without further preamble, he said, “Admiral Bower is out at sea on deployment, for an unknown duration.”

  Tom let out an audible laugh. “Lieutenant Gibbs, my father retires in two weeks. His last posting was to Pearl Harbor, at his request, so that he could oversee the transfer of the Pacific Submarine Fleet… so don’t try and tell me he’s gone out to sea.”

  “I don’t know what to tell you, sir.”

  Tom swallowed down the frustration. “Just tell him that Tom has an urgent message for him, that can’t go through the Emerald Queen of Spades.”

  “Who?”

  “It doesn’t matter. Just make certain he gets the message.”

  “Understood, sir.”

  He ended the satellite call.

  Sam glanced at him with a wry smile on his lips. “The Emerald Queen of Spades?”

  Tom shrugged. “What? It was the best I could come up with at short notice.”

  “But will your father get it?”

  “Of course, he will. That’s what he used to call the secretary of defense when she cheated at cards.”

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Svetlana committed the precise coordinates of the 8th Continent to memory.

  She would have liked to have written them down, but any reference to them would have provided insurmountable proof that she had indeed spied on her own captain. Instead, she waited, trying to mentally picture the location in her mind.

  How could a continent have remained hidden there for so long?

  It was another hour before someone unlocked her door, and an hour after that before divers removed the purpose-built covers to her hydrophones.

  She immediately increased the range to their maximum.

  There was little point.

  Despite the signals of three other vessels she heard within her range, she knew none of them came from the submarine that had docked beneath them.

  The Vostok continued to head south for the next twenty-four hours.

  She opened the thick, soundproofed hatch and was on her way to the deck to enjoy her first view of the sky – albeit at night time – since she boarded the Vostok nearly a month ago when she heard the sound.

  Quiet at first. Little more than a sibilant hiss as wind whipped through the array of radar and satellite dishes on the top of the Vostok’s bridge.

  A moment later, she spotted the fine mist of water, as it pummeled the deck. The warm seawater quickly turned to ice. Above her, she heard the sharp crack of the thick Perspex windshields that lined the bridge, being shattered by the icy pellets.

  Her head snapped round to the right, where the end of the passageway was starting to freeze solid. An intricate web of ice started to form. Small stars of ice formed on the doorway. Part of the wall broke apart as though the entire thing had been struck by liquid nitrogen.

  Svetlana turned to run.

  Her breath misted and crystallized in front of her.

  She opened the door to her surveillance room and slammed it shut behind her. Inside, the room was silent. The temperature remained unchanged, protected by the thick layer of soundproofing.

  There she waited.

  What the hell was that?

  After twenty minutes, she couldn’t take it anymore. She opened the latched door, which opened inwards.

  On the outside of the door, was a solid wall of ice.

  She closed the door and screamed, her voice lost, trapped, and alone.

  Chapter Thirty

  Rockpile Beach, Oahu, Hawaii

  Sam was breathing hard from exertion as he made it over the crest of the final wave between him and the relative safety of the deep blue water beyond the break. He sucked in the warm ocean breeze as it clipped the tops of the waves falling away behind him. Snapping himself up to sit on his surfboard, he glanced over his shoulder toward the sand at Rockpile Beach on Oahu’s North Shore. He raked the surf with his eyes, trying to see where Tom had gotten to among the white-water rollers.

  He relished the ache in his triceps and back muscles after his hard work getting back out. He and Tom had been doing some hard surfing this morning, blowing off some steam on the first day of a long-needed vacation. Rockpile was usually the domain of veterans and kamikaze surfers only, renowned as one of the meanest breaks in Hawaii – and so far, it had delivered just what Sam and Tom were after – big, heavy waves.

  Half a minute later Tom crested a breaking wave near Sam, paddling hard, whooping and laughing as he slapped down on the calm side of the break. He eased up alongside his friend, smiling from ear-to-ear.
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  “Pull up a seat!” Sam said, returning his friend’s good cheer.

  “Oh man,” Tom said, with a satisfied groan as he sat up on his board, “It’s been far too long between waves.”

  “Couldn’t agree more,” Sam said, with one eye on the horizon, searching for the next wave, idly paddling himself with his hands by his side.

