Salas stood up and cleared his throat. He walked away from the table as tears began to shimmer in his eyes. Genero moved to him, but he used his hand to wave her back down. Kira poured a glass of water and brought it to him. He downed it and turned around, pain emanating from his eyes.
“When I rejected the idea based on my research, he said that his talents would be better served elsewhere.” The vision of those last moments came back to him like a lightning strike.
“NO!? HOW CAN YOU SAY NO!?”
“Steven, there’s no way it can work? We don’t have the technology to mine anything that deep,” Salas defended.
“I’m designing that technology, Joe! We can do this!”
“No, we can’t. We don’t have the vehicles to accomplish this. PRAS Deep is an industrial dig, Steven. Our vehicles here are too small to add drills and collection arms. I designed them for speed and observation, not heavy labor.”
“Then maybe you should let me do the designing, Joe. You’re the author, the lecturer and the global savior; I’m the businessman and the visionary.”
“And there’s the problem right there, Steven! Right there! You’re the businessman! How much is HELIOS offering you to get them down there?”
“They are offering us, not me, ten million! Ten million for a successful capture!”
“And what happens when we don’t make the capture? Or the equipment malfunctions? Or there’s a leak? PRAS Deep could drain out indefinitely!”
“Goddamn it, Joe!” Steven laughed, shaking his head. “Are you serious, man? Nothing will happen. We will be employees of HELIOS. If something goes wrong, then something goes wrong—we keep at it until it does work.”
“We become employees of HELIOS, the biggest fucking monopoly on the planet! Steven, they don’t give a shit about the Earth except how to rape it for their own profit! You want to work for them?”
“Joe, on top of the ten million, they will finance all our designs, patent them and market them. Joe!” Haynes looked excitedly into Salas’ eyes wildly. “No one has ever attempted this. No one has ever imagined it. We are the only two people on Earth who can make this work. We basically own the trench.”
“Not anymore apparently,” Salas countered. “You’re going to sell it to corporate criminals.”
“Oh Joe! Get over that, for Christ’s sakes! The entire United States is corrupt, starting from the fucking president!” He stepped forward, again smiling, with his vision guiding his steps and his words. “I’m talking about truly making our mark on the world. Imagine the books you’ll write, the lectures you’ll give, the symposiums you’ll head! That, my brother, that’s the dream you’ve wanted! That’s the science you’ve loved! You will have been the only man to protect the trench, discover its natural fuel, and then save our economy by mining it. Is this not a scientist’s dream?”
Salas sat down and felt the snake oil Steven was peddling touch his lips. Haynes went to the lab’s kitchen and came out with two cold bottles of beer. He popped them open and handed one to Salas.
“Joe, look at us. Look at what we do. We take measurements, readings, dive into the abyss, take more readings, monitor the chemicals, salinity and wave heights, and for what? Yes, we get a little excitement when we bust a company or the Navy on some infraction. We protect ecosystems, save beached whales and speak at international conferences. But other than that, what do we really accomplish? What is our legacy?”
“We protect our little piece of the planet,” answered Salas flatly. “You’re right, the trench is basically ours, especially PRAS Deep, and it’s our responsibility.”
“But that’s all it is, Joe. Like acres of undeveloped land, it’s useless unless tapped or built on. It’s just a canyon filled with water and no one really gives a damn about it.” Haynes dropped his smile and turned on a seriousness that Salas wanted to believe. “Joe, think about what I’m about to ask you right now. Think about it hard because I want to hear your answer.”
“What, Steven?”
“Is what we do, really so important?”
The question was simple enough and could have been answered instantly, but Salas hesitated. They took long swigs as an uncomfortable silence floated between them.
“What did you say?” asked Sakura. She and the rest of the group remained silent, concentrating on his recollection as if they were sitting around a campfire listening to a ghost story.
“I didn’t know what to say,” he confessed. “The underdeveloped land angle was correct. Other than a handful of scientific societies, academics and fellow researchers no one gives a damn about the Marianas Islands, Micronesia, the trench or Guam.” His eyes turned dreamy, as if he was looking at some strange thing in the distance.
“Steven said it was my duty.”
“It’s your duty, Joe!”
“What do you mean?”
“It’s your duty as a Chamorro to protect Guam, its people and its way of life. Can you imagine what this venture could do for local business? The companies that would be built here? The factories, labs and supply and storage facilities? Can you see that? Like a manufacturing plant built in a shanty town, local employment and urban development would boom. The economy would explode with the billions of dollars of investment, building and land rental. PRAS Deep would not only be an undersea industrial park, but an Asian employment center.
“And the tourism, Joe! A new dimension of undersea tourism! We can design subs to go into the trench! Not near the mining facility, of course, but take people deeper than they’ve ever been.” Haynes took a deep swig from his bottle, his smile returning as this new vision began to take hold. “And it won’t be like that space tourism crap! Twenty-million-dollars per person! What a crock of shit! This won’t be a goddamn vanity trip for the rich, but an actual life-changing experience for normal people.” Haynes moved even closer to Salas.
“Joe, it costs a typical family of four $700 to see a three-hour NFL game; well, why not charge that much for a five-hour dive into the deepest abyss on the Earth? The deeper the dive, the more they pay. Discount trips for students and free dives for UOG marine biology majors. Joe! Do you see it!? The possibilities for your island!?”
“That actually sounds hella epic,” said Sakura. “That would definitely put Guam on the map. People would come from all over Asia and the world to go into the trench.”
“But you said no to him,” concluded Aurelia. Salas nodded.
“I must admit, I was taken in by the visions. Steven could sell an air conditioner to an Eskimo, but what he said was really starting to make sense to me. I’m a Chamorro, yet my work, my books and my battles for the environment have done nothing to elevate my people or my island. Steven is a genius and a visionary, and with HELIOS money, it could have possibly worked. But in the end, I couldn’t get past the safety factors. I didn’t want PRAS Deep to be a cesspool. ”
“So, why do you suspect he has anything to do with this killer sub?” asked Duenas. Salas grabbed his laptop and connected it to McLaren’s, using the wall screen to display his own files.
“Steven showed me some of his designs for the project. Take a look.” He began flashing the concept art images on the huge screens. They were painstakingly detailed with titles and labels written in Haynes’ own hand.
“Damn! He’s good!”
“He’s