Niles and Virginia were the first to stroll down to the command center. As they entered and saw the center for the first time in close-up detail, they saw it looked nothing like any submarine they had ever seen before. It was thirty times larger than the mock deck of the starship Enterprise. They saw neither First Officer Samuels nor Captain Heirthall on duty.
The deck was quiet, exceedingly so, as operators manned their stations in silence. Niles spotted a man standing near the holographic chart table. The system was like their map visuals at the Event Group, only this one was more compact and didn’t use a water-misting system. This was actually a three-dimensional view of the ice cap surrounding Leviathan.
“You know, when I was a kid, I can remember the first polar transit by USS Nautilus,” Niles said aloud, gaining the attention of the man at the chart table, but also that of several of the operators at their semidark stations. He saw that their looks were anything but hostile, nor did they show annoyance at his breaking of the silence. Instead, they were polite and complete with smiles.
“Indeed, sir,” the young man at the chart table said, looking up at Niles and Virginia. “I’m afraid I wasn’t born at that time, but I can imagine the world was very excited at the news. Captain Heirthall’s mother and father—they actually followed Nautilus on her journey under the ice—they wished to make sure she was in no danger. They were great admirers of the nuclear submarine program and wished to see it succeed.” He looked around, almost embarrassed. “At least, that was the way it was taught to us in the Heirthall Midshipman School.”
Niles just shook his head and looked from the young Norwegian-sounding officer to the others watching him and Virginia with curiosity. Several of these crewmen were as young as Yeoman Alvera; trainees, he figured, and obviously midshipmen in their teens as well. They didn’t look quite as interested in Niles, nor the navigator’s reminiscences. Their looks were almost hostile, not only at them, but also at the crew that listened.
“Well, I remember my father pointing to the headline at least—I was a little young myself. But in answer to your comment, yes, we were very proud, at least my father was. He was an engineer in construction, and I remember him saying, ‘The world is now being opened before us.’”
The technicians exchanged looks and smiled, nodding their heads. They seemed to be very interested in Niles’s remembrance of the time. This time, Virginia noticed the younger midshipmen exchange looks, and for some reason, those looks didn’t look too friendly at all.
“I am Lieutenant Stefan Kogersborg. I am watch commander and officer of the deck. You must be Drs. Compton and Pollock?”
Virginia nodded politely.
“Would you like to see our position? I would be most happy to show you exactly where we are.”
Niles stepped up to the table with Virginia and the young officer pointed at the ice cap above them, tinged in white light-emitting lines.
“As you see, the ice thickness above us is at varying depths and thicknesses. We have very large pressure ridges which are very dangerous to a submarine, even one as large as Leviathan.” He moved his fingers along the three-dimensional outline of the ice above. Then he pointed to a miniature version of the submarine far below. “The captain has ordered our speed cut in half to seventy knots for safety reasons,” he said in all seriousness.
Niles looked closer at the hologram simulation before him.
“That’s Leviathan here?” he asked, pointing. “What in God’s name is our depth?”
The officer of the deck pushed a button, and a projected speed appeared next to the moving vessel.
“We are currently at forty-five hundred feet.”
Niles was stunned. “May I … may I ask how you can achieve such a depth without crushing?”
Kogersborg had to stifle a laugh. Niles and Virginia heard the other technicians, but not the midshipmen, chuckle at their stations as many of them exchanged bemused looks.
“Did I say something amusing?”
The officer cleared his throat loudly. The operators silenced and went back to their scanning and monitoring.
“Of course, you did nothing of the kind, Doctor. We here on Leviathan are so used to what this vessel can do, we sometimes forget our abilities are somewhat astounding to the outside world. Also, I would like to apologize for the technicians of this watch”—he looked around him at the crewmen of his shift—”as we sometimes do not utilize the manners our captain insists upon.”
“No need to apologize. I am just … stunned, to say the least.”
“Lieutenant Kogersborg, I don’t think the captain wants you to go into such fine detail about many of the technologies in the control center.”
They all turned to see Yeoman Alvera standing behind them.
“Yeoman, I am following First Officer Samuels’s orders to the letter. Now return to your duties, and never leave your station while on duty upon this bridge, or you’ll be called to mast before Mr. Samuels.”
“Aye, Lieutenant,” she said as she looked from Kogersborg to Niles and Virginia. “You have my apologies.”
“Yeomen—they think they run the boat. I’m sorry for the interruption. In answer to your inquiry, Doctor, I could go into much detail about how we operate at this, and far greater depths, but I haven’t the elegance to do justice to our captain and her family’s science. Captain Heirthall will explain it all to you. You know”—he leaned in close to Niles and Virginia—”the captain is making a gift of all this to the world one day. She knows in order to fulfill the demands she’s making upon everyone on land, there has to be a reward for the harsh times they’ll have to endure.”
Compton was sure the young officer had just give him a prepared speech. He thought the young man had been directed to sneak that little gem in somewhere to someone while they were touring. As he thought this, he felt the eyes of the younger trainee midshipmen on them, and for some reason he couldn’t fathom, he didn’t like it at all.
