Maelstrom - Chapter 1

Stephanie Whittaker struggled to focus on the task at hand. The instrument panel in front of her did not require much attention, but she was responsible for every dial and every reading. If anything went wrong, she would be the first line of defence - and at 1980 meters below sea level, if anything did go wrong, it had the potential to go wrong in a very bad way.

However, with the instruments humming contently, her eyes drifted up to the five inch thick reinforced glass dome above her instrument panel. In the blue glow of the spread lights, the outside environment resembled a post apocalyptic wasteland. A few meters beyond the range of the lights, the Puerto Rican trench sank to the deepest point in the Atlantic forming a massive underwater canyon.
What secrets lay hidden in the depths of the ocean? What mysteries were evading the eyes of man? And more to the point, what was the U.S. Navy looking for on their daily excursions down the trench?

Returning her attention to her steaming coffee, she reached for a tub of honey. Raising her hand high, she poured a thin stream of the golden liquid into her cup. Flipping the bottle cap back on, she took a tee spoon from the counter and stirred.

Graveyard shift - it would have been boring in any other laboratory, but not here. Being the youngest civilian PhD graduate on a military excursion of this level was as exciting as it sounded. Years of late nights behind her books and early mornings working behind a counter had finally paid off. She would finish her two year contract on Deep Water One and then contract her services out as a leading expert. Not bad for a small-town mechanic's daughter.

Placing the cup in the designated holder on the instrument panel, she sucked the residue coffee off the tee spoon. The electronics softly hummed and all instruments read normal. Her gaze returned outside.
Staring into the waters outside Deep Water One was not as colourful as it had been on Aquarius - Aquarius having been the only underwater habitat for oceanic research until the recent commissioning of Deep Water One. Situated sixty feet below the surface and next to a coral reef, the water outside the windows of Aquarius was swarming with colourful life. In the darkness outside of DWO, plant life was non-existent and marine life was limited to small, colourless creatures - no dolphins, whales or any other large fish species.

In a distance she could see a bulky grey shadow approaching through the cold waters. Ominously it glided closer, until the spread lights revealed its identity. Approximately fifty feet wide by eighty feet long and ten feet high, the Mobile Ocean-bed Laboratory known as Barracuda, reminded Stephanie of something out of Star Wars. A submarine-laboratory, it was more at home parked on the ocean floor than gliding through the water.

Even at a distance of more than fifty yards, Stephanie could recognise the U.S. Navy's eagle emblem below the navigation cockpit. Returning from an undisclosed location in the trench, it started rotating, positioning itself to dock at the station's northern anchor pylon.

Barracuda was completely self sufficient and housed a team of fifteen. Except for weekly re-supply runs and crew replacements, submersibles rarely docked with the Barracuda since its research was classified as "top secret".

"Mysterious...you navy boys," she whispered to herself. Wiping her dark brown hair from her green eyes, she took another sip of her honey flavoured coffee.
She pressed the transmit button on the control panel and leaned closer to the microphone.

"Sonny you up there?"
Turning to look at the electronic diagram covering the wall behind her, she wanted to see where the response came from. Sonny should be in the surface control room.
The diagram consisted of three main components; the Floating Instrument Platform or FLIP resembling an oil platform on the surface, the Grounded Ocean-floor Base positioned between the FLIP's three anchor pylons, and the Mobile Ocean-bed Laboratory known as Barracuda. A number of small green lights dotted the diagram, and Sonny's response should be accompanied by a green light blinking in the FLIP's control room.

"Hey Steph. Everything ok down there?" the voice asked - a green light blinking on the FLIP control room.
"Navy boys just came in...Can you believe it?" she asked hoping Sonny knew something she didn't.
"Yeah. It's been like a beehive up here as well...navy choppers delivering containers, new scientists, heck I'm surprised they haven't had an elephant delivered yet - it's like a circus up here."
"Why the sudden flare in activity?" she asked.
"Dunno. Walker's response was; 'Ask me no questions and I'll tell you no lies'," Sonny replied faking his superiors voice.

Stephanie snorted in mock disgust. Reginald Walker, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Chief Scientist had instructed his crew to stay focused on their work and to pay the Navy no mind.
She could still remember his instructions during induction, "We're working in this facility for the Navy and I expect you all to respect that. Keep out of their way, and they will do the same."

"Walker doesn't know anything," she said. "But you let me know if you hear anything interesting...us civvies have to stick together."
"Will do Steph. Talk later."
The green light blinked off.

Sipping her coffee she swung back into position behind the instrument panel. Keeping an eye on the station's vital statistics wasn't rocket science. In fact at twelve at night it was more of a compulsory duty forced on the youngest scientist than a privilege. The youngest scientist on Deep Water One...a smile played over her lips - that won't get old anytime soon.

Getting the coveted position of Mechanical Systems Officer was a dream-come-true. Four years ago, her decision to pursue her PhD specializing on the Ocean Atmosphere Seafloor Integration Study as proposed by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration had been a risky one. At that time, the Government was not even considering footing the sixty million dollar bill to construct the proposed underwater laboratory.

That was until the Navy suddenly developed a keen interest in the idea. With an undisclosed agenda, the Navy contracted the specialist engineers and scientists from the NOAA, Stephanie being one of them. Two-hundred miles off the coast of Puerto Rico, construction of the underwater laboratory started.

At two thousand meters below the surface, it was the most industrious undertaking since the Space Program, albeit shrouded in mystery. Attracting heavy criticism from both democrat- and republican senators and an inquisition from the Government Accountability Office, the project somehow managed to survive the chopping block. Still, public speculation ran amok.

"It's a remote radar stations they're constructing to monitor avenues of submarine activity..."
"Bullshit. Do you think it's a coincidence they're in the Bermuda Triangle - they've been experimenting with electromagnetic interference in this area since World War Two."

People were speculating and the degrees of outrageousness seemed limitless. And even though she loved her job, she could not help but be distracted by the possibilities of what went on right under her nose.

In a distance she could see a hatch open on the Barracuda. Two aquanauts slipped into the blue, no bubbles rising from their re-breather systems.

"Late night repairs?" she wondered out loud. The two divers made their way over to the docking modules - adaptors plugged into the Barracuda's electric system. With a small nuclear reactor, similar to those on nuclear submarines, the Barracuda had enough power for exploration and most research purposes. But what Stephanie noticed, was how the navy boys were plugging in for more power - every night.
"They must have some fancy equipment on that rig to need all that power", she mused to herself.

A clanging alarm blared from the instrument Platform.
"POWER CRITICAL" flashed in red. Within a second the whole console lit up like a Christmas tree. A surge of adrenalin pulsed through her body. With shaking hands she started flipping switches. Her primary concern was to deactivate the non-critical systems.

While punching the console with one hand, she reached for the microphone with the other.

"Sonny! Sonny! What's going on? Are you reading this?" she screamed into the microphone, certain that the control room in the Floating Instrument Platform was also drowned in screaming alarms. Returning both hands to work the switches she waited for a response.

"MASTER CAUTION" was blinking red. The power-down procedure was not having any effect.
"Sonny do you hear me?" she screamed. No response.
She flipped the radio control switches to an open channel.
"Mayday! Mayday! This is Deep Water One! We need assistance! We've..."

Looking up to see if the outside spread lights were shutting down, her eyes widened in shock. Behind the Barracuda a black shadow sped through the blue waters. Approaching fast, the dark object was heading straight for the station.

The radio transmitter clattered to the floor.