Don't Pick the Flowers

by D.F. Jones

Genres: Science Fiction; Sci-fi Action & Adventure; Cyberpunk

Synopsis

When experimental drilling on the pacific sea-bed breaks through the earth's thin mantle, vast quantities of nitrogen, trapped for untold millions of years, are released into the atmosphere. As a result, the oxygen in the air becomes dangerously diluted. Whole areas of America are thrown into chaos as the inhabitants literally fight for breath. Two men and two girls put to sea in a yacht in a desperate effort to escape the terror, but terror, in a different and no less deadly form, pursues them relentlessly.

Release date: June 13, 2019

Publisher: Gateway

Print pages: 320

Sample

A slight bump; no more than that. I took no notice. Fresh off watch, I was more interested in a glass of milk and getting sacked up. I heard muffled shouting, and the thump of hurrying feet on the deck above. So what? Not my problem. I got my milk.

Someone clattered noisily down the steel ladder; a red, excited face was thrust in the doorway of the bright-lit mess hall.

‘Hey! The goddam drill’s bust!’

The face disappeared, eager to be first with the bad news elsewhere. I jumped up, cursing as I spilt the milk. As senior watch-keeping geologist, I could not rely on scuttlebutt. This would indeed be my problem. A broken drill, four thousand feet down in the Pacific and another two thousand feet into the rocky bottom was serious; especially as this was the last and biggest drill of the entire expedition.

Back in the IGY* someone dreamed up Project Mohole, which was quite a dream. Imagine an apple shaped like an orange. The skin represents the earth’s crust, that part on which all life, as we know it, exists. On this scale, that skin is still far too thick to be an accurate model of the crust, but it will do. It varies in depth, perhaps it is as much as twenty-five miles thick on the continents, only three miles deep in parts of the sea. Underneath this crust lies the mantle. Now there is a theory, which looks good to me, that the crust is not fixed, but actually slides around on the mantle. This theory is called Continental Drift, and suggests that there was once one large land mass, and that the continents became detached. The Euro-Asian continent went one way, the Americas another, and Africa more or less stayed where it was. This plane of junction between the crust and the mantle is called the Mohorovic Discontinuity, because a Yugoslav geologist, one Mohorovicic, thought of it first.

Project Mohole was the plan to drill down into the mantle to find out a variety of things. If this seems a strange proposition, remember that we know a whole lot more about the Moon than we do about what goes on fifteen miles under our feet, and there is a school of thought that rates it just as important.

But Mohole never got off the deck; there was not enough money. Space, the glamor stock of the science market, had most of it. A little did get through to geophysics, and a lot of small holes were drilled, mostly at sea. Oil and gas drilling pioneered the techniques, but research vessels like Caldrill refined the art. Sea drilling has a lot of advantages, not least being that you can get your drill down the first few thousand feet by just lowering it in water.

Our project, drilling here and there in the ocean bed off the West Coast, had gone well—until now. This bore, on a spur of the East Pacific Ridge, was our big one. Suffren, my boss and the head of our new Institute, needed a spectacular to drum up more money, and he suspected that this submarine mountain was not all crust, and that there was an underlying hump in the mantle. He had a very personal theory of inverted isostatic compensation which was all his own. No one else would touch it, but the derision of his fellow academics only strengthened his faith. Crudely put, isostatic compensation suggests that an overlying weight, like a heavy mountain, can dent the mantle. Suffren held that where the weight was less than average you might get a bump. This was his bump. So he was having a go without advance publicity, drilling deeper than anyone we knew about. And now this.

On the drill control deck men hurried about, cursing finely. Their squat misshapen shadows, cast by the gantry arc-lights, added weight to their diabolical language. Hieronymus Bosch could have painted this one.

Suffren was nearly frantic. His wispy hair disordered, his thick glasses flashing. He grabbed my arm and dragged me to the rail, as if we could see four thousand feet down.

‘What happened, Chief?’

He mussed his hair some more.

‘God knows! The drill was going fine, then suddenly, slack, in free spin!’ He shrugged and shifted gears neatly into a fatalistic mood which was entirely phoney. ‘Well, that’s it! The schedule allows only two more days, and the tool pusher reckons——’

He stopped, staring at the oily swell astern, black and silver under the floodlights.

