UNDER PRESSURE
or
A TENTACLE ROMANCE
Scott Harrison


	It is difficult to adequately describe the isolation of a place where time, warmth, and even light are absent. Deep beneath the churning surface of the North Pacific the only sources of illumination were the carbide glare from my lantern and the fleeting glitter of a scaled fish disappearing into the curtain of night. Aside from these occasional glimpses of life the seabed was a barren desert, broken only by outcrops of petrified coral and the occasional whale-fall. Mine were the only footsteps that would ever disturb that place, for all but the best equipped would perish there in an instant.
	Even ensconced within the suit I swore I could feel the relentless pressure of 80 fathoms of water bearing down upon my shoulders.  Perhaps that was just the burdensome helmet clamped firmly around my neck. The standard diving dress (Mk.4) was not designed to be nimble , and I struggled to even shuffle forwards with my feet encased in lead-weighted shoes. Of course ,without that peculiar footwear I would've been at the mercy of any passing current, a tiny bubble of breathable air trapped at the bottom of a titanic ocean. Instead, my buoyancy was carefully balanced, the Marseilles belt, shot-bag and boots all working together to traverse the delicate tightrope between pulling me to the seabed and allowing a modicum of movement. Even when an equilibrium was found the forces at work were never conducive to a healthy posture, and my other attire still left me with feet of clay.
	Much of my body was covered with a thick coverlet of waterproof canvas that did little to hamper the penetrating chill of these sunless waters and served to chafe all of ones most intimate regions. The sack webbing that crossed my breast and weighed heavily on my hips left me with little room to breathe but was vital for carrying the tools of my trade. After all, To venture into this Stygian landscape without a pneumofathometer or my reinforced divers chrono would be to invite a rapid demise. Every element had to be in working order , and one reaches a state of constant schizophrenia, of compulsive check listing. Check pressure gauge, check dive calculator, check umbilical – the rote training never stops, the eternally nagging voice of the petty-officer mother resounding in poorly purged memories. Despite my best efforts ,the gremlins were there to protect me.
	All of this paraphernalia was relatively ergonomic compared to the colossal brass helmet strapped across my shoulders. Some non-delvers have called it claustrophobic, but this does little justice to the restrictions it places on the wearer. Despite having four lights (what the non-cognoscenti would call a porthole) ,the great metal ball limited my vision to a a restricted portion of the floor directly beneath my nose. If I sought peripheral views I was forced to turn my head inside and try to glance through one of the smaller side-lights, but this operation was partially blocked by the positioning of the spit-cock and the exhaust valve that regulated my air supply. I suspect that a blinkered mule has a greater field of view, and a more comfortable one too.
	If the suit were not already inhibiting enough, my movements were further stymied by the stocky umbilical that snaked above me into the twilight, carrying the life-giving gas without which I would die in very short order. Every minute I was underwater a party of deckhands had to sweat away at a manually pumped compressor to circulate air through the system. Though I was reliant upon it for my existence , it was a resentful tie to my mothers apron-strings, a connection and a reminder to the duties and responsibilities that bore down on me like no weight of water ever could.
	And yet, there in the watery shadows, i could sense liberty. The suit , far from being a poor imitation of my natural environment ,was a passport to paradise. This underwater world was a place of escape rather than danger ,a haven from the social cyclone in which I had trapped myself. The irony that my existence in this peaceful realm was reliant upon the exertion of my fellow man was not lost on me.
	Since I was a child the attractions of land and the humanity that inhabit it have slipped from my affections at an ever increasing pace. The petty bullies of the boarding school left me jaded towards those I should have called my fellows. The navy was little better. Warrant officers like I belong to neither mess, having enough technical education and authority to distance them from the ratings, but insufficient class to be considered an officer. To this day their taunts colour the pleasures of company with resentment and fear in my mind. Perhaps I am overly melodramatic, but the life of an aquanaut gives little opportunity for anything but self reflection, and opportunities for socialisation are at a premium . We separate ourselves through choice, and the price is an eternity of internalising ones depression. Moreover, my profession makes it difficult to seek pleasure in joyful matrimony. I am rarely ashore ,and any woman accepting my vows would have to live with the possibility (neigh ,probability) that I will eventually succumb to the dreaded caisson disease that forever stalks delvers. No, instead I seek my comforts far from the maddening mass of humanity in the bosom of the ocean, a sanctuary where I can flourish without disturbance even if I must endure the protective ensemble. Check pressure gauge, check dive calculator, check umbilical.

