Sea of Greed

Kurt knew Joe needed to stay on the submersible to help the Raleigh hook on. “Throw me a mask,” he said. “I’ll take a look.”

Joe pulled a diver’s mask from his kit and tossed it to Kurt. After adjusting the straps, Kurt took a deep breath and dived under the small craft. The bow of the submarine looked fine. A few feet back, he found a mark on the hull. Running his hand over it, Kurt decided it was organic. Some large fish or marine mammal had rammed the sub. It happened from time to time.

Still holding his breath, Kurt continued aft, checking for more damage. He was just about to surface when he felt a strange sensation, like someone had thumped him in the chest. At the same moment, a pressure wave boxed his ears as it swept by.

He surfaced, grabbed the handhold and flipped up the mask. “Did you feel that?”

Joe was standing now, looking out toward the horizon. “No, but I saw it,” he said. “Shock wave running on the surface. Are you all right?”

“Felt like a mule kick, but I’m fine.” Kurt pulled himself onto the submersible next to Joe. “Might have been seismic.”

“I don’t think so,” Joe said. He pointed to the horizon. A trail of smoke was rising into the sky due east of their position.

Sound and shock waves traveled four times faster and four times farther in water than they did in the air. Nearly a minute after Kurt had felt the pressure wave below, an echoing boom rolled over them from the distance.

“That’s a long way off for us to hear and feel it,” Joe said.

Kurt did some rough calculations. “Twelve miles,” he suggested, “give or take. Who’s out there?”

“Only the oil platforms,” Joe said.

A grim look settled on both of their faces. Joe dropped back into the submersible, sat in the command chair and powered the sub up.

Kurt climbed up and dropped in beside him, grabbing the radio.

“Raleigh, this is Austin,” he said. “Prepare for pickup. And contact the Coast Guard. I have a feeling our assistance is going to be needed.”

• • •

TWENTY MINUTES LATER, Kurt and Joe stood on the bridge of the Raleigh with the ship’s microphone in Kurt’s hand. The Raleigh was already traveling at flank speed, heading in a direct line for the inferno in the distance.

Kurt’s estimate of twelve miles had been almost dead-on. The Alpha Star oil rig was burning 11.7 miles away. Holding the microphone near his mouth, Kurt adjusted the frequency and pressed the transmit switch. “Alpha Star, this is Raleigh. We’re coming to render aid. Please advise status.”

Kurt stood six feet tall, with a rugged build, a square jaw and a thick tangle of prematurely silver hair on his head. Tanned from days on the water and weathered from years in the elements, he looked older than his age, though he was squarely in his mid-thirties.

He was the head of Special Projects at NUMA, a branch of the federal government known for taking action when the calls came in, especially in situations like the present one.

He changed frequencies and sent out the same message. There was no response. “Nothing on any of the regular or emergency channels.”

Across from him the Raleigh’s captain, Kevin Brooks, took the information stoically. “Coast Guard reports three rigs on fire,” he said. “Two of them are evacuating. But the Alpha Star is in the thick of the inferno.”

“There has to be help on the way,” Joe suggested.

“Plenty of it,” Brooks said. “But we’re the closest ship. That oil rig will be a melted pile of slag by the time anyone else arrives.”

Kurt expected that to be the case. “Let’s see how bad it is.”

Putting the microphone in its cradle, he switched on a monitor and tapped a few keys. The screen was linked to a pair of high-powered cameras at the top of the Raleigh’s antenna mast. The cameras had long-range lenses and high-powered optic sensors that allowed them to see in many wavelengths simultaneously. They could make out a license plate from a mile offshore and were stabilized on gyroscopic mounts that enabled continuous, crystal clear video, even as the ship pitched and rolled.

As Kurt focused the cameras, the inferno came into view. The Alpha Star platform was half shrouded in dark smoke and burning everywhere they could see. Only the upper rigging remained in the clear.

“Worse than I thought,” Brooks said. “It’s no wonder they can’t respond.”

“There’s an odd angle to the rigging,” Joe pointed out. “The platform is listing. It has to be taking on water down below. We need to get there before that rig turns turtle on us.”

Kurt adjusted the camera, pulling back. In the wider shot, they could see fires raging all across the sea, surrounding the Alpha Star and both of the other rigs. “We’re going to have to sail through the fire to do that,” Kurt said.

The captain glanced at the screen. “You know they’re probably all dead.”

“They might be,” Kurt said. “But if there are survivors, they won’t be getting out of there without our help.”