28

The Atlantic
Ocean

Even before Chase opened his eyes, he could tell from the rhythmic pitching motion that he was aboard a ship.

He could also tell there was someone else with him. “Hi, Sophia,” he groaned.

“Again, I’m impressed,” Sophia said as he blearily forced his eyelids apart, fighting to overcome the nauseating aftereffects of the tranquilizer dart. She stood a few feet away, looking down at him. He tried to get up, but found that his arms had been handcuffed in front of him around a pipe running from floor to ceiling, in what appeared to be a cargo hold. “How did you know I was here?”

“Your perfume. Chanel. It always was your favorite.”

“Hmph.” Sophia tapped one of her high boot heels on the deck. “By the way, welcome aboard the Ocean Emperor. I seem to have inherited it from René. A shame I won’t be able to enjoy it for very long, but needs must.”

Chase didn’t like the sound of that. “Where’s the bomb?”

“Close by. Don’t worry. It’ll be even closer before long.”

He liked that even less. “So what’s it all about, Sophia? What’re you going to nuke? And why?”

She arched a perfectly shaped eyebrow. “Actually, I was rather intending to be the one asking the questions. Who helped you get out of Algeria? You might as well tell me—even you must realize by now that there isn’t time to stop me.”

Chase brought his arm around the pipe to look at his watch. It was well after one in the morning—not much more than seven hours before the bomb was set to detonate. “No, there’s still time.”

Sophia sighed. “Stubborn…to the last. Really, Eddie, Joe checked that pipe before he cuffed you to it. It’s rock solid. The only way you’re going to get loose is if you gnaw your own hand off. Who helped you?”

He ignored her and gripped the pipe, then braced himself and yanked at it. As Sophia had promised, it was solidly fixed in place, not even rattling. He tried again, with the same lack of result. Sophia made a tsk! sound with her tongue. Defeated, Chase released the pipe and sank back to the deck. “The dead guy you left in that room full of spears had a radio,” he admitted. “I called MI6.”

Sophia looked confused. “But it wouldn’t have enough range to… Oh, I see. One of Mac’s little tricks, I suppose. You couldn’t have got support from the upper echelons, though, otherwise they would have taken action already.”

“They still might.”

“No, they won’t.” She slowly circled him, a hint of victory in her smile. “You keep forgetting, Eddie—I know you. Deception’s not one of your skills.”

“Unlike you,” Chase shot back.

“It’s a useful talent, certainly. None of my ex-husbands realized that I was using them for my own ends, and that includes you.”

“So what are your ends? I told you what you wanted to know, so now you can tell me—you owe me that much.”

She narrowed her eyes. “I don’t owe you anything.”

“Except your life.”

Although she tried to hide it, Chase could tell that his words had hit home. Sophia completed her circle as if about to exit the hold, then turned back to him. “All right, if you really want to know, I’ll tell you. It’s only fair, since you’re at least partly responsible in the first place.”

“How the hell am I responsible?”

She crouched, staring intently into his eyes, malice burning in her gaze. “Because of you, Eddie, my family lost everything they had. All I have left is my title. Because of you.”

Chase tried to work out what she was talking about, but came up with nothing. “Not quite with you there, Soph. You mind elaborating?”

“My father was completely opposed to my marrying you.”

“Well, yeah, I worked that out pretty early on. Like about five seconds after I met him.”

“No,” she hissed. “You have no idea. He despised you, considered you on the level of vermin.”

Chase snorted. “Now I don’t feel so guilty for buying him those cheap cuff links that Christmas.”

She jumped up. “This isn’t funny, Eddie!” For a moment he thought she was going to kick him, but she wasn’t foolish enough to get within range of his hands or feet, even if he was cuffed to the pipe. “I never told you, but while I was with you, Father practically disowned me, cut me off financially. And you didn’t even notice, because you were so used to living on the cheap that it never even occurred to you just how much I’d been affected.”

“Is that what this is about?” Chase sneered. “Poor little rich girl, Daddy cut up her credit cards?”

Again, she seemed about to lash out at him before intelligence overcame anger. “You never did understand my family, what we did. Our business, our wealth, goes back generations, built up through diligence and reputation. We deserved it, it was our right. But then …” Her face twisted with disgust. “The world changed. Suddenly, reputation and right counted for nothing. It all became about pure greed, just money, numbers flying back and forth between computers. Legacies were destroyed for nothing more than a quarterly profit statement.”