-o-o-o-

	 As my eyes adjusted to the blackness on the first dive of the expedition, an ominous elephants graveyard began to emerge from the shadows. Above my head cyclopean ribs arched upwards towards an invisible heaven, arrayed with tattered fragments of tender flesh that flapped gently in an invisible breeze. In the silt at my feet the pale outline of half-buried detritus oozed softly out of focus, like the remains of a final meal slowly digesting themselves where once a cavernous stomach had rested. In the insufficient light that ribcage of mammoth proportions poised menacingly on my flanks, and as I struggled forwards through that valley of death I had to remind myself that this was not the corpse of a fallen titan. This was a folly of man brought to naught.
	Only a few short weeks before that mortuary for whales had been a leviathan of the skies. She was hardly comparable to the stately pleasure liners of the Gold Star Line, but the aerostat Pride of Dawson had none the less been a shining symbol of man's assumed mastery of the skies. Hundreds of feet long, her wallowing cream gasbag was a familiar sight along the pacific coast from Juneau to Olympia, and the gentle rumble of her steam turbines had brought smiles to the faces of many weary travellers. For many years she had been chartered on the Yukon route, carrying wealthier prospectors out to the gold fields of the Klondike and hauling back the fortunate few who struck the mother-lode. Renown for her alacrity, the Pride was also by far the most congenial means of passage in this wild corner of North America. She was a far cry from the snowbound tramway of the Chilkoot pass, and infinitely faster than the seasonal steamer route via Nome. On her last flight, bound for Seattle, her sumptuous staterooms had been fully booked by miners able to pay for the privilege of abandoning their claims and returning to civilisation. Most were no doubt glad to leave the land of the midnight sun and retire to warmer climes, but they never reached their destination. Whilst cruising over the jagged fjords of British Columbia the dirigible was ensnared by one of the vicious squalls that are so common in those skies and forced west over the Hecate straits. Her crew had fought valiantly to save her, discharging ballast, furnishings, even the aerial jolly-boat , but to no avail. A Nipponese trawler riding out the storm saw a flare on the horizon as her red hot boilers, strained to bursting point in a forlorn effort to gain altitude, met the surface of the savage sea. Any survivors were lost to the maelstrom.
	The loss of the Pride was immediately lauded as an immense tragedy throughout the Imperial Federation and all civilised nations. Even the Teutonic Customs Union issued a statement of condolence for those who perished under the ensign of its hated rival. However, the disaster would never had attracted the attention of my erstwhile employers, the Humboldt Salvage Consortium, if it were not for the contents of her final manifest.  Leaving aside the personal effects of the passengers, there was half a seasons output from the worlds richest goldfield locked in the ships strongroom, just waiting for somebody foolish enough to try and retrieve it.
	It took many weeks of dragging the sound with a proton magnetometer to locate the final resting place of the Pride ,but there are few trials that seem onerous when the smell of gold is hanging in the air. What is is about that ductile metal that drives men mad? Even as I moped about the decks of the salvage tug Anthemusa, lost to my melancholy, the other crew seemed feverish regarding any whiff of discovery. The faintest return on the complicated electronic oscilloscope brought about a flurry of activity as the mariners sought to gain a first glimpse of the wealth wrought by others. Twice I was hurriedly crammed into my gear only for a bitter word to strip it from me as the diviners declared the reading to be that of a lost barque or an ironstone deposit. Only I seemed to be immune to the enthusiasm for fast money that had gripped the hearts of all on board, and my surliness did not go unnoticed by the other hands.
	I had taken the Pride assignment because it offered me a chance to elude terrestrial society, a vacation worth more than any bullion. My apathy was a virtue in the eyes of the firm, but did little to engender me to the ratings. Rumours of my eccentricities abound. Did I have unnatural tastes? Was I an adherent to some exotic cult, or a dope fiend? I tried to ignore the whispers that passed in my wake, or the cynical eyes that roved over me as I ate in the mess, but they accumulated with every changing of the watch. Despite my cynicism I was thankful when the first mate finally announced that we had located that which was so eagerly sought.
	As I drew closer to the storied corpse of the Pride its remains became less cadaverous and merely sepulchral. Its framework paled from bone white into the dull silver of duralinium, and the remaining fixtures and fittings took a recognisable form once more. Though the buttressed framework of the former lift bladders still curved into a vault large enough to accommodate a chapel , I began to grasp the full extent of the shattered wreckage. The surface impact had burst most of the compartments open and shredded what was left of the outer envelope, but the lions share of the hull had been intact until colliding with the sea floor. Unlike its first descent ,that second fall did not have the influence of luftgaz to retard its plummet and the fuselage had struck the bottom with the momentum of a freight train. Everywhere I looked the lightweight assembly was warped, bent beams heaped upon gridlocked girder and tortured trusses intermixed with valves and wire. It was nothing less than a towering mountain of Zeppelin-grade aluminium that bore little resemblance to its former configuration, and into which I would have to tunnel to locate my objective.
	Between the murk and the mire my search for the remains of the aft airman's gondola took the better part of an hour. After a series of false starts I discovered a half-buried inspection hatch which had once provided egress into the No.3 propeller room ,and gingerly I made my way inside the tomb. Check pressure gauge, check dive calculator, check umbilical. Avoid sharp edges.
	If a stroll across the abyssal plain is not for the faint hearted it must be said that the exploration of sunken wrecks at any depth is work for the professional lunatic. Every corner held a hazard for the unwary or inexperienced. Check pressure gauge, check dive calculator, check umbilical. Check it twice. What were once well appointed staterooms fitted with the latest fashions were now dank crypts shorn of even the smallest creature comforts. The fastidiously white-washed panelling now sported a growth of slimy mildew beneath wallpaper that peeled from the bulkhead in sheets and threatened to constrict the inattentive. The companionways, so recently bustling with triumphant rushers and lit resplendently by Edison-Swan filaments were now darkened chasms distorted into unnatural angles by the death throes of the airship. To traverse them I had to painstakingly edge my way along the battered hand-rail, conscious that a single slip would leave me to sink irrecoverably into the bowels of the hulk. With my attached weight, the prospect of climbing or swimming away from such a pitfall was laughable. Check pressure gauge, check dive calculator, check umbilical. Check footing. Even the dogged hatches which once sheltered aviators from the final storm formed a potential death trap. As the derelict began to settle there was a non negligible chance that one of these ponderous doors would close on my trailing umbilical, leaving me to gasp (Briefly!) at my misfortune.
	Perhaps the most pressing risk however was of going astray. In that dismal labyrinth ,devoid of outside references such as the faithful sun or the full force of gravity, orientation was impossible. Shifting sands changed the layout hourly , and what were once clear corridors could become choked with dregs at the change of the tide. It was all too easy to lose ones way and become trapped in a compartment, doomed to remain there until exhaustion and hypothermia finished the job that carelessness had started. Check pressure gauge, check dive calculator, check umbilical. Check cord reel. The only mercy found in this flooded charnel house was that the crabs and currents had carried away the fleshy remains of the departed voyagers. Such a bounty is rare at those depths, and no doubt its carnivorous citizens feasted gluttonously on the poor souls.
	It took me an age to secure a path through the upper decks, clearing what obstacles I could and applying my pry bar to those that more obstinate. At each turn I played out a little more of my “Come home” line, the thread that has led many a subaquatic Theseus to safety. The work was arduous and every passing minute sapped a little more of my strength, but one learns to be conscientious in my occupation. There would be other dives, and one never knew when a crisis could erupt. An old diver is meticulous by nature, but a slothful diver is dead before they can age. I could always follow my rope back to this point and continue when I was refreshed, and by the time I emerged on the mezzanine above the grand staircase I was approaching the limit of my endurance. Check pressure gauge, check dive calculator, check umbilical. Check chrono. I took a moment to rest and absorb the tarnished splendour of this expansive atrium, originally the nexus of the first class decks. Even beneath the deluge the walls radiated grandeur, its rich mahogany veneer and elaborate brass clocks haughtily unaware that they now served only the sharks. In the middle of it all a statue of Poseidon lay face down in the muck, his arms outstretched as if to break his fall, or to invite us to look upon his works ye mighty- and despair. Satisfied with the progress made, I was preparing to return to the surface when I became aware of a light emanating from the deck below.
	The first thing that struck me was its harsh , actinic glare.This was no natural phosphorescence and a pole apart from the meagre glimmer of my own Rumkopf coil. As I crept closer to the rotting wooden bulwark that overlooked the first class saloon I realised with astonishment that the beam was radiating from another suited figure. They were taller than I, but they seemed to have none of the bulk that I associate with my brethren divers, and no sign of the perpetual barrel chest or the omnipresent trunk legs.Like me they were clad in a variation of the standard diving dress, but of a make and model so far removed from my own that it makes comparison almost farcical. Rather than the bulky brass sphere that I wore about my head, the mystery diver sported a slender copper dome that was more akin to a stovepipe hat. It dropped over their shoulders, a single solid cylinder with no discernable collar. It had none of the awkward miscellany that obfuscated mine, lacking even rivets or noticeable straps. Instead, it seemed to be connected to their smock with a vulcanised rubber gasket, secured with buttons. Facing fore they had a single oblong light with a substantial lamp immediately above set into the metal, a feature that thwarted any hope of getting a clear view of their face. Every time I tried I found myself par-blinded by that infernal beam. Identifying their race, or even their sex was impossible.  Beneath the corselet the unknown wore a navy blue suit of impermeable fabric that would have blended into the shaded waters behind them were it not arrayed with patches and insignia. Rather than identifying the wearer, these strange sigils  conveyed no rank with which I am familiar. Instead ,they reminded me of the notches that hunters sometimes carve upon the butts of their rifles, a series of target like counters being sown to the arm beneath a crude rendition of a terrible sea creature. These features were enough to evoke my confusion, but the most startling feature of their attire was a conspicuous omission. No matter how hard I sought, I could perceive no sign of an umbilical, no placental connection to the world above. Instead the stranger shouldered a pack made of the same copper-like metal that formed their helmet, surmounted by a reinforced cylinder that I can only assume contained their oxygen. It must have housed a form of indipendent breathing apparatus, supplied to the wearer by a regulator of advanced design. I had never seen anything like it ,and to my knowledge no equipment like it is manufactured anywhere on earth. Check pressure gauge, check dive calculator, check umbilical. Sanity check.
	My brief observation of this singular visitor was cut short by my own fist-handed clumsiness. Shifting my weight on the festering boards, I dislodged a carved cherub from the end post and the resultant cloud of silt served to draw attention to my naked voyeurism. They turned to stare in my direction, forcing me to close my eyes in the glare of their iridescent lamp. By the time that my tortured retinas adjusted once more to the perpetual midnight of that sunken space they had  extinguished their lantern and vanished into the lower decks. Given the dangers inherent in a headlong chase through this mausoleum I was not inclined to give pursuit. Utterly perplexed by this encounter and with an array of questions floating through my head, I reluctantly turned to depart. I had no explanation for what I had just seen, and yet, I knew I could not rest until I had seen them again. I didn't know it at the time, but this was to be only my first encounter with this mysterious phantom of the Pride.

