Ocean on Top

Chapter Two

I didn’t believe it, of course. I’m a very conservative person who likes even his fiction realistic, and this was too much to swallow. I had to stop reading The Maracot Deep when I was young because it described a luminous ocean bottom. I know Conan Doyle had never been down and needed the light for story purposes and didn’t have very high standards of consistency anyway, but it still bothered me. I knew he was wrong for the same reason everyone does — the bottom just isn’t bright.

Only now it was.

The tumbling wreck was swinging me upward away from the light, and I had time to decide whether I should believe my eyes or not. I could still read instruments. The pressure dial gave a direct depth of four thousand eight hundred eighty feet; a quick mental correction from the record tape of the thermograph added another two hundred or so. I certainly should be near the bottom, somewhere on the northern slopes of the mountain whose peaks are Rapanui.

I swung gently over the top and back down the other side, and my line of sight pointed downward again. Whether I wanted to believe my eyes or not, they insisted there was light in that direction. It was a gentle yellow-green glow — just the sort of thing you use in lighting effects to give the impression of an underwater scene. At first it looked uniform and smooth; then, a few turns later and two hundred feet lower, it showed a pattern. The pattern was of squares, with their corners just a little brighter than the rest of the area. It didn’t cover the whole bottom; its edge was almost below me, and it extended toward what I thought was the north, though my compass wasn’t reacting too well to the tumbling.

In the other direction was the normal comforting and frightening darkness — that was real enough.

Two things happened at almost the same instant. It became evident that I was going to come down pretty close to the edge of the light area, and it also became obvious what the light area was. The second realization got to me. For three or four seconds I was so furious and disgusted that I couldn’t plan, and as a result I almost didn’t get around to telling this story.

The light was artificial. Believe it if you can.

I realize that for a normal person it’s hard. Wasting watts to light up the outdoors is bad enough, but sometimes it’s a sad necessity. Spending power to illuminate the sea bottom, though — well, as I say, for a few moments I was too furious to think straight. My job has brought me into contact with people who were careless with energy, with people who stole it, and even with people who misused it; but this was a brand-new dimension! I was lower now and could see acres and acres of light stretching off to the north, east, and west until it blurred out of sight. Acres and acres lighted by things suspended a few yards above the level bottom, things visible only as black specks in the center of slightly brighter areas. At least, whoever was responsible for this display had some sense of economy; he was using reflectors.

Then I got my anger under control, or maybe my fear did it for me. I suddenly realized that I was only a few dozen yards above the lights. I was not going to come down among them, but a little to the south. I couldn’t say safely to the south. I couldn’t say safely anything, because my assemblage of Pugnose-bow and safety tank was turning over slowly enough to let me predict the attitude it would have when it hit bottom, and it looked pretty certain that the open end of the hull would be underneath.

Quite aside from the fact that I wouldn’t be able to see anything from under the wreckage, there was the likelihood that I wouldn’t be able to do anything either — such as get back to the surface. This time I did reach the controls.

Since the whole idea hinged on concealment, the separators used springs rather than squibs. I waited until the spin put the hulk between me and the light and punched the button. The push was light enough to make me wonder for a few seconds whether I mightn’t be in even worse trouble than I’d supposed. Then light began to come in through ports which had been covered by the hull, and that worry ended. The springs had kicked the tank away from the lighted region, so I could see Pugnose’s bow outlined against the luminescence. The separation had slowed our fall very slightly with the wreckage now going just a trifle faster than I was. At least something was going as planned; the wreck would hit first, so there should be no chance of my getting trapped under it.

I hadn’t expected to see it hit bottom, of course. I would certainly never have expected to see what happened when it did.

For the most part, level stretches of sea bottom tend to be on the gooey side. They may call it globigerina ooze or radiolarian ooze, but it’s usually ooze. You can meet with coral and sand and other firm stuff in shallow water and honest rock at times on slopes, but where it’s level you expect something like a cross between ordinary mud and the top couple of inches of a stagnant pond. When something hard and heavy lands on it, even gently, you don’t expect the bottom to give it much support. You may sometimes be surprised on this matter, but you never count on anything bouncing off the sea bottom.

