Tom struggled to see the door.
He shined his flashlight directly on it. The light bounced straight back at him like a mirror. “That’s not brass. I believe that’s gold!”
Chapter Fifty Two
Genevieve tried for a couple of minutes to break the door. “Okay, time for a new plan. I’m not going to be capable of creating enough force to break this door.”
Tom looked at his dive computer. He had about ten minutes worth of Heliox remaining. And they still had to get out of the ancient trimaran. “I’m going to see if I can squeeze past you to reach it.”
“There’s no way you’ll fit.”
Tom carefully detached his BCD from his chest. “I’m not planning on taking my dive tanks with me.” He then slowly slipped his twin dive tanks off. It was hard, and for someone his size, Tom was surprisingly lithe in the confined area. He would still struggle to turn around, but he might just squeeze through to the door.
“I need you to rotate so that you’re looking up towards me.”
“Why?”
“Because, for me to get past you, I’m going to have to lose my dive tanks.” Tom shuffled closer to her and picked up her dive computer. She had less than half the Heliox he had. “We’re running pretty low on Heliox. Good thing, Matthew made me take an extra twin tank.”
She slowly maneuvered herself to face him. “Pity its back on the deck.”
Tom shuffled a little closer towards her. This was the dangerous part. If he became stuck now, they would both die for his mistake. “We’ll break through this door and then we’ll find somewhere to turn around. Trust me.”
He disconnected his dive tanks from his facemask. Dozens of bubbles of residual Heliox disappeared from the end of the tube, with a hiss.
He held his breath and then calmly turned to face Genevieve. No longer encumbered by his own twin tanks he was able to squeeze himself directly above her. He attached her secondary gas source to his own facemask. Expelled the small amount of water in the tube. And then took a deep breath of Heliox.
Tom could see her light. He could hear the deep, mechanical sound of her breathing too much Heliox. But he couldn’t see her face as he tried to squeeze over the top of her. The ancient silt had been stirred so badly that it looked like a million stars made of gold as the light ricocheted off the tiny particles.
Their two bodies pressed together, hard. Tom shuffled himself ever slightly forward. Her arms shook, just slightly — the only outward sign of fear she displayed. They were trapped at the end of an ancient tunnel inside the trimaran’s hull, sharing the one Heliox system, at a depth of 175 feet.
The sort of thing that would scare the best wreck divers.
Tom felt his facemask scrape along hers. Careful not to damage it, he strained his eyes to see. They were face to face with their masks only just separating them.
Genevieve opened her eyes. They were blue and stared at him with something resembling adoration. And there was something else there, too. It surprised him — was it desire?
“Tom, do you realize you have the most beautiful hazel eyes? They have tiny shimmers of green in them.”
The statement shocked him.
“Thank you, I think.” Tom squeezed further forward. “I’ll give you the chance to have a much better look at them once we break through that damn door and get back onboard the Maria Helena.”
He felt her place the crowbar back in his hand. “Can you reach the door with this?”
The tunnel was so narrow that Tom was only able to take shallow breaths. He pushed the crowbar into the side of the door. The hard steel bent back part of the thin layer of gold covering the wooden door. If he had more room to move, Tom was certain he could break through it.
He pushed harder until the sharp edge of the crowbar broke through. Tom tried to pry the door open. His arm couldn’t move far enough to get the leverage needed to have any effect on the door.
Tom didn’t check their Heliox supply. He didn’t have to — he knew it was going to run out within minutes.
Then his eyes noticed something else.
It was fastened to the side of Genevieve’s left leg. He glimpsed it, but couldn’t quite see it properly. Then he remembered her fixing it there when they were talking about beating his green ghost and diving with adequate weapons.
He slid his right hand down her leg. Tom felt the neoprene wet suit stretch over her firm thigh as he slid his hand downward. She didn’t move an inch. Until he reached what he wanted — the Shark Stick.
“Hey, just because I said I liked your eyes doesn’t give you the right to —” she stopped short.
Tom had just fired the shark stick at the door from point blank from the door.
Designed to stop an approaching Great White Shark, the Shark Stick was basically a modified shotgun. Loaded with a backwards facing Winchester 30:30 cartridge case, and then primed with .38 Special case in its mouth to hold the primer, the full case of burning powder was propelled into the target upon firing. The muzzle blast does the damage as so much high-pressure gas is forced into the flesh of the target.
Tom looked for the remains of the door.
There were none but something else shined right back at him.
“Holy shit!” Tom said.
He felt Genevieve pull him backwards. “Whoa! Is that what I think it is?”
Tom swam inside. “I believe it is. And it’s probably worth more than you or I will ever make in a dozen lifetimes.”
Chapter Fifty Three
Sam had spent the afternoon watching hours upon hours of CCTV footage from a laptop inside the foreman’s office. They watched the initial damage to the vessel from what appeared to quite clearly be a rogue wave. It was nighttime, but the green wave appeared as a wall of turbid water.
The video ended and Sam looked at his watch. It was approaching 7 p.m. and getting dark. He closed his laptop. “Okay, I’ve seen enough. We should get back to the Maria Helena. Until we know more about what we’re dealing with, we should destroy the Bimini Road. At the very least block the Bimini Road before another rogue wave forms.”
“Agreed,” Veyron replied.
Sam climbed down the series of stairs and through the gate. He saw the foreman, Donald, approach. He shook the man’s hand warmly. “I must thank you for your hospitality. We’d better be getting back to the Maria Helena.”
Donald looked him in his eyes. “Find out whatever the fuck that thing was and where it came from. And then make sure you kill any more of its kind.”
“We’ll let you know as soon as we do.”
Sam walked towards the Sea King Helicopter. The last of the sun was setting on the horizon. The sky was clear, and the air was a little cooler than it had been all day. The stars would be out tonight. He unlocked the side door to the cockpit and climbed into the pilot’s seat.
Sam looked at Veyron. “We need a way to predict when another rogue wave forms. Then we can come up with a plan to destroy whatever the hell that green thing was. At the very least, we can keep out of its way.”
Veyron grinned. “Maybe we can.”
Sam flicked the main electrical switches to on. The Rolls Royce engine began to hum as the rotary blade began to spin counterclockwise. “What are you thinking?”
“The plankton glows with bioluminescence in response to movement, doesn’t it?”
“Yeah, it’s thought to be a primal response to a predator. Whatever comes to eat them, is now reflecting the light, and consequently becomes the prey of something larger. Why?”
“Because that means that the light created when a rogue wave is forming, or more exactly, as the group of whatever the hell these things are, come together, a large glow will form. My prediction is that light will be big enough to be seen from space, or certainly a real time satellite that’s looking for them.”