-0-0-0-

	The weather was fine that day and the men in the fighting top attested without caveat that there was no other vessel within twenty miles. There was no ship to dive from or islet that the unknown could call home. All hands who were not on watch had spent the morning scanning the horizon for sails and smoke with vigilant eyes, and they had good cause to. We were moored far beyond the territorial line, where only international law applied and the exclusive salvage rights issued by a judge in Sitka meant little. The crews stake was at risk if an interloper were to jump Humboldt's claim, and with such a reward in prospect there were sure to be other seekers. Every half-rate recovery outfit from Baja to the Bering were honing in on our location and it was only a matter of time before they caught us at anchor and launched their own divers. For the moment however we were alone upon this corner of the sea, and as such my hurried and excitable narrative of my curious meeting was met with ridicule.
	It was hard not to blame the crew for the scorn and derision that they poured on my account . The Anthemusa did not have a close-knit complement at the best of times, and they were men little inclined to believe that which they did not already know. This flight of fancy failed to satiate the hunger for specie that was consuming them daily, and until I had fulfilled my end of the  contract they would have scant regard for further leaps of nonconformity. A more generous man than I might point to the corrosive effect of my misanthropy and pardon them for finding fault with my credibility.  The more charitable of my mess-mates claimed that the other diver was an apparition brought on by oxygen narcosis, or perhaps the result of of the great strain upon the senses that such depths impose. Even a man with the stoicism of a Viking could crumble under those conditions, and no acclimatisation could prepare the faculties adequately. Those more inclined to amusement at my expense argued that I had helmet squeeze (a form of barotrauma) and that my brains were being sucked from my skull. Worst of all were the bounders who sniggered and suggested that my failure to seek a woman in the fleshpots of Portland or Tacoma was leading my mind to invent a companion only I could be privy too. Truth be told my own conclusions entertained elements of all three of these hypotheses. Surely no diver could survive down there alone? Perhaps I was going insane. More likely I was mad to start with. And yet, I couldn't get the image of that lone aquanaut out of my head. It was a fixation, an obsession, a mystery that was never far from my thoughts even as I tried to recoup my energies for a repeat dive.
	The only person who seemed willing to give my story any credence was Captain Andrews. A miserly, cantankerous Caledonian of great antiquity, his Midas affliction was perhaps even more advanced than that of the crew. I was rarely privy to scuttlebutt, but even I was aware that Andrews had mortgaged the Anthemusa heavily to undertake this venture, and that if it failed to turn a profit he would be ruined. I doubt, however, that the spectre of bankruptcy explained the glint in the corner of his eyes when he talked about recovering the Pride's gold. That was a glimmer of pure greed that would have made Croesus blush. Before I donned my equipment to return to the work site he called me to the forecastle for a discreet council of war beside the locker that served as an armoury. His face a mask of stony resolve, he presented me with a long steel harpoon separated from its wooden shaft and bereft of the standard rope coil. Its barbed tip had been sharpened to a wicked edge that caught the sunlight filtering through the grating above. My immediate protests were brushed aside with a leering grin and assurance in his thick brogue that id be glad of the weapon if this mysterion were to get between me and his treasure. What went unsaid was the implicit threat regarding the cost of failure. The patience of captain and crew was limited, and if I couldn't show progress towards our collective goal, he was wont to turn that spear upon me. I did not know at the time Andrew's warning was to prove unfounded, but I was soon to have good cause to thank him for his paranoia and avarice.

