Diving Deep

by P D Singer

  “You don’t need to. And we’re not penetrating deeply if at all—we don’t know the layout.” Bobby pulled the conversation back to something more nearly neutral, bless him. “But you can go back down this afternoon, help with the exterior survey.”

  Stuart nodded, and the tension subsided in the room once they got back to technical issues. Lee poured more tea all around, which gave the men something to concentrate on besides Eddy, who ought to have been draining like a colander from his companions’ laser glares.

  Bobby lost his ferociousness in the rustle of laminated sheets of bottom times and deco stops. “If we wait another two hours to go in again, we can stay down….”

  Oh yeah, Bobby was all in on this, his face shining, the tip of his tongue showing in his concentration. He traced a line of times and depths with a fingertip, debating furiously with Darrell and Chuck about maximum bottom times after a generally shallower dive.

  The GoPro video begged to be watched again, but Lee wouldn’t hit replay. They’d seen enough to know they needed to see more, and they’d all popped boners when the conning tower showed flat to the sea bed. Lee slipped out of the lounge, leaving his divers to their calculations. He owed Johnny Ray Slidell big-time for putting that intensity on Bobby’s face and aboard his boat. He climbed the stairs to the wheelhouse. The horizon rose and fell, empty of other vessels.

  “Bottom Hunter to Tracy Bolden,” he hailed through the shortwave radio. The Tracy Bolden was nowhere to be seen, but Johnny Ray wouldn’t overfish prime territory. Not even if the slight overcast and the easy swell made this the perfect spot to drop lines today.

  “How’s it hanging, Lee?” came back at him through pops and crackles.

  “Pretty fair, I’d say.” Fucking amazing was more like it, not that Lee’d say that on an open circuit. “Might even have something to show you.”

  “Is that so?” A smile transmitted perfectly well through the ether. “I’ll look forward to that.”

  “Hey, I wanna see too.” A new but all-too-familiar voice rasped through the speakers.

  “Why don’t you wait to be asked?” Lee needed another dive captain butting in like the Bottom Hunter needed a hole in her hull.

  “Still pissed about that grate on the Andrea Doria, huh?” Bert Guldbrandsen’s laughter put paid to any further conversation with Johnny Ray, no matter how cagily Lee phrased things.

  He refreshed the surface radar, horribly certain he’d find the Tech Tach chugging up beside them. The sweeping hand showed no close company, but Lee’d take no chances. His automatic identification system hadn’t suddenly activated, which mattered nothing when Tech Tach could run as silently. “Fuck off, Bert.”

  “Why you gotta be like that?” didn’t merit an answer. Guldbrandsen’s laughter echoed long after Lee flicked the radio silent.

  Chapter 10

  BELOW AGAIN, with his camera mounted on his wrist this time, Bobby headed directly to the conning tower, flanked by two of his diving companions. If there was an easy way in, he’d find it here. Or in the blast damage, but…. He’d try the conning tower first. It was deepest, right? Had to start with the deepest part of his dive and ascend gradually.

  His breathing loud in his ears, Bobby reached out to touch the hull. Where were the hatches under the tons of barnacles and anemones? Could a long-ago submariner have left one open? If the men were hurrying to escape, they’d leave through an engineered opening. The gaps in the hull he’d investigated so far led into machinery, nothing he’d try without scouting a different route first.

  Stuart brushed a dozen shrimp away from something that caught his eye. Bobby aimed his camera there, watching Stuart clean the loosely attached sea life away, though the barnacles might not move without dynamite. The sharp shells could slice right through neoprene gloves. Stuart moved in slow motion, testing his grip on an encrusted door pull.

  Awright! This might be the way in. Bobby fished a short pry bar out of his leg pocket. Stuart backed away enough to let Bobby take a tool to the handle. Yanking on it didn’t swing the hatch open. Was that because of the encrustation around the edges of the door or a latch on the inside? Not like Bobby hadn’t scraped more than his share of barnacles off his work surfaces, but that was a time-consuming job, and expensive in terms of oxygen. Not something he’d try with tanks on a first encounter.

