FMS Episode One 24 (Patreon)

Aya's hand touched down on the white sandy bottom forty meters deep. A fluff of dust swirled up and disturbed some little fish with spiny fins out of their hideouts in the sand. The enormous dark red hull of Yaeyama Maru loomed in front of Aya, resting on the bottom with a slight lean to one side. Aya looked up and squinted, and after noting the gap that led to inside the ship, she approached with swift strokes and kicks along the sea bottom like she was diving in a shallow twenty-five meter pool. The loose sand particles occasionally touched her lips and nostrils that have long ceased to take in air.

The gap, about one meter across, was from when Yaeyama Maru collided with another ship from her small convoy during this spring’s sea storm. While the other ship managed to limp back to the north reef, Yaeyama Maru was badly damaged and sank, sitting where she was until this day.

Without hesitation, Aya swam in through the opening and made a re-entry into the flooded section of the ship. She was in an empty bulk, with no portholes and almost pitch dark.

Aya treaded water for a while, managing her buoyancy so that she would not drift up or down. She then made out the position of the gap where she entered and started to swim across toward the bulk’s farthest end. She recalled that there was an open hatch in that area that would lead up the lower deck where Chihaya’s air-tight cabin was. Aya eventually made her way to the far end and felt and grasped the rusted ladder bars that were bolted onto the back wall. If she crawled up, her head should easily pass through the hatch and emerge onto the lower deck.

Except that it didn’t.