Chapter 5

The voice that echoed over the talkback mic was pitched slightly high, as if the person on the other end had been sucking helium. “Another five minutes, Dr. Crane, and you can pass through Airlock C.”

“Thank God.” Peter Crane swung his legs off the metal bench where he’d been dozing, stretched, and checked his watch. It was four AM—but he suspected that, if the Facility was anything like a submarine, day and night held little meaning.

Six hours had passed since he’d left the bathyscaphe, stepped gingerly through the double-hulled outer skin of the Facility, and entered the maze of airlocks known as the Compression Complex. He’d been cooling his heels since, waiting through the Facility’s unusual acclimatization period. As a doctor, he was curious about this: he had no idea what it might consist of, or what technology was involved. All that Asher had told him on the videophone was that it made working at great depths easier. Perhaps they’d modified the atmospheric composition: reduced the amount of nitrogen and added some exotic gas. Whatever the case, it was clearly an important breakthrough—no doubt one of the classified elements that made this mission so hush-hush.

Every two hours, he had been instructed by the same disembodied chipmunk voice to pass through an airlock into a new chamber. Each of the chambers was identical: a large sauna-like cube with tiers of metal bunks. The only difference had been the color. The first compression chamber had been military gray; the second, pale blue; and the third—rather surprisingly—red. After finishing a short dossier on Atlantis he’d found in the initial chamber, Crane spent the time dozing, or paging through a thick anthology of poetry he’d brought along. Or thinking. He’d spent a lot of time lying on bunks, staring up at the metal ceiling—and the miles of water pressing down on him—and thinking.

He wondered about the cataclysm that could have sunk the city of Atlantis to such a depth; about the lost civilization that had once flourished. It could not be the Greeks, or the Phoenicians, or the Minoans, or any of the other usual suspects favored by historians. As the dossier had made clear, nobody knew anything about the Atlantean civilization—not really. Although Crane was surprised the city was situated this far north, the dossier had also explained that, even in the original sources, its actual location was obscure. Plato himself knew next to nothing about its citizenry or its civilization. Perhaps, Crane mused, that was one reason it had remained hidden so long.

As the hours slowly passed, his feeling of disbelief refused to ebb. It seemed miraculous. Not just that it had all happened so quickly; not just that the project was so breathtakingly important—but that they’d wanted him. He hadn’t stressed the point on the videolink with Asher, but the fact was he remained unsure why they’d so particularly required his services. After all, his specialty wasn’t hematology or phlebotomy. You seem uniquely qualified—both as a doctor and as a former submariner—to treat this affliction. True, he was well versed in the disorders of those who lived in undersea environments, but there were other doctors who could make the same claim.

He stretched again, then shrugged. He’d learn the reason soon enough. And besides, it didn’t really matter; being here was simply his good fortune. He wondered what strange and wonderful artifacts had been unearthed, what ancient secrets might already have been rediscovered.

There was a large clank, and the hatchway in the far wall opened. “Please step through the airlock and into the passageway beyond,” the voice said.

Crane did as instructed and found himself in a dimly-lit cylindrical passage about twenty feet long, with yet another closed hatch at the end. He stopped, waiting for the hatch to open. Instead, the airlock behind him closed again with another sharp clank. There was a rush of escaping air, so violent that Crane’s ears popped painfully. Then at last the forward hatch opened and yellow light flooded in. A figure stood in the hatchway, haloed in light, one arm outstretched in welcome. As Hatch stepped out of the passageway and into the chamber beyond, he recognized the tanned and smiling face of Howard Asher.

“Dr. Crane!” he said, taking his hand and shaking it warmly. “Welcome to the Facility.”

“Thanks,” Crane replied. “Though I feel I’ve been here a while already.”

Asher chuckled. “We kept meaning to install DVD players in the compression chambers to help pass the acclimation time. But now that the station is fully staffed there didn’t seem any point. And we weren’t anticipating any visitors. How did you find the reading material?”