Then I saw it. The smooth, rolling water was momentarily broken; a roughly circular patch appeared, its surface disturbed, streaked. Almost as quickly it vanished. As I watched the spot, another disturbance appeared on the periphery of my vision, and as I watched, it too disappeared. Suffren’s grip on my arm tightened painfully. He was cursing quietly.

‘My eyes! Hell and damnation—I can’t see properly! What is it?’

Before I could answer, a shout from further aft showed that someone else had seen it.

Butch, a tough Texan who had graduated from his native oil fields via sea drilling rigs to us, ambled towards us, helmet pushed back.

‘Well,’ he drawled in his tired voice, ‘guess we hit somethin’——’

‘What?’

Butch hitched his belt over a comfortable stomach. ‘Gas, Prof., Gas.’

‘Gas,’ muttered Suffren, half to himself.

‘Yeah,’ said Butch, ‘an’ if you have no objection I’d kinda like to get back what I can of the string, and right soon.’ He eyed Suffren with faint amusement. ‘Reckon we should git off this patch a mite fast. Mebbe there ain’t enough to make a real bang, but if that should be methane, we could have ourselves a torch under our ass!’

Suffren frowned. ‘Most unlikely. The seismic readings gave no hint——’

‘Mister, the readings may be swell, but they don’t alter the situation none.’ He glanced meaningly over the side.

It seemed to me that the disturbances were larger, more frequent.

‘Yes, you’re right.’ Suffren shrugged. ‘I want those cores. Recover what you can, and ease the ship away.’

The tool pusher nodded, gave his pants another hitch and rolled aft, his hard brazen voice bawling at his crew.

I relaxed slightly as we moved away from the disturbed water. Suffren had gone to consult with the captain. Gleaming sections of drill slid up from the sea, gears ground, auxiliary motors screamed, men shouted. We’d been unlucky; that was all there was to it. I yawned, tired, went below and turned in: to hell with it!

Outside our puny patch of light the gas bubbles welled up into the black night, and grew …

It was around eight-thirty when I was shaken, none too gently.

‘Come on, Mitch! Suffren wants you up top—soon!’

Cursing sleepily, I scrambled out of my bunk and into some clothes and made my way on deck. A fine morning, with little breeze and a haze that promised heat to come. Suffren was leaning on the rail, staring with profound gloom at the sea around fifty yards off our quarter. I woke up quite quickly.

There was a circular patch, about ten yards across, which heaved and seethed like water boiling in a gigantic pan.

Suffren barely acknowledged my arrival; he spoke as if we had never left the deck. ‘Can’t understand it, Mitch. The seismic traverses——’ He went on about P and S readings and generally proved that what we were watching couldn’t happen. He was trying out his report on me. By inclination, I’m a petrologist rather than a seismologist, which means I’m more interested in rocks than bouncing sound waves through them, but I did my best.

‘It’s not your fault, Chief. We’re breaking new ground, working at this depth. There must be many unknown factors which could upset your calculations. These geophones are very new; they could have let you down. I reckon we’ve hit an anticline, blown a small pocket of gas——’

‘I had already reached that conclusion!’ He spoke with savage acidity. Clearly I was not much comfort. ‘We’ve got a sample.’ He simmered down fractionally. ‘We’ll soon know if it is methane.’

‘If it is, the chances are you’ve got yourself the deepest oil well in the world!’ I meant well, but it only got me a half-choked snarl. His mind was still dickering with that report. For a time we stood silent, watching. Then the same thought occurred to us both. Suffren got in first. He was a lot less aggressive.

‘You know, Mitch, the point that puzzles me about that patch is its smallness, observing the depth. I’d expect bubbles to come up over a much larger area.’

‘Me too. I suppose …’ I stopped. It struck me as an improbable theory.

Suffren creaked round to regard me through his thick glasses. He looked like a highly intelligent toad. ‘Go on—I may be ahead of you.’

‘We made a small hole, just a few inches in diameter, in something which must be mighty tough if it broke that drill——’

‘If,’ he interjected. ‘I am beginning to think that drill was blown out, not broken.’

