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  He turned to Gano and Drake. “I’m going down.”

  “You’re no Acapulco cliff diver,” Gano said.

  “I’m not diving. I’m going to make a rope ladder. Find a rope at least one hundred feet long, maybe half-inch diameter. If you get shorter pieces, I can use a double fisherman’s knot to join them. Find several carabiners and some webbing or thicker rope.” He looked at Drake. “Get something to break the padlock on that hatch and something else to cut the cables inside without me getting electrocuted.”

  They took off on the scavenger hunt, but he felt it was pointless. The fire had begun to cause explosions. The heat was creating updrafts but not enough to drive away oily smoke. He looked over the edge again: another cliff he had to descend or die.

  He’d risked death before when climbing, but then the contests had been between him and the rock or ice. Here, there would be fire above him, a methane burp below, and only minutes before the biggest eruption in recorded history. He’d never been this tense in his life.

  Gano ran up with two long lengths of new rope. “A deckhand told me this will hold the weight of a full-grown jackass, if you get my meaning.”

  Another deckhand followed behind Gano with a handful of locking carabiners and a knife.

  Jack spotted a steel post bolted onto the main deck that would be a solid anchor for one end of a rope. He snapped a pear-shaped carabiner around the post and tied the rope to the carabiner. Then he tied a string of Alpine butterfly loops down the length of the rope, roughly two feet apart. Creating each loop took only a few seconds. Next, he cut a length off the other rope and formed a harness he could sit in while he worked at the hatch. He snapped a small carabiner onto the harness.

  “When I get down the ladder, use the other rope to lower the tools.”

  The odds seemed like a zillion to one against cutting the power source in time. The unknown was a methane burp. If it came up under the already-stricken platform, it would suck him off the side of the pontoon like a lobster off a boulder.

  “You’re wearin’ a life jacket, right?” Gano had one in his hand.

  “It would be in the way and if I fall off, our time would run out anyway. Steve, you know ships. What am I going to see inside that pontoon?”

  “Probably several tubes. Each has a different function. The one you’re looking for will have an insulated, water-tight jacket inside. In that jacket will be three wires twisted together in a spiral. Two are ‘hot,’ the other is the ground wire.”

  “So I cut them and that’s it?”

  “My God, no. Cut all three at once and you’ll electrocute yourself and short-circuit the generator that provides power to the platform. You cut one at a time. Don’t let them touch each other after you’ve cut them. If you’re grounded when you cut a hot wire, you’ll be French-fried.”

  “What if the wires are different from what you described?”

  “Wing it.”

  Yeah, right. How did someone as unhandy as he was get into this situation? He should have taken that shop class in high school. He tugged hard on the rope secured to the post and tossed the rest of the ladder over the side. The end slapped the water.

  He knelt on the edge of the deck and probed with his right foot until he found the loop. He put his weight on it, swung his body over the side, found a loop with his left foot, and began his descent. As soon as he was below the cargo deck of the platform, the makeshift ladder swung inward, banging him into the pontoon. Body canted backward, arms carrying most of his weight, it grew harder to find each step of the ladder. The wind picked up. Swells rolled between the pontoons. His heart was beating hard from exertion and anxiety. Time was slipping away.

  Finally he was level with the three-foot-wide hatch. He clipped the carabiner on his harness to the rope above him so it bore his weight and freed his hands. The end of the second rope dropped next to him with the tools.

  He carefully unclipped a bolt cutter. If he dropped it, they couldn’t get another to him in time. He got the shackle of the big padlock in the bolt cutter’s jaws. After two tries, he knew he didn’t have enough leverage. He stood up in the loops and threw his body into the cut. Just as the shackle snapped, his right foot slipped out of the loop. His harness caught him, narrow ropes cutting into his thighs. He righted himself and stuffed the bolt cutter in his belt and the padlock in a side pocket. It took all his strength to pull the door of the hatch toward him, leaning back so it wouldn’t strike him as it swung past. Suddenly, the wind jerked it wide open and pinned it against the pontoon.

