Leviathan

Heirthall came fully awake and fell to his knees as he let go of the wheel. He tried to stand and was thankful when Meriwether once again lifted him to his feet. He left him, ran to the wheel, and tried to turn the giant ship. The rudder was nonresponsive as it was dragging in the thick mud of the bottom. He used all of his considerable strength to turn her, but the resistance was just too great. The mines Stanton had ordered placed against Leviathan's hull, coupled with the weight of her ballast, were dragging the stern into the mud.

"She's not responding, Captain," Meriwether cried out.

Heirthall leaned heavily against the thick crystal of the viewing window. His eyes blank and his body dying, he still needed no binoculars to see his family lined up on the riverboat's stern.

"Elizabeth," he cried out weakly as his body slumped and blood seeped heavily from his mouth.

"Captain!" Meriwether cried out as Heirthall collapsed.

"What has thy vengeance wrought?" Heirthall said, the words coming out as a whisper.

Stanton ran to the railing and jumped over the side. His large body hit the cold water unnoticed by the riverboat's crew and complement of marines. The French news correspondent stood his ground as the great submarine rushed toward him. He suddenly tried to run and reach the woman and her children, but he slipped on the wet deck and went down hard just as the Mary Lincolnstarted a turn. The momentum of the large riverboat rolled the young Jules Verne into the river. Once the cold water closed over him, the Frenchman heard the scream of Leviathan's three propellers as they pushed the huge mass of iron boat through the water. He kicked as hard as he could to fight his way toward the rocky shoreline of the Penobscot, crying as he did at the ruthless fate awaiting the woman and her children.

Leviathan'striple prow sliced the waters of the Penobscot cleanly, and her tower rose majestically over the doomed riverboat. It seemed as if Heirthall had aimed the killing apparatus directly at his wife and children, cleanly slicing into the Mary Lincoln'sstern. The tower of Leviathanfollowed the killing cut of the arched keel breaker. If any were alive inside the strange craft to see, they would have beheld a bizarre sight, as the first mate was covering his captain with his own body.

Leviathanwas traveling in excess of fifty-eight knots when she made contact with the wood, iron, and brass riverboat. She sliced through her from stern to bow in less than three full seconds, with the impact only slowing her by six knots.

The Mary Lincolnsimply folded over in two separate sections and sank as if she had never been, while Leviathancontinued into the broad mouth of the Penobscot and the deeper waters of the ocean beyond.

Meriwether assisted Heirthall to his ship's wheel. The great submarine was dying. Water cascaded into the tower from the cracks in the nearly indestructible crystal of the viewing ports. He could hear the men below fight the flooding caused when her steel rivets popped upon impact with the steel and iron of the riverboat's power plant.

"I have killed that which I loved most, I--"

"It was not you, Captain, 'twas warmongers; it was the likes of Stanton. They are responsible for this."

Heirthall reached up and grabbed the wheel. She turned easily now that her rudder was clear of the river bottom. She had made it back to the sea--made it back to her home.

"Take her ... to the continental ... shelf, Mr. Meriwether; she'll die in deep waters," he ordered as his chin sank lower until it rested against the wheel's stanchion.

The lights flickered and then went out as Leviathandove deep for the last time in her short life. As the red battery-driven emergency lights came on, Octavian Heirthall died.

As the crushing depths started to take a lover's hold on Leviathan, Meriwether and the crew were under no grand illusions about their fate.

Meriwether closed his eyes as the thick, meticulously machined crystal window cracked, the crack streaking across the surface like an invisible hand. Then the first inward bulge of the crushing effect popped loudly outside in the companionway.

"Down to the sea with heavy heart, we follow our captain. We are going home."

PART ONE

DOWN TO THE SEA

IN SHIPS

The ship hangs hovering on the verge of death, / Hell

yawns, rocks rise, and breakers roar beneath!

-- William Falconer, "The Shipwreck"

1

EVENT GROUP COMPLEX,

NELLIS AIR FORCE BASE, NEVADA

PRESENT DAY