-o-o-o-

	My second descent to the ruins of the Pride was expedited by the use of a shot line and guide rope that I had established with laborious care during my previous visit. The weighted cable provided a direct route to the spot where I entered the hull plating before, and I had only to brake my fall on the hemp to land safely once again. This, however, was the limit of my good fortune. Check pressure gauge, check dive calculator, check umbilical. The unremitting currents had worked to pool sand and debris into passages cleared with so much effort only a few days previously. Where before I had walked with ease, a yard of water above my head, now I was forced to crawl. In some places the return hawser was lost altogether to the choking clag and I was obliged to make a long dog-legged detour through the dark reaches of officers country.
	The decor of the control gondola was not as ostentatious as the rest of the sky-ship, but the sense of tragedy was all the more palpable. The Marconi room to my left would have sustained an electronic atmosphere as the fraught wireless operator sought to transmit his fruitless pleas for assistance until the end. I noted with reverence that the hero's headphones were still floating in the paradoxically still waters next to his station, needing only the application of a lead-acid battery to take on their forlorn task once more. The navigators office on my right also contained shades of its previous life. Though the paper maps had rapidly transmuted to mulch, the instruments that had charted that fateful course still hung on the pegboard behind the broad aluminium desk and the bottle-green lens of a night sextant watched me like a doleful eye as I shuffled forward towards the bridge.
	The heel-shaped room I found myself in had once been the command centre of the Pride, its air heavy with the sound of engine telegraphs and the guttural bark of orders muted through miles of sound tubes. I can only imagine the sense of helplessness that much have reigned as this place of control and authority made its final headlong plunge into the icy waters of the Pacific. Perhaps it was these disconsolate thoughts that distracted me from the strange organic bulk that rested out of sight in the darkest reaches of the cabin. As I felt my way between the compass binnacle and the great wooden wheel where the coxswain once worked the elevators I was utterly oblivious to the fact that I was being trailed. In a single terrifying moment I felt a sudden pressure enclose my leg in a vice like grip.
	Those whom have never delved the oceanic depths can scarcely conceive the level of restraint needed to avoid a terminal hysteria when the unexpected strikes. Check pressure gauge, check dive calculator, check umbilical. A momentary loss of concentration might lead to disorientation ,a sudden negligent movement could result in a torn air-line, even hyperventilating can lead to hypoxia and death. Check pressure gauge, check dive calculator, check umbilical. Down there, far from our natural battlefields, to panic means death. Moreover, sealed within that accursed helmet and encumbered by enough lead to outfit a battalion with bullets, it is not even possible to turn and face the source of your trouble. Check pressure gauge, check dive calculator, check umbilical. If they are inconsiderate enough to approach from your rear, where even a contortionist could not face in such dress, you have no choice but to let them make the first move. In that brief second before I could react I wondered whether I had lived my final hour, and I felt an irrational annoyance that I might forever remain ignorant of the agent of my destruction if they chose to make the first blow a final one. Check pressure gauge, check dive calculator, check umbilical. My ignorance was at once sated and my nightmares realised by the appearance of a ropey tentacle in my left side-light and the chilling patter it made as it lay a succession of sucker-pads upon the arch of my helmet. Somewhere behind me a terrible monster from the deep was stirring itself into action, and I was incapable of even turning to face it.
	My life was on the verge of being extinguished there and then, caught in the clutches of a homicidal cephalopod. It took every ounce of remaining willpower I possessed to push aside the curtain of meloncholia which hung over me and rouse myself to resist. After spending so many years cursing my fate, it seemed almost surprising to discover that I did not want it to end this way. Check pressure gauge, check dive calculator, check umbilical. Of course, resurrecting a survival instinct is one thing, but preserving that spark of life is quite another. I would still likely have perished had it not been at that moment that my sluggish senses registered that I was carrying the captains harpoon in my mitts. The leisurely examination of the Octopus and my own treacle-like train of logic raced to find a tactical conclusion. Though the mollusc's grip on my head precluded an attempt to brace myself before striking, I savagely plunged the point beneath my armpit in the distant hope of procuring more time. My reckless jab was rewarded with a spreading cloud of blue ichor as the cruel head drove home into cartilaginous flesh. As the Prussian blood of the sea-devil filled the cabin it released its grip upon my head and feet and I was able at last to turn and get a glimpse of the foe with which I was struggling.
	The aquatic monster was of a species altogether unknown to me, and I was not inclined to spend time searching my shaky knowledge of taxonomy for an exact classification. The beasts size was incomparable to its many harmless cousins that Ive encountered in my career. Each of its tentacles was as long as a man is tall and as thick as a hogshead at their base. They were coated on the underside with thousands of pulsating suckers that throbbed with the beat of its stony hearts and which individually looked capable of pulling my fingers from their sockets. Its mottled skin glistened like wet leather and as I watched its colouration shifted from jet black to an angry copper-red. Though it was small comfort at the time, this adaptive camouflage at least serves to explain how I had overlooked the behemoth, for it had cloaked itself in the ubiquitous shade of the sea-floor. As it slithered a few yards backwards to assess this strange new behaviour of its victim, I could see that its body supported a pair of bulging, globular eyes, both of which seemed to be trained on my pitiful soul. As the kraken surveyed me I could see in those orbs a combination of keen intelligence and outraged malevolence. Beneath the indignant gaze sat a vicious chitin beak that snapped angrily in my direction. Almost a foot wide, the powerful bite of that gaping maw would cut to the bone if I let it get close enough. One does not have to be a marine biologist to deduce that the creatures only desire at that moment was to send me into oblivion as rapidly as practicable.
	I realised with horror that my opportune thrust with the harpoon had served only to inflict a minor injury to the superfluous fleshy webbing that joined the gorgons arms. Even as I considered my options the devil wrapped one of its smaller appendages around the shaft and tore free the bloodied metal point from its delicate skirts, flinging my only true weapon irrecoverably into the furthest reaches of the deck. I can't say that what followed was the result of rational thought. Instead I retreated to the primal drives that humans husband for those moments of mortal peril, the brutal reflexes of the id that keep us alive when our civility and reason has failed. As the flailing arms launched towards me I scrambled at my utility belt and pulled forth my last line of defence. The Green River diving knife is typically utilised to cut nets or other sources of entanglement, but here I would have to wield it as a lethal weapon. It was akin to battling a panther with a toothpick, but before I could despair a flurry of arms was upon me.
	I will not pretend that this struggle was one for the ages. In any conflict as mismatched as ours the outcome is all but predestined. My opponent tipped the scales at half a ton, and did not have to struggle against the inertia of ballast as I did. Even had we fought in an environment more amenable to man, the animal had four times the number of usable limbs I did, and the advantage of being able to breathe underwater. We grappled for what seemed to be hours ,but which in objective time must have been mere moments. Time and again I tried to plunge the puny blade into the centre of the attacker, but every time I battered my way to its core one of those fleshy members moved forward to block my manic slash. Even where the knife grazed the surface of those powerful tendrils it slipped harmlessly over the rubbery epidermis, and in the octopuses eyes I could detect a flutter that seemed to mock my futile efforts. Within an effortless curl of its limbs the Octopus  seized both of my arms and used its remaining appendages to begin crushing the life from my chest.
	Had my neck not been armoured beneath the metal helmet I would likely have found my death to be instantaneous. A frustrated tentacle curled itself around the base of that bulbous metal barrier, putting a new dent in the tortured bronze. Unable to throttle me my opponent sought a weakness elsewhere and quickly found a chink. The impervious mail shirt I wore beneath my coverlet was only meant to protect against the enquiry of stingrays and did not provide protection from this sort of battering. Slowly but surely my diaphragm was pulled tight by the cloying clutch of my enemy and my brain was starved of air. Every gasp was more shallow than the last, each inhalation a few more inches of give sacrificed to the vice that enclosed me. The first sensation to go was that of touch. An immutable numbness spread downwards into my toes. It was followed swiftly by sound as what remained of my precious blood began to pool in the brain. My vision turned monochromatic, and then began to fade at the edges. I was only dimly aware in my last moments of consciousness of a bright flash of light, followed by a sudden paralysis of my entire being. This shock was the final nail in my sonombulance ,and I drifted away, expecting only death. Checks are pointless now...

