Free EXOSKELETON II: Tympanum by Shane Stadler Page A

they’d still talk regularly, she agreed that it was no way to begin a relationship. She’d taken it well – better than he did.
    He turned the radio on and forced himself to think about something else. What would things be like in Baton Rouge after more than a decade?
    Although he was okay with staying in a safe house for a while, the objective was not well defined. His case handler had told him that he’d partake in the surveillance of former Red Box inmates who’d been gathering in the area, but provided no details. The FBI didn’t know what the men were doing, or why they were in Baton Rouge. He knew another Compressed Punishment facility was being built in the city, but construction had been halted when the program was shut down.
    The drive south on Interstate 57 was going to be long and featureless, but he was anxious to the get to southern Illinois and pass by Cordova, the little college town where he’d tried to cultivate a life and career. It was the place where, over a year earlier, he’d been falsely accused and eventually convicted of a horrible crime. Before he reached Cordova, however, he’d pass by Marion Prison, where he’d been incarcerated before going to the Red Box.
    He shuddered. For an instant his thoughts conflicted: his instinct was to avoid the place where his life had plummeted into despair. But his curiosity trumped the darker emotions. He wanted to see it, this time from the outside.
     

 
    2
    Saturday, 9 May (8:42 a.m. EST – Antarctic Circle)
     
    McHenry washed down the last bite of his breakfast with a swig of bug juice, a cool-aid-like drink that could double as a cleaning agent. They were closing in on their destination, and it would soon be time to violate every instinct of self-preservation that he had as a submarine captain. They’d reveal their presence to every ship in the area. He felt reassured, however, that a carrier group was on its way, and that other friendly subs were sleeping nearby.
    There must be some genuine worry in Washington about whatever was making the noise. If he had to guess, it was a piece of lost scientific apparatus – scientists sent devices up in balloons all the time, many of which get blown out to sea, and then fall in the water and sink into the deep. It just seemed to him that exposing an attack sub was an overreaction. They should’ve sent a surface exploration team.
    A young sailor entered the mess hall and approached McHenry. “We’re in position, cap’n,” he said.
    McHenry followed him through a maze of tight walkways and ladders to the sonar room. He stopped at a consul where his best sonar tech tapped away at a computer.
    “What’s the status, Finley?” McHenry asked.
    “Located the source, same position as yesterday,” Finley explained. “The sounders and detectors are in the lock and ready to be deployed.”
    “How long will we be vulnerable?”
    “The array will be in passive mode until we get to depth,” Finley explained. “As for active time, that depends on how many images you want.”
    “We’ll see what they look like,” McHenry said. “We aren’t leaving until we have what we need – we don’t want to do this twice. Let’s get the show on the road.”
    Finley pushed a button. “Load-lock filling.” Thirty seconds later he said, “Bay hatch open, winch unwinding, turning on bay camera.” He clicked a button on the computer monitor opening a video frame. A mess of cords and pulleys appeared on the screen.
    “Don’t tangle anything,” McHenry warned.
    “Just have to do it in the right order. The source goes first,” Finley explained and pointed to the screen as a white, beach-ball-sized, faceted sphere, lowered by cable out of sight and into the dark. He clicked another button. “And now the detector array.”
    The device resembled a large chandelier, with detectors in place of lights. “How much line do we have?” McHenry asked
    “Five hundred meters,” Finley answered. “Should be enough to get