Dirk Pitt18-Black Wind

by Cussler, Clive

  The relieved men in the passenger compartment let out a cheer as

  Giordino gingerly coaxed the blimp up to an altitude of one hundred

  feet, the big airship slowly stabilizing under his steady hand.

  "I guess you showed us who's master of the airship," Dirk laudedl

  "Yeah, and almost commander of a submarine," Giordino replied as he eased

  the nose of the blimp to the east and away from the platform.

  "Uprange and away from shore isn't exactly the direction I'd like to be

  going at this altitude," he added, eyeing the Koguryo warily out the

  window to port. "I radioed Deep Endeavor to get out of the way of the

  rocket's flight path, so they should be cutting a wide swath around to

  the north. We ought to keep them in sight in case we have to

  ditch."

  Dirk scanned the horizon, keeping one eye locked on the launch

  platform. Far to the southwest, he spotted the distant mass of San

  Nicolas Island. Peering to the northeast, he saw a tiny blue dot,

  which he knew to be the Deep Endeavor. Then, just to the north of the

  NUMA ship, he noticed a small brown mass rising from the sea.

  "That landmass up ahead. I recall from the navigation charts that it's

  a small channel island called "Santa Barbara." Why don't we head that

  way? We can drop the crew there and have Deep Endeavor pick them up

  before we get into any more trouble."

  "And get back to find your dad," Giordino said, finishing Dirk's

  thought. Dirk looked back at the platform with hesitation.

  "Can't be much time left," he muttered.

  "About ten minutes," Giordino replied, wondering like Dirk what Pitt

  could possibly pull off in such little time.

  Physically surviving A launch on board the Odyssey was not impossible.

  When a rocket was fired, the main thrust was directed beneath the

  platform at ignition. The Odyssey had been constructed as a reusable

  launch platform, and, in fact, had already withstood more than a dozen

  launches. The deck, hangar, crew compartment, and pilothouse were all

  built to withstand the fiery heat and exhaust generated from a powerful

  rocket launch. What a human inhabitant was not likely to survive,

  however, was the noxious fumes that engulfed the platform at blastoff.

  A massive billow of exhaust from the spent kerosene and liquid oxygen

  fuel all but buried the Odyssey in a thick cloud of smoke for several

  minutes after liftoff, smothering the breathable air in the vicinity of

  the platform.

  But that was of little concern to Pitt as he jumped off the elevator

  and raced out a back door of the hangar. He had no interest in hanging

  around the platform when the Zenit was lit off. Instead, he was

  hell-bent on making it to the bright red submersible he saw bobbing

  in the water from the pilothouse window. Like a contestant running a

  timed obstacle course, Pitt ran, jumped, and hurdled his way across the

  platform to the corner column support and sprinted down the steps to

  the water's edge. In their haste to evacuate the platform, Tongju and

  his men had not thought it necessary to let adrift the NUMA sub. Pitt

  was thankful to find her still tied to the column steps as he

  exhaustedly reached the water's edge.

  Untying the line, he jumped aboard and scrambled down the Badger's top

  hatch, sealing it closed behind him. In seconds, he had activated the

  submersible's power systems and opened the ballast tank for submersion.

  Engaging the throttles, he quickly maneuvered away from the Odyssey's

  forward column and proceeded down the interior length of the platform

  before positioning the submersible for the task at hand. Holding the

  submersible steady, Pitt activated the controls to the bow-mounted

  coring device and, with just minutes to spare, prayed that his

  cockamamie plan would work.

  The Korean launch team aboard the Koguryo watched the video screen with

  curiosity as the silver blimp touched down on the Odyssey's helipad and

  the crew of the platform jammed into the gondola. Kim grimaced with

  anger but noted that Tongju remained calm.

  "We should have killed the crew and destroyed that airship when we had

  the opportunity," Kim hissed as they watched the Icarus lurch off the

  platform. An alternate camera was turned toward the blimp, showing the

  airship fight for altitude before turning out to sea. Tongju nodded

  toward the video image with assurance.

  "She is overloaded and unable to make speed. We shall easily catch and

  destroy her after the launch," he said quietly to Kim.

  His eyes returned to the launch countdown and the noisy jabber of the

  engineers within the control center. The room was a flurry of activity

  and pressure as the final minutes drew to a close. Ling stood

  nearby, reviewing the output from a series of launch vehicle

  assessments. Beads of sweat rolled from his forehead in tense

  anticipation despite the cool temperature of the air-conditioned bay.

  For Ling, there was every reason to be nervous. In the world of space

  vehicle delivery, there was an astounding rate of mortality. He knew

  all too well that roughly one in ten satellite launches ended in

  failure, and that the fault could come from a thousand and one sources.

