Zero Hour (9781101600559) Read online

  DIRK PITT® ADVENTURES BY CLIVE CUSSLER

  POSEIDON’S ARROW (with Dirk Cussler)

  CRESCENT DAWN (with Dirk Cussler)

  ARCTIC DRIFT (with Dirk Cussler)

  TREASURE OF KHAN (with Dirk Cussler)

  BLACK WIND (with Dirk Cussler)

  TROJAN ODYSSEY

  VALHALLA RISING

  ATLANTIS FOUND

  FLOOD TIDE

  SHOCK WAVE

  INCA GOLD

  SAHARA

  DRAGON

  TREASURE

  CYCLOPS

  DEEP SIX

  PACIFIC VORTEX!

  NIGHT PROBE!

  VIXEN 03

  SHOCK WAVE

  RAISE THE TITANIC!

  ICEBERG

  THE MEDITERRANEAN CAPER

  FARGO ADVENTURES BY CLIVE CUSSLER

  With Thomas Perry

  THE TOMBS

  With Grant Blackwood

  THE KINGDOM

  LOST EMPIRE

  SPARTAN GOLD

  ISAAC BELL NOVELS BY CLIVE CUSSLER

  THE STRIKER (with Justin Scott)

  THE THIEF (with Justin Scott)

  THE RACE (with Justin Scott)

  THE SPY (with Justin Scott)

  THE WRECKER (with Justin Scott)

  THE CHASE

  KURT AUSTIN ADVENTURES BY CLIVE CUSSLER

  With Graham Brown

  THE STORM

  DEVIL’S GATE

  With Paul Kemprecos

  MEDUSA

  WHITE DEATH

  THE NAVIGATOR

  FIRE ICE

  POLAR SHIFT

  BLUE GOLD

  LOST CITY

  SERPENT

  OREGON FILES ADVENTURES BY CLIVE CUSSLER

  With Jack Du Brul

  THE JUNGLE

  THE SILENT SEA

  CORSAIR

  PLAGUE SHIP

  SKELETON COAST

  DARK WATCH

  With Craig Dirgo

  GOLDEN BUDDHA

  SACRED STONE

  NONFICTION BY CLIVE CUSSLER

  BUILT FOR ADVENTURE: THE CLASSIC AUTOMOBILES OF CLIVE CUSSLER AND DIRK PITT®

  With Craig Dirgo

  THE SEA HUNTERS

  THE SEA HUNTERS II

  CLIVE CUSSLER AND DIRK PITT REVEALED

  G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS

  Publishers Since 1838

  Published by the Penguin Group

  Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street,

  New York, New York 10014, USA

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  Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  For more information about the Penguin Group visit penguin.com

  Copyright © 2013 by Sandecker, RLLLP

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the authors’ rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

  Published simultaneously in Canada

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Cussler, Clive.

  Zero hour / Clive Cussler and Graham Brown.

  p. cm.

  ISBN 978-1-101-60055-9

  1. Austin, Kurt (Fictitious character)—Fiction. I. Brown, Graham, date. II. Title.

  PS3553.U75Z48 2013 2013008130

  813'.54—dc23

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the authors’ imaginations or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Contents

  ALSO BY CLIVE CUSSLER

  TITLE PAGE

  COPYRIGHT

  PROLOGUE

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  CHAPTER FORTY

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

  CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

  CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

  CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER FORTY-NINE

  CHAPTER FIFTY

  CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE

  April 18, 1906

  Sonoma County, Northern California

  Thunder shook the unlit cavern as an immense, blue-white spark jumped between a pair of towering, metal columns. Instead of fading, the shimmering charge split in two and the twin streams of plasma began to circle their respective pillars. They moved like flames chasing the wind, racing around the columns and snaking their way upward toward the underside of a curved, metallic dome. There, they swirled together like the arms of a spiral galaxy, joining each other once again before vanishing in a final, eye-searing flash.

  Darkness followed.

  Ozone lingered in the air.

  On the floor of the cavern, a group of men and women stood motionless, night-blind from the display. The flash had been impressive, but they’d all seen electricity before. Every one of them expected something more.

  “Is that it?” a gruff voice asked.

  The words came from Brigadier General Hal Cortland, a burly, squat figure of a man. They were directed at thirty-eight-year-old Daniel Watterson, a slight, blond-haired man wearing spectacles who stood by the controls of the great machine from which the artificial lightning had come.

  Watterson studied a bank of dimly lit gauges. “I’m not actually sure,” he whispered to himself. No one had ever gotten this far, not even Michael Faraday or the great Nikola Tesla. But if Watterson was right—if his calculations and his theory and years of serving as Tesla’s apprentice had led him to understand what was about to occur—then the display of light they’d just witnessed should be only the beginning.