“Incredible. Have you really discovered—”

But Asher stayed the question by raising his finger to his nose, winking, and giving Crane a conspiratorial smile. “Yes, we have. And the reality is more incredible than you can imagine. But first things first. Let me show you to your quarters first. It’s been a long trip, and I’m sure you’d like to freshen up.”

Crane let Asher take one of his bags. “I’d like to know more about the acclimatization process.”

“Of course, of course. This way, Peter. Did I already ask if I could call you Peter?” And he led the way with another smile.

Crane looked around curiously. They were in a square, low-ceilinged vestibule with smoked windows lining the opposing walls. Behind one of the windows sat two technicians at a bank of controls, staring back at him. One of them saluted.

At the end of the vestibule, a white hallway led off into the top level of the Facility. Asher was already heading down it, bag slung over one shoulder, and Crane hastened on behind him. The hall was narrow—of course—but not nearly as cramped as he’d expected. The lighting was unexpected, too: warm and incandescent, quite unlike the harsh fluorescence of submarines. The atmosphere was yet another surprise: warm and pleasingly humid. There was a faint, almost undetectable smell in the air Crane didn’t recognize: coppery, metallic. He wondered if it was related to the atmosphere technology the Facility employed.

As they walked, they passed several closed doors, white like the hallway. Some bore individual’s names, others abbreviated titles like ELEC PROC or SUBSTAT II. A worker—a young man wearing a one-piece jumpsuit—opened one of the doors as they passed by. He nodded to Asher, looked curiously at Crane, then stepped out behind them and headed back toward the vestibule. Peering inside, Crane got a look at a room full of rack-mounted blade servers and a small jungle of networking hardware.

As the door closed again, Crane realized it was not painted white, after all. Instead, the walls and doors were constructed of some unusual composite that seemed to take on the color of their environment: in this case, the light of the hallway. He could see his own ghostly reflection in the door, along with a strange, platinum-colored underhue.

“What is this material?” he asked.

“Newly-developed alloy. Light, non-reactive, exceptionally strong.”

They reached an intersection and Asher turned left. From the videophone image, Crane had assumed the chief scientist of the National Ocean Service to be in his late sixties, but he was obviously a decade younger. What Crane had taken for age lines were really the weathering of a life spent at sea. Asher walked quickly, and he toted Crane’s heavy bag as if it was nothing. For all his apparent healthiness, however, the man kept his left arm cradled against his side. “These upper levels of the Facility are a warren of offices and dormitories, and they can be disorienting at first,” he said. “If you ever get lost, refer to the schematic diagrams at major intersections.”

Crane was impatient to learn more about the medical issues and the dig itself, but he decided to let Asher set the agenda. “Tell me about the Facility,” he said.

“Twelve decks high, and exactly one hundred eighty meters per side. Its base is embedded into the matrix of the ocean floor, and a titanium dome has been inserted in place over it.”

“I saw the dome on the way down. That’s some piece of engineering.”

“It is indeed. This Facility we’re in sits beneath it like a pea under a shell, and the open space between is fully pressurized. With the dome and our own hull, there are two layers of metal between us and the ocean. And it’s some metal, too: the skin of the Facility is HY250, a new kind of aerospace steel, with a fracture toughness above 20,000 foot-pounds and a yield strength in the range of 300 KSI.”

“I noticed the surface of the dome was punctured by a tube, running inwards,” Crane said. “What’s the purpose of that?”

“You must mean the pressure spokes. There are two of them, actually, one on either side. Given the atmospheric pressure at these depths, the ideal shape would be a perfect sphere. The dome being only one half of a sphere, those two tubes—open to the ocean—help counterbalance the pressure. They also anchor the Facility to the dome. No doubt the propeller-heads on Deck 7 could give you more details.”

This second hallway they were walking through resembled the first: a ceiling busy with cabling and pipes, lots of closed doors with cryptic labels. “I also noticed a strange, cup-shaped object attached to the top of the dome, maybe thirty feet across,” Crane said.

