A Three Hour Tour

When the shaking finally subsided, I threw on a pair of shorts and a tank top and went jogging along the beach again, trying to get that nightmare out of my head. The Tongan sunrise was spectacular, and the sheer beauty of it did much to displace those other, darker images. I returned feeling refreshed and invigorated, with enough time to catch a shower and grab some breakfast before heading down to the dock where the submersible lay at anchor. The tour, at least, promised to be fun. Nice, quiet scenes of coral and fish. I was looking forward to it.

I spotted Theresa first, waiting on the pier. As I watched, I could see Laughlin coming from the hotel, wearing the same clothes he'd had on the previous day. It didn't look like he'd made it back to his cabana last night. As he ambled towards the pier with a slight smile on his lips, I wondered what, or who, was responsible. Theresa, perhaps? I filed it away as a possibility, although without much corroborating evidence so far.

The tour submarine was an impressive 20-person affair, equipped with large bubble windows, twin screws and bow thrusters for pinpoint maneuvering, according to the brochure. The pilot, who was performing a last check of the exterior, was a lean man wearing a cowboy hat and snakeskin boots. He had a small wad of chewing tobacco in his cheek to complete the image. I wondered if he'd speak with a drawl.

The tour guide, a perky young Asian woman of indeterminate origin, was speaking as I approached. "All right, Ladies and Gentlemen. If you would please step this way. Watch your head when you go in - it's quite low. Please move all the way to the end. Every seat has a window." The small crowd began to enter. Theresa was near the front of the line. I fell in a little bit further back.

Laughlin and I nodded politely as he passed by, heading straight for Theresa. Interesting, but it didn't mean he'd slept with her. He could just be wanting to talk to someone familiar. Still, I watched with interest as he fell into step beside her. Theresa gave him a friendly smile. "Good morning, Doctor Laughlin. I didn't know you'd be aboard this morning. Nice to see you."

Sadly, Laughlin's response was lost in the clatter as we descended into the sub. We wound up close to the front of the boat, with Laughlin sitting across from Theresa, and me sitting behind him. As I was getting settled, Laughlin leaned back and asked, "Uncomfortable with all the water?"

I wondered what had prompted that question? Perhaps I was still showing the effects of my nasty little dream. "A little," I responded. "I had a bad dream last night, which probably isn't helping any. I'll be fine."

The submersible got smoothly underway at that point, and after running out of the inlet, dove slowly to a depth of about seventy feet. The water there was darker, but still clear, and the submersible's brilliant floodlights lit up an alien world of fantastic fish, huge octopi and coral reefs. The variety of sea life was really quite amazing, and I found myself more impressed than I thought I'd be. I even took a few pictures with the disposable camera I'd brought along as a prop. By far the most spectacular feature was the steep, sheer slopes of the island underwater. According to the hotel brochure, Avua'tutu was merely the peak of a massive undersea mountain. The brochure hadn't managed to convey the true scale of the thing, though, the way the sheer sides of the island plummeted down into unfathomable darkness below... You could almost imagine that there was no ocean bottom down there, that it just went on forever.

The tour proceeded uneventfully for a few hours, until the submersible rounded the flank of another peak, the tiny offshore islet of Avua'tuopavo. Suddenly, Theresa stood bolt upright, screaming horrifically. Then, just as suddenly, she fell to the floor of the submersible, unmoving.

Laughlin gave me a quick glance, then crouched down over Theresa to check her. I moved over to her as well, checking to see if she was breathing and had a pulse. I was relieved to find that the answer to both of those was yes, although her breathing was very shallow. Without taking my eyes off of Theresa, I asked Laughlin, "Do you have any medical training?"

"Not a bit," he replied, "But I spend so much time in the field, you pick things up periodically."

Pity, I'd been hoping he'd know more than I did. I had some training, mostly what I'd learned as a life guard, but it wasn't enough to do more than try and keep a patient alive until true medical personnel arrived. In Theresa's case, I believed she was going into shock. From what, I couldn't be sure. All I could really do was get her warm and get her to a hospital...or what passed for one out here.

