When Babin got to Williams’ quarters, the bed was empty. She made her way to the galley where she found some of the crew. They told her he was with the captain on the bridge.
“Yes, of course.” She thanked them and headed for the bridge.
Williams and the barge captain were looking at the weather display when Babin arrived.
“Good morning miss Babin.”
“I’m not sure I’d say it was all that good Dr. Williams. If this keeps up, the Pheia is going to break up when it gets to the surface.”
Williams nodded. “The captain and I were just talking about the weather. It looks like this will pass sometime tomorrow. That should allow us to send down divers and attach a line to the Pheia.
The captain added: “I am confident we can maintain station in this wind. So long as it doesn’t pick up any more, we’ll be fine here.”
Babin addressed Williams. “Leclerc was retching his guts up but I’ve got him outside and fed him. I think he’ll live.”
Williams smiled. “I suspect he will not be the only one today. Some of our academics do not like boats very much.” He grinned. Williams was enjoying himself in the same way that Babin was. Some wind and a bit of a swell was all it took.
Babin grinned too. “Brings back my childhood.” she said. Then added: “I need to work with Leclerc on a sling design for the Pheia. I want to put something together that distributes the lifting forces properly but which does not do any more damage than is already present.”
“What is wrong with the system we used to put it in the water?” Williams asked.
“Nothing at all, except that when we designed that, the two cylinders were separated by the two tunnels. Now that the tunnels have become detached the cylinders will pull together as we lift the rig. I want to stop that from happening. It’s not complicated. I will make something from the wire and fittings we brought with us. I can make it from the design plans but the divers will need to be instructed as to how it needs to be attached, and I probably need to include some way to alter lengths and so on. Since I have no real data on how the two cylinders are separated, I will have to allow for the worst case I can think of which means quite a bit more cable. If the separation is not that bad, that means a lot of slack.”
“Yes, I understand.” Williams replied. “By the way, I have sent a message to the Pheia explaining that the divers expect to connect the line when it reaches one thousand feet. The divers are happy with that depth. They will return to the surface in the Pheia. That gives us a day and a half or two days. Something like that.”
“OK. We’ll be ready well before then,” Babin replied, and left to discuss the details of the lifting rig with Leclerc.
Leclerc was still holding the railing and staring out at the horizon when Babin found him. He had the hood of his rain jacket up. His skinny white legs and bare feet made him look like a garden gnome.
“How are you feeling?”
Leclerc turned and looked at her. “Not so bad now. The food has helped. But I have just fed it to the fish.”
Babin laughed. “OK, that’s as expected. If you feel up to it I’d like to talk about the sling design. We need to make it adjustable so the divers can fit it properly.”
“Oui. I had been thinking the same thing. But I do not think I can be inside.”
“That’s OK. You stay out here. I’m going to rough out a design or two. When I have them I’ll show them to you.”
Leclerc looked at her and laughed. “But it is raining. Your computer will not like that.”
“I thought of that. I think we can sit in the small supply container. It is fairly close to the center of the ship and the doors face the railings. It will provide enough shelter from the rain that is coming in from the other side of the ship. It also has the materials we will need. We can work in there.”
“OK. Yes. Let’s go.”
Leclerc let go of the railing, steadied himself, and the two of them walked across the ship to the small container. As they were crossing the deck, Leclerc retched again.
“May I have another sandwich?” He asked.
Babin laughed. “Of course. I’m glad you like them. I will bring it with the computer.”
Leclerc was happy to have something to do. It took his mind off the awful feeling in his stomach. When they had first come out to the barge, he had been offered a Dramamine patch but had declined it, not wishing to seem weak. He was regretting that now, and wondering where they were kept. They would be inside somewhere, of course and he had no intention whatsoever of going back inside the structure until the sea was flat calm. He would stay out here for days if that was what it took.
He opened the doors to the small container and locked them back to the sides, then stood in the opening facing the sea. He was out of the rain now and pulled his hood down. It was actually quite warm now that he was out of the wind. He grabbed one of the folding chairs from the workbench inside and set it in the doorway. Sitting there, watching the clouds on the horizon, he felt much better. The boat was moving up and down less here than his position at the railing. He kept his eyes on the horizon and started to think about the sling design. His stomach growled. He hoped Babin would be back with his sandwich soon.
When Babin returned some time later, the rain had stopped and the sun was out. It was still quite windy and the waves on the sea were the same height, but it looked like the storm was passing. Babin guessed that it would take many hours for the sea to calm down, but at least it was sunny. It always looked better when it was sunny. She gave Leclerc his sandwich and got herself a chair.
“I have looked at the original sling design,” she began, “and I think if we cut the inside lines and insert bottle screws we can make it adjustable enough to account for the angle of the two cylinders.” She showed Leclerc a 3D model that she had set up to show how the Pheia might look with the tunnels separated in the way Kate had described. “Of course, I have no idea if these gaps are the right size but I don’t think it will matter much.”
Leclerc looked at the laptop briefly. His stomach was feeling better and the motion now felt no worse than a bad airplane flight. He could look at the screen briefly so long as he went back to looking at the horizon when he talked or listened to Babin.
“I agree with the idea. But I think we need more range of adjustment than a bottle screw will provide. Perhaps we use two in each leg of the sling?”
They discussed the design for over an hour before they were both satisfied that it would hold the Pheia at whatever angle it was currently at and prevent it from shifting as they lifted it.
In the Pheia, Kate was attempting some yoga, more out of boredom than the need to exercise. The floor was hard, cold, and slippery from the ever-present moisture which made a down dog a rather temporary pose. She could push her butt up, straighten her legs and start to push her heels down, but then her hands started to move out away from her on the floor. So she kept the poses short, and tried to ignore the unpleasant feeling of the diamond pattern of the deck plates. It was after all a ship not a gym, she thought. It felt good to stretch out. She had been sleeping in one position for a long time now, and apart from the recent dive, she was getting almost no exercise at all. And the dive hardly counted either. She moved so easily in the water, it took almost no effort.
Thinking about it, she decided that the only exercise she had gotten, was putting on the scuba gear. “Pathetic.”
Kate was used to running or riding her bike almost daily. It not only kept her fit but also helped her mental state a lot. A good bike ride could drive out thoughts of work — provided she focused on the trail. There were plenty of times when she’d been out on a run or on her bike when she realized she didn’t know quite where she was. She’d been totally zoned out thinking about her work. At one time she was determined to learn Spanish, and had tried listening to the lessons on her iPod while running. It was a complete failure. She found she could tune out the lessons within a couple of minutes of starting the run. They provided a weird kind of white noise background that enabled her to think about work, or other problems — anything but Spanish.