Mary looked at the man standing at the other end of the sub pool. Some of the two-person subs were still wet from their last trip outside the resort only hours ago.
A larger transport sub floated to the right, designed to ferry guests from St. Cats to the resort. Two other subs, clunky deep-ocean submersibles, shiny ball bearings with arms, dangled from giant hoists.
"That's it— don't move," Mary said.
"What the bloody hell is he doing here?" Cutter said.
"Relax. Everything's fine. Get your computer running so we know what's happening."
Mary turned back to the SousMer employee standing by the rear door. "Now, I want you to come over here. That's it— very slowly, with your arms at your sides."
"Are you going to kill him?" Cutter whispered. He had perched the computer on the bench where the guests removed their diving suits.
"Shut up," Mary whispered back.
The man kept walking toward them, a glum expression on his face.
Killing him was a possibility — but too risky. The man had probably been sent down here, and if he simply disappeared, more people would come down here. Things could get messy...
"That's it," Mary said, her gun aimed at Gooding's chest. I don’t want to kill him, Mary thought. Not yet, anyway.
Then the man was in front of her. She read his name, embroidered on the lapel of his navy blue shirt.
H. Gooding.
"Well, H. Gooding... can you tell us what you're doing down here?"
She watched his eyes flicker down to the body on the floor, then to Cutter playing with his computer.
"There's still a problem with the computer," Cutter said breathlessly. "Maybe we're down too deep, but—"
Mary didn't turn to Cutter, but she said, "Now you have a problem. We need that computer link." She shifted the gun to her other hand, fatigued from holding it up, keeping it pointed at H. Gooding. "If there's a problem, solve it."
She turned her attention back to Gooding.
"So now — what are we going to do with you?"
It's funny Terry McShane thought as she sat in front of the computer screen. Funny that I happened to be here... for a completely different reason... when the resort became hostage.
Though she wasn't too sure what good she could do down here. She was only another hostage.
The screen flashed a coded sequence of letters, which Terry stared at for a moment before mentally using the cipher based on a key word, translating the line of letters to read, MESSAGE RECEIVED, INSTRUCTIONS TO FOLLOW.
Key-word ciphers were easy to crack — if you had the key word. In this cipher, each line of text used a different key word to scramble the alphabet... and the sequence of key words was based on a passage memorized by all level three intelligence officers at the UEO.
It was a quick and easy way to get some security — when any system's ICE could be cracked. Not exactly a high-tech code, it meant that any terminal, anywhere, could be used with a reasonable assurance of security. If anyone were monitoring this conversation, it would take them hours to unscramble all the lines.
The computer tech next to McShane turned to her.
"Miss, I don't know who you are. And I don't know what you're doing. But you can't use this terminal. I gotta call Security."
McShane smiled and dug into a small pocket in the back of her skirt. She dug out a white card.
"Go ahead," McShane said. "Strip it."
The tech took the card and pulled it through the magnetic reader on the console. The screen blinked, announced that it was "searching" — and then it flashed Terry's face, name, and the information that she was with the UEO, Information and Research Division — immediate supervisor, Admiral William Noyce.
The technician nodded. "Okay — I guess you're cleared."
But Terry had her eyes on the screen in front of her, looking at another line of code, a long one this time. McShane mentally inserted the key word at the beginning of the alphabet, then filled in the other letters, ready to decode each word.
Stay... in... contact... DSV—
Her breath caught. She knew what was coming, and the surprise, and her feelings, caught her like an icy breeze, chilling her...
seaQuest DSV is proceeding to location. Stand by.
seaQuest. McShane had heard about the change in command, about the new captain. Someone had told her at UEO headquarters before she grabbed the transcontinental shuttle for the East Coast.
"Yes," a friend had said, "didn't you hear? They got Nathan Bridger to take command."
And then—
"Hey, didn't you know him, years ago? Didn't you work with him?"
Nodding, turning away, because time can make some things better, and it can make other things go away. But not Bridger. He was a memory that wouldn't go away.
And now — life can be so strange — here was Bridger cruising to this resort, the cavalry rushing to the fort.
Terry turned to the computer operator. "Now tell me — where can I find the director?"
