Beyond the Ice Limit

14

THREE DSVS HAD been removed from the hangar deck and now rested on the fantail, casting long shadows in the golden light of morning. Gideon arrived a few minutes before the scheduled briefing, cup of coffee in hand, pleasantly exhausted by the long night of lovemaking. Alex was already there, dressed in a sleek black leotard-like outfit, as if channeling The Avengers’ Emma Peel. She looked well rested—intimidatingly so, he thought, all things considered. Manuel Garza had arrived as well and was chatting with Alex. To Gideon’s surprise, he appeared to be dressed for a dive.

“Hello, Gideon,” said Garza, offering his hand.

Gideon took it. He thought Garza looked a little nervous, but maybe that was wishful thinking. “So you’re piloting a DSV, too?”

“Assigned to George. You’re going down in John.”

“And I’m in Paul,” said Alex, sauntering over.

Gideon tried to maintain a nonchalant look and avoid staring. He glanced around at the others in view: a few DSV techs and the ship’s second engineer, Greg Masterson, a powerfully built man who was on hand to look over the DSVs’ engines and give the dive a green light. Did they know? But there weren’t any knowing glances; just an air of professional gravity.

“Coffee before a dive?” Alex asked, arching her eyebrows. “That’s brave.”

“How so?”

“Coffee’s a diuretic.”

Gideon hadn’t thought of that—although he had already been down twice. “Um, what happens if you have to pee?”

“In your pants.”

Gideon set his coffee cup aside.

A deck door opened and Glinn emerged, limping ever so slightly, carrying an iPad and blinking in the bright sunlight. He clasped his hands behind his back and bestowed on them a cool smile of welcome.

“Nice day for a dive,” he said. “We’ve been lucky in the weather.”

Nods of agreement.

“You’ve all studied the mission plan, but I’m going to run through the main points briefly and see if there are any questions.”

He paused. Gideon glanced surreptitiously at Alex. Her eyes were on Glinn. With an effort, he turned back to the briefing.

“First, a word about communications. Unlike yesterday, all of you will be in communication with mission control via your UQC underwater phones. The UQC is an acoustical modem that operates at a speed of twelve hundred baud maximum—very slow. It can carry voice communications and minimal data, but almost all the heavy data has to be archived for downloading once you surface. We’ll deploy special sonobuoys above where you’re working to pick up the signals and relay them to mission control. But because of the minuscule throughput, there will be a time delay before we’ll actually be able to view them on the surface. Also, because these are acoustical signals, they’re easily blocked. Gideon, when you’re inside the Rolvaag, your communications will be temporarily cut off—not just from mission control, but from the other DSVs.”

Gideon nodded.

“The two black boxes are vital. One contains all data and communications to and from the ship’s bridge. The second stored the CCTV video from security cameras set up throughout the ship. If we can recover both, we’ll have a detailed picture of the ship’s last moments. We know exactly where they’re located: in the electronics hub on the forecastle deck. With the Rolvaag lying on its side, you’ll have to enter the hull, make your way through the wreckage of the hold and beyond to a point underneath the forecastle deck, then cut through the deck to reach the electronics hub. The route has been fully programmed into your DSV, but we don’t know the condition or layout of the interior, so once you enter the hull you’ll have to use your own judgment. The John has a cutting torch on its mech arm. It’s AI-assisted, so there’s no fear of making a mistake. Questions?”

“Not at the moment.”

Glinn shifted, turning toward Alex.

“Since we can’t map the, ah, Baobab with sonar, we’ll scan it using visual light and LiDAR. That’s your job. The LiDAR is a green-wavelength laser capable of penetrating sixty feet of water. We need to know the extent of this thing—not only the trunk, but its branches as well. Also, what are those tendrils Gideon saw on the ocean floor, and how far out do they go? And do they go to anything in particular?”

Gideon, looking at Alex again as Glinn spoke, found his mind wandering back to the previous night. He quickly squashed the vivid images that rose in his mind. Given his own precarious medical condition, he thought, what was he doing, getting into a relationship like this? Following the awful events that had transpired during their time on the Lost Island in the Caribbean, Glinn had healed amazingly well—and Gideon still held out some hope he might also be cured of his condition. Or was that just wishful thinking? As of yet, there was no evidence that anything had medically changed—no evidence that he might have any longer than nine months left to live. Was he becoming an old softie, or did this really feel, already, like more than a shipboard romance? What the hell should he do? Once again, he made a mighty effort to tune back in to Glinn, who was now talking to Garza.

“Manuel, you will undertake a high-resolution sonar and LiDAR scan of the Rolvaag and the surrounding seafloor, extending out a radius of half a mile. I also want you to do a five-mile transect, starting at the Baobab and going out, to see how far the dead zone extends.”

Glinn looked at the three in turn. “Finally, all three DSVs today are equipped with science baskets. If you see something interesting, notify mission control. We will use the UQC to look at it and decide whether it can be picked up and brought to the surface. If so, you’ll use your mechanical arms to place it in the science basket. The operation of the arm is simple and it, too, is AI-assisted, so previous experience is not required.”

He ran through a few more details, then finished with a simple: “Let’s mount up.”

Gideon climbed his submersible’s ladder up to the sail hatch. He stood there a moment, looking at the other two, watching as Alex gave him a smile and a wave, then lowered herself gracefully through the hatch. A moment later he grasped the bar and stepped into his own hatch, climbing down the miniature ladder into the personnel sphere. Unlike the previous day, he felt calm and confident.

Ten minutes later, Gideon once again found himself staring through the forward viewport at a swirl of silver bubbles as John was lowered into the water. He heard the clank as the DSV was released and watched through the viewports as he drifted down into the infinite, darkening blue.