Goliath (21 page)

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Authors: Steve Alten

BOOK: Goliath
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“Conn, sonar, confirm. The
Goliath’s
engines have shut down. The ship is slowing to drift. Fifteen knots … ten …”
Commander Lockhart glances at General Jackson. “So far, so good. Chief, take us in, make your course—”
A sudden shudder, as if the ship has run aground, followed by a chorus of groans as computer consoles begin lighting up like Christmas trees.
Lockhart grabs the 1-MC. “Damage control—”
“Conn, engine room, propulsors two, three, and four have shutdown.”
“Conn, electronics. Main computer’s not responding. Backup systems are down as well.”
“Conn, reactor room, we’ve got a major emergency. Both primary and secondary cooling circuits on reactors three and four have shut down!”
“Can you scram the reactors?”
“Negative. We’ve tried, but the computer’s gone haywire, it keeps overriding our commands. All backup cooling systems have failed, and the fuel rods are continuing to heat.”
“Can you shut it down manually?”
“Still trying, but the controls have overheated.”
Lockhart’s skin tingles with fear. “Chief, how soon to a meltdown?”
“Ten minutes … maybe. Pipes are bursting everywhere, we’re ankle deep in radioactive water. Fuel rod temperature just passed thirteen hundred degrees, the paint’s burning on the outer plating.”
“Get your men out of there. Seal off the compartment. Chief of the Watch, emergency blow, all main ballast tanks.”
“Belay that order,” Jackson says, pulling the captain aside. “Commander, technically, this vessel does not exist. Do you understand? You cannot surface her.”
Lockhart grits his teeth. Thinks.
We’re still over the continental shelf.
“Chief, how deep is the seafloor?”
“Nine hundred thirty feet.”
“Very well. Emergency descent, set her down on the bottom. Radio, launch distress buoys. Commander Terry, give the order to abandon ship. I want every crewmen in escape suits in three minutes.”
Gunnar maneuvers the minisub beneath the inert
Goliath
. As he glides beneath its massive propulsion units, a square of luminescent yellow light appears up ahead, growing larger as the enormous doors located along the stingray’s belly open, beckoning him to enter.
David grins from ear to ear. “Told you it would work. Now take us inside and let’s finish the job.”
Gunnar pulls back on the joystick, guiding the prototype up through the opening and into the flooded chamber of the hangar bay. He sets the vessel down upon the decking closest to the forward wall of the compartment and waits for the bay door to reseal and the chamber to drain, his heart pounding with adrenaline.
The reverberations of hydraulics hum beneath them as the hangar bay closes. High pressure air shoots into the compartment as several dozen ramjet pumps situated beneath the decking suck seawater from the chamber.
The water drains quickly. Bright overhead lights ignite, shining down through the sliver of aqua blue Lexan glass located above Gunnar’s head.
And then the lights go out.
“David?”
“Relax, G-man, a minor glitch.”
“Maybe.” Gunnar frees himself from his harness, then removes a pair of ITT Generation-5 night-vision glasses from a side compartment of his console. He adjusts the glasses over his eyes, the interior changing from black to pea soup green.
Reaching above his head, he unseals the dorsal hatch. A
whoosh
of air as the hatch pops open and the cabin equalizes. He hears water dripping against an otherwise silent backdrop.
Gunnar leaves the OICW weapon beneath his seat and releases the safety of his M-4 carbine. Quietly, he climbs out of the minisub, gun drawn, his eyes searching for movement.
Left, right, center—nothing.
Murphy’s Laws of Combat: If your attack is going really well, it’s probably an ambush.
Rocky jumps down from the minisub, fanning out to Gunnar’s left. “All clear. David, do your stuff.”
David remains in the minisub.
“David, let’s go—”
