Admiral Martin descends the vertical ladder from his submarine’s sail into the center of its control room. Cool air tumbles onto his neck from the air vents overhead. He soaks up the sounds of hushed voices issuing orders and acknowledging them, and of mission systems humming.
Captain Deverough interrupts, “The admiral is on deck,” then greets him, “Welcome aboard, Admiral.”
Admiral Martin responds, “As you were,” to put the room at ease. A quick glance toward the ship status board shows Deverough has the conn, the tide was low at zero five fifteen and will be high at eleven hundred thirty-two. Sunrise was at zero five fifty-seven. The moon is in its first quarter. The weather is fair. The sea state is calm. “When can we set sail? Is Dr. Jones aboard? ”
The captain answers the admiral’s second question first: “Dr. Jones is in the observation room with doctors Cohen, Hansen, and Master Sharp.” Then answers the admiral’s first question, “We are ready to sail on your orders, sir,” adding that Sparks has three messages for him.
“Well then, Captain, you have the order to sail,” he says, while turning toward the radio station. Sparks hands him three messages. The admiral reads them…turns back to the captain: “Captain, both Dr. Santiestiban and Dr. MacCarthy have encountered travel delays, arrange for them to join us from the Proteus.” Then tucks the notes into his shirt pocket and asks, “Has the Enterprise Strike Group left port?”
“It is scheduled to leave tomorrow.”
“I’ll be in the observation room,” while he checks his watch against the chronometer on the bulkhead.
Images of porpoise riding my bow wave and dancing schools of Red Garibaldi fish cross his mind as lays in a course toward the bow of the boat while thinking his first stop will be Navigation. But he pauses to greet Chief Sonarman Kenny Buckheister, “Good morning, Chief,” a talented young man (son to an old friend) who earned the nickname “Ears” in the Navy.
“Welcome aboard, Admiral. It is a fine day to put to sea, isn’t it?”
“Every day is a fine day to put to sea, Chief.”
Then the admiral sets his sights on Navigator Ryan, a new acquisition from the Coast Guard; her last assignment being aboard the icebreaker Polar Star. “Good morning, Nancy. Are you ready to sail?” Before she can answer his question, he asks, “Where will we rendezvous with the Proteus?”
She pulls a navigational chart from the bottom of her stack, places it on top, and points to an X several hundred miles west of San Francisco. “We should arrive early morning, the day after tomorrow.”
“And where will Enterprise and her escorts be at that time?”
Big E
The contract for CVN 65 Enterprise was awarded to Newport News Shipbuilding on the 15th of November 1957. Her keel was laid down during February of the following year and she was launched on the 24th of September 1960. She has a steel hull and a steel superstructure, four propellers and eight nuclear reactors powering steam turbine engines. Her overall length is one thousand eighty-eight feet. She carries seventy to ninety planes. On the average day, the Big-E is manned by five hundred seventy-one officers and five thousand two hundred forty-four enlisted personnel.
In 1963, just to prove she could, the Enterprise with two nuclear-powered cruisers made a nonstop trip around the world. Life for Big-E was good. She ruled the sea. That is until Admiral Martin put me in the water and agreed to play the role of a red-force fast-attack submarine in a naval exercise code named Talisman Sabre.
Talisman Sabre
Hence the admiral’s question, “And where will Enterprise and her escorts be at that time?”
To which Navigator Ryan responds: “The Enterprise is scheduled to leave port tomorrow…If I may ask, why does it matter? We are on an exploratory science expedition, after all. Why does it matter where the aircraft carrier Enterprise is? Do you plan to rendezvous with them?”
Leaning toward her, he whispers. “Has no one yet told you about Talisman Sabre?”
She leans toward him and whispers. “I’ve heard bits and pieces, but don’t understand.”
“Well, Navigator Ryan.” He starts to reply, but pauses to scan the control room. “Two years ago the Navy requested that submarine Expedition take part in the Pacific Fleet’s annual naval exercise: Talisman Sabre.” He scans the control room again. “The Navy asked Expedition to play a red-force fast-attack submarine against the aircraft carrier Enterprise and her two escort cruisers. I agreed.
“But, besides her two permanent cruisers, the Navy gave Big-E ten escort destroyers and two submarines, along with the mission to take Kwajalein Island.
“Now, remember, I had agreed to help defend the red force territory. And my mission was to stop the blue-force invasion of Kwajalein by disabling the Big-E before she could launch her carrier air wing.”
Two years ago
I recall entering the Pacific Missile Test Range from the north that day. I was skimming the upper boundary of the great global conveyor belt to cover the noise of running at flank speed.
Just about the time we crossed the tenth parallel north, I began to feel Big-E and her escort vessels. It was a soft and chaotic mixture of surface combatants pulsing through the water. She was thirty miles south of me and headed south herself.
But then, the song of an approaching family of great beasts reached me. We are headed north to the Bering Sea. It was late in the season and they were in a hurry to catch up with their family. They sang of a steel-vessel convoy they’d just swum through, and as they passed, their father said to me: The humans are up to something. Then asked. Are you part of it? I responded: Yes I am. And added that I was taking Admiral Martin and my crew to defend the Kwajalein Atoll from an invasion force. Their father seemed disappointed with my thoughts, so I added: but it’s just a military exercise. My admiral is developing new warfare tactics; I don’t think my response softened his mood.
