Page 44 of Clive Cussler Desolation Code

They passed eight hundred feet and then touched nine hundred, slowing further and finally stopping their dive at nine hundred and sixty feet.

Gamay looked around. “Do you see any leaks?”

Chantel glanced up and about. “Nope.”

“This is your new test depth,” Gamay said.

Chantel laughed. “I’ll be sure to tell the boys who put this thing together.”

“Don’t tell them the part about the whale falling on us,” Gamay suggested. “You’ll never hear the end of it.”

Chantel laughed some more and took one last look below. The whale was still falling away, slowly escaping the range of the lights. It had almost vanished when something strange happened. It passed through what looked like a dim gray cloud, punching a hole in the middle of it and causing a ripple of light to radiate outward in all directions.

“Did you see that?” Chantel asked.

Gamay nodded. She’d seen it. Though she couldn’t explain what it was. She took a deep breath. “Let’s go a little lower.”

Chantel agreed.

With the caution of a person walking on thin ice, Gamay brought the sub down toward the cloudy layer below. It grew brighter as they neared it. And before they touched it, she knew what she was looking at. A web made up of millions of the glowing orbs. They stretched as far as the eye could see, which wasn’t that far underwater, but the effect made it seem like they went on forever.

Gamay cruised above them, piloting the submersible like an aircraft skimming the clouds. After a minute or two she’d seen all she needed to see. “I think we’ve spent enough time at this depth. Let’s surface before the men get all emotional about our vanishing act.”

Chapter 24

Alang, India

Kurt and Joe had a problem. In fact, they had multiple problems. The biggest issue came from the Indian National Police, who were looking for them in conjunction with the events at Alang. Sharma and several of his people were dead. Faked security video showed them storming into the office with guns. The fact that they’d been there earlier in the day and had been turned away and escorted off the property only added to the suspicions.

They were driving a small rental car that would be linked to them before long. Kurt had already driven through several mud puddles and areas of standing water to drench the car in a dirty coat, but it wasn’t much of a disguise, even if half the license plate was smeared.

Sitting in the back, as nervous as a frightened cat, Five stared out the window. Everything he saw astounded him. Cars, trucks, buses. The noises they made. Buildings that rose up and blocked the sun. Posts with colored lights on them. Wires running everywhere like jungle vines. Billboards and decorations and streamers. The bright colors were like a kaleidoscope to him. Most of all, he could hardly believe the crowds.

“So many people,” he whispered over and over. “How are there so many people?”

Navigating the crowds of India had left plenty of people with similar thoughts, but for a young man who’d lived his short life on a desert island in captivity, the question was not rhetorical.

“There are a lot of people here,” Kurt said. “But this is a city. Think of it like an anthill or a beehive. Did they have bees on your island? Anyway, lots of people flock to the cities, but there are places out in the countryside that are less crowded.”

“Ahh,” he said, “like bees. I understand.”

They came to a halt near an open area that might have been a park. While they were stopped at the light, two free-roaming cows moved toward the car. One of them looked into the back seat and mooed deeply.

Five scrambled across the seat to the other side, as if they were being attacked by an angry bear. The animal licked the window, mooed again, and then went back to the grass it had been chewing.

“What is that?” Five asked in shock.

“Where I come from, it’s lunch,” Joe said. “But we’re not going to find it on the menu around here.”

Kurt laughed. “Don’t worry,” he told Five. “It’s a cow. It won’t hurt you.”

Five gazed at the mangy animal as if it were a unicorn with golden wings.

As they waited for the traffic to move, the sound of high-pitched sirens became audible. Kurt saw flashing lights approaching in the rearview mirror. He kept calm, but plotted a possible escape route in case the vehicles were police cars filled with detectives looking for the two Americans.

An ambulance and a paramedic’s truck came up behind them.They swept by on the shoulder, sirens wailing as they passed. Five covered his ears while Kurt and Joe breathed a sigh of relief.

“We really need to get out of India,” Joe said. “Otherwise we’re going to end up framed for everything that went down at the breakers’ yard.”

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