Rising Tides: Destroyermen by Anderson Taylor
Author:Anderson, Taylor [Anderson, Taylor]
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Roc
Published: 2011-01-31T16:00:00+00:00
By that evening, with the assistance of the “portable” steam-powered generators from Chief Electrician’s Mate Rodriguez’s growing concern in Baalkpan, and the combination of his crude electric motors and the sophisticated Lemurian pumps, tons of brackish, ill-smelling water had already gushed out of the aft hold. Laney’s patch leaked, but seemed to be holding well enough. Myriad bizarre creatures slithered or skittered in the emerging silt accumulated in the ship. The workers down there, occasionally tightening Laney’s bolts or shoveling mucky silt toward a hose that reliquefied it so it could be sucked from the bilge, were constantly on alert for squirmy things. At one point, Isak emitted a most unmanly shriek, but then went after something that looked like a horseshoe crab with long, wickedly curved and articulated downwardstabbing forelegs, or “jabbers,” as he later called them. It had come marching directly at him out of the gloom, and probably spurred by his own initial terror, he relentlessly pursued the thing with a wrecking bar long after it reconsidered its attack. He never found it.
At about 2100, Santa Catalina began to groan. She’d been glued to the bottom for so long, her sudden buoyancy was stressing her old bones as she tried to break the suction. Chapelle had everything they could spare thrown over the side—empty or damaged crates, chairs, beds. He insisted they save the springs out of the mattresses, but they were cut up and the dank, mildewed fabric and stuffing went. A lot of the once submerged crates in the hold contained spare engines for the P-40s. Many of the engines were probably ruined, but they could salvage parts and the steel was good. The crates around them went. Paneling was torn from the officers’ and passengers’ staterooms and went into the swamp. Most was too rotten to save anyway. Santa Catalina was Cramp made, in 1913, and everyone but Gilbert was surprised to learn she wasn’t a coal burner. If she had been, Chapelle might have lightened her still more by transferring much of her remaining fuel to the barges alongside. The expedition, with the additional help of the rest of the squadron still anchored downstream, could have cut wood for her proposed voyage to Baalkpan. As it was, the ship had only about three hundred tons of fuel, and that was somewhat suspect. She could never make it to Baalkpan without a refill. It struck Chapelle that she never would have made it out of Tjilatjap with her original crew—back in their “old” world—and he felt a wave of sadness for their futile sacrifice. He transmitted the need for fuel oil from either Baalkpan, Aryaal, or First Fleet.
Considering her heavy cargo, Russ finally decided to pump out the ship’s ballast. He knew he was running a risk, because with so many crates on deck, the ship might be top-heavy, but they had to break her hold on the bottom. After that, they still had to get her through the shallow swamp and closer to Tjilatjap without a tug, or anything but her own dubious, neglected power plant.
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