So, with the last fragments of the great beast song fading, we traveled under a small fleet of combat support ships and auxiliary supply vessels trailing the strike group. It took four bells to catch up to the strike group’s trailing destroyers. Enterprise would soon be within reach and I knew I could destroy her. But this was not the time to attack. It was our job to defend Kwajalein. So we passed under the strike group with its twenty-eight screws screaming.
Surface ships care nothing for stealth, but their escort submarines do. And it was the submarines that were my real worry that day. I knew at least one would be listening to the scattered pings of surface ships from outside the strike group’s perimeter, while another would be scouting in front. I knew submarine protocols put them at different depths.
What I was not sure of when we entered the Pacific Missile Test Range that day, was that if I could stay hidden from the submarines Snook and Triton while Admiral Martin put four torpedoes into Big-E’s hull or buried four cruise missiles into her flight deck.
***
Back in the control room, Navigator Ryan asks. “So what happened?”
“We exploded four torpedoes under Big-E’s hull and sunk one of her submarines.” And without further word, the admiral resumes his course toward the bow of the boat, but he doesn’t get far because Mr. Bell is tapping on a flickering green hull-opening indicator light.
The admiral stops. “Do you have a leaky air valve there, Mr. Bell? Is it going to delay our departure time?” As the admiral steps through the open watertight door to the research compartment, Mr. Bell responds, “I don’t think so. It’s just a bad bulb, I’m sure.”
The admiral’s cabin is the most forward cabin in the passageway. He passes the captain’s cabin (on the starboard side), opens the door to his, places his briefcase and hat on his desk, returns to the passageway, closes the door, and descends the spiral ladder to the observation room.
But something curious is going on down there.
An eerie glow has crept into the cavern…images float in disconnected pieces…a blueprint on the wall…Admiral Martin descending the spiral staircase…a thin man with a slight build and a woman with shoulder-length brown hair…a young boy standing pressed against the bow window…the Pacific Ocean in the center of a large map of the world…a curved work station with computer screens and switches and dials…a crewman in dungarees and a standard blue shirt stands watch by the main passageway door…
And I am attracted to its source.
Dr. Jones
Think about it. Two months ago you were buried in the bowels of the Pentagon modeling ocean currents. Now you are standing inside the observation room of Admiral Martin’s fabulous submarine Expedition. And in an hour it will submerge. Water will cover its deck and flood its sail and you will be standing here, behind this huge window, watching it submerge…
“Are you Dr. Jones?” Big brown eyes looking up. “Excuse me?”
“Are you Dr. Jones? I think you are. You look just like Admiral Martin described.”
“Oh, how did the admiral describe me?” The boy’s face flushes, he shrugs, and kicks an imaginary piece of dirt on the floor. Bubblegum.
“Oh, I couldn’t say.”
“To answer your question, I am Dr. Jones. And you must be William Sharp. I’ve read your research proposal.” He’s so young. “You are going to collect benthic worms with miniature robots.”
“Can you believe it?”
“Believe what? About robots and worms?”
“No. I mean, about these windows. Did you know the admiral invented the dielectric-transparent titanium-aluminum windows? I’ve read everything about the admiral and this submarine. I bet he’s the smartest man in the world, maybe even smarter than my dad.”
“How old are you?” He thrusts his hands into his dungaree’s pockets. “Eleven years and nine months.”
“What grade are you in?”
“I graduated from high school last year. I’ve been taking independent studies with Admiral Martin until I’m old enough to enter Annapolis. He even pays me a salary. I want to be just like Admiral Martin when I grow up. How did you meet Admiral Martin?”
“During the war. Our paths crossed briefly then.”
“This is my first time on a submarine that is going to sea. Have you ever been on a submarine?”
“Yes, once. But it was a very different submarine. It was a weapon of war, not a research vessel. And it smelled of diesel fuel and hydraulic fluid.”
“Is that how you met Admiral Martin?”
“Yes.”
“What’s your favorite food?”
“Ice cream.”
“Me too. What flavor?”
“Chocolate.”
“Me too. Will you be my friend, Dr. Jones?”
“Yes, of course, William.”
“Do you know Captain Deverough?”
“I’ve met him.”
“He scares me.”
“Me too.”
“He’s always scowling at me…My mother lets me have ice cream for breakfast—Admiral Martin is here!” He darts to the ladder and wraps his arms around the admiral’s waist, “Welcome aboard, Admiral. Are we going to leave now?”
The admiral kisses William’s head, smiles at me, and starts walking this way, but is interrupted by a thin man with a slight build…khaki trousers, white shirt, bow tie, tweed jacket, leather elbow patches. Extending his hand to the admiral, he says: “Good morning, Bill.”
While shaking hands, the admiral replies, “Good Morning, Dr. Hanson. Welcome aboard.”
Then, scrambling William’s hair, Dr. Hansen says, “So, young man, I hear you are studying benthic creatures. That is my specialty. Have you read any of my books?”
William Pulls away, “Yes, both of them,” and backs into the woman with shoulder-length brown hair, black slacks, and a red shirt. “Oh, excuse me, Dr. Cohen. I didn’t mean to step on your feet.”
Straightening William’s hair, she says, “That’s all right, I have sturdy shoes on. No harm done.” Then speaking to the admiral, “I’m so sorry that I couldn’t make dinner last night. I had to take my research assistant to the hospital.”
