Nigel Thompson - Pheia

Kate put her one sweatshirt back on after giving it a sniff. No chance for laundry down here and no room for much in the way of spare clothes. She didn’t really care. It was no different from the weeklong backpacking trips she had done with her father when she was younger. Kate was happy sitting in the dirt wearing the same shirt all week if that’s what was needed. In an odd way life aboard the Pheia was a lot like backpacking. You only had what you could carry on board, the food was freeze-dried and you tended to wear the same clothes every day. At one point Boris had pointed out that the obsession with soap was a strictly American problem. Russians were happy with their natural smells. Kate thought that was fine for a week or two, but not as a way of life.

She zipped up her sweatshirt and climbed down the ladder to the galley, leaving the bulk of the crew still asleep.

In the galley she found Boris and Chas Dunsworth drinking coffee. Kayla was by the stove as usual.

“Do you sleep Kayla?” Kate asked her.

“Sure do. Just not all day like you folks.”

She waved the coffee pot in the air.

“Yes please” Kate said.

Shoes appeared on the ladder from the bunk room, followed by the legs of Dr. Martin, recognizable by the dress pants he always wore.

The rest of the crew who were not on night watch arrived in the galley over the next ten minutes. It was always loud in there during meal times. The metal walls echoed the talk and everyone always seemed to be talking at once.

Martin tapped his empty coffee mug on the table. “Everyone. Everyone, can I have some quiet please?”

The chatter died down.

“We are half way down. That’s 2,500 feet and deeper than most other dives with the exception of some research dives the Navy has done. Today is a big day for the Pheia as we will disconnect from the surface umbilical and begin the remainder of the descent under our own power. But before we can do any of that we will run compete systems checks today. The dive team will also conduct another checkout dive to be sure the equipment is all OK and to be sure that everyone is happy operating at this depth. I’m very pleased to say that Dr. Ford is happy with everyone from a biological point of view and Dr. Carver says you are all in excellent mental health.”

A few looks from some members of the team questioned that last statement. Megan Young summed it up best: “We are all nuts to be down here. That’s what he really means.”

Duncan stood up and banged a spoon on his mug.

“Listen up. All divers need to be down in the moon pool by 10 hundred to prep for today’s dive. See you there”.

Duncan opened the hatch to the other part of the hab and he, White and Perez crossed the short tunnel that connected the galley to operations. From there they descended the ladder to the moon pool room and began to get dive gear ready.

Kate followed the divers through the connecting tunnel into operations where she saw Newell sitting in the center chair with his feet on the desk. He was snoring.

“Jason. Time for breakfast.” Kate said.

Newell didn’t move so Kate crossed the room and waved her coffee mug under his nose.

“Wake up. Your shift is over.” Kate poked him in the shoulder with her forefinger.

Newell woke up. “I was just resting my eyes. What time is it?”

“Time to get your self some breakfast.” Some watchman you are. How long have you been asleep?”

“Not long. Do you have any idea how boring it is to sit and watch these computer screens, especially knowing that the computer is actually monitoring everything anyway? If we had a real problem, there is likely nothing I could do anyway. I think Martin just feels the need to have one of us sit here.”

He rose and stretched. “Right. Breakfast it is.” He left leaving Kate alone in the operations area.

Kate looked at the small patch of wall illuminated by the Pheia’s lights outside the portal. The wall wasn’t moving. She supposed Martin was right and they’d reached the halfway point and the surface barge had stopped lowering them. She was thinking of calling the surface vessel when Martin and Bazhanov joined her. They were talking about the reactor and gas systems.

“Kate, aren’t you supposed to be getting ready for a dive?” Martin asked her.

“Yes, I suppose I should get down there,” she replied and walked the few steps to the ladder that connected operations to the moon pool.

Martin pressed the talk button on the desk mike.

“Pheia to surface. Martin here.”

“Go ahead Dr. Martin.”

“We are beginning our systems check and our second test dive. We expect to be ready to uncouple at about 13:00.”

The voice over the speaker from the surface came back. “We concur. Plan to uncouple at 13:00. We are monitoring your systems which all look OK to us. We’ll continue to monitor until disconnect. Surface out”.

“Thanks.” Martin replied. “As soon as Chas gets here we’ll start the systems check.”

Dunsworth arrived just as Martin was finishing his sentence.

“Ready to start the checks boss?”

Martin looked at Bazhanov who nodded back to him”

“Yes we are.”

The three men took seats at the control consoles and began working their way through a long checklist for the entire systems in the Pheia.

In the moon pool, Duncan was organizing the divers.

“This will be the same sort of dive as the one we did during pre-dive confinement with of course the exception of Mr. Ramirez who is working on his tan.”

He continued, “We’ll drop through the moon pool and assemble on the wall-side of the Pheia at the top of the weight stack. That puts us level with where we are now. Matt will stay behind for shore duty. I’ll take the lead and Mr. Perez will take up the rear. Once we’re all on top of the weight stack we’ll do a comm check and then we’ll cross to the wall and swim up-current for a way. Let’s all try to stay together please. I know it’s only four of us but nobody goes in front of me. Chris will stay behind whoever is at the back. Please try to resist the urge to go sight seeing — not that there is much to see down here. Questions?”

Megan Young asked: “What’s the sea temp?”

“Cold.” Duncan replied. “But you’ll be nice and cozy in your suit.”

Kate shook her head. She just wanted to get in the water. It was going to be very interesting to dive at 2,500 feet below the surface. Of course, in a sense they were already diving — they just weren’t wet yet. But being in the Pheia under pressure wasn’t the same as being in the water. Sitting around in a metal tube wasn’t diving.

Duncan continued. “Please also make sure your ear buds are seated properly so you can hear the comms. I know you all learned not to use ear plugs when you did scuba training but two things are different here. First, these ear buds have a water channel in them to allow the water to pass into your ear. Second, and this is the best part, we are far enough down now that altering your depth won’t affect the pressure on your ears. So please make sure they are well seated. I also had a hard time hearing some of you on the last test dive. Please speak slowly and clearly. It is not necessary to shout. We are not in the movies. Shouting just distorts the sound and makes it impossible to understand what you are saying.”

The full face dive masks took some getting used to. The Navy guys were used to them but the rest of the crew having trained with separate masks and regulators found it a bit odd not to have the regulator in the mouth.

Kate had initially found the comms a bit intrusive. She liked the solitude of her dives. Duncan and his crew spoke very little but the scientists tended to be more like a group of teenage schoolgirls. On some of the earlier training dives it had been hard to get a word in between the chatter.