Fire Ice (NUMA Files 3)

"Got something, Kurt," he said excitedly.

Austin wheeled the Torpedo 2000 around in a tight arc. He glided past the beach and homed in on a silvery pinpoint that blinked like a firefly on a summer night. Zavala was hovering at midwater and flashing his light as a homing beacon. When Austin got closer, Zavala adjusted his light to flood pattern and pointed the beam toward the face of the undersea wall that rose to become the chin of Imam's Point.

Austin was looking at a huge pile of rubble that resembled a landslide one might see in a mountain valley. The sea bottom below the slide was littered with hundreds of chunks of rock and concrete obviously flung there with great force, most likely by an explosion.

"Not exactly what I'd call a welcome mat," Austin said. With short fluttering fin strokes, he swam up the face of the rubble pile. If this was the entrance to the pen, no submarines would be using it soon. He swam back and forth searching for an opening, but the blockage was complete.

Zavala floated up beside him. "So much for my dreams of beautiful Russian women."

Austin scanned the rubble, then swam over to a slab about six feet tall and half as wide that stood like a giant l gravestone in a more or less vertical position. A pair of steel rods protruded from the top, like antennae on an insect.

"If we could topple this slab, maybe we could start a slide that would open up this mess."

"Not a bad idea. Too bad we forgot to pack dynamite."

"We may not need it. Remember what Archimedes said?"

"Sure, he's the guy who runs the Greek restaurant down the street, He said 'Eat here or to go?' "

"I'm talking about the other Archimedes."

"Oh, that one, He said, 'Eureka!' "

"He also said, 'Give me a place to stand and I will move the earth.' "

Zavala stared at the steel rods. "Archimedes was into levers and fulcrums, as I recall."

"Eureka," Austin said, swimming up the rock slide until he was above the slab. He squeezed in between the concrete and the cliff, braced his back against the wall and placed his feet on one of the rods. Zavala took a position beside Austin with his feet on the other rod.

"Let's see if we can move a smaIl piece of the world," Austin said, "On three."

They pushed against the rods and the slab tilted a few inches before settling back into place. The air tanks got in the way, so they adjusted them and tried again. The slab tipped precariously this time. For a moment, it seemed as if the block would go over, but despite their shoving and grunting, it rocked back into place.

Zavala suggested that they push higher for more leverage. They slid their feet to the ends of the rods, planted their backs and tried again. This time the slab went over so fast that they almost tumbled down with it. It crashed in slow motion off a big boulder, breaking in half, then bounced a few more times before landing in a muddy cloud. Several other chunks followed it down in a secondary landslide.

"Crude but effective," Austin said, as he drifted down the face of the pile and stopped in front of a newly created opening in the rubble. He probed the hole with his light, then tried to squeeze through only to have his air tanks get in the way again. He removed the tanks. Keeping the regulator in his mouth, he backed into the opening feet first and pulled his tanks in after him. Zavala followed using the same procedure.

They were wedged in a tight space between the pile of boulders and two massive steel blast doors. The armored doors were sealed, but near the top of one was a shadow where the force of the explosion had peeled back a comer like a page in a book. The gap was big enough for them and their tanks. They slipped through the hole and flashed their lights around. The beams faded into nothingness except for a grayish reflection over their heads. They swam up several feet until their tanks scraped against concrete. Swimming a few feet below the ceiling, they proceeded through the murky water.

After a few minutes, the ceiling disappeared and they swam up until their heads emerged into the open. They were in complete darkness. Austin removed the regulator from his mouth and took a tentative breath. The air was musty but breathable. They switched on their lights and saw that they were near the edge of a man-made pool. They swam to a ladder, pulled themselves up on the side of the pool and flashed their lights around, probing the perimeter of the rectangular basin.

"Hel-Io," Austin murmured. "Someone left their rubber ducky in the bathtub."

His light outlined the contours of a submarine on the far side of the pool.

They stacked their scuba gear in neat piles for quick retrieval and stripped down to their lightweight black insulated liners. They were traveling light, taking only their weapons, extra ammunition and lights and, in Austin's case, a belt radio. He tried to call Kemal, but the thick concrete walls made radio contact impossible. Setting off to explore the high-ceilinged chamber, they followed a set of narrow-gauge tracks that ran around the pool's perimeter, making their way past fuel pumps and conduits for water and electricity.

Gantries and cranes hung from the ceiling to service heavy loads. Sideways-traversing machinery could move a sub to the dry side for maintenance. Austin and Zavala went around the pool to where the submarine lay in dry dock. The sub was between three hundred and four hundred feet long, Austin estimated. They climbed aboard and explored the sub from end to end. The deck behind the conning tower was of an unusual design, long and flat and recessed. They climbed the sail and opened the entry hatch. The stale smell of food, unwashed bodies and fuel issued from the opening.

As the expert on underwater vehicles, Zavala volunteered to go inside the sub while Austin stood watch. A short while later, Zavala emerged.

"Nobody home," he said, his voice echoing in the great chamber.

"Nothing?"

"I didn't say that." Zavala handed Austin a navy baseball cap. "I found this in a bunk room."

Austin examined the white lettering on the front of the cap. NR-1. "This raises more questions than it answers."