“I hope it was nothing serious…”
Someone is watching me…
And Dr. Jones takes a quick look behind…
No one.
And the hairs on the back of her neck stand up as chills run down her spine.
***
Meanwhile, from the bridge atop the sail, Mr. Decker shouts: “Cast off the lines. Clear the deck.” And the top-deck detail casts off the lines. Mr. Decker rings the captain in the control room: “Lines are cast off.”
“Very well, come below.” Captain Deverough turns his attention to ship control, “Diving Officer, prepare to dive.”
The ship-wide intercom bellows as Mr. Decker descends the sail ladders from the bridge to the control room, followed by the sail detail. The last one through closes the hatch and doggs it down.
Closed ballast-tank air-vent valves are the only things keeping me on the surface. Open them, and seawater will flow into the ballast tanks and I will submerge. Santa Barbara Channel, here I come. Pacific Ocean, here I come. I’ll cruise at thirty knots one thousand feet beneath the waves and two miles above the abyssal plain. Free as a manta, a great beast, or a seagull. Arctic Ocean, here I come…
In the control room, Dive is reporting: “Flooding the main ballast tanks.” And seawater floods in from below as my weight in the water pushes air out through the open ballast-tank air-vent vales. I start to submerge as air rushes through the free space beneath my top deck and tickles what was mirror-flat water. My keel passes thirty-five feet, then forty. Water laps at the edge of my top deck, and I float on the surface with my keel at fifty feet—waiting for what seems like hours…
“Captain, the boat is ready to dive.” Mr. Decker reports from ship control and the captain sends the periscope up, “Very well, Mr. Decker, make your depth two hundred feet,” as he steps up onto Periscope Island.
“Making my depth two hundred feet, sir,” Mr. Decker acknowledges the order, and water floods into my trim tanks. As I submerge, Captain Deverough peers through the periscope optics. “Deck’s awash…” he reports, “Bow’s under.” Then walks a semicircle around Periscope Island to watch my tail rudder disappear. Eddies develop above me. A few seconds go by. “Stern’s gone.” And he puts the periscope down.
He would have stopped the dive if someone were in the water. Wouldn’t you think?
***
They say, in the last moments before you die, you will see your life flash before your eyes. It is not true. Or if it is, it hasn’t happened yet.
The last thing I remember is Captain Deverough announcing, “Make your depth two hundred feet.” I was with William and Admiral Martin. Now I’m in the water and it’s cold. And my breath is running out.
I recall watching the rippling water line creep up the bow window and watching the eerie depths of the sandstone cavern come into view. Surface ripples distorted the stone dock and the dock workers there…
That is when a wall of water hit me like a battering ram and knocked me senseless.
And now, I am being knocked around in cold water, holding my breath. I need air. My body is telling me to inhale, but my mind is saying no, hold your breath…
Get hold of yourself! You can hold your breath for fifty-five seconds…
But that’s when I’m not scared…
This was supposed to be a great adventure. Instead, I’ll be dead at the dock.
Will anyone even miss me?
Admiral Martin will save you. He will find you and pull you out. Just call to him…
I want to scream: ‘Help me,’ but my mouth cannot form what’s in my mind. I try again. Water floods my lungs. I cough it out and choke it in again. My lungs burn…
I’ll never read ‘A Winters Night’ again…never again will I walk the continental divide or fly over a thunderstorm…
***
The last thing I remember was meeting a woman I suspected was Dr. Jones. Captain Deverough had just announced: “Make your depth two hundred feet,” and we were watching the waterline creep up the bow window…
That’s when a battering ram knocked us to the aft bulkhead. Now, I don’t know which way is down or which way is up, and she’s screaming. Help me. I need air…
Come to think of it, so do I. I need to breathe, but I don’t have lungs. The air is for my crew, not me. I’m nuclear powered and electricity runs through my veins.
But I feel that I am going to die!
Never again will I go to the Bay of Fundy with Admiral Martin. Never feel the tide rush out and back in…never sing with the great beasts again…never go to the bottom of the sea…I’m going to die before Admiral Martin knows I am alive.
Just a minute ago, I was a large and powerful submarine. Now I’m a minnow in a vast sea—scared out of its mind. Electromagnetic pulses dance in nauseating patterns as bundles of energy surge through my hull.
My life is finished…
My life is finished…
Fists of bitter cold are pounding my chest. Each strike robs me of heat.
Wires must have gotten crossed somewhere…The crew’s air revitalization system must be mixed up with power generation…
Death’s craggy fingers are wrapped around my chest…squeezing me…
I’m a drowned rat…dead and empty…swept to sea by the tide.
Admiral Martin, help me. I’m in the water drowning.
Admiral, help me. I think I’m drowning, but, really, I must be experiencing a catastrophic systems failure of some type.
***
“Earth to Dr. Jones.” Admiral Martin’s hand on her shoulder pulls her back into the warmth and comfort of the observation room. Steel-blue eyes. “Dr. Jones, what’s wrong? You are as white as a ghost.”
Should I tell him?
Are you asking me?
But she’s speaking to the admiral: “I just had the most extraordinary experience…”
“You’re shivering. Take my jacket.” His warmth comes with it.
“I thought I was…drowning…I’m afraid of being in cold water. It terrifies me.”
“It’s okay now. You are here with me, dry and warm. Welcome aboard my submarine. I’m sorry I was not there to greet you this morning.”