-0-0-0-

	When I regained my faculties, I found myself propped up against the sturdy column of the engine telegraph. Check pressure gauge, check dive calculator, check umbilical. CHECK UMBILICAL. Reaching up in a state of affright, I found that my umbilical had been coiled neatly around a heavy oak lever to give the maximum flow of restorative oxygen. My instincts satsified, tt took me longer to fight through the haze that fuddled my mind and for the red mist to once more retreat to the fringes of my perception. The bridge was now brightly lit, and in my bewilderment I briefly thought that the airships dynamo had been restarted. It was only when I discerned that the sockets of the illuminators remained bereft of bulbs that I realised that the dazzling flare was issuing from a familiar, yet foreign, helmet.
	The unknown diver sat crouched a few feet away. It may have been my befuddled imagination, or the effect of their lantern on its maximum setting, but when I glanced at that copper dome it appeared fringed with a Halo. A long repressed romantic sentiment awoke within me. For the briefest of moments they seemed the most wondrous of beauties ,a fitting second to the Venus of Titan or a model Aphrodite emerging from the ocean. I had been rescued by an angel, and my whole perception of the world seemed to undergo a paradigm shift. This strange apparition was no longer a cold figure of metal mystery- it was a person, a compatriot ,a figure to adore and cherish.
	They cannot have failed to notice me staring at them, but they seemed to resent the intrusion far less than our first rendezvous, and they deferentially adjusted their beam when I began to stir. Up close, their posture and demeanour was unusual. I could see on them no evidence of the masses that held me to the ocean floor, only a few chains around their mantle and a pair of dull grey blocks strapped to their ankles. Compared to my awkward form their movements seemed free-flowing and easy, barely encumbered at all. In my eyes at least, they possessed grace and poise unparalleled.
	With a start I forced my emotions to one side. My new companion and I were still in grave jeopardy. What had become of the ferocious cephalopod that so recently threatened to purge me of life? Had this murderous malcontent paroled me in order to extract some kind of sick sport? Had the arrival of the unknown caused it to take flight? Even as I contemplated the terms of my miraculous escape the stranger shifted their position to reveal an impossible scene. Sprawled across a bank of elevator levers on the far bulkhead lay the octopus, manifestly immobile. As I watched with growing stupefaction the languid tentacles twitched occasionally, like the paws of a dreaming dog. It was utterly insensible, its great eyes firmly closed and its hitherto threatening mouth closed upon a convenient piece of drift wood. A dozing infant could not have presented a more fitting portrayal of peaceful slumber, and it was only the absence of coleoid snoring that assured me that my rival was stunned rather than resting. With a jerk of their shining head my indisputable saviour turned to me and gestured to the comatose foe in what I can only describe as smug pride. Then they began to talk.
	Terrestrials often wonder how we semi-permanent residents of the aqueous world hold discourse when we are underwater. A lucky few have the option of using an underwater telephone integrated into their equipment, but that option was not available to me. Even if Humboldt were willing to invest in the delicate horn, it would require both parties to be plugged into a switchboard on the vessel above, a connection my partner lacked. Without such niceties, chatting presents a significant challenge. Even the shortest conversation is an exasperating exercise in co-ordination and patience. With both headgear and fluid proving barriers to the transmission of the the naked voice, professional divers have developed hand signals - the "finger telegraph", that allows for a crude form of communication. Even with the clumsy gauntlets essential to our trade, an astounding diversity of words and gestures can be performed. Most of these are simple instructions that convey only the most vital information, but with practice a workable dialogue can be maintained.
	At first I struggled to comprehend the unknowns faltering and archaic style of semaphore. It was as though they had learned the language from a textbook, the subaquatic equivalent to a schoolboys French or pig Latin. Many of the signs they used were obscure to me, or from a dialect I did not comprehend. Even when they had made their meaning clear, the limited vocabulary available to ones digits made their speech faltering and restrictive. It was only with repetition and not a small amount of guesswork that I could piece together what they were trying to say.
	"ME. SORRY." They signed, helmet dipped towards the mossy deck plates. "TO.DISABLE. DANGER. DISABLE. YOU. ADDITION"
	For the first time I realised that the hands of the stranger were not bare, but instead sported a skeletal rifle of uncanny construction. The gun was crafted from a rich buttery brass that held a dull shine despite the bright glare of its wielder. Though its barrel was several feet long, its construction featured no wooden reinforcement, presumably because the buoyancy would spoil the aim. Rather than a conventional stock it was supported on an elaborate metal framework that presented the crude notch sights to the middle of the shooters sternum, their bulky helmet making a shoulder grip impossible. Though it had a bolt-action like any common hunting piece, the protrusion was larger to accommodate the mitts the stranger wore, and I could see no sign of an ejector for spent cartridges. Indeed, there was no visible magazine, and I was soon to realise that the bearer needed no second shot.
	Perhaps mistaking my inquisitive examination for puzzlement the stranger saw fit to provide me with a practical demonstration of their prowess. From a small flax pouch upon their belt they withdrew a tiny silver ball bound in glass, which upon inspection proved to be a form of vitrified mercury. To my surprise they extracted no cartridge or powder. The propellant was instead provided by a canister attached to the weapon itself, a reserve of compressed gas no larger than a seltzer bottle. Sliding the metallic pellet into the breech, the unknown did not so much shoulder the rifle as clutch it to their chest beneath their forward viewport, drawing a bead on the still-twitching octopus. Within the over-sized trigger guard their gloves tightened and a brilliant bolt of light erupted from the muzzle like a flash of lightning. For an instant the Octopus jerked as every gland and muscle in its bulbous body seemed to expand and contract simultaneously, a pitiable spray of ink being released from its swim bladder. For the briefest of moments an arc of crackling electricity passed between its tentacles, which became unnaturally straight as they burst towards the points of a merciless compass. As quickly as the shock had come it passed, and the wretched thing collapsed once more ,now truly unconscious. Even from the other side of the bridge I could feel the lingering voltage, and yet, for reasons I have never been able to fathom the effect of the charge did not transmit through the water that separated us. Neither I nor the unknown were effected by the burst of power which had robbed the vanquished creature of its mobility.
	Returning to me whilst unmounting the weapon, the stranger once more took to their fingers.
	"ELECTRICITY. DISABLE. DANGER. SURFACE SOON. LEAVE NOW."
	The strangers hands flew hurriedly and I rapidly grasped that their their use of "Surface" had a dual meaning. It transpired that this remarkable weapon could only stun the cephalopod, and that my avenger had no means by which to permanently render it into calamari. Perhaps they did not wish to, for surely with such forces at the fingertips, did they not have the power of the gods themselves? Before I could consider this, they motioned again towards the dark sky above, urging me to leave before the creature roused itself. It would be labouring under a monstrous headache and would doubtless seek vengeance, and I had no desire to be there to gratify it. At the same time my curiosity towards the stranger had not only doubled , it now had tinges of admiration and affection. I could not leave with my interest so inflamed, and this time it was my own fingers that did the talking
	"IDENTIFY. YOU?" I signalled concisely, using the most frequently practised form of telegraph. My inquiry only elicited a barrage of gibberish gestures that I could neither follow nor identify. Perhaps this was a name in a foreign finger? I will never know, as before I could ask for a nickname the unknown stood briskly and made to leave. I could not let them depart so easily - every fibre of my being begged to know more ,and summoning much of my remaining strength I gripped their arm and they indulged me with a final query.
	"THANK YOU. SEE. AGAIN?" It was a weak request , and I was in no position to demand, but I could not contemplate ending my quest without knowing I would see them again. It was impossible to make out features on the unknowns face beneath that blinding orb, and their body language was even more difficult to interpret underneath the inflexible suit, but I could have sworn that the stranger flinched with surprise. A twitch of their shoulders denoted apprehension , but also perhaps anticipation. I like to think that was the moment of their own paradigm shift. Fingers flew for a final time.
	"YES. HOPE". At that they turned and darted into the gathering murk. By the time that I had recovered sufficient energy to move myself they had disappeared once more into the depths of the wreckage and for a second time I could not pursue. The realisation that this person might have suddenly walked out of my life as quickly as they had saved it was unexpectedly wrenching and only added to the pain ebbing from my ribs and to the bamboozlement that was stubbornly refusing to fade from my synapses. What hold had this ghost taken upon me? They clearly valued me sufficiently to preserve my wretched life, but why did it matter to me that I come to know them more intimately? All of a sudden I had an ache in my heart that was not there before, and which was certainly not a battle wound.
	Reminded by this throb of my friends final warning, I took a last glance at the slowly stirring octopus and beat as hasty a retreat as possible under the circumstances. I began to pity the poor creature. After all, were we not the trespassers in its domain? Perhaps that is why the stranger was so careful not to harm it permanently. No doubt there was a clutch of its translucent eggs nearby that it was striving to protect, and even if it was without young the intrusion of such clumsy interlopers was enough to raise anyone's dander.