  First break he’d gotten. Feeling chilled and overheated at the same time, wiping salt spray out of his eyes, he clutched the ladder as it swayed in the wind.

  Nested inside the pontoon were five separate tubes coming from above and running down out of sight into the darkness. Two were a couple of feet in diameter. Must be the suction tubes that brought up gold-laden mineral slurry. The third was too thick for shielding an electrical cable, probably meant to bring methane to the storage tanks. The last two were much smaller and identical in size. Either could contain the cable he had to cut. But which?

  The tube to his left was nearly out of reach. Working on it would be almost impossible. The one to his right was closer but, since he was left-handed, would be harder to deal with. If he made the wrong choice, time would run out. He chose the closer one.

  He looked on the rope for the cable cutter with non-conductive rubber grips. Instead, there were only a small hacksaw, a boson’s knife, and a roll of duct tape. That meant there would be no insulation between him and that high voltage.

  He stood up in the loops and adjusted his harness to suspend himself a short distance away from the pontoon. He took the roll of duct tape and stuffed it in his other side pocket. Then he used the hacksaw to cut out a section of the protective tube, revealing the cable jacket inside. He returned the hacksaw to the rope. Boson’s knife in hand, he reached inside the tube, grabbed the cable jacket, and sliced until he’d made a cut all the way around. Like peeling a banana, he pulled strips of the jacket from the intertwined wires inside until he’d exposed two feet.

  He took the cable jacket in one hand and used his other hand to try to separate one wire from the other two. After failing several times, he managed to twist them apart and expose a couple of inches of one.

  He pulled the duct tape out of his pocket, cut off two strips, and stuck one end of each to his harness. Then he unclipped the hacksaw and held it over the short length of wire, like a bow poised above a fiddle string. The blade barely scratched the wire, but it didn’t spark or make him part of its circuit. He bore down harder and hacked through the wire.

  His thighs stung from the effort it took to avoid grounding himself against the pontoon. Faster. He whipped the strip of duct tape around the end of the wire, but couldn’t tell whether it was “hot” or neutral. His fingers were on the threshold of mutiny.

  Dealing with the second wire was even more stressful. There could only be a few seconds left. He kept hacking. The line parted, and he wrapped its end.

  Drake had said a bundle contained two hot wires and one ground. Therefore, one of the two wires he’d cut must have been hot. He’d broken the circuit. Instead of feeling triumphant, he felt bone weary. What if he he’d made the cuts too late? What if he’d chosen the wrong tube? Then he’d failed, and the devastating process had started deep in the Earth’s crust and nothing could stop it. He thought about Debra working at her desk. If he’d failed, would she get enough warning to save herself?

  He remembered the methane burp rushing up from deep below. He had to get higher, but didn’t know if he had enough strength to climb up fast enough. He was about to shout for someone to haul him up when he focused on the wide-open hatch in front of him. If the semi-submersible platform sank even a dozen feet, seawater would rush through the hatch and flood the pontoon. The additional to
ns of weight could wrench the entire skeleton.

  It took all his power to swing the hatch cover closed against the wind. Because he’d cut the shackle, the padlock was useless. Unless. He cut off a loop of rope, hooked the shackle of the padlock through the hasp, and tied the two together. The improvised fix might blow apart under pressure, but it was the best he could do.

  He tugged on the tool rope, the signal for men on deck to haul up the rope ladder. Nothing happened. He tugged again, then shouted, “Haul me up.” No response. “Damn it! Get me out of here.” It wasn’t going to happen. Something had gotten worse up there.

  Climbing up was torture. Over and over, his wet foot slipped off a rung, and he had to hang on until he could shove it back onto a loop. With a last dreg of energy, he pulled himself level with the deck and poked his head up for a look.

  Molly was racing toward him. She dropped to her knees, reached over his shoulders, and grabbed the back of his shirt. He gave a push with his exhausted legs as she dragged him onto the deck. No time to think, not even to feel. Stumbling together, they took shelter behind a shed.

