Powerdown (Richard Mariner Series)

by Peter Tonkin

  ‘Eighteen hundred feet sheer,’ supplied Colin knowledgeably. ‘Half a mile on the path and it is very steep too.’

  ‘But once we’re in Port Foster bay, we can send Zodiac with a team prepared to run up there and call whoever you want. We might even be able to send the Sikorsky, but I can’t remember whether they have a landing area up there.’

  ‘But it will be too late for us!’ said Borisov desperately. ‘All our systems will have shut down.’ He looked at his watch; double-checked with the chronometer above the helmsman’s head. ‘We have just over one hour then. Total powerdown. All systems. Dead.’

  ‘Not the engines,’ said Richard. ‘And not the ancillaries the engine room controls. At five to midnight we get the chief to switch to manual override. We’ll still have steerageway.’

  ‘Steerageway to where? We’ll be blind and deaf, in the middle of the worst storm I have seen. And nothing ahead of us but Neptune’s Bellows, a passage less than a kilometre wide with rocks and shoals on either side and winds tearing in and out all over the place. It is madness. We’ll be dead.’

  ‘No we won’t,’ Richard insisted. ‘Not if we’re careful. Not if we plan. Not if we’re prepared. Ships have been coming and going through Neptune’s Bellows for centuries. Most of them without all of this equipment.’

  ‘Not in storms like this!’ cried Borisov, looking around as though expecting applause for this clincher to the argument.

  ‘Mr Varnek,’ snapped Richard. ‘When will we reach the eye of the storm?’

  ‘At midnight, Captain Mariner.’

  ‘And what will we find there?’

  ‘According to the weather sat, clear skies and calm winds for one hour, maybe two.’

  ‘Mr Yazov, where will we be then?’

  ‘Waiting to enter Neptune’s Bellows, Captain Mariner.’

  ‘You see, Mr Borisov? It is a question of timing. Of being ready and having every eventuality planned for. In one hour’s time, this weather will clear for one hour, perhaps two, before it all closes down again. In one hour and five minutes, we will lose everything except power and propulsion. Therefore we will need to know to within millimetres where we are and how we are heading. We will have moments to post watches on bridge wings and, if we can, on the forecastle head. If we are lucky we may even be able to get the Sikorsky up. As soon as the weather clears we will head at full speed towards Neptune’s Bellows. And the moment we are through we will need to send teams, either by Zodiac or Sikorsky, to the base there.’

  On this note, a distant cheer erupted, as though the passengers had heard and approved Richard’s decisive words. Kate swung round and gasped with shock. The lift car stood open, unnoticed, its door wedged wide by Killigan’s boot on the one side and Hoyle’s on the other. The instant Killigan saw Kate recognise him and open her mouth to warn the bridge party that they were being spied upon, he moved. They both stepped back. The door hissed shut. The lift car was gone. The cheering carried on, distant but unmistakable. It was midnight in Rio, fifteen degrees to the east of them. They had exactly one hour left.

  *

  For the team on the bridge it was an incredibly busy hour and it passed in a flash of frenetic activity. The same was true for the men in the engine room. But for those caught in between, time dragged, the slow tick of the minutes only partially lightened by the colourful excesses in Rio. And there were a good number of people caught in between, for the team on the bridge was stripped down now to navigators and ship-handlers. All the computer people were redundant; even if they could fix anything, the respite would be pointlessly brief. Kyril stayed at his post, but he remained there alone, his equipment dead, his hope of communication with anywhere, near or far, put on hold until he got into the Sikorsky or up onto the deserted base on Deception. All the watch officers remained, on watch or not, just as all the engineers assembled with the chief below, preparing to switch over from the automatic to the manual systems at the captain’s order in fifty minutes’ time. Richard and Colin remained; no one else.

  Kate returned to the Mariners’ stateroom and passed back to Robin Richard’s love and the knowledge that her message had been received. The hunch-backed T-Shirt, with Max and Jolene, went down to the dining salon in search of food and a little more partying. But Jolene was restless, all too well aware that Killigan and Hoyle were on the prowl and that Vivien Agran was nowhere to be seen. In the innermost pocket of her jacket, beneath the warm bulk of T-Shirt’s parka, she still held the little pile of computer disks, wrapped in the printouts of Billy Hoyle’s logs like a little present. Getting to a radio was a high priority for her, too, and she required a much less powerful machine than any of the others, for she only needed to reach Agent Jones at Armstrong. He was so close at hand, she had even tried to raise him on her personal phone, but the signal had gone down with the satellite dish and had not come up again.