  Latch? Stuart asked with a twisting hand motion. Bobby nodded, and they started groping for a nearby handle. There had to be a way to get the door open from the outside, right? Or would it be a recessed handle, hidden by sharp guardians?

  They found nothing to twist or turn—what they sought would need to be scouted on models and in pictures, or they’d be scraping large swaths of sea life off for no good reason. Not a great use of time. Bobby kicked away from the conning tower out into the current. Wasn’t too bad here, just enough to keep him finning in place. He wanted to get a panoramic view of the tower because every type of sub had something a little different, and if his Jane’s was back on shore, he’d know more once he cracked the pages. The flat nav platform and the remnant of a gun protruded. What had that gun shot at, and what had it hit?

  Stuart marked the handle with a length of pink plastic tape and kicked out to join Bobby. Drawing a circle around the tower with a gloved forefinger, he waited for Bobby’s signal and swam off. In the distance, more shadowy companions explored the hull. The flat upper surface had beckoned most of them, though Eddy and Chuck planned to check out the rudders and propellers. They’d gathered enough intel from Bobby’s first footage to know which end was the stern.

  Bobby circled the tower, noting the bent periscope and the exposed snorkel. He couldn’t find the slot in the deck where the snorkel would rest while the sub was underway on the surface or running on the electric engines. Probably overflowing with sponges and pale corals. Had the snorkel been up when the sub met its fate, or had impact jolted the pipe out of its housing? How had this boat and its men died?

  The summons from his wrist sent him ascending, at least to the upper curve of the sub. See, Lee? I’m diving the plan. He had thirty-eight minutes to investigate before dragging himself away, and the impact area was a few short strokes. The strobe on the nearest anchor line flashed fretfully at the far reaches of his visibility. Finning himself along at a near crawl along the depression, he searched for entry into the hull.

  The industrial-powered flash he aimed into the breach he’d found earlier painted shadows against the irregular surface inside. He’d have to learn this design by heart—how else to interpret the twisted metal and damaged bulkheads? How else would he know where to look for the clues to this boat’s identity? He fanned the light through the breach, braced for the eerie grin of a lost submariner. Hard to blame Stuart for not wanting any part of exploring inside. But no one gave him a ghostly welcome. A juvenile black bass flicked itself into the darkness. Bobby thrust his arm in, holding the flash, panning around to let his camera find the details he couldn’t get near. Two complete circuits used up most of his bottom time—was there another opening here?

  A breach he’d passed right over on his first descent came clear. Kent was investigating—a section of hull moved under his hands. Bulky in his gear, but too buoyant to have much weight, he pushed down. A long crack grew wider. Bobby came to lend a hand. Or something—shoving hard against the sharp mollusks would rip his gloves and then his hands. He was cold enough he might not feel the damage for a while. Best not to risk it—he aimed his pry bar end first at the hull.

  The section buckled under their combined weights; the crack became a chasm. Eighteen inches or so. Still not enough to get a diver through, but if it moved this far, it might move farther. What could they manage with three or more to move the plating? This section couldn’t be well attached to the rest of the boat. If they had equipment…. Where in the interior did this lead?

  Kent worked his pry bar into the gap, stabilizing it for the moment. Bobby peered inside with flash and camera. So much dangling stuff—bars
, joists, pipes. Getting in would mean avoiding a ton of hazards waiting to foul a diver. And once they got in, what had been narrow passages when the boat was in operation could be smashed into impassible tubes—or not. Think positive. But how many pipes did this boat have? Ten million? And all right at the rip in the hull?

  Kent tapped his wrist—yeah, they’d used all their bottom time for this dive. Plus the cold water had frozen his few square centimeters of exposed skin and was working on his extremities. Another seven minutes at eighty feet and he’d be a Popsicle for sure.

  Two more companions gathered at the anchor line, and up they went. Conversation would be short with no more communication than a few words on a white board.

  ??? was easy enough to understand. Bobby scribbled, Closed hatch. Nods all around.

  Gash in hull, Kent contributed.

  Damage aft, Darrell wrote. Big.

  Looked like they could get in, one way or another. The heat of that knowledge kept Bobby warm all the way to the surface.

