Pitt turned off the lights of the Starfish and moved closer to the vehicles, the nearest of which was called a bulk cutter. It looked like an overgrown tractor with a giant roller for its snout.
The roller was a rotating cutting drum affixed with tungsten carbide teeth that could chew apart rocks and hardened sediment. The tracked vehicle would ingest the rubble and expel it out a large tube in back. The second vehicle, similar in size but absent the roller drum, was a collecting machine. It would follow the bulk cutter and suck up the slurry, pumping it to the surface through a thick Kevlar hose.
Pitt closed with the bulk cutter, admiring its robot efficiency as it churned across the seabed an inch at a time. Summer captured the image of the slate-colored vehicle with the onboard video camera, knowing that few manufacturers could build such a specialized machine.
Pitt was edging alongside for a better view when a bang erupted from the rear of the submersible. The Starfish drifted laterally, knocking against the side of the cutter. Pitt reversed the submersible’s thrusters, resulting in a second clang from behind.
Summer turned to peer out a small rear viewport. “It’s an ROV. It rammed us.”
“It just took out our main thruster.” Pitt toggled a pair of side thrusters to maneuver out of the way.
The submersible started to turn when another bang rang out and the Starfish was again shoved toward the bulk cutter.
“It’s intentionally pushing us toward the bulk cutter,” Summer gasped.
Pitt felt the effects through the steering yoke. The ROV had smashed into and disabled one of the remaining side thrusters. Before the ROV could strike again, Pitt pivoted the Starfish, spinning away from the bulk cutter. The ROV’s bright lights shone through the submersible’s canopy. Pitt could see it was a large, deepwater ROV, box-shaped and better than twice the size of the NUMA submersible. The vehicle came charging at them again.
Striking the Starfish’s bow off center, it again drove the weakened submersible sideways, shoving it against the bulk cutter just behind the cutter drum.
Pitt reached between their seats and pulled a grip toggle that released an emergency ballast weight. The submersible ascended at once, then came to a crashing halt.
Near the top of the bulk cutter, a large manipulator had been extended. As the Starfish collided into it, the robotic arm moved down and pinned the submersible against its side.
Pitt kicked the remaining side thruster and applied full reverse power. The Starfish just slipped from under the manipulator when the ROV came up from the side and smashed into their top. Their instrument lights flickered as the submersible keeled over.
At the same instant, the manipulator dropped down and slid through the base frame of the Starfish. Its claw grabbed onto a section of tubing and closed shut.
Pitt frantically worked the thruster controls, but they proved useless. The bulk cutter had a solid grip on them and there was nothing they could do about it.
“It’s going to ram the glass!” Summer shouted.
The ROV had repositioned itself directly in front of the Starfish and was rushing toward the acrylic viewport. At the last second, the ROV ascended, striking the top of the submersible and sliding along its roofline. The ROV then backed away, sporting a scruff of yellow paint and some dangling wires.
Pitt looked at the wires. “It’s our emergency transponder. So we can’t communicate with the surface.”
“Are they going to leave us here to die?” Summer whispered.
“Only they know the answer to that,” Pitt said, staring out the viewport.
Like an all-seeing apparition, the ROV floated before them, its lights glaring into the submersible in a blinding taunt of death.
38
We’ve lost contact with the Starfish.”
“Be right there,” Giordino said.
Hanging up a wardroom telephone, he called over to Dirk, who was examining the results of additional water samples while the submersible was on its dive. The two raced to a tiny control shack on the stern deck.
A communications technician greeted them with a sober nod. “Both data and communications quit about five minutes ago. I’ve tried multiple frequencies and links but am getting no response.”
“Any indication of trouble beforehand?” Giordino asked.
“Negative. The last operating specs were fine. Summer radioed a few minutes earlier that they had located the Alta and were following some underwater tracks leading southeast.”
“Give me a mark on their last telemetry.” Giordino moved to a monitor that displayed a chart of the area. The technician tapped into a keyboard, pulling up the submersible’s last-recorded coordinates, which appeared on the chart as a red triangle.
“That’s about a thousand meters south of us.” Giordino motioned out a side window toward the lights of the ship in the distance. “In the same direction as our friends over there.”
“I’ll call them from the bridge and find out what they’re doing and whether they have any resources in the water,” Dirk said, rushing out the door.
“Have the captain reposition us over the Starfish’s last coordinates,” Giordino said. “I’ll have an ROV ready to deploy in five minutes.”
It took ten minutes for the ship to be repositioned. Dirk hailed the nearby vessel but received only a brief rebuff. Without identifying itself, the ship replied that it was engaged in seabed testing, had not seen the Starfish, and ordered the NUMA ship to stay a half mile clear.
The Sargasso Sea’s captain promptly ignored the request, rushing his ship within a quarter mile of its position in hopes of locating the submersible.
Giordino lowered his ROV over the side, spooling out its lift cable as fast as the drive winch would allow. Dirk sat in the control shack, watching its video feed. Halfway down, the ROV’s camera briefly picked up some faint lights in the distance, then lost them.
At six hundred feet, Dirk activated a joystick and navigated the ROV in a small circle as the seafloor came into view.
Giordino stepped into the control shack a minute later. “See anything?”
“Caught a flash of lights during the descent at about two hundred feet. Looked too dispersed to be the Starfish.”
“That ship is up to no good. Take a look at those bottom tracks.”
The ROV hovered over a slew of tread marks that crisscrossed the bottom. Dirk guided the ROV toward the heaviest concentration.
“Something off to the right,” Giordino said.
Dirk pivoted the ROV, its camera picking up a distant flicker of lights. “Let’s go have a look.”
While Giordino remotely played out additional cable, Dirk powered toward the lights. It didn’t take long to see they didn’t come from the Starfish.
The lights twinkled from the massive collecting machine that was designed to vacuum up crushed rock. The big vehicle sat idle, its bulk cutter partner nowhere in sight. Standing watch nearby was the large, square ROV, hovering a few meters off the bottom.
As the NUMA probe drew near, the collecting machine rose off the bottom amid a cloud of silt. A thick pair of cables began hoisting the machine on a slow journey to the surface. Dirk tracked its motions for a short distance, then broke away as the other ROV came to investigate.
The two ROVs eyed each other warily for a minute. The larger vehicle then turned and chased after the ascending machine to the surface.