Collapse Depth

by Todd Tucker

  “Captain, I’ve explained myself as best I can in my letter.”

  “Okay. But I wasn’t kidding. I’m not going to accept your letter.”

  “But—”

  “I know, you’re worried about missing your twelve-month window. You won’t. I can’t tell you all the details right now, but we’re going to pull into port in a couple of weeks. If you still want to get out, I’ll endorse your letter then. But I think in the meantime you may see that it’s still possible to do some vitally important missions on a nuclear submarine. If I’m wrong, then I’ll endorse your letter and this will be your last patrol. Okay?”

  Jabo nodded. He actually felt a sense of relief about not yet having his letter in, as well as a sense of excitement about learning whatever awaited them in their patrol orders. There’d been rumors, of course, especially with the sudden departure. “Okay, Captain. Thank you.”

  “Thank you Danny—thanks for giving the Navy another two weeks.”

  They looked at each other for another moment, Jabo waiting to be dismissed.

  “You know, Danny, it is possible to raise a good family, to be a good family man,

  and be in the Navy.”

  Jabo nodded without saying anything. It was a discussion he didn’t want to have. The captain had a wife, and two daughters, and Danny couldn’t tell him that he thought they all suffered because of the captain’s chosen career. But moreover: he couldn’t do it. I can’t spend another sea tour away from Angi, he thought, another year where I see her more in my dreams than in real life. And if the captain asked him in response, don’t you think I love my wife? Jabo would have had to answer: I must love my wife more. It was the one vanity he allowed himself.

  There was a firm rap on the door and the XO let himself in. He was agitated, and not in the bemused way he had reacted to the rumor about girl babies. Jabo wondered briefly if his resignation had bothered him that much. He dismissed that idea as the XO stepped back out and waved impatiently at Jabo to exit.

  As they traded places in the captain’s stateroom, the XO said something about the Nav. He shut the stateroom door behind him.

  Jabo walked to his stateroom, grateful for several things. He was grateful that his beautiful wife was pregnant with their child. He was grateful that, as hard as it was, he’d told Captain Shields of his plans to leave the Navy. And, as he walked up the ladder to the control room to take the watch, he was grateful that he’d been able to have that talk with the understanding Captain Shields, and not his predecessor, Captain Mario Soldato. That guy was an asshole.

  • • •

  “What’s up?” said the captain.

  The XO remained standing, running his hand across his smooth bald scalp. “It’s the navigator. He’s gone and done something weird.”

  Captain Shields leaned back and laced his fingers across his stomach, his face grim, awaiting details.

  “Lieutenant Maple said that yesterday in control he stabbed himself in his leg with his dividers. Repeatedly. Got blood everywhere. Apparently Maple took a day to think this over before telling me.”

  The Captain raised an eyebrow. “What did you say?”

  “I told him to shut the fuck up about it.”

  “Have you talked to the nav?”

  “No sir, not yet. I wanted to talk to you first, because I know we don’t have much time.”

  The captain paused. “Time for what?”

  “To get him off the boat! Let’s get him off with the fucking mail.”

  The captain waited before responding. He knew the XO had never liked the navigator. In fact, the navigator was a tough man to like. But part of it was that each man was, in his way, a perfect representation of the two different tribes of submarine officers. One was a torpedo-hurling warrior who trusted his instincts. The other, a highly-schooled, bookish, technical expert. The tension between them was as old as the Nautilus, the Navy’s first nuclear submarine, and the captain realized that he was probably closer to the nav’s end of the spectrum than the XO’s. “Mike, do you think they have a spare navigator waiting for us on that tug?”

  “Fuck sir, I don’t know. I’ll do it, I’ll be the goddamn navigator. Or let’s give Jabo a battlefield promotion. I trust him more than I trust that crazy fucking Mark Taylor.”

  “That’s enough,” said the captain sternly.

  “Yes sir.”

  They both paused long enough to let some of the pressure out of the room.

  “You really think it’s that bad?” said the captain. “Bad enough to kick the guy off the boat? Scuttle his career?”