  THEY’D PROBABLY all be talking at once and at the tops of their lungs if they weren’t half-congealed, but everyone had something to cheer about. Finally herded into the lounge with enough hot liquids to start thawing, the divers ran their footage through the big screen.

  “Oh my God” was the consensus on the damage aft, where a torpedo tube lay open to the ocean. The hull had peeled away in the long-ago and forgotten battle. The ordnance remained, covered with sponges, a dark tunnel leading in.

  “Is that big enough to get through?” Kent demanded, his eyes alight. “Or can we open the passage?”

  “Dunno. I’d like to know if the torpedo’s still live before I go bothering it.” Chuck took a deep swig of tea, his cup held in hands still white at the fingertips. “How long do those things need to soak before they’re safe? And how many of its brothers are still down there?”

  So many unanswered questions—for every detail they’d recorded, a dozen ideas needed consideration. “How do we get inside?” was at the top of everyone’s list.

  Bobby changed out cameras. “We didn’t get the hatch open, but….” They all watched the herky-jerky motions of trying to open the hatch, and held their breaths when Bobby shoved his arm through the gap. “Don’t know how secure that piece of hull is where we cranked it,” Bobby mused. “If we had a couple of jacks, we could keep the gap open a whole lot wider. I need twenty-seven inches of clearance to get through without scraping.”

  “I don’t need any clearance at all,” Stuart mumbled. “Not going in.”

  No one needed to ask why. Bobby’d panned around the interior of the sub trying to catch every angle. No question at all what the pale dome at the bottom was, even covered with silt.

  THEY’D WATCHED every scrap of their underwater footage a dozen times over, making notes, gabbling plans. Lee offered his own perspectives to a furiously intent Bobby, who’d nodded agreement, jotted more notes, and fretted out loud about books back on shore and not here where he needed them.

  This was Bobby as Lee remembered him, consumed totally in a project. This was Bobby as Lee wanted to remember him, willing to take his dive captain’s, once his dive partner’s, opinions into consideration. This might even be Bobby as Lee wished he’d be again, ready to take out his restless energy in sex until he could get below again.

  Lee would be more than happy to make sure Bobby slept well tonight.

  They’d broken for dinner only by putting their notes and dive planning aside, the talk turning to other dives with other friends. One too many stories about Rafe Chatham took the smile off Bobby’s face. Couldn’t let that escalate.

  “Okay, research time.” Lee dug through the box of bargain-bin DVDs. “Do we want Hunt for Red October or Das Boot?”

  “Das Boot, Das Boot!” came the near unanimous cry—he ignored a plea for “something funny.” There’d be bottles thrown if he loaded The Big Lebowski. With an apologetic shrug, he hit play and watched Stuart disappear below.

  “Going to check the weather” was Lee’s excuse for leaving, but he’d seen this movie more than a few times. Mostly in a boozy fog. Not a good setting—he could hear the liquor calling from the freezer, and the temptation to crack the seal grew stronger the longer he sat among the group. Kent and Chuck had beers, and Eddy headed to the fridge while the opening sequence played.

  The weather really did need checking.

  The instruments sent colored flashes of light into the dark wheelhouse. He settled himself into the captain’s chair and punched up the weather reports. A front way north, moving at…. Lee did some math and checked a chart. The winds would move in advance of the front—how long did they have before the seas grew too rough for divers?

  He needed a gauge. Groping in the chart case, he found his gauge, but his fingers pumped something round that rolled away from the impact.

  “Shit.” How had he forgotten? Maybe because he’d been half seas over when he’d dropped this time bomb?

  He didn’t—he couldn’t. The bottle lay cradled in his palm.

  This was the stupidest fucking thing he could have done. Had he left it a month ago? A year ago? The miniature bottle could have lain in wait for ages, but he’d come up here to avoid temptation.

  He could drink the damn thing right now, put it out of his misery. Get it over with. Fall off the wagon and not have to live with the grinding thirst that whispered how it was five o’clock somewhere. Just a few swallows. Nobody’d know. Bobby was below, watching a movie in the lounge. He’d be there for an hour or two. Plenty of time for the scent to fade, the taste to leave his mouth. He could brush his teeth. Gargle. Bobby’d never know. Bobby might kiss him and still never know.

