“Then let’s go do it,” she said. Then she smiled turned and raced up the ladder two rungs at a time through the hatch.
Briscoe followed her up easily matching her pace.
By this time of night, I was dragging a bit, but made it up as well.
Soon we stood in an engineering marvel. Williams had closed the pod bay hatch behind us as we topped the ladder and suggested a brief tour before she released us to our quarters. I reminded her it was approaching 0130 hours and it had been an exhausting day. Brief was the operative word.
The deck we entered, Deck 1 — Quad 2 from a large sign on the wall, reminded me of the entryway to one of Jeremy’s better sandcastles he and I created when we were kids. That design was a pie-shaped deck cut into four slices with a large circular center section accessible from each slice through one of four watertight bulkhead doors. I called that a submarine core because it resembled a sub hull turned on end.
I remember him telling me that it was a good idea. He said that the rounded convex bulkhead walls of the central core provided better protection against quadrant flooding pressures. It was all too complicated for me back then but I went along with him and pretended that he knew what he was talking about. Now looking back it all made pretty good sense.
The stark white surroundings reflecting the intense overhead lights blinded my eyes so I couldn’t see all the details but they were adjusting slowly. Briscoe standing beside me, must have been affected the same way he shielded his eyes waiting for them to adapt.
Several of the staff in blue jump suits walked hurriedly through the room ignoring us carrying empty coffee mugs to a coffee pot somewhere. Briscoe eyed them curiously until they disappeared behind a wall.
“Now this is the main level Deck 1. Decks 2, 3 and 4 are above us,” she said sweeping her hand across the room giving us a tour she’d obviously given before.
“We’re in quadrant two… Q2 with Q1 to our left, Q3 to our right and Q4 opposite the central core. Remember they increase going clockwise when looking down from above. Past that bulkhead door at the end of this room a central core chamber twenty feet in diameter, matching our deck height, joins all four quadrants through watertight bulkhead doors. Above it are more core rooms surrounding an elevator rising to the top of the dome. The top core room is called the panic room a safe haven for us. The last room to be flooded in a dire emergency. Attached—”
“Wait a minute,” I asked, “So if we have a pressure breach and water rushes in we race up the core trying to beat the rising water to the panic room at the top of the dome. Is that right?”
“Basically, yes.”
“Then what from there? We kiss our asses goodbye?”
Chuckling, she patiently explained:
“No, Mr. Cross, the panic room is attached to a thirty-man pressurized escape pod bathysphere we affectionately call the EPod. It can separate from the dome and float to the surface buoyantly: a lifeboat of absolute last resort. Why? If we ever use it, it will inundate the station with seawater leaving it forever unusable. That escape pod also serves as our scuttle mechanism if an enemy force ever commits an unauthorized entry. Then sixteen hundred pounds of strategically placed C4 explosives will obliterate the station. Does that answer your question?”
I gulped loudly.
“Er… yes, Lieutenant. Thank you. Please proceed.”
Walking us through the room toward the narrow end, she continued:
“Each of the quadrants on this deck has almost two-thousand square feet and only two passages in or out: the pod bay hatch we just used and the bulkhead core room door we’re approaching. If we ever have a dome rupture or docking bay accident, God forbid, then we can seal off each quadrant independently from the core for flood control.”
“Yes, God forbid. What’s behind that wall over there? I smell fresh coffee,” Briscoe added preoccupied looking over a bank of workstation consoles with several seated workers scrutinizing large video screens.
“Oh, that’s the coffee bar for this quadrant want some?” she replied. “I could use a cup myself.”
“Well does a whale poop in the ocean, Lieutenant? I thought you’d never ask.”
Fortunately, that broke our red-eye tour. I mean it was interesting and everything but I was so tired her words were bouncing off my brain; it was so overloaded with new information it couldn’t accept more. Besides, I had started worrying about Lindy wondering if she had been told of my disappearance, what her reaction would be and if she’d hate me forever for this.
When I finally voiced my concern to Lt. Williams as we sat with our coffee at a small reading table, she suggested, “Ask Ivy. She’ll know.”
“Really?”
Surveying the surrounding area filled with bookshelves and a black vault like the one that Greenfield opened at HQ, I asked, “Where is she? Where’s her eye on the wall?”
“She has four sensors in each quadrant one on each bulkhead wall. The closest one is right by the coffee pot over there. Many of our staff use her for retrieving information as they sip their caffeine trying to find answers to their problems. Ivy has a great scientific mind, is an expert educator and logician. and does pretty well at answering medical and psychological questions too. She can even send email for you but security filtered. Ever use Google?”
“Of course.” I answered.
“Well, since you have no laptop or smart phone down here you’ll still have unanswered questions for Googling and a need for external contacts as we all do. Just ask her. She’s your verbal link into that ginormous database they keep plus more from our station’s files.”
“Mind if I try?”
“No knock yourself out.”
Taking my cup to Ivy’s panel, I stood and read a few brief instructions.
“Ivy, Matt Cross here. I have a request.”
The dark reddish center brightened and began to pulsate with my heartbeat.
“I know who you are, Matt Cross. Welcome to Discovery One. What is your request?”
Her soft voice was eerie but soothing like a voice from my conscience, a guardian angel, a close friend. It drew my confidence and trust.
“Has my wife Lindy Cross been told of my sudden disappearance? Is she worried or mad?”
Her lens pulsed faster reading my anticipation of an answer. I didn’t notice my increased heart rate, but she did.
“One moment,” she said. A soft mechanical purring filled the silence for seconds before I heard the sound of a telephone line ringing.
“Hello this is Lindy.”
“Hello, Ms. Cross. I called your husband from Florida early this morning and spoke with him. Do you remember the call?”
“Yes sir, oh-dark-thirty about some new mission I believe.”
“That’s correct, Lindy. An emergency mission to save a U.S. deep-sea asset and its workers from their demise. We had no choice but to deploy him immediately.”
“Deploy him immediately? Oh my God! He won’t be coming home today?”
“No ma’am. Not today or tomorrow. I’m sorry. He’s working with us now. You can expect him to be gone up to a month.”
“Who’s us? Where is he?”
“Ma’am, I can’t tell you that but if you need more information please contact his boss Carlos Montoya at MBORC. Do you have that number?”
“Why yes of course b-b-but—“
“I’m sorry, Ms. Cross, but that is all I can say. Have a good day.”
A dial tone replaced the conversation over Ivy’s speaker.
“Yes, she has been notified, Matt Cross. Does that answer your concern?”
“Sure, but how did you do that? That was her voice.”