Watersleep

by James Axler

  Brosnan left first. Ryan noted his rapid exit, and remembered the man's hopes of being on the surface long before Ryan could make the journey by swim­ming with the air tank.

  Best time's the right time, went through his mind. Dean said that sometimes.

  His son. Ryan wondered if the boy would think this kind of operation was the "hot pipe" of excitement he was always searching for when they traveled.

  Ryan exited the submarine into the watery un­known

  .

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Now that Ryan was out of the submarine, the trick would be keeping himself from surfacing too quickly. He had no desire to give himself a crippling case of the bends. No, unlike Brosnan, he would have to go slow, and not outrun the stream of air bubbles coming from the mouthpiece he held in his teeth. There was no rushing this sort of thing, and he was resigned to the long swim to the surface.

  Even though the temperature of the ocean sur­rounding him wasn't freezing, it was still cold enough to make him wish he had taken an extra moment to dress himself in the sleek black wet suit he'd found on top of the scuba gear in Poseidon's footlocker.

  Outside the submarine, there was no light. He waited, paddling in place while keeping the darker hull of the sub in his line of vision. His eye had to adjust, but there was murk on top of murk. The depths of the ocean were as black as the womb. Ryan thumbed on the flashlight, but even the steady stream of light punching a path through the gloom couldn't truly provide what was needed, and that was a sense of direction.

  No time to think about that. Ryan kicked his feet and began to push himself upward, struggling against the water pressure weighing down upon his head. There was a roaring in his ears as he left the sub's black shape behind.

  Ryan's throat felt tight. He felt a rush of claustro­phobia, which was strange for two reasons. First of all, he normally didn't suffer from the affliction. Sec­ondly he'd been held within the confines of the sink­ing Raleigh with no problem.

  Still, this sensation wasn't totally alien to him. It felt almost familiar somehow.

  Then he remembered.

  The dream. The vision. The nightmare he'd suf­fered days earlier during the jump into the Florida redoubt. Ryan grimly sucked dry air from the oxygen tank strapped to his back, and the taste grew more and more metallic, as if the tank were almost empty.

  He extinguished the thought. Paranoia would in­duce panic. He'd checked the tank himself. The charge was true. Breath easy. Push up.

  Ryan's chest echoed heavily with the dull thud of a waterlogged pump, each heartbeat a resounding contraction of muscle in his body. He watched the bubbles from his mouthpiece float upward, capturing them in the light of the flashlight. He used the beam to follow their path with his good right eye, tracking them until they faded into the gloom, and tried to focus on what might lie beyond them up there.

  He knew what he would find. There was no sky overhead. No clouds, no stars…nothing but water. He squinted, and took in the sight of the infinite green of the ocean. No lake or man-made pool had ever offered up such a color of green, a green duskier than the blackest of any moonless night, and just as dark and infinite.

  The green was everywhere, surrounding his entire body and being.

  In the dream, Ryan had been warm. That part of the mat-trans-induced mental journey was a false­hood. He'd known the ocean depths would be as cold as ice, and now he found he was incredibly cold, for there was no sun. No sky.

  Only water. Only death.

  Ryan willed his legs to kick, his arms to push down to check his descent, push past the strange eellike creatures that were swimming past, their mouths yawning open as they sifted through the brine for mi­croscopic bits of plankton.

  Push past the sinking hull of the submarine.

  A red haze was starting to lay itself over his field of vision from lack of oxygen. True or imagined? He couldn't be sure. Ryan was tired, so tired now. A coppery, bitter taste filled his mouth, mixing with the traces of salt water.

  A man always has a choice, came the grizzled voice of the Trader, whispering in Ryan's ear. He can either live…or he can die.

  As his lungs began to ache and his heartbeat grew even louder in his ears, Krysty's face shone like a beacon in Ryan's mind's eye. He thought of his son, Dean, and how he wanted to see the boy become a man. He thought of J.B., who was like a brother to him. He thought of Doc and his endless supply of quotes and stories; of Mildred's love of people and knowledge of how to heal; and of Jak's unwavering trust and willingness to follow him into anything.

  He thought of them all.