Pugnose didn’t exactly bounce, I have to admit, but she certainly didn’t behave properly. She hit the lighted surface thirty or forty yards from the edge, and perhaps twice as far from me. I could see easily. She touched, as expected, and sank in as expected. There was no swirl of silt, though — no sign of the slow-motion splash you normally see when something lands in the ooze. Instead, the bow section disappeared almost completely into the smooth surface while a circular ripple grew around it and spread away from the point of impact. Then the wreckage eased gently back up until it was half uncovered, then back down again, still in slow motion. It oscillated that way three or four times before coming to rest, and each rebound sent another ripple spreading out from the spot for a dozen yards or so.

By the time that stopped, so had my tank. I felt it hit something hard — rock, for a bet, and I’d have won. Then it began to roll very, very gently toward the light. I couldn’t see the surface I was on at all clearly, but it seemed evident that it was a solid slope which would deliver me beside the Pugnose in two or three minutes if I didn’t do something about it. Fortunately, there was something I could do.

The tank had what we’d come to call legs, six-foot-long telescoping rods of metal which could be extended by springs and retracted again by solenoids. I was still hoping not to have to use magnets, but it seemed that the legs were in order; I propped out four of them in what I hoped were reasonable directions. Enough of the guesses were right to stop the rolling, and for the first time I had a steady observing platform. Naturally, I concentrated on the area I could see.

I was now below the level of the lights themselves. They appeared to be strung on lines at intervals of about twenty yards, with the same spacing between lines. That was a guess, though, since I couldn’t actually see any supports. Their regularity bolstered the guess, though the fact that the wreck had come down just about on a line between two of the lights without appearing to disturb them counted rather against it. I wasn’t too surprised to see nothing growing or moving on the flat surface they illuminated, though of course I wouldn’t have been surprised to see a few tracks or holes scattered around.

At least, I wouldn’t have been surprised at them if I’d not seen the Pugnose’s landing. With that to go by, it was perfectly clear that whatever I was looking at was not sea bottom. It was more like a rubber sheet stretched like a tent roof over everything more than about ten feet down slope from me. The wreck had dented it but hadn’t punctured it, and the stuff was strong enough to hold up the comparatively small submerged weight of metal and plastic.

This, I reflected, could be useful. I had no idea why whoever was under the tent wanted to light up the outside, but unless the fabric were completely opaque they could hardly help seeing the shadow and the dent in their ceiling. That should bring people to investigate, and they would be easy to see without my having to use lights of my own and giving myself away. All I needed was one clear view of unauthorized human beings at the bottom of the Pacific; that, plus the scale of energy wastage I could already detail, would be all my report would need — a major control expedition would do the rest. No one expected me to arrest a group large enough to set up an installation like this, and I had no ambition that way either. To put it mildly, the tank wasn’t maneuverable enough to serve as a police car; I was in no position to arrest a passing shrimp. All I asked was a good look at a work sub, or a suit of pressure armor, or even a handling robot under remote control — anything that would show that this setup was being actively managed — one good look, and I’d be ready to drop ballast.

I wouldn’t do it too hastily, of course, for two good reasons. A sonarman might reasonably dismiss a sinking object as a piece of a wrecked ship, or even a dead whale, and not be too curious; but he would be most unlikely to feel the same indifference toward something rising. I’d have to take some time to evaluate the sonar danger. It was nice, but not conclusive, that there had been no sign of it so far.

The other reason against haste I didn’t know about yet, and didn’t learn for a number of hours.

I’m not a clock-watcher. I knew I had plenty of survival time in the tank and wasn’t keeping very close track of how much of it had passed. When the second reason did show up it never occurred to me to check the time, and for several hours after that I was very thoroughly distracted from such things as clocks. I can’t say, therefore, just how long I spent sitting in the tank waiting for something to happen. I can guarantee that it was a number of hours; long enough to get me bored, cramped, irritated, and more than half convinced that there was no one under that tent roof anywhere nearby. The idea that it might be someone who didn’t care a hoot about fragments of ship in his ceiling seemed too far out to be worth considering, if anyone had seen it, he’d have done something about it.

