Ocean on Top

I made little progress with the rolling. They’d gotten some knots into the system already, and it looked as though I were there to stay. I managed to make a half turn, getting what had been the tank’s bottom when I was caught swung up to the top, but it didn’t do me a bit of good. The meshes wound around the tank even more tightly during the turn.

I was a little above the sub by that time — as I said, they’d trimmed it to rise a little more slowly than the tank — and the tension on the line co

I didn’t find out. The uninjured man towed his companion to the little vessel, opened its main hatch, and after some trouble got him inside. Up to that point we’d still been raising. Now it appeared that the sub was putting on more weight, for the line tightened and my pressure gauge reversed its direction once more. However, the sub, which had leveled off after the men got on board, now went down

badly by the stern. Evidently the off-center lift through the net line was more than could be countered by shunting ballast, at least if enough total weight was in the tanks to maintain a descent. Apparently there was a higher priority attached to bringing me back than to keeping the boat level. I watched, with my fingers crossed, hoping the line would give.

It didn’t, but someone’s patience did. Maybe the swimmer I had hit was seriously injured, though I hoped not; but whatever the cause, whoever was now ru

He suddenly cast off rope, net, and all, and disappeared in a few seconds. I was alone at last, bound once more for the surface. It was almost an anticlimax.

It was also quite a letdown. The dogfight, if you could call it that, had lasted only ten or fifteen minutes in all and certainly hadn’t involved me in much physical labor, but I felt as though I’d just done ten rounds with someone a couple of classes above my weight.

Now I was safe. There wasn’t a prayer of their finding me again without sonar, with no one hanging outside to broadcast sound waves from my own hull, and with my lights out — I hastily turned them out as that thought crossed my mind. I had less than two thousand feet to go — not much over ten minutes, unless the drag of the net and line made too much difference. I watched the gauges for a while and decided that they didn’t, and for the first time since I’d left the surface I fell asleep.

Chapter Seven

I was awakened by being tossed around; the storm was still on. More specifically, I was awakened by being cracked on the head by a corner of the control panel.

It wasn’t hard enough to damage either the panel or my skull, but it was uncomfortable. So was the whole situation. Riding up and down on fifteen-foot waves is bad enough in a stable boat, but in a nearly spherical container which has practically no preference for a definite up and down it is infinitely worse. I’ve been in free fall in space, which is no joke, but I’ll take it again any time before being a human volleyball in the middle of even a modest-sized Pacific storm. That was one thing they hadn’t bothered too much about when they designed the submarine escape shells. The idea was to get to the surface rather than to be comfortable afterward. All I could do was turn on the rescue broadcaster and try to keep my stomach in place.

I couldn’t even be sure anyone was receiving it—the broadcast, I mean. It was a good bet that they were, since my return was certainly expected. But several good bets had failed to pay off already.

I couldn’t even sleep. Fortunately I’d had enough sense not to eat when the idea had occurred a while back, so I couldn’t do what my stomach wanted most to do just then. I couldn’t do anything. The whole situation was as bad physically as the original descent had been mentally,

But there’s no point trying to make it any clearer; I might succeed.

I did wish I’d taken the trouble to find out how long the storm was due to last. Then I might have gotten some comfort from an occasional glance at the clock. As things were, I quickly found that it was better not to look at it; the time since the last look was always so much less than I’d guessed. As it turned out, I should have watched some of the other instruments, though their reading would have been no comfort either — and there would have been nothing to do about them.

I would never have believed that the end of that motion could have been anything but a relief. If anyone had told me that it would make me feel worse, I’d have used violence on him for fear he might convince me. Unfortunately, he’d have been perfectly right. The end came much too suddenly.

The first motion to stop was the rolling. The tank still bobbed up and down, but seemed to have acquired a definite top and bottom. Then the vertical oscillation also decreased, and finally stopped. By that time there was nothing more the pressure gauge could tell me, but I looked at it anyway.

I was right. The tank was going down again.

There was one thing I didn’t have to worry about; it wasn’t a case of ordinary sinking. The only hollow space which gave the tank its buoyancy was the one I was in, and if that had been leaking I’d have known it already. No, I was being pulled down; and granting that there are such things as giant squids, I didn’t for an instant think that one of them was responsible. The sonar monitor was dark now, but maybe it hadn’t been for the last hour or so — I wouldn’t have— known.

There was only one reasonable explanation. I looked down, not knowing what I really hoped to see and didn’t see very much; the sub wasn’t bothering with lights. I turned on my own, but could see only the single line, taut now, leading from the net which was now thoroughly tangled around me to a vague bulk just on the edge of visibility.

The line, it may be remarked, was quite strong enough for what it had to do; we were descending much faster than my original ballast had carried me down. If the owners of that rope were prepared to trust it under such stress, I saw no point in doubting their judgment. I didn’t even bother to hope it would break. I calculated that I’d be on the bottom in twenty minutes or so, and let it go at that.

At least, I could eat now. I began to absorb a dextrose pill with such calmness as I could collect. There was nothing else to do; they had me.

We were still several hundred feet from the bottom when company showed up. Two more subs, brightly lighted, hove into view. They were work machines similar to the one I’d had trouble with a few hours before. If they were in communication with the one which had me in tow, it was by means of something none of my instruments could pick up. They probably were, since their maneuvers were perfectly coordinated. First one and then the other newcomer swung close beside me, and each used its ‘hands” to hang several hooked slugs of metal into my net. These weights took nearly all the stress off the tow rope and removed any hope there might have been of its breaking at the last moment.

Then a swimmer slipped out of each boat and took station beside me, saving themselves work by holding onto the net too. I flicked my lights on for a moment, but couldn’t recognize either face. I began to wonder about the fellow I’d hit and what his friends might think about it if I’d hurt him really seriously. The human mind sometimes goes off on fu