Zachariah and Carson stood on the main deck of a ferry commandeered from the city. A group of machinists and Octo and Benz stood with them. A ball of metal with a thick window was hooked to a chain on a crane. Sola held a chicken in her arms.

“Everyone ready?,” asked Carson.

“Do we have to kill the chicken?,” asked Sola.

“He’s not a pet,” said Carson. “He’s making sure any crew we put in the water will live.”

“I know,” said Sola. “But Hardy likes playing with him.”

“He can play with him after he comes up,” said Carson. “Oxygen hose?”

“Ready to connect,” said one of the machinist.

“Hook it up,” said Carson. “Put in the chicken.”

Machinists hooked up the oxygen hose, hooked up an engine and started it running, and opened the door to put in the chicken. Sola winced as she placed the chicken inside the metal ball. The door clanged shut. The crew locked it down.

“All right,” said Zachariah. “Everyone ready? We need to make sure the hull will take anything the water will give it, and we need to make sure nothing can get in. Be careful when we pull the test ball out. The water is poisonous, and we don’t want any of it to splash on us.”

“We’re ready with the hoist,” said Arnold.

“We’re ready with the cleaner,” said one of the others.

“Ready with the gauges and oxygen,” said Renetta.

“Let’s dump it over and see what happens,” said Carson. He waved at the small army of machinists to go ahead.

The oxygen pump hissed as the crane lifted the ball off the deck and swung it over the water. A lever pull dropped the test vehicle into the water. Bolan turned an hourglass over to measure the time.

“Everything is working according to this,” said Renetta.

“I would feel better if we had a sea daemon following the thing down, but that would really be dangerous for the daemon,” said Zachariah.

“It’s all right,” said Carson. He kept his eyes moving. They had assembled the best machinists they could find. If anything went wrong, their crew would have a hundred solutions ready by the next day.

The main problem is would the test vehicle survive in the water, and would the chicken survive inside it. If either failed, they would have to take the test data and revise their plans.

The main test was for the window. If it gave way, they would have to revise the pilot’s compartment. They couldn’t leave the pilot vulnerable to being crushed if the water could get inside his workspace. And if they lost that, the rest of the crew would go down to the bottom.

They needed a secondary set of controls even if was to lift the machine to the surface. Once on top of the water, they could drain the pilot’s compartment and sail back to port.

Zachariah doubted it would be that easy unless they installed small pumps to capture the water at the bottom of the compartment and drop it into the ballast rooms. That should get the water out of the way without the crew worrying about letting it drop into the main body of the vehicle.

They would have to do weapons trials next to make sure that would work under the water.

The light cutter looked like their best option, but a version of the gravity gun was also being installed. The solid shot cannons were unworkable until they could figure out how to make the engines smaller to carry them to the target and explode.

Zachariah thought they could build solid slug guns that didn’t need engines if they were slung with more force than usual to hit at range. The water was the main factor on how far the projectiles could go.

“Time,” called Bolan.

“Bring it up,” ordered Carson. “Remember to keep it away from us until the hull dries.”

The chain retracted. The ball broke the surface and slowly lifted into the air. They let it hang over the water for minutes. Then they swung it over the deck and dropped it back on its test bed.

Zachariah pulled on gloves. He went to the door and helped open it. The chicken clucked at him from inside the sphere. He pulled the bird out and gave it to Sola. Small drips of black water fell on the deck.

A daemon boiled the access water away before it touched any of the machinists, or crew. No one knew what it would do to a living being, and no one wanted to find out.

“It held,” said Renetta. “The hull was pushed on but we know what the theoretical limit is, and can make our own ship that much tougher.”

“Small cracks in the glass,” said Arnold. His bird showed a diagram in the air. “We’ll have to increase the toughness of it, but she’ll reach the bottom with no problem. The glass breaking is going to be a constant threat while you’re down.”

“But you can handle it?,” asked Carson.

“I’d be surprised if we couldn’t,” said Arnold. “The hull will be heavier than expected but we can safely double this stress test data limit in a week, or two. Then we can put in the separators and pipe fittings for the wiring harness.”

“We might need two more engines,” said Renetta. “The heavier it is, the harder it will be to push.”

“So the only thing we really need to worry about is the weapons,” said Zachariah.

“We can set up and do the tests for that day after tomorrow,” said Nick. “A full scale test in the water will tell us how much we have to alter to make things fit the profile.”

“We don’t have to do those here in the dead zone,” said Carson. “We can do it in clearer water.”

“Yeah,” said Nick. “The last thing we need is to get poisoned by the water while we’re changing things out.”

“Let’s head in,” said Zachariah. “We need to get the data added in and look at what we need to change. Things look good for us remaining on track.”

“The oxygen supply and scrubbers are going to be the main problem,” said Carson. “We need to be able to keep air for the crew up to five days in case there is a problem.”

“I know,” said Zachariah. “I’m still looking at it. I’m hoping some kind of magic

formula will drop into my head to show me how to do that. Will the breathing tube work?”

“As long as you are close to the surface, and not moving too fast,” said Carson. “Otherwise it will snap off like we thought.”

The ferry started the slow turn to take the group back to the dock prepared for the test loading. A daemon with earth moving had built the thing under the direction of its partner. Once pulled in, they could unload the sphere, and start loading what they needed for the weapons test.

The ferry slowly sailed into the dock and tied off before lowering the massive ramp needed by the machinists. Daemons and crew got to work offloading the sphere and placing it on a dolly so it could be rolled to the testing lab. Nick and his crew went to get the prototypes they had been working on.

“The sphere did better than I expected,” said Carson.

