3
Eastern Atlantic, June 15
AS DAWN BROKE OVER
THE ATLANTIC, Kurt Austin stood near the bow of the NUMA vessel
Argo, wiping sweat off his face with a
towel. He’d just finished fifty laps around the main deck. Only,
because the deck did not encircle the ship, he’d been forced to
enter the superstructure at the end of every lap, race up two
flights of stairs and across the main transom, then down two
flights and back out to begin the next lap.
It would have been
far easier to hit the exercise room, pound the treadmill for five
miles and then climb on the StairMaster, but they were at sea, and
to Austin the sea had always meant freedom; freedom to roam and
explore the world, freedom from traffic and smog and the sometimes
claustrophobic existence of modern urban life. Out here—with the
promise of dawn on the horizon—he wasn’t about to lock himself in a
cramped windowless room for his morning workout even if it had
air-conditioning.
Wearing black
sweatpants and a faded gray T-shirt with the NUMA logo on it, Kurt
felt as good as he could remember. He stood just over six feet
tall, with broad shoulders and curly silver-gray hair that looked
almost platinum at times. He considered his eyes a shade of blue,
but apparently they were an unusual shade, as many
people—especially the women in his life—had tried to
explain.
As he closed in on
his fortieth birthday, Kurt had rededicated himself to working out.
He’d always been in shape. A career in the Navy and several years
as part of a clandestine CIA salvage team required it. But with the
decade number on his age going to four, Kurt was determined to get
in the best shape of his life, better than he’d been at thirty,
better than he’d been at twenty.
It was a tall order.
It took more work, left more aches and pains, and was slower in
coming than when he’d been younger, but he was almost
there.
Ten pounds lighter
than he’d been a year before, benching, curling, and lifting more
weight in the gym, he could feel the strength surging through his
body like it had in his youth when he believed he could do
anything.
It was needed too. A
career at NUMA came with lots of physical punishment. Beyond the
regular labor-intensive work of any salvage operation, he’d also
been beat up, shot at, and half drowned on a regular basis. After a
while the dings started to add up. A year ago he’d considered
taking up a standing offer to go back to work for his father, who
owned a prominent salvage company of his own. But that felt like
leaving on someone else’s terms, and if there was one thing Kurt
Austin didn’t do, it was follow any lead but his own.
He stared out at the
horizon as it changed from a deep indigo to a pale grayish blue.
The light was rising even though the sun had yet to show its face.
He stretched and turned, trying to crack his back. Off the
starboard beam, something caught his eye; a thin trail of smoke,
drifting skyward.
He hadn’t seen it
during his run, the darkness had obscured it, but it was no
illusion.
He squinted and
stared, but in the predawn gloom he couldn’t make out the source of
the smoke. He took one last glance and then headed for the
stairs.
Austin stepped onto
the bridge to find Captain Robert Haynes, the Argo’s commanding officer, standing with the
officer of the watch, plotting out their course to the Azores,
where the NUMA team would participate in an X Prize–like race to
crown the world’s fastest two-man submarine.
The operation was a
milk run. A pure research assignment given to Kurt and his partner,
Joe Zavala, as a reward for all the heavy lifting they’d done on
recent missions. Joe was already on Santa Maria Island making
preparations and, as Kurt guessed, making friends, especially among
the women. Kurt was looking forward to joining him, but before the
minivacation could begin they would have to make a slight
detour.
Haynes never lifted
his eyes from the charts. “Done wearing out my decks?” he
asked.
“For now,” Kurt
replied. “But we’re going to need to change course to
one-nine-zero.”
The captain looked up
briefly and then back down at the chart table. “I told you before,
Kurt, you lose something over the side, you’re going to have to
swim for it if you want it back.”
Kurt smiled briefly,
but the situation was serious.
“There’s a line of
smoke off our starboard beam,” Kurt said. “Someone’s got a fire
going, and I don’t think it’s a barbecue.”
The captain stood
straight, the joking look gone from his face. A fire at sea is an
incredibly dangerous event. Ships are filled with pipes and
conduits that carry flammable liquids like fuel and hydraulic
fluid. They often carry dangerous and even explosive cargoes: oil,
natural gas, coal, and chemicals, even metals like magnesium and
aluminum that burn. And unlike a fire on land, there’s really
nowhere safe to run unless you abandon ship, the last option in any
captain’s handbook.
Kurt knew this, as
did every man on the Argo. Captain
Haynes didn’t hesitate or even attempt to confirm the accuracy of
Kurt’s assessment. He turned to the helmsman.
“Take us around,” he
said. “Make your course one-nine-zero. Bring us to flank
speed.”
As the helmsman
executed the order, the captain grabbed a pair of binoculars and
headed out onto the starboard wing of the bridge. Kurt
followed.
The Argo was fairly close to the equator, and at such
latitudes the light grew quickly. Kurt could see the smoke plainly
now, even without the binoculars. Thick and dark, it rose skyward
in a narrow vertical column, thinning out only marginally on the
way up and drifting slightly to the east.
“Looks like a cargo
vessel,” Captain Haynes said.
He handed the
binoculars to Kurt.
Kurt trained them on
the ship. She was a midsize vessel, not a containership but a bulk
carrier. She appeared to be adrift.
“That’s oil smoke,”
Kurt said. “The whole ship is shrouded in it, but it’s thickest
near the aft end.”
“Engine-room fire,”
Haynes said. “Or a problem with one of the bunkers.”
That would have been
Kurt’s guess as well.
“Did you pick up any
distress calls?”
Captain Haynes shook
his head. “Nothing. Just regular chatter on the
radio.”
Kurt wondered if the
fire had taken out her electrical system. But even if it had, most
ships carried backups, and every vessel of that size would have a
few handheld transceivers, an emergency beacon, and even radios in
the main lifeboats. To hear nothing from a 500-foot vessel burning
and adrift seemed all but impossible.
By now the
Argo had finished its turn and was
heading dead at the stricken ship. Her speed was coming up, and
Kurt could feel them surging through the water. The Argo could make 30 knots in calm seas. Kurt guessed
the range at just over five miles, closer than he’d first thought.
That was a good thing.
But ten minutes
later, as he trained the binoculars on the superstructure and
increased the magnification, he spotted several things that were
less than good.
Flames were licking
out through various hatches all along the deck, meaning the entire
vessel was burning, not just the engine room. The ship was
definitely listing to port and was down at the bow, meaning she was
taking on water as well as burning. But worst of all, there were
men on the decks who seemed to be dragging something toward the
rail.
At first Kurt thought
it was an injured crewman, but then they let go of the person,
dropping him to the deck. The man tumbled as if he’d been shoved
and then got up and began to run. He made three or four steps, only
to fall forward suddenly onto his face.
Kurt snapped the
binoculars to the right just to be sure. He could clearly see a man
holding an assault rifle. Without a sound he saw the muzzle flash.
One burst and then another.
Kurt turned back to
the man who’d fallen. He lay utterly still now, facedown on the
deck.
Pirates, Kurt thought. Hijackers with assault rifles. The cargo vessel was in
deeper trouble than he’d guessed.
Kurt lowered the
binoculars, fully aware that they were now heading toward more then
a rescue.
“Captain,” he said.
“Our problems just multiplied.”