The Silent Sea (44 page)

The bay erupted.

Miles of gas lines lit off in a cataclysmic blast that sent sheets of water soaring into the night, while the flash lit up the sky from horizon to horizon. Three of the disguised rigs were blown off their piers.

Secondary and tertiary explosions rippled the exterior walls of the gas factory until they were blown flat and sent flaming debris out across the bay and over the buildings of the station.

Aboard the
Admiral Brown
, the ship’s heavy armor protected all of her crew except the men on the bridge. They could have saved themselves by simply ducking but to a man had stood in awe as their cruiser caromed into the plant. They were sliced to ribbons when all the windows imploded, turning the bridge into a hail-storm of glass.

Unnoticed in the maelstrom of fire, another small charge exploded under the cruiser’s bow. It was the device Juan had clamped over the tow cable to release it. When it went, the carbon fiber was pulled free of the remaining pad eyes, and the
Oregon
no longer had her in tow.

AS SOON AS THE PLANT BLEW, Mark Murphy toggled the explosives Mike Trono and his team had planted in the glacier overlooking where the
Silent Sea
had been sunk by Admiral Tsai Song five centuries earlier. They had drilled deeply into the ice and repacked the holes with water that had frozen solid so as to contain the blast. The multiple explosions were timed precisely and built a harmonic resonance that was powerful enough to shear off a massive slab of ice as neatly as a knife. The newly calved berg was the size of a Manhattan office tower. Two hundred and fifty thousand tons of ice slammed into the bay and actually fractured when it crashed against the seafloor. The wave it spawned encompassed the entire water column and swept from shore to shore. Its momentum was such that anything caught in its path was borne away like leaves in a gutter. The magnificent Treasure Ship, so long preserved in its frigid realm, was no exception. The wave tumbled it across the seafloor and onto the long slope that led down into the deep waters of the abyssal plain. When the waters finally calmed, there wasn’t a trace that it had ever existed at all.

ERIC STONE FELT IT the second the ship was free, and he cut the power to the drive tubes.

“That’s it,” he said, staring at the big monitor on the front wall of the op center.

The camera that was mounted in the nose of an unmanned aerial drone revealed hell on earth, with fire shooting a hundred feet and higher over the processing plant and pockets of gas above the bay still aflame. It looked as if the very seas were burning. Gomez Adams was at the tiny plane’s remote controls, and he used a joystick to fly it across the sprawling facility. It was a testimony to his skills as a pilot that he could keep the unstable craft flying through the storm. Small pockets of fire dotted the landscape where debris blown from the gas plant continued to burn. But another fire drew his attention. A building well away from the blast had flames licking through its roof.

“Looks like Eddie and Linc are making their move,” he said.

A second later, Eddie’s panting voice filled the high-tech room from ceiling-mounted speakers. “Eighteen present and accounted for.”

Max Hanley couldn’t care less. “Have you heard or seen the Chairman?”

“Negative. Last I knew, he was in the plant. He hasn’t gotten word to you?”

“No, damn it! All he said was, he’d find his own way out.”

“What do you want us to do?”

As much as Max wanted to delay, he knew that Eddie and his group of freed captives would eventually draw attention. “Get to the submersible as fast as you can. Maybe Juan’s already on his way. His radio could be dead.”

“We’re moving.”

Hanley tried calling Cabrillo on every preset frequency their radios picked up. He got no response. He knew in his gut that Juan hadn’t gotten clear when the gas processor blew. There hadn’t been enough time. He’d sacrificed himself to stick to their plan.

THE SCENE ON THE GROUND was absolute pandemonium. Lieutenant Jimenez couldn’t find the Major, and the discipline they had drilled into their men seemed to have evaporated. This was the start of the American attack and yet many of his troopers abandoned their positions to gawk at the conflagration. He screamed at them to return to their posts and get ready for the assault. Noncoms added their snarls, and slowly they started getting the soldiers to pay attention to their duty.

Oil workers ignored the curfew and poured from their dormitories to see what had happened. When Jimenez yelled at them to return indoors, he was met with derision. Within minutes of the blast, a hundred men or more were outside.

A Corporal approached and saluted. “Lieutenant, it’s not the Americans.”

“What? What did you say?”

“It’s not the Americans, sir. The
Guillermo
broke free from her mooring and drifted into the big processing plant. That’s what caused the explosion.”

