Agent 21: Reloaded: Book 2 Read Online Free

first. A gloomy, ghostly silhouette. Through his dive mask, Zak made out an enormous sharp V with rounded edges. It took a couple of moments for him to realize he was looking at the very tip of a battleship. He followed Raf towards the bow of the ship and as they drew close, he gradually understood how big HMS Vanguard was. There was no way he could see the bottom of the hull or the other end of the vessel. It was sitting on the seabed at a thirty-degree angle like an enormous sleeping monster. Its hull and decks were corroded now, with holes here and there, but Zak could see it must have been an impressive sight when it was above water. They swam along its length – ten metres, twenty metres, thirty metres – and the main body of the ship hulked above them, so vast that Zak’s powerful torch could only light up the smallest sections of it at any one time.
    Raf headed left and they found themselves floating half a metre above the deck. In front of them was a doorway. The door itself had corroded away from its hinges and was lying on the deck. Zak shone his torch into the opening.
    He started when he saw a pair of eyes staring back at him. What was it? What was looking at them? The eyes were ten metres away and coming closer …
    The fish that emerged from the doorway five seconds later was like nothing Zak had ever seen, even though he’d been studying books on marine life to prepare for this dive. It was at least a couple of metres long and its eyes were the size of grapefruits, and just as bulbous. It swished lazily through the doorway and its tail fin brushed against Zak’s arm as it passed him before disappearing into the murky depths. Raf looked over his shoulder and gave him a thumbs-up sign. Zak returned it and together they kickedthrough the doorway and into the body of the ship, lighting the way with their powerful torches.
    They found themselves in a narrow corridor, very cramped. Because of the angle of the vessel, the corridor was tilting downwards. Some kind of seaweed was growing like lichen over the walls. They passed through clouds of plankton that misted their vision for a few seconds at a time, then the corridor turned to the right. They hit a flight of steps going down. Raf and Zak followed this stairwell into the hull of the ship.
    They passed through another doorway and finally found themselves in what looked like the engine room. There was debris everywhere – chunks of metal, bits of old machinery – and Zak could tell that the explosion that had sunk HMS Vanguard had occurred here. He kicked deeper into the room and the light of his torch fell on something else. At first he thought it was another sea creature, resting on the floor of the ship. It was only when he kicked himself closer that he realized he was looking at the deathly grimace of a skull. Grimly fascinated, he swam nearer.
    And his body almost went into shock when he saw the skull move.
    Zak immediately kicked away and he felt a bit foolish doing so. He told himself that it was just the underwater currents he and Raf were creating that hadcaused the skull to move. Dead men can’t hurt you . Now, though, his attention was elsewhere. He shone his torch up and down, left and right. And everywhere he looked, everywhere he turned, there were skeletons.
    There was no way he could count them. The bodies of the dead sailors were still partially covered in the ragged remains of their clothes, but they had been stripped of flesh. Was that because fish had nibbled away at them, or had they rotted away of their own accord? Zak didn’t know. His torch lit up the bones of a man lying on his back. His jaw and teeth were fixed in a horrific smile and Zak started as a small silvery fish darted out from behind his ribcage. Bizarrely, he remembered the fish tank his mum and dad had before they died. The little goldfish there had hidden behind ceramic rocks, not human remains.
    A tap on his shoulder. Raf was there. He pointed deeper into the cabin. Zak