AllFreeNovel
Share Us
There was another knock on the door, and Juan opened it to see Langston Overholt waiting outside.
“Lang, welcome to the Oregon,” Juan said, shaking his old mentor’s hand. “Please come in and join me for dinner to celebrate your first visit to the ship. Not the way I would have liked it to happen, of course.”
“Thank you,” Overholt said as he entered. “It smells delicious.” He glanced at the bottle in Maurice’s hand. “Château Montrose. Excellent choice. Is it the 2007?”
“It is the 2006, Mr. Overholt,” Maurice replied.
“It sounds like you two have met.”
“Not yet, actually,” Overholt said.
“I’m not surprised Maurice knows your name,” Juan said. “Not only is he the best steward on the Seven Seas, he’s also the most well-informed person on the ship.”
As the two older men shook hands, Maurice had an odd look on his face.
“Forgive me, sir, but haven’t we met?”
Overholt wore a similar expression of recognition. “You look familiar to me as well. For some reason, Admiral Beale of the Royal Navy comes to mind.”
Maurice nodded. “I served under Admiral Beale when he was captain of the HMS Invincible.”
“Yes, I remember now,” Overholt said. He turned to Juan and said, “This was long ago, back in my days as a field officer at the Agency. We brought a defecting KGB officer back to Maurice’s aircraft carrier, and the Royal Navy generously hosted us for a few days until we could get him back to America. I imagine Maurice and I were both at the start of our careers during that mission.” He turned back to Maurice. “I’d love to reminisce with you a little later over drinks. Not many people in our cohort left to remember the olden days.”
“I would be honored.” He looked at Juan. “Captain, please ring when you’d like me to remove your dishes.”
“Thanks, Maurice.”
The courtly steward picked up the silver tray and left as quietly as he had entered.
Juan and Overholt sat down and ate heartily, each of them recounting the events of the past two days.
When they were done with the recap, Juan brought up the theory about the sonic weapon that Julia had told him while she was suturing his wound.
“She thinks that the metal hull of the Oregon vibrated in a resonant frequency when this sonic device hit it, transmitting the signal throughout the ship and affecting the entire crew.”
“I’d say her theory’s correct given the immunity that Linda Ross seemed to have,” Overholt said.
“The question is, how do we fight a weapon like that? I can’t very well make my entire crew deaf.”
“What about earmuffs or -plugs?”
“It’s worth a shot, but Julia doesn’t think it would work. The harmonic tones could be infrasound, and the low frequencies aren’t as well blocked by hearing protection. The resonance might be carried by bone conduction, like our molar mics.”
“I know the U.S. military has done experiments along these lines, but no one has produced results anywhere near what your crew has experienced.”
Juan shook his head in frustration. “They tell me that they would have jumped overboard or destroyed the ship to escape their hallucinations. We got very lucky that Linda was unaffected. I don’t want to count on luck again, but if we don’t have an effective countermeasure, we’ll be at Tate’s mercy if we battle the Portland. There’s got to be some way to neutralize it.”
Overholt sat back and got a faraway look in his eye.
“Tate did let something slip while I was on board the Portland. He said they sank the Kansas City partially because someone aboard had critical knowledge he seemed to consider dangerous. I recall the exact quote because it seemed important. ‘That SEAL was too curious about his cousins’ deaths.’”
“So there was a Navy SEAL on the KC who Tate was so concerned about that he sank a nuclear sub to conceal it?”
“That seems to be the case. Could they still be alive?”
Juan considered that before saying, “Although it’s been more than ten days, it’s possible. If the hull wasn’t breached, there could be enough air for the crew to survive that long. I know bottoming tests on Los Angeles–class subs have shown crews can last up to two weeks with battery power and by burning emergency O2 candles.”
“But where are they?” Overholt asked. “It doesn’t seem the Navy has found it yet. If Tate led them to the wrong location with that SEPIRB, the search could be going on hundreds of miles away from the KC’s actual wreckage site.”
