The Expedition Comes Aboard

Friday. The Nautilus took on her first expedition today, in Perth, and within the hour they had fixed her. I had not asked them to fix her.

They arrived as scientists always do, with notebooks and confident shoes, hunting a sea monster that has been bothering the shipping lanes. They found my submarine instead. Then the machinery failed, the hull began to groan, and the air, which I had always considered plentiful, turned out to be limited.

I addressed them through the speaking tubes in my most commanding voice. They ignored me and started pulling levers. One of them, a woman named Priya, read a gauge aloud and said, “Well, that’s not good.” She was right. It is never good.

And all the while, outside the portholes, the Beast. My old adversary, the Kraken. A tentacle slid across the glass as if it were reading my correspondence.

The first expedition surfaced with time to spare and thanked me warmly, which I accepted on the submarine’s behalf. The first of December. I have underlined it twice.