Okay, but it comes to the same thing,’ I said. ‘Either way it must be incredibly tough, unfaulted strata; tough enough to break the drill, or tough enough to withstand the pressure which could blow a drill—and that’s my main point. The small diameter of that patch may mean that the gas is jetting up like a steel bar for quite a long way—for most of the way, in fact—allowing little time for the bubbles, when formed, to drift much.’

Suffren nodded. ‘And you are amazed by the pressure that would need, allowing for the overlying four thousand feet of water. Right?’

‘Right.’ We both lapsed into silence.

‘Morning, Professor—morning, Mitch!’

I turned to greet the new arrival on our piece of rail with some pleasure. Doctor Jakobsen, our medical officer, was a recent acquisition. Our regular doctor had been, ironically, his own first patient when he slipped down a ladder and broke his leg before we had cleared the Golden Gate. We’d returned, landed him, and picked up the only replacement we could find ready—and willing—at such short notice. The replacement was Jakobsen; Doctor Bette Helga Jakobsen.

I don’t know how they make out in Russian ships with female crew members, but a woman like this can be a terrible distraction in an American ship.

Around five feet six, twenty-five and perhaps one hundred and ten pounds, she was a nicely proportioned blonde. Her thick, corn-gold hair was drawn severely back in a pony tail, accentuating a fine oval face which was not so much pretty as beautiful. Her usual expression was solemn and a little defensive, and there was an alert wariness in her manner that warned men to keep their distance. I was doing well with her because, unlike some, I had heeded that warning.

But when she smiled, the transformation was magical. That firm mouth would soften, those blue eyes which could be as cold as the bottom of a fjord would sparkle, and for the recipient the sun shone. Personally, I reckoned that smile gave her an unfair advantage over her fellow doctors. Any male patient who failed to respond would surely be in a very bad way indeed.

‘Hi, Doc!’ I remembered I had not shaved lately and that, dressing hastily, I was not all that well buttoned up.

Suffren was a lot less enthusiastic. Age and his intense devotion to work made him fireproof, but he was well aware of the impact she had upon his staff and that he resented, particularly where I was concerned. I was his chief assistant and that, he told me often, should make a difference; but it didn’t. He muttered something about the gas sample and left, radiating disapproval.

‘Trouble, Mitch?’

Coming from an attractive blonde, that remark was acceptable—just.

‘You might say that.’

I explained briefly. She listened intently, looking rather solemn. A few soft strands of hair had got loose, and I had a terrible urge to touch, to restore them …

‘What happens now?’

‘That’s up to Suffren, but our schedule and resources won’t allow us to drill again. I guess we’ll recover what we can, and hightail it for San Francisco. I’m sorry we don’t have longer——’

She ducked that one, and pointed a slim ringless hand at the patch. ‘And that?’

‘Depends. If it’s methane, we’ll probably light it and leave it. We’re well off shipping lanes, so it can’t do any harm. Just burn itself out in a week or so. It’s happened before; Suffren’s just burned up because his seismic readings let him down. It’s nothing much.’

Twenty-four hours later we were heading back. Rather surprisingly, the gas had turned out to be nitrogen; which was a relief, for there was no question of firing it. We had got a lot of the drill back but only a few feet of core, mainly sedimentary ooze. Suffren was like a wounded mountain bear. Mostly we kept out of his way.

I was a little happier. Earlier bores had yielded a lot of core, and examination of this material would keep me busy for months. Our new institute, located on the outskirts of San Francisco, was conveniently close to Bette—we’d got that far—who was buying a share of a group practice in the City. Afloat, Suffren reckoned he had bought his staff for twenty-four hours a day. Ten minutes quiet relaxation with Bette, and I got that baleful myopic stare. Ashore it would be different.

