Clive Cussler - Dragon

“We’ll get you out,” Sandecker promised.

“And what of the operation?”

Sandecker’s voice dropped off so low that Pitt could hardly hear him. “We close the play—”

“Hold on!” Pitt snapped abruptly. “The bottom has come into viewing range.”

The ugly brown of the seabed rose up out of the blackness. He watched apprehensively as the desolate terrain burst toward the camera. The DSMV struck and sank into the silt like a fist into a sponge cake. A huge cloud billowed into the cold black water and curtained off all visibility.

On board the aircraft, as if triggered by a mutual fear, the eyes of Giordino and Sandecker lifted and met across the top of the communications equipment. Their faces were taut and grim as they waited for Pitt’s next voice contact.

All anger had vanished from Giordino after he was released from his latrine prison. Now there was only intense concern as he waited for news of his friend’s fate in the depths of the sea.

Far below, Pitt could not immediately tell if the DSMV had buried itself under the seabed. His only sensation was of being pressed into his chair by a firm weight. All vision was gone. The cameras and exterior lights only recorded brownish ooze. He had no way of knowing whether the control cabin was covered by a thin coating of silt or entombed by five meters of quicksandlike muck.

Fortunately the parachute canopies were caught in a three-knot current and drifted off to the side of the DSMV. Pitt pulled a switch releasing the hooks attached to the chutes’ thick lines.

He engaged the nuclear power systems and shifted Big Ben into “forward.” He could feel the vibration as the great tractor belts dug their cleats into the silt and began to turn. For close to a full minute nothing happened. The belts seemed to spin on their gear wheels with no indication of forward traction.

Then Big Ben lurched to starboard. Pitt adjusted the controls and turned the DSMV back to port. He could feel it edge ahead slightly. He repeated the process, careening the great vehicle back and forth until centimeter-by-centimeter it began to gain headway, picking up momentum and increasing its forward movement.

Suddenly it broke the suction and lunged up and ahead, traveling over fifty meters before breaking out of the silt cloud into clear visibility.

Long seconds passed and a vague feeling of triumph began to seep into Pitt’s body. He sat there quietly relaxed, allowing the DSMV to travel across the seafloor under its own control. He switched on the automatic drive and set a computerized navigational course to the west, then waited a few moments to be certain the DSMV was operating smoothly. Thankfully, Big Ben soon reached its maximum speed and was rolling over the barren underwater plain as effortlessly as if it was plowing under a cornfield in Iowa.

Only then did Pitt contact Sandecker and Giordino and report that he was on his way toward Dennings’ Demons .

68

IT WAS MIDMORNING in Washington when Jordan took the message from Sandecker, ten time zones to the west. The President had returned to his bedroom in the upstairs White House for a shower and a change of clothes. He was standing in front of a mirror knotting his tie when the call came from the Situation Room.

“Sorry to interrupt you, Mr. President,” said Jordan respectfully, “but I thought you’d like to know the drop was successful. Pitt and the Deep Sea Mining Vehicle are in motion.”

“Nice to start the day with some good news for a change. How soon before they reach the bomber?”

“An hour, less if the seafloor is flat and doesn’t hold any geological surprises.”

“And detonation?”

“Two hours to remove the bomb and another three to reach the explosion site, set the detonators, and give the DSMV enough time to get safely out of the area.”

“There were no problems?” asked the President.

“Admiral Sandecker reported the fall through water was a bit hairy for a while, but the DSMV survived the impact in good shape. The only other hitch, if you want to call it that, is Pitt somehow arranged to leave Giordino behind and is conducting the operation on his own.”

The President was secretly pleased. “That doesn’t surprise me. He’s the kind of man who would sacrifice himself before endangering a friend. Any late developments on the bomb cars?”

“The task force engaged in the search have turned up twenty-seven.”

“Yoshishu and Tsuboi must know we’re breathing down their necks. If they had the code to explode the bombs, we’d have heard from them.”

“We’ll know shortly if we’ve won the race or not,” Jordan said soberly.

The President’s special assistant, Dale Nichols, rushed up to the President as he stepped out of the elevator. The President immediately recognized a look of urgency on Nichols’ face.

“You look like you’re standing barefoot on an anthill, Dale. What’s going down?”

“You’d better step into the communications lounge, Mr. President. Ichiro Tsuboi has somehow entered our safe system and opened up communications on the video entry.”

“Is he on view now?”

“Not yet. He’s on hold, demanding he talk only to you.”

“Alert the Situation Room so they can tune in the conversation.”

The President entered a room down the hall from the Oval Office and sat in a leather chair on one end of a small stage backed by a giant rectangular opening in the far wall. He pressed a button on a console in the armrest and waited. Suddenly time and space melted into one place, one moment, as a life-sized three-dimensional image of Ichiro Tsuboi materialized on the other side of the stage.

Thanks to the magic technology of photonics—fiber-optic transmission—and computer wizardry, the two men could sit and converse as though they were in the same room. The detail was so amazing that Tsuboi’s image appeared sharply defined and solid without the faintest indication of fuzzy transparency.

Tsuboi was kneeling stiffly on his knees on a bamboo mat, his hands loosely clenched and resting on his thighs. He was dressed in an expensive business suit but wore no shoes. He bowed slightly as the President’s image appeared on his end of the transmission.

“You wish to establish dialogue, Mr. Tsuboi?” said the President for openers.

“That is correct,” replied Tsuboi, rudely refusing to address the President by title.

The President decided to shoot from the hip. “Well, you certainly got my attention with that nuclear blast in Wyoming. Was that supposed to constitute a message?”

The impact of the President’s words was heightened by his seeming indifference. The consummate politician, the President was a shrewd judge of human character. He quickly detected a perceptible tenseness in Tsuboi’s eyes and deduced the Japanese was not dealing from a solid power base.

The international financial wizard and heir apparent to Suma’s underworld and industrial empire tried to appear calm and in control, but the President’s prior silence on the explosion had produced an unsettling effect. He and Yoshishu could not understand why the chief executive had virtually ignored it.

“We can save many words, Mr. President,” said Tsuboi. “You know of our technical advances and superiority in defensive technology, and by now Senator Diaz, Congresswoman Smith, and your intelligence people have provided you with information on our facility on Soseki Island.”

“I’m quite aware of your Dragon Center and the Kaiten Project,” the President countered, mindful that Tsuboi failed to mention Hideki Suma. “And if you believe I won’t order massive retaliation should you insanely detonate any more of your bomb cars, you’re sadly mistaken.”