The Project 02 - The Lance

least they were the way to go if everything kept working.
    The water was getting darker. Bits of floating sediment drifted all around. The sea floor came into view. Selena began to see objects scattered about. A layer of greenish-brown silt covered everything, softening the outlines of debris spewed from the submarine when she'd plunged to her death. She saw a cook stove lying on its back. A large and ugly fat lipped fish peered out at her from the open oven. Selena thought of pans of eggs and sausage and soups and cakes being cooked on that stove.
    They swam over a scattered string of phallic shapes, artillery shells for the guns. There were box like outlines, unidentifiable mounds. Then a pair of boots, the toes splayed outward. She wondered what his thoughts had been, this German seaman, in those last seconds when the water rushed in.
    T he hulking ruin of the sunken submarine emerged from the blue-green gloom of the deep. Ghost-like and silent on the ocean floor, U-886 still looked like the menacing predator she had once been.
    The sub had struck end on and settled upright. The stern section was crushed and buckled. The bow pointed straight down a steep slope covered with thick mud and silt. The slope ended at an undersea cliff that dropped off into fathomless depths.
    Sea growth encrusted the wreck. B izarre clumps and shapes hung from the railings and guns. Pale yellow fronds and long green streamers trailed in the current. The sea floor around the submarine was stained reddish brown from rust, as if U-886 had bled to death in her final agony.
    The visibility was good, but Selena reminded herself to be cautious. It wouldn 't take much to stir up a cloud of particles and turn everything murky.
    T he British depth charges had ripped a long, ragged gash on the starboard side, exposing the central corridor to the sea. A painted white shield with a black sword and swastika was still visible on the conning tower.
    Nick 's voice sounded in Selena's earpiece.
    "Lamont. What's your status?"
    " It's the right sub. We're looking at her. She's almost upright. She's ripped open and the stern is collapsed. We're not going to find anything aft. The center section looks accessible. I'm going to take a look now."
    " Roger that. Selena, you okay?"
    " I'm good. You should see this. There's a painted badge on the tower, sword and swastika on a white shield."
    " Most of the U-Boats had badges. They identified the boat and her crew."
    Lamont and Selena reached the breach in the hull and turned on their lights. The bright white beams lit up the dark interior of the wreck. Cables and wires hung down and swayed in the current, their crisp outlines blurred by sea growth. Fallen pipes lay rusting on the deck.
    Selena's light cast strange shadows inside the sub. If this were a recreational dive, she'd never have thought of going in. The opening into the hull was jagged and sharp. It reminded Selena of the maw of a primeval beast, waiting for unsuspecting prey to swim through.
    Waiting for her and Lamont.
    The transceiver crackled. " Nick, I'm ready to go in. Selena, you hang back behind me, give me some light."
    " Roger."
    Lamont eased through the gap and hung suspended . He shone his light down the passageway.
    " I can see the control room. The hatch is open, that's a break. They must not have had time to get it closed. Some pipes down, cables, not too bad."
    He moved into the blackness of the sub's interior. Selena followed him in and shone her light through the dark water after him. Through the open hatchway she could see the periscope column and a bank of gauges in the control room. Clusters of valve wheels, rusted pipes and sagging conduit lined the ceiling and walls. Debris lay everywhere, covered in yellowish silt. Lamont's passage sent small clouds of sediment drifting in her beam.
    Her light caught something white. A half buried skull looked up at her from the floor.
    Lamont pause d in the control room. "Bones on the deck," he said. "The depth gauge glass is cracked and the needle is stuck right on 76 meters. 228 feet. That's about right. There's a box by what's left of the radio. I'm going to open it."
    Selena watched Lamont fumble with something out of view.
    "It's junk. Looks like some kind of typewriter."
    Lamont moved about in the wreckage of the control room. He tugged on a cabinet door above his head. The door came open in a cloud of rust particles. He reached in and withdrew a flat, black object. It turned to a soggy mass