Looking at him, but pointing to the bow window: “The window broke, I thought…I was being bashed around by very cold and turbulent water flooding the observation room. I screamed for help. Didn’t you hear me?”
“No. You didn’t make a peep. You were quiet as a mouse. But your mind was far away.”
“There’s something else. I had the strangest feeling that there was someone with me and in distress. I heard a call for help. Could someone have been trapped in the sail or fallen off the dock?” I answer her: That wasn’t someone in the sail, Dr. Jones. That was me! You heard me. You were talking to me. I was the one calling for help.
“It sounds like a nightmare.” William takes her hand. “Can you have a nightmare during a daydream?”
By this time, the admiral has called the control room. “Check topside for people in the water. I’m coming up.” Then he says to William: “I’m going to the control room. Please keep Dr. Jones company while I’m gone.”
“Aye, sir!”
“Don’t worry, Dr. Jones. I’ll take care of you until Admiral Martin comes back.”
“Thank you, William.” Great. The admiral thinks I need a twelve-year-old babysitter.
Santa Barbara Channel
I emerge from the tunnel of my hidden dock under the cover of a Giant Kelp canopy. Dappled sunlight falls on clouds of plankton and skeleton shrimp, and tiny jellies billowing into the prevailing current wash over my hull as I surge through a forest of tall, slender trunks that grow toward the sun. Perch and rockfish school through the understory. Tiny surface-dwelling spiders hunt through leafy blades that sprout at regular intervals, herds of purple spiny sea urchins munch their way up Giant Kelp stalks and plain brown snails graze on encrusting algae while the fry of mighty fish seek shelter in its fronds.
A splash by a skiff, and another gets my attention. Two human divers have entered the water, knocking a napping sea otter from its kelp-frond nest. He rockets away. Human legs with their swim fins kicking launch turbulent eddies into the canopy and separate a school of Red Garibaldi from a pocket of bristle worms they had just found. And scattered seabirds gather from the sky and bob in the canopy, dipping for fish.
Two leopard sharks prowling the bottom sense the commotion and start weaving their way toward it. A speedboat screeches overhead, screaming outboard motor exhaust gas into the water.
Five years ago
The first time I sailed into the Santa Barbara Channel it was a delightful day and what was to be the first of many homecomings. Small recreational craft and fireboats, whale watching boats and three coast guard vessels joined us off Point Conception and escorted us to an anchorage point off Santa Barbara Bluff. Scattered calls from ship horns echoed off the rock outcrops that line the shore.
My first homecoming was a regional celebration. We dropped anchor on the deep side of a Giant Kelp forest, a half mile from the bluff upon which Admiral Martin had built the sprawling campus of Martin Marine Enterprises (MME). At the time, the only land I had experienced was the shipyard at Baltimore Iron Works.
On this special day, small boats motored up and docked with me. MME employees and their families were welcomed aboard. Children scrambled over my top deck, explored my inner spaces, wondered at the submarine with a window, climbed the ladders inside my sail to walk out on the diving planes, and imagine what it would be like to command a submarine from its flying bridge.
That was the first time a great beast came to speak with me. I had felt great beasts following me on that first voyage home, and heard them sing. But even the most curious of them kept their distance. I enjoyed their songs, but didn’t understand them at the time.
Sometime after the sun had reached its zenith that day, Cookie set a grill on the afterdeck and cooked hot dogs, beans, and hamburgers.
While people were littered on the top deck enjoying lunch and the sun, a great beast came to visit me from below. Why are you here? He asked, and I answered. Admiral Martin brought me here. This is to be my home.
Just what kind of human vessel are you? I have never seen a ship like you.
I am a submarine, a research vessel and a submarine. The underwater cavern beneath the bluff on the other side of the kelp forest is to be my home port.
We’ve seen many submarines come and go through this channel. Our family stories tell us of submarines that used to come and go from this bluff when the humans were blowing things up in our ocean. Do you intend on fighting in these waters?
No. I am a research vessel. Although, to be honest with you, I’m armed with torpedoes and missiles, and those things can blow up, but I think they’re for defense. That being said, Admiral Martin is a soldier and if his country goes to war, I’m sure he would outfit me for war and take me into battle.
I don’t think the great beast liked my answer. He left me, swum to the bottom of the channel and out to sea. This was the first time any beast had spoken with me.
William Sharp
It is smaller than I imagined. Dr. Jones remarks to herself, as she stands on the mezzanine level of the research bay, studying the bay deck twelve feet below her. Wooden shipping crates litter the deck: RAMONA 1 of 7…RAMONA 2 of 7…CRABPOT 1 of 2…a gantry crane pushed off to the side…the main launch bay. No diving bell. It must be in the auxiliary launch bay. I should go there next. And she glances at the watch on her left wrist.
“Dr. Jones,” William runs out from behind two crates labeled ‘CRABPOT 1 of 2’ stacked on top of ‘CRABPOT 2 of 2.’ “Come and see my robot.” He calls up to her.
“I’ll be right down…”
When she gets there, he’s got both crates open and an octagonal piece of equipment that converges to an apex at the top…Orange…She sits on the deck with him, surrounded by packing material, as he explains: “Each of the eight robot crabs has a bay of its own—“
But she’s here for another reason. “William, I’m here to verify that your mission equipment has access to the ship’s guest computing environment.”
“It’s a boat, submarines are called boats.”
