"Damnit, Mark." Mercer was standing with both hands on the wheel. "You must have messed up the steering pushing this ship around like a Jet Ski." He frowned, then stepped back. "Here, you try it."

Ryan tried to turn the wheel. It gave for an inch on either side, but it seemed locked into place. He exerted a slight pressure, then gave up. "The damned thing is locked into place," Ryan said, with a com- bination of anger and puzzlement.

Ryan picked up the telephone, ordered the engine room to stop and turned his attention back to the wheel. Instead of slowing down, the ship inexplicably picked up speed. Ryan swore and called down to the engine room again.

"What's wrong, Cal?" he barked. "Those engines finally made you deaf? I said cut speed, not increase it."

Ryan's engineer, Cal Rumson, was a topflight seaman. "Hell, I know what you said," Cal replied. The frustration in his voice was obvious. "I did reduce speed. The engines are acting crazy. The con- trols don't seem to be working."

"Then kill the power," Ryan said.

"I'm trying, but the diesels are work ing harder

"Keep trying, Cal."

Ryan slammed the phone in its cradle. This was insanity! The ship seemed to have a mind of her own. Ryan's eyes swept the sea ahead of the ship. Good news. No vessels or land masses in the way. The worst that could happen would be to run out of fuel in the At- lantic. Ryan picked up the radio microphone to inform the cruiser of their predicament. But he was interrupted by a yell from Mercer.

"The wheel's turning!"

Mercer was trying to hold on to the wheel, which was gradually spinning slowly to the right, bringing the ship around toward the cruiser. Ryan grabbed the rim, then he and Mercer tried to bring the ship back on course. They used every ounce of strength they could muster, but the wheel slipped out of their sweaty hands and the Sea Sentinel moved closer to the warship.

The Danish ship had taken notice of the course change. A famil- iar voice crackled over the radio.

"Come in, Sea Sentinel. This is Captain Petersen. What is the in- tention of your course change?"

"We're having problems with our steering. The wheel is locked and we can't shut down our engines."

"That's impossible," Petersen said.

"Tell that to the ship!"

A pause. Then Petersen said, "We'll bear off to give you plenty of sea room. We'll issue a warning as to any ships in your way."

"Thanks. Looks like you'll get your wish about us leaving the Faroes."

The cruiser began to peel away.

But before the Danish ship could veer off, the Sea Sentinel made a sharp turn and drove toward the cruiser's exposed side like a water- borne guided missile.

Sailors lined the cruiser's decks and frantically tried to wave off the advancing ship. The cruiser blew short, rapid warning bursts of its horn. Voices squawked over the radio in Danish and English.

Seeing that the ships were within seconds of disaster, the sailors ran for their lives.

In a last desperate attempt to avert a certain collision, Ryan put all his weight into the wheel. He was still hanging on when the ship smashed into the side of the cruiser. The Sea Sentinel's sharp bow pen- etrated the steel hull plates like a bayonet, then slid off the moving ship in a horrendous shriek of tearing metal.

The Sea Sentinel wallowed in the ocean like a dazed boxer who had just taken a hard right to the nose. The cruiser was struggling to keep afloat, as thousands of gallons of water poured in through the gaping hole in the hull. Crewmen scrambled into the lifeboats and prepared to lower them into the cold sea.

Therri had been thrown to her knees by the impact. Ryan helped her to her feet, and he and the others in the pilothouse dashed down to the deck. The panicked TV people, seeing that they were now part of the story rather than covering it, were trying to get someone to tell them what to do. People were bruised and limping.

Someone was screaming for help, and crew and press people were extracting a bloody body from the metal mush that was all that was left of the bow section.

Ryan shouted orders to abandon ship.

With all the yelling and confusion, no one looked up to see the hel- icopter wheeling high above the ships. The chopper circled a few times like a hungry buzzard, then headed off along the coast.

Off the northern coast of Russia

TWELVE HUNDRED MILE S southeast of the Faroe Islands, the search-and-survey ship William Beebe lay at anchor in the frigid waters of the Barents Sea. The letters NUMA were embla- zoned on the 250-foot-long turquoise hull. Named after one of the pioneers in deep-sea exploration, the Beebe bristled with muscular cranes and winches capable of hoisting entire boats off the ocean floor.

Four crewmen dressed in Neoprene wetsuits stood on the stern deck, eyes fixed on a patch of ocean where the surface roiled like a bubbling cauldron. The surface grew paler and mounded into a foamy white dome, and the submersible rescue vehicle Sea Lamprey burst from the water like a mutant leviathan coming up for air. With the precision of a navy assault team, the ready crew pushed an outboard-powered inflatable down the stern ramp into the water, scrambled aboard and raced toward the wallowing submersible.

The ready team attached a towline to the bright-orange vehicle, and a winch on board the Beebe hauled in the submersible until it was under the tall A-frame that angled out over the ship's stern. Kevlar cables were fastened to eyebolts on the submersible's abbreviated deck. The powerful A-frame motor growled, and the submersible was hoisted from the sea. As it dangled from the cables, the Sea Lam- prey offered a full view of its unlovely cylindrical hull and strangely truncated accordion bow.

The A-frame swung slowly over the deck and lowered the vehi- cle into a custom-made steel cradle, while the waiting deck crew placed a ladder against the cradle. Then the hatch at the top of the low conning tower opened and clanged back on its hinges. Kurt Austin poked his head out and blinked like a mole. His steel-gray, almost platinum, hair was radiant in the intense metallic light of the overcast sky.

Austin greeted the deck crew with a wave, then squeezed his

broad shoulders through the narrow hatchway, climbed out and stood next to the conning tower. Seconds later, his partner, Joe Zavala, stuck his head out into the fresh air and handed his partner a shiny aluminum case.

Austin tossed the case down to a stocky, middle-aged man who stood at the base of the ladder. The man was dressed in a wool turtleneck sweater, yellow rainproof pants and a slicker. Only the high-peaked cap on his head identified him as Russian navy. When he saw the case go airborne, he let out a yell of despair. He caught the container, hobbled it for an instant, then hugged it close to his chest.

As Austin and Zavala descended the ladder, the Russian opened the case and removed a paper-wrapped object cushioned in protec- tive plastic foam, then he unwrapped the paper to reveal a heavy square bottle. Holding it like a newborn, he mumbled in Russian.

Noticing the perplexed looks on the faces of the NUMA men, he said, "Pardon me gentlemen. I was offering a prayer of thanks that the contents of the container were undamaged."

Austin eyed the label and grimaced. "We just dove three hundred feet and cracked into a submarine to retrieve a bottle ofvodla?"

"Oh no,ff Vlasov replied, digging into the case. "Three bottles. The finest vodka made in Russia." He carefully unwrapped the other containers and planted a noisy kiss on each one before laying it back in the case. "Jewel of Russia is one of our finest and Moskovska is su- perb. Charodei is the best chilled."