The Gate (18 page)

There was the slightest give in the distance the hatch moved freely, perhaps an extra quarter inch. Lake’s arm muscles were screaming in pain from the exertion of the constant movement. He laid on the floor and jammed his back against the floor as he used his feet to kick the handle, then his arms to pull it back the inch and a half, then he kicked again. He fell into the new rhythm even as he heard water sloshing in the hallway on the other side of the door. The seal on the door wasn’t perfect as water under pressure slowly began to seep in around several spots on the frame as the water filled the corridor outside.

The PVC pipes exploded, sending shards of plastic through the room. Seawater spurted through where they had been. Lake shook the spray out of his eyes and turned his head. The level in the room was going up at an inch every five seconds. Slower than the ship was going down, he estimated, based on how quickly the water had filled up the passageway on the other side of the hatch.

The arc of movement on the handle was getting slowly larger, now almost two inches. As water crept up around his chest and threatened to cover his head, Lake had to stand and go back to just using his arms. As his muscles worked, his mind calculated. There were three variables. The wood holding the door shut was the key one. If it didn’t give before water filled the room, nothing else mattered. If it did, then there was the question of inside pressure versus outside water pressure. The ship was probably all underwater now and the pressure outside was greater than that in here. Lake wondered how deep the ocean was at this point. If they went down over a hundred feet, he could forget everything. There was no way he could make it out of the bridge complex and then make it to the surface from that depth.

The water edged up around his hips and continued sliding up his body. Lake had tied off the trash bags with the document box in them to his weight belt and the box thumped against his back as he continued to work the handle.

As the water reached his neck, Lake’s hands slipped off the handle. He quickly regained his grip and continued. Three inches now.

“Goddamn!” Lake hissed. The thing had to give! He accidentally sucked in a mouthful of seawater and tilted his head up to spit it out. He stood on his toes and took a deep breath, then squatted, completely submerged and gave one great shove. Four inches but that was all.

Lake let go and floated to the air trapped in the upper-left corner of the room and took another breath. He felt the ship settle and come to a halt, still angled down and to the right Lake didn’t know it, but the keel was down at over a hundred feet but the height of the ship itself and the bridge tower put his depth at just about sixty feet below the ocean’s surface.

Lake dove down to the handle and gave three shoves before he had to swim back to the air pocket. It was about four feet by three feet by fourteen inches deep. Lake visually marked a spot on the wall before he dove back down for another try. When he came back for more air, he noted that the pocket had lost two inches. That gave him about four or five more tries before he was out of air. At least the pressure on both sides of the door would be equal now, which was a slight consolation.

Lake dove down and grasped the handle. He pulled it up, then slammed it down. Up again, then down. He felt something give. Excitedly he spun the handle and was rewarded with the door swinging open. The way out beckoned.

Lake turned and swam up to his air pocket which was now less than six inches in depth. He tilted his head back and his mouth was just below the ceiling as he sucked in several lungfuls of air.

Taking one last deep breath, he turned and dove for the door. He shot through and turned left up the outside corridor. The door to the left railway was open and Lake was out in the open, then he slammed to an abrupt halt his waist jerking him. He twisted and looked. The garbage bag had caught on the railing and he was anchored to the ship. His hand grazed down his side and pulled out his dive knife. Just as was about to slice through the offending plastic and free himself he halted. He reached down and grabbed the railing with his free hand. Dropping the knife, he pushed on the bag and freed it. Then he finned for the surface. Looking up, Lake could only see dark green. He had no idea how deep he was.

He reached and grabbed the knobs of his life preserver and popped them. The water wings inflated and accelerated his race to the surface.

Lake trailed a steady stream of bubbles out of the corner of his mouth as he’d been taught to do by sadistic instructors so many years ago in the water outside of Coronado, California, just a couple of hundred miles to the south of here.

But he realized he’d never been as deep as this as he ran out of air to blow out. He felt his chest spasm, then he involuntarily opened his mouth and seawater came in, filling his mouth, leaking down his throat into his lungs. Lake spasmed, doubling over, no longer swimming, his body fighting to expel the foreign substance filling his lungs, but no matter how much he retched out, it was just replaced with more water.

Lake felt unconsciousness from lack of oxygen coming and he was looking forward to the relief from the pain in his lungs when he burst to the surface. He retched again, water and vomit pouring out of his mouth and air making its way in as he gasped. Lake’s insides felt like they were being torn apart as he coughed and hacked at the same time trying to suck oxygen in.