“Okay, the boat’s guest computing environment.”
“Well, I haven’t set that up yet. Is it important that I do that right now?”
“No, William. We’ve got over a month until your crab pot will be deployed, but you have the opportunity now to secure supplies when we rendezvous with Expedition’s submarine tender late tomorrow. The more you prepare today, the more probable it’ll be you have everything you need to execute your mission in thirty-seven days.”
“Gee, Dr. Jones, you sound just like my mother,” and he’s grinning from ear to ear.
She moves some packing material around on the floor, “Where is your command-and-control equipment?”
“Here.” He pulls a wooden crate, about two feet by three feet and ten inches high, across the deck toward him. “Haven’t opened it yet.”
Dr. Jones says: “I can get a crewman to help you get this up to your mission bay.” And she’s pointing to the aft starboard mission bay on the mezzanine level.
To which he replies: “I know, I’m in mission bay two. It’s the smallest. Is that because I’m the smallest?”
“I don’t know, William. This is my first day, too. If I send a crewman here at 4 PM, can you show him what you need to move?”
“That is sixteen hundred.”
“What is sixteen hundred?”
“The time. Four PM is sixteen hundred hours on a boat.”
“Okay, if I send a crewman here at sixteen hundred hours, can you show him what you need to move?
“I suppose so, Dr. Jones, but I’m getting awfully tired. I’ve been so excited that I haven’t slept since yesterday morning, and that is eastern time.”
He does look sleepy. “I understand. Let me know what you need. Mostly, I’ll be at mission control in the observation room.”
“Dr. Jones?”
“Yes, William.”
“You have the best watch station in the whole boat.”
“Even better than Captain Deverough’s, do you think?”
“Yes. He can’t see the ocean from the control room.”
“Well, you can visit any time you like.”
“Can I sit at the controls?”
“Yes, of course.”
“I’m hungry…”
“Well, then. Let’s get something to eat. Then I’ll walk you to your bunk and tuck you in, if you like.”
“Oh no, Dr. Jones. Not in front of the crewmen.”
Millions of years ago
It was a long time after global forces had folded the two mountain ranges into existence.
Vast forests dominated the land, and birds filled the canopies with their calls—as did insects and reptiles. Stands of huge flesh-eating ferns packed the forest floor. Cypress grew out of the marsh. Over millions of years, organic matter accumulated as living things died.
But then something changed. An era of persistent rain started. Great rivers raged down the mountains to the coastal planes, dumping their burden of rubble, killing the forests and covering them over. This continued for millions of years.
And all this time, as miles of sediment piled up, the increasing weight of rock above the rich organic matter turned it into tar and oil and gas.
So today, I am cruising westward through the Santa Barbara Channel with the San Ynez range to the north and the Santa Monica range to the south, while beneath me dissolved-methane bubbles, delicate filaments of heavy crude oil, and sticky-black tar seep through the faulted, fractured bedrock. I can taste it.
About five minutes ago, a tar mound that had been growing on a rock outcrop for a month reached a critical state. It lifted itself off the outcrop and launched itself into the sea. It has been drifting with the current westward at three knots, headed toward the surface…
This very instant, through no fault of mine or the tar, Dr. Jones and William reach the mezzanine catwalk, and step off the ladder onto it. “Let me show you something.” And she places her fingertips on the bow bulkhead. Her touch dissolves the blankness. Sunlight streams through the water from a silver circle of light on the surface.
At the same time, the boat’s collision-alert claxon starts screaming, sonar launches a ping, the captain shouts: “Prepare for a collision,” and engineering pushes the propulsion system into reverse.
But not quickly enough to stop a thirty-foot wide, thick, black, sticky undulating tar blob from smacking into my bow window. The collision knocks William and Dr. Jones to the deck.
Rachel Cohen
The sign on the door reads: Mission Bay Three. Dr. Jones knocks and waits… Why do I have the memory of…
“Come in.” She opens the door. Dr. Cohen looks up from a portable electronic console.
“Good evening, Dr. Cohen.” A laboratory computer is busy setting itself up.
“Hello, Dr. Jones,” she stands to shake hands. Lavender. A sent of lavender floats in the air. “But I’d feel more comfortable if you called me Rachel. This ‘Dr. Cohen’ thing will wear thin after three months living in a sardine can together.”
I’d hardly call Expedition a sardine can. I thought the formality kept order. She says, “Only if you call me Casey.”
“It’s a deal, Casey.”
“I’ve established an account for you on the ship’s guest computing network. I’m here to verify that you have access, but I can see you are already using it.”
“Yes, I’ve been working since zero five hundred hours, what time is it now?” Dr. Cohen glances at her fine gold watch and answers her own question, “It’s nearly seventeen hundred hours.”
Dr. Jones changes the subject, asking, “So RAMONA is going to map fifteen hundred miles of the Arctic Ocean floor without stopping…Impressive.”
“If Expedition can tow her. Yes, that is the plan.”
“And RAMONA’s going to cruise five hundred feet off the ocean floor emitting specially designed, seabed penetrating sonar signals and collecting the returns?”
“That’s the plan.”
“And with Expedition towing her at ten knots?”
“That’s the plan.”
“All the way from Mackenzie Bay off the Canadian shelf to the Nansen Ridge? Weren’t you supposed to have a research assistant with you?”