-0-0-0-

	The painful memory of my crew-mates scoffing put pay to any desire I had to tell the full tale of my most recent encounter with the mysterious stranger. They didn't need to know the full details of our conversation, or of my creeping infatuation. I also had no intention of revealing the fact that without their dramatic intervention I would have been bait at the end of a line, little more than a heavyweight lure. However, my injuries required an explanation, not to mention a brief stay in the infirmary. The sawbones did a ropey job of binding my ribs, chewing away at a cheap cigarillo even as he applied the A.B.C. Liniment, the smell of the cured tobacco doing little to detract from the tang of chloroform or the sting of the belladonna. As I lay in a cot receiving his none-too gentle ministrations I relayed the events with the octopus to Captain Andrews and a few select others. I was careful to leave out any mention or my saviour, but needless to say , I felt a little conflicted at shifting heroism onto my own shoulders by omission. The Captain was left with the impression that I had fought off the giant with nothing more than my knife, but perhaps fortuitously most of the crew once again met my tale with incredulity.
	Few of the old sailors could argue with the evidence of my multiple contusions, but they could not bring themselves to believe in the existence of mighty killer octopodes. It was almost as though their traditional penchant for superstition had been mitigated by their gold-lust and their enmity. Most put my fanciful fight down to the same circumstances as before - the impact of difficult ,high pressure work - with the added slander that I had managed to injure myself through incompetence, tangling myself in an old rope or even my own air line. This libel was understandable, if insulting. Their vexation gained new heights as, for a second time ,I had returned to them with a tall tale but not even a grain of gold. Outside of my sick bay the mood was souring, and the salts plotted an extrajudicial keelhauling, staved off only by the demand for my skills.
	Little of this concerned me though. Every night as the clouds rolled in and the ships bell rang out the third watch I lay awake with the picture of that diver in my mind and an uncomfortable absence within. Their image was the last thing on my mind as I slid into sleep and the first that greeted me when I entered dreamland. Perhaps it was the effect of the laudanum that the quack had given me to aid rest, but those fantasies became vivid, even graphic. I joined the unknown in an underwater utopia, a kingdom of colourful coral and tropical fish through which we frolicked like children in the meadow, happy ,content and carefree. I was liberated from the lead blocks, the hoses and the canvas, swimming nude like the pearl divers do, darting from one marine wonder to the next without the apparent need to rise for breath. No matter how lucid the reverie however, I could not envision my consort denuded of their own attire. Throughout each of my nightly journeys to their dominion they remained just as I had seen them in the belly of the Pride, a copper-clad enigma to which I was inexorably drawn. After three days of such bed-rest romance the physician declared me sound of body, if not in mind, and I was discharged for duty.
	Once again, only the Captain seemed to have some developed some intimation of the truth, though even he never pushed for an answer as to how I had escaped the clutches of death or what had become of his harpoon. After I was released from the sick bay he straightforwardly asked if I was willing to take whatever risks were necessary to complete the job before the winter weather closed in. I would like to say that it was hubristic pride which drove me to agree, or even compassion for the poor fool that would be drafted to replace me should I prove incapable. The truth is simpler. I wanted to talk to the unknown diver again, to explore the growing mystery at my heart. Why was it that I could dream of nothing else? All that mattered to me now was seeing what lay beneath that helmet ,and to answer that question I would gladly risk my life, and gold be dammed.

