by Greig Beck
“Fuck it!” She swept a pile of folders and pens from her desk. It had been her job to screen the submersible crew, and somehow a switch had taken place. She screamed her frustration, and snatched up a heavy crystal clock, drawing her arm back and preparing to throw it.
Sonya stopped her arm – Valery was still alive, but he had days and hours, not months. She dropped the clock and sat heavily, closing her eyes and feeling her heart beat rapidly in her chest. She used her training to ease it back, like a racing car driver throttling down as they came into a bend – if not there would be an imminent crash.
“Who are you?” She mentally ran through the list of Valery Mironov’s known enemies. It was a long list, but only a handful wanted him dead. Her brows furrowed. But only one she knew of wanted him punished first, and then dead. Her eyes flicked open.
Brogidan Yusoff, head of the Russian Ministry of Resources and Agriculture – could it be him? Only he had the resources, the reach and determination, and also the psychology to undertake such an attack… and he had tried before.
She sat stone still for a moment, her ice blue eyes unblinking. “I can’t contact you, Valery, but if you urgently wanted to contact me, you would make your way to…” her eyes widened. If they knew about the mission, then they’d soon know about the communication silos. She launched back from the desk so quickly the chair flipped backwards several times.
She pulled open her desk drawer and reached for the gun – a Glock 27 – small compact, and deadly. She tucked it into her belt and then sprinted for the door.
CHAPTER 13
The Prusalka hovered at the edge of the chasm. No one spoke, or seemed to even breathe. Cate stood behind Jack and Yegor, and everyone else crowded up behind her to stare out through the curved glass window at the darkness beyond the submerged cliff drop-off.
She knew there were things down there that wanted to attack, and if given the chance, eat them alive. Not that that was likely to happen, because once at depth, any puncture to the hull, and they’d all be dead in a few seconds, compacted down to the size of soda cans by the thousands of pounds of pressure that relentlessly worked on the skin of the vessel. She was staring trance-like, until Jack’s voice made her start.
“The first communication silo is directly under Hobart Bay, fifteen miles eastward. But to get there we’ll need to go deep this time,” Jack said.
“Past hard-head fish.” Dmitry nodded, and then went back to his scope.
“And that other thing,” Greg said. “Whatever that big blip was – either a shark or a whale, it came up out of the depths, and luckily for us, went after the dunkle-whatever.”
“Wasn’t interested in us.” Jack briefly glanced at Greg. “We don’t really have a choice. Think of it as walking through a jungle – there might be a tiger in there, but we know it can’t be everywhere, and if we’re quiet and smart, it won’t even find us.”
“As quite as we can be in a fifty ton clunker of a submarine,” Greg said.
The huge Yegor turned and glared, and Greg immediately hiked his shoulders. “Not that Prusalka is a clunker.”
Yegor muttered and faced the window again.
“What are you thinking?” Cate asked Jack.
Jack looked back out at the dark void. “We descend to five hundred feet again – run hard and fast at those depths. Should keep us below any surface predators, and above anything rising up from below.” He turned in his seat. “But there’s a shelf that pushes down a thousand feet; we’ll need to dive deep to get under it.” He turned back. “There’s no other way to the first comm-buoy.”
Cate nodded slowly, and got to her feet. She walked forward, and stood beside Jack, arms folded. She could feel his eyes on her.
After moment, he reached up and placed a hand on her forearm. “We’ll be fine.”
“Of course we will.” She patted his hand, but then turned slightly, pulling away from him. “So, let’s go for it. We need to find out what the hell happened… and where we can find another way out.”
“Gets my vote,” Greg said. “Full speed ahead, Captain Nemo.” He reached back to high-five Abby.
Yegor turned to Jack, waiting.
“Let’s take her down to five hundred feet again, maximum speed until we close in on the shelf.” He half smiled. “And if we’re still in one piece, then we’ll dip under it and head for Hobart Bay.”