No one had done anything about it. Therefore, no one was within sight. And if no one was within sight under the fabric, I might as well take a closer look at it myself. Maybe I could even get a look under it.

Dangerous thinking, boy. Don’t let all those wasted kilowatts go to your head. You’re just a detached eyeball; if you don’t get back with information, anything you do manage to do is pure waste — and waste, of course, is the profane word around the Board.

It was a temptation, though. No motion — no sign of human life except the lights and the tent roof itself, and mighty little sign of any other kind of life. No sound. Nothing from the sonar frequency monitor. Why shouldn’t I roll gently down to the edge of the fabric and study it more closely?

The best answer to that question, of course, was that it would be the act of a dithering idiot. As time went on, though, it occurred to me once or twice that merely being here at all wasn’t the highest possible display of human intelligence. If I must act like a fool, I might as well be a real one. I don’t know where that sort of thinking comes from; maybe I should see that psychiatrist.

I’m not sure just how close I came to giving in. I know I almost pulled in the legs three times and each time thought better of it.

The first time I was stopped by something moving, which turned out to be a fair-sized shark. It was the first large living thing I’d seen since reaching bottom, and it set my thoughts off on another tangent for a while. The next couple of times I started to move the tank I was stopped by the memory of the shark; it had disappeared — had it heard something I couldn’t, that had frightened it off? I had no instruments outside for low or audible frequency detection, just the sonar receptors.

I know all this isn’t making me sound much like a genius, or even a reasonably competent operator. I wish I’d had more time to edit my memories a bit before having to tell this story. If I’m to justify the decision I’m trying to sell, I should have some chance to look like a sensible adult first. All I can put in for my own defense at the moment is one of those let’s-see-you-do-better remarks. Are you sure just how your own thoughts would have gone if you were practically helpless in a six-foot plastic bubble a mile under the ocean? If you’re not, please suspend your criticism until I’m done.

The second reason for not dumping ballast too hastily finally did show up. My attention was still pretty well focused on the wreckage, so I didn’t see it coming. My first glimpse was from the corner of my eye, and I thought for an instant it was another shark; then I realized it was human, and I had my evidence. Fine. Once it’s out of sight I can head for the surface.

Not a chance. What I needed was convincing evidence, and if my own eyes weren’t convincing me it was unlikely that my words would convince anyone else. What I saw was a person, which was all right in itself; a suit of four-inch polyphase armor, adequately powered in the limbs, will hold back the ton and a quarter or so per square inch that sea water exerts a mile down. Such armor will even let the wearer look rather like a human being and move about in a very clumsy walk.

It will not, however, unless he is immersed in an ocean of mercury, let him swim; and this clearly human figure was swimming.

It came into view some distance to my left, appearing in the light rather suddenly as though it had come down from the darkness above. It was swimming toward me and the wreck, not in any obvious hurry. As it approached, details became plainer; and the plainest of-all — plainer even than the fact that it was female — was that she wasn’t wearing armor. She was wearing a cold-water coverall type scuba suit, absolutely ordinary except that it had a spherical, transparent helmet instead of a breathing mask, and the ballast seemed to be in rings here and there around body and limbs instead of being fastened to the belt. I repeat — in fact, I had to repeat it to myself several times — that the garment was not pressure armor. Its wearer’s swimming motions showed plainly that it was nearly as flexible as ordinary skin, just as a scuba suit should be.

She didn’t seem to see my tank, which was some relief. She didn’t even seem to see the wreck until she was within twenty yards of it. She had been swimming very slowly along the edge of the tent roof with no more apparent purpose than someone out for an afternoon stroll, up to that point. Then she changed course and headed straight for the bow of Pugnose.

That didn’t fit. Anyone down here should have been looking for that wreck, not running across it by accident. I’d been expecting a working party sent out by the people under that cover.

Well, there’s more than one thing I haven’t been expecting about this business. Stop with the working hypotheses, brother, you haven’t enough data even for that yet. Just watch (I don’t even address myself by name).