  He switched off the main power, stepped away from the controls, and pulled the wire-rimmed glasses from his face. Despite the darkness, he could make out a soft blue glow coming from the columns. He raised his eyes to the dome above. An effervescent hue could be seen coursing around its inner surface.

  “Well?” Cortland demanded.

  Back at the console, one of the needles ticked up. Watterson saw it from the corner of his eye.

  “No, General,” he said quietly, “I don’t think it’s quite finished.”

  As Watterson spoke, a low rumb
le made its way through the cave. It sounded like heavy stones tumbling in some distant quarry, muffled and distorted, as if the vibration had to traverse miles of solid rock just to reach them. It rose for several seconds, then faded and ceased.

  The general began to snicker. He switched on a flashlight. “Uncle Sam ain’t paying for a show with wet fireworks, son.”

  Watterson didn’t reply. He was listening, feeling for something, for anything, at this point.

  The general seemed to give up. “Come on, people,” he said, “the party’s over. Let’s get out of this mole hole.”

  The group began to move. Their shuffling and mumbling made it impossible to hear.

  Watterson raised a hand. “Please!” he called out loudly. “Everyone, stay where you are!”

  The observers stopped in their tracks, and Watterson edged over to where the steel columns penetrated the rock floor. From there, they descended another five hundred feet “to get a firm grip on the Earth,” as Tesla once put it.

  Laying a hand on one of the columns, Watterson felt a cold vibration. It surged through his body as if he’d become a part of the circuit. It wasn’t painful like electricity and didn’t make his muscles spasm, nor did it find its way to the ground and electrocute him. It was almost soothing, leaving him slightly dizzy, even a bit euphoric.

  “It’s coming,” he whispered.

  “What’s coming?” the general asked.

  Watterson looked back. “The return.”

  Cortland waited a few seconds before scowling. “You scientists are like barkers at a carnival: you think if you say something loud enough, and often enough, the rest of us will begin to believe it. But I don’t hear any—”

  The general swallowed his words as the deep rumble made a second appearance. It surged through the cavern more emphatically this time, and the blue glow around the towers intensified, pulsing and matching the sound waves identically.

  This time, when the waves faded, everyone held still. They were waiting for more. Forty seconds later they were rewarded. A third wave came through like a freight train passing by. It shook the cave underfoot and brought the swirl of lightning back to the polished surface of the dome above. The visible spiral of energy began descending the pillars, making it halfway down to the ground before vanishing.

  Watterson pulled back, stepping away from the danger zone.

  Moments later, a fourth reverberation surged into the cavern. The columns flared as it hit. Flashes of light jumped back and forth between them. The cavern began shaking. Dust and tiny bits of stone rained down from above, sending the witnesses scurrying for cover.

  Watterson caught sight of General Cortland bathed in the light and grinning manically. Their roles had reversed. Now it was Cortland looking satisfied as Watterson began to worry. The scientist stepped toward the panel, slid his glasses back on, and studied the display. He couldn’t account for the vibration.

  Before he could determine anything, a fifth wave hit. The vibration and the artificial lightning grew so intense, even the general seemed to realize something was wrong. “What’s happening?”

  Watterson could barely hear him, but he was wondering the same thing. The power gauges—all but dead moments before—were heading toward their redlines.

  A brief respite gave way to a sixth harmonic return, and the needles went off the scales. The shuddering was unbearable. Rocks were falling from above. A huge crack began to zigzag its way across the reinforced wall of the cave where the army had poured concrete to shore it up. Watterson had to grip the panel to stop from falling down.

  “What’s happening?” the general repeated. Watterson wasn’t sure, but it couldn’t be good.

  “Get everybody out of here,” he yelled. “Get them out—now!”

  The general pointed toward the cagelike elevator that would take them four hundred feet to the surface. The group ran for it like a stampeding herd. But the tremors intensified and the far wall gave way before they could climb inside.

  A thousand tons of rock and concrete plunged down on them. Those too close were crushed instantly. Others scrambled away just in time as the scaffolding-like frame of the elevator was bent and shoved aside.

  Watterson began to panic. His hands flew back and forth across the controls, flicking switches and tapping gauges. The vibration was constant. The sound deafening.

  Cortland grabbed him by the shoulder. “Turn it off!”

  Watterson ignored him. He was trying to understand.

  “Did you hear me?!” the general shouted. “Turn the damned thing off!”

  “It is off!” Watterson shouted, pulling free of the general’s grasp.

  “What?”

  “It’s been off since after the first spark,” Watterson explained.

  The latest wave faded, but on the panel he could see the next wave building. The needles went off the scale and Watterson’s face went white. Each wave had been bigger than the last. He feared to imagine what kind of power was on its way.

  “Then where’s the energy coming from?” Cortland demanded.

