Banshee Beneath

Chapter 2

By the time they reach the end of the hallway, David Macmillan had gotten clearly impatient. Seema caught the fifty-year-old man fiddling with his pocket and pen as he led them to the projector room. To her, he looked like an old man with a teenagers soul--an impatient, extremely eager impatient teenager.

"Finally," David said, regaining his charismatic voice she had heard so many times in T.V. He pushed open the double doors at the end of the corridor, revealing a rather gloomy room. David walked across the threshold and was swallowed by the gloom. Seema turned and faced Josh.

Josh shrugged his muscular shoulders, gave her a transient smile and said, "Ladies first."

She unwittingly returned his smile and sauntered into the dark hall. Except for the center and the wall opposite to her, the rest of the room was bathed in darkness. A long table stood on the middle of the floor while a projector installed on the ceiling flashed images of the opposite wall. Echoes of David's footsteps rang in her ears, he made his way towards the table.

"Come here, Miss. Take a seat." David's unnaturally loud voice said. She felt her way towards the standing silhouette of a man who she supposed was David, groped for the chair, found it and gave her legs some rest. As she sat, she noticed there were more people in the room with her, most of them seated at the table. She heard scraping noise as Josh took his seat beside her.

"Thanks for the interruption," said an unfamiliar voice.

"Sorry for that, Chris," David said, "Please don't resign for this trivial reason." At this, a woman sitting opposite to her, whose face was still not visible, giggled.

"You think that's funny, David, huh?" The man said as he walked in front of the projector's screen. She saw Chris was a black man wearing a tight shirt and denim pants. He was wearing a microphone near his left ear which led her to conclude that he was giving the presentation. "You know you won't be able to nothing without me." He sounded vexed.

"That's why I'm telling you to not to resign." She couldn't clearly see David's face but was sure that the billionaire was smiling. More voices giggled and sniggered. Chris just scuffed and shook his head and sighed.

"Whatever," Chris said, "So, where was I? Oh, yes, I was talking about the molecular arrangements--" He clicked something on his hand and the image behind him change. "This image shows the molecular structure of Diamond and Graphite which consist of the same element that is carbon. Diamond is the hardest substance known to mankind while graphite is very soft. Although they are made up of the same material, their properties differ. Why? All--"

"Because of their molecular structure," Seema interrupted.

Chris gave her a death stare and went on. "As she told us, it's because of the different patterns in which the atoms of carbon arrange themselves. So, for decades scientist have been creating different types of alloys with varying range of properties. Thanks to Mr David's funding and the hard work of my colleagues, we have created an alloy so tenacious that it can withstand the pressure up to 18,000 psi. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you--" He lifted a small, grey colour slab-- "Strengthanium." He clicked again and an image on the white wall changed. "And we have created this material to build our underwater mobile habitat." The new image showed a thing which was a cross between a tanker and a futuristic house which it actually was. A house that can slide underwater.

"This is just the prototype," Chris said, "The real thing is sitting right below us on the seabed. We call her Host. Her whole outer surface is made up of strengthanium and she is powered by a nuclear reactor that can provide her energy to roll across the ocean for next ten years. But it only has provisions that will last for two months. We will descend tomorrow in a submarine that will take us to Host where we will spend our next two weeks."

"I do have a question," the woman sitting across Seema said. "What if something goes wrong? How will we escape? Looking at Host's design, I can bet it only slides across the ocean bed and does not floats."

"Doctor Judith," Chris said, "You are right about that. Host doesn't floats. It was made to spend the rest of its life below the ocean. So, as a security precaution, we have attached a mini-submarine to it. This submarine is also made up of the same material and will act as our backup. Any more questions?" He looked across the long table. No one said a thing. "Fine." He clicked again and the lights in the room came on, and Seema finally got to see the faces of the people with whom she would be travelling to the deepest point on the earth's surface.

"That's Doctor Judith Bay," David said, pointing at the blond woman. "And she is Kasume Honda, an oceanographer." He pointed at a small Japanese woman. "You have already talked with our head engineer Chris Parker. And this young man here is the assistant engineer, Justin Jackson. Friends, she is Seema Bisht, marine biologist and this man is Josh... what the hell."

Seema turned and saw that Josh had fallen asleep.

"Damn," David said, "I didn't know Chris you were this boring."

  That made the whole room rang with laughter. But Seema didn't participate. They are going to the deepest point on the surface of Earth, she thought. Why aren't they worried? Anything could go wrong... Anything...