  “How is the weather holding?”

  Fucking hell. Lee turned to see Bobby standing in the wheelhouse door. “Thought you were watching a movie?”

  “Eddy keeps yelling at me when I try to pause it on a good interior shot.” Bobby shrugged. “Thought I’d come hang with you instead.”

  What the hell was he going to do with this three-inch-long life-fucker-upper? “Just calculating how long before the front gets here.” Would darkness be enough shield? He slipped his closed hand into the chart box. “Need my gauge.”

  “That gauge lying on the table in front of you?”

  “Uh, yeah, that one.”

  Damn movie didn’t kill Bobby’s night vision, did it?

  “So what are you hiding?”

  Sure hadn’t damaged his bullshit detector.

  Lee pulled his hand out of the chart case. No help for it—not if he wanted any kind of trust to survive the next few moments. He showed Bobby the tiny liquor bottle. “It’s still sealed.”

  “That’s nice.” Bobby turned to leave.

  “Wait, Bobby!” Lee sprang from his chair. “I didn’t drink it. I wanted to, I found it, I didn’t know it was there, and yeah, I wanted to drink it, real bad, and I was thinking. Fighting with myself. And it’s still sealed.”

  “But you had it. Because that’s what addicts do, they protect their stash.” Bobby didn’t turn around.

  Trying to turn Bobby by force, Lee shook the bottle and nearly clobbered Bobby in the nose when he succeeded. “But see! Still sealed. I told you it’s a fight, Bobby. This is fucking hard, and it’s harder when you just turn your back on me. I forgot this was up here. I don’t know how long it’s been here. But I didn’t drink it, damn it!”

  “You were thinking about it, though. And you tried to hide it.” The softer his voice went, the worse the reproach.

  “I was afraid you’d react exactly like you’re reacting.” Maybe he should just punch Bobby in the face, get him to see sense by force. “You’re not supposed to go to jail for thinking, but you’ve got me tried and convicted already, and this damned bottle’s still sealed.”

  Fuck it. He could drink the whole thing, search the boat for any others he might have left in the nooks and the crannies. The engine room was full of hiding places. Or he could face another shi
tty night, made shittier by knowing it was Bobby’s last night aboard, ever. Or—

  Lee pushed past Bobby and went down two steps, far enough for a clear shot at the rail. He hurled the bottle at the water. The splash blended with the boat’s night noises, but his hands were empty. “There. Now I can’t drink it.”

  “How much more do you have hidden around the boat?”

  “I don’t remember.” Lee would have sworn the bottle in the freezer was the only one, but guess not. He’d have to search. “I should get rid of them all. I didn’t remember about that one.”

  “Do you want me to help you look?” Bobby’s voice brushed the dark. He took Lee’s arm to bring him back into the wheelhouse.

  “I’d say yes, but….” Meeting Bobby’s eyes was too hard. Lee stared at the flashing green radar screen.

  “Because then they wouldn’t be there anymore?”

  “Because you’d get madder and madder at me every time we found one.” Resting his hands on the back of the captain’s chair, Lee leaned over as if that would make the radar screen swim into focus through the unshed tears. “I am trying, Bobby, I really am, and I’ve never done anything that sucked so bad, and for what? Watching you walk away again and again? For even thinking about slipping up?”

  “You gotta do this for you, Lee. Not for me.” The warm weight of Bobby’s hand came to rest on Lee’s shoulder. Burning him right through his sweater. “I don’t know how to make it easier for you. I don’t know what I can do to protect myself without making it harder. But I see that you’re trying.”

  Bobby’s words started Lee’s shoulders shaking. His voice went hoarse. “Tell me there’s something good that comes from this.”

  “There is.” Bobby gathered Lee against his chest, that broad, muscular chest where Lee had rested a thousand times in the past. “Definitely something good.”

  Oh fuck, everything he’d ever wanted to hear. Lee held on tightly, his face buried in Bobby’s neck. “Does that mean you’ll come back?”