The Diving Bundle: Six Diving Universe Novellas Read Free

of the wreck. I had a half dozen cover stories ready, depending on who might spot us. I hoped no one did.
    But taking this precaution meant we needed transport to and from the wreck. That was the only drawback of this kind of secrecy.
    First mission out, I’m ferry captain—a role I hate, but one I have to play. We’re using the skip instead of the Business . The skip is designed for short trips, no more than four bodies on board at one time.
    This trip, there’s only three of us—me, Turtle and Karl. Usually we team-dive wrecks, but this deep and so early, I need two different kinds of players. Turtle can dive anything, and Karl can kill anything. I can fly anything.
    We’re set.
    I’m flying the skip with the portals unshielded. It looks like we’re inside a piece of black glass moving through open space. Turtle paces most of the way, walking back to front to back again, peering through the portals, hoping to be the first to see the wreck.
    Karl monitors the instruments as if he’s flying the thing instead of me. If I hadn’t worked with him before, I’d be freaked. I’m not; I know he’s watching for unusuals, whatever comes our way.
    The wreck looms ahead of us—a megaship, from the days when size equaled power. Still, it seems small in the vastness, barely a blip on the front of my sensors.
    Turtle bounces in. She’s fighting the grav that I left on for me—that landlocked thing again—and she’s so nervous, someone who doesn’t know her would think she’s on something. She’s too thin, like most divers, but muscular. Strong. I like that. Almost as much as I like her brain.
    “What the hell is it?” she asks. “Old Empire?”
    “Older.” Karl is bent at the waist, looking courtly as he studies the instruments. He prefers readouts to eyeballing things; he trusts equipment more than he trusts himself.
    “There can’t be anything older out here,” Turtle says.
    “Can’t is relative,” Karl says.
    I let them tough it out. I’m not telling them what I know. The skip slows, shuts down, and bobs with its own momentum. I’m easing in, leaving no trail.
    “It’s gonna take more than six of us to dive that puppy,” Turtle says. “Either that, or we’ll spend the rest of our lives here.”
    “As old as that thing is,” Karl says, “it’s probably been plundered and replundered.”
    “We’re not here for the loot.” I speak softly, reminding them it’s an historical mission.
    Karl turns his angular face toward me. In the dim light of the instrument panel, his gray eyes look silver, his skin unnaturally pale. “You know what this is?”
    I don’t answer. I’m not going to lie about something as important as this, so I can’t make a denial. But I’m not going to confirm either. Confirming will only lead to more questions, which is something I don’t want just yet. I need them to make their own minds up about this find.
    “Huge, old.” Turtle shakes her head. “Dangerous. You know what’s inside?”
    “Nothing, for all I know.”
    “Didn’t check it out first?”
    Some dive team leaders head into a wreck the moment they find one. Anyone working salvage knows it’s not worth your time to come back to a place that’s been plundered before.
    “No.” I pick a spot not far from the main doors, and set the skip to hold position with the monster wreck. With no trail, I hoped no one was gonna notice the tiny energy emanation the skip gives off.
    “Too dangerous?” Turtle asks. “That why you didn’t go in?”
    “I have no idea,” I say.
    “There’s a reason you brought us here.” She sounds annoyed. “You gonna share it?”
    I shake my head. “Not yet. I just want to see what you find.”
    She glares, but the look has no teeth. She knows my methods and even approves of them sometimes. And she should know that I’m not good enough to dive alone.
    She peels off her clothes—no modesty in this woman—and slides on her suit. The suit adheres to her like it’s a part of