The Swarm (53 page)

Peak paused.

‘A few figures for you. Every day two thousand vessels pass through the Strait of Malacca and other nearby waters. Nearly twenty thousand ships of all shapes and sizes cross the Suez Canal every year. Each of those regions carries fifteen per cent of world trade. Three hundred ships a day make their way along the English Channel
en route
to the North Sea, the most congested sea in the world. Roughly forty-four thousand ships every year connect Hong Kong to the rest of the planet. Countless freighters, tankers and ferries circumnavigate the globe, to say nothing of the fishing flotillas, cutters, sailing-boats and sports boats. Millions of journeys are made through the oceans, marginal seas, channels and straits. Given all that, it probably seems unreasonable to suggest that an occasional supertanker accident could seriously threaten world trade. Surely a little thing like that wouldn't stop anyone filling their ramshackle tankers with oil? You see, most of the seven thousand oil tankers in the world are in a god-awful state. More than half have been in service for over twenty years, and most aren't worth the metal they're made of. People in this business aren't afraid to take risks. There's always a chance that disaster could strike, but they're used to that. So they do their sums and ask themselves, What if it all goes right? They calculate the odds, and the rest is a gamble. If a three-hundred-metre-long tanker sinks into the trough of a wave, its hull can be warped by up to a metre. That's an enormous strain for any structure. But the tanker sets sail because, according to their calculations, things will be OK.' Peak gave a thin smile. ‘But those calculations mean nothing when accidents start happening that can't be explained. They can't assess the risk. A different kind of mindset comes to the fore. We call it the shark-attack syndrome. No one knows where the predator's lurking or who it might eat next, so a single shark is enough to stop thousands of tourists swimming in the sea. Theoretically, it's impossible for one man-eating shark to have any real impact on tourism, but in practice the effect can be ruinous. So, imagine a shipping lane that's seen four times as many accidents in the space of a few weeks than ever before, and with no discernible cause. Ships are
being sunk by alarming phenomena for which there's no explanation, and even those in tip-top condition aren't safe. No one knows which might be next and what measures they could take to safeguard it. There's no more talk of corrosion, storm damage or navigational errors. The word on the street is: don't set sail.'

Now Peak showed them the mussels. He pointed to the tufts poking out from between the striped shells.

‘This is the byssus, a kind of foot. Zebra mussels use it to latch on to surfaces while they're drifting on the current. Technically, it consists of adhesive proteinaceous threads. On this latest breed of mussel, the byssus has been turned into a propeller. It's a swimming technique that's not so very different from the forward propulsion of
Pfiesteria piscicida
. Of course, adaptations are known to occur through convergent evolution, but that takes thousands and millions of years. So either the new mussels have kept themselves well hidden; or they've acquired some startling new abilities overnight. If that's the case, we're dealing with a speedy mutation, since in many ways they're still zebra mussels, only now they seem to know exactly where they're going. For example, the sea-chests of the
Barrier Queen
were clear of mussels, but the rudder was covered with them.'

Peak described the circumstances of the accident and the attack of the whales on the tug. Although the
Barrier Queen
eventually pulled through, the strategy of co-operation between mussels and whales had proved as effective as the alliance between humpbacks and orcas.

‘That's insane,' said a German colonel.

‘Oh, no, it isn't.' Anawak turned to him. ‘There's method behind it.'

‘What rubbish. Don't tell me that whales made a pact with some molluscs!'

‘No, but they definitely joined forces. You'd be in no doubt about it if you saw it for yourself. In our opinion, the attack on the
Barrier Queen
was probably just a test.'

Peak activated the remote, and the screen showed a picture of an enormous vessel lying on her side. High seas pushed waves the size of houses over the hull. Driving rain made it hard to see the detail.

