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"Why do you not seek to catch it?" asked Chiun.
"Be interesting to try, but there's no way. If we could drop a net in front of it, at this speed it would pop right through."
"Remo can catch it," Chiun offered.
Sandy Heckman laughed, and up in the dead gray sky the petrel joined in raucously. Their voices had about the same tone.
"With what-an undersea butterfly net?" she scoffed.
"We have our ways," Remo said defensively.
"Remo, I command you to catch this mysterious fish that is not a fish," Chiun said sternly, pointing at the water.
"Aw, c'mon, Chiun. Don't bust my chops."
"Remo, you are commanded. Obey."
Remo sighed and said to Sandy, "Get ahead of it. I'll see what I can do."
"We have diving gear aboard," she offered.
Remo shook his head. "I don't need it."
"You can't go down without scuba gear."
"I do it all the time." Then, remembering the previous night, he added, "But I'll take a wet suit."
Sandy looked to the helmsman, who said, "Orders are to assist in any way possible."
"It's your lungs," Sandy said.
The Cayuga spurted ahead, got ahead of the underwater contact, then came to a slow, easy stop.
Stepping out of his Italian loafers, Remo donned a night black neoprene wet suit, drawing in a deep charge of oxygen as he stood on the afterdeck. He disdained the gloves and flippers.
He waited until everyone was looking the other way. Only Chiun was watching him. Then, from a standing start he back-flipped into the water. He made no discernible splash.
The water closed in on him, and the first cold clutch of fear took hold of his mind. Remo pushed the thought back.
His face tingled from the shock of the cold, then it went numb. He diverted warmth to his hands and feet, where he really needed it.
Remo let himself sink, eyes adjusting to the lessening light. Seawater filtered out the red-orange end of the spectrum. The blues and indigos soon shaded to a uniform gray.
The first thing Remo looked for was a submarine. The water was completely free of subs. Remo was not surprised.
But the school of small fish showed with increasing clearness. They formed an ellipse of well-spaced ranks over the ocean floor. In the filtered daylight, Remo was surprised by one thing. Other than the school, there were no fish in sight. This far out, that was unusual.
The school, its multitudinous eyes gleaming like perfectly matched silvery coins, swam toward him. Remo was impressed by the whiting's orderly lines. They might have belonged to some fishy army, they were so disciplined.
He spotted the thing following them at an even speed and distance.
Seen head-on, it looked as dull as a big blunt bullet. It was not a fish. What it was wasn't exactly clear.
Setting himself, Remo achieved neutral buoyancy by releasing air from his lungs while he waited for the blunt nose to come to him.
The whiting-if that's what they were-grew agitated when they came upon Remo. Still, they held their course, their tiny fins waving rhythmically.
Remo let the leading fish pass over and around him. They seemed to take his presence in stride.
It was a torpedo, Remo saw as the pressure of its approach touched his benumbed face. Remo scooted out of the way slightly and, as it passed, trailing a bubbly wake, he snap-kicked at its tail.
The torpedo shuddered and veered, churning water. Abruptly its steady mechanical whir sputtered out. It slowed. Tail first, it began to sink.
Reaching out, Remo wrapped his arms around it and, as the pod of whiting broke in every direction, clearly startled, Remo pushed to the surface.
The torpedo was heavy, but it responded to his upward thrusts. Feet kicking furiously, Remo followed it, pushing at intervals to keep it moving along. Finally he got it to the surface.
Treading water, one arm wrapped around the middle, Remo called up to the cutter deck. "Hey! Lower a net!"
Sandy Heckman's startled face showed at the rail.
"Where did you come from?"
"I dived."
"I didn't hear you. We thought you'd ducked below-decks."
"How about that net? My toes are turning blue."
A net was lowered. It was studded with orange flotation balls, and after Remo got it wrapped around the torpedo, he climbed a stainless-steel hull ladder while the crew hauled up the long object.
On deck Remo said, "It's a torpedo. I disabled it."
"With what?" Sandy wondered aloud, looking the thing over.
"A side kick."
"You kicked it out of commission?"
Remo grinned stiffly. His face was still numb. "You should see me stun a shark with a flick of my finger."
Sandy Heckman seemed unimpressed.
They uncovered the torpedo on the afterdeck and looked it over with cautious respect.
"I don't see a detonator," the helmsman was saying.