A sudden flash of steel, and Gunnar’s world goes topsy-turvy as one of the monstrous robotic claws snatches him about the knees within its six-foot-long tripod pincers. Lightning smooth, inhumanly graceful, the mechanical hand pivots 180 degrees around its wrist and rises, whisking him upside down and away from the deck with gut-wrenching force.
The carbine clatters to the floor.
The hangar lights flash on.
Gunnar tosses aside the night-vision glasses and looks around, helpless. He sees Rocky hanging upside down from the other mechanical hand, and
then, from across the hangar, a slight figure steps out from behind a huge generator and walks toward him.
From around the perimeter, seven more men appear, their Kalashnikov AK-47 assault rifles drawn. One of the Arabs collects Gunnar’s carbine.
Simon Covah looks up at Gunnar, a crooked smile plastered on his disfigured face, the upper right corner of his scarred mouth twitching from the effort. “Welcome aboard. It’s been a while.”
“You don’t look well, Simon. But then, I’m not used to seeing you from this angle.”
“
Sorceress
, lower Captain Wolfe, gently please.”
Gunnar drops, then is pivoted right-side up and released.
Sorceress? The computer’s active …
Three of Covah’s men move in, aiming their guns at the former Ranger. Two Arabs search him thoroughly, removing his weapons and bulletproof skin.
David’s head pokes out from the minisub’s open hatch. “Is it safe?”
“It’s safe.” Covah greets him with a hug. “Well done, my friend. So good to see you.”
“You too.” David reaches into his satchel and removes several vials. “For you.”
“David, you fucking bastard—”
David looks up at Rocky, smiling nervously. “Sorry, Simon. I had no choice in bringing her.”
Covah ignores Rocky’s string of expletives, more interested in Gunnar. “Tell me, Gunnar, did you come all this way to kill me?”
“The thought had occurred to me.” He glances up at Rocky. “Would you mind?”
“Are you certain? From what David’s told me, she prefers you dead. I seem to remember the two of you always enjoying a love-hate relationship, but this—”
“Just lower her.”
“Of course.
Sorceress
, lower Commander Jackson … gently.”
In one fluid motion the massive appendage swivels and drops to the deck, easing Rocky to the floor. Two of Covah’s men push her to the rubberized decking and search her.
Covah holds his hands wide in front of Gunnar. “Before you cast final judgment, I only ask that you afford me a chance to explain.” He turns to his men. “Strip and search them both thoroughly, jettison every article of their clothing, then take them to their stateroom. Treat them as guests, but do not let your guard down.”
Taur Araujo, an ex-guerrilla leader from East Timor, points his gun in
Rocky’s face. “Whatever you’re wearing, remove it … slowly.”
Covah glances upward at the scarlet sensor orb. “
Sorceress
, what is the status of the
Colossus
?”
SHIP IS DISABLED. CURRENT POSITION, SEAFLOOR, THREE POINT SIX KILOMETERS DUE NORTH.
David’s eyes widen in wonderment. “Anna’s voice?”
Covah nods. “I find it … comforting.”
“What did you do to the
Colossus
?” Rocky says, as her Special Ops clothing is pulled from her body.
“Gave her a little virus.” David answers, affording himself a quick look at Rocky’s naked physique. “By now her reactors should be overheating, her missile silos popping open.”
“Sorceress,
take us to the
Colossus,”
Covah rasps. “Reflood the hangar the moment we leave and begin removing all of
Colossus’s
nuclear missiles.”
ACKNOWLEDGED.
Gunnar turns to Covah. “Don’t do it, Simon.”
“Please trust me, Gunnar, trust that my agenda is yours. You know, David and I went to great pains to bring you here. There’s so much I want to share with you, but there’s so little time. I have a plan, a plan that will justify all you’ve done and make up for all you’ve sacrificed.”
“You’re part of this,” accuses Rocky, “I knew it!”
Gunnar ignores her. “What are you going to do, Simon?”
Covah smiles. “My friend … we’re going to change the world.”
“Any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind.”
—John Donne
 
