‘Well, we’ll die anyway, right?’ Gallen said. ‘We can try to do something, or we can slowly peter out, like goldfish on the carpet.’
‘I’m in,’ said Hansen. ‘I’ll get the dry suits and the BIBS. You two decide how to shut down the reactor.’
‘Excuse me,’ said Aaron, as Hansen crawled aft, ‘weren’t we going to vote?’
‘Thanks for thinking of me, but no need for that, son,’ said the Swede as he rummaged. ‘I’ve spent all my life on the ocean — I’m not letting these people blow up the sea bed.’
The dry suit fitted okay and the helmet seemed to have a proper seal. The BIBS mouthpiece only just fit inside the helmet and Hansen sealed the join around the hoses with fast-setting silicon gel and strapped it all down with heavy-duty duct tape of the type used on oil rigs.
The BIBS system usually comprised two hoses that ran from the tanks and met at the regulator dangling in front of the mouthpiece. Hansen had rigged three BIBS hose sets to one another, bolted together at the regulators, giving Gallen a theoretical umbilical of seventy-five feet. They figured it would be long enough.
‘So that’s it?’ said Gallen, peering at Aaron. ‘Florita’s birth date. We got any back-up on that?’
‘That’s the best guess I can do on an eight-digit code,’ said Aaron, who took occasional puffs on his BIBS mouthpiece.
‘And once I’m in manual override?’ said Gallen, wanting to get out there.
‘A number of square buttons on the control panel will light up red,’ said Aaron. ‘You push the one that says Safety reset, okay? ‘
‘What does that do?’
‘It triggers every safety protocol. Even if it senses sea-water inundation, it can shut itself down and self-seal. So don’t hit any other button, just Safety reset.’
‘Got it,’ said Gallen. ‘I would make a speech, but I’ve already used fifteen minutes of the BIBS air.’
They looked at each other, knowing this was it. Gallen’s legs shook slightly and he tried to clear his head. Stay focused.
‘It’s been fun,’ he said, extending a hand to Hansen, who shook it like a Viking.
‘See you on the other side, my friend.’
‘Save a seat for me,’ said Gallen. ‘I drink Millers.’
Aaron stepped up, putting put both hands on Gallen’s shoulders. ‘Shut that sucker down, Marine!’
‘Aye, aye, boss,’ said Gallen. ‘Let’s fill this tub.’
Standing under the main hatch, Gallen controlled his breathing as Hansen opened the valves and a sound started that could have been static on TV or a running brook. The foot wells in the cockpit filled first, rising rapidly as they were all left alone with their thoughts.
The air rasped and gurgled inside Gallen’s helmet, the BIBS system not designed for what he was about to make it do. The most likely outcome was the BIBS failing, becoming snagged or breaking, and Gallen drowning before he ever got a shot at the reactor.
The water lapped at his knees and it had risen to Aaron’s chin as he sat in the cockpit. The spook turned to look at him; Gallen saw the man’s terror — but also a man determined to stay calm as they all went to their deaths. He gave Aaron a thumbs-up and a wink but the face remained unchanged: the light had gone out. Aaron was shutting down with the cold.
Gallen turned his attention back to Hansen, who was going to give him the signal when the pressure inside the Sea Otter equalised with the ocean. The engineer’s lights left a strange red glow as the water rose, the incredible cold strapping itself around Gallen’s legs and then torso, like a python trying to squeeze the life out of him. He gasped as the water level hit his chest, Hansen and Aaron still alive in the hellish frigidity judging by the bubbles rising from their regulators.
The water level hit the Sea Otter’s ceiling and Gallen prayed quickly as the BIBS roared with noise inside the helmet. Looking down into the cockpit, through the red glow, he kept his eyes on Hansen. Come on, you old salt, he thought. Stay alive for another five minutes.
The cold gnawed at his neck and shoulder blades, and he fought to stay calm. Then Hansen turned, looked at Gallen through the red water, and gave him the thumbs-up.
Struggling with the hatch lock, his arms and fingers almost useless in the cold, Gallen grunted to release the lock and pushed upwards as it gave. Easing up into the blackness, Gallen rested on top of the Sea Otter to pull his extended BIBS hoses through: he wanted them coiled on the sea floor, not getting snagged in all the superstructure on the flat roof of the submersible.
He was exhausted by the time he’d coiled the BIBS hoses on the sea bed and pushed off the roof into the mud. The cold was so taxing on his breathing and muscular control that he almost couldn’t think straight, let alone move normally.
Making himself take one step at a time — held to the bottom by a weight belt — he struck out through the mud for the fifteen strides to the reactor, moving like a tin soldier with no leg flexibility. He was dying.
Panting by the time he reached the reactor, he could already feel the heat coming off it. It shimmered like bent light and a plume of silvery water rose above the reactor.
Reaching out, he touched it through his dry-suit mitts. It was hot, but not unpleasant, and he put his other palm on the smooth steel until it was too hot to touch.
There was no ladder on the reactor and the hatchway was on top of the structure. Gallen walked around the reactor and saw the caisson rising out of the mud. Putting his hands over the lip, he pulled himself up to the edge, making sure he didn’t tangle the BIBS lines in the process.
Sitting on the caisson, he was now at the level of the reactor’s roof. Rising to stand on the concrete, he pushed himself away from the structure and stepped out onto the roof. Heaving for breath as he gained his balance, he felt the heat powering up through his dry-suit-booted feet. He hopped slightly, the incredible cold not enough to combat the heat.
Realising he’d have to act quickly, he kneeled by the hatch lock and twisted. But he was too weak; the water pressure and the cold had already drained most of his strength. Then the heat surged through his knees and into his bones.
‘Shit,’ he said, leaping back from the reactor and onto the caisson lip, where he windmilled his arms, trying to maintain balance. If he fell in that caisson, that would be it: mission over.
Looking at the Sea Otter, he saw the four front portal windows staring back like a big insect; Hansen and Aaron were behind them, lost in their own reveries and fears.
Regaining composure, he thought it through. He’d have to land on the reactor and twist the hatch lock open in one go. And he’d have to do it quickly because the reactor seemed to be progressing into its meltdown state.
Leaping onto the roof again, he leaned over and summoned every ounce of his strength, both hands straining at the lock as the heat burned into the soles of his feet.
‘Shee-it!’ he yelled to himself and then, slowly at first, the lock moved and he pulled up the hatch.
Steam exploded out, flipping the hatch back hard and throwing Gallen backwards. Sailing through the illuminated sea, he hit the mud back-first and sank into it.
Struggling against the sediment and the sucking sensation, Gallen sat up, checking his BIBS line with his hands. The sediment swirled around him as he stood, the oxygen still making it to his mouthpiece.
As he climbed back to the lip of the caisson, his motor skills had degraded to the point where he even had to think about breathing and how to use his hand. He was shutting down and even on the caisson he could now feel the heat from the reactor. He swooned, blinking hard to focus.
A body floated out of the reactor’s hatch as Gallen stood and readied to step across. The Israeli technician drifted out of the hatchway and into the depths, held aloft as if someone was lifting him by his armpits.