“Legacies like your dad’s, you mean.”

“He was ill!” Sophia shouted. “He wasn’t thinking clearly, he made mistakes. Mistakes which if I’d been there to help him, he never would have made! But because I was with you, he was too proud to ask for my help—and when the jackals in the City and on Wall Street saw weakness, they charged in and destroyed him! They broke up his businesses, tore them apart to sell off piece by piece so that the banks and the stockbrokers and the lawyers could share it all out among themselves—and they left him with nothing! They left me with nothing!”

“And setting off a nuke somehow makes everything all right?” Chase asked. “What the hell are you expecting to achieve?”

“I’ll tell you exactly what I expect to achieve,” she said, her flood of emotion now replaced by a calculating coldness. “The wealth of the people who destroyed my father is a sham, an illusion based on nothing more than the faith that their system works. I’m going to shatter that illusion, bring down the system. My target is New York, Eddie.”

“Jesus!”

She took in his shock with a degree of pleasure before continuing. “Specifically, the financial district. At eight forty-five, just before trading starts, the Ocean Emperor will be in the East River at the end of Wall Street. When the bomb goes off, it will obliterate lower Manhattan—and completely destroy the hub of the worldwide financial markets. The financial crisis after 9/11 and the crash of 2008 will be nothing but a blip, compared to what will happen today. The American market will completely collapse, and take the rest of the world’s stock markets down with it. All those people whose wealth and power is based on nothing more than faith, on pieces of paper and numbers in computers, will be left with absolutely nothing. Just as they left my father.”

“While you still have all the gold from the Tomb of Hercules,” Chase realized.

Sophia nodded. “I have more men excavating the site right now. Nina was absolutely right—the value of physical wealth will multiply enormously following a financial crash. I’ll get back what was rightfully mine—my family’s wealth and status.”

“And screw everyone else, eh?” Chase growled.

“You’re not only going to kill fuck knows how many tens of thousands of people when the bomb goes off, but what about all the millions of other people who’ll lose everything too? Not just the fat cats, but ordinary people?”

“Why should I care?” Sophia sniffed. “They’re just the little people.”

“And what about me? Is that all I ever was to you?” She didn’t answer him, not quite able to meet his gaze. “What happened to you, Sophia?” Chase asked despairingly. “Jesus Christ, you’ve murdered people in cold blood, and now you’re going to set off a fucking nuclear bomb! How the fuck did you end up like this?”

Now she looked back at him. “I have you to thank for that, Eddie,” she said. “And I really do thank you, sincerely. If there’s one lesson I learned from our time together, it’s that.”

“What lesson? What the fuck are you talking about?”

Sophia stepped closer, just outside the range of his legs, and crouched down. “My family always had power, Eddie, but it was the kind of power that came from wealth and influence. But when I met you, when you rescued me from the terrorist camp …you showed me an-other kind of power. The power of life and death.”

Chase couldn’t answer, unable to do anything more than listen in horror as she went on. “When you wiped out the members of the Golden Way, you taught me how to truly exercise power. The unwavering pursuit of an objective, without remorse. Anyone in the way of that objective must be destroyed.”

“You’re fucking mental,” Chase finally managed to say. “I went in to rescue you. I only killed people who were trying to kill us.”

“You can’t deceive yourself any better than you can me,” Sophia snapped. “You were ordered to exterminate them, Eddie. Not to drive off or capture, but to wipe them out. You were an assassin, a killer. You didn’t feel anything when you shot them or stabbed them or slit their throats. I saw how you acted. I’ll never forget it—because it taught me that I needed to be like you. You were pursuing an objective, exercising power. Just as I am now.”

“I was on a military mission to rescue British citizens from terrorists,” countered Chase. “What you’re doing is mass murder for personal gain and … and fucking childish revenge!”

“You can say whatever you want!” said Sophia as she stood, voice rising to a shriek. “You made me! All of this happened because of you!” She whirled and strode to the door, heels striking the deck like shots. “Joe!” she shouted. “Bring it in!”

“Don’t do this, Sophia!” Chase said, pulling himself upright. Still trapped by the pipe, he could only move a couple of feet in any direction.