“I see. Let’s hope we can dissuade her from the demands she’s making, and maybe reach a middle ground,” he said as he saw the midshipmen return to their training.
The blond officer smiled, and then leaned on the holographic table. “Perhaps.”
“For such a brilliant woman, she has moments of sheer brutality,” Virginia said, watching for a reaction.
“We all realize the stress that the captain is under, and her orders of late have been—”
“May I ask where it is we are going, at so great a speed and depth?” Niles asked, cutting off the officer’s answer. He had noticed several of the young midshipmen looking directly at Kogersborg, and for a reason Niles couldn’t quite understand, he stopped the officer from committing to an answer.
“You may indeed,” Kogersborg said, somewhat disturbed at the abrupt change of subject. “We will subtransit the ice cap and be in Pacific waters before you sit down for the elegant meal the captain has planned for you this evening.”
“The captain, she spends long periods alone?” Virginia asked.
“She has many duties that keep her away from the crew for long hours; research, mostly, but we understand what kind of stress she is under.” He finally looked up at the two Event people. “All this death of what she, and we, love … well, she has placed this all upon her shoulders, and we are only too—”
“Lieutenant Kogersborg, First Officer Samuels has the conn. You are relieved.”
They turned to see a freshly showered and shaved Samuels as he stepped up to the navigation console.
“Aye, I have been properly relieved. Commander Samuels has the conn,” Kogersborg called to his chief of the boat, and then turned and bowed to Virginia and Niles. “It was nice sharing time with you, and I hope I answered all your questions. Good afternoon.”
“Seems like a bright young man,” Niles said as James Samuels took over the conn.
“Yes, he is one of our brightest.” He looked at Niles. “His parents were missionaries in Somalia; they disappeared there after t
he UN troop pullout in nineteen ninety-three. The captain and Dr. Trevor discovered him as we have many of our midshipmen: destitute and alone. The young man was feeding himself on dried rice in the streets of Mogadishu when we found him while on a humanitarian mission to that country.”
“It seems Captain Heirthall, and indeed the entire crew, is quite accomplished in acts of humanitarianism,” Niles said, again watching closely for the officer’s reaction.
Samuels glanced up from his course calculations and looked at Niles.
“Doctor, our captain wears many hats. She can be the most humane person in the world, but her wrath can be multiplied many fold if she is angered. Captain Heirthall did not want to take the course of action she has taken, but she has been angered most recently by the loss of sea life in the Mediterranean, and her family has been betrayed countless times in the past two hundred years.”
“Two hundred years? May I ask—”
“Doctors, if you will excuse me, our watch change is very complicated and time consuming, and we are a bit behind schedule. I must apologize. May we take this up at dinner?”
“You said loss of life in the Med. You mean human life, of course?” Virginia asked.
The commander became silent for a brief moment. “Again, may we take this up at a later time, please?” he said, instead of answering her question.
“Yes, of course,” Niles said as he took Virginia by the arm.
As they stepped from the control center into the companionway, Niles looked at Virginia.
“Something is eating at that man; I can’t figure him at all. And what in the hell is with those creepy midshipmen? Nice and charming one minute—”
“Niles, I have to tell you something, I should have told you immediately after lunch when I saw who we were dealing with. I was hoping I was wrong, but …” Virginia whispered, looking pale and nervous.
“What is it?”
“It’s Heirthall. I was—”
“Well, well, we were just looking for you two. I knew these bastards wouldn’t let us into the weapons room—free rein of the boat, my ass,” Lee said as he and Alice stepped through hatchway and into the companionway.
Virginia looked from Niles to Alice, then smiled. It was a weak smile and lacked sincerity, and then she turned back to Compton, shook her head, and mouthed, Later.
Samuels observed the watch change from the navigation console through the holographic image of Leviathan. The second command watch took their seats after the older crewmen exchanged watch changes, course adjustments, and joked with one another. The midshipmen, instead of their usual teenage talk, smiles, and warnings of training material ahead for them during shift change, nodded at one another and then quietly took up station next to their older trainers. He saw Yeoman Alvera look his way and smile—the same smile he had seen a thousand times before, only this time she held the humorless smile a bit longer, and he had to admit it to himself, he didn’t like it at all.
Commander Samuels reached under the console, brought the phone to his ear, and punched in the captain’s cabin number to report the change of watch.
“Yes,” a male voice answered.
“Dr. Trevor, is something wrong? Where is the captain?”
“She’s lying down. I’ve had to medicate her—her headache became much worse in the past hour, and I was just about to leave. Shall I wake her anyway, Commander?”
“Negative, Doctor. Thank you.”
“Then I shall see you at the function this evening?”
Samuels didn’t answer the inquiry as he laid the phone down on the console and stared through the hologram at nothing.
An hour later, Sarah stepped into the extreme forward section of Leviathan, followed by Farbeaux. After the many crowded sections they had passed through, the remoteness and silence of the bow was so extreme it was like stepping into a soundproofed room.