We radioed the Navy, giving the location of our foul-up. They promised aerial surveillance, and that was that. The first ten days in harbor were very busy. As soon as we docked, Suffren disappeared in a cloud of dust to raise his own particular brand of hell in the Institute, leaving me to organize the transhipment back to base of stores and equipment, some of it as temperamental as a ballet dancer. There was also the little matter of several thousand feet of refrigerated core in forty foot lengths to be got out, delivered undamaged and racked in order, in the Institute’s cold store. It was quite a game, and Suffren got near his twenty-four-hour target. I still lived aboard, shuttling back and forth to the cold store and the lab, when I was not in the ship’s refrigeration compartment; and when I slept, I dreamed of cores.

Socially, I rang Bette’s number twice, and both times she was out. On the tenth night we had the job pretty well licked, and after supper I sank gratefully into my bunk, bent on catching up on my sleep. I did fine until three a.m., and then Suffren phoned.

I was to dress, pack, and get ready for sea. There was no real rush; the Navy boat coming to collect me would not arrive for at least fifteen minutes. As abruptly as ever, he rang off. For ten seconds I stared at the handset, and then I got moving.

Suffren never kidded.

I am from Kansas farming stock, though some unknown genetic quirk had always dragged me to the sea, but forty minutes later, when I was scrambling up the side of a destroyer, the attraction was very thin.

My bag was grabbed, and I was hustled up to the bridge. Up forrard the anchor cable clanked, the deck vibrated, and the sad, shrill call of the bosun’s pipe sounded tinnily in the loudspeakers.

On the bridge I was pushed into a corner and told to wait. A shadowy figure thrust a mug of Navy coffee—which is the same as shore-side coffee, only four times stronger and ten times sweeter—into my chill but grateful hands. I sipped, watching the smooth, efficient ritual of a Navy ship going to sea.

We slid out, under the bridge, the shore lights dimming with distance and rain. Our bows lifted easily to the swell, and I looked astern at those lights with a rich variety of thoughts chasing across my mind. I thought of Bette and my broken sleep and upset plans. Above all, I wondered what the hell Suffren and the USN thought they were up to and I spared time to feel somewhat sorry for myself.

‘Mr. Grant? I’d be obliged if you’d come down to my cabin.’

Clear of harbor, the captain was now free. I followed him down one deck to his sea-cabin. He waved me to the only chair, sat down himself on his bunk, and by way of hospitality produced a pack of cigarettes.

‘It’ll save time if you read this.’ He passed me a crumpled teletype.

‘EMBARK ONE PASSENGER NAME GRANT AND SAIL FORTHWITH AT BEST ECONOMICAL SPEED FOR POSN TWO ONE ZERO TANGO TANGO TWENTYFIVE PAREN FURTHER ORDERS FOLLOW’

A lot of things fell into place. ‘I begin to get the idea.’ I looked at the chart on the bulkhead. ‘Can you show me this position?’

He stood up and stabbed at the chart with one finger. ‘There.’

‘Yeah,’ I said, ‘I know all right.’

‘I’m glad,’ his smile was unconvincing, ‘perhaps you can tell me?’

I did. All about our drilling and the gas strike.

For a moment he was silent, smoking his cigarette. ‘Have you any idea why they want you there in such a hurry?’

‘Can’t imagine.’ I shook my head. ‘Hell, I’m only the chief assistant, Professor Suffren is the boss man——’

‘Yes.’ Clearly the captain was not interested in personalities. ‘I know Tuscarora was ordered to this area around twelve hours back…’ He shrugged. ‘Well, speculation is a waste of time. We’ll be told soon enough.’ He picked up a phone. ‘Send a messenger to my cabin.’ As he replaced the handset he smiled briefly, like his output was metered and chargeable. ‘Get some sleep while you can. The exec, will fix you up.’ He waved the teletype at me. ‘One thing; do not discuss this with anyone, it is graded SECRET.’

That was a new idea to me.

In the Navy it is all go, and it seemed that I’d hardly shut my eyes than someone was shaking me. I woke up, sat up, and banged my skull on the deckhead. I swore and clambered gingerly out. The movement was more lively now, and the racket from the propellers was deafening. It was eight-thirty. My guide waited while I dressed, which meant I put my shoes on, then led me back through the labyrinthine, bright-lit bowels of the ship to the bridge.

It was an uninviting morning, gray sky, a brisk wind throwing plenty of spray around as we plunged into the rising sea.

