Devil's Gate

“Level off,” the captain said. “More countermeasures.” The bow angle eased. Another explosion rocked them from far off, but the sonar man looked stricken.

He turned to the captain, shaking his head. “No good.” An instant later the Memphis was hit. Anyone not seated and belted in was thrown to the floor. The main lights went down. The sound of alarms wailed throughout the ship.

The captain got to his feet, managed a quick look at the damage board. “Emergency surface,” he ordered.

The Memphis blew all tanks and began to rise.

MILES AWAY, Paul and Gamay Trout couldn’t see any screen or hear any radio calls describing the action. But the ocean carried sound much more effectively than the air, and echoes from the booming explosions reached them one after another like the sound of distant thunder.

Neither of them spoke, except as necessary for navigation.

Finally, Paul slowed the craft. They’d dropped from the Navy helicopter, descended into the far end of the canyon, and wound their way back toward the platforms.

“We’re at two hundred feet and holding,” Paul said. “If the inertial system is right, the platforms are less than a mile away.” Gamay was already activating Rapunzel ’s program. She wanted to get this over with as quickly as possible.

“Detaching umbilical,” she said.

She felt herself sweating once again despite the cold. And then she felt Paul’s hand on her shoulder, massaging it softly.

Another series of explosions rumbled through the depths, these far bigger, closer, and more menacing than any that had come before.

“Do you think that was one of ours?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” he said. “Don’t think about it. Just do what you have to do.” She tried to block it out, even as another, smaller boom reached them, but there was nothing to see through her visor except darkness.

Seconds passed.

“How far?” she asked.

“You should be almost there,” Paul said.

Something was wrong. “She’s not moving,” Gamay said.

“What?”

Gamay studied the data feed from the little robot. “Her motor is operating, but she’s not moving. She’s stuck.” “How is that possible?” Paul asked.

Gamay, with a flip of her right hand, switched on Rapunzel’s exterior light. The answer to Paul’s question came through instantly.

“She’s stuck in a net.”

Gamay put Rapunzel in reverse and pulled her back a few yards. The net was no fluke; it was draped from above.

“Antitorpedo nets,” Paul said. “We must be right beside the platform.” Gamay switched on Rapunzel’s cutting tool. “I’m cutting through it.”

THE MEMPHIS had broken the surface but was taking on water fast. The order to abandon ship was given, and men were scrambling from the hatches and into boats or just into the sea itself.

But the survivors were well inside the Event Horizon line. If their enemy wanted to, he could fry them all with a single burst from his weapon.

ON THE ONYX, Kurt noticed the lighting returning to normal. He was thankful that the bow thrusters hadn’t come back to life. He hoped that meant the high voltage was still out and the Fulcrum array was still off-line.

He moved back to where Katarina sat in the hall. “Ready for one more run?” he asked.

“I don’t think I can,” she said.

He studied her hand. The blood flow had slowed, the wound was finally clotting.

“Come on,” he said. “You’re a champion. Prove it to me.” She looked into his eyes and clenched her jaw. He helped her up, and they began to move.

“Do you still want to get to the coolant room?” she asked.

He nodded. “They’ll get this power back on soon enough. We have to permanently disable this thing.” “I know another way to get there,” she said. “They’ll never expect us to use it.” She led him forward until they came to another hatch. This one was sealed tight.

Kurt dropped beside it and grabbed the wheel.

After two full rotations it spun easily. He opened it to see a ladder dropping down through a shaft. Dim red lights lit the rungs, and glacial air wafted up toward him. Kurt suddenly thought of Dante’s Inferno, which depicted some of Hell’s outer layers as frigid, Arctic-like zones.

“What’s down there?” he asked.

“The accelerator tunnels,” she said.

That didn’t sound like a safe place to be, but the sound of feet pounding on the metal deck above changed his mind.

He helped her onto the ladder, climbed down behind her, and shut the hatch. At the bottom they dropped into a tunnel.

It reminded Kurt of standing on a subway platform, like the Washington Metro, only narrower. The familiar high-voltage lines and liquid nitrogen conduits raced down each wall and also along the ceiling and floor. Rows of the shiny gray rectangles that Kurt knew to be the superconducting magnets traveled off into the distance, curving slightly at the limit of his vision.

Kurt exhaled a cloud of ice crystals. He was already chilled to the bone. It reminded him of the Fulcrum’s compartment only colder.

“If we go this way,” she said, “we can pop up through the rear access hatch. One level down from the coolant room.” Kurt began walking, with Katarina leaning heavily on his shoulder. It was a great plan. The crew would never search for them down there, he was sure of it.

“What if they turn this thing on?” he asked.

“Then we’ll be dead before we even know what’s happened.” “All the more reason to hurry,” he said.

61

BY NOW DJEMMA GARAND could feel the danger clawing at his own throat. Washington, D.C., stood untouched by his weapon. Andras would not answer and the crew of the Onyx reported commandos aboard.

Swirling around him, the American military showed no signs of backing off, no matter how hard he pounded them.

“Where’s Andras?” he demanded into the radio.

“He is looking for the American,” came the reply.

“What about the array?”

“It’s still down. We have no power.” The crewman from the Onyx sounded