"Hard-left rudder--one hundred percent down on fore and tower planes--all up on aft planes--all-ahead flank--full emergency power!" Everyone in the control center was shocked at the strength coming from Heirthall.

Leviathanstarted a straight-down, headlong run just as the torpedo reached its target area. In essence, what the captain did was bring the great vessel to an attitude where the hull would be less exposed--bringing the strongest portion of Leviathan'shull head on against the detonation and the thickened composite armor at her protected stern. Running at close to one hundred miles an hour toward the bottom of the sea, Leviathanwas still vulnerable as an egg in a cattle stampede.

The American warhead detonated ten thousand yards from the massive stern section of Leviathan. The tremendous heat generated by the warhead turned the sea to steam in a microsecond. The pressure wave shot in all directions, even down into the exposed jet ring-rudder of the giant submarine.

The first sensation for all inside was the feeling of free falling, as the seawater around her started running faster than Leviathanherself. The second sensation was that of the great boat flipping over as if it were a twig caught in a flashflood. The shock wave tore free the directional ring acting as the main rudder for Leviathan. Then the same heated wave assaulted the jet-thruster housing, causing the main seal to fail. The shaft that sent high-pressure water outward from the main engines, giving the submarine her thrust to the four water jets, backwashed and forced the rubber seals to melt, and then fail, allowing seawater to enter the pressurized hull with tremendous force.

Jack was thrown to the deck, and then it was as if he were on a sheet of ice as Leviathanmade her run for the bottom of the Ross Sea. Then the detonation effects actually made the centrifugal force of the submarine faster than Jack's fall, and he found himself free-floating above the deck.

Tyler wasn't as lucky. He seemed to hit every engineering console in the compartment on his slide down the ever-increasing steepness of the deck. Just before he was crushed in the final fall toward the bulkhead, the same strange force that halted Jack's fall stopped Tyler in midair. Then, almost as soon as the floating effect started, it ceased, as Leviathanagain caught up with the speed of the rushing seas.

Both men started free-falling toward the bulkhead at crushing speed as the inner hull was breached in engineering. Tyler landed at bone-crushing speed, and Jack landed on top of him.

As Collins was trying to figure out if he had any broken bones, Tyler moved from under him.

"Help ... me," Tyler whispered.

Collins tried to turn to hear what Tyler was saying, but the automatic damage-control system was pumping compressed air into the compartment to push back some of the flooding covering both men, as the submarine was still in a nosedown attitude. Water soon covered Tyler as Jack quickly thought about his options. Decided, Collins raised Tyler's head from the bulkhead until it was just free of the rising water. Tyler spit and tried to clear the saltwater from his mouth and throat.

"Don't let me drown," the broken Tyler said as loud as he could.

Jack remembered the people at the Event Complex lost, and all the people Tyler was prepared to kill for the sake of money and power. The nuclear strikes would have caused the deaths of millions of innocents. Then the thought of Sarah, Lee, Alice, and those children so callously abandoned at Ice Castle made his decision for him.

"Sorry," Jack said as he took Tyler by the shoulders and slowly pushed him back into the water.

As the level of the flooding rose, Jack had to crane his neck to keep it above the water while he held Tyler down. He stayed that way until the large Irishman's struggling ceased. Collins turned away and floated until he was as far away from his deed as he could get.

The restraining belts were holding the crew in their seats, with the exception of Everett, who was dangling from the navigation console.

"Engines all back!" Heirthall yelled over the sound of the flooding alarms--the effort causing a large flow of bright red blood to fill her mouth. "Blow all ballast tanks. Give me full rise on the planes!"

"Captain, we have serious flooding in engineering--it's a major hull breach!"

"That will not affect power. All back!"

Leviathanstarted to bring her already-flooded bow up, but her speed was so great she continued to fall toward the bottom.

USS MISSOURI (SSN-780)

Jefferson knew that the flooding was overwhelming Missouri's ability to pump it out. The forward weapons room had to be abandoned, and all the ballast he could send out to the sea had already been pumped out.

"Captain, we are about to lose the reactor--we're losing her," Izzeringhausen said, holding onto the nav table.

"Maintain revolutions! Launch the rescue buoy!"

Izzy did as he was ordered, but knew no rescue buoy in the known world would allow anyone to reach them almost three miles down; they would soon be crushed to death in a quarter of that depth.

Missourihad lost her fight for survival.

LEVIATHAN

Jack felt the deck straighten, but knew through his stomach that Leviathanwas still sinking at incredible speed. He struggled toward the intercom and smashed his hand against the button.

"Conn, this is Collins in engineering!" he screamed. "We have a massive breach open to the sea!"

"Abandon the compartment, Colonel ... seal the area!" Heirthall responded.

Collins shook his head and fought his way through the chest-high water. He didn't have to go far when the flooding and current grabbed him and threw him toward the hatchway. He grabbed for the coming and held on. Then he gained his feet and struggled with the heavy hatch, attempting to close it as the water rushed out of engineering. The torrent was just too much, and he knew that the next compartment and companionway would soon flood and be too much for Leviathan's pumps to shed.

Collins was losing the entire deck.

ICE PALACE

The large Zodiac was loaded. All the children, using blankets found in the supply room, huddled against the rubber sides. Sarah was the last one to enter beside the Frenchman. She turned just as a rumbling from the south started to roll over the remaining mile-thick ice.

"Come on, Henri, that sounds like a damn tidal wave!"

Farbeaux looked from Sarah to the dissolving Ice Palace. Before he could comment, the wave from the nuclear detonation two hundred miles to the north struck the broken ice shelf. Ice Palace started to fall over away from the main shelf, breaking free and turning bottomside-up.

Farbeaux shoved Sarah down into the Zodiac and then pushed it away from the small shelf lining the rising end of the carved-out platform.

"Damn it, Colonel, get in!" Sarah called out.

Farbeaux allowed gravity to take him where he needed to go. He slid down until he hit the rear wall of the building, then rolled to the open ice stairs and slid on his belly down into the basement. He struggled to gain his feet as he pulled the inflation cords on three of the rubber boats. Then he turned and looked into the water-filled corridor.