Dark Fathoms

by James Axler

  “Probably the balance warning,” Ricky replied. “It’s two-toned, so as long as you don’t hear the higher, louder-pitched one, you’re fine. You’re practically there, anyway.”

  Ryan realized that Ricky was correct—he was at the right angle to reach out and grab the cylinder. He did so carefully, wanting to get this right the first time. Inch by inch, the right clamp drew closer and closer to his target.

  “Grab sometime today, why doncha?” Jak called.

  “Not...as...easy...as...it...looks,” Ryan said, even as he maneuvered the clamp around the cylinder and squeezed it closed. When he was sure he had a grip on it, he lifted it into the air as he straightened.

  Everyone in the room burst into applause. Ryan took a deep breath, feeling like he had just tried to pick up a toothpick while wearing a mitten, and sketched a quick, if jerky, bow.

  “That’s pretty good, Ryan,” Ricky said when the clapping died down. “Now let’s see how you do with the tactile response.” He wheeled out a metal mechanic’s cart and set a plastic can of oil on it. “See if you can pick up the can without breaking it.”

  “Okay.” Ryan reached for the plastic can, but this time his overconfidence made him shoot the arm forward and knock it off the cart.

  “Easy does it.” Ricky picked up the can and set it back on the cart.

  “This thing’s touchy,” Ryan said as he adjusted the arm to try again. This time, he got the clamp around it and applied enough pressure to make the plastic flex a bit under the grip. He raised the arm, lifting the can of oil.

  “Remember, it says that the clamps operate on something called a logarithmic scale, so the more pressure you apply, the higher level of strength it uses,” Ricky said.

  “Oh?” Ryan said as he clenched the finger controls as hard as he could. The oil can ruptured, spurting black liquid all over the floor. “Like that?”

  “Ryan!” Krysty said, shaking her head at the mess.

  “Hey, I just wanted to test it out, to see if Ricky was right,” he said. “Okay, I’m ready.”

  “Not quite.” Ricky held up a large piece of rubber with a hole in the middle. “We have to get you submerged in there—” he pointed at the suit “—before you go out there.” He pointed at the airlock.

  “Oh yeah...kind of forgot about that part,” Ryan replied.

  “No problemo,” Ricky said. “In fact, this’ll be good practice for you. Use the rear camera to back up to the hoist.”

  Ryan looked up at the top of his viewport to see the camera showing what was behind him. Carefully, making sure every step was sure, he slowly backed up until he was in the hoist again.

  Ricky got up top and opened the hatch. He passed Ryan a pair of goggles. “You’ll need these, otherwise you won’t be able to see through the fluid.”

  “You know I only need one, right?” Ryan said, in an attempt to lighten the mood.

  “Yeah, I thought about blacking one out, but decided not to,” Ricky replied with a smile. “Didn’t think you’d like it.”

  “Wait! Wait a second!”

  Ryan heard boots on the ladder, then Krysty’s head appeared a few seconds later. “Did you honestly think you were leaving without saying goodbye?”

  “Since I’m coming back, I didn’t think there was a need, but...” Grabbing the edge of the hatch with both arms, Ryan pulled himself up as Krysty leaned down. They met in the middle, her free arm curling around him as she kissed him hard.

  When they separated, she held him tight for a moment. “Make sure you come back to me, Ryan Cawdor,” she whispered, staring into his eye.

  “Just going for a little walk. Be back before you know it,” he replied.

  “You better be.” Reluctantly, she drew back, and Ricky’s head appeared. He handed the rubber gasket down to Ryan, who was making sure the goggles were comfortable on his head and over his eye.

  “Stick your head through and attach this to the indicated points around the cockpit.” He pointed them out, and Ryan clipped the gasket in from the underside. When he was done, it looked like his head was floating on a sea of black rubber.

  “Okay, we’ve got the base blueprints all ready to go in here, so all you’ll have to do is follow our directions, and we’ll home you in on that pod. Once I seal the hatch again, the liquid’s going to come out of that tube near your mouth...” Ricky paused, as if the gravity of what they were doing had just sunk in. “I’ve never done this before, Ryan.”

