Clive Cussler - Shock Wave

“Weird,” Giordino said, staring ahead at the restless sea as the islands north of Cape Horn grew in the distance.

“‘Weird’?” Pitt echoed in a tone of indifference.

“What Maeve yelled as we lifted off.”

“How could you hear anything over the chopper’s racket?”

“I couldn’t. It was all in the way she formed the words with her mouth.”

Pitt grinned. “Since when do you read lips?”

“I’m not kidding, pal,” Giordino said in dead seriousness. “I know the message she tried to get across to us.”

Pitt knew from long years of experience and friendship that when Giordino turned profound he worked purely from essentials. You didn’t step into his circle, spar with him and step out unscathed. Pitt mentally remained outside the circle and peered in. “Spit it out. What did she say?”

Giordino slowly turned and looked at Pitt, his deep-set black eyes reflective and somber at the same time. “I could swear she said ‘Help me.’”

The twin-engined Buccaneer jet transport touched down smoothly and taxied to a quiet corner of Andrews Air Force Base, southeast of Washington. Fitted out comfortably for high-ranking Air Force officers, the aircraft flew nearly as fast as the most modern fighter plane.

As the flight steward, in the uniform of an Air Force master sergeant, carried their luggage to a waiting car and driver, Pitt marveled at Admiral Sandecker’s influence in the capital city. He wondered what general the admiral had conned into temporarily lending the plane to NUMA, and what manner of persuasion it took.

Giordino dozed during the drive, while Pitt stared unseeing at the low buildings of the city. The rush-hour traffic had begun streaming out of town, and the streets and bridges leading into the suburbs were jammed. Fortunately, their car was traveling in the opposite direction.

Pitt cursed his idiocy for not returning to Ice Hunter shortly after liftoff. If Giordino had interpreted her message correctly, Maeve was in some sort of trouble. The possibility that he had deserted her when she was calling out to him gnawed at his conscience.

The long arm of Sandecker reached through his melancholy and cast a shroud over his preoccupation with guilt. Never in Pitt’s years with NUMA had he ever placed his personal problems above the vital work of the agency. During the flight to Punta Arenas, Giordino had provided the crowning touch.

“There’s a time for being horny, and this isn’t it. People and sea life are dying by the boatload out there on the water. The sooner we stop this evil, the more lives will be spared to pay taxes. Forget her for now. When this cauldron of crap is over you can take a year off and chase her Down Under.”

Giordino might never-have been hired to teach rhetoric at Oxford, but he seldom failed to fill a book with common sense. Pitt surrendered and reluctantly eased Maeve from his mind, not entirely successfully. The memory of her lingered like a portrait that became more beautiful with the passage of time.

His thoughts were broken as the car rolled over the driveway in front of the tall green, solar-glassed building that housed NUMA’s headquarters. The visitors’ parking lot was covered with television transmitter trucks and vans, emitting enough microwaves to launch a new chicken rotisserie franchise.

“I’ll run you into the underground parking area,” said the driver. “The vultures were expecting your arrival.”

“You sure an ax murderer isn’t roaming the building?” asked Giordino.

“No, the reception is for you. The news media are starved for details of the cruise ship massacre. The Australians tried to put a tight lid on it, but all hell broke loose after the surviving passengers talked when they reached Chile. They were glowing in their praise of how you guys rescued them and saved the cruise ship from going on the rocks. The fact that two of them were daughters of diamond king Arthur Dorsett naturally excited the expose rags.”

“So now they’re calling it a massacre.” Pitt sighed.

“Lucky for the Indians they can’t blame this one on them,” said Giordino.

The car stopped in front of a security guard stationed in front of a small alcove that led to a private elevator. They signed an entry form and took the elevator to the tenth floor. When the doors opened they stepped into a vast room that was Hiram Yaeger’s electronics fiefdom from which the computer wizard directed NUMA’s vast data systems network.

Yaeger looked up from a huge horseshoe-shaped desk in the middle of the room and smiled broadly. No bib overalls today, but he was wearing a faded Levi’s jacket that looked like it had been dragged from Tombstone to Durango by a horse. He jumped to his feet and came from behind the desk, vigorously shaking Pitt’s and Giordino’s hands. “Good to see you two scoundrels back in the building. It’s been as dull as an abandoned amusement park since you skipped to the Antarctic.”

“Always good to be back on a floor that doesn’t rock and roll,” said Pitt.

Yaeger grinned at Giordino. “You look nastier than when you left.”

“That’s because my feet still feel cold as ice,” Giordino replied in his usual burlesque tone.

Pitt glanced about the room crowded with electronic data systems and a crew of technicians. “Are the admiral and Rudi Gunn on hand?”

“Waiting for you in the private conference room,” answered Yaeger. “We assumed you and A1 would go there first.”

“I wanted to catch you before we all sat down.”

“What’s on your mind?”

“I’d like to study your data on sea serpents.”

Yaeger raised his eyebrows. “You did say sea serpents?”

Pitt nodded. “They intrigue me. I can’t tell you why.”

“It may surprise you to learn I have a mountain of material on sea serpents and lake monsters.”

“Forget the legendary creatures swimming around in Loch Ness and Lake Champlain,” said Pitt. “I’m only interested in the seagoing variety.”

Yaeger shrugged. “Since most of the sightings are on inland waters, that cuts the search by eighty percent. I’ll have a fat file on your desk tomorrow morning.”

“Thank you, Hiram. I’m grateful as always.”

Giordino peered at his watch. “We’d better move along before the admiral hangs us from the nearest yardarm.”

Yaeger gestured to a nearby door. “We can take the stairway.”

When Pitt and the others entered the conference room, Sandecker and Gunn were studying the region where the latest case of unexplained death was projected on the holographic chart. The admiral and Gunn stepped forward to greet them. For a few minutes they all stood in a tight little huddle and deliberated the turn of events. Gunn anxiously probed Pitt and Giordino for details, but they were both extremely tired, and they condensed the wild series of incidents into brief descriptions.

Sandecker knew better than to crowd them. Full reports could be written at a later time. He motioned to the empty chairs. “Why don’t you sit down, and we’ll get to work.”

Gunn pointed toward one of the blue globes that seemed to float over one end of the table. “The latest kill zone,” he said. “An Indonesian freighter called Mentawai, with a crew of eighteen.”

Pitt turned to the admiral. “The vessel that exploded after another ship’s crew had boarded her?”

“The same,” said Sandecker, nodding. “As I told you aboard Ice Hunter, actor Garret Converse, his crew and his fancy junk were reported sailing in the same area by an oil tanker that went unscathed. The junk and everyone on board appear to have vanished.”

“Nothing on satellite?” inquired Giordino.

“Too much cloud cover, and the infrared cameras won’t pick out a vessel as small as a junk.”