‘The
Sansuo
, one of Japan's biggest car freighters,' Peak explained. ‘On its final voyage it was carrying a consignment of trucks. The vessel hit a swarm of mussels off the coast of LA. In a replay of the
Barrier Queen
incident, the mussels clogged the rudder, only this time conditions were
rough. An enormous wave hit the vessel portside, filling it with water. We can only guess what happened next. The force of the breaker must have shunted some of the trucks, which crashed through the ballast tanks and ruptured the side. This picture was taken less than fifteen minutes after the rudder had jammed. After another fifteen minutes, the
Sansuo
split open and sank.' He paused. ‘Since then the list of similar incidents has been growing by the day. Tugs sent to help the vessels are coming under attack, and most rescue missions have to be aborted. The amount of damage caused in each incident is rising all the time. Dr Anawak's right in saying that there's method to this madness. And, recently, we've discovered that it comes in different forms.'

Peak showed a satellite image of a kilometre-long dark black cloud. It was drifting towards the shore from a point some distance out to sea, where it thickened in a grubby red plume. It looked as though a volcano had just erupted in the water.

‘Beneath that cloud are the remains of the
Phoebos Apollon
, a tanker carrying liquefied natural gas. She's a Post-Panamax vessel - the biggest of her kind. But on the eleventh of April, fifty nautical miles off the coast of Tokyo, a fire broke out in her engine rooms, causing a series of explosions to rip through her four tanks. The
Phoebos Apollon
was a top-notch vessel, in perfect condition, and regularly serviced. The shipping line in Greece was determined to investigate, so a robot was sent down to check.'

Flashes of light flickered over the screen. Digits started ticking over, then a snowstorm filled the murky picture.

‘An exploding gas tanker isn't likely to leave much intact. The
Phoebos Apollon
was torn into four separate pieces. The seabed near Honshu drops off to a depth of nine thousand metres, and the debris lay scattered over several square kilometres. But in the end the robot found the aft-end of the boat.'

Through the snowstorm they could see some faint outlines - a rudder plate, then the twisted remains of the stern and sections of the superstructure. The robot swung past and dived down, following the line of the hull. A lonely fish appeared on the screen.

‘The bottom current carries all kinds of organic material - plankton, detritus, you name it, it's there. It's not easy to manoeuvre at that depth. I won't make you watch the whole film, but this next bit's intriguing.'

The camera was much closer to the hull now. A layer of something
coated the metal, stacked in thick clumps. It shimmered in the beam of the floodlights, glowing like molten wax.

Rubin leaned forward in agitation. ‘What the hell are
they
doing there?' he said.

‘What would you say they are?' asked Peak.

‘Jellyfish.' Rubin squinted at the screen. ‘Tiny jellyfish. There must be tonnes of them. But why are they sticking to the hull?'

‘When did zebra mussels learn to steer? Anyway,' Peak continued, ‘somewhere beneath all that slime are the sea-chests. No prizes for guessing that they're clogged.'

One of the diplomats raised a hand hesitantly. ‘Er…What exactly are the, er…'

‘Sea-chests?' He had to explain every darned thing. ‘Rectangular recesses that draw in the water for the intake system. They're protected by metal grating to keep out flora and ice. Inside the ship, the pipes branch off and take the seawater to where it's needed - to be distilled, for use in case of fire or, most importantly, for cooling the engines. It's hard to say when the jellyfish settled on the hull. Maybe not until the boat had sunk. On the other hand…Well, imagine the following scenario. The shoal of jellies drifts towards the tanker. They hit the hull in a mass of bodies and, within seconds, the sea-chests are blocked. Water can't get in. More and more jellies pile on top of each other, causing organic mush to squeeze through the grating. Meanwhile, the engine drains the last drops of water, and the pipes run dry. The next thing you know, the cooling system's broken. The engine overheats, lube oil bubbles over, the cylinder heads glow red, and one of the valves bursts open. Red-hot fuel shoots out and triggers a chain reaction - and there's no way of extinguishing it because the system can't draw water.'

‘An ultramodern tanker explodes because of jellyfish in her seachests?' asked Roche.

It was funny, really, thought Peak. All these high-powered scientists sitting there like disappointed children because the high-tech world had let them down.