  “That makes two of us.” Ryan looked back up at the teenager. “You’re doing great, Ricky. Keep going. What else do I need to know?”

  “Well, the manual says that you shouldn’t try to hold your breath, but I expect that’ll be kind of natural at first. Basically, just breathe in and out as normally as you can. It says your body will adjust, although you’ll have to work harder at breathing, ’cause it’s a liquid. The important thing is not to panic, because you can’t thrash around in here—way too dangerous, both for you, and for us.”

  “Okay. Anything else?”

  “Yes. You won’t be able to talk to us once the liquid fills your lungs—something about it putting pressure on the larynx, so you can’t make noise. You’ll be able to hear us, however, and there’s a button on the right side of the suit—” Ricky grimaced as a high-pitched tone sounded. “Good, you found it. Like I was saying, that’ll allow you to make a tone. One beep for yes, two for no. J.B.’ll be up top, and I’ll be monitoring you from below. If it looks like something’s going wrong, hit the button and hold it down. We’ll get you out as fast as we can. The most important thing to remember is simply to breathe. Everything else should be easy after that.”

  “Sure—for you.” Ryan grinned at the young man, looking at him through the goggles. “If there’s nothing else, seal it up and let’s go.”

  “You got it. Closing the hatch now.”

  The shadow fell over Ryan again as Ricky sealed him in. Ryan took a deep breath, feeling the faint stirring of unease at the idea of soon being completely immersed in liquid he was somehow supposed to suck into his lungs in order to breathe.

  “Okay, Ryan, you’re good to go,” Ricky said from the ground in front of him. “We’re going to start the liquid flow now. Remember, don’t fight it and breathe.”

  “I’ll do my best,” he replied. “Hit it.”

  There was a moment’s pause, then the light blue liquid began dribbling into the chamber around his head. It smelled like ozone as it quickly covered the rubber and began rising. Soon it covered Ryan’s chin, then his nose, then his eye. Trying to keep his breathing normal, he instinctively raised his face to keep it out of the liquid, but just as quickly realized that it wasn’t going to help, and lowered it into the stuff again.

  By now the liquid had risen over his head, matting his hair to his skull. Ryan felt the pressure building in his lungs, and decided to try to help the process along by emptying them. He exhaled as long as he could, feeling the burn intensify as his cells began demanding oxygen. Try as he might, however, he couldn’t force his mouth open until there was no choice.

  With a cool gush, the liquid poured down his trachea, making him gasp and choke as it began filling his lungs. Ryan whipped his head from side to side, fighting the rising panic inside him. It wasn’t happening—his lungs weren’t making the switch to breathe the liquid. He groped for the button, about to press it and have the guys try to get him out before he drowned in this stuff when—

  Inhaling deeply, Ryan took a breath. A thick, wet breath, but a breath nonetheless. It was so unexpected that he stopped moving for a moment and did it again.

  It felt strange, as if he were breathing through a soaked, gloppy pillow. But he was breathing, and that was the important part.

  And now that he was, he could hear urgent voices outside. “—need to get him out now!” That was Krysty talking.

  “He hasn’t given the signal yet—” J.B. began.

  “I don’t give a good nuking shit if he hasn’t, I want him out—�
�

  Ryan found the button and pressed it once, then again.

  “Two for ‘no,’” Ricky said, relief evident in his voice. “You all right in there, Ryan?”

  Beep.

  “Bet that feels weird, huh?” Ricky asked.

  Beep.

  “You ready to go outside?”

  Beep.

  “All right, then, follow me.”

  With Ricky guiding him, Ryan came out of the hoist, slowly turned and headed for the large airlock. When he was inside, Ricky stood in front of him.

  “The good news is that you’ve got plenty of time,” the teenager said. “A full hour of air, and the suit can run for about twelve, so you don’t have to rush it. I’m going to leave, then the door behind you will close, water will come in, and the outer door will open. Beep if you understand.”

  Beep.

  “All right. Vaya con Dios, Ryan.”

