Undersea Fleet Read Online Free

depth-narcosis…
    I resolved to keep an eye on Bob.
    “Any questions?” Coach Blighman rapped out. There were no questions. Very well. Secure face-pieces! Open Sea Valves One and Three!”
    We snapped our face-lenses and mouthpieces into place.
    The cadet at the control panel saluted and twisted two plastic knobs. The sea poured in.
    It came in two great jets of white water, foaming and crashing against the bulkhead. Blinding spray distorted our lenses, and the cold brine surged and pulled around our feet.
    Coach Blighman had retreated to the command port, where he stood watching behind thick glass. As the lock filled we could hear his voice, sounding hollow and far away through the water, coming over the communicators: “Sea door open!”
    Motors whined, and the sea door irised wide.
    “Count and out!”
    Bob Eskow was number-four man in our crew, just before me. I could hear him rap sharply four times on the bulkhead as he squeezed through the iris door.
    I rapped five times and followed.
    The raptures of the depths!
    But they weren’t dangerous, they were—being alive. All of the work and strain at the Academy, all of my life in fact, was pointed toward this. I was in the sea.
    I took a breath and felt my body start to soar toward the surface, a hundred feet above; I exhaled, and my body dipped back toward the deck of the sub-sea raft. The electrolung chuckled and whispered behind my ear, measuring my breathing, supplying oxygen to keep me alive, a ten-story building’s height below the waves and the sky. It was broad daylight above, but down here was only a pale greenish wash of light.
    The deck of the gym ship—all gray steel and black shadow on the surface—was transformed into a Sinbad’s cave, gray-green floor beneath us, sea-green, transparent walls to the sides. The guide line was a glowing, greenish snake stretched tautly out ahead of me, into the greenish glow of the water. There was no sense of being under-water, no feeling of being “wet”; I was flying.
    I kicked and surged rapidly ahead of the guide line without touching it.
    Bob was just ahead, swimming slowly, fingers almost touching the guide line. I dawdled impatiently behind him, while he doggedly swam to the bow superstructure and fumbled around the scoring rig. Our numbers were there, with the Troyon tubes glowing blue over the signal buttons. They stood out clearly in the wash of green light, but Bob seemed to be having trouble.
    For a moment I thought of helping him—but there is an honor code at the Academy, strict and sharp: Each cadet does his own tasks, no one can coast on someone else’s work. And then he found the button, and his number went out.
    I followed him with growing concern, back along the guide line. He was finding it difficult to stay with the guide; twice I saw him clutch at it and pull himself along, as his swimming strokes became erratic.
    And this at a hundred feet! The bare beginning of the qualifying dives!
    What would happen at three hundred? At five?
    Finally we were all back inside the lock, and the seapumps began their deep, purring hum. As soon as the water was down to our waists Coach Blighman rasped:
    “Eden, Eskow! What were you jellyfish doing? You held up the whole crew!”
    We stood dripping on the slippery duckboards, waiting for the tongue-lashing; but we were spared it. One of the other cadets cried out sharply and splashed to the floor. The sea-medics were there almost before the water was out of the lock. I grabbed him, holding his head out of the last of the water; they took him from me and quickly, roughly, stripped his face-piece and goggles away. His face was convulsed with pain; he was unconscious.
    Sea Coach Blighman strode in, splashing and raging. Even before the sea medics had finished with him, he roared: “Ear plugs! Theres one in every crew! I’ve told you a hundred times—I’ve dinned it in to you, over and over—ear plugs are worse than useless below a fathom! Men, if you can’t