Dennis Wheatley - They Found Atlantis

Now the last trace of green had faded from the spectrum and the brilliant blue was tinged with violet. Yet the light had not perceptibly darkened, only its reds, yellows, and greens had disappeared leaving a strange unearthly brightness which had a queer effect upon them. It held excitement and exhilaration something similar to the effect of mountain air or a draught of iced champagne. There was a tenseness in the atmosphere and their senses seemed tuned up to a greater, almost unnatural, degree of vivid receptivity.

A lantern fish, their first sight of a real inhabitant of the deeper seas came sailing by, his scales ablaze with his full armour of iridescence. A squid, goggle eyed, pouched bodied, his tentacles waving in a deep sea dance pulsed on his way, then some pinkish fish, semi-transparent so that their vertebrae and food filled stomachs were clearly visible, and next a great scarlet snapper.

'Now 600 feet,' announced the Doctor as the sphere stopped in its descent again. 'No man has been so deep except in a bathysphere.'

The light had darkened to a deep violet blue and still had that eerie unearthly quality about it. In the distance now they could see some pale flashes as fish from the deeps, carrying their own lights, moved to and fro. The Doctor switched on his searchlight but although it seemed dark outside the yellow glare had, as yet, little effect, so he turned it off.

Again the steel chamber in which they crouched together slipped gently downward. Two iridescent eyes suddenly appeared at the porthole, then as they moved a long pale ribbon like transparent gelatine undulated by. the larva of some great sea eel. Black jellyfish, a shoal of shrimps, a pale blue fish and then a great dark form moving slowly in the blue black distance. More sea snails looking like dull gold shields, another squid, larger this time, and next a lovely silver hatchet fish glowing faintly in the deep blue murk.

At 800 feet it seemed that the limit to light penetrating from that far upper world of sun and wind and sky. had come. Only a grey blue blackness now filled the steel chamber yet the remaining suggestion of light still had that strange brilliant quality about it and when they tried the searchlight it made little impression on the darkened waters. As the Doctor switched it off everything went dead black for a moment then the intensely silent blue black twilight wrapped them in its folds again.

As they sank still lower, twinkling lights moved all the time in the distance palish green, lemon, pink, yellow, and blue. A big jellyfish slopped against one of the portholes its stomach filled with luminous food, a great deep sea eel came slithering past and then a cloud of petropods momentarily shut out everything else from view.

'1,000 feet,' announced the Doctor. 'We shall see now with our light,' and as he switched it on they saw that it had at last become effective. The bright yellow beam cut asharply defined path through the inky blueness of the waters. Then they were able to witness a most curious phenomenon. Outside the beam lights of all colours were visible like the fairy lamps in some enchanted garden as arow of them moved forward they suddenly went out and the head and body of a strange looking fish appeared like abrilliant colourful painting in the yellow ray. Sometimes afish would remain half in half out. its head and fore-part clear and beautiful but cut off as though with a sharp knife in the middle, the rest of its body and tail only indicated by arow of tiny lights like the portholes of a ship.

At 1,200 feet a great cloud-like mass came into view again but the extreme range of the searchlight only just showed it so their intense curiosity regarding this mighty inhabitant of the lower seas had to remain unsatisfied.

At 1,400 feet, there was an inexplicable empty patch. For some unknown reason not a single organism of any kind was visible, but at 1,600 they passed into teeming life again. Squids, jellies, deep sea prawns, rat-tailed macrourids and golden-tailed serpent dragons all carrying their own illuminations drifted or swam by. Even Count Axel who had expected wonders was staggered by the thought of all this brilliant multi-coloured life spreading over the thousands of miles of sea that cover two thirds of the earth's entire surface.

When they reached 1,800 feet the Doctor switched off the light again. After the first almost physical blow of darkness had fallen an intense unutterable loneliness seemed to chill their hearts. The ship above seemed as far away as England. It was in another world, distinct, apart; their present life did not even seem to be a continuation of that which they had known; years back as they felt it at that moment, where moon and stars alternate with the daily rising and setting of the sun.

Gradually, into that vital bluish darkness a faint, faint greyness seemed to penetrate, and they knew that even here the last tenuous suggestion of the brilliant sunshine above could just reach them.

Spellbound they gazed from the ports. The blackness tinged only by palest grey was lit by an absolute display of fireworks. Green, red, yellow, blue, in rows of dots, singly, in pairs, in long tenuous streamers, they flickered and moved, some going on and off as though under the control of their strange owners. Something seemed to burst in the near distance giving off a million tiny sparks. The Doctor switched on the light; there was nothing to be seen but a shoal of incredibly thin fairy like fish and a big octopus half in and half out of the beam.

As they moved downward again more lantern fish appeared, and a shoal of hatchet fish, then a great blunt nosed monster at least three feet in length who carried a large green light waving above his head upon a single fin.

'We register now 2,000 feet,' announced the Doctor. 'The sun's light never penetrates to this depth. Here is the region ofperpetual night.' Again he switched off the searchlight. The pyrotechnic display outside continued but not the faintest glimmer of greyness now came to light the Stygian blackness of this uncharted world.

'We ascend now,' said the Doctor, and Oscar, who had been keeping up an intermittent mutter, mumbled again into his mouthpiece.

'No, no!' cried Camilla, 'let's go further down—please.' It was the first time she had spoken for nearly three quarters of an hour.

'Not so!' The Doctor shook his head. 'It is enough. The sphere has only been tested for this depth today. We must not go deeper,' and as he spoke they felt the pull of the cable carrying them up to daylight once more.

For the forty minutes of the upward journey they witnessed fresh scenes in the ever changing life which flourishes beneath the seas, from the self-lighted creatures who roam the depths, to a ten foot shark at 400 feet, and the floating jellies of the shallow waters. From out of the pitch black depths they rose by stages through the faint grey lighting of the bluish murk into the deep black-blue, then experienced again, for a thousand feet, the weird exhilaration of that staggeringly brilliant blue light growing brighter and brighter as they came near to the surface and, at last, passed into the area where green still penetrates then yellow and finally, just beneath the surface orange and red.

As the crew began their preparations for hoisting the bathysphere back on to its steel supports Count Axel smiled at Camilla.

'You enjoyed it?'

'Oh immensely.' She squeezed his arm, 'I never dreamed that such things could be. Thank you a thousand times for persuading me to come.'

He leaned towards her: 'There are many other wonderful things in the world which I could show you if you wished.

'Are there?' she raised one eyebrow with a little smile.

'Yes. You have hardly travelled at all yet and travel needs more than just money and a guide book to be undertaken successfully. It is an art.'