  Ricky ran out of the airlock, leaving Ryan alone as the heavy door closed behind him. For a moment, there was nothing but silence, broken only by the faint wheeze of Ryan taking a breath. Then he heard Ricky again.

  “Here it comes, Ryan.”

  With a deafening whoosh, the outer door cracked open, and the black ocean flooded in.

  Chapter Seventeen

  A black, liquid wall rushed at him. It was so fast that Ryan thought it might knock him off his feet, but the suit just stood, heavy and immobile, as the sea swirled around it.

  Almost before he knew it, the room was full. The suit’s exterior lights came on automatically, showing him water, water, and more water.

  “Everything all right, Ryan?” Ricky’s voice asked.

  Beep.

  Taking a deep, hard breath of liquid oxygen, Ryan lifted his leg and stepped forward. Then he did it with his left foot. A few more steps and he stood at the edge of the airlock.

  He looked out onto a barren wasteland. As far as his lights could penetrate the murk, there was nothing but light gray sand everywhere. Or maybe it was dust, Ryan wasn’t sure. He cautiously lifted a leg and stepped onto the floor outside, ready to retreat if his leg sank into the ocean floor.

  It went down about two inches and stopped. Ryan gradually leaned forward, putting more weight on the leg, not knowing what to expect—if it would hold or if he would sink in up to his neck and be stuck there until his air ran out.

  The surface held. Ryan brought his other leg out and stood on the ocean floor, more than a mile below the surface.

  “We can see that you’ve left the airlock. Everything still all right so far?” Ricky asked.

  Ryan looked around. Beep.

  “Okay, you’re going to want to turn to face north, on a heading of 287 degrees,” Ricky said. “You’ll be going approximately seventy yards out. Beep if you understand.”

  Beep. Using the suit’s internal compass, Ryan found the heading easily and trudged off. There were no obvious signs of life down here, not even the tiny bits of plankton and other small animals that usually made up these sorts of aquatic ecosystems. There was just Ryan and the seemingly endless, gray plain all around him.

  Or was there? A flash of movement on the rear camera caught Ryan’s attention, but he saw nothing there when he looked up at it. He couldn’t be sure, but he got the impression that whatever was out there was pretty large. He took a moment to look around, but nothing showed up in the vicinity of his lights. With a last glance at the rear camera, he began moving forward.

  It was slow going. Walking in the suit in the maintenance room had been one thing, but it was entirely different out here, like wading through a sea of constantly shifting molasses that buffeted him with every step. It wasn’t bad, but he was certainly aware of the currents, even all the way down here.

  “Looks like you’re about halfway there. Beep us when you get to the pod.”

  Beep. As he responded to Ricky, Ryan spotted the movement again in his rear quarter. This time he turned, just in time to see a large, black wriggling eel-type creature smack into his viewport and wrap its body, as thick as his waist, around the upper torso of the suit. A circular mouth, easily the diameter of Ryan’s head, fastened itself to the window and began rasping at it with rows of teeth as long as his pinky finger.

  Lamprey!

  Ryan had lots of experience with the parasitic fish, but he’d thought they only kept to fresh waters and had no idea they could exist at this depth.

  The mutated versions of these fish were several times as large as their normal ancestors and extremely aggressive. Ryan remembered the ones he’d encountered in Canada and knew them to be efficient killers.

  Although the huge lamprey was trying its best to penetrate the three-inch-thick glass, it wasn’t getting anywhere. Ryan reached up with his right arm, shoving the giant predator partly off him, and punched the gripper deep into the slimy fish’s body. Once it was inside, he opened the clamp, making a kind of internal hook to keep the monster in place.

  It writhed and squirmed but couldn’t free itself. Ryan brought his left arm over and sank that into the fish’s upper body, as well, just behind the head. After he’d opened that clamp, too, he went for the head itself with his right, driving into the flesh and in effect, ripping the eel’s head completely off. The body drifted off to settle on the ocean floor a few yards away. Ryan flexed his clamps, trying to get the sticky remains off the metal, with limited success. When he was clean enough, he realigned himself on the right course and resumed his march.