So I watched. I watched her swim around the shattered bow, and into it and out again, and over it. Then I watched her unlimber an object which turned out to be a light, which had been clipped to her suit belt, and swim inside once more. That worried me a little; the camouflage for the tank had not been designed for that sort of inspection. Its clamps, its launching springs -

She came out again, with no more visible signs of excitement than before, and at that point something else dawned on me. It was a very minor point compared with what I had already seen — at least, it seemed minor when I first noticed it; as I thought, it became more and more a major puzzle.

Her scuba suit was, as I said, quite ordinary except for helmet and ballast. Its ordinariness included a small tank between the shoulders, whose upper end just touched the helmet and was presumably connected with it, though I could see no piping. All this was reasonable. The jarring note was that there were no bubbles.

Now, I’m familiar with rebreather systems, and I know about chemical supplies — mixtures of alkali metal peroxides and superoxides which react with water to give free oxygen and pick up carbon dioxide. I know them well enough to know that they must have, besides the chemical container and mixer systems, a sort of ‘lung’ — a variable-volume, ambient-pressure gas bag or tank — with the supply chemicals between it and the user’s own lungs. The exhaled gas has to go somewhere until it’s ready to be inhaled again. That ‘lung’ must have a volume great enough to take all the air a swimmer can exhale at one breath — in other words it must have as much volume, or nearly as much, as his own inflated lungs. There was no such bag visible on this swimming outfit, and the back tank was not nearly large enough to have contained one. It seemed, therefore, that the unit did not involve a chemical oxygen supply; and unless some sort of microscopic pump was taking the gas as fast as she exhaled and squeezing it back into another part of that little tank at fantastically high pressure, there should be exhalant bubbles. I couldn’t see any reason for such a recovery system, but I couldn’t see any bubbles either. I had already been bothered about what gas mixture she could be breathing — at this pressure, half of one percent oxygen would have burned her lungs out, and there was nothing I knew of which could be used to dilute it. Even helium was soluble enough down here to make decompression a job of many hours.

It crossed my mind for a moment that people might be living permanently under this pressure, breathing a nearly pure helium atmosphere with a fraction of a percent oxygen in it; but if that were the story, I still couldn’t see why that girl’s suit didn’t give out bubbles. Granted there might be every economic reason to recover helium, there are engineering problems which I still don’t think could be completely solved.

No. All hypotheses inadequate. Keep on observing. Facts so far are only that she seems to be living and moving normally in a closed system at outside pressure, and that the pressure in question — skipping the old superstition about flattening a human body — is quite high enough to mess up any biophysical or biochemical processes involving gas dynamics.

There wasn’t much more to observe, though. The girl clipped the light back on her belt, took a last glance at the wreckage and began swimming away from it. She didn’t go back the way she had come, but continued on to my right, slanting away from the lighted region. In a few seconds she had disappeared, though I knew she couldn’t be very far away yet.

It seemed likely that she was off to get help in moving the wreck off the tent roof. How long before she would be back with it was anyone’s guess. There might be a tent entrance a few hundred yards away, or there might not be one for several miles. The former seemed a trifle more likely, but I wasn’t going to risk money on the question.

Just my future.

She might have noticed the gear that had held and launched my tank; she wouldn’t have had to be much of an actress to hide an expression of suspicion under the circumstances. If she had noticed and reported it, those who came with her were going to be very curious about the whole area. The outside of the tank was deliberately a little irregular in outline so that it wouldn’t be too obviously artificial, but it was not going to fool anyone who took a really good look at it. Maybe it would be better if I moved a little farther away. I wasn’t concerned with personal safety; I could always get away, but I wanted to see as much as possible before that became necessary.

So I told myself.

Moving would be a slow process; traveling ability was not really a design feature of the tank. There were two dozen of the legs, and I had enough stored power to retract them against their springs several thousand times (that had taken argument), but I had not been born a sea urchin. I had had a little practice rolling the thing around under water, but the purpose of the rig was to let me juggle into a better observing position, not to keep out of the way of searchers. If I were found, my only real recourse would be to drop ballast and start for the surface. That was a once-only operation, and I didn’t want to resort to it before I really had to. There was still some hope, I figured, of deciding what was going on down here in some detail.

Maybe it’s courage, or maybe just natural optimism.