“My God,” Sarah said as she lifted her chin and followed the massive beams to their height of a hundred feet above their heads. There were partitions in front that wrapped around the entire compartment. They continued to the ceiling and then to the midpoint toward the compartment’s end. The effect was like a giant, retractable clamshell aircraft hangar. There were twenty chandeliers lining the ceiling in two rows. They looked almost Art Deco in their design, and were at present dimmed to a comfortable setting.
“I must say, when this woman builds something, she builds to impress,” the colonel said, as he too craned his neck to see the expanse of the compartment.
Placed on the impressively crafted teak deck was an old-fashioned ship’s wheel that faced the extreme bow. Placed alongside it was a gold-plated ship’s enunciator. The white leaded glass was illuminated, and was actually set at all ahead. Sarah walked over and looked at the gold inscription on the ship’s wheel.
“ ‘Leviathan—1858,’” Sarah said aloud. “ ‘For the sake of the world.’ This is the original ship’s wheel from the very first Leviathan.”
She placed her hand on the wheel and looked around her at the richly upholstered couches facing the outer hull of Leviathan. There was a large conference table at the center, a larger area for serving meals, and spotlighting that highlighted the many aquariums that wrapped around the interior from midhull level to the floor.
“You remind me of my wife. She was always awed by what she saw around her. The human race, the past of the world, all made her feel it was her duty to understand it. I envy you your naïveté, young Sarah.”
She turned, looked at Farbeaux, and slightly tilted her head.
“Of all the things Danielle was, Colonel, naïve she wasn’t.” Sarah saw the momentary look of hurt in Henri’s features. “I’m sorry, I know you loved your wife. It seems the more we love, the more fate is destined to work against us. However, since the reason you came to the Event Complex was for murder, I can find little sympathy for you at the moment.”
They were interrupted when the large double hatch opened and Virginia, Niles, Alice, and Lee stepped through. Sarah and Farbeaux watched them file inside and look around, equally as impressed with the domed room as they had been.
“Quite a place, huh?” Sarah said.
The lights suddenly dimmed to near blackness and the partitions lining the hull and at the extreme bow started to part and slide into each other, just like the salon, only on a much larger engineering scale. The action was mimicked on the seaward side. It was a double-hulled protection screen.
As they watched, the deep blue sea opened up before them, in front and over their heads, since the glass covered not only the front, but a hundred feet of upper deck. The expansive vista of Arctic Ocean stretched out before them, and the brightest lighting any of them had ever seen illuminated the depths. They could even see the massive conning tower high above them when they looked aft and out of the windows at the top.
“It’s so beautiful … I … I …”
Lee patted and then squeezed Sarah on the shoulder as she hung on to the ship’s wheel and watched the sea erupt before the passage of Leviathan. The glass nose was sectioned by forty-foot areas of acrylic, separated by composite beams that the glass fit into. The partitions that slid away to reveal the depths had all been packed neatly into the section beams. Their view was unobstructed as far as the eye could see.
“The engineering is beyond that of anything naval architecture has achieved thus far. It has opened a completely new world. It would be criminal not to come to some accommodation,” Niles said aloud as he watched the deep blue sea beyond the glass.
“If it were as simple as that, Niles, I would agree,” Lee stated flatly and without emotion. “However, we are not seeing something here. There is a touch of desperation beyond the captain’s claim of pollution and the degradation of the ecosystem.”
“I believe her, and I believe she thinks this is our only course.” Virginia placed her hand against the cold glass, just as the captain had done earlier. She felt that coldness and let it travel up her arm. “No, in her opinion, t
here can be no other choice in this matter. She wants the unconditional surrender of the seas, and I don’t believe she’ll settle for anything less.”
The others looked at Virginia in mild surprise. She had been so silent since their abduction she had begun to worry them.
“Ginny developed an environmental conscience rather late in her academic life.”
Everyone except for Virginia Pollock turned and looked up toward the back of the compartment. On a ten-foot-wide railed overhang there was a large chair. The captain of Leviathan sat and watched the sea shrouded in darkness. Heirthall slowly stood and looked out over the wooden deck sixty feet below.
“Ginny?” Niles asked, looking from the captain to Virginia, who had merely lowered her head and placed it against the cold glass.
“Virginia always seemed so formal—so at MIT I called her Ginny. We were what they called child prodigies. She was always into books and study, but never noticed the world around her. However, she was always preaching God and country, but never allowed a thought to what her country was doing to the world’s environment—indeed, God’s environment.”
“You two know each other?” Sarah asked before Niles could.
“You Americans are surprisingly entertaining,” Farbeaux said as he walked over and started looking for the bar he knew must be in the compartment somewhere.
“We are … or I should say, at one time, the best of friends,” Heirthall said from her high vantage point.
“Tell me you’re not the saboteur?” Compton said, taking a step toward the glass.
Virginia turned, looking shocked and hurt.
“What?”
“You didn’t allow this woman to attack the vaults and then the complex itself, killing our people?” Niles asked, even shocking the others.
Leviathan: An Event Group Thriller Page 22
