Descent Hour Nine
U.S.S.Constellation
The boom of the huge glacier collapsing into the water was like a bomb blast, knocking Admiral Warren off his feet and shattering the glass of the bridge on the U.S.S.Constellation.
Another boom followed seconds later, and then he heard more still as the massive waves crashed over the bow. Glass fragments were scattered across the flight deck, where seventy-six attack jets were straining at their chains.
“Admiral?”
Warren turned. It was a signalman.
“FLASH traffic.” The petty officer handed over the clipboard and held a red-covered flashlight over the dispatch so Warren could read it.
“God Almighty,” said Warren as he started reading. “U.S. Geological Survey sensors at McMurdo just registered an eleven-point-one shock wave.”
“Admiral!” shouted a lieutenant.
Warren looked up in time to glimpse a towering, muddy green wall of water descend on the bow and wash over the flight deck, scattering the attack jets like toys and crashing into the superstructure where he stood. A deafening crack split his ears as the crush of water demolished the bridge. Desperately he searched for something to hang on to.
Water filled the compartment. Warren held the bar of a console and braced his back against the wall to stay upright. On calm waters, the 86,000-ton carrier rose 201 feet above the waterline. But these swells were lifting the aircraft carrier like an empty Cuban cigar box.
Warren coughed up some water and yelled to anyone who could hear him. “Turn us into the wave or we’ll capsize!”
He strained to hear his command received with an “Aye, sir!” from a helmsman, but there was no sound beside the crash of water.
When the wave broke, he looked around the bridge and saw two floating bodies. The rest had been swept to sea. He ran down the stairs to the wheelhouse, gripping the rail tightly. The wheelhouse was empty.
He turned toward the coast to see another towering gray mass, a cliff-size wave. He grabbed a chain reserved for one of his 55,000-pound planes and hoisted it on his broad shoulders and headed down to the flight deck.
Men and planes were thrashing about the tilting deck. Then a new wave lifted the carrier toward the sky. As he fell through the air, still clutching the chain, Warren saw a rail. Water crashed over the deck again, knocking him to his knees. But he saw his salvation. If he could just reach the rail in between waves, he could chain himself down.
The next wave split the twin-finned JSF attack jet in front of him, and Warren ducked to avoid being sliced in half by a broken wing. He willed himself to stand, his numb legs wobbling beneath him, and broke into a run, splashing through the shallows toward the rail.
Part of him wanted to slip and fall so he could just stop fighting and die, but he stayed on his feet until he rammed into the rail. He reached up and grabbed the heavy chain on his shoulders with both hands and lashed himself to the rail before the next wave crashed.
The winds and spray swept the deck as he clung for his life. The wave broke over the bow, and just as Warren could feel the force lift his body off the deck and sweep him aside, his chain caught and held.
For more than a minute he stayed that way, sure his arm would be torn off and he would be washed away like the remaining planes on deck. But God help him, he swore, he was going to survive this cataclysm if only to pay back Yeats. Then, slowly, he felt the carrier shifting and heard the creak of the massive steel buckling. He looked up and saw that the entire ship was on the verge of capsizing before the giant swell had passed.
“Goddamn you, Yeats!”
Part Three
Dawn