The Deep Range - Arthur C. Clarke [60]
“I don’t understand it. The mechanism worked perfectly every time we tested it in the lab.”
“Did you test it at a hundred atmospheres pressure?”
“Er—no. It didn’t seem necessary.”
Don’s “Huh!” seemed to say all that was needful about biologists who tried to dabble with engineering, and there was silence on all channels for the next few minutes of slow ascent. Then Dr. Roberts, sounding a little diffident, came back to the subject.
“Since we can’t rely on the bombs,” he said, “you’d better come up more quickly. He’ll revive again in about thirty minutes.”
“Right—I’ll double speed. I only hope this collar doesn’t slip off.”
The next twenty minutes were perfectly uneventful; then everything started to happen at once.
“He’s coming around again,” said Franklin. “I think the higher speed has waked him up.”
“I was afraid of that,” Dr. Roberts answered. “Hold on as long as you can, and then let go a bomb. We can only pray that one of them will work.”
A new voice suddenly cut into the circuit.
“Captain here. Lookout has just spotted some sperm whales about two miles away. They seem to be heading toward us; I suggest you have a look at them—we’ve got no horizontal search sonar on this ship.”
Franklin switched quickly over to the long-range scanner and picked up the echoes at once.
“Nothing to worry about,” he said. “If they come too close, we can scare them away.” He glanced back at the TV screen and saw that Percy was now getting very restive.
“Let go your bomb,” he told Don, “and keep your fingers crossed.”
“I’m not betting on this,” Don answered. “Anything happen?”
“No; another dud. Try again.”
“That leaves three. Here goes.”
“Sorry—I can see that one. It isn’t cracked.”
“Two left. Now there’s only one.”
“That’s a dud too. What had we better do, Doc? Risk the last one? I’m afraid Percy will slip off in a minute.”
“There’s nothing else we can do,” replied Dr. Roberts, his voice now clearly showing the strain. “Go ahead, Don.”
Almost at once Franklin gave a cry of satisfaction.
“We’ve made it!” he shouted. “He’s knocked cold again! How long do you think it will keep him under this time?”
“We can’t rely on more than twenty minutes, so plan your ascent accordingly. We’re right above you—and remember what I said about taking at least ten minutes over that last two hundred feet. I don’t want any pressure damage after all the trouble we’ve been to.”
“Just a minute,” put in Don. “I’ve been looking at those whales. They’ve put on speed and they’re coming straight toward us. I think they’ve detected Percy—or the beacon we put in him.”
“So what?” said Franklin. “We can frighten them with—oh.”
“Yes—I thought you’d forgotten that. These aren’t patrol subs, Walt. No sirens on them. And you can’t scare sperm whales just by revving your engines.”
That was true enough, though it would not have been fifty years ago, when the great beasts had been hunted almost to extinction. But a dozen generations had lived and died since then; now they recognized the subs as harmless, and certainly no obstacle to the meal they were anticipating. There was a real danger that the helpless Percy be eaten before he could be safely caged.
“I think we’ll make it,” said Franklin, as he anxiously calculated the speed of the approaching whales. This was a hazard that no one could have anticipated; it was typical of the way in which underwater operations developed unexpected snags and complications.
“I’m going straight up to the two-hundred-foot level,” Don told him. “We’ll wait there just as long as it’s safe, and then run for the ship. What do you think of that, Doc?”
“It’s the only thing to do. But remember that those whales can make fifteen knots if they have to.”
“Yes, but they can’t keep it up for long, even if they see their dinner slipping away. Here we go.”
The subs increased their rate of ascent, while the water brightened around them and the enormous pressure slowly