 
“Death comes to everyone. We must stand proud as Afghans in the defense of Islam.”
—Mullah Mohammed Omar, Leader of the Afghanistan Taliban, following the terrorist attacks on America
 
 
“I loved you too much … that was my problem … I loved you too much.”
—O.J. Simpson, star football player, known wife-beater, who was acquitted of murder addressing his ex-wife’s coffin at her funeral
 
 
“I wanted to make him thoroughly sick so that he would give me permission to divorce him.”
—Maria Groesbeek, a South African woman who killed her husband with insect poison
General Jackson, Commander Lockhart, and two officers huddle inside the alcove, waiting their turn to use the forward escape trunk, a pressurized two-man chamber that can be flooded, allowing trapped submarines access to the sea.
“All right, Adams, Furman, up you go.”
The two officers climb up a short steel ladder, sealing the hatch behind them.
Lockhart turns to the general, adjusting the hood of the Navy’s Steinke egress/exposure suit over Jackson’s head. “Ever done this before?”
“No.”
“The suit contains an air reservoir breathing system. Wait until I close the hatch before using the air port to charge the suit. Remain under the chamber’s air bubble with me until the outer hatch opens.”
Lockhart checks the escape trunk’s pressure gauge. “All clear. All right, General, up you go.”
Jackson climbs the steel ladder into the tight, eight-foot-high-by-five-foot wide chamber, his thoughts once more turning to his daughter.
She’s okay, she’s alive. By the time you surface, there’s a good chance the Goliath will be on the surface, under Rocky’s command …
Lockhart climbs into the chamber and seals the hatch behind him. Using an air hose, he inflates Jackson’s suit, a combination life jacket and hooded breathing apparatus. The commander charges his own air reservoir, then twists open a red valve.
Frigid seawater rushes in from the floor, rising rapidly around the two men as they huddle together beneath an air bubble flange.
The outer hatch opens above their heads. Jackson feels an invisible hand grab his body, yanking it forcefully up through the open hatch. Instinctively, he raises his arms over his head, his buoyant egress suit rocketing him out of the Colossus and into the pitch dark sea—
Whumpf
!
The impact shatters both Jackson’s wrists and drives the breath from his lungs. For a chaotic moment, he rolls along the ceiling of an immovable object like a bug on a ceiling.
Breathe
!
He inhales a humid breath within his inflated headpiece, fighting to focus through the dizziness and pain. Out of the pitch-dark he sees a halo of light … below and in the distance, shining down upon the sloping spine of the
Colossus
. Rising up through the light is a long object, guided by invisible hands …
A missile!
And suddenly he realizes—
He is pinned against the underside of the
Goliath
, trapped eight hundred feet below the surface, witnessing the theft of the
Colossus’s
nuclear weapons.
The Bear panics, thrashing against the rubberized metallic surface that prevents him from rising as his mind dissects the nightmare his eyes are seeing.
Scrambling across the flattened surface, he heads for a blinding beacon of white light and claws his way toward it—
—and suddenly he is free, shooting upward past the edge of the death ship’s prow, catching a frightening glimpse of two demonic scarlet eyes—
—and the shadow of his enemy watching from behind the viewport’s glass.
Higher … faster … flying up through the shivering blackness like a bullet, until his upper torso shoots out of the water and falls back into the roaring sea. For a dizzying moment he just bobs like a cork, surrounded by darkness and pelting rain. And then a pair of hands grabs him from behind, pulling him closer.
The crew of the
Colossus
drifts like weeds on a deserted Sargasso Sea, huddling en masse beneath an ominous gray morning sky.
Simon Covah stands before the immense scarlet viewport, watching as
Colossus’s
crewmen fly upward through the prow’s beacon of light like human missiles.
David and Thomas Chau stare at the black-and-white images appearing on the theater-size computer screen above their heads. Video sensors mounted along
Goliath’s
underbelly reveal the dark winged hull of the
Colossus
, the downed ship half-buried in silt. External underwater illuminators pierce the lead gray depths for the benefit of Covah’s crew, revealing twelve pairs of open vertical missile silo hatches situated within
Colossus’s
protruding spine.
A swarm of shark-shaped minisubs weave in and out of the light, moving with military precision as they escort each Trident II (D5) nuclear ballistic missile on its journey into the bowels of the
Goliath.
Thomas Chau shakes his head in disbelief. “Very impressive.”
David nods in agreement.
The camera angle suddenly changes, offering a bow-to-stern view of the
Goliath’s
undercarriage. Suspended beneath the curvature of the steel stingray’s belly are dozens of dead crewmen, their buoyant egress suits pinning them headfirst against the sub like human stalagtites.
Chau turns away in disgust. “How can you bear to look? They were your men.
David continues watching the screen, mesmerized. “Actually, I’ve always found death to be quite fascinating, the more gruesome, the better. My maternal grandfather owned seven funeral homes. After school, I used to sneak into the embalming room and watch as he prepared the bodies.” David glances at Chau. “Did you know the viscera of the dead are removed and immersed in embalming fluid before being replaced in the body?”
“You’re a sick man.”
David grins. “Sick and brilliant. Isn’t that right, Sorceress?”
SICK : TO BE ILL. REPORT TO THE MEDICAL SUITE IMMEDIATELY.
“It’s just an expression. A term of sarcasm.”
SARCASM: IRONY. INQUIRY: Is HUMAN DEATH IRONIC?
David smiles. “It’s like talking to an inquisitive child.”
“Enough of this nonsense,” Covah chastises. “
Sorceress
, how soon until the Colossus’s nuclear weapons are transported aboard the
Goliath?”
SEVENTEEN MINUTES, TWENTY-SEVEN SECONDS.
“Upon completion, ascend to antenna depth and transmit Covah message Alpha-One on all predesignated frequencies. Then plot a course for the Mediterranean Sea.”
ACKNOWLEDGED.
 
