Уильям Мейкл - Operation - Siberia

They laughed, but Sean was struck by the idea. Being a graduate student was a time for learning what could be reasonably speculated upon and what was better not to waste one’s time with, because the thesis and dissertation were what mattered most. The fortunate few, however, were able to develop something new, something at least different , about which they could publish, and publish papers on every change of nuance as their research developed. Sean and every other student in any graduate program anywhere needed something real, and possibly dramatic, upon which to create a reputation and thus become very attractive to those seeking to fill empty tenure-track lines at Carnegie I research institutions.

However, he also had heard many cautionary tales of grad students who went awry trying to prove some pet theory of their advisors’—drinking the academic Kool-Aid, as it were. Embarrassment and wasted time were the least of it. No, the worst was a career up in smoke, one’s world-changing dissertation given up for something mundane, something just to get the degree so he could accept the first community-college job offered to him. If any were offered. Life as an adjunct earth sciences “professor” was worse than embarrassing to someone like Sean; it would be humiliating and would remain humiliating until the day he retired. Or killed himself. Which would be preferable was a coin toss.

In other words, Sean Muir needed to find something attractive and unusual, maybe even slightly groundbreaking, but nothing so off the wall that it would come crashing down around him and ruin his life. (Any advisor he had would be tenured already and thus wouldn’t be affected professionally in the slightest by such a disaster. If he or she were a human being , the professor in question might feel terrible about the whole thing, but pity or even heartfelt regret didn’t open doors to academic careers.)

But God, dinosaurs still existing near the ocean floor! Evolved and adapted, of course, just like every other living thing, but perhaps in the same way that sharks and alligators had evolved—almost unchanged through the millennia, so what you had now was almost identical to what you would have had 300 million years ago. And even if it weren’t dinosaurs, finding whatever was at the top of the sea-vent chemosynthesis food chain would attract a lot of welcome attention.

It was a risk; but no risk, no reward. Sean had a long talk with his advisor the day after their undersea excursion, during which each argued for and against the idea of building on this speculation as a real program of research. Finally, they agreed the best course of action would be for Sean to change his concentration from oceanography and tectonic geology to marine biology and—thank God he was at San Diego, where this wouldn’t get him laughed out of the room—paleoichthyology. Even if he didn’t find the predators that just had to be there ( life finds a way ), he would certainly discover enough about deep-sea hydrothermal vents to write a dissertation that still broke new ground, so to speak.

A voice snapped him back to reality, the present, where he was in the rickety JSL submersible surrounded by black water.

“Sean? Copy? Sean .” It was crew chief Mickey’s voice, and he must have been calling for a while. “Sean, tell me you’re not dead. Sean, do you copy? ”

He said into the comm, a bit sheepishly, “Copy here, Sea Legs . Sorry, I was having trouble with something.”

“Sure, okay,” Mickey said in the tone Sean would have used himself if he had been on the other end. “Listen, do you still have the sub’s cable in view?”

Fortunately, despite his sudden mental walkabout, he did.

“You’ve got about twenty feet to go, by your instruments. Can you get a visual on D-Plus? She should be just below you, dead cen—right in the middle.”

He leaned against the viewport and saw the lights that adorned the submersible. “Affirmative, I see it. If I can get down to Kat—”

“No, Sean, there’s no time. You need to extend the JSL claw in front of you and open the claw, then ease yourself forward until you can get a tight grasp on the cable. Keep descending, too—get as close as you can to the sub, but stay above her . Nobody blames you for wanting to see your lovely bride after all this, but first we need to get her out of danger by you clamping on. You copy that?”

“Roger. Moving toward the cable—”

“Did you extend the arm and open the claw?”

Dammit . A few seconds later, he called up, “Affirmative. Centering JSL to position the claw around the cable… got it .” He could hear a small background cheer from Mickey’s microphone.

Copyright 2018 by William Meikle