Piranha (Oregon Files 10)

“Which probably means we’ve got fifteen minutes until they all go off, including the one down inside the Roraima.”

“We can’t open the hatch this far down to evacuate the passengers.”

“Even if we could they’d all drown before we could get them up top.”

“Right. You hightail it to the Oregon. We’re going to need help from them to get that sub surfaced.”

“What about you?”

“I’m going to try to get the photo tin before the bomb blows.”

“I’ll be back with the cavalry,” Linc said, and churned his powerful legs toward the Oregon’s moon pool.

Eddie turned back to the window to see the pilot’s pleading face.

“Aidez-nous,” the man said.

Eddie understood that. Help us.

He smiled and circled his thumb and forefinger in the OK sign. Help is on the way.

Then he swam back down into the depths of the Roraima.

—

As Linc swift-kicked toward the Oregon, Max and the rest of the crew in the op center watched him on the big screen via the underwater camera lowered from the moon pool. Linc hadn’t been down long enough to need a decompression stop so he swam straight up into the pool.

Max had the technician put him on the line before he was even out of the water.

“Where’s Eddie?” Max asked.

“He’s trying to retrieve the photo plate,” Linc said. The view from Little Geek confirmed that Eddie was throwing up clouds of silt digging through the wreck. “But we’ve got a bigger problem. The barrel inside the sub is going to blow in thirteen minutes and the controls have jammed. They’re stuck down there.”

With that little time left, Max didn’t have the luxury of debating the two primary ways of bringing up a submerged vessel: either floating it or pulling it up. It would take precise placement and synchronized inflation of air bags to bring it up without capsizing it. The best choice was to use one of the deck cranes to hoist it. They didn’t have to raise it all the way out of the water, just enough to be able to open the hatch and not drown the occupants.

“Linda,” Max said, “get us over the sub now. Put someone on the number one crane, and divers in the water to attach the cables.” He radioed down instructions to Linc to attach the cables to the sub.

Linda rushed to the helm. There was no anchor to raise. The Oregon had been station-keeping with its thrusters. She nudged the ship over to the Roraima, expertly placing it so the crane’s extended boom was directly over the sub.

Once the divers were in the water with Linc, Max ordered the moon pool doors closed. He didn’t want the sub hostages seeing the unusual configuration as they were raised to the surface.

He wasn’t worried about damaging the sub further. Speed was of the essence. He had a camera lowered with the crane’s hook so that he could monitor what was happening on board. Five minutes later, Linc signaled that the hooks were secure. Max gave the order and the cable spooled up, grew taut, and the sub began to rise. The divers rode up on it except for Linc, who descended out of camera range. At the same time, Max had a lifeboat lowered to take the hostages aboard.

While the sub was coming up, Max checked with Murph, who was watching Eddie’s efforts on Little Geek’s monitor. The cloudy water made it hard to see any progress, but he was still digging.

“What’s that?” Max said when he saw movement at the top of the screen. He thought it might be Linc coming to help Eddie. Instead, it was a piece of steel that must have been dislodged by the falling barrel.

Max went cold. “Warn him!”

“Not enough time,” Murph said, and drove Little Geek forward into the path of the falling debris. Seconds later, the ROV lurched downward and the screen went dark.

Max and Murph l

ooked at each other with dread, but there was nothing more they could do. They had to concentrate on getting the hostages to safety.

“Time?” Max said.

Hali had been keeping track. “We’ve got four minutes left, if the sub’s pilot is accurate.”