Bridger led Lucas over to the dolphin tank aft of the bridge. Darwin swerved back and forth.
"Want to... play?" his synthesized voice chirped through the speaker.
Bridger shook his head. "Not now, Darwin."
There was a clipping sound. "A problem?"
Bridger nodded. "Yes. And I need your help."
Darwin splashed in the water, excited.
"He's ready," Lucas said. "How can I help, Captain?"
"You said something about 'modifications' before, that you made modifications to Darwin's speech program linking him to the ship. What exactly are they?"
Lucas took his Marlins hat and turned it brim forward. "I only helped with the programming. It was Ortiz's idea."
"Go on."
Lucas leaned closer to Bridger. Was this some kind of secret? Bridger thought. And — shouldn't they have gotten my permission? After all, he was the captain.
"We thought— wouldn't it be great if Darwin could access seaQuest’s systems directly."
"Directly? What do you mean?"
"Get information directly from the ship's systems, through the same chip that turns his dolphin talk into words. So— that's what we did."
Bridger turned and looked at Darwin.
"Problems... Darwin said. "Storm... explosives... you have big problem."
Bridger grinned.
Lucas leaned close to the tank. "He can get the information as soon as you can, Captain. Maybe faster. I hope you don't mind, but now it's like he has a computer in his head."
And sure, Darwin still looked happy — though Bridger worried that it might all be too much for Darwin. He was a smart mammal, no mistaking that. But was he adapted to deal with this flood of information?
The thing Darwin liked best was to play.
Or so Bridger thought.
"Okay. We'll try it out, see how Darwin does with it."
The dolphin splashed in the water, slapping the surface with his tail. There was a time, Bridger thought, when that was all the communicating that the animal could do.
"I... help problem?"
"I hope so, Darwin." Bridger turned back to Lucas. "You know where we're going? You know what's happened?"
Lucas nodded, his face serious.
"I have an idea," Bridger said. "It involves Darwin. And I want you to tell me whether it's possible."
Darwin came close to the thick Plexiglas to be part of the huddle...
"There. I've got it. There must have been some interference from the electronics down here, all the subs..." Cutter aimed the holographic image from his computer console into a point in the air a few feet away.
"Good. Now," Mary said, looking at Harry Gooding. She had asked him his name, and now she used it. "Harry, we want to use one of these subs you have here to get out. Now, why don't you tell us what you're supposed to be doing down here?"
"I- I was supposed to go outside."
Mary nodded, waiting, the gun only feet away from Gooding, who was sweating despite the chill from the cool ocean water.
"And what were you supposed to do outside, Harry?"
"I had seen something. On one of the power plants. On my last inspection. I thought it was a fish—"
Mary turned to Cutter. "I told you. God, they spotted it."
"So," Cutter said, "it's not as if they can get it off."
Back to Gooding, Mary smiled. "And you were going to take another look?"
Gooding nodded. "And— and, if it looked like an explosive, I guess they'd want me to try and get it off—"
"Good bloody thing you didn't get near it," Cutter said. "Would have blown us all sky high. Hey, what's this— what the bloody—"
The holographic screen floating in the pool area was displaying a screen from a specialized program tracking all the communications in and out of the resort. Rafael didn't want any surprises.
"What," Cutter said, "is this?"
Mary looked at the data, the numbers, the floating windows telling Cutter that someone was communicating in the station.
"What is it? What's wrong?" she said.
"Someone has set up a direct link out of the resort. I'm not sure — but it looks like they're using the same ultra high-band frequency used by the UEO."
"So, they're talking, reassuring each other, telling themselves that everything's going to be—"
"No. This stuff, this traffic is all in some kind of code... "
"So break it—"
Cutter shook his head. "It's changing... each line, a different pattern. Looks like a substitution cipher. Antiquated stuff. Yeah, that's what it is. No voice, only alphanumeric stuff. Changing every bloody line."
"Break it, I said."
Cutter laughed. "Sure. But it will take a while to crack the first line, then another bit for the second line, and on and on. In the meantime we won't know what's happening."
Mary turned back to Gooding.
"You've come at very useful time, Harry. They'll be looking for you to leave in a sub... to check things out. They'll be waiting for you to leave."