  She had a clear view of her duty beyond making that call too. Whether she could tell Jones what she had found and what she planned or not, it was her duty, clear and unavoidable, irrespective of the cost, to get back the Power Strip if she could and prevent its design specifications getting from the floppy disk onto the Internet. All she could do at the moment was to keep herself generally aware of the whereabouts of Killigan and Hoyle. But she had no wish to go looking for them. The next time they managed to get her alone for a couple of minutes they would not hesitate to finish their unfinished business with her.

  The obvious thing to do was to ask the otherwise unemployed T-Shirt for his help. And Jolene knew he would not hesitate to give it. But sometime during that ecstatic time in the shower and those wonderful hours immediately afterwards, T-Shirt had managed to become so precious to her that she would far rather put herself at risk than do anything that might endanger him.

  And so she and T-Shirt and Max sat with the others in the dining salon, watching a midnight carnival snaking through Rio with stories and comments from Montevideo and Buenos Aires. It was not until a little item came in from Gander, Newfoundland, whose time zone was on the half-hour between Rio’s and their own, that she realised how late it was getting. Shaking herself into some kind of wakefulness, Jolene looked around. The first person she saw, in the distance, was Vivien Agran. She had changed her clothes, Jolene noticed. She was wearing black jeans, a black shirt, a thick, heavy black parka. Jolene raised her hand, trying to catch her eye to ask her about a parka for herself so T-Shirt could have his back, but she was gone, leaving an impression almost as disturbing as Killigan and Hoyle. Jolene sat back, mind racing, and suddenly realised she was sitting opposite the one potential ally she had not tapped for any favours yet. She leaned forward. ‘Hey, Corporal Washington,’ she said. ‘How are you feeling?’

  *

  So far, anyone wanting to use the Sikorsky or the Zodiacs had gone down the deck. The Sikorsky sat on a platform above the main deck behind the bridgehouse. The Zodiacs were lowered from the poop further back still, and were boarded down a set of retractable steps which started at a little mezzanine dock, hardly more than a balcony, and reached to a little step-off point at water level. This was not the only way to get back to the chopper and the inflatables, however. A long passageway reached back at second engineering deck level, piercing the storage areas and ending at the bottom of a well with a ladder up its side and a hatch at the top. The hatch was in the main deck just below the Sikorsky’s overhanging tail, within easy reach of the davits to lower the Zodiacs and one companionway up from the little mezzanine balcony. At 11.45, local time, Third Officer Borisov led a little squad of men down this passageway. His orders were manifold. He was to wait for the sudden quiet calm which would announce that they had passed into the eye of the storm. He was to expect a signal of confirmation on his VHF. He was not to expect the lights or power to fail as the chief switched over to manual power — though in fact he did expect this. He was then to lead his men up onto the deck. There he would ascertain, as best he could, whether the chopper would fly and the inflatabl
es would float, and ready them all as swiftly as he was able. The pilot was part of his little command, as were the two most expert Zodiac coxwains. Kyril was with him. The radio officer would go first to the Sikorsky and try to raise any local bases he could on the chopper’s radio while the pilot was doing his pre-flight. Once the chopper was ready or the Zodiacs could be lowered, Kyril and Borisov would signal the bridge and be directed into the helicopter and/or the boats. By this time it was assumed that Kalinin would have passed, safe and sound, at best speed possible, through Neptune’s Bellows and into the calm, safe haven of Port Foster.

  As Borisov led his elite team down the long engineering deck corridor, he was wrapped in thought, his mind — a dangerously negative force on occasion — far ahead of his feet, wrestling with ghostly problems. He was unaware that Killigan and Hoyle were also intent on making use of the quickest way off the ship and across to the communications equipment at the unmanned station on Deception.

  *

  ‘Do you realise what you are asking?’ demanded Irene Ogre, drawing herself up to her full height. Corporal Washington met her, look for look on the level. ‘Yes, ma’am, Captain. But I am a legally constituted member of the United States Army, ma’am, and this is American soil. I know you have firearms locked away for use in emergencies. This is an emergency, ma’am. I realise you cannot leave the bridge at this moment, so I want you to turn over the key of the gun cabinet to me, please. The inspector here and I have to go and place two men under arrest until such time as Federal agents can come and question them.’

