The legs of the Morpheus loomed closer. They’d gone off track again: another adjustment was required, this time in the other direction. Together they swam towards Jason and Binning who were out of sight beyond the next peak. The line went taut again, indicating that the two men had made the same assessment.
The massive legs became dark pillars astride a vast blacked-out cave, the structure no longer distant enough to be encompassed in a single gaze. The ceiling lights in the lower decks shone so brightly down onto the water that it seemed impossible to the divers that they could not be easily seen. Stratton had thought the same the first time he’d made such an approach. But after reversing position to watch another team close in on a well-lit area he knew how difficult it was to see a blackened body unless the watcher knew precisely where to look.
They rose and fell on the rolling sea, a good fifty metres apart and rarely visible to each other, the line connecting them seesawing as one hit a peak and the other a trough.
It grew suddenly darker as they moved into the shadow of the platform and past the perimeter of lights, heading directly beneath the overhanging balconies of the decks, the leg expanding visibly as they got closer. Rowena and Stratton passed close to another leg that was coated all the way round with a thick layer of barnacles clustered at the waterline. The waves struck the vast supports and the booming noises that they made rebounded around the platform cave.
The leg diameter was the length of a bus. Stratton’s gaze darted between it and the line. Jason and Binning became visible briefly on the top of a swell and Stratton knew they would hit it perfectly.
The troughs exposed the gnarled barnacles that Stratton knew from experience were razor sharp. ‘Watch out for the barnacles!’ he shouted to Rowena. It was just another problem to add to the load she already had.
They rose up onto a peak as they came alongside the curved wall of steel. The wave slammed into the upright, the frothy water reaching up towards the first cross-beams. Stratton was drawn into the leg and stuck out his feet to fend it off. Solid. And sharp. The barnacles scratched his fins as he went by.
Jason and Binning went down the other side and the line wrapped around the leg. The pairs moved closer together as they slid down into another trough. The line suddenly went taut and yanked them to a brutal halt.
It was like being dragged along by a boat now. The sudden change pulled them lower in the water and it was much harder to keep breathing air. When they were at the peak of the wave they were almost dragged under and when at the trough the force was trying to yank them higher. They’d hit the leg in the middle of the line so they were held almost the same distance - its width - from it. They could hardly see anything directly beneath the platform, only a few rays of light finding their way between the girders.
Stratton lay on his back, holding on to the line. He searched the nearest girders for signs of life. The wind and rain whipped through the structure in gusts and squalls, beating tirelessly against the metal. If there was someone hiding in the darkness above they would be invisible but they would also have to be holding on tight or lashed to a span. And if they were, they could not stay there for long. Stratton felt confident that the team was not being observed.
He pulled the grapnel launcher from around his neck, took hold of the stock and trigger grip and selected the ideal spar. The air-powered device had been primed since before they’d left the Chinook and Stratton removed the bungee that held the grapnel in place, checked that the line was free to uncoil and then removed the safety catch. He put the butt against his shoulder and raised the grapnel end skyward. The heavy sea made it difficult to maintain position long enough to get off an accurate shot.
‘Hold me!’ he shouted.
Rowena pulled herself to him and grabbed him from behind, her hands gripping his harness, her legs finning as hard as she could. Her head went under the water and she spluttered when she surfaced but maintained her grip. She would not be able to