Terminal Run

Judison nodded and vanished. He would be launching unmanned underwater vehicles toward the bearing of the Snare detect, and some Mark 8s, a torpedo body with an acoustic daylight sonar reception pod, which would drive away from the ship to a planned point in the sea and shut down. The Sharkeye sonar sensors would deploy in the sea both above the layer and below, extending the ship’s onboard sensors by hundreds of miles. The UUVs, Unmanned Underwater Vehicles, unlike the stationary deployed Sharkeyes, would drive silently in the sea, mobile listening platforms. With two UUVs and two Sharkeyes, the ship could both remain here at PD and scan the sea for hundreds of thousands of yards to the northeast, to the bearing of the Snare.

“Hello?” Admiral McKee barked into the phone.

Commander Peter Collingsworth, Royal Navy, looked out of the commander’s porthole of the submersible Berkshire at the hold bulkhead of the steamship City of Cairo. He wore welder’s goggles as he watched the arm arc downward with the torch, melting through the rusting steel of the ship’s hold. As he sliced the lower horizontal section of the hold cut, the intercom beeped.

“Commander Collingsworth?” It was the voice of the Explorer 7/‘s captain.

“Collingsworth, here, over,” he said in annoyance, trying to concentrate on the cut.

“Commander, I’ve got a rather unusual item to report to you. We’ve just received a satellite phone call. From the Americans, of all people.”

Collingsworth kept cutting, finally saying, “Hard to believe the Americans are calling us.”

“The transmission is apparently coming from the Atlantic,

sir, from the American submarine Hammerhead, a Virginia class. The phone call is from an admiral named McKee, the commander of the U.S. Submarine Force.”

“Go ahead, Knowles.” The cut was a fourth of the way through the horizontal marked line. In a few minutes Collingsworth could stop the cutting torch and prepare to lift out the plate and expose the silver.

“He wants to talk to you. Commander.”

“Well received, Knowles, but what is going on? Have we any guidance from London on this matter?”

“Captain Baines is on holiday until day after tomorrow, sir.”

Collingsworth decided to talk to the Yank and see what the bastard wanted. “Hold on, Knowles. Stand by to patch him in. I have the plate, Jenson. Disconnect the temp derrick. Damn, there’s too much dust. I can’t see anything but sediment, and we don’t have the battery amp-hours to wait for it to settle. We’ll have to come back.”

“You want to make a quick grab and see if you can get a silver box?”

“No, we could break the box and have coins all over hell. Tomorrow’s another day. We’ll be right back, and with Explorer II hovering topside, no one’s going to be down here to grab our take. Knowles, I’m commencing ascent now. Patch in the admiral.”

“Here he is in three, two, one. Admiral McKee, can you hear me?”

“I can hear you. Commander Collingsworth, do I have the pleasure of speaking to you directly now, sir? This is Admiral Kyle McKee, but you can call me Kelly, It’s good to meet you over the radio, Commander. How is your salvage going? Over.”

Collingsworth made a face of irritation. “Admiral, this is Commander Peter Collingsworth. You may call me Commander. What is the nature of your request, sir? Please state your business, over.”

“Of course, Commander. I can tell you’re a busy man. Fact is, we have a little emergency out here a bit north of you and we need your help. And we need it immediately, over.”

“I receive you, Admiral, but please state the nature of your emergency.”

“Commander,” the voice said on the radio, “we have it on good authority that you have a deep diving submersible and an autonomous diving bell on the Explorer II. I’m afraid we’re going to need them both at north latitude twelve degrees and longitude twenty-three west, a bit over nineteen hundred miles from your salvage site. If you get going now, you can be here in two days. We’ll have a U.S. contingent to meet with you here, over.”

“Admiral, I still don’t know what you are talking about. I shall ask you again — please state the nature of your emergency, over.”

“Commander, that rig you’rein right now was built to rescue survivors of a sunken submarine, is that fair to say?”

“Yes, Admiral, that’s the fundamental duty of the Explorer II, but unless there’s a sub to salvage we use the system for other purposes.”

“So, can I tell my superiors you’re on your way?”

Collingsworth’s face grew beet-red in the dim interior light of the submersible. “Admiral, you still haven’t stated your emergency. I’m going to have to terminate this conversation, sir, over.”

“Commander, I think I just did state my emergency.”

Collingsworth hesitated. “Sir, am I to understand that you have a sunken submarine emergency?”