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“Where was the lab’s service shuttle when all this happened?”

“A short while before the attack, the submersible had made a run down to the lab to deliver a representative froe of the Locker’s security The sub was still on the lab when the missile came in”

“What about the Locker’s minisubs?” Kane said “They could be used to evacuate the lab in an eency The lab also has escape pods it can use as a last resort”

“No subs or pods, Max Our guess is that what happened to the lab was sudden and catastrophic”

Kane’s head was spinning He sluest the iht about Lois Mitchell and the other athered to send hi himself that he was a scientist who dealt with facts, not suppositions

Straightening up in his chair, Kane said, “How long before we can check out the lab itself?”

“The Concord is sending down a remote-operated vehicle,” Casey said “All we can do at this point is to wait for them to report in”

“I hope the Navy is doingon its hands,” Coombs said “Have you tracked the source of the missile?”

The lieutenant raised an eyebrow Coo staff aides who looked as if he had been punched out of white dough with a cookie cutter He was as clean-cut as a West Point grad, although his closest brush with a uniforle Scout He had cultivated an all-purpose facial expression of quiet coance During his naval career, Casey had frequently encountered clones of the White House man, with their inflated sense of power, and had learned to cloak his disdain under a polite veneer

He prefaced his ansith a pleasant smile

“The Navy can walk and chew gum at the same time, Mr Coombs We’ve reconstructed the probable trajectory of thein on the launch position”

“The White House isn’t interested in trajectories or vectors, Lieutenant Has the source of the launch been tracked? If it was launched by a foreign power, this could have serious international repercussions”

“The missile could have come from a ship, a sub, or a plane, sir, that’s all we know Pretty estions as to how to proceed, sir”

Coo the buck to take the bait

“I’ll leave that up to the Navy,” he said, “but I can tell you one thing: this has all the earanized and well-financed plan”