Yegor nodded and pushed a t-shaped joystick forward. The thrumming of the engine vibration tickled the soles of their feet as the propeller shaft spun ever faster. Jack pushed the u-shaped wheel forward, and they begin to descend down the side of the cliff.
“Take your seats and strap-in everyone.” He turned and grinned. “Coffee and tea will be served shortly.”
“But how long, until…?” Abby’s voice was barely a squeak. She cleared her throat. “Um, how long have we got, thinking about, you know, food, water, air…?”
Yegor turned in his seat. “Don’t worry, little sparrow. We can stay down one hundred and twenty hours, but I do not think this will be necessary. There will be air pockets in the caves, so we can surface and replenish the tanks if need be. We have food for a week, and…” He waved a huge arm at the window. “…there is plenty of fish. Also, we have water and water purification device.” He turned, his lips curved up in a lopsided grin. “I think our big problem is not having deck of cards if we get bored.”
Abby smiled, and nodded. “Thank you.”
“All the comforts of home; but if we do get stuck down here, forever…” Greg leaned towards her. “…we might need to start thinking about populating the inner Earth, and, well, I’m single.”
She wrinkled her nose. “Not if you were the last man on Earth… or below it.”
Greg reached into a pocket, and held up a half eaten bag of M&Ms. “I have chocolate.”
“Ooh, then that must make you the chief.” Abby pushed him back towards his chair.
Dmitry laughed. “You see? We’ll be fine.”
“Five hundred feet, leveling off.” Yegor eased back on the wheel, and the bulbous craft slowed in the water like a deep-sea dirigible in a pitch-black sky.
CHAPTER 14
Hobart Bay, Alaska
– 57°27'11" North, 133°23'36" West.
Population: 12
The stealth chopper dropped the two black-clad men a mile from the Bay’s village. It was a scoured area gouged out of the pristine wilderness, and sat on the edge of a moonlit bay that was as still as dark blue glass.
There were just three permanent resident families this time of year, and as the outside temperature was currently hovering around zero degrees, all of them would be inside their respective cabins preparing for hot evening meals.
The men now moved quickly to the edge of the clearing, where they crouched – there was no movement, sound, or alert dogs watching the village grounds.
One used night vision glasses to slowly scan the perimeter, and then focused back on the tiny, unremarkable structure. It was constructed of old wood and designed to blend into its surroundings. But they knew what it housed was far from the ordinary.
He lowered the glasses. “External motion sensors, infrared cameras, and acoustic detection devices – we’ll need a pulse.”
The other man grunted, and pulled a squat-looking device from his backpack. The pulse generator would direct a short but powerful electromagnetic wave over the structure, temporarily disabling any electronics.
“Clear…” He fired it. The pulse was invisible and powerful. There would be no clues for Mironov’s teams this day.
He quickly packed it away, and then the duo sprinted hard to the small building. The door was closed but the electronic lock was now disengaged – one pulled it open, turned to the other and grinned.
“After you, comrade.”
Inside it was dark, but they could easily make out the huge cylinder that protruded from the earth. There was a three-foot access panel flush with the skin of the communication silo. Inside it was
a feat of engineering mastery, as the long tube stretched down thousands of feet to the subterranean sea below. The six foot bore hole was then lined with pre-made tubing that was a ribbed design to allow flexibility so the whole pathway could move as the surrounding geology breathed and flexed with every tremor, quake, or seismic shudder the earth could muster in these parts.
Inside the access panel there were thousands of feet of fiber-optic threads, plus a type of hydraulic dumb-water to transport any urgently-required materials to below ground. The communication buoy and support package was gone, now thousands of feet below, mute and patiently waiting for its guests to arrive.
One of the men waited at the door, holding it open a crack, and keeping an eye on the silent village, while the other dropped to one knee shrugged off his backpack and removed a loaf of bread-sized package. He removed a waterproof wrapping and then set to working on some dials and buttons. Immediately, a blinking green light went red, and a digital readout began to count down. He stood, and placed the package inside the shaft, letting it drop into the dark.