“You started all this the moment we met,” Sophia told him malevolently. “It’s only fitting that you should be here at the end as well.” Behind her, Komosa and the nuclear technician entered the hold, carrying the bomb between them. She pointed to one side of the room, well away from Chase. “Over there.”

The two men carefully set the heavy device down. Komosa had something over his shoulder on a strap; at first Chase thought it was a weapon, until he saw that it was actually a bolt gun, six-inch steel shafts loaded into an open magazine protruding from its top. There were three holes spaced equidistantly around the bomb’s metal base. Komosa placed the end of the gun into the first hole and pulled the trigger. A sharp crack of compressed gas, and a bolt was blasted through the deck with a piercing clang. Two more clangs, and the bomb was immovably secured. Komosa put down the bolt gun beside it.

Sophia went to the bomb, taking the arming key from a pocket. She inserted it, then with a dismissive glance back at Chase turned it. The screen lit up, still showing the time of detonation: 0845. A push of a button, and the display changed to a countdown.

Seven hours, two minutes, seventeen seconds.

Sixteen.

Fifteen…

She pulled out the key, but the display remained lit, the seconds flicking away. “I think I’ll pop up to the deck and throw this into the sea,” she taunted, holding up the key as she headed back to the door. The two men followed her. “By the way, Eddie, the timer has an anti-tamper mechanism. If anyone attempts to stop it without the key, the bomb will explode. I just thought you should know.”

“Good-bye, Chase,” said Komosa, grinning his diamond smile. “Enjoy the afterlife.”

The door closed behind them with a decisive thud.

Chase pulled and kicked at the pipe again, with no more success than before. Then he drew back his arms so that the chain of the handcuffs was around the metal and hauled on it with all his strength. Blood oozed from his wrists as the steel cut into his flesh, but the cuffs were too tightly fastened for him to slip his hands through.

But he kept trying. He had no choice.

“We’re almost there,” Trulli said above the constant shrill of the engines. “I think.”

Nina, stiff and sore from being stuck in her cramped position for more than two hours, twisted to look up at him. “What do you mean, you think?”

“The inertial navigation system isn’t as accurate as GPS. Especially when the ride’s this bumpy—it throws it off. Worst-case scenario, we could be nearly ten kilometers from where we think we are.”

Nina touched her pendant. “Let’s hope for the best-case scenario, then. So what happens now?”

Trulli examined the instruments. “Well, first, I’ve got to bring us out of supercavitation drive without squashing us like a cane toad under a road-train!”

Nina’s eyes opened wide. “Wait, what, squashing? You didn’t say anything about squashing!”

“I’ve never been this fast before!” Trulli explained. “I can’t just stop the engines, ’cause when the supercav shock wave collapses it’d be like running the sub into a brick wall. I’ve got to ease it down, get us to a safe speed before shutting off the steam.” He made adjustments to several controls, then took hold of the throttle. “Okay. Let’s give this a crack …”

Nina took hold of the seat and braced herself.

Trulli pulled the throttle back slightly. The noise of the engines didn’t alter as far as Nina could tell, but the Wobblebug’s vibration changed, a snaking sideways motion slowly building up.

“Is that bad?” Nina asked.

“I hope not!” Trulli moved the throttle again. This time, the shriek from the engines lowered slightly in pitch. But the oscillation continued, the weaving sensation worsening. “We’re down to three hundred knots. It’s working!”

“What about that shaking?” The sub’s movement was making Nina seasick, but she couldn’t help thinking that nausea was the least of her problems.

“I dunno why it’s doing that—just have to hope it goes away on its own!” Another push of the lever. “Two-eighty, two-seventy … Come on, you bugger! Two-fifty—”

The back end of the submarine suddenly slammed sideways as if kicked, only to hit something that flung it back the way it had come.

Another impact, and another—

Nina clung desperately to the seat as she was thrown about. Trulli fought with the controls, the submarine’s stern swinging violently like the clapper inside a bell. “Tail slap!” he screamed.

“What?”

“The back end of the sub’s bouncing off the inside of the shock wave! If I don’t get us under control, it’ll collapse!”

Trulli struggled to bring the Wobblebug back in line. The submarine lurched sickeningly, bashing against the edge of the swirling vortex surrounding it a few more times before its motion began to dampen down.