Taur Araujo sorts through a pile of clothing, then tosses an outfit at his prisoner.
Gunnar steps into the legs of the jumpsuit, slips his arms in the sleeves, then zips it over his naked body. The Chinese naval uniform is a good three sizes too small, the pant cuffs reaching clear up to his calves.
“You’d make a lousy tailor.”
Taur ignores him.
The other man, a dark, lanky African, hands him a worn pair of sneakers. “These are mine, size thirteen. You don’t like them, then you go barefoot like your girlfriend.”
Gunnar sees the African has no hands. Two antiquated metal prosthetics are attached midforearm. “Where’s the girl?”
“Shut up.” Taur Araujo motions for Gunnar to walk down the corridor.
 
The internal living space of the
Goliath
attack sub is comprised of a 610-foot central compartment that divides the ship’s two enormous wings. Served by its central computer, the vessel’s internal layout reflects the needs of a skeleton crew.
The
Goliath’s
hangar bay divides the main section of the submarine in half. Located directly above the hangar, assessable via an open freight elevator attached to the starboard bulkhead, is an upper-central compartment dedicated to the ship’s twenty-four vertical missile silos. Aft of the central compartments is the engine room, the ship’s five nuclear reactors, and pump-jet propulsion plants, contained within an enormous football field-size chamber.
The space forward of the hangar bay is divided into three main decks and a smaller fourth—the stingray’s head—which comprises the ship’s control room/attack center. Lower deck forward houses the battery compartment, ship’s storage, and forward sensory array, while upper deck forward contains the crew’s quarters, lab, and galley, as well as a small spiral stairwell leading up to the conn. The remaining level, central deck forward, is the most vital part of the ship, housing the components of the
Goliath’s
computer brain. The entire space is sealed off by a two-ton, three-foot-thick steel vault door, inaccessible to all but Simon Covah.
The remaining bulk of the submarine—the ship’s enormous wings—houses a labyrinth of ballast and trim tanks, as well as a sophisticated maneuvering system that enables the
Goliath
to soar through the water like a ray. Within the forward sections of each wing, accessible by way of a steel catwalk, are two weapons bays. Within each of these robotically operated chambers are three torpedo tubes, racks of torpedoes, and an armory.
 
Gunnar follows the African up a steel ladder mounted within a vertical access tube. Pausing at middle deck forward, he regards the imposing vault door guarding
Sorceress.
The Guerrilla leader at his back prods him from behind with his gun, directing him to the next deck.
Gunnar follows the African up to upper deck forward. The corridor is twice the width and height of the
Colossus
passage, more luxury hotel than submarine. Crew’s quarters are laid out dormitory-style, with communal bathrooms set between every third stateroom.
Heading forward, they pass a watertight door marked SURGICAL SUITE, then a small galley. The aroma of baked goods caused Gunnar’s stomach to growl.
The African signals him to stop.
“Sorceress,
unlock stateroom twenty-two.”
The
click
of a steel bolt snapping back, the door swinging open as if by an invisible hand. The East Timorian prods him from behind.
Gunnar enters, the door closing behind him, the locking mechanism sealing him in.
There are two bunk beds in the stateroom, mounted to the bulkhead. A small desk and chair sit in one quarter, a sink in another. A lone figure is lying on the bed.
Rocky’s jumpsuit is two sizes too large, rolled up at the sleeves and pant cuffs, revealing her bare feet.
“You okay?”
She sits up. “Get out of here! Go join your pal, Simon!”
He ignores her, lying down on the other bed.
“I hate you, Gunnar. Do you know how much I hate you—”
He closes his eyes. “I hate me, too.”
In the far corner of the ceiling, mounted to the bulkhead by two reinforced steel brackets, is a scarlet eyeball-shaped sensor. A three-quarter-inch cable runs from the back of the eyeball, directly into the wall.
Rocky drags a chair over and stands on it so that she is only inches away from the scarlet eyeball. “Hey,
Sorceress,
can you hear me? You tell that asshole Covah that I want my own room. Do you hear me?” She reaches out to seize the device.
Gunnar opens his eyes. “Rocky, no—”
A sizzling, invisible electrostatic sledgehammer wallops her across the skull, tossing her backward into oblivion.

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