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One year ago the ARA San Juan submarine disappeared in the Atlantic ocean during a training exercise. One distress call was made before its disappearance. The wreckage was just discovered 500km off the coast of Comodoro Rivadavia in southern Argentina. 44 Crew members were on board, none were recovered, one body com-suit has been found.
15th November 2019
Com-suit 24#
Engineman: Mundo-Maravilloso
Com-suit connected
“Hello, hello, checking Alpha Bravo Charlie, on. Date is fifteenth of the eleventh twenty nineteen in the year of our lord, and the time is-(static break)-ten hundred hours. Fire outbreak in the forward batteries, repeat, fire in the forward batteries.”
-(muffled movement)-
-(unidentified voices)-
“Crew members Oruga and Alicia are with me, we are dousing the fire with hydrants. Two batteries are lit. Distress call should be being made. –(Static)- -(muffled movement)-”
“OUT? OUT.”
“Repeat fire has been doused. Time, ten hundred and ten hours. Damage has been done to the forward batteries and I am disconnecting, Sub will use aft batteries to continue on. Alicia would you mind telling Commander? Yeah, -(unintelligible voice)- yeah, it seems to be a water leakage, I’ll follow it and see if I can patch it up.”
-(muffled movements)-
“Water is coming from above, which makes me sure that it won’t have gotten into the control compartment, but from somewhere above the crew accommodations. It sprinkling in through the piping and ceiling. A tear perhaps to the hull? We made no collisions though that I’m aware of. Making my way up the crew stairway, steady as she goes.” –(static)- “Ah yup, water is raining in from above the crew corridor, making my way up again to the exhaust system which hopefully hasn’t been damaged too much from the leak. –(muffled movements)- Ah.”
-(static break)-
“Time is ten twenty and there is a leak in the snorkel. –(sigh)- Fixing it now.”
-(static blip)-
“Time is ten thirty and I’ve just been informed that the distress signal was made, leak has been patched up, and we are still moving with the aft batteries intact. Commander will probably head us towards the first port, and I’m going to check the rest of the exhaust and generators to make sure no water has damaged anything near the rear of the sub.”
-(muffled movement)-
-(static blip)-
“Huh, its ten thirty eight and I’m making my way towards the generators and I just noticed more damage? No… a hole? No… Inside the generator room, and there seems to be an odd light coming from beneath Generator 1. Green. Report green light is coming from under the generator. –(muffled movement)- I’m on my stomach looking beneath, I can’t see any, no scratch that, I can’t see any liquid, but the light seems to be coming from a split underneath. Along the floor of the back wall I can see a small line of green light from behind the gen. I can see, a door? No. –(laughter)- -(muffled movement)- Just. Making. My way. Underneath. Report, confirming unidentified door. I have not seen said door before, nor been made aware of its existence. –(voice lowered)- How have I never seen this before? I’ve been on this sub for two years.”
-(unintelligible noise)-
-(high pitched static)-
“Ugh, finally, wiggled my way beneath, all the lower of the Gen looks fine, but this door. Its sitting against the back wall, no one could get back here without going beneath. Which isn’t recommended. But it’s small, perhaps a containment hatch? It’s just cut into the side of the hull, a small brass handle sits to one side and… and… confirming, its only a couple of feet tall. I can’t get up, I’m stuck on my stomach touching the door. It’s warm. Solid, and made from the same metal as the hull. –(silence)- But only the pressure hull should be behind here. There’s no way a maintenance shaft or storage space could be there. I don’t understand.”
-(static)-
“The doorknob turns, I’m opening the door, it pulls inwards towards me, having to shuffle a little out of the way. –(muffled movement)- It’s… Oh… oh wow. The light was almost blinding as I opened it, green light shining out. Or in. But there is a room. A room! On the other side! How? –(muffled movement)- -(high pitched static)- Just wiggling my way in.”
-(static blip)-
“I’m inside. This room should not be here. At all. And it is a room. On what should be the outside of the Sub. I hope my com-suit is still recording, please be recording. I repeat, a room is on the outside of the sub, and the door is behind me, at my feet, only tall enough for me to shuffle in on my stomach. But this room, its like a bubble. A glass dome on the outside of the hull, metal cross work is covering it as though it was made here. Meant to be here. But this is impossible, I’ve never seen this before, it’s not on the plans. It’s carpeted too, the floors I mean. Rugs all over the ground. And lamps, like old fashioned gas lamps line the back of the room behind me, shouldering the door. Why would you put gas lamps in here? In a sub? –(muffled movement)- It’s echoey, I hope you’re picking that up on the suit-com, as though the glass isn’t double paned. But… and here, right by the glass domes front, there’s this giant torch. Like a metal barrel on its side, but pointing towards the window is a giant bulb, a leaver is on its side, I’m guessing it’s switch. Why would you have this here? It comes up to my hip, and looks old fashioned, like a lighthouse lamp. –(metal tapping sounds)- It’s not plugged in, but beside it is a vinyl player. Like, an actual vinyl player, and not the new types either, it’s like the ones you see in old films. Period films. Nineteen forties styled. –(static)-”
-(static blip)-
“Maybe this is odd to say, but there’s no dust. No dust at all in here. And it echoes with the sound of the water against the window, and that green light is the light coming in from the ocean. But it should just be darkness out there, a nothingness, and inky swell that is as empty as the backs of your eyes, but its not! It’s green! Glowing darkly green. Glowing inwardly I mean, like the water motions are waving on the carpets, which would only happen if there was light behind it. Behind the water, which there’s not. It just keeps going and going, just as it should. But it’s too bright. The water. It’s too see-able. I shouldn’t be seeing this. –(muffled movement)- -(high pitched static)- My head hurts. –(thud)- -(muffled movement)- Oh! Oh. –(heavy breathing)- The door closed. It closed behind me… -(quieter)- even though its on a rugged carpet, with no wind, or loose hinges.”