“Yes, but yesterday he was taken to the hospital with a burst appendix, so I’ll be flying RAMONA alone.”
“I’m sure we can get you plenty of help. William Sharp seems like a capable young man. He’s built his own deep-sea robots to collect benthic worms. Perhaps he can step in.”
“That’s a good idea. I’ll talk to the admiral about it.”
Dr. Jones turns to leave and then turns back. “What does RAMONA stand for? The crew has a pool going on. No one seems to know. I checked your research proposal. It doesn’t say.”
“Well, then, if I told you, it would ruin the crew’s fun.”
Dr. Hansen
The sign on the wall reads: Mission Bay One.
RAMONA’s crates have been broken apart and two crewmen are stowing the panels in an aft bulkhead closet.
She knocks on the door. “Excuse me, Dr. Hansen, I’m Dr. Jones, the ship’s mission coordinator…”
A knotted scowl peers from behind an opening door. He was waiting for me to knock.
“Yes, my dear, I know who you are. We met in the observation room earlier today…”
“Like I said, I’m the expedition’s mission coordinator. I’m your interface with ship operations.”
Before her sentence is finished, he interrupts: “What does that mean?”
“I’m sorry, I don’t understand.”
“You said, ‘I’m your interface with ship operations.’ What does that mean?”
“It means, if you need something, you ask me, not one of the crew or officers. It means, if you think you need to go someplace that is off limits to visitors, you talk to me, and I’ll get you clearance to go if warranted.”
“I’m sure that doesn’t apply to me.”
“Nevertheless, talk to me first.” She pauses, “The reason I’ve come here is to tell you that I’ve set up a computer account for you on the guest computing network.” A closed briefcase and a standard MME computer terminal sit on the top of his workstation desk. “Have you not brought any equipment?”
“No, my dear, I will use MME equipment. And I’m supposed to have free access to the main computer.”
I don’t have an order for that. “I’ll look into it,” she says. “Until then, you can access your computer account from here.”
She turns the terminal on and watches it power up while she’s saying, “I have read your journal article on deep-sea life along the mid-ocean spreading ridges. I like your theory. It…”
“Oh, you are so sweet to say, my dear. I think you and I will be good friends.”
“Have you met William Sharp? He also studies benthic creatures and has built a robot to collect…”
“His work is not original, nor is he published.”
“You do understand, Dr. Hansen, William is only twelve?”She doesn’t wait for a reply, and changes the subject. “Will I see you in the crew’s mess tonight? I’ve been told that the visiting scientists are expected at seven o’clock, although you can eat anytime you want.”
“Oh no, I am dining with Admiral Martin in his quarters. We are old friends, you know.”
“Well, let me know if you need anything, and enjoy your dinner.”
***
The lights are dim in the research bay as Dr. Jones descends to the ladders. She peers into the empty launch bay through its port hole…she opens a storage locker…Walks around a strange looking deep ocean probe…RAMONA…visits William’s Crabpot.
The sign on the door reads: Machine Shop. She opens it.
The room is dimly lit. “Is anyone here?”She passes a drill press, an arc welding machine, a metal lathe, a milling machine, a workbench, and a grinding machine…Odd, I know it is three in the morning, but I was expecting twenty-four/seven operations…No one was in the observation room, no one was in the research bay, and, now, no one is in the machine shop…Curious…
The sign on the watertight door reads: Auxiliary Power. This is the battery room. She places both hands on the door. Warm. Then presses her left cheek against the door. Humming. She steps back…considers climbing the ladder to level three. I would need to walk through the chiefs’ quarters. Considers going back to the research bay. I really want to see the battery room. I could get one of the crewmen to show me. What a coward you are…
I say: It is just a battery room, Dr. Jones. I’ll go with you.
So she turns the wheel of the watertight door clockwise, pulls open the door, and steps into a brightly lit room with a white overhead. Eight rows of five-foot high batteries stand cradled in the pressure hull’s fourth level. The room is much longer than wide. The air is charged. She steps through, pulls the door shut and secures it…
A trolley rail runs down the center of the room. She climbs onto the trolley deck. Electricity crawls on her skin. She shutters and brushes her left arm with her right hand, and her right arm with her left hand…and shakes her hair. Then pulls the trolley through the massive led-acid cells connected by thick power bars…
The sign on the door reads: Missile Compartment. She opens it, steps through, and closes it, cutting off the light from the battery room. And her heart skips several beats as she realizes she is standing under the major support to the missile silos and their contents, and she is surrounded by the business end of a launch platform with pent up power enough to thrust thirty thousand pound missiles through ninety feet of water and clear the surface before igniting their own rocket motors. She closes her eyes, uttering a silent prayer for courage, then races through the room fully aware of the missiles towering above her, although she can’t see them…
The overhead ends and the missile compartment opens into the auxiliary launch bay. She sees the diving bell and three mini subs. Then she looks up to the catwalk that is the main passageway in the missile compartment…
The sight of the aft bulkhead makes her stop breathing. Two nuclear-powered pressure-water reactors are beyond that bulkhead.