  Failure of the rocket at launch was still not an uncommon occurrence,

  though most satellite losses were due to deploying the payload in an

  incorrect orbit. The short, suborbital flight of the mission at hand

  eliminated a great deal of the problematic issues associated with most

  rocket flights, but the risk of a catastrophic launch failure never

  went away.

  Ling breathed easier as he digested the latest status updates. All

  critical systems appeared operational. There was nothing to indicate

  that the trustworthy Zenit rocket would not fire off in its usual

  dependable manner. With less than five minutes to go, he turned to

  Tongju and spoke with a glimmer of confidence.

  "There will be no launch holds. The countdown will proceed

  unimpeded."

  Their attention turned to the image of the rocket on the video screen

  in its last minutes before takeoff. Despite the multitude of studious

  eyes converged on the image of the rocket and platform, no one in the

  room noticed the tiny movement at the periphery of the picture. Only

  the camera saw as a dark-haired man ran to the edge of the platform and

  scrambled out of sight down the corner column stairwell.

  Pitt had wasted no time in engaging the full set of thrusters that

  powered the Badger. Though he knew it was the worst possible place to

  be, he quickly guided the submersible down the underbelly length

  of the platform and maneuvered the vehicle to a stop alongside the rear

  starboard support column. Directly above him was the recessed

  launchpad flame deflector, which would route the titanic blast of the

  Zenit's thrust toward the sea at liftoff.

  Pitt turned the nose of the submersible until it was aimed at the

  column, then backed away from the rotund support leg as he submerged

  the vessel to a depth of fifteen feet. Using a set of manipulator

  controls, he lowered the huge coring probe until it stretched perfe
ctly

  horizontal in front of the submarine's prow, protruding like a medieval

  jousting lance. Pitt braced his feet against the metal deck plate and

  muttered, "Okay, Badger, let's see your bite," as he jammed the

  throttles to full forward.

  The shiny red submersible clawed its way through the water, quickly

  gaining speed over the short distance to the column. Pushed by the

  full weight and force of the submersible, the coring probe slammed into

  the side of the massive steel column with a bang. Pitt held his breath

  as he was jolted forward and continued to slide ahead until the nose of

  the submersible slapped against the column. Rammed to a halt, he

  quickly threw the thrusters in reverse and peered through the surging

  bubbles as the submersible backed away from the column. A metallic

  grating sound echoed back at him as the probe was drawn roughly off the

  column. Through the murky and turbulent water, he caught a glimpse of

  the coring probe jutting intact off the bow and he exhaled in relief.

  As Pitt had hoped, the momentum of the speedy submersible had driven

  the tip of the coring probe cleanly through the side of the support

  column, opening an eight-inch-diameter hole.

  Pitt felt a little like Ezra Lee on the Turtle. The Revolutionary War

  volunteer had attempted to sink a British warship in David Bushnell's

  small wooden submarine by drilling a hole in the side and attaching a

  mine. Though the attempt failed, the Turtle would be remembered in

  history as the first submarine ever used in combat. With the benefit

  of propulsion, Pitt backed the Badger away twenty feet and adjusted his

  depth slightly, then reversed the thrusters and charged into the

  column

  again. Once more, the probe tore through the outer wall of the column,

  leaving a neat round hole for the seawater to pour into.

  Though abjectly crude, Pitt's mad ploy had an element of simple genius

  to it. He calculated that if there was no way to stop the rocket from

  lifting off, then, perhaps, there was a way to change its intended

  destination. By creating an imbalance in the platform, he might at

  least angle the rocket off its intended flight path. On such a short

  flight, the rocket's guidance system would not have sufficient time to

  fully correct the deviation and could miss its intended target by

  miles. And there was no doubt that the Achilles' heel of the platform

  at launch were the rear support columns. With the rocket standing

  vertically at the extreme rear edge of the platform, the Odyssey had to

  maintain a careful balance to handle the uneven weight distribution

  across the entire platform. An active trim-and-heel system utilized

  ballast tanks in the columns and pontoons to maintain stability,

  managed by six large ballast pumps. By flooding the rear support

  columns, there was a chance of destabilizing the launch deck. For

  Pitt, it would be a desperate race against the ballast pumps to create

  a material imbalance.

  Like a passenger on a carnival ride gone amok, Pitt was violently

  thrown about the submersible as he rammed into the column time and time

  again. Electronic equipment was jarred from its mounts, crashing and

  flying about his feet with each impact. The nose section of the

  submersible soon became battered after repeated collisions with the

  column wall and small rivulets of salt water began streaming into the

  interior through the damaged seams. But none of this mattered to Pitt.

