The Silent Sea (Oregon Files 7)

“That’s it in a nutshell, I’m afraid,” Juan said as kindly as he could. “The stakes are too high for anything else. Our government has decided it doesn’t want to play the role of world cop, but we need to show people that there are still consequences for breaking international law. One of the ways we have to do it is to destroy that wreck.”

She didn’t look at him, or even speak, but after a second she nodded slightly.

Juan laid a hand on her shoulder for a moment, then went back to the controls. He vented some water out of the ballast tanks, and as the submersible rose toward the surface the light slowly became brighter.

When they broached, Juan climbed out of his seat and over Linda to reach the topside hatch. “Back in a second.”

He stood to the side when he spun open the locking wheel to avoid the deluge of freezing water that cascaded to the deck. He climbed up the integrated ladder, his hands going numb on the wet steel. He popped his head out of the hatch. The chill took his breath away. Needles of agony pierced his sinuses, and it felt like his eyes were being seared. Juan ignored all this and concentrated on his surroundings. A tongue of ice stood poised

in the gap between two black mountains that soared at least two thousand feet into the sky. The ice formed a vertical wall between them that ran right to the water. The bottom edge had been partly eroded by waves and tides, but the rest looked like a solid massif.

“You’ll do,” he said aloud, his words torn from his mouth by the wind, and then he ducked back into the relative warmth of the submersible.

His first act when he retook his seat was to crank the heater to maximum, power-reserve requirements be damned.

TWENTY-FIVE

A team lead by Mike Trono was heading to the bay where the Silent Sea lay on the bottom even before Juan and the others returned to the Oregon. Juan had radioed his instructions for them to take the larger Nomad back up north and get to work on making the wreck disappear. Mike had five others with him and almost a ton of gear crammed into the submersible.

They were in for a cold, miserable night.

After what was the longest, hottest shower of Juan’s life, and learning that the Argentine’s survey boat hadn’t spent more than an hour in the wrong location before coming back to base, he met with his department heads to go over the next phase of their operation. The meeting went quickly. In the idle hours motoring back from the wreck site, Cabrillo had developed a plan that needed little refinement. He was back in the moon pool less than two hours after returning home.

Rather than take the time to recharge the Discovery’s batteries, technicians swapped them out for fresh ones, and they changed the carbon dioxide scrubbers and refilled all her air tanks as well. For this mission, Juan chose Franklin Lincoln to accompany him. He wasn’t expecting any gunplay, but the big former SEAL moved like a wraith despite his size and had been on more covert insertions than almost the rest of the crew combined.

By the time they were ready to leave, Kevin Nixon arrived with arctic clothing his staff had modified to closer resemble the gear the Argentines wore. Once they were bundled into the jackets, pants, hoods, scarves, and goggles, they would be completely anonymous.

It took them ten minutes to enter the narrows. Even submerged, they could see the aura of lights on the far shore. With machinery on the oil platforms banging and whining, the waters sounded like a wrecking yard. The industrial clatter masked the sound of their motors, so there was no need for stealth as they started across.

“What’s that noise?” Linc asked as they were gliding along at thirty feet.

“The oil platforms?”

“No. Like a low-frequency gurgling sound. It was really strong when we first entered the bay, and, while it’s gotten quieter, I can still hear it.”

Juan concentrated, and he, too, picked up the strange tones. He chanced turning on one of the weaker floodlights. From the surface, it would look like the moon’s reflection off a wave. In its glow, he saw curtains of tiny bubbles rising up from the seafloor. And as his eyes adjusted further, he and Linc spotted the lattice of pipes laid across the ooze and how they were the source of the bubbles.

He killed the lights, and the two men shared a look.

“Any ideas?” Linc finally asked.

“That’s how they keep the bay free from ice.” He checked one of the computer displays. “Yup. That’s it. The water temperature is near sixty degrees. They must use the vent gas from the oil platform to heat air and force it through the pipes. Pretty ingenious, when you think about it.”

Moments later, they passed within a hundred yards of the big cruiser resting at anchor.

“Any thoughts about what we’re going to do about her?”

Juan could almost sense its dark presence in the inky water, like some great predatory shark. A fight between the Oregon and the cruiser would be short and brutal and would most likely end with both ships on the bottom. “Hopefully, inspiration will strike tonight.”

Twenty yards short of the piers, Cabrillo extended the Discovery’s low-light television periscope. It was no bigger than a pack of cigarettes, and the pictures it took went to an HD display in the sub as well as aboard the Oregon. A dozen sets of eyes studied the docks as Juan panned the camera back and forth for the next few minutes. Other than the workboats tied to the pier, there was nothing to see but concrete pylons. It was simply too cold for men to stand watch for any significant period of time.

Cabrillo also suspected that, for now, the Argentines were feeling good about their accomplishment and didn’t believe they were in any danger yet. Later, perhaps, there would be an armed response, but for the next few days the world would continue to reel from their audacious play.

He guided the sub under the dock and slowly brought her to the surface. Less than eight inches of her hull broached, and the coaming around her hatch was a mere five inches taller. With her hull painted a deep blue, the submersible was all but invisible. Add to that, an observer aboard the workboat would have to be on his knees and looking under the pier, so their chance of detection was virtually zero.

The two men felt like a couple of contortionists when they donned their parkas, but a few moments later Linc popped the hatch and climbed up onto the deck. There was little clearance, and he had to work stooped over as he tied off the submersible so it wouldn’t move when the tide changed. Cabrillo stepped off the minisub and onto the port side of one of the workboats. Linc climbed up next to him, and, as if they didn’t have a care in the word, they moved onto the dock and approached the Argentine base.

This was the first good look Juan had of the facility, and he was amazed by its size and scope. He knew from Linda’s pictures that there was room around the bay to more than triple its size. Given free rein, there would be a real town here before too long.