There was silence from the DSC-6 for a moment until Cam spoke into the comms. “Hey, can you give me a readout on your nitrogen-oxygen mix?”
This caused Gunner to laugh even harder. He was relaxed and feeling good. “Cam, it’s not the air mix. Everything’s fine. I’m just in a good mood, that’s all.”
“Good to hear,” she said with a hint of concern in her voice. “You know, it’s not too late for me to join you. I can suit up in—”
“Not necessary. Besides, I’m about to go in.”
Bear reminded Gunner of their radio blackout while he was in the sub. “We’ve got you five-by-five right now, but we’ll lose you once you find the cargo hold.”
“Copy that.”
“Ghost has asked us to take a lap around this thing to look for identifying marks. I guess the State Department needs to assess the find before they decide what to do with it.”
“Am I still pingin’?” Gunner asked.
“Affirmative,” replied Bear. “Regardless of your exit point, we can come to you.”
Gunner took a deep breath of the pure oxygen. “Copy that. I’m going in. See you in a few.”
Chapter Forty-One
Outside the Wreckage of German U-boat 1226
The Puerto Rico Trench
Depth: 27,840 feet
Fathoms: 4,640
The Deepsea Challenger 6
North Atlantic Ocean
“Even with these lights, it’s near impossible to see more than a hundred feet in any direction,” lamented Cam. She’d taken control of the manual spotlights attached to the front of the submersible, designed to supplement the fixed lighting used for navigational purposes.
“I can hover and maintain a fifty-to-seventy-five-meter separation between us and the U-boat. Any closer and we run the risk of running into a wayward hunk of steel.”
Cam continued to light up the surface so the multiple external cameras affixed to the DSC-6 could record every aspect of the wreckage.
“Whoa! What the hell was that?” Bear shouted his question.
Cam swung the spotlight toward the front of the submersible in the direction where Bear was pointing. She frantically searched the dark ocean depths back and forth until she found the phenomenon floating ahead of them.
The twenty-foot-long oblong object seemed to move and change in shape as the current pushed it around. She steadied her hand to keep the light on the center of the blob as it drifted aimlessly to their side.
“It’s some kind of gelatin egg sac. Look, the membrane is almost transparent.”
Bear leaned forward in his seat. “Is it full of eggs?”
“I see them,” she replied. “Hundreds of them. Hell, thousands even. It has to be from a giant squid.”
“For real?” asked Bear in disbelief. He never knew when Cam was pulling his chain.
“Yes, I’m serious, Bear. There are large squid throughout the oceans. Most are around sixteen feet, but males can grow as large as thirty-nine.”
Bear started looking all around the DSC-6. “Um, does that mean mama might be nearby?”
Cam slugged him. “You big baby. Let’s keep going. I don’t want Gunner to have to wait on us.”
Bear methodically moved along the length of the sub. Cam focused on illuminating the hull and then had Bear pause for a moment as they passed the conning tower. She turned her attention to the operations console. She adjusted the focus and telephoto lens of the side camera to zoom in on the tower.
“I think I have some type of marking on the tower. We’ll analyze it topside.”
Bear didn’t immediately power them forward. Instead, he was staring at his sonar. An object could be seen sitting stationary on the other side of the wreckage. He tapped on the console to get Cam’s attention.
“Do you see it?” he asked.
“Yeah. It might be the squid. The size makes sense.”
“C’mon, Cam. Seriously?”
Cam leaned over to study the object. It was stationary, something she found odd. “I wonder why it’s not moving?” she muttered.
“Maybe it’s waiting for us to come around the hull?”
She ignored his silly statement. A squid doesn’t stalk its prey. It simply consumes whatever comes into its feeding tentacles. They also rarely remain stationary. Like most fish, as they swim, water rushes under their gills, where the blood in their capillaries picks up oxygen that had dissolved in the water.
“Let’s abandon our surveying of the wreckage for a minute. Head straight for the blip on the sonar.”
“What? Straight toward the squid.”
“Just go, Bear. We need to see what it is.”
“No. Actually, no, we don’t. Let’s stay on mission.”
Cam turned in her seat and gave Bear the look. “Since when do you wanna stay on mission? You’ve got the worst op ADD I’ve ever seen.”
“Since we discovered the giant squid over there.”
Cam shook her head, and Bear reluctantly accelerated across the bow of the sub in the direction of the sonar anomaly. Minutes later, he slowed the DSC-6 to a drift.
“Well, I’ll be damned,” he muttered. “We’ve got company.”
Cam tensed, grabbing the arms of her seat. “Yeah, and if we can see them, they can see us.”
Chapter Forty-Two
Inside the Wreckage of German U-boat 1226
The Puerto Rico Trench
Depth: 27,840 feet
Fathoms: 4,640
North Atlantic Ocean
Gunner’s light kit provided him more than enough illumination to safely move through the interior of the submarine. The decayed wreckage still provided some semblance of its former layout, which Gunner had studied while they awaited the bad weather to clear at the Coast Guard station in Puerto Rico. He found an area where a spiral staircase was once confined. The staircase was gone, but the opening was wide enough for him to drop several levels without having to follow passageways or to discern what remained of them.
The pressure hull plating and the framing material of U-1226 was made of the thickest steel and was relatively intact. The interior was created by cold-formed frames of aluminum-normalized steel, a much thinner, lighter-weight material. Virtually all of that had disintegrated, leaving large open spaces that were once considered very cramped quarters.
Gunner recalled the video he’d watched from the previous dive that had doomed three good people to their death. He could’ve followed