  “I really don’t know, captain. Maybe this whole thing just confirms a feeling I’ve always had about the Nav—I don’t know.”

  “I think if you’ll really ask yourself—this isn’t the craziest thing either one of us has ever seen a man do at sea. Not even close.”

  “Very true, Captain. But this is our navigator. And with so much at stake this patrol…”

  “Exactly. And it’s already too late for us to turn around, to ask for a new navigator. He’s done a stellar job for five previous patrols, and I’m confident he will this time too, before he goes on a well-earned shore tour.”

  The XO sensed that the decision had been made. “Aye, aye, captain.” He turned to leave.

  “XO?”

  “Yes sir?”

  “Pay a visit to Maple. Tell him there’s no point in spreading this around. We don’t need stories like this getting around with the crew, undermining their confidence in their leadership.”

  “Aye, aye sir,” said the XO. But he knew the story had probably already circled the boat twice. They both knew.

  • • •

  Seaman Hallorann was nineteen years old, just two weeks out of boot camp. He learned quickly that his most urgent priority onboard Alabama was to “qualify,” to complete all the requirements of a yellow booklet that took him through every compartment of the ship, after which he would receive the coveted silver dolphins to wear upon his uniform. With that goal in mind, as the ship pitched and rolled its way to sea, he found his way to Maneuvering, a tiny box of a room in the upper level of the engineroom. A line in his yellow book read: identify and observe Maneuvering watchstanders. Sounded easy enough.

  “Request permission to enter?” he asked, mimicking a chief he’d observed entering and leaving maneuvering before him.

  An officer looked up at him from a thick black book, slightly surprised, slightly amused. His name tag said Hein. Hallorann knew he was the Engineering Officer of the Watch, or EOOW, pronounced to rhyme like the sound that a cat makes. He sat behind a small raised desk, looking at the backs of three enlisted watchstanders.

  “Reason?”

  Hallorann held up his yellow book. “Qualifications, sir?”

  “Name?”

  “Seaman Hallorann, sir.”

  Hein turned to his watch team. “Should we let him in?”

  “Sure,” said the one closest to him, without turning around. “This watch is in danger of becoming boring.”

  “Enter maneuvering, Hallorann.”

  It was a perfect cube of a room covered on all sides by lights and dials. Beneath the small desk of the EOOW were two rows of thick, black books like the one the lieutenant was reading. Hallorann considered himself a smart guy, had been told that by others: it was one of the reasons the Navy wanted him on a submarine. But he wondered how anyone could ever master all the information available in that small room.

  “So, Hallorann, what are we doing out here?”

  Hallorann knew he was being fucked with—and that being fucked with would be one of his primary duties until he pinned on his dolphins. Still, he preferred to give an answer that didn’t make him sound like a complete shit head. “Strategic deterrence?” he said.

  A couple of the watchstanders actually glanced away from their panels at that, impressed.

  “Wow, pretty good,” said the one on the right, who looked to be running the ships electrical system, a control
panel that contained dials marked in units familiar to Hallorann: volts, amps, and kilowatts. “Officer material.”

  “That is good,” said Lieutenant Hein. “And that would normally be correct. But that doesn’t seem to be the answer this patrol. Any idea what we’re doing here this patrol?”

  “It’s a trick question,” said the one of the left, the steel wheel of the throttles in his hand. He seemed to be concentrating harder than the rest, and Hallorann got the feeling that the ship’s rolling motion was making his job harder, as he constantly adjusted the position of the wheel in his hands with each pitch and roll. The movement seemed to be intensifying. “No one knows what the fuck we’re doing out here on this patrol.”

  “We’re going somewhere, that’s all I care about,” said the watchstander in the middle.

  “You’re a lucky fuck, Hallorann,” said the electrical operator. “I made four patrols before I went anywhere. And that was just Pearl. God only knows where we’re gonna end up on this run.”

  “I’ll bet the lieutenant knows,” said the thottleman.

  “You bet wrong,” said Hein. “I’m a mushroom too right now.”