After several minutes of agony, he could breathe somewhat normally and he lay on his back and looked up. The fog was dissipating and the ocean around him was empty. There was a three-foot swell and an occasional wave lapped over his face.

Lake knew the currents around here were not favorable.

He was caught in the great surge of water coming out of the Golden Gate and pushing out to sea. He lay on his back and began finning to the east, even though he knew it was futile; the outward current was much stronger and quicker than his leg strokes.

Lake reached across his chest with his left hand and pushed a button on the side of the homing device that Araki had given him. Now he was going to find out how trustworthy his expedient partner was.

SAN FRANCISCO

WEDNESDAY, 8 OCTOBER 1997 2:00
a
.M. LOCAL

“I want the rest of the payment credited to the same account before close of business today,” Okomo said. The wounded were being carried off the tug to dark cars parked on the otherwise deserted pier. They were being whisked away to doctors who owed the Yakuza a favor.

“You will be paid,” Nishin said, deliberately omitting the title of respect he had so grudgingly been forced to use the last several hours. He no longer needed the old man and would be glad to be done with all of this.

“That includes the payments for the dead,” Okomo growled.

“Yes, yes, I will include the blood money.”

“Some of those wounded may die of their wounds,” Okomo added.

Nishin again felt he was in the fish market dickering with some old hag. “Sensei Nakanga will contact you in two weeks. Let him know if there are more dead. But do not count bodies that are still breathing, old man, or you will face the wrath of the Black Ocean.”

“Ah, the puppy growls,” Okomo said with a short laugh.

“But you do not have very long teeth,” he added. “Remember, you are not out of reach of my arm yet.”

Nishin turned his back on the Oyabun and walked off the tug. He headed for the first phone booth he could find. Stopping at it, he reached into his pocket and pulled out the piece of paper. There were two messages on it, from the dates, obviously copied from messages in the box.

Nishin ran his eyes down the first one.

DTG: 1 AUGUST 1T4S/10DQ HOURS TOKYO

FROM: IMPERIAL NAVY STAFF/C0P1- SUBGP

TO: COH/l E4/EYES ONLY

TEXT: PROCEED TO HUNGNAM-, KOREA-. AT FLANK SPEED TO TAKE ON CARGO. FURTHER ORDERS WILL FOLLOW

Then he read the second one and his heart felt an icy hand surround it. He now understood why the North Koreans had been so willing to die.

With shaking fingers he dialed the phone number he had memorized and was gratified to hear Nakanga’s voice answer after the second ring.

“Yes?”

“It is Nishin.” He knew that the Society’s phones were secure. The chances of this pay phone being tapped were not significant enough to be considered a threat.

“Yes?”

“The target has been destroyed.”

“With the papers?” Nakanga asked.

“Yes.”

“Any problems?”

“There was a radio transmission just prior to the target being destroyed.”

There was a sharp intake of breath on the other end. “We will check on that.”

Nishin related the frequencies and radio data that he had memorized. “I also have the content of the message,” Nishin said.

“Go ahead.”

Nishin read both messages. When he was done, there was a long silence, then finally Nakanga spoke. “I will have to speak to the Genoysha about this. Remain there. Await further orders.”

“There is something further.”

“Yes?”

Nishin told Nakanga about the American arms dealer and how he had been on board the ship.

“Was he there to collect his payment?”

“He was in the room with the box of documents,” Nishin said. “I do not believe he would have been there simply to collect a few thousand dollars.”

“Then he was not simply an arms dealer?” Nakanga asked.

“I do not believe so.”

“You are sure he died with the ship?”

“Yes. There were no survivors.”

“You must try to find out who this American worked for. How much he knew and how much he told those he worked for.” The phone went dead and Nishin slowly put the receiver down.

*****

The man who Nishin was concerned about in death was actually very much alive at the moment. Lake’s legs had settled into a smooth rhythm that he knew from experience was propelling him at three knots through the water. The only problem was that he estimated the current he was swimming against was about six to eight knots which meant he was going farther out into the Pacific at three to five knots an hour.

The option of turning and swimming with the current, while it would certainly go with the flow, was unacceptable because no matter how fast he swam. Lake didn’t think he’d be able to make it to Hawaii; alive at least.