All around us, I could hear people babbling, screaming or shouting. The tour guide was trying without success to push her way near to Theresa, while the pilot announced that the submarine would be surfacing and making an immediate return to the Pangai resort. A small part of my mind idly noted that he did, indeed, have a distinct Texas drawl. I focused my attention on Laughlin. "We need to keep her warm until we can get her to a hospital. Give me your shirt for starters, and see what else you can find. There might be towels or blankets on the sub somewhere. Ask the tour guide."

"Right." Laughlin stripped off his shirt and then started looking for an emergency kit. I wrapped the shirt around Theresa as best I could and checked her vitals again. The pandemonium around us began to subside somewhat, as the submersible slowly ascended to the surface. Laughlin quickly found an emergency kit in a well-marked locker and passed me a silvery thermal blanket that he found inside. I wrapped it around Theresa, and was relieved to note that she appeared to be stabilizing, although she remained unconscious.

Laughlin and I remained with Theresa during the thirty minute return to the Pangai pier, where presumably medical staff were standing by. It was a noisy trip, with many of the other passengers speculating on what had happened, or whether they would get a refund. Amidst this chaos, Laughlin leaned forward and whispered to me, "Did you see the cave?"

I raised an eyebrow at the odd question, then recalled that Laughlin and Theresa had been looking through the same porthole just before she collapsed. I shook my head and whispered back, "No. Is that what set this off?"

"The timing is a little too good to be anything else. After all the poor woman has now passed out inexplainably twice while underwater, with no physical explanation." He paused, looking to see if anyone was listening before continuing, "I am planning on seeing what is down there."

"Twice? That is odd. We should talk more, after Theresa has been seen to." At the very least, I wanted more details about the first time this had happened. I couldn't see any obvious connection to Stroeker in this, but I didn't have many other leads to follow at the moment, and it did seem kind of unusual. And it's amazing how often seemingly unconnected but unusual events turn out to be related after all.

We passed the rest of the trip in silence. Theresa remained stable throughout, but did not regain consciousness. At the pier, the hotel medical staff took charge of her, and told us that a helicopter was en route to take her to the hospital on Tongatapu, the main island of Tonga, about 20 miles to the west. On finding that Theresa was with the Woods Hole expedition, the nurse suggested that perhaps one of us should call Dr. Volk. Behind us, I could see the submersible pilot beginning to go over the craft with his Tongan mechanic. I didn't think he was going to find anything. If something on the sub was at fault, it probably would have affected all of us.

After Theresa was safely away, I turned to Laughlin. "Are you acquainted with Dr. Volk? I'm afraid I never met the man. Or woman."

"I have met Dr. Volk, and will of course let him know what has happened to his assistant, at least if I can find him. Since the project has some shoreside personnel staying at the resort, I'll start there. Would you like to join me? We almost certainly need to talk after this."

I nodded. "Lead the way."

As it turned out, Doctor Volk was not at the resort. The hotel staff directed Laughlin to another pier, where the Woods Hole staff had set up a shoreside communications station.

"Yes, I can get a message to Doctor Volk," said a young man with an earring and shaved head. "He's about a day away, on the Hippocampus, studying seismic phenomena. Just a minute."

Shortly thereafter, the Doctor's voice crackled out over the short-wave radio. "Hello? Hello? Professor Laughlin?"

"Hello, Dr. Volk. It's Dr. Laughlin. Theresa has collapsed again. She is being taken care of, but I thought you would like to know. Could you give me any specifics on when and what was going on with her the last time?"

There was a pause. "Theresa? My God, is she all right? What was she doing? Well, she was taking the Hippocampus on a trial run. The team was setting out the sensor array, and so she decided to have a look around. Why?"

"I think Theresa is going to be OK, but I think we need to figure out what is gong on. The obvious choice is that she suffers some type of pressure induced seizure. I was hoping that you could give me an idea of the depth and maybe the location of your sub the last time this happened."

There was some confused conversation at the other end, then, "No, Doctor, this is not possible. Hippocampus is a state-of-the-art vessel. The occupants are protected from any effects of pressure at depths down to four thousand meters. But as to location, we were southeast of the island, about two miles. Just off the smaller island you can see from the resort."

I felt my eyes widen a bit upon hearing that. Unless I was mistaken, that was the same area where Theresa had had her reaction this time. Two submersible trips to the same place. Two catatonic reactions. What were the odds?

Jillian's Page | Jillian's Journals

Last modified on August 15, 2000 by Kris Fazzari.