“Let’s go.”
They were out the door and sprinting to the tree line, retracing their steps for another hundred feet, before the deep thump of the explosion shook some early snow from tree branches down onto their heads.
One grinned to the other. “Sorry Mr Mironov, no letters from home today, Da?”
The other laughed. “We need to hurry. Fifty miles to our next target, in Sheslay Canada – and now they know we’re here.”
They began to sprint back to their pickup point. One paused to look back. Behind them, a column of orange erupted from the roof of the small building sending a mushroom cloud of vaporized fiber-optic cables and plastic into the air. He grinned again, and ran harder.
CHAPTER 15
“Now at three thousand feet.” Yegor’s voice was deep and calm as ever, despite the intermittent sound of metal popping and groaning under immense pressure.
Jack ignored it; he knew the sounds a submersible made in deep water, and nothing he heard worried him in the slightest. Hours back, he had switched off the ring of halogens around the window, and they rarely saw any luminescent life forms appear out of the darkness. Dmitry reported the odd anomaly on the sonar, but whatever they were, they never came close enough to concern them
“Wow, this is deep,”’ Greg said. “Bottom of the ocean stuff.”
“Nyet, far from it,” Yegor said, without turning. “Now we are approximately at a level that is usual bottom of continental shelf. Long way down to real ocean bottom.”
“How deep?” Greg said, leaning around to stare out into the dark void beyond Jack and Yegor.
“In this cavern, or in the oceans?” Jack asked.
“Both,” Abby said, leaning back.
“Well, in here, our soundings having it drop to below eight thousand feet in certain places – that certainly is deep – crush depths for sure. But it’s nothing compared to what’s in the ocean trenches.” Jack spun in his seat to face the group. “Cate mentioned the different depths we have in the ocean. It’s actually a bit like the Earth’s geology and can be defined in layers – the crust, the mantle, outer core and inner core – so too can the world’s oceans be thought of as existing in layers.”
Jack used his hands, to make layers in the air. He started at the top. “Most everything we know lives in the upper-most layer, called the pelagic zone; that’s above the continental shelf. But below that are several more layers that are largely unexplored.” He grinned. “Did you know that ninety-five per cent of the underwater world remains unexplored? Down in the deep and dark, are three more zones – below three thousand feet, we enter the Bathyal Zone – it’s also called the midnight zone as it’s the first layer totally devoid of light.”
Yegor grunted. “We can dive to this depth in the Prusalka if need be.”
Jack nodded. “But the ocean goes even deeper, dropping down farther to below thirteen thousand feet or so, and into the abyssal zone – the abyss – home of the giant tubeworm and giant squid, and that one goes all the way down to twenty thousand feet.”
Cate leaned forward resting her elbows on her knees. “But there’s one more zone to go – the Hadal – my favorite, and named after the realm of Hades. That one drops down to thirty-six thousand feet, and touches the deepest ocean trenches on Earth. We have no real idea what’s down there. And when our deepest submersibles make it down, they can only spend a few minutes looking at about a dozen square feet of the environment. Imagine dropping into the Amazon jungle for a few minutes, at night and in a coffin, with a flashlight and tiny window to see through.” She took a small sip from her water bottle. “We don’t know what lives down there… if anything even could.”
Jack nodded, holding her gaze and hoping she was thawing to him again. “That’s right, and for that matter, we aren’t even sure what really lives in the dark layers above either. The world still has plenty of mysteries, and the ocean is the prize winner for keeping the most.”
“Well, thank god, we’re in this cave, where it’s nice and safe,” Greg said, grinning.
Another pop and groan from the hull seemed to punctuate Greg’s comment, making everyone look at the steel ceiling above their heads.
“Safe-ish,” Greg added.
Dmitry smiled in the red-green darkness. “A little pressure is good – makes diamonds, yes?”
