Frank Schatzing - The Swarm

'Huh? What about that black thing, then?'

'Easy. That's us. It's our ship.'

HEEREMA, La Palma, Canary Islands

Maybe they shouldn't have allowed themselves to celebrate so soon. Over the past sixteen hours the tube had been in constant operation, sucking up pinkish creatures by the tonne. The worms didn't seem to take too kindly to the rapid change of scene. Most had exploded in transit, while the remainder writhed in their death throes, jaws twitching. Frost had run out on deck as soon as the first polychaetes spurted out of the tube into enormous nets stretched beneath it. As the water drained through the mesh, giant slides conveyed the bodies into the bowels of a freighter moored alongside the Heerema and whose load was growing steadily. Frost had plunged his hands into the mass and returned to the control room, covered with slime but brandishing a dozen corpses, which he waved triumphantly in the air. 'The only good worm is a dead one,' he veiled. 'Yeee-haa!'

They'd all clapped, including Bohrmann.

After a while the swirling sediment had settled, and a view of marbled lava had appeared on their screens. Isolated strings of bubbles were rising from the surface of the rock. The cameras on the lighting scaffold zoomed in, showing Bohrmann the true nature of the marbled pattern. 'Bacterial mats,' he said.

Frost turned. 'What does that mean?'

'It's hard to say.' Bohrmann rubbed his knuckle against his chin. 'Provided they've only colonised the surface, there won't be any danger. I can't tell how many bacteria will have worked their way through the sediment. See those dirty grey lines? That's the hydrate.'

'At least it's still there.'

'Some of it. But who's to say how much was there in the first place and how much has dissociated already? The escaping gas hasn't reached critical proportions yet. For the moment I'd say we haven't been entirely unsuccessful in our efforts.'

'A double negative is as good as a yes.' Frost got up. I'll make us some coffee.'

After that they'd waited for hours, watching the tube graze the plateau until their eyes were sore. In the end van Maarten had dispatched Frost to bed – he and Bohrmann had barely slept for three days. Frost had protested, but his eyes were closing, and he wobbled out unsteadily to his cabin.

Bohrmann stayed behind with van Maarten. It was 23.00 hours.

'It's your turn next,' said the Dutchman.

'But I can't.' Bohrmann passed his hands over his eyes. I'm the only one who knows enough about hydrates.'

'We know enough.'

'It won't take long now anyway.' Bohrmann was drained. The operating team had been relieved three times already. In a few hours Erwin Suess would be arriving by helicopter from Kiel. He had to hold out until then.

He yawned. A soft hum filled the air. The lighting scaffold and the tube had worked their way slowly but surely towards the north. If the readings from the Polarstern expedition were correct, the infestation was restricted to this terrace. He knew it would take at least another couple of days to vacuum the worms up entirely, but hope was stirring inside him. The methane content of the water was above average, but there was no real cause for concern. If they could get rid of the worms and the bacteria, there was a chance that the partially eroded hydrates might restabilise.

Eyelids drooping, he gazed at the screens. It took him a while to grasp what he was seeing. The picture had changed. 'Something's glittering down there,' he said. 'Move the tube.'

Van Maarten squinted. 'Where?'

'Look at the monitors. There was a flash in the water. Look – there it is again!'

Suddenly he was wide awake. Something was amiss, and the footage from the scaffold now confirmed it. The cloud of sediment had swollen. Bubbles and dark clumps of matter were spinning around and drifting towards the tube.

The cameras filmed nothing but darkness, then the tube jerked to one side.

'What the hell's going on down there?'

The operator's voice came through the speakers: 'We're sucking up large chunks of something. The tube's becoming unstable. I don't know if-'

'Move the tube!' shouted Bohrmann. 'Get away from the flank.'

This can't be happening, he thought. It was the Sonne all over again. Another blow-out. They'd lingered too long over the same section of terrace and the plateau had come loose. The vacuum was tearing up the sediment.

No, it wasn't a blow-out. It was worse than that.

The tube tried to retreat from the billowing sediment. The cloud bulged, then seemed to explode. A wave of pressure rocked the scaffold. The picture juddered up and down.

'It's a landslide,' screamed the operator.

'Stop the pump!' Bohrmann sprang to his feet. 'Get away from the terrace!'

He watched as lava boulders crashed down on to the terrace. Somewhere within the fog of sediment and debris the tube was still moving, almost hidden.

'The pump's off,' said van Maarten.

Eyes wide with horror they watched the progress of the slide. Debris continued to shower from above. If the cracks were to spread through the almost vertical flank, ever larger boulders would detach themselves from the volcano. Lava was porous: within minutes a small slide could become an avalanche, prompting the scenario they'd been trying to prevent.

We should accept our fate, thought Bohrmann. We haven't got time to get away.

He pictured the dome of water stretching six hundred metres into the sky…

The clatter of rocks stopped.

There was a long silence. No one said anything as they stared at the monitors. The terrace was enveloped in a haze of sediment that scattered the light from the halogen bulbs.

'It's stopped,' said van Maarten. There was an almost imperceptible shake in his voice.

'Yes.' Bohrmann nodded. 'Apparently.'

Van Maarten radioed the operators.

'The scaffold shook all over the place,' said the guy in charge of the lighting unit. 'We've lost one of the floodlights. The others are bright enough, though.'

'And the tube?'

'Seems to be stuck,' came the verdict from the other crane. 'The system's processing our commands, but it's unable to react.'

'I guess the mouth must be buried under rubble,' said the scaffold operator.

'How much debris do you think will have fallen?' asked van Maarten.

'We'll have to wait for the cloud to settle,' said Bohrmann. 'But it looks as though we've escaped with a bruising.'

'OK, then, we'll wait.' Van Maarten leaned into the microphone. 'Don't attempt to free the tube. You can all have a coffee break. I don't want anyone causing any more damage. We'll wait for a while, then reassess.'

THREE HOURS LATER they could vaguely make out the mouth of the tube.

Frost had rejoined them, his hair springing out from his head in an unruly mop of wiry curls.

'It's trapped,' said van Maarten.

Frost scratched his head. 'But I don't think it's broken.'

'The propellers can't turn.'

'How are we going to free them?'

'We could always send down a robot and try to shift the debris that way,' Bohrmann suggested.

'For the love of God,' protested Frost, 'that would take forever. And things were going so well.'

'We'll just have to hurry.' Bohrmann turned to van Maarten. 'How quickly can we get Rambo ready?'

'Right away.'

'Let's go, then. We'll give it a shot.'

Rambo owed its name to the Sylvester Stallone films. The ROV looked like a smaller version of Victor, and came equipped with four cameras, a set of thrusters at the stern and on its sides, and two powerful articulated arms. It was suitable for depths of up to eight hundred metres, and was popular in the offshore industry. Within fifteen minutes it was ready to go. Soon it was descending along the flank of the volcano towards the terrace, attached to its control system via an electro-optical tether. The lighting scaffold came into view. The robot sank further, accelerated and manoeuvred its way towards the trapped tube. Seen in close-up, it was obvious that the propellers and the video system were still intact, but the tube was well and truly jammed.