  Ryan decided to ante up the jack and buy the pack­age. He knew from previous experiences he was psi-sensitive. If he'd been exposed to some kind of bi­zarre doomie prophecy back in the gateway, then he was going to see it through.

  As he had during his nightmare, he willingly clung to the image of Krysty—her lips, her body, her hair undulating in reaction to her many moods. But this time, he also clung to the images of his entire family. His friends. Or, as Poseidon had contemptuously re­ferred to Ryan's group back at Kings Point, "his peo­ple."

  Ryan struggled to make his body work, willing his muscles to pull taut and assist his ascent. In a burst of movement, he was rewarded with his legs kicking out and his arms pushing down. How many feet down? Four hundred? He unbuckled the web belt and released one of the weights strapped around his waist. Four hundred feet? Not far to go.

  Up and out. Focus. Focus.

  Something brushed against his ankle, then grabbed down hard.

  Ryan was so startled, he almost spit out his mouth­piece. As he turned back, valiantly striving to keep his sense of direction intact, he saw a humanoid shape near his feet. Fireblast! Had that son of a bitch Po­seidon gotten up with half of his head stove in and managed to follow him out here, as well? Or was it Brosnan, his hood having not functioned as planned?

  He swung down his torch and the sickly yellow flashlight beam revealed the face of a Dweller. Ryan felt a cautious rush of relief mixed with fear. Why was the mutie fishman down here? And did the mu­tant know Ryan wasn't one of Poseidon's men?

  Shit on a dinner plate, how could he even begin to explain it?

  Then Ryan realized he knew this mutie.

  This was the one Shauna had called Mike, the one who had saved them after Poseidon's mine had ripped into their boat during the storm.

  Mike gestured, and Ryan followed with the flash­light, revealing a half dozen other Dwellers swim­ming at an angle above them. They were busy with Brosnan's body, tearing the former follower of Po­seidon limb from limb, their incredible strength hit­ting home to Ryan for the first time.

  One of Brosnan's arms drifted lazily by, trailing blood, dark black streamers extending off into the twilight depths. Ryan saw a flash of white bone, and he aimed the flashlight down farther. He hadn't par­ticularly liked Brosnan, but the man had given Ryan a fair shake in revealing the escape trunk. Ryan had no desire to stare at pieces of his burst and dismem­bered corpse.

  They'd both gotten a fighting chance, but Brosnan was unfortunately the first man out of the trunk, and he possessed no such hidden advantage as Ryan did in having previously met one of the aquatic mutations who wanted to kill him. Who knew how long they had been dwelling here for this opportunity, day and night, watching for an attack to approach from below to wipe out their homes and the homes of their friends on land?

  Waiting to defend it the only way they knew how.

  Ryan almost laughed, suddenly understanding now how the reactor had blown up without the radiation rippling out and chilling them all. The Dwellers had seen the massive sub coming toward that part of the coast, and they'd used one of Poseidon's own mag­netic mines against him.

  Mike was no longer holding Ryan's ankle in his misshapen flipper of a hand. Ryan wondered if this was how he would perish, alone in the darkness, flail­ing out at the muties who now called this part of the ocean their home. The muties who had abandoned their eager
ripping at Brosnan were now slowly sur­rounding him, one by one.

  Ryan took a deep breath. The air coming into the mouthpiece really did taste foul.

  The muties had now circled him, and he moved the flash from one to another, their eyes glowing yellow in the feeble light.

  He realized he wasn't afraid of them; he hadn't caused them harm.

  Twenty-four hours ago, the world had been an en­tirely different place. Ryan hadn't particularly cared if he lived or died, but that was before he'd learned that Krysty was alive, deliciously alive and whole.

  He wanted to feel her touch again.

  IF ONE HAD BEEN PRESENT on the water above, he would have heard Ryan before seeing him.

  Air bubbles from his tank erupted on the surface of the calm sea in a series of burbles and pops before Ryan's head broke free from the ocean. The first thing he saw was the brightly colored naval emergency raft floating in the moonlight. He had almost forgotten sending it up.

  The Dwellers, their attention on both the sinking Raleigh and the escaped Brosnan, had allowed the raft Ryan had shoved out of the hatch to arrive safe and unharmed on the water's surface.

