Paul Christopher - The Lucifer Gospel

The small waves lapping at the side of the rubber dinghy were cold. Finn looked up. The sun was dying in the west, somewhere beyond Cuba now; the further side of the afternoon. It was still light enough to dive, but not for long. It would take the better part of an hour to get suited up and prepared, and they’d already had a hectic day. She trailed her hand in the tropical water. Beneath her fingers the wreck of the giant ship waited silently, as it had for half a hundred years, secrets still locked within her wave-torn, coral-encrusted hull. She looked to the south; there was a deepening streak of silvery gray. Storm clouds were gathering over the distant horizon.

“Tomorrow?” said Finn.

“Tomorrow,” Hilts answered. “If the weather holds.”

They reached the wreck at fifty-five feet, following the anchor line from the dinghy on the surface down to where it stood hard against the current, the cast aluminum mushroom of the anchor itself tangled in the old twisted cables of a lifeboat davit amidships on the starboard side. The wreck was gigantic, a massive torpedo shape in the green-blue water, the dark hull clear against the white sand of the ocean floor. It seemed to stretch forever, the stern hard against the reef, the weed-and-shell encrusted bow jutting out slightly into the long sandy chute leading to the channel. The wreck was corkscrewed, the bow tilting downward, the amidships section and the stern still intact but rolled slightly to one side. From where the line came down from the dinghy it was easy to see why the huge hulk had remained undiscovered for so long. High above they could see the choppy surface just off the reef. The weather had turned ominous overnight, but they’d decided to chance the dive anyway.

Hilts pointed upward and his voice echoed electronically in Finn’s earpiece. “She must have been rolled against the reef wall during the hurricane when she sank,” he said. “Over the years the tidal surge and the current carved out that lip-and-groove formation.”

Finn saw what he was pointing to; it was as though the water had scooped out a bed for the sunken ship to sag into, the overhang of coral throwing a long, broad shadow that would hide her from view. She could feel the suck and pull of the surge against the rebreather unit snugged onto her back plate. With the tide ebbing it was easy enough to counter, but she knew it would get steadily stronger as the dive wore on.

“Let’s get going,” she said. They’d been up since first light, planning the dive against the deck plans. They’d assumed, correctly from the looks of it, that the upper superstructure of the deckhouse, sundeck, boat deck, and promenade decks had pancaked into each other as she sank, like a building imploding, crushed by the weight of the two large funnels as they collapsed. According to the news reports there had been an explosion in the boiler room, but by the looks of the twisted plates and the hull it was the bow section that had torn away.

“Can you tell where we are?” Finn asked. She turned slowly in the warm water, looking up and down the confusing length of the immense vessel. Her weight belt kept her poised, negatively buoyant in the blue-green ocean. She moved her arms back and forth in a slow, sweeping gesture, just enough to keep her upright. At a guess she would have said they were somewhere ahead of where the bow funnel had been, partway between it and the forward mast.

“Somewhere just behind where the bridge would have been,” Hilts answered.

“That means we have to head back toward the stern,” she said. “According to the plans the main gangway doors and the lobby were a hundred and sixty feet from the bow.”

“Fifty feet back,” Hilts said with a nod. He unclipped a Sea Marshall Diver’s Beacon from his vest, attached it to the anchor line and set the pulse light flashing. If either one of them got turned around or the weather turned bad quickly, the light and the 121.5-megahertz signal being transmitted from the device would lead them back to the anchor line.

They swam slowly to the edge of the collapsed deck and Finn stopped suddenly, brought up short as she found herself suddenly looking down to the ocean floor as the hull dropped away. The sense of size was almost dizzying; even under water it was almost enough to give her vertigo, regardless of the fact that she couldn’t actually fall off the edge of the ship.

“Intense,” said Hilts, treading water beside her.

She nodded and launched herself over the side, her legs and hips moving in a smooth undulating technique that was meant to reduce silt disturbance. She planed down the side of the hull, breathing evenly, enjoying the full face mask and the fact that she didn’t have to keep a mouthpiece clamped between her jaws. The oddest sensation was the ebreather’s lack of bubbles. The simple, even hissing of the unit and the boiling sensation of the bubbles’ release around her was vaguely claustrophobic; it was almost too quiet. On the other hand, the silence let her glide through the local schools of bluefish and cobia almost without notice. In the distance she could see a smaller group of silvery barracuda swimming in their distinctive, nervous zigzags, but she ignored them; she knew the needle-toothed creature’s reputation was built more on appearance than actual danger. On the rare occasions that the predatory fish attacked humans it was because they’d been attracted by some glittering piece of jewelry or a brightly reflective watch.

She planed down, aware of Hilts beside and just behind her. She kept her eyes to the left, watching the weed-and-barnacle-covered deck plates, the steadily strengthening surge moving the wrack back and forth like waving fingers. Regular lines of portholes ran off into the distance, most of them still intact, the thick glass covered in a crust of silt and growth, the cabin interiors on the other side of the barrier dark and unwelcoming. The ship was dead, not even a ghost; this was no Titanic with the specters of a thousand passengers still hovering nearby; this was a burnt-out hulk.

“There,” she said finally, pulling up short and pointing ahead and down. A dark hole gaped in the side of the hull. It was close to a perfect square, the edges softened by a dense mat of sea growth. “The main entry hatch. It’s wide open.”

“They would have taken off the passengers through there while they still had the time. Easier to load the lifeboats from here.”

Both Finn and Hilts were carrying high-intensity twin lights, one lamp fixed to their back plates, the other clipped to their belts. Both were powered by battery packs that had a charge life of almost two hours. They switched on and the entranceway was suddenly lit up brightly. They had agreed on position and protocols the night before, so there was no need to discuss it again now. Because Finn was smaller, Hilts would go first to assess their best route; if he could get through a space, then it stood to reason that Finn could follow. Finn on the other hand would be the one keeping track of the time, regularly checking the dive computer dangling from her vest. It would be easy to get so far into the wreck’s interior that they would run out of time; it would be up to her to call the cutoff point no matter how close they’d come to their objective.

“Top to bottom,” said Hilts. “We start with the Vatican guy.”

“Augustus Principe, the bishop. Upper Promenade Deck, Gelderland Suite. Cabin number seventy-one.” Finn reached down, pulled up the dangling computer on her vest, and set the elapsed time function. The computer would let out a loud buzz at the halfway point-their signal to turn back, no matter what. The digital display began to count down. “Go.” She dropped the computer. Hilts eased forward, keeping his swim-fin motion to a minimum to reduce disturbance of the accumulated silt that had settled on board. He kept one hand extended, sweeping his hand light back and forth. Finn came in behind him and a little above, pacing herself to him.