Changes in the neural system caused by…

By what exactly?

He had to think of a name for it. It was annoying to keep describing it in full. He stared at the screen in concentration. Did the committee have access to his laptop? Suddenly he suspected that Li and her gang were spying on his thoughts, and he resented the idea. It was his theory and he'd confront the committee with it when he deemed it time.

It was pure coincidence that his left hand brushed the keyboard and his middle and ring fingers formed a word. Although it wasn't really enough to be a word. Three letters appeared on the screen: Dr Johanson was about to delete them, but stopped himself Why not leave them? Any word would do. And this word would be better than a real word because no one could decipher it. Besides, he wasn't even sure what it described. There wasn't a term for it, so an abstract word would do fine.

Yrr.

He'd stick with yrr for the moment.

THAT WAS THE third pencil Weaver had chewed since the presentation had begun.

'Maybe that's the kind of havoc that the Great Flood wreaked as well.' Peak was just coming to the end of a lengthy digression. 'Descriptions of floods occur in many religious stories and myths. The earliest verifiable description of a tsunami tells of a natural disaster that hit the Aegean in 479 bc. More recently, in 1755, sixty thousand people died in Lisbon when Portugal was pounded by ten-metre waves. Reliable evidence also exists for the damage caused by the Krakatoa eruption in 1883. The summit of the volcano was blown off, prompting the underwater caldera to collapse in the magma. Two hours later, waves reaching heights of forty metres swept into the coasts of Sumatra and Java, laying waste to three hundred villages and killing nearly thirty-six thousand people. In 1933 a much smaller tsunami hit the Japanese town of Sanriku, flattening the north-east of Honshu. The outcome? Three thousand people dead, nine thousand buildings destroyed and eight thousand boats lost at sea. But none of those incidents was anything like as devastating as the recent tsunami in northern Europe. The North Sea states are all highly developed industrial nations. Two hundred and forty million people live there, the majority near the coast.'

There was a deathly hush.

'Geologically, the whole area was transformed in a flash. It's too soon to predict the consequences for humanity, but economically the effects have been calamitous. Some of the most pivotal international ports suffered serious damage or were destroyed. Less than a fortnight ago Rotterdam was still the biggest maritime trading centre in history, while the North Sea was a major repository of the world's fossil fuels. Approximately four hundred and fifty thousand barrels of oil were being extracted from the North Sea every day. Half of Europe's oil reserves were located off the coast of Norway, a significant proportion off the coast of Britain, not to mention the region's share of the world's natural gas. And yet the entire industry was destroyed within hours. Initial estimates place the death toll at two or three million, but there are at least as many again who are injured or homeless.'

Peak recited the figures as though he were reading the weather forecast.

'The question is, what caused the slide? The polychaetes are undoubtedly the most striking example of mutation that we're up against. Nothing even begins to explain how billions of worms teamed up with bacteria and swarmed over the slope. Besides, Dr Johanson and our friends at the Geomar Centre in Kiel believe that we still don't have the full story. There's no doubt that the invasion of worms destabilised the hydrates, but a catastrophe of that magnitude just doesn't make sense. There must be another factor. The wave was only the most visible part of the problem.'

Weaver stiffened. The hairs stood up on the back of her neck. A long-distance satellite image was taking shape on the screen. The contrast had been altered and the contours were hazy, but she recognised the vessel straight away.

'You'll see what I mean from these pictures. The boat had been placed under satellite surveillance…'

What – Weaver couldn't believe what she was hearing. Bauer, under surveillance?

'It was a research vessel, the Juno said Peak. 'The images were taken at night by a military recon satellite, EORSAT. Luckily the visibility was good and the sea was calm, which isn't often the case in these waters. The Juno was off the coast of Spitsbergen at the time.'

The washed-out glow of the vessel's lights stood out against the darkness of the sea. Then light dots appeared in the water, multiplying rapidly until the sea seethed.

The Juno tipped from right to left, heeling…

Then she sank like a stone.

Weaver froze. No one had prepared her for that. Now at last she knew where Bauer had got to. The Juno was lying at the bottom of the Greenland Sea. She thought of the worrying indications of his research, his fears and concerns, and it dawned on her that she was the only person left who knew the details of his work. Bauer had left her his scientific legacy.

'It was the first time,' Peak was saying, 'that we'd actually witnessed the phenomenon. Of course, we'd known for some time that methane blowouts were occurring in the area, and yet-'

Weaver raised her hand. 'Did you anticipate this would happen?'

Peak fixed her with his eyes. His face was so still that it looked almost carved. 'No.'

'What did you do when you saw the Juno sinking?'

'Nothing.'

'You mean the region and the boat were under satellite surveillance, and you couldn't do a thing?'

'We were gathering data by tracking different boats. It's impossible to be everywhere at once. There's no way we could have guessed that precisely this vessel-'

'Correct me if I'm wrong,' Weaver interrupted forcefully, 'but surely you were aware of what happens in a blowout? The Bermuda Triangle's right on your doorstep.'

'Ms Weaver, we-'

'Let me put it another way. You knew blowouts were causing boats to disappear. And you knew that methane was being released into the Arctic. Didn't you have an inkling of what was going to happen to the shelf?' Peak stared at her. 'What are you trying to suggest?'

'I want you to tell me if there's anything you could have done.' Peak's expression didn't alter. His eyes were still fixed on Weaver. It was uncomfortably silent. 'We misjudged the situation,' he said eventually.

LI WAS ALL too familiar with this kind of scenario. Peak would be forced into admitting that their aerial recon hadn't delivered. There was no denying that they'd noticed a rise in the number of blowouts occurring near Norway, but they'd been registering all kinds of other phenomena too. The worms had come as a surprise.

She stood up. It was time to lend a hand. 'We couldn't have done a thing,' she said calmly. 'Besides, Ms Weaver, I would be grateful if you could listen to what the major has to say, instead of jumping to conclusions. Bear in mind that the scientists in this room were selected for two reasons: their expertise, and their familiarity with what's going on. Some of our delegates were directly involved in the events you refer to. What could Dr Bohrmann have done to prevent the disaster? What could Dr Johanson or Statoil have done? What could you have done, Ms Weaver? Having cameras in the sky doesn't mean that we have some omnipresent taskforce to rescue people anytime, anyplace, no matter what the danger. Would you prefer us to close our eyes instead?'

The journalist frowned.

'We didn't come here today to start apportioning blame,' Li said, before Weaver had a chance to reply. 'Let he who is without sin cast the first stone – that's what I was taught, and that's what it says in the Bible. And the Bible often gets it right. We're here to avert any future disasters. Perhaps we can move on…'