The captain was sitting in a high chair clamped to the deck. He nodded and handed me another despatch.

‘DOCTOR GRANT IS TO BE TRANSHIPPED BY YOUR HELO TO TUSCARORA AS SOON AS PRACTICABLE’

‘Jesus!’ I said with considerable feeling. ‘They’re really pushing me around!’

I got a brief, cold smile. ‘You certainly seem to be highly regarded, Doctor.’ He cast a quick glance at the heaving green-gray sea. ‘We’ll fly you off quite soon. You’ll get there a lot quicker. We’ve established contact with Tuscarora. We’ll have to winch you down to her.’ He took the prospect very calmly.

‘Now look, Captain! I’m getting pretty tired of all this! I’m a civilian—I don’t see——’

‘Neither do I, Doctor. All I know is that a large and expensive destroyer with a tight schedule is diverted to ferry one man. You may not like it, but right now this ship, all four thousand tons of her, and three hundred men is way off track to transport you! I don’t like it either, but we both have to do as we are told.’ He turned away, and dismissed me from his mind. ‘Take Doctor Grant down to the wardroom for breakfast.’

Halfway through the meal I was brought another teletype. I was beginning to dislike those bits of paper.

‘CONFIDENTIAL PERSONAL FOR GRANT FROM SUFFREN STOP AERIAL SURVEY REPORTS EXTENSION OF LEAK STOP STUDY AND REPORT SITUATION DAILY FOR WEEK OR MORE IF YOU CONSIDER DESIRABLE STOP FULL FACILITIES IN SHIP FOR YOU SONAR SOUNDER ETC CODEWORD SARAH ALL REPORTS CONFIDENTIAL GOOD LUCK SUFFREN’

I stared at that ‘if you consider desirable’. A sop to my vanity? Not that it was much help; frankly, I was too busy being terrified at the idea of dangling on a wire from that helo. I read the message again. Crazy name, SARAH! Suddenly I hated everything and everybody. Suffren, the captain, even Bette, but most of all Suffren. All right for them, I was the Joe … The destroyer rolled a little more, a plate slid and smashed, the weather was not getting any better. I finished my breakfast—it was practically my only consolation that I am a good sailor—and sank into an armchair and tried to think scientifically of SARAH, but without notable success, my mind kept reverting to that damned helo.

‘Doctor Grant?’ A big, cheery lieutenant sat down beside me. ‘My name’s Fiedler. Among other things, I’m aircraft safety officer. Ever flown in a chopper?’

I shook my head.

‘Nothing to it! ’ He confided with suspicious heartiness. ‘But the USN has regulations—oh boy, do we have regulations!’

He got no sympathy from me.

He pressed on. ‘We’ll fix you up with all the gear—you know,’ he said enticingly, ‘survival suit, lifebelt, dinghy pack, but you have to know the drill—what to do when you ditch——’

‘What d’you mean, when?’

‘Okay,’ he said easily, ‘if she goes down. First thing is; don’t panic. The crewman will have the door open. Let her settle—you’ll do no good trying to get out with half the Pacific getting in. Just wait; when the first rush of water stops, break loose from your harness—I’ll show you that—and get out. Simple! Watch out for the rotor blades, inflate your life belt, and when clear, your dinghy. Stay near the helo. Okay?’

I found my voice at last. ‘You make this sound like a daily event!’

‘Hell, no! We ain’t lost a chopper yet—not from this ship, anyway.’ He gave me a big, wide grin.

I could have hit him—in theory.

‘Come along to the aircrew ready room,’ he made it sound like a night club, ‘in half-hour, and I’ll fix you up. Bring your grip. Don’t want to keep the old man waiting when he decides to launch.’

‘You mean I’m going that soon?’ My heart was pumping hard.

‘Around an hour’s time, I guess.’ He heaved his bulk out of the chair, gave me a final grin. ‘See you!’

Half-hour later I was in the ready room, and met my pilot, which did me no good. He looked every bit of nineteen, going on nineteen-and-one-half.

‘Hi!’

