Gravity

‘It went by so fast! Just this streak—like a snake whipping by.’

‘Did it look like a fish’s head on an eel’s body?’

‘Yes. Yes, that’s what I saw.’

‘Then it was an eelpout. Thermarces cerberus.’

Cerberus, thought Ahearn with a shudder. The three-headed dog guarding the gates of hell.

‘It’s attracted to the heat and sulfur,’ said Helen. ‘You’ll see more of them as you get closer to the vent.’

If you say so. Ahearn knew next to nothing about marine biology. The creatures now drifting past his acrylic head dome were merely objects of curiosity to him, living signposts pointing the way to his goal. With both hands steady at the controls now, he maneuvered Deep Flight IV deeper into the abyss.

Two thousand meters. Three thousand.

What if he had damaged the hull?

Four thousand meters, the crushing pressure of water increasing linearly as he descended. The water was blacker now, colored by plumes of sulfur from the vent below. The wing lights scarcely penetrated that thick mineral suspension. Blinded by the swirls of sediment, he maneuvered out of the sulfur-tinged water, and his visibility improved. He was descending to one side of the hydrothermal vent, out of the plume of magma-heated water, yet the external temperature continued to climb.

One hundred twenty degrees Fahrenheit.

Another streak of movement slashed across his field of vision. This time he managed to maintain his grip on the controls. He saw more eelpouts, like fat snakes hanging head down as though suspended in space. The water spewing from the vent below was rich in heated hydrogen sulfide, a chemical that was toxic and incompatible with life. But even in these black and poisonous waters, life had managed to bloom, in shapes fantastic and beautiful. Attached to the canyon wall were swaying Riftia worms, six feet long, topped with feathery scarlet headdresses. He saw clusters of giant clams, white-shelled, with tongues of velvety red peeking out. And he saw crabs, eerily pale and ghostlike as they scuttled among the crevices.

Even with the air-conditioning unit running, he was starting to feel the heat.

Six thousand meters. Water temperature one hundred eighty degrees. In the plume itself, heated by boiling magma, the temperatures would be over five hundred degrees. That life could exist even here, in utter darkness, in these poisonous and superheated waters, seemed miraculous.

‘I’m at six thousand sixty,’ he said. ‘I don’t see it.’

In his earphone, Helen’s voice was faint and crackling. ‘There’s a shelf jutting out from the wall. You should see it at around six thousand eighty meters.’

‘I’m looking.’

‘Slow your descent. It’ll come up quickly.’

‘Six thousand seventy, still looking. It’s like pea soup down here. Maybe I’m at the wrong position.’

‘…sonar readings…collapsing above you!’ Her frantic message was lost in static.

‘I didn’t copy that. Repeat.’

‘The canyon wall is giving way! There’s debris falling toward you. Get out of there!’

The loud pings of rocks hitting the hull made him jam the joysticks forward in panic. A massive shadow plummeted down through the murk just ahead and bounced off a canyon shelf, sending a fresh rain of debris into the abyss. The pings accelerated. Then there was a deafening clang, and the accompanying jolt was like a fist slamming into him.

His head jerked, his jaw slamming into the body pan. He felt himself tilting sideways, heard the sickening groan of metal as the starboard wing scraped over jutting rocks. The sub kept rolling, sediment swirling past the dome in a disorienting cloud.

He hit the emergency-weight-drop lever and fumbled with the joysticks, directing the sub to ascend. Deep Flight IV lurched forward, metal screeching against rock, and came to an unexpected halt. He was frozen in place, the sub tilted starboard. Frantically he worked at the joysticks, thrusters at full ahead.

No response.

He paused, his heart pounding as he struggled to maintain control over his rising panic. Why wasn’t he moving? Why was the sub not responding? He forced himself to scan the two digital display units. Battery power intact. AC unit still functioning. Depth gauge reading, six thousand eighty-two meters.

The sediment slowly cleared, and shapes took form in the beam of his port wing light. Peering straight ahead through the dome, he saw an alien landscape of jagged black stones and bloodred Riftia worms. He craned his neck sideways to look at his starboard wing. What he saw sent his stomach into a sickening tumble.

The wing was tightly wedged between two rocks. He could not move forward. Nor could he move backward. I am trapped in a tomb, nineteen thousand feet under the sea.

‘…copy? Steve, do you copy?’

He heard his own voice, weak with fear: ‘Can’t move—starboard wing wedged—’

‘…port-side wing flaps. A little yaw might wiggle you loose.’

‘I’ve tried it. I’ve tried everything. I’m not moving.’

There was dead silence over the earphones. Had he lost them? Had he been cut off? He thought of the ship far above, the deck gently rolling on the swells. He thought of sunshine. It had been a beautiful sunny day on the surface, birds gliding overhead. The sea a bottomless blue…

Now a man’s voice came on. It was that of Palmer Gabriel, the man who had financed the expedition, speaking calmly and in control, as always. ‘We’re starting rescue procedures, Steve. The other sub is already being lowered. We’ll get you up to the surface as soon as we can.’ There was a pause, then: ‘Can you see anything? What are your surroundings?’

‘I—I’m resting on a shelf just above the vent.’

‘How much detail can you make out?’

‘What?’

‘You’re at six thousand eighty-two meters. Right at the depth we were interested in. What about that shelf you’re on? The rocks?’

I am going to die, and he is asking about the fucking rocks.

‘Steve, use the strobe. Tell us what you see.’

He forced his gaze to the instrument panel and flicked the strobe switch.

Bright bursts of light flashed in the murk. He stared at the newly revealed landscape flickering before his retinas. Earlier he had focused on the worms. Now his attention shifted to the immense field of debris scattered across the shelf floor. The rocks were coal black, like magnesium nodules, but these had jagged edges, like congealed shards of glass. Peering to his right, at the freshly fractured rocks trapping his wing, he suddenly realized what he was looking at.

‘Helen’s right,’ he whispered.

‘I didn’t copy that.’

‘She was right! The iridium source—I have it in clear view—’

‘You’re fading out. Recommend you…’ Gabriel’s voice broke up into static and went dead.

‘I did not copy. Repeat, I did not copy!’ said Ahearn.

There was no answer.

He heard the pounding of his heart, the roar of his own breathing. Slow down, slow down. Using up my oxygen too fast…