  “You know why we’re mushrooms?” asked the Electrical Operator.

  Hallorann nodded.

  “Because they keep us in the dark and feed us shit.”

  “It’s something different this patrol, that’s for sure,” said Hein. “Maybe we’ll end up with some kind of unit citation.”

  “I’ll just be happy if I just get one day in a liberty port,” said the electrical operator. “Not all that concerned about the implications for my career.”

  They plunged dramatically. Hallorann barely stopped himself from falling into the back of the electrical operator. An alarm sounded on the far left panel. “Watch it!” said Lieutenant Hein, and the throttleman spun the throttles to the right as all the others made adjustments.

  “Screw came out of the water,” said the throttleman, as things settled back down.

  “Steam flow hit 80 percent,” said the middle watchstander. “It was WAY out of the water.” Outside maneuvering, something crashed loudly to the deck.

  Hein looked a little flustered. He spoke into the microphone on his desk, the words echoing outside maneuvering. “Engineering Watch Supervisor, verify stow for sea.” A few seconds later, the chief acknowledged the order into a mike.

  “Shit falling all over the place out there,” said the electrical operator.

  “Fuck, I can’t wait till we submerge,” said Hein.

  It went silent for a minute as things got back to normal. Hallorann felt Hein looking past him, a little blankly. He wondered of he had been in there long enough to get the signature in his yellow book; he felt the need to speak.

  “It’s pretty rough, isn’t it?”

  All three enlisted watchstanders turned with raised eyebrows, and Hein grinned.

  “This your first time at sea?” asked the throttleman.

  “Yeah—how about you?”

  The throttleman, without turning, pulled a ballpoint pen from his shirt pocket. “Hey, shit stain, see this pen? It has more sea time than you do.”

  The reactor operator, in the center, chimed in. “I’ve got more time eating ice cream at test depth than you’ve got underway, nub.”

  Hallorann laughed at that.

  “Is the motion getting to you, Hallorann?” Lieutenant Hein asked, still grinning. “All this rocking and rolling?”

  Hallorann nodded. “Not really.”

  “It’s okay….everybody feels seasick once in a while.”

  “Yeah,” said the electrical operator. “There was like three inches of puke in the aft head this morning. Mostly looked like scrambled eggs, but I saw some McDonald’s fries floating around in there, too, that one last meal on the beach.”

  The reactor operator spoke up. “There was a line down there at both heads this morning, so Leer had to puke in his hat. It’s the only one he’s got so he was washing it out in the sink so he could keep wearing it.”

  “Is that the same hat he shit in?” asked Hein. He turned to Hallorann. “He kept his hat tucked into his back pocket, and once last patrol he sat down to take a shit and the hat fell in the commode without him realizing it, and he took a big dump in it. Couldn’t flush it like that, had to pull it out, dump the shit in the bowl, and carry on.”

  Hein waited for him to react. Hallorann suddenly realized what was happening. They were trying to make him sick…it was a game to play with the new guy. But he still wasn’t feeling seasick in the least, he appeared to be one of those guys immune to the ailment, despite a life spent landlocked. And if they thought they could make him sick merely by telling gross stories…Hallorann had spent every summer of high school working at a chicken slaughterhouse outside of Fort Dodge, Iowa. He had a pretty high tolerance.

  The throttleman remained focused on his panel, but he seemed like he’d been saving something. “What’s your name again, nub?”

  “Hallorann.”

  “Hallorann. Right. Don’t listen to these guys, honestly. But if you ever start to feel a little queasy, I know a cure.”

  Hallorann didn’t say anything. The motion of the ship had changed, from kind of a violent pitching up and down, to a roll that seemed to move them in every direction, like a rock tumbling in space.

  “OK, take it easy. Mind your panels,” said Hein. He was again staring past Hallorann, tiny beads of sweat forming on his upper lip.

  “One second, sir, I just want to help the new guy out with my seasickness cure. Wanna hear it Hallorann?”

  “Sure.”

  “Just go to the mess decks, okay, and get one of those ice cream bowls.”

