By the time they were roused, the sun had risen high above the horizon and the Gulf of Boothia stretched before the ship. To the west, the land form of Boothia Peninsula rose out of the water, an abrupt profile cutting through the surface of the sea.
They were ten nautical miles from the southeastern end of Thebes Deep when Garner spotted something moving above the horizon directly in front of them. It was not approaching or retreating, but apparently engaged in some kind of search-and-traverse flight plan parallel to the track of the Phoenix.
Zubov and Junko joined him at the rail.
“It’s too small to be an airplane,” Zubov mused, studying the object through a pair of binoculars. “At least, too small to be a piloted airplane.”
Junko took the binoculars from Zubov and followed his gaze.
“It’s a flying dosimeter,” she said finally. “Remote controlled. Used to track the dispersal of radionuclides through the atmosphere. In fact, they are often used in parallel with programs like PATRIC for modeling purposes.”
“Cool,” Zubov whistled. “Why don’t we have one of those?”
“I doubt even the Nolan Group could afford it,” Junko said.
“How about Global Oil?” Garner asked. He had spotted the Global emblem on the mechanical silhouette of an oil rig dead ahead. “Big enough budget there?”
“Maybe bigger than theirs too,” Junko replied. “I’m thinking Pentagon proportions.”
“Interesting.” It was Garner’s turn with the binoculars. “But they’re operating it for a reason. They’ve got to be looking for the same thing we are.”
“Why would something like an oil rig even be equipped for this?” Junko asked. “It doesn’t make sense.”
“No, it doesn’t. Unless it isn’t really Global doing the surveying.”
Garner trained the field glasses on the massive platform. Below the rig and barely visible against the massive bulk of the GBS, he focused on the low profile of a nuclear submarine.
“Six-sixty-six,” Garner said as he read the sub’s hull number. “The Hawkbill.”
“Should we know that?” Zubov asked.
“She’s a U.S. nuclear attack sub,” Garner explained. “Refitted with the latest in cartographic equipment and used to carry civilian researchers up here.”
“To do what?” Junko asked.
“Ordinarily, to draw the best maps of the Arctic seafloor ever created and collect reams of data on the ice. In this case, I have no idea. They could just be stopping in for coffee, or they could be assisting the rig’s crew with some surveying.”
“Using a flying dosimeter?” Zubov sounded unconvinced.
“Something’s up, all right,” Garner agreed. “If the Canadian Coast Guard knows about this, I’m wondering why they didn’t tell us.”
“And if they don’t know about this, then somone’s got some explaining to do,” Zubov remarked.
“We should let them know we’re here,” Junko suggested.
“I’m surprised they haven’t already done that very thing,” Garner replied. “The Hawkbill should have heard us coming before we even came over the horizon.”
“If the Global rig didn’t want us to identify ourselves, the Hawkbill certainly would,” Zubov suggested.
“Unless they’re already expecting us,” Garner countered. “We could have just stumbled into our own welcome party.”
As if in response, the walkie-talkie on Garner’s hip crackled. It was Frisch, patching through a call from the Phoenix’s radio room.
A clipped voice, immediately recognizable as Scott Krail, greeted him through the tiny speaker. Garner and Zubov exchanged looks of stunned surprise.
“Good morning, Commander,” Krail said cheerfully. “I’m glad you could join us. We’ve got ourselves a little situation here and I hope you’re just the man who can help.”
16
The Phoenix approached to within half a mile of Global B-82, where it was met by a motorized launch dispatched by the oil rig. The most obvious feature about the two men who picked up Garner, Carol, and Junko was that neither of them was wearing a protective suit. As the boat turned in a wide arc back toward B-82, its wake broke the mirror-calm surface of the dark blue sea.
“We’re having a little problem with environmental radiation,” Garner shouted to the launch’s pilot over the roar of the outboard motor. “Maybe you’ve heard something about it.”
“They say we’re fine here,” the helmsman replied curtly. He was an ensign, young and rigid and focused only on the task at hand. He was only in as much danger as his commanding officer had told him, something Garner still found unnerving even after his own experience in the Navy.
“Not anymore.” Garner cocked his head back toward the Phoenix. “That’s a twelve-thousand-ton radioactive sink. Every inch of her outside surface is hot from the water we’ve just passed through.”
“Commander Krail didn’t see that as an issue,” the other escort said.
“Krail doesn’t know what we know,” Garner countered. “You’ll have to take that up with Commander Krail.”
Company men following orders. But whose orders, exactly? Perhaps even more disconcerting, the advice they were following appeared to be sound. Why had the radioactive slick suddenly disappeared? According to the PATRIC plot, B-82 should be right on top of one of the most likely places for the leak, yet apparently, no radiation had been detected here — at least not enough to warrant protective measures. That made things all the more puzzling. If the Phoenix was only chasing a mirage, as everyone from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to the Navy had suggested, then what was Krail suddenly doing here with the Hawkbill? He had practically laughed Garner out of his office in Arlington, yet he had surreptitiously taken Carol’s concerns seriously enough to commandeer the Hawkbill, and do so fast enough to beat the Phoenix to the scene. That kind of mobilization suggested a tremendous amount of panic and enough political clout to grease the keels of naval mobilization, if there ever was such a thing.
Now here they were, one happy group, ostensibly united in the exploration of this mysterious leak, but the radiation was the only thing that was now absent.
Yes, Garner had several questions for Scott Krail.
With his tanned skin and crisp, pressed uniform, Krail looked more like the social director of a cruise ship than the commander of a military operation.
This appearance was all the more pronounced by the greasy surroundings of the rig and the obvious disparity between Krail’s men and B-82’s working crew.
“What are you doing here, Scott?” Garner demanded before he was even off the launch.
“Just rolling out the welcome mat for an old friend.” Krail smiled. “What’s your pleasure?”
“My pleasure is to know—”
“Tell you what: Let’s talk about it upstairs,” Krail said, cutting Garner off.
He briefly introduced Charon and Stimson, then turned and led the contingent up to the topsides. They were ushered into a claustrophobic conference room someone referred to as the tank.
“We’re soundproofed here,” Krail explained, “so we can stop pretending you’re just a research ship that happened to be in the neighborhood. Good to see you, Brock. Sooner than expected, but still, reassuring.”
“Then answer my question,” Garner said tersely. “What are you doing here? You could have told us something about this before and saved us all a lot of work.”