Gooding nodded.
Mary smiled. "It's all very convenient."
"I don't know," Lucas said. "I can try."
Bridger nodded. He was no systems expert. It was up to Lucas to tell him whether his plan would work or not. And — so far — it looked as if the kid wasn't intimidated.
"I... try too," Darwin said.
"Good work, now if—"
"Captain!" Lieutenant Bachmann called to Bridger from the communications station.
Bridger turned back to Lucas. "Go to it, Lucas."
"Yes, sir." And Lucas hurried away, while Bridger walked over to Bachmann's communications console.
"Captain, I've got something coming in from the UEO." Bridger put on his earpiece. "Which screen. Lieutenant?"
"Screen one, sir."
Bridger nodded, then the data screens disappeared and Admiral Noyce was there.
"Nathan, we have completed our search and scan of the guests of SousMer. And we think we've got something."
"Go ahead head, Admiral... I'm watching."
Noyce disappeared, and there was a photo of a woman, and a name — Mary Knox. She was an attractive blonde, but the woman's face was drawn, sullen. The name meant nothing to Bridger.
"Mary Knox, aka Mary Bristol, aka Samantha Cronin, aka Bloody Mary... Knox is connected to over thirty acts of piracy and terrorism, including the raid on the Bounty Trough Mining Colony, off New Zealand."
That was an incident Nathan had heard about. Forty people were killed when a trio of modified Skipjacks and Tridents raided the colony and made off with tons of pure sulfides and rare ore deposits.
It was a brutal, vicious raid. Rafael Vargas was blamed — it had all his hallmarks — and he didn't deny his involvement. The sick thing was that there had been no reason to kill anyone.
"Mary Knox is considered Rafael Vargas's second in command."
Then there was another face, a pudgy fellow with dark eyes, perpetually guilty.
The name below the photo read, John Cutter.
"Jack Cutter once worked for Harpe'Enterprises' Deep-Sea Mining Division. He is an explosives expert, best in the business. When Harpe discovered he was selling black-market organic explosives to the combines, he was arrested, but later Cutter was sprung in an action that showed the marks of Rafael. All the guards were killed, the other prisoners on the transport to the penal island were killed... only Cutter was taken."
Right, Bridger thought. That's one way to buy employee loyalty.
Now Bridger waited for the bad news he was sure would come.
Noyce cleared his throat. "Nathan, it appears that both Knox and Cutter entered the resort without a ripple from SousMer security."
Maybe things will get tighter after this, Bridger thought. Lock that barn door.
"And Nathan — we think that they're still there."
Sure, that made sense. They couldn't risk having explosives discovered. It had to be done fast. Plant them, and then get away, making sure no one was around to watch the escape.
"So, we may be able to do something—"
Not, thought Bridger, if everything they said was carried on the Net. It was time to cut Noyce out of the loop. If anything was going to be done, it would be done without sending every message up to the Net.
"Admiral, I have taken steps to deal with the situation."
Noyce's face looked confused.
"Nate — the bullion is in the air. We don't want to do anything to jeopardize rescuing the hostages—"
"Yes, sir. And therefore I'd like to recommend that any communications with the resort go directly through seaQuest."
Bridger looked over at Bachmann, who wore a surprised smile on learning that he had just become Hostage Central.
Come on, Nathan thought, read between the lines here. Those people in SousMer were dead whether or not Rafael got his bullion. Unless they could save them... somehow...
Bill Noyce, who knew Bridger all too well, nodded. After all, hadn't Noyce brought ice cream to the island... pulling Bridger back from the peace, the serenity of his work... to this?
"Right, Captain, that's a good idea." Noyce started to turn away...
"And, Nathan — good luck."
Noyce disappeared from the screen. Bridger walked over to his command chair. Ford came over to him from Navigation.
"Captain, we'll be in the area in about twenty minutes. Do you want to order battle stations and ready the plasma torpedoes?"
"No, Mr. Ford. Just tell me who's on that EVA team I requested."
Ford grinned. "Weapons Officer Phillips, sir. He's trained with explosives."
"And the second man?"
"Oh — and myself, sir."