  “Oh my God,” she said, “I was so worried about you. I saw Gano a minute ago. He said two of Barbas’s guards had showed up here. He was afraid they’d look over the side and pick you off, so he chased them up that way.” She pointed west.

  They both had to turn away as a wave of heat swept across the deck with a popping, crackling roar. Molly looked roughed-up, long hair in disarray, a red welt on her cheek. Then he realized she shouldn’t be here.

  “You should be in Command Central. What happened?”

  “Renatus was quiet, just watching his monitors, when suddenly he started hammering on the console with his fists. Barbas shouted, ‘What’s wrong?’ Renatus said the temperature in the other three reservoirs was within one-quarter of a degree of destabilization when it stopped rising. The power supply in the primary electric cable to the heat source had failed.”

  He’d done it. “The Gods are smiling. I cut the right cable.”

  “But,” she said, “Renatus told Barbas there’s another electric cable from the generator to the heat source. It’s controlled by a panel in the methane storage building. It runs to the seabed right next to the primary cable.”

  Son of a bitch. A back-up system. He’d cut the right power cable, but he should have cut both.

  “What did Barbas do?”

  “I don’t know. Barbas was cursing and Renatus stood up, so I backed farther out of reach, almost to the door. I heard automatic weapons fire in the passageway, then an explosion outside. Something slammed me in the back and knocked me out. Barbas’s guards must have hit the door with a grenade. When I came to, the room was hazy with smoke. I guess they thought I was dead, so they just grabbed my gun and took off. Barbas was gone, Christos too.”

  That explained the red swelling on her cheek. “Renatus?”

  “Sitting in front of the monitor screen but not really watching. Maybe Barbas told him to wait there for instructions. He looked at me with those strange eyes and didn’t say a word.”

  “And Randy?”

  “Gone. There was blood on the floor.” She closed her eyes.

  “You did everything you could. I’m damned glad you’re alive.” He felt more strength back in his legs and stood. Barbas was on his way to get the electric power started again. He had to get to that methane storage building and stop him.

  A regular stream of gunshots was progressing eastward toward them. Barbas must have organized his mercenaries into a sweep to get control back.

  About thirty yards away, he saw Drake sneaking up on the helicopter they’d seen return from attacking Challenger. The pilot had hunkered down next to his craft, looking the other way. Drake raised his Sig Sauer and took aim. Jack waited for the crack of the pistol.

  Instead of shooting, Drake shouted words Jack couldn’t hear. Startled, the pilot looked in his direction. Fear flooded his face as he connected Drake’s words with the missiles he’d fired at Challenger. Drake kept shouting and stood up. The pilot held up a hand, palm out, apparently pleading. Suddenly, he swung his other hand up and fired at Drake. In the same split second, Jack heard the sharp report from Drake’s gun.

  The pilot bounced off the side of his Ka-52 and slumped to the deck, writhing, then fell inert.

  Drake turned and stumbled slowly toward Jack.

  Chapter 42

  July 30

  8:00 p.m.

  Chaos platform

  MOLLY, HAND OVER her mouth, stared at Drake in shock. She’d just been knocked cold by a grenade blast, and now she’d seen Drake execute a man.

  Jack wanted to get her mind on something else. “I told a guy named Jorgenson to pile up all the lifesaving gear somewhere over there.” He pointed. “Find him, and make sure he’s doing that. I have urgent business with Barbas.”

  “I know Jorgenson. I’ll make sure he’s on it. Be careful, Jack.”

  “Yeah,” he said. He was so far out of his comfort zone he’d passed “careful” miles back.

  She touched his arm and took off in a run.

  Barbas and his mercenaries were like a deadly snake. If he couldn’t cut its head off, it would kill him. Now that Barbas knew the methane wasn’t coming up, he’d be spitting venom. If he got into the methane storage building and started power flowing back to the heat sources, destabilization of the reservoirs would occur in minutes.