  “From everywhere,” Watterson said. “From all around us. That’s what the experiment was supposed to prove.”

  The cavern began to shake once again. This time the lightning was not contained on the columns, it jumped around the room, flying into the walls, the ceiling, and the floor. Shards of stone and clouds of dust blasted out into the open space.

  Amid the screams and panic, Watterson stood helpless, his moment of victory fading to utter catastrophe. From above him came the ominous sound of cracking.

  With the cave shaking so badly they could barely stand, both Watterson and the general looked up. A dark fissure snaked across the ceiling. It went from wall to wall and then spidered in different directions.

  The ceiling collapsed all at once and a million tons of rock dropped toward them.

  Death came instantly, and neither Watterson nor General Cortland would ever know the fury they’d unleashed or the utter devastation that the ensuing earthquake caused in the city of San Francisco.

  December 2009

  In the midst of a growing tempest, Patrick Devlin stood on the aft deck of the Java Dawn, an oceangoing tug linked by a single massive cable to the rusting hulk of a cruise ship known as the Pacific Voyager.

  Huge swells came at the tug sideways, slamming against the hull with the sound of a shotgun blast. The rain fell in diagonal sheets, though it was hard to distinguish from the wind-whipped spray.

  Surrounded by towing and loading equipment, including a fifty-foot crane and a powerful winch array, Devlin looked positively small. In truth, he stood nearly six feet tall, with broad shoulders that were hunched against the cold.

  With gray stubble on his cheeks and folds of burnished flesh hooding his eyes, Devlin appeared every bit the wizened old sailor he was. Taking stock of the deteriorating weather, the increasing strain on the cable, and the condition of the sea, he came to a grave conclusion: they’d made a ruinous choice to leave port, one they’d be lucky to survive.

  As Devlin grabbed the ship’s phone, another swell rolled the tug severely. The captain picked up on the other end.

  “What’s our heading?” Devlin yelled into the receiver.

  “Due south,” the captain said.

  “It’s no good,” Devlin replied. “We’ll never survive this side-on beating. We have to turn into the swells.”

  “We can’t, Padi,” the captain insisted. “That’ll take us into the teeth of the storm.”

  Gripping the bulkhead to keep from falling, Devlin watched a wave crash over the deck. “This is madness,” he said. “We should’ve never left Tarakan.”

  Tarakan was the primitive, almost backwater port where they’d picked up the Voyager. The old liner had berthed there for repairs some years ago after an accident. She’d ended up marooned when her shipping line went bankrupt several days later.

  At some point, the ship was sold to a mystery buyer, but, for reasons unknown, the Voyager
sat and rusted at Tarakan for three more years. Issues with the bankruptcy and squabbles about who would pay for the repairs, Devlin guessed.

  Whatever it was, the ship looked like a derelict when they’d found her; covered in corrosion from stem to stern, barely seaworthy. The hastily repaired damage from where the freighter had holed her looked like a jagged H near the bow.

  Now, caught up in a storm that was rapidly getting worse, she was certain to go down.

  “How’s the line?” the captain asked.

  Devlin glanced at the thick cable that stretched from the gigantic winch across the aft end of the tug and out toward the Voyager. The cable tensed and strained with the load before going slack again.

  “The cable’s taut,” Devlin said. “That rust bucket is starting to pitch with these waves. She’s definitely riding lower as well. We need to get the inspection crew back.”

  Against Devlin’s wishes, the captain had allowed three men to stay aboard the cruise ship to watch for leaks. It was dangerous in these conditions and a waste of time as well. If she was taking on water, there was nothing they could do to stop it. And if she started to go down—like Devlin thought she was—they would need to cut the cable and let her go before she dragged the Java Dawn into the depths alongside her. But with three men on the ship, cutting that cable would be the closest thing to murder Devlin had ever done.

  The big tug nosed over and dropped into the largest trough yet. As it did, the cable stretched so tight that it actually began to sing. The tension pulled the aft end of the tug backward, the water churning around the hull as the propellers fought against the strain.

  By the time the tug rose up on the next swell, the Voyager must have been dipping into a trough of her own because the tow cable pulled downward, bending over the reinforced-steel plating at the tug’s transom and forcing the aft end of the deck into the water.

  Devlin raised binoculars to his eyes. The action of the waves had a way of obscuring the truth, but only to a point. The Voyager was definitely riding lower.

  “She’s down at the bow, Captain. Listing slightly to port.”

  The captain hesitated. Devlin knew why: this tow was worth a small fortune, but not if the ship didn’t make it.

  “Call them back!” Devlin shouted. “For God sakes, Captain, at least call the men back.”

  Finally, the captain spoke. “We’ve been calling them, Padi. They’re not answering. Something must have gone wrong.”