Sea of Greed

Near the fuel cells was a control area, with a wall of gauges and a computer screen displaying a diagram of the liquids and gas flowing through the pipes and the various valves.

On the far side, he saw a pair of large vats and several dozen tanks stacked up in racks. The tanks were long and cylindrical, like those used at gas stations to hold propane.

Because the space was a near-perfect sphere, sounds echoed at them from every direction. Footsteps, valves opening and closing, voices. Someone on the far side dropped a tool and the sound reverberated around the sphere multiple times.

Kurt took a path to the left, moved behind the nearest rack of equipment and continued forward, slowing to listen to an echoing voice.

“This… this… this…”

“Pressure at one-zero-five… zero-five… zero-five…”

“Primary vat ready for transfer… transfer… transfer…”

A loud bang sounded as a valve was thrown open and the echo circled them half a dozen times, drowning out the odd bits of conversation.

Kurt glanced through a gap in the machinery. Volke and Millard were at the console near the wall of gauges in the center of the room. They appeared to be having a heated discussion.

“Ever been to Statuary Hall?” Kurt whispered, leaning close to Joe’s ear.

Joe grinned. “You’re thinking of John Quincy Adams.”

Kurt nodded. “Rumor had it, he would pretend to sleep at his desk while eavesdropping on his opponents as their voices echoed off the domed ceiling. If we can find the right spot, we might be able to overhear everything Volke and Millard are saying.”

“Great idea,” Joe said. “We’ll cover more ground if we split up.”

“You go that way,” Kurt said, “I’ll go this way. Keep an eye on the hatch. If anyone heads for the submarine, we need to beat them to it.”

Joe nodded and walked off. Kurt went in the opposite direction, grabbing a clipboard from a hook and carrying it with him.

He wandered from one section of equipment to the next, passing the bank of fuel cells. The acoustics were such that he reached one spot where the machinery noise was amplified and painful to hear. A few feet away, it was almost completely silent.

He moved in closer to propane-style tanks. Each was labeled to hold five hundred gallons of liquefied gas. Oddly, the tanks were hot to the touch. Wandering among them, pretending to check the gauges, Kurt counted forty tanks in all, stacked two high on a scaffold and connected to one another by copper pipes, some of which led back to the large vats.

“We need more storage… storage… storage…”

The words came out of nowhere, but with a French accent. It had to be Millard.

“Pressure getting too high… high… high…”

Kurt moved to the right, heard less, and then moved back to the left.

“I don’t have time to wait around… around… around…”

Kurt assumed the second voice was Volke’s. He moved crouched down as if looking more closely at one of the gauges and found the sweet spot.

“That petrol truck was supposed to be used for siphoning off the gas,” Millard said. “Nine thousand liquefied gallons of it. We’re far beyond safe storage down here already. If you fill it with bacterial cultures instead, this whole production facility will be in danger of shutting down or, worse, blowing up.”

“Relieve the pressure another way,” Volke said. “Vent some of the gas into the sea, if you have to.”

“It reacts with water,” Millard reminded him. “You might as well send up a flare telling the whole world we’re down here.”

The argument ended and Kurt checked the orange-faced Doxa watch on his wrist. They’d spent six of the eleven minutes they had before needing a decompression stop on the way up.

Time to go.

Kurt moved back the way he’d come, but another crewman was heading his way. He veered off and took the stairs onto a catwalk that allowed for inspection of the second level of the stacked tanks.

The catwalk took him around the back half of the sphere, the long way around. He moved quickly, glancing at the gauges on the tanks as he went. Every pressure reading was in the red. The needles on some of the gauges had already crossed the max pressure line.

No wonder Millard was worried — he was working in a room with forty ticking bombs.

At the far end of the catwalk, Kurt reached a second stairway and made his way down. At almost the same moment, two men came past one of the large pumps and stepped onto the stairway, coming up toward him.

It was Kurt’s intention to pass them with a polite nod, but the nearest of the two had his eyes locked onto Kurt.

“What are you doing up here?” he asked. “This area’s off-limits to…”

“Checking the pressure,” Kurt said, pointing to the clipboard.

Kurt saw the lack of recognition in his eyes. With a crew of only twelve, every face was familiar. “Who are you?”

Kurt acted instantly, jamming the clipboard into the man’s chest, shoving him backward and down the stairs.

“Intruder!” the second crewman shouted. “We have an intruder!”

Kurt slugged him and sent him sprawling, but the alarm had been raised.