  “Okay.”

  “Fill it all the way to the top with mayonnaise…”

  “Okay.”

  “And then microwave it until the mayo is just steaming hot. Then eat the whole thing, every spoonful.”

  Suddenly Lieutenant Hein pushed Hallorann away from his desk. He stuck his head down into a tiny trashcan that was lashed to the side of it, and began puking dramatically. The three enlisted watchstanders in maneuvering cheered like it was New Year’s Day.

  • • •

  Hallorann excused himself from maneuvering, thinking it wasn’t a good idea to participate in the mocking of the young officer. He considered going back forward, but he found himself interested in the engine room, and wanted to explore it further. He’d overheard another enlisted man say that you could actually see the main shaft where it penetrated the hull, and watch it turn, the very thing that propelled them through the water. That was intriguing enough to seek out. It had to be aft, the most aft thing on the boat, he assumed, and he resolved to walk that direction until he found the shaft or until someone told him to leave. He retrieved some foam earplugs from his pocket and shoved them back into his ears.

  He passed maneuvering into a space that opened up, a place of large machines and bright fluorescent light. A mechanic was on watch, taking a reading and recording it on a clipboard. His sleeves were rolled up, revealing large, ornate tattoos with Japanese characters adorning images of dragons. He looked up from his clipboard and nodded with a smile. Hallorann began to walk toward him, to ensure his presence there was okay, and to accept help if it was offered.

  Two steps later, however, Hallorann was almost leveled by a noise so loud that it had a physical force; he could feel it impacting and deforming his ear drums right through the foam plugs. The noise was so loud that it was meaningless to try to determine what direction it came from, it was everywhere, filling the space, pressurizing it. He fought the strong urge to run in fear. He watched the reaction of the watchstander with the clipboard, to see if what he was hearing was normal. He could see in the startled expression that it was not. The watchstander seemed almost as confused as Hallorann. An announcement came through the speakers, but was unintelligible over the roar. For a moment, it seemed like the sound would consume them all as they stood there, paralyzed by i
ts force.

  Then through the tunnel marched an officer Hallorann had not seen before. He was putting on heavy-duty ear protection as he strode aft, and actually had a smile on his face. He brushed by Hallorann without a glance, walking directly toward the roar, which seemed to Hallorann to be one of the braver things he’d ever witnessed. He glanced at the gold dolphins and his nametag as he passed: Jabo.

  And even though he was walking toward the noise, Hallorann decided that Jabo was the kind of person he wanted to be next to in a crisis. He followed him.

  He walked down a short ladder into the middle level of the engine room. Hallorann had to stop finally, even with the foam earplugs and his hands pushed firmly over his ears, he literally couldn’t take another step toward the noise, it felt as though it would split his skull in half. Jabo kept walking, armed with both superior ear protection and a supreme sense of confidence. At the front of the space Jabo arrived at a row of three identical machines. He walked right up the center one, assessed it briefly, and then threw over the handle of a valve at the top of it. Instantly the roar stopped.

  Hallorann felt himself breathe, and reluctantly pulled his hands from his ears just as an announcement came from maneuvering, Hein’s voice: “Number three high pressure air bank is isolated! Engineering Watch Supervisor investigate!” Hallorann could hear in Hein’s voice that he didn’t understand, even as Hallorann understood, that with Jabo’s action the noise and the crisis were over. A chief brushed by Hallorann, the same chief who’d preceded him in maneuvering, walking briskly toward Jabo with a book open. Jabo smiled at him and pointed toward the valve that he’d just shut.

  The chief handed Jabo the book and began banging on an adjacent valve, first with his fist, and then with a rubber mallet that another watchstander had appeared with in hand. There were several watchstanders who’d gathered around now, all of whom had been invisible when Jabo first approached the roaring machine. The chief seemed to hear something, stopped banging, and then gestured toward Jabo. The lieutenant slowly opened the valve that he’d shut, braced, Hallorann could tell, to shut it if the roar to began again. When it didn’t, he removed his ear protection and put them down around his neck.