If Araki had chartered a boat, which Lake assumed he had done, the CPI agent would be heading out here and the less distance he had to go, the quicker he’d pick Lake up. That is if Araki was looking for him.

There was always the possibility that he’d get picked up by a passing ship, Lake consoled himself as he swam. He was in the shipping lane for San Francisco Harbor. There was a chance something would pass by, in which case he could use the flare strapped to his left calf.

Lake became aware of a strange hissing noise that he’d never heard before. He twisted about, treading water, but in the darkness could see nothing. But he felt that something was different in the waves around him. He focused on his hearing because it was the sense that had alerted him. There was still the faint hissing noise, but now there was also the sound of waves splashing against something solid. As another swell lifted him, Lake looked about.

He blinked. A large black form in the shape of an inverted V, with the points in the water, was silhouetted against the night horizon about fifty feet away. Lake watched the ship as it got closer. He’d never seen anything like it. With its sharp angles and flat surfaces, the thing it reminded him of most was the F-117 stealth bomber. Lake couldn’t hear the throb of conventional engines, just that hissing noise.

A brief burst of red light showed on the right front. A man’s figure was briefly outlined, then the light was out.

“Lake?” Araki’s voice called out.

“Here!” Lake yelled.

A rope ladder was thrown down the slick skin of the ship. Lake turned on his stomach and swam over, grabbing hold of one of the rungs. As he pulled himself up, he was surprised to feel that the hull surface wasn’t metal, but rather some form of hard rubber. He climbed up the side to where Araki was waiting on a small indentation. The hatch opened once more, bathing them in red light, and Araki led him inside, quickly shutting the hatch behind.

Lake looked around. He was in a large room, obviously the bridge of the ship based on the equipment and amount of activity. Several men in uniform, all Japanese, were watching various screens that showed the sea outside and monitoring computers that gave them readouts. There were no windows and all was lit in the red glow that had come out the hatch.

“Impressive, isn’t it?” Araki said.

“What is it?” Lake asked.

“The pride of the Japanese Maritime Self-Defense Force. A stealth surface ship. You saw the outside. It has an inverted triangular hull with a propulsion unit in each leg. This is the bridge. Weapons systems, crew quarters, and supply areas are behind us. All sides of the ship are inclined at angles designed to defeat radar, including missile lock-on systems such as that used by the Exocet.”

Lake had heard that the U.S. Navy had experimented with a design such as this and then discarded it in favor of the more traditional ships they were used to. “How does the propulsion system work?’’ he asked. No one in the crew had come over, they all seemed to defer to Araki, which Lake found interesting.

“Seawater is taken in, put under pressure, and pushed out the rear. Very quiet and efficient and undetectable by sonar outside of five hundred meters away.”

“Weaponry?” Lake asked as he unbuckled his belt.

“Surface-to-air and surface-to-surface missiles fired from closed hatches along the top rear deck. Two subsurface torpedo tubes, one on each propulsion pylon.”

Lake untied the garbage bags from his belt. “How did you get this here?”

“This way,” Araki said, gesturing toward a hatch. “I have some dry clothing for you.”

Lake picked up the garbage bag and allowed himself to be led to a small stateroom. Araki handed him a dark blue jumpsuit.

“I don’t suppose you have any cigarettes?”

Araki shook his head. “There is no smoking on board. The captain is very particular.”

Lake peeled off the top of his wet suit. “So, how did you get this here?”

“I told you that my government considers this mission very important. I was assigned the appropriate assets to get the job done.”

Lake pulled on the jumpsuit. He noted that Araki was looking at the garbage bag.

“How long have you been in the area?” Lake asked. The relief of being rescued had not yet registered on his emotions; he didn’t have time for that. It would have to wait for later when he was alone.

“I just arrived here. I picked up your signal and homed in on it.” Araki took the homing device from Lake and put it in his pocket. “I assume you got the documents,” he added, pointing at the garbage bags.

“I got them,” Lake said.

“And Nishin?”

“Nishin got away.”

Araki nodded. “I have his signal heading back to San Francisco. I was hoping it was a signal from a dead body.”

“No, last I heard, he’s very much alive,” Lake said.

“You heard?”

“I heard his voice through a hatch just before he left the trawler.”

“The North Koreans?”

“The trawler went down. I assume all the North Koreans are dead.” Lake related the story of what had happened on board the Am Nok Sung, from his jumping out of the helicopter to being picked up by Araki.