  There were a half-dozen other intrepid souls out the back of the break, spaced intermittently across the take-off zone. There was a friendly vibe, the dangerous waves immediately placing everyone present in an exclusive club of high caliber surfers. Sam looked at Tom to his right, and then followed his friend’s smiling gaze across to a pair of girls, shoulder-to-shoulder astride their boards, fifty feet to their left.

  Without a word, Tom turned and paddled hard, racing toward a massive wave. Beside him the two girls paddled swiftly trying to catch it too. Sam knew he was too far back to catch the wave so he kicked hard and duck dived beneath it.

  On the other side of the wave, Sam watched as Tom stood up, lurching forward as he raced down the face of the twenty-five-foot wave. On the same crest, the two girls were up on their boards, confidently riding the waves like pro surfers – which they probably were. Tom leaned forward, trying to carve his way into the barreling wave.

  It looked good, but he didn’t quite have the momentum to keep it and a couple seconds later the front of his board dug into the sea and he fell head over heels, disappearing beneath the surf.

  Sam laughed.

  A moment later, he watched as the two girls tried the same maneuver. One ended up the same way as Tom, while the other managed to make it stick, as she squatted down hard on her board and dipped her head.

  Sam lost sight of her as the barrel broke.

  He assumed she, too, had failed in her attempt.

  But a couple seconds later, he spotted her head break free from the northern end of the barrel, as she carved through the surf, veering to the crest on her right, before flipping her board 180 degrees and returning back on the same wave in the heading south, riding it all the way to the shore.

  Sam clapped, not that anyone could hear him. It was an impressive maneuver, and he guessed he was probably right about her being a pro surfer.

  Far behind the breakers, Sam was content just to sit for a while and enjoy the peace and quiet. He was in no hurry. There was nothing about the ocean he didn’t love, so he just soaked it all in for a while.

  When Tom returned, he came up from a duck-dive under a wave, emerging between Sam and the two surfer girls. Sam watched him strike up a conversation with the nearest one, a brunette, athletic girl in a short-sleeved wetsuit. Just out of earshot he watched as she returned Tom’s chatter, smiling with brilliant white teeth and giggling.

  With that, Sam took off on his own wave and was suddenly soaring down the face of a beautiful azure wall of hissing, diamond-speckled water. He was exhilarated as his feet took up the weight of his body on his board beneath him. He flew out the front of the face of the wave as it opened up, tiny bumps on the flat water at the bottom of his run slapping underneath his board and testing his feet’s ability to hold on.

  He bent his legs and sprung himself with vigor back up the face of the wave, cutting in to attack the rise of the water and feeling it surge powerfully beneath him. Turning back once more, he settled into a groove just in front of the breaking white water and set his eyes on the point where the water meets the sand as far off in the distance as he could see. He adjusted his balance, hunkered down and placed his right hand tenderly on the wall of water curling upward beside him. He gripped the left rail of his board with his other hand and relaxed.

  The wave enveloped him.

  The sound of curling, sucking water eddied around him on all sides as he carved between the thick walls of the wave. For a few moments that hallowed place of bliss and connection between those most accomplished of surfers and the ocean was his, all his senses entirely ensconced, then, as quickly as it came – it was gone, and he was shot out the front into the air.

  He was struck by the noise and dazzling light of the day. He was thrilled and refreshed. The wave crashed behind him, and he pushed hard with his back foot, turning up and over the soft shoulder of the wave as it ebbed in the deeper edge of the breakwater. He landed softly down on his stomach, lowering himself to the board once again, smiling to himself. He shook the water from his hair and started the long paddle back out to his friend.

  Making the deeper water once more, Sam found Tom deep in conversation with the two girls, charismatically gesticulating and relaying some story of adventure. They all turned and smiled as he arrived.

  “See that!” he said to Tom, still scintillated by the last wave.

  “See what?” Tom asked.

  “Oh, nothing. Great waves today hey?” Sam said to all three.

  “Sam, this is Kathy and MC.”

  “Pleased to meet you both,” Sam said with a half-wave of his hand and a smile.

  “What are you guys doing for lunch?” The girl farthest from Sam asked. She was Polynesian, with the slim and athletic build of someone who’d been surfing since she could first stand.

  The four got chatting, light conversation about the North Shore’s various beaches. Testing one another’s level of local knowledge as was the custom amongst surfers. It occurred to Sam that both these girls were incredibly beautiful and friendly. As they surfed a last wave back in, he assumed Tom was thinking the same thing as him – imagining a future of surfing, lying about and relaxing on the beach. A life free from the stress, hunger, and hardship of adventure and intrigue. He really did need a vacation.