  ‘Killigan and Hoyle,’ said T-Shirt helpfully.

  Irene looked across at Richard, but for once he was no help to her. His frowning concentration was wholly on the chronometer, the GPS readout on the ship-handler, and the latest weather-sat fax on which Varnek and Yazov had marked the positions of the ship and the still-invisible Deception. It was impossible to believe that in ten minutes time they would break out of this storm wall into a calm sea and clear sky and find an island, twenty miles in circumference, two thousand feet in height, immediately off their port quarter.

  ‘You see Deception, Mr Yazov?’ called Richard, his voice reflecting nothing of the tension he was feeling.

  ‘Clear as clear,’ called Yazov from the collision alarm radar. ‘If I had the sound on this turned on, you would be going deaf right now. As far as I can make out the detail, the mouth of Neptune’s Bellows is seven kilometres due west of us, right about … NOW!’

  On his signal, Richard reached over and hit the emergency left turn button. The button instantly overrode the automatic ship-handling system, swinging the ship onto her new heading due west. The helmsman had been awaiting this and he braced himself to hold the wheel as the game ship swung beam on to wind and sea which until now had been following them. Over she rolled like a corvette, until it seemed that the starboard bridge wing was going to go under. Then she began to right herself. Vicious spindrift came whipping across her foredeck from left to right. A great sea punched her on the jaw, wrenching her head round with massive force.

  ‘How’s that eye coming, Mr Varnek?’ called Richard.

  ‘Any minute now,’ responded the Russian.

  ‘It’ll arrive on the dot of midnight, then,’ said Colin from the other side of the writhing, wrestling helmsman.

  ‘Yes. Very well,’ said Irene Ogre to Washington. ‘Take the keys. But I want no gunfights aboard my ship, Corporal, Dr DaCosta. This is not the Wild West.’ The three of them ran over to the lift and Irene moved to stand at Richard’s shoulder. ‘How long until the chief switches to manual?’

  Richard’s eyes flicked up to the chronometer. ‘Four minutes,’ he said. ‘Nine to powerdown. Where is the eye, Mr Varnek?’

  ‘It’s just coming over Deception. On this line we will run into it at the stroke of midnight, a little less than five kilometres this side.’

  ‘It had better be there,’ said Colin quietly, standing by with Yazov, ready to go out and act as lookout.

  ‘It’ll be there. Are you ready?’

  ‘Aye.’

  ‘Mr Yazov?’

  ‘Ready.’

  ‘Right. Off you go down to the A-deck door. Good luck, the pair of you. And for God’s sake wait for my signal!’

  Colin gestured out at the lethal, howling madness smearing itself across the clearview. ‘You don’t have to tell me twice,’ he said grimly. ‘I’ll not be going out in that without a direct order. Why, man, it’s almost as bad as December in Aberdeen.’

  *

  The guns were sturdy, not very remarkable, reliable. A Remington rifle and a Smith and Wesson .38 police special, a pistol, not an automatic, with chambers and no fancy red-dot sight. But Jolene felt so much better as she pulled it out of the case that she would almost have traded T-Shirt for it. Almost. She saw him looking longingly at it and remembered the section of his life story he had told her in the shower. The Special Forces section. ‘You can’t have it,’ she said firmly. ‘It’s my security blanket. Humour me. And anyway, you look like what you really need is a broadsword.’

  ‘And a horse,’ he said. ‘In fact, now you come to mention it, I’d give my kingdom for a —’

  Corporal Washington snapped the breach on the Remington open and closed like John Wayne with a Winchester. ‘Let’s move out,’ he ordered quietly.

  But T-Shirt held up his right hand. ‘Wait a moment,’ he said.

  The guns were in the captain’s quarters up on Palmer-Hall Deck. Because they didn’t know where Killigan and Hoyle were, Washington and Jolene planned to move downwards, deck by deck. But T-Shirt’s work on the computers had given him an insight into the way the various programs worked, so he called up the accommodation section and swiftly ran through the corridor monitoring programme. Five minutes later he found them, one deck down on Byrd-Ellsworth. ‘There they are,’ he said in triumph. ‘Got you, you —’

  The lights flickered.