Araki picked up with his end of things. “I had the helicopter take me to the Farallon Islands, which are about twenty-one miles outside of the Golden Gate. I was dropped off on a small islet where I had arranged for this ship to be nearby on station. I contacted the captain on my satellite phone and he picked me up with a rubber dinghy. We headed toward your beacon as quickly as possible.”

“What now?” Araki asked.

“Let’s find out what all the fuss is about,” Lake said. “Do you have a knife?”

Araki produced a stiletto from inside his right boot, something Lake noted for future reference. Lake slit through the layers of garbage bags until he uncovered the document box, somewhat battered for its recent journey but dry at least.

He put the box on the bed next to him and pulled off the lid. He found the bound group of papers that had been on the deck and let it fall open to where the pages were bent. “What’s that say?” he asked.

Araki sat on the other side of the box from Lake and leaned over.

“Date, time, group, 1 August 1945. 1000 hours. Tokyo. From the Imperial Navy Staff—there’s some letters here, C-O-M-S-U-B-G-P.”

“Commander Submarine Group would be my guess,” Lake said.

“To,” Araki continued, “C-O-M, slash, 1-24. Eyes only.”

“Commander of whatever 1-24 was,” Lake interpreted. “It must be a submarine if the orders are coming from the commander of the submarine group.”

Araki nodded. “Submarines had the # prefix to identify them from surface ships during the war.”

“The rest of the message,” Lake prompted.

“Text. Proceed to Hungnam, Korea, at flank speed to take on cargo. Further orders will follow.” Araki looked up. “That’s it.”

“Cargo,” Lake said, rubbing the stubble of beard on his chin. It snapped into place. “That means this submarine, 1- 24, took something out of Hungnam before the end of the war. The Koreans must be looking for it. Whatever it is I assume it would give them proof that the Japanese atomic bomb program existed.”

“I have been thinking about that,” Araki said. “To be frank, I find it hard to believe. I have never heard even the slightest rumor about such a program during the war.”

“I find it hard to believe also,” Lake said, “but it’s the only explanation that fits what’s going on right now.”

Araki frowned. “Do not blind yourself to possibilities. Maybe this is all a setup to make us believe there was a program. There may be no proof. Maybe the North Koreans are simply doing this to raise a flicker of suspicion which the media, if it gets a hold of, will fan into a raging fire.”

“It doesn’t make any difference,” Lake said. “We still have to pursue this as if it were true. This message is real, so let’s stay with that. This sub must have come in and taken something out. Maybe the scientists behind the project.”

“It says cargo,” Araki said.

“People can be cargo,” Lake replied.

Araki shook his head. “I don’t think so. The Japanese word used is specific for inanimate objects. That’s not to say people also weren’t taken on board, but from what I read here, the primary purpose of this order is for the sub to pick up something.”

“Perhaps all their data,” Lake said. “It would make sense that they would want to save as much information as possible before destroying the base.”

“The date of this message is 1 August 1945,” Araki said. “That is two days before Hiroshima was bombed and several days before Nagasaki was bombed.”

“They might not have known the end was near then,” Lake said.

Araki ceded that point. “The home islands were preparing for a great defense. Before the bombs were dropped, it was thought the war would last another year at least.” Araki flipped over the page. “Perhaps we can find the further instructions and—” His voice choked and he paused.

“What’s the matter?” Lake said, snapping up straight on the bed, sensing the dramatic mood change in his fellow agent.

“Date, time, group, 2 August 1945.” Araki read the deciphered Words in a flat monotone. “1745 hours. Tokyo. From the Imperial Navy Staff, Admiral Sakire, Fleet Commander. To COM, slash, 1-24. Eyes only.”

“Text. Pick up Genzai Bakudan at Hungnam. Follow orders of Agent Hatari, Kempei Tai. Proceed to primary target, Code Name Cyclone. Secondary target, Code Name Forest.”

“What’s Genzai Bakudan?” Lake asked.

“An atomic bomb,” Araki whispered.

Lake blinked. “They had another bomb and they put it on the sub?”

“And they had a primary and secondary target,” Araki added.

“Great,” Lake said. “Just fucking great.”

A long silence descended as both of them considered the import of this message. Lake was the first to break the silence. “So where’s Cyclone and where’s Forest?”