-0-0-0-

	As I was lowered into the frigid water for the final time, my jock riding uncomfortably high in the harness, my emotions were reflected in the choppy waters that dominated the surface. A harsh zephyr was blowing from the Northwest, carrying with it a touch of arctic frost and the promise of turbulent weather to come. The waves, previously placid and serene, were now threatening and wild, their crests breaking like a herd of wild horses in  stampede. The ocean swell had leaped from a tame lap against the hull to a remorseless barrage that threatened to wrench our toy boat from its moorings. Under normal circumstances neither I nor the captain would have agreed to dive in such a gale, but we each had reasons of our own to endure the risk. He needed his salvage and I needed my answers, and neither of us were capable of waiting for the spring equinox to satiate our yearning. Check pressure gauge, check dive calculator, check umbilical.
	Just like the incipient storm above, my thoughts were discordant and blurred. Did I truly long for the touch of a stranger who could never connect, for the embrace of a figure so wrapped in their own suit that I could not hope to feel their warmth? Where did the boundary between my personal needs and my duty to those above lay? Was I driven by a perverse masochism, was this foolhardy hunt an end unto itself? I had plenty of time to ponder these questions on my long drop to the bottom. As the calmer waters of the deep overtook the tempestuous currents of the surface so too did my emotions enter the doldrums. Perhaps part of my attraction to the stranger lay in their status as a creature of that other world, a subject of the secluded and silent land now enveloping me. Compared to the cruel laughter and intolerance, to the mocking judgement of every action that ruled the world of my surface peers, the inaccessibility of the diver seemed no barrier. Here truly was a kindred soul, one whom I had never realised existed let alone sought after, a partner who would not offer critique on what they could not understand and whom offered friendship in a common cause. Perhaps even, dare I say it ,they could find room for tenderness in their heart, as I had suddenly discovered a place for it in mine.
	The ravages of the pseudo-typhoon above were clearly shifting the salvage tug away from the wreck. The shot-line I had secured within spitting distance of the wreck on my first dive had been dragged a hundred yards west and I found that I was now descending onto the edge of an abyssal cliff close to the forward part of the drowned airship. Unlike my previous surveys however, the sea floor was no longer a blanket of purest black. At the bottom of my cable there shone the welcoming beacon of light which could only emanate from one person. Perhaps reading my thoughts, my friend had moved from the shadows into my path, and this time they were waiting for me
	When my leaden feet finally reached the silt my love was standing there as patiently and expectantly as a date by the front door, and I felt remiss for having neglected to bring a corsage or a box of milk tray. It was, as before, impossible to read their backlit face, but perhaps was I wrong to say that today the glow seemed a little softer, to have acquired a shade of umbra? Had they gone to the effort to shine that great golden helmet purely in anticipation of our reunion? I could not say if these were the rose-tinted inventions of a sentimental simpleton, but no sooner had the stranger given me a moment to drink in their reinvigorated appearance their fingers shot up in a gesture beckoning me to follow them. I nodded my assent and greeting, both surprised and overjoyed by their sudden forwardness. I was preparing myself to amble onwards when I once more found an alien force gripping one of my limbs - but rather than the slimy arm of the octopus, this time it was the stranger taking hold of my hand.
	It was a naive, almost adolescent jolt of pleasure that took me as I was led into the crushed chancel of the dirigible for our terminal tryst. It might seem strange, but all thoughts of the surface disappeared when I was with the stranger and I found found myself so utterly contented that I don't doubt I would have simply stood there in bliss had they now continued to lead me by the elbow to the objective. Despite the chill seawater that was slowly leaking its way through the seals in my suit I could feel a deep warmth in my core and a sense of belonging as we walked palm to palm like a holy palmer's kiss. Even through the layers of brass and oilskin I dreamt that the stranger was penetrating the secret desires that I had barely even begun to admit to myself and found them decidedly to their taste. In my altered state of mind I believed that we were promenading upon a seaside boardwalk, our arms locked together as we browsed the amusements and laughed together at the novelties. Caught in my daydream, I barely recognised the incongruity of our protective garments as we strolled through that imaginary beach resort, rather than the haunting remains of a flying machine deep beneath the ocean. I cant truly say whether I was in a trance or not. On the one hand I recall every moment of both walks – below the waves and beside them, but even now I struggle to distinguish which of them was a fiction. Is that what everyone feels when they are they are starting an affair, or is such an malady purely my own perspective? At the time such questions did not trouble me, for whether factual or fraudulent I did not wish it to end. Alas, as will all such indulgences, imagination was ultimately forced to give way to obligation.
	When I shook myself from my delirium, I found that I had been guided by my doting chaperone to what remained of 'B' Deck. There, squeezed between the tourist class writing room and the air-locked entry to the Zeppelin's only smoking lounge, lay the armoured door of the pursers office. This section of the airliner had received remarkably little damage during its descent to the ocean floor, and the bare steel construction of the corridor had not yet begun to show the inevitable signs of decay that more organic materials were illustrating. You can envisage my shock then when I realised that the great vault-like door to the strongroom had been forcibly ripped from its mountings and lay neatly opposite the yawning aperture. Constructed from half a foot of Pittsburgh plate, it would have taken a hundredweight of thermite to melt those hinges and days of work with an adamantine drill to pulverise the lock. And yet they had been sheered like a broken key as the brobdingnagian door apparently burst from its housing like the cork from a bottle. Perhaps this felicitous arrangement had been the result of some freakish shock-wave that rippled through the Prides frame when it crashed, but I couldn't help but think that this was a boon from my confederate. Perhaps a parting gift.
	Whether they had popped the door or not, the unknown had not been slothful during my convalescence on the Anthemusa. The pursers office had previously served as bank, bullion reserve and safety deposit box to the passengers of the Pride, its wire shelves groaning with the glittering gifts of the alluvial rivers. Now all that wealth had been cleared away, concentrated into a single metal case the size of a small steamer trunk sitting at the centre of the room. As we approached, the unmistakable sparkle of gold reflected from within. Some was in the form of  gold-dust, still sealed within the glass jars that a prospector had hauled to the assay office from their remote stake. More, perhaps the plurality, had been melted down in Dawson to form good-delivery ingots of 400 troy-ounces. Five of these lustrous bars lined the bottom of the case, each bearing the familiar unicorns and lions of the Imperial seal, bound no doubt for the distant royal mint. Finally, to add gleaming icing to this richest of cakes, there was at least a thousand newly minted canuck sovereigns casually laying in heaps atop the other bounty. Somewhere in the logical portion of my mind I realised that we would all be wealthy men by the end of the day, but the hand of the stranger standing at my side was worth more to me than the fortune within the box.
	It was strenuous work hauling the treasure trove to the recovery ropes, and I would never have managed the herculean feat alone. Once again, I remain unsure as to whether our joint effort represented a binary exertion or whether my beau possessed a physical strength in diametric proportion to my mental frailty. Certainly, they did not seem to show any sign of fatigue as we eased the chest out of the narrow confines of the Pride. Nor, incidently, did they ever show any degree of possessiveness or rapaciousness towards the contents of our burden, even as we approached the surface lines. Perhaps like I, they realised that there were pleasures in life that no coin could acquire, or perhaps their countrymen placed value on a more useful metal. It was the work of only a few minutes to attach the heavy safe securely to the shot-line and send the appropriate signals to the surface. Somewhere above us the doubtless the flabbergasted crew were scrambling to man the capstan and slowly reel the ill-gotten gains to their waiting clutches. Together the stranger and I watched the precious cargo fly skywards into the gloom with almost indecent haste, ready to brighten the Captains miserly heart .With its departure we were once again truly alone ,and finally free to turn to more pressing matters.
	As I started to sign, the movements of the stranger seemed almost bashful. They hunched their shoulders as far was possible beneath the metal plates of the helmet, and seemed to angle their blazing faceplate towards the sand. Given the intimacy they had shown me only an hour previously, I suspect that they were more embarrassed to answer what I must surely ask than to show shame for what might yet be.
	"SURFACE. WITH. ME" I pleaded, an imploring tone escaping my lips as I vocalised the message I was sending with my fingers.
	The figure absorbed this for a moment before giving the devastating X signal of refusal with their forearms. My heart sank deeper than the Pride. The limitless vista of my imagination seemed to rush back at me, retreating once more to the black pit of anguish from which it had so recently been released.  My passion, so quick to ignite and so difficult to fuel, began to gutter towards extinction. I was in the depths of woe, but whilst I teetered on the edge of self-pity my erstwhile mate enacted their own endgame. In that instance they once again took me by the hand and pulled me willingly if perplexed towards the edge of the great underwater abyss I had noticed on my descent, until we were toeing its very brink. As I stared into those unfathomable depths a touch of my natural fears and reason returned to me. This was tantamount to the continental drop , a great vertical expanse of water and craggy rock that plummeted for thousands of yards and I became vertiginous just observing about it. By the time I had overcome my dizziness my partner was signing once more
	"DIVE. WITH. ME. TOGETHER LONG". To make their intention unmistakable they stretched their arm out across the canyon and held out an inviting palm. I was stunned. Surely nothing could live in that Tartarean trench, lest of all human beings. I could see no sign of a submersible or habitat which could offer safe harbour against the relentless pressure, let alone a place of refuge or pocket of air. Abruptly, a preposterous notion entered my head. Could this unique alien be as much a visitor to this place as I? It is an oft-repeated certitude that my species has mapped more of the lunar surface than it has the floor of the oceans that cover two thirds of the planets surface. Was my beau an aeronaut from waters so deep that these shallows were as much a mystery to them as to we who skim the surface? Perhaps I had spent these precious days not with a fellow diver, but with an aquatic alpinist, a climber of the invisible seamounts that far exceed our piffling Everest. No doubt a resident of the challenger deep would find the existence of extra-aquatics thousands of feet above their heads as sensational as the revelation of extraterrestrials would be to the inhabitants of Woking or New Jersey. This possibility and a thousand other exotic explanations clashed in my head ,but all were overridden by the passionate impulses of romantic fervour. Yes, to follow them into this world would be suicide, but what a death! With my enchanter in my arms no challenge seemed impossible. The cliff was no longer terrifying , instead it became as mesmerising as a sudden drop becomes to a drunk or to a small child , a promise of danger and excitement. In an instant that midnight murk came to promise me the serenity, kinship and adoption I craved and which I would never find topside. With a shallow exhale I realised I had made my decision.
	Staring once more into the faceplate of my swain I felt an outlandish resolve grip me. Grunting with determination, fogging my visor, I reached behind my helmet to take a grip of the heavy umbilical that was my only remaining link to the corrupting realm of sun and sky. As I wrestled with the hose my sweetheart showed no sign of a smile , but their gleeful applause was all the encouragement I needed. The task was complex and almost defeated my transitory impulse. Naturally, the line was never designed to be removed underwater and the connecting gasket is typically removed with a monkey wrench. Zest eventually overcame my lack of equipment and with a last lusty heave I tore it loose from its sockets and released a bevy of furtive bubbles. For my efforts I was rewarded with a refreshing fire-hose spray to the back of the head that soaked me in piercing brine. With a burst of pressure the non-return vale in my air inlet closed to seal my helmet against the deluge before it could fill the volume within. This prevented my immediate drowning, but I knew it would be a temporary reprieve. I had only thirty minutes of air in the bail-out bottle hooked into to my harness. Once it was denuded I would surely asphyxiate.
	I turned to my new love for reassurance, for confirmation that this irrational caprice was no mere moment of madness. In their gaze I found vindication, in spades. With a muted but sensual touch of the arm they leaned forward to touch their helmet to mine. I almost flinched at this brazen contact. If two land-lovers of breeding were to be so presumptuous and immodest it would prove a scandal of the highest order. Here, far from the clucking hens and the archaic mores of so-called society such brashness seemed intuitive and I received them with fervour. Though their glaring headlamp almost burned at such proximity, for the first and only time I was able to discern their true voice. Vibrating through the metal came a tinny sound, rendered sexless and muted almost to the point of inaudibility.
	"Welcome home" They said.
	No more checks. Said the voice in my head.
	After a moment of intimacy that seemed to stretch as far as the water below we turned to face the drop-off as one. I no longer felt any fear, or even the nagging urgency of self-preservation. I had placed myself entirely into the arms of my beloved ,and having come so far, my trust was absolute. There were no prayers to the distant deities that I only half believed in, no appeals for counsel or mercy. Had I the opportunity I would have sought to exchange vows, but lacking a minister I settled instead on a firm grasp of their glove. I had divorced the old world in the heavens above, and I was now committed to a new life and a new love beneath the ocean. All that remained was to consummate our union in oblivion. Gently ,I felt them tapping on the palm of my hand. 5, 4, 3,...
	Without warning I was hoisted upwards at an incredible speed, wrested from the embrace of my better half. Blinded by adoration I had neglected to disconnect my safety line, and it was by this detestable thread that I was being dragged screaming back to the surface. Their Aurum affliction remedied by the delivery of precious metal, the men I so despised were now hurrying to save my life. My discarded airline had been the giveaway that something untoward was taking place on the seabed,  and now they reeled me in on the capstan like a reluctant fish. I screamed unforgivable obscenities at my cursed fate, at those noble comrades who were sweating to redeem me and at fickle Neptune himself for having shown me the gates of eden only to cast me out. I saw my love's lights fade away like a ship passing in the night and I wept fiercely as I was hauled once more from heaven into the hellish world of the living and the dammed.

