Extract from "Christine's hunt for rising danger" by Tom Clancy(sort of). CHAPTER SIX: Monday,the Worst Day. Aboard the USS Dallas. The World was ending. Jack Ryan had been awake-what was it now-two thousand straight hours?He'd gotten up that morning in Morrow,England,where he worked as a data analyst for the CIA,and after reaching his conclusion-a calculated guess,actually,but that's what he was paid for-he took a British Harrier jet from the HMS Invincible to Loring Air Force Base in Maine,where he switched to an F-15 Eagle,and flew south to Andrews Air Force Base at Mach 2,where he was met by a marine sergeant with a navy-grey Chevy who drove him up to the George Washington Parkway to CIA headquarters at Langley,Virginia,where he was ushered into the oak-panelled office of the DCI-Director of Central Intelligence-who conferred withCOMSUBLANT-the navy's coomander of submarine forces in the Atlantic-who,in turn,met with the President in the lead-lined situation room beneath the White House on Pennsylvania Avenue-and then issued a FLASH signal on the SSIX-the submarine satellite information exchange,via a naval communications satellite locked in geosynchronous orbit 24,000 miles above the earth.And now,after a brief but bumpy trip out on a Super Stallion helicopter,Ryan was standing in the control room of the USS Dallas,a 688-class US nuclear attack boat,2000 feet below thw Atlantic,just under the thermocline,120 nautical miles north of Bermuda-in that area otherwise known as the Bermuda Triangle. "I've got to get out of here," Ryan all but screamed to himself.At least he wanted to scream,but the words wouldn't come.The walls were closing in on him.Claustrophobia.Seasickness.He was turning green.Was that condensation on the pipes,or blood?In the pit of his stomach he had that churning feeling- and what about that "cook" with the nineteen-inch meat cleaver?The pressure was getting to him.He knew what Evil was out there-or at least he thought he knew-a horrible,black void,sucking at the life force of the world. "Coffee,Jack?" Captain Puris was one of the best boat drivers in the US Navy.Annapolis.Stanford.Family man.Played some ball at Notre-Dame.He could be kind,he could be tough.The enlisted men loved him.He was all things to all people.A good man. "Sure," said Jack.But what if he was wrong,he thought to himself.What if it was just another piece of disinformation by renegade KGB agents?Or the Black September Group?Or Mossad,the GUI,Iraqi fanatics,and the Colombians, all working in league with our own free-lance operatives? "Contact,bearing zero-zero-four,"first class sonarman Martin Luther King Clinton called out from the sonar room.He was a good man. "Do we have an identification on the contact?" Puris asked. "I'm not sure,sir," Clinton replied.Sweat poured off his brow.Panic seized his throat.He wasn't sure what was out there-but every cell in his body,every experience in his all-too-short life told him one thing: Whatever you do,don't open the torpedo tube doors.Get a grip on yourself,he thought. He spoke calmly: "I think it's ome kind of unspeakable Evil that's sucking at the life force of the world."It was a good guess. "Range six thousand," executive officer Ammiratti replied.It was a good range.First class fire controlman Cosmopulos was feeding data from the target motion analyser to the computer.It was a good computer.The diving officer, O'Harah.levelled the boat.It was a good move.They were all good men. "Match bearings and shoot," Puris cried,and the two MK-48 torpedoes were in the water.They were good torpedoes. "They're pinging her,sir." Yes,whatever Evil was out there,it was nothing that a good cup of coffee,a few good American men,and a couple of trillion dollars of US military hardware couldn't take care of. "Coffee,sir?" Jack took the saucer from the cook,First Mate Juan Jesus Cortez.He was a good man,too-even if he was psychotically attached to the meat cleaver. Jack sipped the coffee.He was going to save the world.