  “Ryan, are you okay?”

  Beep.

  He was unmolested the rest of the way, and soon the dome of the other pod appeared out of the darkness. Ryan took a moment to look back. There was no sign of a tunnel connecting this pod to the rest of the base, just his tracks in the silt. It was as if it had never existed in the first place.

  That was odd, but not truly worrying. Ryan was much more concerned about reaching the airlock and finding it broken or unpowered. He sure didn’t want to have to try to find the blasted manual override out here if he could avoid it.

  “Ryan? Have you found the other pod yet?” Ricky asked.

  Beep.

  “Are you inside?”

  Beep. Beep. Getting close enough to see the smooth, unbroken wall, Ryan turned right and began following it. After about a dozen steps, he came to the airlock, and spotted the green button that, he hoped, would still open the door. He reached out with his left arm, squinting through the liquid oxygen goo at the controls. When he was pretty sure he had it lined up, he leaned forward and pressed the button.

  For a moment, nothing happened, and Ryan’s heart started rising into his throat. Then, with a puff of gray sand, the door began to rise.

  Come on, come on, he thought. Do not get stuck, you bastard....

  And it didn’t. Even so, Ryan only stepped into the water-filled room once he was certain that it was open completely. Seeing the matching set of door controls on this wall next to the door, he hit them and stepped back as the door closed.

  The moment it hit the ground, the water around him churned and bubbled as it began to recede. Soon it swirled around his waist, then his knees as it drained out through grates in the floor. The inner door stood before him, and Ryan marched toward it, hitting his signal button as he did so.

  Beep.

  “Are you inside?”

  Beep. Ryan hit the button to open the inner door. He flexed his fingers impatiently while waiting for it to rise, making the clamps click open and closed.

  The door stopped moving, and he immediately stepped forward, ready for anything. The main room was dark and empty. There was no furniture here, just eight heavy doors arranged in a circle around the room.

  “Unauthorized personnel in escape-pod bay. Identify yourself.”

  The computer’s voice made Ryan start inside the suit. The warning and identification request repeated itself in the silent room. Ryan ignored it and began checking out the doors.

  Walking to the first one, he bent to peer through the small po
rthole. He was pretty sure he saw an empty docking bay for some kind of escape pod on the other side. He strode to the next one, finding it empty, as well. He went down the line. Each one he came to was empty.

  By the time he’d checked six of them, he was really starting to worry. In the seventh, however, he found what he was looking for. The escape pod was still snug in its berth. From what he could see, it looked ready to go. There was even a sign next to it: Poseidon Base Escape Pod #7. Capacity: 10.

  Ryan checked on the eighth, only to find that something had damaged it, smashing a huge dent in the top and breaching the hull, leaving an ugly gash in it. It was useless. He took one last, slow look around the room before heading back to the airlock. As he did, one thought kept running through his mind.

  Only one shot at getting out....

  Ryan hit the control to cycle the door closed. As he did, AIDAN spoke once more. “Unauthorized personnel in escape pod bay. Identify yourself.”

  With a grin, Ryan pressed his signal button again as the door descended.

  Beep! Beep!

  * * *

  “ONLY ONE POD left?” J.B. asked.

  “One that looked like it’d still work,” Ryan replied. “The only other one left was right next to it, but it got smashed somehow. It’s useless.”

  They were all back in the maintenance bay. Ryan, bathed in sweat, toweled the liquid oxygen from his skin and hair as he told the others what he’d found. Coming out of the suit had been worse than going in, with him coughing and hacking up the remaining liquid in his lungs for a couple of minutes. Finally, however, he was done and sat back on his haunches, a pool of liquid oxygen on the floor in front of him.

  “Sounds like a bunch of the crew got off the base,” Mildred said.

  “Mebbe...or mebbe AIDAN jettisoned the pods to keep the crew here,” J.B. replied, thinking about the repeated warning Ryan had told them he’d heard in the pod bay.

  “You think it would actually do that?” Krysty asked.

  “I wouldn’t put it past the thing,” he replied.