-0-0-0-

	I had returned to my prison, which seemed more confining than ever. For the first twelve hours in the hyperbaric chamber I slept, unable even to turn and face the stark whitewashed walls. Inside that repulsive vessel I was held under dozens of atmospheres to stop the nitrogen saturating my blood from boiling forth and destroying what was left of my brain and my heart. In all honesty I was so despondent that I would have welcomed that demise with nihilistic gusto. When I stirred from my bunk the Captain was waiting on the other side of the armoured inspection port that served as a visitors room. Judging by the look of consternation on his furrowed brow he would not be fobbed off by stories of an accident or misadventure. I told him everything of course. I could not see the value in existence, let alone a lie. I had no reputation to protect, nor goal to strive for. I poured the whole sorry tale of my encounters with the unknown into the speaking tube, their appearance, my rescue from the Octopus and even their final parting offer. As I retold my story I realised that my strange mania was flowing out with the words, that even as I spoke of my love for the diver I had left in the depths I could no longer find such an emotion within myself. At my conclusion I surmised that I must truly be going around the bend - or perhaps more accurately ,the bends.
	To my surprise the captain did not immediately dismiss my report, or pass off the rambling narrative as a symptom of decompression sickness. Instead he sat back on a stool and puffed away on a long whale-bone pipe carved with a delicate scrimshaw. It was his habit when content to think, though given the clouds of acrid smoke that he produced I recall being thankful for the segregated environment of the chamber. After a few pensive moments he tapped the bowl on the window and took up the tube on his side, his face now a queer mixture of sympathy and righteous fury.
	"Nobody can blame ye lad" His paternalistic tone reaching through the tinny connection and his thick highland accent "You've come across tae most ancient monster of the sea...and tae most insidious in mae opinion"
	My sceptical look forced him to elaborate "Too Odysseus and them Greek laddies they came as a hareem of beautiful lassies, singers perched upon a rock just waiting for them poor wee fools to come and a' rescue them."
	A puff of the pipe. By now his normally wrinkled eyebrows had withdrawn to reveal a pair of raving eyes. He had once told me that his ancestors were Calvinist preachers in the lowlands, and there was a touch of fire and brimstone about his countenance that afternoon. I could almost imagine him atop a pulpit denouncing the evils of witchcraft and pointing an accusing finger at some unfortunate hag.
	"By the time of Columbus" (which he insisted on pronouncing "Colomboos") "Tae showed themselves as gorgeous mermaids that tempted sea-starved laddos off'a tae decks and into their graves. Aye , so long as there have been sailors these harlots have use'd their charm, and guile and devilry to lure seamen like you into davy jones locker. You can only thank almighty God that ye were still attached to that cable and we could pull ye back from the brink lad". By this point he was standing, his hair askew beneath his omnipresent tam-o-shanter and his voice shrill with Presbyterian zealotry.
	"But why me Captain?" A faint whine crept into my voice. I had little time for Andrews blind faith, and I was reluctant to chalk my experiences up to old wives tales.
	"Because yer wer a meal and and an easy target ya fool" Andrews voice was not condemnatory. It had the resigned tones of a exasperated father. "Whatever that was down there , it nevae loved you, any more than you love tha' bastards on this tub"
	He put the receiver down for a minute and massaged his wrinkled forehead. He knocked the embers from his pipe and slipped it back into his sou'wester before continuing on. "Yae did good work down there son, an immae real proud of yae. Surgeon says you'll be oot of that thar tank by the time we reach Victoria - ill make sure yae get a double share. Call it danger money. But if yae want my advice lad, yae might wannae consider a different line a' work".And with that he hung up and marched off.
	Once more I found myself lying in a sterile room contemplating matters of the heart. I had plenty of time to think as the inert poison in my blood was neutralised. Had the whole affair been a product of my desperately lonely imagination, a fantasy inspired by nothing more than nervous strain? Or were my desires attributable to the creeping hallucinations to which even the strongest diver is susceptible? I had a hunch that these were comforting lies , that what I had seen and felt had been all too real. But then, what had been the goal of this enigmatic other - were they a seductor or a saviour? A mythical daemon of the deep that simply sought to play out an ancient tale in a new guise or had I truly missed out on the love of a lifetime? Perhaps even now they wait for me ,75 fathoms below in a world we could have shared. In time I put these questions to bed, confident that I would never be able to answer them, but one final puzzle stalked me. The Captain had claimed that sirens always appeared to sailors in the guise of a woman, and yet ,I had never seen my admirers face. They could have possessed either sex or none at all for all I had known when I fell in love with them. As I finally sank into a restless sleep all I could hear was their voice calling me to join them in the darkness.

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Scott Harrison
Scott_A_Harrison@hotmail.com