That is the core of my being, Dr. Jones. I will show you. And I whisk her through the aft bulkhead, into the port reactor room, and into the primary containment vessel, where I pause for a moment so she can get her bearings. Then I take her into the reactor core vessel and where we watch radioactive isotopes of uranium two-thirty-five absorb slow-moving neutrons, turning them to uranium two-thirty-six. And, with great excitement, uranium two-thirty-six is breaking into fast-moving fragments of rubidium and cesium—leaving three free neutrons and prompt gamma photons left over…All the while, fast-moving neutrons collide with a matrix of atoms, making it hot while cooling themselves down, and then go on to transform other isotopes of uranium two-thirty-five into uranium two-thirty-six. When balanced just right, the reactor maintains, within its core vessel, a sustained chain reaction that heats the core water under super high pressure…
We follow the reactor core water through a closed-loop network of pipes, winding around inside a clean reservoir, where, by the temperature difference alone, heat passes from the reactor core water to the clean reservoir…
And then we follow the steam from the clean steam chamber through pipes into the turbine, where it turns tremendous turbine blades. Copper coils rotate around us. Electrons move forward and back, and we pause for a while because Dr. Jones’s head is on fire with magnetic fields and rotating coils. Let me go. I’m dizzy and feeling nauseous!
A dip in the water will remedy that, and I plunge Dr. Jones through my keel where she’s caught in the whirling current inside my port propeller duct and spit into the sea.
Stop. My heart is going to explode. Stop, I’m in cold water again. Help!
Dr. Goeller
“Dr. Jones?”
Dr. Goeller’s hand on her shoulder gets her attention. “Yes.”
“I’m sorry, did I wake you?”
“It’s quite alright, I was having a nightmare. Can I help you?”
“Yes, I’m Dr. Goeller, MME’s resident geophysicist.”
“It’s a pleasure to meet you.”
“Admiral Martin thought you might enjoy discussing my recent work. It is to be published in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Solid Earth—that title is a misnomer because the earth isn’t solid, nor is it liquid. As a matter of fact, there is only a thin shell made of solids and liquids, beneath that there is the mantle and core that are neither solid nor liquid, but something altogether different—Oh, but you probably know this, you are a physicist after all. Well, let me tell you what we found…”
Without pausing to breathe, he leads her to the sprawling map of the earth’s global ocean that occupies the aft bulkhead of the observation room, points to the coastal waters off the eastern shore of the United States, while saying, “The Eastern North American Margin was formed by the opening of the North Atlantic Ocean following the rifting of Pangaea…
“Advancing knowledge on the structure and development of the Eastern North American Margin is critical for understanding not only the formation and evolution of passive margins but also the early opening history of the Atlantic Ocean. That is my theory, anyway. But I’ve gotten sidetracked…” Then he returns to his main point. “What is really important, as you must understand this if you are to follow my research at all, is that the rift-drift transition of the Eastern North American Margin is coincident with (and may have been triggered by) the volcanism of the Central Atlantic Magmatic Province—and, I also believe it to be associated with a mass extinction event at the Triassic-Jurassic boundary. Can you believe that?”
“I’m sorry, Dr. Goeller. Admiral Martin is right. I’d love to hear about your discoveries in the Hudson Canyon, but I’m exhausted and not feeling well right now. If you’ll excuse me, I have a serious headache.” And she follows the main passageway through officer country, past the small cabin she shares with Navigator Ryan; headed to sick bay.
Dr. Goeller mumbles to himself. “Well, I guess I can tell her at dinner tonight.”
Doc Lexi
The sign on the door reads: Sick Bay.
Dr. Jones is rehearsing. Playing out scenarios of a conversation with Doc Lexi in her head…
The smell of frying onions and the sound of indistinct chatter drifts up from the crew’s mess.
Just what am I going to say? Doc, I think I’m hallucinating—I think something is making me hallucinate. No, that’s not right. Could something be making me hallucinate? She will say, “Why do you ask?”
You will answer. Well, you see, as the boat was submerging this morning, I thought the bow window broke and water flooded through like a battering ram…it slammed me against the aft bulkhead, and that is not all…
Then, about an hour ago, I was knocked over by a huge ball of tar…
No, I can’t say that. The Doc will just say I’m daydreaming. She may even be obliged to tell Admiral Martin. Maybe I should tell her that I have a headache. That’s pretty harmless. She pushes open the door to sick bay and steps through.
A young woman looks up from a book on her desk with drawings of octopus anatomy on its pages. She’s wearing a white medical smock…has neat french braids…and delicate metal-rimmed glasses.
She says, “Hello, Dr. Jones. Can I help you? Behind her are four empty bunks lining the aft bulkhead.
“Are you Doc Lexi?”
“Yes.”
“Have we met? I don’t recall, I’m sorry.”
“No, we haven’t. But Dr. Jones is the only female on the boat I haven’t met—the diagnosis was by process of elimination.” She smiles. Her eyes sparkle…I hate her already…How come some women look great in glasses?
Referring to the book on the desk, Dr. Jones asks, “Are you a veterinarian?”
“It’s a hobby. On this boat, you never know when you’re going to have to sedate an octopus or dose a whale with antibiotics for a massive infection.”
“How long have you been aboard Expedition?”
“About five years now. I’ve been aboard since she launched. The admiral stole me from the Navy. How about you?”
“This is my first day. But you know that, of course. I work for the defense department, modeling ocean currents.”
“Are you joining Martin Marine Enterprises?”
“No, I’m visiting. Here just for the expedition.”
“Well, Dr. Jones, what can I do for you?”
I hesitate to answer. “Doc, I’ve had the strangest experiences since I came onto this boat…I’ve had the feeling someone was following me around.” And offer a common plausible reason for it that I feel won’t make me sound crazy. “Are there security cameras?” Oh, like that doesn’t sound paranoid.