  It would be a pleasant way to spend a few days.

  Of course, Tom was still dating Genevieve, and both of them needed to urgently meet up with Tom’s father to discuss the unique theft of the twin spheres.

  He shrugged.

  The four surfers tossed their boards in their cars, then met up at a burger stand on the edge of the parking lot. They ordered burgers and sodas and took stools at a high table. They sat chatting like teenagers. Both Sam and Tom were enjoying themselves immensely.

  “So what do you guys do anyway?” Kathy asked, taking up her burger with both hands.

  “Well, I’d love to tell you, but it’s highly classified,” Tom answered, grinning.

  Sam kept quiet, concentrating on the juicy burger being placed in front of him by the server.

  “Ha-ha,” she answered. She smiled, yet sarcasm dripped from her words. Tom instantly liked her. “No really, what is it? Real estate, insurance, oh wait I know – you’re big pharma reps on one of those, what do you call it – ‘conferences’,” she said, making the inverted commas signals with her fingers.

  “I’m just kidding around,” Tom said, “Really we’re just two boring ocean scientists on the first vacation in a very, very long...” Tom trailed off, and Sam caught his eye. Both men stiffened in their seats, instinctively turning to their left – toward the mountain behind them.

  At that moment, five Sikorsky VH-3D Sea King helicopters burst overhead, thundering along in a classic five-point star formation. The helicopters were flying low, 500-feet and their noise was overpowering.

  Sam knew these aircraft well, and without delay attacked his burger and fries.

  They were white-tops – meaning they carried the signature paint job of the nation’s most technologically advanced, highly powered luxury helicopters. They belonged to the fleet of twenty-three aircraft known as Marine One – the helicopters used for the president and other high-ranking government officials. They always flew in a group of five or more. One high-value bird, and four decoys. Not only were they like a mobile board-room, appointed with state-of-the-art technology and luxurious fitments, they were armed with an array of high-tech assault and defense weapons.

  Tom, catching the hint, immediately started savaging the food in front of him too.

  All activity on the beach ceased in awe at the display in the sky overhead – th
e crowd at Rockpile was instantly immovably transfixed by the spectacle. The huge helicopters turned and took up a line over the surf break. Facing the beach, they hovered shoulder to shoulder. Two of the hulking birds broke ranks and came forward, touching down on hastily cleared out sand which whipped up in all directions.

  The landing helicopters came to rest side-by-side, 150 feet apart. The rotors slowed in almost perfect unison, and from the two opposing internal doors, seemingly identical Marines in full dress uniform stepped down – taking up positions at attention near the stairs. The other three helicopters, still roaring overhead turned in three different directions and took up a high circling formation, a constant show of power and intimidation. Sam and Tom wolfed down their food and slurped their sodas empty, then started tidying themselves up.

  From one of the helicopters, a tall, broad-shouldered man wearing a navy dress uniform, glittering with color bars and brass stepped down on to the sand. He was shadowed by two Marines, wearing the Marine Blue Charlie/Delta dress uniform and carrying assault rifles. Awkwardly, the trio traversed the sand toward the burger stand. Sam and Tom collected their personal effects from the table and shoved them into their half-turned down wetsuits. Both men stood up as the party approached their table. Half a french-fry fell from the open mouth of one of the utterly aghast girls the men were lunching with.

  The dress marine stopped at their table. “Which one of you is Sam Reilly?”

  “That would be me, sir,” Sam replied.

  “You’d better come with us. The president would like to speak with you immediately.” The dress officer glanced at Tom. “You, too, Mr. Bower.”

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Sam became suddenly conscious of the dripping wetsuit, pulled down to his waist. He turned to the dress-officer. “Do we have time to get changed?”

  “No,” came the officer’s curt reply. “Someone will offer you a change of clothes once we’re airborne.”

  Sam glanced at the five Sikorsky VH-3D Sea King helicopters. They had probably chewed up several thousand dollars’ worth of aviation fuel already, just in the time they’d circled. “Understood.” He then turned to Kathy and MC. “Thanks for the surf. Hope you enjoy the rest of the day. I’m afraid duty calls.”