The Victoria Stone

by Bob Finley

  The call came in as Chief of Naval Operations Lynn Thomas was about to leave for lunch.

  "Commander Jacobs, sir."

  "Yeah, Charlie, what is it? I'm just on my way out the door."

  "Yes, sir. I was hoping to catch you before you left. Mr. Hemingway called. He'd like to meet with you at your earliest convenience."

  "Hemingway! They found her! And she's on the surface and requesting pick-up! Son of a gun! Justin did it after all." Thomas smiled.

  "Set it up," he ordered, referring to his plan to make sure the U. S. Navy was the first on the scene.

  "Working on it, sir."

  "How's his family?" The CNO wanted to know about the rest of the crew.

  "He was in a hurry, sir."

  "Alright. Let me know when and where on Hemingway. And when you speak with him again, tell I asked about his family."

  "Yes, sir. I'll get back to you."

  At 4:26 p. m., less than a half-hour after his original call, the computer warbled to alert Ben Masters to an incoming message.. The encrypted message down-linked by satellite was deciphered on board MARS and scrolled onto the command center screen. It told him that the Military Sealift Command's Combat Store ship FS7 "San Jose" had been diverted from the east-bound Washington Battle Group that just ‘happened’ to be two hours north of him, along with the Guided Missile Destroyer DDG 993 "Kidd". It advised him that the nearest vessel to his position, other than the dozen ships in the Navy convoy, was a freighter of Panamanian registry that was hull-down and west-bound, also two hours away. To make sure he was rescued by home-folks, the “Kidd’s” Seasprite helicopter was on its way to put a diver on board MARS. The diver would handle lines when the "San Jose" took her in tow, assuring ‘friendlies’ were in charge.

  On command, Ben officially radioed a distress call, alleging mechanical failure, and requesting aid. The "San Jose" immediately responded on an open channel, advising that she would render assistance. No mention was made on the air that she was already well under way, or that the "Kidd" would assist.

  Twenty minutes later, with the sun low in the west, a Kaman SH-2F LAMPS-1 Seasprite helicopter shot low over the ship like a 225 knot wasp, flared up, swapped ends, and beat back toward the MARS III on an upwind approach. Two Mk46 ASW torpedoes and a 15-sonobuoy dispenser were slung in front of the non-retracting tail wheel. She carried a pilot, co-pilot/tactical coordinator, and a systems operator. The co-pilot finally decided from the trailing wake which end was which and the pilot slid into position thirty yards off MARS's "bow" and hovered twenty feet up. A maelstrom of blown spray erupted from the wave crests and concentric circles spread outward from rotor blast. On this hop they had a passenger. A black-suited diver leaning out the Seasprite's sliding door grabbed his facemask and stepped nonchalantly out of a perfectly good airplane, splashing into the sea in front of the MARS's forward sphere. He allowed the eighty-foot diameter ‘saucer’ to run up to him and, grabbing a boarding ladder between spheres, clambered topside. He slipped out of his MARC-1 harness and secured it to the MARS’s superstructure, stripped off his "feet", and made his way to the center command sphere. Mounting a ladder to the underway bridge, he was able to look directly down inside the sphere to where Ben sat at the command console. The diver unclipped a small FM radio from his web belt. He held up a series of fingers to let Ben know what frequency he was transmitting on and waited while Ben reset the radio. Ben nodded up through the acriliglass ceiling. The diver put the radio to his lips.

  "I was in the neighborhood and saw your lights on. Hope you don't mind my dropping in."

  Ben saw the diver smile and smiled back. It was a relief to know that he wasn't alone anymore.

  "I sure am glad you did," he said. "I could use some help."