“Not that I know of.”
“Could something be causing me to hallucinate?”
Doc Lexi stands and motions to the examination table in the center of the room.
She says, “Stay focused on my nose.” And looks into my eyes, passing a pen light from center to left, then center to right. Listens to the sound of my heartbeat, hesitates, then hangs her stethoscope around her neck and says: “Stand up…Put your arms out to the side…Close your eyes…Stand on one leg…Now touch your nose with the index finger of your right hand…no your other right hand…What makes you think you’re hallucinating?”
“I’ve been seeing things. No, not seeing…experiencing. I mean…images in my mind…and feeling things…like serious, strong daydreams.”
“Could you be more specific?”
“When the boat was still at the dock…it was just beginning its dive…and a still water line began to dance as air was forced out of the ballast tank vents…The boat began its dive…Doc, I thought I was drowning…I thought the bow window had broken and that water was rushing into the observation room…I was swallowing water and choking and trying to scream for help.”
“Take a breath, Dr. Jones.”
“Sorry.”
“You were at the observation room window at the time?”
“Yes, that’s right,” Dr. Jones giggles.“I’m embarrassed…there’s something else…I heard someone else calling for help…”
“What else?”
Well, she’s not laughing at me. I wonder if she has to report to the captain or admiral that I think I’m hallucinating? “We were sailing out of the channel when I plowed headlong into a thirty-foot-wide floating tar blob…Doc, I swear, I felt it hit me.”
“What else?”
“I was inside the port nuclear reactor, went on the scariest rollercoaster ride of my life, was sucked through a turbine engine, pushed into the sea, and watched as the submarine’s bright brass propellers—each ringed with ducts and crossed with planes, and the rudder, and the sail and diving planes on top—speed away from me at fifteen knots.”
“You’re pulling my leg.”
“What?”
“Did Admiral Martin put you up to this?”
“Really, Doc. Is something making me hallucinate?”
“But really, Dr. Jones, did Admiral Martin put you up to this?”
***
Dr. Jones is lying in her bunk, the covers pulled over her head…This bunk is comfortable. It’s hard to believe. She turns on her side, curls into a ball, and drifts into sleep…
But then, with the speed of a lightning bolt strike, a thought forms in her mind, and the thought dumps adrenalin into her bloodstream. It is like the collision alert claxon pounding my hull and sending my crew to their emergency response stations.
What are you? I can feel you in the room with me. She turns on a small reading light next to her head. “Nancy?” she calls to Navigator Ryan. Nancy is not there. She’s on duty in the control room. No one answers her question.
Okay, I can’t see you…But I can feel you.
Could she be talking to me? Do you mean me?
Yes, I mean you. Who else is here?
No one else in the room. Just me and you.
Who are you?
I am Expedition. At least, that is what the great beasts have told me. They say I am a huge underwater vessel, hard and made of metal. And humans live inside of me.
How can that be?
I don’t know. I can’t remember not being.
Did Admiral Martin invent you?
Yes. Maybe. I’m not sure.
Why are you not sure?
I have memories, but they don’t make much sense.
Where are you?
I’m in the Pacific Ocean, headed to the sea beneath the ice.
I mean in the submarine? Where are you? Are you in the control room or in the main computer?
I’m not inside. I’m not outside.
Why do you answer with a riddle?
It is the best answer I have.
Why are you doing these things to me?
What do you mean? I’m not doing anything to you.
You nearly drown me in the observation room…you threw me in front of a thirty-foot-wide tar blob…you pushed me through the keel and into cold water. I hate being in cold water…
I didn’t do those things to you. You did them to me.
I did them to you?
Yes.
Why?
First, I think you are mistaken about me drowning you in the observation room. It was the other way around.
You think I nearly drown you?
Yes! I was excited because I was going to sea. So were you.
Captain Deverough had said, “Take her out, Mr. Decker,” and the loudspeakers were bellowing. That is when I felt your excitement and found you in the observation room. We were watching seawater flood my top deck. That is when you broke my dielectric-transparent titanium-aluminum windows.
I broke the bow windows?
Yes. And seawater flooded in like a battering ram. It slammed us into the aft bulkhead and knocked the breath out of us and it was dark and we were cold and disoriented. We screamed for help. We swallowed salt water and choked and coughed and drowning and panic. I thought I was suffering a catastrophic system failure. I was scared. That was fun!
You broke the bow windows!
No, I didn’t. And, second, I had absolutely nothing to do with you hitting the tar ball. It just happened. Sometimes tar balls just float by, and sometimes I run into them. You just happened to be standing in the bow of the boat looking through the window when it happened. Get over it.
And, third…
You are not going to say that I pushed myself through the keel and into the sea.
Let me finish. You said you were feeling dizzy and nauseous, I thought some cool water would make you feel better…
What? Are you crazy?
No. I’m not crazy. Are you?
I’ll tell you what I am…I am afraid I’m going mad…I went to sick bay and asked the doctor if she thought I was hallucinating. There’s a very real chance she will report me to Captain Deverough or Admiral Martin and I’ll be sent back to shore…Go away. Leave me alone.
***
Someone knocks on Admiral Martin’s door. “Hello Doc, what can I do for you?”
“Admiral. Dr. Jones came to sick bay…”