Fire Ice

The computer screen went squirrelly for a second. Letters and numbers streamed by in a blur. The screen went blank. Then a message appeared: "We're wired. Starting to download. Hiram and Max."

Austin glanced at his watch as he paced back and forth, wondering how long it would take Yaeger to do his job. The minutes ticked by. He feared that they would have to leave before the job was done. But after ten minutes, a big yellow smiley face wearing gra

They quickly disco

The door opened onto a cabin with two bunks. Lounging on the bunks, with bored expressions on their faces, were Captain Logan and the pilot from the NR-1. Their conversation stopped in midsentence, and they stared at the newcomers with unbridled hostility, assuming they were guards who had come to make their life miserable.

Logan turned to the pilot and said, "Where are they getting these guys?"

"The tall one looks like he should be scaring crows in a field," the pilot said.

"That suit on the shorter guy sure didn't come from Armani," Logan said, with a chuckle.

"Armani was closed, Captain Logan. We had to borrow our wardrobe from the ship's crew."

Suspicion clouded Logan's eyes. "Who the hell are you?"

"That gentleman imitating a scarecrow is my colleague, Paul Trout. My name is Kurt Austin, but you can call me 'Shorty.' "

The captain sprang from his bunk. "Dammit, you're Americans!"

"Told you our disguises wouldn't hold up," Austin said to Trout. He turned back to Logan. "Guilty as charged, Captain. Paul and I are with the NUMA Special Assignments Team."

The captain looked toward the door. "We didn't hear any fighting. Have your guys taken over the ship?"

Austin and Trout exchanged amused glances. "Sorry to disappoint you. Delta Force was busy, so we came alone," Austin said.

"I don't understand. How – "

Austin cut him off. "We'll explain after we get you off this ship."

He motioned to Trout, who opened the door slightly to see if it was safe to exit. Again the hallway was clear. With a Trout leading the way and Austin taking up the rear, they moved along a corridor toward the stairway as if they were escorting the submariners.

The strategy came in handy a moment later when they encountered a lone guard walking in their direction, his weapon shouldered. Austin guessed from the man's casual demeanor that he was on his way back to his quarters. The guard's eyes flicked toward Trout and his brow wrinkled as he tried to figure out why he didn't recognize a shipmate of a Trout's imposing height. The captain stopped when he saw the guard, unsure of what to do.

Austin could have taken the guard out, but he preferred that the visit to the ship go u

Austin shrugged and replied with an i

"Sorry, Captain," he said, with obvious embarrassment. was getting a fix on Paul, and I had to divert his attention."

Logan dusted off the seat of his pants. "I've had my command hijacked, my crew kidnapped, and been forced by these seagoing thugs to use a U.S. Navy vessel for their purposes," he said with a grin. "I'll suffer whatever it takes to get off this ship."

Trout stopped and examined another wall diagram. "It looks as if the moon pool hold is divided into a smaller and larger section. I'd advise going in the smaller end to avoid crew quarters here."

Austin told him to lead the way. With long, loping strides, Trout led them along a series of passageways until they came to an unlocked door. On the other side was a catwalk that ran along the wall of a high-ceiling chamber about a third the size of the moon pool.

"What the hell is that thing?" the captain said. He was looking at a huge cylindrical object suspended from the ceiling. It was at least four feet across and fifty feet long. The bottom end was cone shaped and several projections were clustered around the top, where a complex set of cables and hoses snaked into the ceiling.

"Looks like an ICBM," the pilot said, "only it's pointing wrong way."

"That's not all that's wrong with it," Trout said. "Those thrusters around the top, not fins."

Austin was as fascinated as the others, but time was short. "Take a good look at it now, gentlemen, and we'll compare notes later."

They continued along the walkway through another door and found themselves outside the changing room, where they found dry suits that fit the navy men. Austin and Trout carefully folded their borrowed coveralls and replaced them on the shelves. Then they all moved on to the decompression chamber. The dive gear was undisturbed. They descended a short stairway that led to a room with the smaller moon pool. Set into the deck was a depressed twelve-by-twelve-foot-square section outlining the pool that was used for launching ROVs. Trout studied the controls on the wall, then hit a button and the floor of the shallow wall slid back.

Water lapped over the top of the well and a damp, briny chill filled the room.

The pilot looked into the dark square of ocean and gulped. "You're kidding."

"Sorry it isn't a hot tub," Austin said. "But unless you can figure a way to open the main floodgates so we can use the NR-1, this is the only way off the ship."

"Hell, this should be no different from the escape training tank at Groton," the captain said with bravado, although his face was pale.

"We don't have any spare air tanks, so we'll buddy-breathe. It's about a hundred-yard swim to our pickup. The open hatch probably sets off an alarm up in the wheelhouse, so we don't have much time."

Despite his bluster, the captain didn't look enthusiastic about the prospect ahead, but he gritted his teeth, pulled the hood down and the face mask over his eyes. "Let's go before I change my mind," he growled.

Austin handed the pilot the auxiliary air hose, called the octopus. Trout did the same with the captain. When all were ready, Austin linked arms with the pilot, stepped to the edge of the pool and jumped in.

They sank in a cloud of bubbles until their buoyancy overcame their downward momentum. The bubbles quickly cleared, and Austin saw Trout's light waving in the gloom from several feet away. Austin started swimming. The submariners' kicking technique was uneven and the Siamese-twin arrangement was awkward, but they managed to claw their way out from under the ship's massive bulk.

Austin felt himself rising and falling. Sea conditions must be deteriorating. Austin's compass was useless so close to the huge metal mass of the Ataman ship. He relied on dead reckoning to move them in the general direction of the rendezvous.