  "Roge-O," the diver smiled and cupped his hands in front of him. Ben understood and smiled back. He was 'in good hands'. Fifteen minutes later the sinister-looking "Kidd", with DDG 993 painted in white on her gray bow, made a wide arc and took up station fifty yards to windward, putting the MARS in her lee slick and so minimizing the MARS's yaw and pitch in the eight-foot seas. The chopper settled back onto its aft pad aboard the "Kidd" and was secured. An hour later, just at sundown, the "San Jose" arrived. Her bos'n fired a messenger line over to the diver waiting topside on MARS. Blue-dungareed deckhands followed with successive lines until the MARS was safely in tow, though it would be slow going due to the doughnut shape of the craft. Ben Masters ran a quick systems check with the make-shift tech crew that boarded and then he transferred by Captain's gig to the "Kidd" for a hot meal and debriefing. The Captain flashed an encrypted summary of events to CNO Thomas's office. Peter Jenkins, whose job as aide frequently meant working late, intercepted the message. He immediately paged his boss and, in less than a minute, Thomas called in from his limo's secure phone.

  "Sir, I hate to interrupt you, but you'll want to see this one. It's from Captain McCrary aboard the "Kidd"."

  "Hit the high spots."

  "Yes, sir," Peter scanned the three short paragraphs again. "It seems that MARS III surfaced about 16:30 this afternoon under the conn of an engineer by the name of Benjamin Masters. Masters called for assistance and was taken in tow at about 1900 hours by FS7 "San Jose". In debriefing, Masters told the Captain that...the MARS was intact and fully functional when they found her, but was unmanned."

  "Unmanned?!"

  "Yes, sir, that's what he said. But, then he said that their sub, the VIKING, was attacked by one of the crewmembers...Wojecki?...in a minisub."

  Thomas shook his head as if to clear it. "Go on," he said.

  "Well, then this Wojecki told them...the VIKING crew...that terrorists had boarded the MARS and taken the crew...the other two members of the crew...hostage. But that he, Wojecki, escaped in a minisub and, when the terrorists couldn't find him, they finally gave up and left in their own minisub."

  "And took two hostages with them," Thomas struggled to keep up with the convoluted story.

  "Yes, sir... a Doctor Layton and...ET2 Terry Bryson."

  "So, then what"?

  "Well, it seems that the Captain of the VIKING left Masters to bring the MARS up, since he was the most qualified, being an engineer, and took Wojecki with him in the VIKING, and went after the terrorists."

  "Went after them?! I didn't authorize that! How did he know where to go?" Thomas felt what little control he'd had of the situation slipping away from him.

  "Well, sir, apparently this Wojecki, before he escaped from the terrorists in the minisub, overheard their plans, or their destination, or...something."

  "'Or something'? Isn't that a little vague?" Thomas grated sarcastically.

  "Yes, sir," his aide apologized, "but, if you'll forgive me, sir, this whole story sounds like a science fiction novel."

  Admiral Thomas thought about that. He agreed.

  "Is there more?"

  "Yes, sir, I was just about to get to that. It seems Captain Justin and the others are headed to a place called Centinela Guyot."

  Lynn Thomas leaned back in the limo seat and sighed.

  "What, pray tell, is a 'Centinela'-whatever-you-said?" He could hear a smile in his aide's answer.

  "I thought you might ask that, sir. So I inquired."

  "And...?"

  "It's an undersea mountain off the mouth of the Mediterranean Sea. 'Bout a hundred miles out. Pretty obscure, actually. It wasn't that easy to locate."

  Thomas's mind raced. "Why would they go there?" he asked no one in particular.

  "You've got me on that one, sir," his aide replied.

  "Okay, Pete. Good job. I'll call the SecNav. How many ships do we have in the Washington Group?"

  "Let's see...we have the Washington, the Bainbridge, San Jacinto, the...Doyle, the Kidd, of course...and the Bergall and the Rickover. That's...what...seven out of thirteen. But it's a pretty good cross-section. And, it was put together on pretty short notice, too."

  "Yeah, but we had to have some kind of presence in the general
area where we last heard from MARS, in case we got a call. So...that gives us a carrier, two missile cruisers, the Kidd, which is a guided missile destroyer, a missile frigate, and a pair of nuke subs...right?"

  "Yes, sir." The old man knew his ships.

  "Alright. You get hold of George Conrad over at CIA. Tell 'im I've got to see him soonest. Tonight. If he's not there, don't let 'em give you any lip. Tell 'em to find him. Tell 'em it could be a matter of national security. No, tell 'em it's international security, since this...whatever seamount is apparently in international waters. Then put out the word. Staff meeting in two hours...no, better make that 2100. No excuses."