  The risk to himself and the submersible was the last concern on his

  mind as the seconds to launch ticked down. One more time, he flung the

  force of the submersible against the support column, poking a hole in

  its surface like a rampant mosquito, the jab not drawing blood but

  letting in a flood of water.

  After more than a dozen strikes at the starboard column, Pitt spun the

  leaking Badger around and raced toward the rear port support. Glancing

  at his Doxa watch, he calculated there was less than two minutes before

  liftoff. With a towering crash, he slammed into the other support

  column, driving the probe to its base and further crumbling the nose of

  the submersible. More water began leaking into the interior but Pitt

  ignored it. With salt water sloshing around his feet, he calmly

  reversed thrust and backed away for another stab at the column. As he

  lined up for another assault, he wondered if his actions were the

  futile gesture of an underwater Don Quixote charging at an errant

  windmill.

  Unknown to Pitt, his very first blow on the starboard support column

  had activated one of the ballast pumps. As the number of holes and the

  amount of inrushing water increased, additional pumps were activated,

  until all six pumps were engaged. The pumps operated at the base of

  the columns, which were already submerged some forty feet under the

  water. While the automated ballast system easily kept each pontoon

  level with one another side by side, there was only limited means of

  maintaining balance fore and aft. With the water level rising rapidly

  in the stern support columns, it didn't take long before Pitt's

  drilling overwhelmed the rear ballast pumps. The sinking stern of the

  platform created a programming dilemma for the automated stabilization

  system. Under normal conditions, the trim-and-heel system would

  compensate the aft list by flooding the forward compartments and

  lowering the overall platform depth. But the platform was in launch

  position and had already been flooded to launching depth. Ballasting

  the platform lower, the computer knew, risked damaging the low-hanging

  thrust deflectors. In a handful of nanoseconds, the computer program

  reviewed its software logic for priority actions. The results came

  back unambiguous. During a designated launch countdown, the

  stabilization system was to maintain launch depth as its first

  priority. The sinking aft columns would be ignored.

  Aboard the Koguryo, a red warning light began blinking id the launch

  control room with less than two minutes to go. A bespectacled

  engineer studied the platform stabilization warning for moment, then

  jotted down some notations and briskly stepped over to Ling.

  "Mr. Ling, we have a platform stabilization warning," he reportec

  "What is the deviation?" Ling asked hurriedly.

  "An aft list of three degrees."

  "That is inconsequential," he replied, brushing off the engineer.

  Turning to Tongju, who stood at his side, he said, "A list of five

  degrees or less is no cause for concern."

  Tongju could almost taste the results of the launch now. There could

  be no turning back now.

  "Do not halt the launch for any reason," he hissed at Ling in a tense voice.

  The chief engineer gritted his teeth and nodded, then stared nervously

  at the waiting rocket that stood shimmering on the video screen.

  The interior of the Badger was a jumbled mess of tools, computer parts,

  and interior pieces that sloshed back and forth across the floor with

  each jerk of the sub. Pitt remained oblivious to the carnage as he

  rammed the submersible against the platform colum
n for the umpteenth

  time. Seawater slapped at his calves as he braced himself for yet

  another collision, listening for the warning barn of the core probe as

  it punched into the column side. Thrown harshly forward at impact, he

  detected the smell of burned wiring as yet another electrical component

  shorted out from saltwater immersion. Pitt's hammering had turned the

  submersible into a shattered hulk of its former self. The rounded

  exterior bow had been pounded nearly flat, its coating of glittery red

  paint roughly scraped away from the repeated blows. The coring probe

  was bent and twisted like a piece of- licorice and barely clung to the

  Badger by a pair of mangled brace supports. Inside, the lights

  flickered, the water level rose, and the propulsion motors began dying

  one by one. Pitt could feel the life ebbing from the submersible as he

  listened to the groans and gurgles of the flailing machine. As he

  tried to reverse the thrusters and back away from the column, a new

  sound struck his ears. It was a deep rushing noise emanating far above

  his head.

  To the casual observer, the first sign of an imminent rocket blast off

  the Sea Launch platform is the roaring rush of fresh water as it is

  pumped into the deluge system. At T-5 seconds, a veritable flood of

  dampening water is released into the flame trench positioned beneath

  the launchpad. The effect of the massive water dousing is to lessen

  the thrust exhaust effects to the platform, and, more important,

  minimize potential acoustic damage to the payload from the maelstrom at

  launch.

  At T-3 seconds, the Zenit rocket begins groaning and stirring as its

  internal mechanisms are activated and the massive rocket comes to life.

  Inside its metal skin, a high-speed turbine pump begins force-feeding