“Look – there’s a light out there,” Abby said, pointing out of the front window.
The group turned as one, immediately seeing the dot of blue light in the darkness. It hovered for a moment, like a star in the night sky before beginning to close in on them.
“More bioluminescent fish, I’ll wager,” Jack said.
As they approached, the thing hovered again, seeming to watch them. It lengthened, and they saw that the blue glow ran the length of an eel-like body, with dots of blue, and a bulb at one end.
“Light it up,” Jack said.
Yegor flicked a switch and the ring of lights around the front window threw a pathway out into the dark. The fish was an eight-foot silver ribbon with a hair-like tail. But the other end of the fish was where the nightmare began.
“Jesus,” Greg said softly.
It had a box-like head that seemed all boney and angular. Large, bulging black eyes and a massive needle-filled mouth with the teeth seeming way too large for the jaws that hung open like a trap. Extending out over its mouth was another bulb, a lure, which had been flaring blue until the light had landed upon it.
The thing whipped its tail and vanished.
“Oh wow,” Abby said. “Nightmare.”
“Deep-sea dragonfish,” Mironov said. “Member of the Stomiidae family – but this species is quite a way up. They usually permanently live out their lives at about ten thousand feet… and they’re rarely over a foot long.”
“Everything is bigger down here.” Greg pushed long hair from his forehead.
“Why not?” Cate put her water bottle down. “This place has had hundreds of millions of years all to itself. Bigger things do better in the game of competition. And if the environmental conditions remain static, and no new species are inserted, then there’s no reason for anything to die out. The existing species just continue to grow.”
“And it’s also free of us nasty, predatory human beings,” Abby said.
“Yeah, like we’re the scary things down here,” Greg scoffed.
Cate used the back of her hand to dab at perspiration on her forehead. “If this thing usually lives at ten thousand feet, why was it up here?”
Jack shrugged. “Might just be another adaptation. Or something chased it out of its normal hunting ground.”
“Thank you, Jack; like that just settled my nerves.” Greg got to his feet and tried to pace, but there was only room for a few steps before he had to turn. His head struck a pipe above, ringing through the submersible. “Ouch.”
“Sit down, and be quiet,” Cate said. “You’re making us all nervous.�
��
“I’m making you nervous?” Greg forced a smile. “Am I the only one who thinks it’s getting smaller in here?” He approached Jack and Yegor. “Hey, guys, do you think we can surface soon? Just to get a breath of fresh air?”
Jack turned to study the young scientist for a moment. “Not just yet, Greg. Why don’t you sit down, buddy? Take it easy for a minute or two.”
Greg grimaced, looking like he was about to object.
“Greg, please do as your told.” Cate scowled.
He stiffened, turning to her. “Will you stop talking to me like that? You’re not Captain Bligh, you know.” He pointed at Jack. “And we’ve already got a captain.”
Cate’s eyes narrowed. “I’m the mission leader—”
“Yeah, yeah, and I’m thinking we’re a bit top-heavy on the management layer in here – we’ve got a captain, a mission leader, and also Mr Money Bags at the rear who seems to be pulling the strings.” He began to pace.
Mironov looked up and smiled. Jack swung in his seat.
“Greg… Greg!”
The young man stopped moving.
“Just… take it easy, buddy.” Jack waved him down, but continued to watch him. He’d seen claustrophobia before, and even though the man was of slight build, the last thing anyone needed right now was someone having a panic attack in a confined space. “We got this, Greg.”
Greg grimaced and wrung his hands for a moment, and then headed back to his seat. Jack turned to Dmitry.
“What’s our oxygen level like? Still damned hot and thick in here.”
Dmitry read from his instrument panel. “Oxygen levels are normal, but is still hot – eighty-one degrees. But not just in here; it’s eighty-five degrees outside – very tropical waters.” He looked up. “Should we increase dehumidifiers? Tough on batteries, but…” He shrugged.