‘Tankers and freighters are made up of one part technology, the other ancient history. Diesel and rudder engines might be sophisticated machines, but in general they're only used to turn a propeller or move a blade of steel. The navigation system has GPS, but the cooling system relies on a hole in the hull. And why not? The ships float, don't they? It's
as simple as that. Now and then a sea-chest gets blocked by a bit of seaweed, but it soon gets cleaned out. If one hole's clogged, there's always another. Nature's never launched an attack on sea-chests before, so why change their design?' He allowed a pregnant pause. ‘You see, Dr Roche, if tiny insects launched a concerted attack on your nostrils, your finely tuned, highly complex body would be in danger of collapse. Have you ever stopped to think about that? And that's exactly the problem with all these attacks. No one imagined that such things could happen.'

 

Johanson had stopped paying attention. He knew the next chapter inside-out. He and Bohrmann had structured the material in preparation for the meeting. It focused on worms and methane hydrates. As Peak carried on talking, Johanson transferred some ideas to his laptop.

Changes in the neural system caused by…

By what exactly?

He had to think of a name for it. It was annoying to keep describing it in full. He stared at the screen in concentration. Did the committee have access to his laptop? Suddenly he suspected that Li and her gang were spying on his thoughts, and he resented the idea. It was his theory and he'd confront the committee with it when
he
deemed it time.

It was pure coincidence that his left hand brushed the keyboard and his middle and ring fingers formed a word. Although it wasn't really enough to be a word. Three letters appeared on the screen:
Yrr
. Johanson was about to delete them, but stopped himself. Why not leave them? Any word would do. And this word would be better than a real word because no one could decipher it. Besides, he wasn't even sure what it described. There wasn't a term for it, so an abstract word would do fine.

Yrr
.

He'd stick with
yrr
for the moment.

 

That was the third pencil Weaver had chewed since the presentation had begun.

‘Maybe that's the kind of havoc that the Great Flood wreaked as well.' Peak was just coming to the end of a lengthy digression. ‘Descriptions of floods occur in many religious stories and myths. The earliest verifiable description of a tsunami tells of a natural disaster that hit the Aegean in 479
BC
. More recently, in 1755, sixty thousand people died in Lisbon when Portugal was pounded by ten-metre waves. Reliable evidence also
exists for the damage caused by the Krakatoa eruption in 1883. The summit of the volcano was blown off, prompting the underwater caldera to collapse in the magma. Two hours later, waves reaching heights of forty metres swept into the coasts of Sumatra and Java, laying waste to three hundred villages and killing nearly thirty-six thousand people. In 1933 a much smaller tsunami hit the Japanese town of Sanriku, flattening the north-east of Honshu. The outcome? Three thousand people dead, nine thousand buildings destroyed and eight thousand boats lost at sea. But none of those incidents was anything like as devastating as the recent tsunami in northern Europe. The North Sea states are all highly developed industrial nations. Two hundred and forty million people live there, the majority near the coast.'

There was a deathly hush.

‘Geologically, the whole area was transformed in a flash. It's too soon to predict the consequences for humanity, but economically the effects have been calamitous. Some of the most pivotal international ports suffered serious damage or were destroyed. Less than a fortnight ago Rotterdam was still the biggest maritime trading centre in history, while the North Sea was a major repository of the world's fossil fuels. Approximately four hundred and fifty thousand barrels of oil were being extracted from the North Sea every day. Half of Europe's oil reserves were located off the coast of Norway, a significant proportion off the coast of Britain, not to mention the region's share of the world's natural gas. And yet the entire industry was destroyed within hours. Initial estimates place the death toll at two or three million, but there are at least as many again who are injured or homeless.'

Peak recited the figures as though he were reading the weather forecast.

‘The question is, what caused the slide? The polychaetes are undoubtedly the most striking example of mutation that we're up against. Nothing even begins to explain how billions of worms teamed up with bacteria and swarmed over the slope. Besides, Dr. Johanson and our friends at the Geomar Centre in Kiel believe that we still don't have the full story. There's no doubt that the invasion of worms destabilised the hydrates, but a catastrophe of that magnitude just doesn't make sense. There must be another factor. The wave was only the most visible part of the problem.'