“The window still cracked some,” said Zachariah. “If we knew more, we probably wouldn’t need a window at all. We need some kind of ranging machine in case we do have to sail blind.”

“Once we replace the window, one of us is going to have to go down and see what we can see,” said Carson. “I’m thinking that will have to be me.”

“I’m afraid not,” said Zachariah. “You’re going to have to stay top side. Bolan and I are going down.”

“Bolan and you?,” said Carson. “Can’t have it.”

“It has to be us,” said Zachariah. “We’re the only ones qualified. You just want to do it so you can have your name in daemon colored lights.”

“This will make me a ton of loot as is,” said Carson. “I don’t need to be famous on top of that. You’re the inventor of this. Anything happens to you, and the project is sunk.”

“You are more than capable of carrying on without me,” said Zachariah. He waved at the facility that had been built with help from Rioridania. “This will all be yours.”

“What would I do with this?,” said Carson. “I could never do what you’re doing. I know what my limit is.”

“You can do it, Carson,” said Zachariah. “If something were to happen to me, you would be able to finish both contracts without a problem. Everyone knows it. That’s why they don’t gripe at not being the second with you onboard. They all know you’re the best man for the job.”

“I’m not going to test it,” said Carson. “We should go out and watch the weapons tests, and then go over the data for the sphere before we do the next dive. I think you should take Arnold with you on your dive if you want to go because he’s building the hull, and he’ll want to know how much he has to do to keep everything together.”

“All right,” said Zachariah. “Bolan can go down on the second run if there aren’t any problems.”

“He’s a good kid, and a fair machinist,” said Carson. “Is he going to stay on?”

“I don’t know,” said Zachariah. “I want him to have his own projects, but right now I need him to get mine done. When the flying ship is done for Lobster Bay, I’ll ask him if he wants to try to fly above the atmosphere with me, or find something down here that’s not so head in the clouds.”

“He’ll fly with you, and get in trouble with you too,” said Carson. He grinned. “He’s too young to know not to jump off a cliff.”

“He knows,” said Zachariah. “I’m more worried if he cares.”

The friends fell silent as the weapons crew rolled huge machines of destruction toward them. Some carried portable electrical chargers to power the weapons once they had been dropped in the water.

“All the wiring is waterproofed,” said Nick. “Naturally most of this will be in the boat and the waterproofing won’t be that big a deal, but if something happens, I wanted to make sure the guns would still shoot.”

“Show us what you came up with, Nick,” said Zachariah. “We can go over power costs with Renetta after the tests.”

“We’re ready,” said Nick. He jogged up the ramp and oversaw the storing of his prototypes. Nothing should be able to damage them on the ferry, but he didn’t want to take chances.

“And now we’ll be back at sea,” said Carson.

“I would like to see what Nick came up with,” said Zachariah. “He said the light cutters might be the thing to use, but he wasn’t sure.”

“He’s probably got it overpowered so it’ll set the water on fire,” said Carson.

“I doubt that,” said Zachariah. “Shall we? This will be just as entertaining as the sphere testing.”

“We’ll know a little more about what we can do,” said Carson. “Nick will be the one having fun.”

“It’ll be useful to see what he came up with from the designs I gave him,” said

Zachariah. “We might not need a vehicle if he can hit the target from here.”

“We’d still have to build something so we could go down there and make sure,” said Carson.

“We already have the sphere,” Zachariah pointed out.

“Don’t be contrary,” said Carson.

Once the equipment and crew were on board, the ferry’s crew untied it from the dock and raised anchors. The boat moved away from the shore and headed out to a different part of the harbor. They didn’t need to test the weapons in the dead zone.

Zachariah and Carson stood out of the way as Nick’s crew rigged the crane to drop their weapons overboard. He set up the measurement panels to check what happened when the guns fired.

“Set up the light cutters, guys,” said Nick. “We’ll test those first.”

They set up the long gun and plugged it into the battery on the deck. They hooked it to the crane and lifted it into the air. The crane operator gently lowered the weapon overboard. People with shepherd staffs made sure the barrel didn’t swing back to point at the ferry’s keel.

“Test firing,” called Nick. He pushed the button on the control panel.

A short beam of light sliced the water. It faded away yards from the ferry. The crew looked at the gauges. Nick nodded at the readings.

“How did it do, Nick?,” asked Zachariah.

“Better than I thought,” said Nick. “This might be the perfect weapon for underwater battles. I don’t know how much the water blocks the impact, but we can set up a target to check it.”

“What else did you bring?,” asked Carson.

“A lightning gun, a gravity gun, and two sets of slug throwers we’ve been working on,” said Nick.

“Let’s see what those look like,” said Zachariah. “The cutter did better than I

thought.”

The weapons crew reeled in the light cutter, and hooked up the next weapon. They tested each one, but the lightning gun’s blast spread out too much and attacked the ferry, the gravity gun only attacked what was in front of the barrel which made the water a perfect shield, and the slug throwers were slowed down so it was hard to say how dangerous they actually were to their targets.

“The cutter and the mark two is the best of the lot,” said Nick. “The water makes the lightning gun and the gravity gun dangerous to us or useless unless the target is point blank.”

“We can use the cutters as primary weapons, and the mark twos as some kind of defense if anything gets past the cutters,” said Zachariah. “We’ll need to talk to Arnold about hull placements.”

“Don’t get me wrong,” said Nick. “I think the lightning and gravity weapons will be super dangerous above the water. But in water, they’re not much of a threat.”

“I’ll talk to Octo and Benz,” said Zachariah. “Their planes use slugs. They might not want to try exotic weapons.”