  He raced across the deck, dodging a stack of smoldering tires and flames belching out a shed window. He stopped about forty yards from the only door into the red building, unsure how he could get closer without being completely in the open. To his right, a solidly-built man above average height stepped through a door in the superstructure and onto the deck. He wore a knee-length foul weather jacket, and a wide-brimmed rain hat cast a shadow over his eyes. Jack’s gaze moved past him, and then the curly black beard registered. It was Barbas heading for the red building. Almost there, he pulled keys from his pocket.

  “Behind you.”

  Jack spun around at the shout and saw one of Barbas’s Russian guards walking toward him cradling a shotgun at waist level, finger on the trigger. He’d heard the shout too, raised the shotgun, and pitched forward. The shotgun was knocked from his grasp a split second before his face smashed into the deck.

  Drake stood behind him like a specter, smoking Sig Sauer still held in firing position.

  Drake was halfway through giving him a mocking salute when someone fired at him, and he lunged for cover.

  Jack turned back to the red building. Barbas was already inside, and the door was closing. He fired a quick shot into the door to drive Barbas away before he could lock it. He fired again, jerked the door open, dove inside, rolled to his right and came to a stop behind a tall metal cylinder. Barbas was nowhere in sight.

  The well-lighted building, about the size of a basketball court, was filled with rows of fifteen-foot tall shiny steel casks, certainly methane storage tanks. Motors hummed. Compressors chugged.

  Barbas knew someone was inside and roughly where. He could also guess it was Jack Strider hunting for him.

  Jack was about halfway along the south wall of the building. The control panel Barbas was after must be on the west wall, not far from the door. That’s where Barbas would be restoring the heat source to the three reservoirs. Damn it. After all he’d gone through in Pontoon Three.

  His sharp hearing picked up a continuous low hissing somewhere to his right, farther from the door. Discharge from an overflow valve? Methane leak? Methane wasn’t toxic, but a methane build up in an enclosed space could displace enough oxygen to suffocate them. Or it could explode and blow them to hell, as it did when a spark detonated a methane buildup in a coal mine. That gave him an idea.

  “Barbas,” he called. “I want to be sure you know I was the one who cu
t the power. That was payback.” He wanted to piss Barbas off, goad him into making a mistake. No reply. No sound of movement. “Listen to me. A methane burp is going to hit the platform. If you get out of here now and get a life jacket, you might survive.”

  He’d just revealed his position, so he moved several feet to his right and edged along the east wall away from the door. Two or three minutes had passed since Barbas had started sending electricity to the bottom.

  He scraped his boot and lightly tapped a tank to “accidentally” advertise his movement. In less than a minute he was almost to the corner farthest from the door. “Barbas, your time is running out.” No response. Now Barbas again knew where he was and would do the reasonable thing—move along the wall to get between Jack and the door, cut off his escape. Jack had to keep him moving in that direction. To do that, he had to offer himself as bait, not a strategy they’d taught in law school.

  He heard the faint sound of Barbas’s shoes sliding along the rough deck until Barbas reached the position between Jack and the door, close to where Jack had hidden when he entered the building. Jack picked up a wrench off a bench and skidded it in Barbas’s direction. “That’s my gun.” Still nothing. He moved closer and took off his shirt. “We have to get out of here. I’m coming out.” He tossed the shirt ahead of him and dropped to the floor.

  Barbas fired a volley. The muzzle blasts of hot gases ignited the hissing methane leak, and a brilliant fireball lit the space like a flash grenade. Exactly as planned. For several seconds, Jack’s vision consisted of ghostly fractured black and white images. Barbas’s shrieks filled the building as he stumbled toward the door, clawing at his eyes, skin boiling off his face.

  Jack ran to find the power control. The clearly marked, two-foot long electrical power bypass lever was in the “On” position. He used both hands to pull it down to “Off.” If he was too late, the whole world would know soon. He headed for the door.