  "Yes, sir. Anything else?"

  "Yeah. You eaten?"

  "No, sir."

  "Well, order you and me in some dinner. I haven't eaten, either." He sighed. "Looks like it might be a long night."

  Chapter 36

  Sergeant Major Paul Samuel Banner stepped off the elevator onto the platform outside the penthouse high above the cavern floor. He withdrew from beneath the vee of his shirt front a key on a rawhide lanyard, inserted it into a receptacle mounted in the corner railing, and turned it. From beneath the suspended catwalk twenty feet distant an electric motor came to life and smoothly slid a section of walkway toward him, bridging the chasm. When the bridge locked into place, he crossed and retrieved it...Banner was reminded of a medieval castle drawbridge...and made his way along the narrow catwalk that ran the width of the cavern just fifteen feet below the vaulted stone roof. Besides himself, Jambou limited access to this area only to his chief of security and his gofer, Breton. His muted footsteps on the metal walkway sang faintly as he covered the hundred-plus feet to the tunnel that housed the computer facility. The mercenaries under his command eighty feet below breathed a little easier as they went about their routine, glad that he had something to occupy his time so that, at least for a little while, he wouldn't be looking over their shoulders.

  He'd grown up poor and rough in the brackish marshes and swamps along the Bogue Chitto south of Bogalusa, Louisiana. Looking for 'gator dens, he'd wade chest deep in the dark red waters, groping blindly up to his armpits into underwater holes dug into the banks. He bought his first clunker of a car when he was sixteen with money he made from selling the hides on the black market...about the same time he dropped out of school. His few close friends tagged him with the nickname "Bull" because of his habit of thrashing the murky water with his fists and roaring like a big bull alligator after he'd wrestled one out of its den and killed it. They'd shake their heads and laugh and call him crazy. But nobody ever crossed him.

  He never knew his mother. He only knew that she'd died giving birth to him. His father, a roughneck on a Gulf oil rig until he disappeared off one in a hurricane when Paul Samuel was five, had made sure the boy knew it was his fault his mother had died. His father's body was never found...except, probably, by one of the big sharks that fed on the refuse dumped off the platforms. When the Department of Social Services showed up to lay claim to the boy, his widowed paternal grandfather showed them the business end of a twelve-gauge. When they arrived the next morning with six deputies and a court order, the boy, the old man, and the battered old pick-up truck were long gone. The house was empty and the neighbors had all gone blind and deaf. The old man went to ground in the place he knew best...the swamps. Gradually, as the heat died down and the overloaded case workers moved on to more pressing business, the two quietly resurfaced inland on the Bogue Chitto. When the boy turned six, he entered school under his mother's maiden name. He spent every hour he could with his grandfather. He learned to pole a skiff and lay a trot line for fat, juicy catfish and to "grunt" worms in the sandy soil for fishing. He grew strong and bronzed and self-reliant. When he was seventeen, his grandfather signed for him to join the army. They were made for each other. He completed his education in the yokochos of Japan, the legal brothels of Germany, the deserts of the Middle East, and the jungles of Central America. He was a man's man and the Army stacked stripe after stripe on his sleeve. His psychological profile was eventually recognized and, in school after school, he gradually evolved into that most valuable of military weapons...a lean, mean, killing machine. Unencumbered by conscience, programmed to follow orders, immensely powerful, it never occurred to him to be afraid of anyone or anything. The Army loved him. Until it caught him selling a half-million dollar heavy duty Army crane piece-by-piece on the black market. It was about then that the Army chose to ignore the psychological profile it had been so proud of. He was court-martialed and dishonorably discharged. And a now bitter, lean, mean, killing machine was up for sale to the highest bidder. As a uniquely skilled and highly-trained mercenary, ex-Sergeant Major Banner quickly learned his real value in terms of dollars and cents. He capitalized on his assets, merchandised his wares, and smiled all the way to the bank on job after job.