He reduced the throttle further. “I think that’s got—”

Skrench!

Something ripped loose from the bow and screeched back along the sub’s length before being lost in the water behind them.

“What the hell was that?” Nina cried.

“We lost a fin!” The steering yoke bucked in Trulli’s hands. “I’m gonna have to risk backwash braking—whatever you do, don’t let go!”

She had no idea what he meant, but his voice warned her that it was almost as dangerous as letting the shock wave collapse. She hugged herself against the seat as Trulli shoved a lever—

The louvres on the seawater intakes slammed closed.

For a moment, the shriek of the engines dropped almost to nothing as the flow of water to the red-hot heating elements was cut off. The last of the superheated steam was blown out of the engine nozzles—then a surge of frothing bubbles from within the shock wave was sucked into the nozzles as the pressure inside them plummeted.

Without water to carry away the excess heat, the temperature of the steam elements had already shot up. The froth hit the searing metal, instantly exploding into superheated vapor—

Trulli pulled the lever again.

The intake louvres snapped open just as the expanding steam erupted through them, blasting twin jets through the supercavitation wave created by the submarine’s blunt nose. The disrupted shock wave instantly collapsed, but the Wobblebug plowed through it into the swirling mass of turbulence beyond, a buffer zone slowing the vessel rather than smashing it to an abrupt halt.

But it passed through the zone in barely a second …

Even with his seat belt fastened, Trulli was slammed against the steering yoke as the sub hit dense seawater. If Nina hadn’t been clinging to his seat with the strength of every sinew in her arms she would have been flung headfirst against the forward bulkhead. Something on the cabin wall broke loose and smashed into the instrument panel. The lights flickered, broken metal beating at the hull…

The submarine slowed.

Trulli gasped in pain as he tried to lift his hand to the throttle control. “Ah, shit!” he wheezed. “Nina, help me, quick!”

Arms aching, Nina dragged herself upright. “What’s wrong?”

The Australian’s face contorted. “I think I’ve busted a rib! I can’t reach the throttle—pull it back, shut off the elements!”

She hurriedly did as she was told. The hissing of steam from the engines died away, as did the last vibrations. The Wobblebug fell silent.

“Thanks,” Trulli gasped. “Well, we stopped, and we’re still in one piece, more or less. Guess that’s something.” He examined the damaged instruments through pain-narrowed eyes. “Don’t think the sub’s going to be going much farther, though. Both the intakes are wrecked, and we’re almost out of power.”

“How badly are you hurt?” Nina asked.

He grimaced. “Won’t be playing tennis for a while. I need to check where we are, get a GPS fix. See that lever up there?” He pointed at a particular lever on the cabin ceiling. Nina nodded. “Pull it. It’ll blow the ballast tanks, take us to the surface.”

She steadied herself, then pulled it. The submarine shuddered as water was forced out of the tanks by compressed air. Within a minute, a different kind of rocking motion took over—the swell of Atlantic waves against the hull.

Trulli tapped clumsily at the keyboard with one hand, the pain from his chest preventing him from moving his other arm. “Okay, GPS signal is coming in… got it. Wow, we’re not too far off.”

Nina looked at the screen as a map appeared. “Where are we?”

“Off the coast of Maryland. About two hundred and ninety kilometers from New York.”

Nina instantly made the conversion to imperial measurements: a hundred and eighty miles. “Where’s the Ocean Emperor?”

“Give me a sec to see if I can get a satellite connection. It’s not exactly like we’ve got Wi-Fi access out here…”

She waited anxiously first for the computer to link up to Corvus’s network, then for Trulli to log in. Compared to the system in his office, the satellite link was excruciatingly slow.

“Gotcha!” Trulli said at last. A yellow triangle indicating the Ocean Emperor’s position appeared on the screen. “It’s about four kays behind us, a bit farther offshore. Same course as it was on before, still doing twenty-three knots.”

“Can we catch it?”

“If the pump-jets haven’t been completely screwed, then yeah. If we’re quick.” He indicated one particular gauge. “The batteries are almost drained. We’ve got maybe ten minutes of power left. But I’ll need your help to pilot the sub. I can’t do it with only one arm.”

Nina stared at the triangle on the map, so close to the icon marking their own position. Eddie …

She set her jaw in determination. “What do you need me to do?”