  ‘Shit!’ he said. ‘What’s the time?’

  Jolene looked at her watch. ‘Jesus! It’s ninety seconds to midnight.’

  ‘You want to watch these bozos for a bit?’ asked T-Shirt. ‘See what they’re up to?’

  ‘No,’ said Jolene decisively. ‘I don’t want to watch them. I want to stop them.’

  ‘Fair enough,’ said T-Shirt. He stood up and prepared to follow her. ‘Hey!’

  ‘What now?’ snapped Washington, beginning to run out of patience.

  ‘They disappeared. I’ve got Mrs Agran now, but Killigan and Hoyle’ve gone. Now where the hell …’ He began to flick through the corridor monitors again, holding the others up for a few more vital seconds. Then, ‘Gotcha,’ he said again. ‘They’re on Palmer-Hall. Hey, that’s this —’

  Jolene’s watch alarm went off, interrupting him. ‘It’s midnight,’ she said, and distant cheering echoed up from below.

  ‘Cool,’ said T-Shirt. ‘Welcome to the new millennium …’

  And everything went off. Lights, monitors, engines, everything.

  *

  ‘Speak to me, Chief,’ said Irene Ogre, her face like a mask of ice. The only light on the silent bridge was coming out of the whirling heart of the storm, dull as pewter. ‘You promised me that this was not going to happen. Speak to me!’

  Richard was at her side, his large hand on the helmsman’s shoulder, steadying the solid seaman as he fought to hold the ship on course while she still had steerageway.

  ‘It’s midnight, Mr Varnek,’ said Richard.

  ‘A moment more,’ said Varnek. ‘The last weather map was so clear. It can only be a moment …’

  Under the straining silence of his uncompleted sentence, the engines suddenly rumbled back to life. Richard felt the kick of steerage slam up from the wheel into the helmsman’s shoulder. He raised his VHF to his lips. ‘Colin?’ he said. ‘Mr Yazov. Any minute now. And remember, the seas will still be running high and there are no safety lines out there.’

  As he spoke, a flaw in the wind snatched the whirli
ng ice away and he shouted, as though kicked in the stomach with brutal force. Just for an instant, there was Deception. Just where Yazov said it was. Just as Varnek said it was. A black cliff nearly five kilometres long, six hundred metres high, less than four kilometres dead ahead, coming towards them at all of fifteen knots.

  Then the mad swirl was back again and he couldn’t see the forecastle head, let alone four kilometres. The lights flickered back on then as the alternators kicked in.

  ‘Mr Varnek,’ said Richard. ‘What is your computer saying?’

  ‘Rest in peace, perhaps. Nothing else. It is dead.’

  ‘The whole thing? You can’t even access Mrs Agran’s systems?’

  ‘I tell you, Captain, I’d see more if I was looking up a dodo’s ass.’

  ‘Very colourful, Mr Varnek,’ spat Captain Ogre. But whatever sharp words were spilling onto her lips were snatched away with the storm wall as they plunged into the eye, just as he had predicted. And, as Richard had already seen, there was Deception, a black wall seemingly immediately ahead of them, grinding down upon them. What made it particularly terrifying, other than its solidity and shocking proximity, was the fact that Neptune’s Bellows was invisible, indistinguishable from the unremitting bulk of it. And such was their speed as they plunged towards it, that even if Richard hit the emergency turn button again, they would ram themselves with massive force onto some black, ice-bound part of it.

  ‘OK, Colin,’ said Richard into his VHF. ‘You’re on.’

  *

  Colin Ross was used to the cold. He did most of his work on the ice at the Poles. He had man-sledded across the Big White when Ranulph Fiennes was still a lad. He made no great song and dance about it, but his left hand was prosthetic, the real one lost to frostbite a quarter of a century since. But he had never felt cold like this. Out on Kalinin’s foredeck, everything was thick and slick with ice; ice that seemed ambitious of attaining absolute zero on its own. The wild physics of the storm were still being worked out here as molecules of pure and salt water intermingled at temperatures far below zero, still in the grip of the awful forces which had been whirling around them until a moment or two ago. There was a frost fog in the unnatural calm, something born of the wild wish of the ice to be closer still to interstellar temperatures, to attain the blue perfection of glacier hearts where even light begins to freeze.