  Ryan nearly hadn't made it back. The precious oxygen in the tank had gotten more and more metallic as he struggled upward, his arms and legs becoming increasingly leaden as he struggled to keep moving, keep swimming. Mike had pushed and prodded Ryan onward, even pulling him the last stretch of the jour­ney.

  Ryan had been completely lost. He had no idea at any given time how close he actually was to the sur­face, as the night sky above offered no comforting sunlight to those below.

  The mutie had led Ryan up through the darkness of the ocean safely, and now the weary warrior stretched out as well as he could manage on the rub­bery canvas floor of the raft. He mused he was almost getting used to the sensations of trying to be com­fortable in a life raft when the queer face of the mutie that had saved his life appeared, staring at him.

  "What, you want a thank-you or something?" Ryan gasped.

  The Dweller nodded.

  "Manners are manners," Ryan replied with a weak laugh. "Thanks."

  Mike waved once, and like a dropped stone dis­appeared from sight.

  Ryan gratefully swallowed down the fresh sea air while unfastening the weight belt, then the air tank. For a moment, he almost started to save the gear, until realizing he'd never have use for it again. He dropped both into the water next to him, where they promptly began the long journey back down to the ocean's floor.

  "Good fucking riddance," Ryan muttered.

  "SOMETHING OFF the starboard bow, John," Mildred said. "I saw movement. Looks like something's float­ing out there."

  "'Starboard'?" J.B. repeated. "Since when did you become so conversant with the lingo?"

  "When in Rome, I guess," Mildred replied. "I watched a lot of TV as a kid."

  Krysty turned on a large spotlight that was mounted at the front of the cruiser's cabin and illuminated a round circle of the water in the direction Mildred had pointed, but she knew what she would find even be­fore the raft was revealed.

  "It's Ryan," the redhead breathed, then added with more authority, "Ryan's out there."

  "Dad!" Dean cried joyfully, pointing at the bob­bing life raft in the distance.

  Ryan saw the approaching boat and waved the flashlight back.

  "Could be anybody. Could be Admiral Poseidon. Could be another one of those scaly Dwellers. Who could tell from here?" J.B. muttered quietly but with­out conviction. If Krysty said it was Ryan, then the Armorer would take her word for it. He felt a stir of excitement as he steered the sleek craft toward the spot Dean had pointed out.

  Krysty and Jak reached down and grabbed the neck of Ryan's tattered shirt to help steady him at the side of the boat as they pulled up and over.

  "Welcome back, lover," Krysty said, her flushed cheeks and anxious green eyes belying her light tone. "Decide to go for a swim without me?"

  "Uh-huh. Come on in," Ryan rasped back. "The water's fine."

  She smiled down at him, tears starting to run down her cheeks. Ryan took her hand, smiling back in re­turn. Then, exhausted beyond all limits of human en­durance, he closed his eye in confidence, knowing she would watch over him and would still be there when he woke up.

  Epilogue

  Down in the watery depths, down farther than human eyes could see and human lungs could breathe, down farther still, deep on the hidden floor of the black ocean rests the wreckage of man.

  Sunlight can penetrate a full half mile into the sea, feeble light that didn't even come close to where the crushed hull of the USS Raleigh rested. Paper-thin creatures drifted past, blind in the dark. No bubbles of air escaped the many fissures where the welds of the plating of the once mighty submarine had given way.

  The Raleigh and her crew were dead.

  A man trapped down there would implode, fold inward on himself from the pressure. No human could survive such a crushing defeat. Poseidon had been wrong. He was no lord of the sea. He was a man, and man, despite his inventions and scientific magic that allowed him to travel beneath the sea, belonged on the land, not down there in the deep.

  But what about a man who took the name of a god and caressed the three-pronged trident of power and dared to emulate the most fearsome of Olympians and shake storms of radioactive dust from his own great beard, claiming the title of Admiral and the command of his followers that went with the title. What about him?

  Listen close—there were no sounds here, yet still, there was a tapping.

  Down there, where there was no air, one man drank deep of the ocean and still lived.

  Down there, in the silence, one man raged on…

  Not dead.

  Not yet.