“Are you certain?”

“I saw it myself. It looks like a quarter of the ship is buried inside the building.”

Jimenez couldn’t believe it. An accident caused all this? “Have you seen Major Espinoza?”

“No, sir. I’m sorry.”

“If you see him, tell him I’m investigating the plant.”

“Sir. Yes, sir.”

Jimenez was about to start across the complex when he heard the unmistakable chatter of an automatic weapon. This was no accident. He took off at a run toward where the gunfire originated.

WHEN THE EXPLOSION ROCKETED into the storm-torn sky, Linc started hustling the prisoners out to the entry vestibule while Eddie used a lighter to ignite the flammable jelly. It went up even better than he’d hoped. The wood paneling was the cheapest product available and was made of sawdust and glue that burned furiously. In seconds, the top layer of space was a dense cloud of smoke.

He made sure he was the last person out. He rushed across the room where the guards still slept. They left the door open so fresh air would revive them, though the reason behind this was to feed the fire and not offer these men any humanity.

As Cabrillo had predicted, the Argentines had temporarily lost control of the situation. Soldiers had left their patrol sectors, and civilians were mingling in with the troops.

A half mile away, the fire at the gas plant glowed orange and yellow through the curtain of blowing snow. Eddie didn’t have to see it to know the building was a total loss. Without that facility, the men had no way of powering their base. In one fiery instant, the Corporation turned the Argentines from masters of the Antarctic Peninsula to people who were going to need rescuing within days or risk freezing to death. Their hope of annexing this region was over. The world would not sit idly back and let them rebuild.

All that remained now was, getting away with it.

He didn’t like that they were such a big group. Large numbers attract attention; however, no one seemed to be paying them heed. Most were making their way closer to the huge blaze to see what had happened.

He made his report to the
Oregon
, and was as troubled as Max about Juan’s disappearance. But he knew the Chairman and had a pretty good feeling that he was boarding the minisub this second.

They kept moving at a pace that wasn’t quite a jog but more than a walk. The buildings were packed tightly together, and it was only a matter of time before they rounded a blind corner and ran into a sentry.

Linc had given the point position to him so that once they reached the Nomad, Eddie could go directly to the cockpit without having to climb over their guests.

The guard had his back turned when Eddie saw him. In the distance, he could see where the white ground gave way to the black ocean. The pier was less than a hundred yards away.

Sensing more than hearing anything, the soldier spun in place, his weapon held ready. “Jaguar,” he challenged.

“Capybara,” Eddie returned.

The soldier asked a question. Seng spoke no Spanish, and realized Linc should have stayed on point. Eddie cupped his glove to his hood as if to say he didn’t hear the question. Ignoring Seng’s pantomime, the sentry moved closer to look at the people with him. Though they were shapeless under the heavy parkas, there was no disguising that three of them were much shorter than average. Short enough to be women, something the complex had none of.

He went straight for the blonde, whose name was Sue, and pushed back her hood to reveal her cherubic face. He whipped up his H&K and aimed it point-blank between her eyes. No one would ever know if he intended to fire. Linc dropped him with a three-round burst.

In a fit of inspiration, Eddie raised his own machine pistol and loosed an entire magazine into the air. The soldiers were nervous, had no information about what was going on, and had doubtlessly been told since their arrival that American commandos would be hitting them any day. Even the most seasoned veteran would be panicky right about now, so a moment after Eddie’s burst some young recruit on the other side of the base saw a shadow he was certain was a Green Beret and opened fire. Like opening a flood-gate, men began shooting indiscriminately, the chatter of autofire rising above the roar of the burning gas plant and the shriek of the wind.

Linc got it immediately. He toed the corpse. “This poor sap got hit by his own guys.”

“That’s how it’ll read. I’ll be surprised if they actually don’t shoot a few of their own themselves.”

They took off again and made it to the dock moments later. The gunfire didn’t let up one bit, which worked to their advantage right until the instant a stray bullet caught one of the scientists in the leg. He crashed to the ground, clutching at the wound and moaning.

It wasn’t a life-threatening wound, at least at that moment, so Linc picked him off the snow and threw him over his shoulder with barely a break in stride.

The Nomad had drifted a bit out from under the dock, so Eddie had to haul it back on its line. He jumped aboard and opened the hatch.