  And now, here he sat, a hundred and fifty feet under the sea, with a bunch of apes instead of soldiers under his command, inside a cave whose roof might collapse at any minute, with a Napoleonic egomaniac for a client. And what was he doing? Catching up on two days’ worth of watching videotapes from security cameras at fast-forward speed, looking for...what? Some goon sneaking a smoke around the corner? Some poor slob on the graveyard shift catching a quick nap instead of walking a mind-numbing patrol? He sighed and stopped the machine. Finally, he rubbed his face, digging his knuckles into his tired eye sockets. He got up and went to stand by the big glass window at the computer console that overlooked the vast cavern. He stared vacantly into space, remembering the stillness of fog-shrouded mornings on the bayou prairies. Finally, he rolled his head slowly around, hoping to clear the fog his brain seemed to be in this morning. Morning? Well, the clock said it was morning. He sighed again, walked back to the video rack, popped in another DVD, and leaned back lazily into his chair, fingers intertwined at his belt buckle and eyes mere slits.

  He almost missed it. At a fast-forward ratio of 13-to-1, just a blink and he'd never have seen it. But he hadn't blinked. His eyes widened and he quickly sat up. Leaning forward, he reversed the ‘tape’ and alternated between the play and backwind buttons until he reached the place he was looking for. There. He played it through at normal speed, then backed it up and played it all the way through in slow motion. He went back to fast forward, but this time he was alert, intent, and though it took ten minutes to get there, he knew what to watch for. And, sure enough...there it was. He inserted a fresh DVD into a second machine and edited both incidents onto it, so that there was no time lag...what was it, three and a half hours?...between events. Finally, he ejected the edited disk and laid it on the counter while he sat thinking for long minutes. His fingers unconsciously drummed on the DVD as he sat.

  "Now, what were those two up to? In the middle of the night, they go for a swim. A three-and-a-half hour swim. They had to have been inside the sub. They couldn't have been anywhere else. How did they get in? What were they doing in there? What would they risk their lives for that was so important? And, what am I gonna do about it?"

  He got up and moved toward the door. One thing was for sure. The first item of business was damage control. If Jambou found out about this, it would make him and his crew look like incompetents, something he couldn't afford. Literally, couldn't afford. This contract, if he was lucky, would be his last. He'd make enough money off this one that, with what he already had in offshore accounts, he'd be able to retire. He sighed again. He'd been at this a long time. He'd suspected lately that he was losing his edge. He couldn't afford to. And he couldn't afford for his employer to believe that he had. In this business only the strong survived.

  "And this is one old lion who plans to quit while he's ahead...not as a head on somebody's wall."

  He locked the DVD in a drawer, took one last look around, and headed for the catwalk. He had some questions. Somebody had better have some answers.

  Chapter 37

  A bleary-eyed Kim Matsumoto was in Doctor Layton's quarters w
hen "Bull" Banner roughly shoved the door open and stepped inside. Kim knew something was wrong by the set expression on the big man's face. His narrowed eyes were as hardened as a missile silo and it was obvious he wasn't there for small talk.

  "Good morning, Mr. Banner," Bill Layton said carefully.

  Banner didn't return the greeting. He slowly turned his cold gaze on Kim.

  "Am I interrupting something?" He spoke with menacing deliberateness. Kim, who'd just been relating his night's adventures to the older scientist, felt like a schoolboy who'd been caught misbehaving. It was distinctly disconcerting and put him off balance.

  "What do you mean?" he blurted. Wrong response.

  Banner said nothing. His big boots echoing hollowly on the wooden floor, he walked behind Kim and slowly circled the two men, his eyes never leaving his diminutive hostage. When he completed his circuit, he walked straight up to Kim and stopped only a foot-and-a-half from him. His eyes were still boring into the smaller man's. The close physical presence was an intentional, aggressive violation of Kim's "comfort zone". Kim recognized the bullying tactic for what it was...but the sheer mass of the man and his mastery of the interrogation ploy intimidated him in spite of his determination to stand firm. He tipped his head back to look into the giant's face.

  "Is there a problem?" he asked obtusely. And waited.

  Banner continued to look down at him for several seconds with absolutely no change of expression.

  "Yes." He spoke so faintly Bill Layton had to strain to hear him. "There is a problem. Would you like to tell me about it?"

  Kim feigned ignorance. He certainly wasn't going to give anything away.

  "What are you talking about?"