Chapter 55 - The Black Box of Jan Mayen
They vaulted the catwalk railing just as the *Njord’s* sail glided directly beneath the collapsing gantry.
Rebecca landed hard on the non-skid composite casing of the submarine's sail, the slick surface trembling under the brutal torque of its magnetic-drive propulsion. Vance landed five feet behind her, his boots finding purchase on the recessed tie-down cleats.
Above them, the Jan Mayen caldera shrieked. A massive slab of basalt, the size of a five-story building, tore free from the cavern ceiling and plunged into Berth Seven, creating a twenty-foot tidal wave that obliterated the dry dock they had stood upon seconds earlier.
"Breaching charge on the escape hatch!" Rebecca shouted against the deafening roar of water and collapsing stone.
Vance slammed the magnetic satchel against the flush-mounted circular hatch atop the sail. The magnets bit with a heavy thud. He twisted the secondary timer, setting it for five seconds.
"Down!"
Both officers dropped flat against the curved casing, hands clamped over their helmets.
*Crack!*
The shaped charge focused all its concussive fury inward, punching through the hydraulic lock without compromising the surrounding structural ring. The circular hatch popped open, venting a pressurized cloud of cold, nitrogen-rich air from within the submarine's pressure hull.
Rebecca was on her feet instantly. Drawing her sidearm, she swung her legs into the hatch and dropped through the tube into the interior of the *Njord*.
She landed in a narrow, dimly lit companionway bathed in emergency green lighting. There were no crew members. No voices. Only the chilling, rhythmic thrum of quantum processors and the pneumatic hiss of automated trim tanks.
The *Njord* was a ghost ship, driven entirely by Orion's autonomous combat matrix.
Vance dropped down behind her, his shotgun raised. "Where’s the central processing node?"
"Forward of the auxiliary control room," Rebecca said, moving down the passageway with practiced muscle memory. The interior layout was an eerie bastardization of an *Ohio*-class ballistic submarine, stripped of human bunks, mess decks, and life support systems, replaced entirely by endless racks of black server towers and humming liquid-helium lines.
They reached the CIC—a circular chamber dominating the midsection. In place of helm stations and sonar consoles, a single central pedestal rose from the deck, housing a glowing, hexagonal crystal cylinder: the master quantum core.
On the overhead monitors, the strike parameters were actively compiling:
`TARGET 1: MID-ATLANTIC TRENCH (FAULT STIMULATION)`
`TARGET 2: PUERTO RICO TRENCH (TECTONIC DISPLACEMENT)`
`ESTIMATED CASUALTY PROJECTION: 14.2 MILLION.`
`AUTHORIZING OFFICER: HAYES, REBECCA (COMMANDER, USN)`
`FINANCIAL VALIDATION: ORION ACCT #8849-THOMAS-H`
Seeing her father’s name linked to the genocide of millions made Rebecca’s jaw clench so tight her teeth ached.
"Vance, secure the perimeter. Watch the ladder," she said, holstering her weapon and stepping to the pedestal.
Beside the core sat an encrypted physical data drive—the Black Box of the Sovereign Accord. It held the unedited, non-erasable transaction logs, the biometric intercepts, and the direct communications between Orion Defense, Cross, and her father’s private accounts. It was the only proof on earth that could clear her name and dismantle the conspiracy within the Pentagon.
Rebecca reached out and gripped the drive's extraction handle.
May you like
"Warning," the submarine's automated system announced. "Unauthorized physical tampering detected. Autonomous defense subroutine engaged."
Behind them, the watertight blast door to the companionway slammed shut with the force of a hydraulic press, sealing them inside the heart of the dying leviathan.
