The crewmen with welding skills recruited by Boats set about cutting through the walls of the Conex containers on the floor of the hold. They worked from a schematic printed up by Morris Tauber. Doorways were cut between containers to make for free passage between each. Floors and walls were removed, and the resulting space shored up with I-beams welded in place as a frame.
This large central chamber was four containers high and wide and ten containers in length. New entry hatches were bolted in place. This would be the secure room where they would construct the Tauber Tube 2. From the exterior of the ship, no one would suspect that the hold contained anything other than the usual cargo of coffee or hemp or scrap metal.
Morris gave Jimbo and Dwayne directions, and they bolted aluminum sheeting to the ceiling and bulkheads of the bridge and radio room. They laid copper mesh down on the deck and placed rubber-backed carpeting atop it. They did the same in the engine room with copper mesh laid under the duckboards that ran around the monster Daewoo fuel oil engine. Extra care was taken to make sure any electrical cables were clad in aluminum sheeting covered in copper mesh.
All of the parts of the ship that would be most affected by the electromagnetic field necessary to power the tube were now shielded. Essentially, they created an enormous Faraday Box to enclose the superstructure and engine decks so the Raj would not become dead in the water, its electronic controls fried, in the EMP wave to come. The Tube chamber and computer station container were both shielded as well.
The work in the sun was hot and hotter still below decks where the welding torches worked. Fans were set up as well as air exchange vents, but they did little to reduce the inferno. The welding crew took breaks to leap into the sea to cool off. The scientists, Rangers, and crew consumed astonishing amounts of beer, but no one got drunk. The brew came out through their pores as fast it went down their gullets. The pile of Luxor Nubia cases stacked in the reefer shrank each day from a mountain to a hill. Every night found Caroline, Dwayne, Jimbo, and Morris racked out on lawn chaises set up on the aft deck where they hoped for cool ocean breezes to wash over them while they waited for the dinner gong. A boom box pulsing with a Sufi beat was competing with the thrum of the idling engine below decks.
“What do you think the crew makes of all this?” Morris said.
“They aren’t saying much. But they’re not missing a move we make,” Jimbo said. “You know they’re curious even though they’re paid not to be.”
“They trust Boats,” Dwayne said from beneath a damp rag draped on his face. Caroline was asleep by him, softly snoring. “They know it’s not guns or dope or anything that will get them in trouble. He wouldn’t do that to them.”
“I just hope they don’t lose their mud when things start going bang,” Jimbo said.
“Speaking of bang, where are our Iranian friends?” Dwayne said.
“They’ll be along. Caroline’s been getting daily updates via some cryptic emails,” Morris said. “I hope it’s soon. The framing work is done and the transformers are wired. We finish assembling the Tube module and we’ll be ready to fire up their little baby.”
“Little baby,” Jimbo said, half-asleep.
As good as their word, Quebat and Parviz arrived the following day. A deep-sea fishing charter brought them out to meet the Raj at anchorage. The Greek Cypriote crew on the fifty-foot craft was busy on deck. They slung tire fenders along the gunwale as the smaller boat drew alongside the towering hull.
The two Iranians stood huddled on board with their stack of trunks and bags. They were not able seamen and refused to use the ladder that swayed from the midships hatch. The Med was gently swelling with not a white cap in sight. Even so, the cable ladder looked to them like a trapeze line wildly swinging back and forth over the deck of the little charter. The skipper of the charter spat Greek at them and gestured in a shooing motion. He wanted these passengers off his tub and now. He had his money, and he wanted the hell out of here.
A transfer chair was rigged up and slung out over the Raj’s starboard by a crane. First Quebat, then Parviz, and then their luggage was hauled up and aboard on a line. The charter motored away swiftly and was out of sight within an hour. The Iranians’ troubles did not end there. Both were prone to violent seasickness that was not improved even by transferring from the little charter boat to the steadier platform of the Raj. Most of the crew was up on deck to watch their arrival. They found the dry-heaving Iranians the height of comedy.
“We are not used to ocean travel,” Parviz offered as an apology for the mess he’d made on the deck after climbing down from the transfer chair.
“Try not to look at the horizon,” Boats offered. “That is most helpful advice,” Quebat said, on his knees with his forehead resting on his arms.
The Iranians took to their bunks after taking fistfuls of Marezine and Xanax. They had a couple of days to get themselves seaworthy before their expertise was needed to hook up the cold reactor.
The rest of what Dwayne took to calling Team Tube began assembling the transitioning module under Morris’ direction. The new array was fabricated and designed like a giant model kit with numbered parts and boxes of hardware to bolt the ramp, walkway, and conductive rings together. It reminded Caroline of some Ikea furniture she had in college. Morris