-(muffled movement)-
“Time is…. Wait. What? Time is zero two hundred hours but, but that isn’t possible. I was just here a couple of minutes it can’t be two, it was ten in the morning how is it now two am? I’m going mad, I don’t understand. –(muffled movement)- I’m getting out. I don’t like this, I need to report to the commander. We should be nearing the docks. I’m at the back of the room, but… what? –(sliding metal sounds)- -(heavy breathing)- The doors gone. –(silence)-”
-(High pitched static)-
-(static blip)-
“Time is zero four hundred hours, though I haven’t been in here more than thirty minutes. The door is just non-existent. The back of the room is pure outer-hull metal. There’s no marks, no engravings, no door, no nothing. It’s completely clear. Like it was never even there, but I’m here. And I can’t be here unless there was a door to let me in. To be honest I’m scared. I’m shitting myself. I hope my com-suit is still on, otherwise I’m just talking into nothing. And there’s a whole lot of nothing happening behind me. In the green. The green, green ocean. I can feel it there, watching me, colouring my back with its green light and I don’t want to turn around. I’m worried what I’ll see. What if it’s just watching me, the sea, with its green eye staring in. What if I turn around and it’s black? What if I turn around and it’s gone, and then the room is gone and I’m left floating in the water thousands of miles beneath the waves and I can’t breathe, I can’t think, the pressure at this depths would explode my blood vessels. I’d pop. Out like a light. And nothing separates me and that but that glass dome. That glass dome that’s looking out into that glowing green void that shouldn’t be there. –(heavy breathing)- I’m resting my head against the hull, with my hands up against its cold body, and I want to go home.”
-(static blip)-
-(muffled movement)-
“I’m… I’m going to turn around now. I don’t know how long it’s been but it is definitely not the time that my watch is telling me. The door has not returned, but perhaps if I look away it will. So I’m going to look away now. –(muffled movement)- I’m turning, I can see the line of gas lamps to the right, and I can see the side of the dome, it’s darker there than when you look out the front. I’m turning, and now I can see the vinyl player, but I’m keeping my eyes down, I don’t want to look into the green. I can see it though, making patterns on the rugs, swirling and dancing. It’s pretty, like a murmur of birds. Swirling. –(laughter)- It is pretty. Why don’t I look up? The green is obviously still there. –(silence)- I could look up if I wanted to. –(silence)-”
-(static blip)-
-(static blip)-
“Oh… my head. It hurts so much. And my feet, I wonder how long I’ve been standing here, I spaced out for a few moments, but my mouth is so dry it feels like a lifetime. I’ve looked up into the dome and all I see is the green glowing ocean that shouldn’t be green or glowing. But there it is, ebbing. Ebbing. Eb-b-bing. –(heavy breath)- -(thud)- My watch looks better on the floor, it’s broken I think, it’s no longer useful to me. But this light, this vast torch pointing into the unknown, that, that is useful. Of course we would need a lamp into the sea, how else could we see what’s staring back at us. All those life forms, all that life. Just out there, beyond our sight line. What a vast kingdom beyond Human understanding. –(laughter)- -(laughter)- -(laughter)-”
-(high pitched static)-
-(mic pop)-
“-(laughter)- Ohhh and the music! The music, of course there would be music! For the light! The light could not be without the song of the sea calling out to it! Oh what music we’ll have here, what music we’ll get to hear! –(muffled movement)- -(scratching sound)- -(whale song)- Oh… oh it’s whales! Do you hear that? –(loud tapping)- Hey do you hear that my com-suit? Whales, oh, oh no what's that? –(unidentified noise)- The song has changed, it’s like a, like a far off screaming sound. Can you hear that? –(high pitched static)- -(unidentified noise)- Agh! –(muffled movement)- Its screaming! Screaming! My hands are over my ears and I can still, still, hear it! I’m backing away. –(static increasing)- -(loud thud)- Oooft. Agh, I backed into the torch, it’s rocking, no, no don’t fall! –(loud click)- Oh! Oh, it’s on. It came on. I caught its handle on my sleeve and it’s shinning. That noise! I wish it would stop, I can’t bring myself to get closer though. It Just Keeps Screaming! Screaming! Screaming! The light! The lamp is shinning white light into the sea, through the domed glass wall and I can see! I can see… –(mic pop)- -(laughter)- What’s that? –(cracking sound)- Wait what is that! –(cracking sound)- -(static)- -(mic pop)- -(mic pop)- WHAT IS THAT! WHAT ARE YOU! OH GOD OH GOD OH GOD! HELP! –(Muffled movements)- -(screaming)- HELP! HELP! HELP ME PLEASE! OH GOD OH- -(screaming)- -(crashing sound)-”
22nd November 2019
Com-suit 24#
Engineman: Mundo-Maravilloso
Com-suit reporting water fault
Com-suit disconnecting
Com-suit dead
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