I tried a sickly grin. My big pal was there, and in ten minutes I was dressed fit to land on the moon. Thick survival suit, boots, helmet with visor, throat microphone, more zips and cords than I imagined possible, and then I was loaded with a lifebelt with air bottle, a dinghy pack also with air bottle and God knows what else. I began to see where the taxes went. The instructions went on and on. Finally my chum said with great carelessness, ‘Got all that, Doc?’

I could only nod miserably.

‘Fine—well, just sign this, willya?’ A long form appeared by magic. ‘Pure formality. Just says you acknowledge you’ve been instructed in survival drill. Regulations—you know.’

I signed.

‘How long will it take?’ I didn’t care if they did see I was scared, I was a geologist, not a professional hero.

‘’Bout hundred and fifty miles. Bit under two hours with this wind—assuming we find Tuscarora straight off, which is unlikely, with Ed here navigating!’ The pilot poked a playful elbow in the ribs of a hitherto silent figure, also engrossed in the chart. He looked up, and my over-worked heart took a deeper dip. Another high-school face.

Navy helo’s do not take off straight up. They lift off a few feet, heel about sixty degrees and shoot off sideways. Strapped firmly to my seat, I caught a momentary glimpse of the destroyer’s deck where the horizon should have been and after one tight turn we set off. We climbed, wave motion ceased, and the swell congealed.

My state of mind was not improved by the clipped, laconic chat on the intercom. I tried to block it out, and found myself rehearsing the ditching drill, one hand gripping the quick release clasp on my harness. Somehow, time passed … After an age, I heard the welcome voice of the operator in Tuscarora calling us, reassuringly loud. The pilot answered, and we began to let down. Below, the slight overcast was thickening.

‘Remain on your present heading. Let down to five hundred. Pay strict attention to my orders.’ The voice was harsh, metallic. ‘You are not repeat not to get northwest of me.’ The voice softened to the grimly facetious. ‘Not if you want to stay in business.’

‘Roger.’ We were in, then through the overcast. The pilot spoke on the intercom. ‘What’s so tough about that sector, Ed?’

‘It looks mighty thick that way,’ answered Ed. There was a pause, then, ‘Ker-ist! What the hell’s that?’

The shocked young voice did me no good at all. The pilot did not reply for a moment, then he spoke to me.

‘Doc, I’ll weave right. Take a look out of your left-hand window.’

I leaned across as the machine changed course. Beads of moisture flicked across the glass. Held by my harness, I only got a glimpse, but that was enough.

Mist obscured much, but ten, maybe twelve miles off I had a fleeting vision of concentric rings of waves spreading out from a hidden center, and from that rose a column, white to pearly-gray. There was no time for more; I was left with an impression of vast size, SARAH had grown up. I gulped, my mind staggered; I even forgot about my impending departure from the helo. We turned back on course.

‘Waddya make of that, Doc?’ The pilot really wanted to know.

I gulped again. ‘Didn’t see much, but I sure agree with Tuscarora!—stay clear!’

Suddenly we were a lot lower, the waves were moving again, the crewman moved across and sat on the floor, his legs dangling casually in space.

‘This is it, Doc. Unplug your intercom, jack, get out of your seat harness and the dinghy pack, and get down beside the crewman—he’ll see you down, don’t worry. Good luck with your baby!’

I managed to croak my thanks. The crewman grinned at me and passed a padded loop under my armpits. He lifted the edge of my helmet and shouted in my ear. ‘Hold the wire, keep your feet together. It’s a bit windy—I’ll come down with you to steady you!’

Things happened fast and I had no time to get extra scared. Tuscarora suddenly slid sideways underneath us, and forty feet below. A bang on the shoulder, I took a deep breath and stepped off into space, and hung, rotating slowly. The crewman negligently stepped off, holding the wire above my head, wrapping his legs round my waist, and down we went. The noise was colossal, the scream of the engines, the vicious whistling of the rotors combined to block any idea of what conditions were like below. Then we were hanging six feet above the deck, and the deck was heaving. With great skill the pilot got into step with the rise and fall of the ship’s stern, my feet touched the deck, instantly the wire slackened. Feverishly I scrambled out of my suit, tumbling it all into a bag held by a seaman. The crewman had been up for my grip, and we exchanged bags. He ga. . .