"Ah, Nick, I don't think you'll be able to tell anyone about this."
"And why not? This has nothing to do with your military secrets, Lyse. This is about history and culture."
"I think what the lovely Ms. Lyon means," the captain supplied, "is that your presence here, and for that matter our actions today, are illegal. We did just shoot up a Russian destroyer, you realize."
"But as far as they know, that action was carried out by a Russian submarine. There will be no contesting that identification. And since the Russians have sold off several of their older subs, there'll be no shortage of possible suspects."
The captain shook his head. "If you were to go public with your discovery, their government might be more scrupulous in demanding an accounting, both of the attack on the destroyer, and your presence in Georgia to begin with."
"You can't tell the world Nick," Lyse stated. "Not yet, at least. We can't afford to have Russia pissed off at us right now."
Kismet sighed. He knew she was right, but it irritated him to have worked so hard for nothing.
"Nick, there is yet one thing I do not understand." Kismet turned to hear out Peter Kerns. "I can accept your theory of the gold being drawn out of sea water, and accumulating on the ship. But the relics I found were not on the ship itself, but in the silt nearby, unaffected by the electrical field. The altar stone, for example, must have broken off when the ship went down. It did not have any gold on it. But the helmet fragment did. How is that possible?"
He reflected on the day Harcourt had brought the bronze and gold fragment to his office, nearly two weeks before; a dented and torn shard of a helmet that had been forged for a smaller head than his own…"It must have been plated prior to the sinking of the galley."
"Maybe the helmet really did belong to Jason," Irene suggested, unknowingly voicing Kismet's own wild speculation. "Remember that Medea used her magic to protect him when he slew the serpent that guarded the Fleece. And when he sowed the serpent's teeth, and fought the champions that grew out of the ground, her magic guarded him. If the gold was the source of her magic, perhaps she used it on his armor somehow. I seem to recall that at one point, Jason threw his helmet into the midst of the champions, causing them to turn on each other and kill each other in the confusion."
Kismet couldn't remember if the last part of her recollection was really part of the Argo legend, but he didn't contradict her. Her hypothesis was no more elaborate than his own.
"Then the helmet shard you spoke of was something the Greeks brought back with them," offered the captain. "Perhaps it was hidden beneath that altar stone; a sacred relic from the time of the real Jason."
"I guess we'll never know," Kismet concluded.
"Okay, I understand all of that." Irene faced her father again. "Now, why are we on a Russian submarine?"
"That was my idea," Kismet hastily supplied, trying to prevent the captain from grabbing any more glory. "When I first decided to go after Harcourt, both to rescue Peter and maybe find the Fleece, I made a deal with Lyse. She would back us up secretly, from a submarine, so that when we succeeded, we could sneak out unobserved."
"Almost sinking the Boyevoy isn't exactly my idea of stealth."
"It sure beats the alternative."
"You may have suggested using a sub, Nick, but it was the Colonel here—" Lyse nodded to the sub's pilot—"that gave us the K-322."
"Air Force, retired," explained the captain. "Nowadays I earn my pay with a certain maritime agency that disavows any knowledge of this little jaunt. After the end of the Cold War, the Russians sold off a few of their older boats, and this one found it’s way into the hands of a drug cartel. The Navy sank it in about four miles of water, and then the CIA asked my agency to help salvage it so they could use it for…well, for days like today.”
"They’ll be wise to the deception now,“ Kismet intoned. “What's next?"
"Well, now the fun really begins. The captain of that destroyer will have already sounded the alarm, so the entire Black Sea fleet will be after us. Unfortunately, there's only one way out the Black, through the Bosporus."
"Can we get there before they blockade the strait?"
"Officially, they can't blockade it. But that won't stop them. And the answer is: probably not. In any event, we won't be trying. We're now heading south, toward the Turkish coast. Once we get there we'll scuttle this boat, and make landfall. Then we'll break up into smaller groups and make our way home."
"They'll be looking for Irene and me."
"It would probably be best for you two to split up.” Lyse supplied. “Eventually, when you've made it back to the States, you can concoct some story about escaping from a rogue Russian military group with their own submarine."
"Wonderful," said Irene, sarcastically. "I thought all this insanity was finally over."
The captain smiled. "Well, I can promise you a few hours of peace. No one's using the officers' quarters. Why don't you grab some shut-eye? You look like you could use it." He proffered a hand, which, after a quick glance in Kismet's direction, she accepted. Kerns raised an eyebrow, and then moved to follow them.
Lyse threw a wry grin at Kismet. "Better watch out, Nick. He moves pretty fast with the ladies. Speaking as one, there is something…irresistible about him."
Kismet hefted the Fleece, avoiding her eyes. "Lyse, what makes you think that I would even give a damn?"
"Uh, oh. Things not working out between you and Svetlana?"
He considered matching her barb for barb, but thought better of it. "No. I guess there's not much room in my life for romance."
"Hell, I could have told you that. I figured that out years ago."
He chuckled, but there was no humor. "Yeah, I guess you did." He tossed the Fleece onto his shoulder and turned in the direction the others had gone, eager to find a quiet place to relax.
"Nick, wait."
"I'm keeping the Fleece, Lyse. You owe me that much."
"Sure, whatever. But there's something you owe me. The memory card? Remember? You told me you gave them to a friend. I need to know who that is."
Kismet almost laughed. It had all started with those plans; plans to build a super weapon using the mystery element contained in the Golden Fleece. Now that the ubergold was beyond reach, at the bottom of the Black Sea, Kismet wondered if the plans would do anyone any good.
"Why not?" He reached for his waist pack. The nylon bag, which had somehow survived the assault by Grimes and the final descent of the golden ship, was bloated with seawater. He turned it over, and the contents splashed on the deck, drenching Lyse's shoes. He laughed as she jumped back self-consciously, and then drew out the sheath of his kukri. The scabbard of carved wood, overlaid with black leather was probably ruined but it was replaceable. Using the blade of the big knife, he cut apart the seams that held the leather together along the backside of the sheath. The dyed covering spread apart, revealing the plastic bag with the SD card inside. He pulled it loose and tossed it to her.
Lyse was livid. "You told me you gave it to a friend."
He held the kukri up, inspecting it in the subdued light, and remembering a fateful night many years before when he had been given the blade as an almost sacred trust between warriors. "One of my oldest and dearest. And might I add, the only one I trust implicitly."
"What if you had gone down with that ship? Then it would have been lost forever."
"That probably would have been better. The world would be a better place without your superbombs."
She wagged her head in despair, and then went to work unwrapping the package, as if still convinced that he would again try to swindle her. Leaving her to inspect the SD card, he continued down the companionway, into the heart of the submarine. A narrow portal in the bulkhead opened into a cramped room with two vacant bunks. As he entered, he heard his name called yet again, but this time it was not Lyse.