“Oh, yes. That’s the emergency escape pod. Just in case somebody accidentally pulls out the plug.” Asher laughed as he said this—an easy, infectious kind of laugh.

“Sorry, but I have to ask. That dome around us isn’t exactly small. Surely certain foreign governments have taken interest?”

“Naturally. We’ve carefully disseminated a disinformation campaign about a secret research sub that went down at this site. They think we’re involved in reclamation operations. That doesn’t stop the occasional Russian or Chinese sub from doing a drive-by, of course; causing our military contingent all sorts of angst.”

They passed by a door with a retinal scanner beside it and a complement of two marines, rifles at their sides, standing guard. Asher didn’t offer an explanation, and Crane didn’t ask.

“We’re on Deck 12 right now,” Asher went on. “It’s made up mostly of support services for the rest of the Facility. Decks 11 and 10 are crew quarters, including the sports complex. You’re bunking on Deck 10, incidentally. We’ve got you sharing a bath with Roger Corbett, the mental health officer. Most rooms share baths—as you can imagine, space is at a premium. We’ve already got a full crew complement, and you’re an unexpected addition.”

He paused before an elevator, pressed the button. “Deck 9 is crew support. The medical suite—where you’ll be working from—is there as well. And Deck 8 holds the administrative offices and research facilities.”

There was a quiet chime and the elevator doors whispered open. Asher waved Crane in, then followed.

The elevator was of the same strange material as the corridor. There were six unmarked buttons on the panel: Asher pushed the third from the top and the elevator began to descend.

“Where was I? Oh, yes. And Deck 7 is the science level. Computer center, scientific laboratories of every description.”

Crane shook his head. “It’s unbelievable.”

Asher beamed, looking as proud as if the Facility was his own, rather than on loan from the government. “I’ve left out a hundred things you’ll discover for yourself. There are three mess halls served by galleys specializing in haute cuisine. Half a dozen lounges, comfortable accommodations for over three hundred persons. Basically, Peter, we’re a small city, two miles below the surface of the ocean, far from prying eyes.”

“In th’ocean’s bosom unespied,” Crane quoted.

Asher looked at him curiously, a half-smile on his face. “That’s Andrew Marvell, isn’t it?”

Crane nodded. “Bermudas.”

“Don’t tell me you’re a reader of poetry.”

“Now and then. I got in the habit during all that down time on sub duty. It’s my secret vice.”

The smile widened on Asher’s sea-tanned face. “Peter, I like you already.”

The elevator chimed again, and the doors rolled back onto another corridor, much wider and busier than the others. Glancing out, Crane was shocked at how well-appointed the crews’ quarters appeared to be. There was elegant carpeting on the floor, and—miraculously—framed oil paintings on wallpapered walls. It reminded him of the lobby of a luxury hotel. People in uniforms and lab coats were walking past, chatting amongst themselves. Everyone had an ID badge clipped to their collar or shirt pocket.

“Yes, the Facility is a marvel of engineering,” Asher went on. “We were extremely lucky to get the use of it. In any case, this is Deck 10. Any questions before I show you to your quarters?”

“Just one. Earlier, you said there were 12 levels. But you’ve only described six. And this elevator has only six buttons.” Crane pointed at the control panel. “What about the rest of the station?”

“Ah.” Asher hesitated. “The lower six levels are classified.”

“Classified?”

Asher nodded.

“But why? What goes on there?”

“Sorry, Peter. I’d like to tell you, but I can’t.”

“I don’t understand. Why not?”

But Asher didn’t answer. He simply gave him another sly smile: half-chagrined, half-conspiratorial.

DEEP STORM is copyright © 2007 by Lincoln Child.
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this text, or any portion thereof, in any form.
DEEP STORM will be available in the United States in January 2007 from Doubleday Books, http://www.randomhouse.com