Into the Abyss (Tom Swift, Young Inventor) by Victor Appleton Page B

my strength. I lay there on my little raft with my arms outstretched like a dead body, staring out at the ocean …
    Speaking of dead bodies … was I seeing things? Or was that actually a dead body floating toward me?
    It was a body, all right—wearing a diving suit and mask, complete with an air tank on its back!
    I got a sudden, sick feeling in my stomach. Death is a shocking thing when you stare right at it. And I also knew that, if I didn’t find
Nestor
soon, I’d be just as dead.
    I paddled my raft closer, then dove into the water and swam a few strokes until I could get hold of the body and bring it back to my raft. I hauled myself up out of the water, then dragged the corpse on board.
    “Ooooohhhhh …”
    I almost fell off the raft. The body was alive!
    I took off the diving mask, and saw that it was an older man, about my dad’s age. He had a huge, purple bump on his forehead.
    “Where … am I?”
    “You’re in the middle of the ocean,” I told him. “You got hit by a giant wave. Are you all right?”
    “Wave? Where’s my boat?”
    “You’re lying on what’s left of it,” I said. “But don’t worry. I’m going to get us back to my ship.”
    He groaned and closed his eyes. That bump on his head must have really hurt.
    I made sure he didn’t have any other injuries that needed attention. Apart from some cuts and bruises he seemed like he’d be okay—if he didn’t have internalbleeding, that is—and if we didn’t both float away into oblivion.
    Staring at the air tank, I suddenly got an idea. “Does that tank of yours have any air left in it?” I asked my wounded companion.
    “Should have about fifteen minutes worth,” he said. Oooohhh …”
    “You just rest,” I said. “I’m going to get us out of this mess.”
    “How?”
    “I’m going to use the pressure in your air tank to propel us back to my ship.”
    If it wasn’t already too far away, that is.
    First things first, though. I put my watch back together, and held up its solar recharging panel to catch the sun’s energy.
    Nothing happened, but I kept trying. I knew it would take awhile for enough energy to be converted by the solar panel. Sure enough, five minutes or so later, the watch’s digital readout sprang to life.
    “URHGNGN …” The voice of Q.U.I.P., garbled by salt crystals, emanated from the watch.
    “Hello, Q.U.I.P.,” I said. “What is your condition?”
    “Gzz … What happened to me? Everything tastes salty.”
    I heaved a sigh of relief. If
Q.U.I.P.
still had his sense of humor, he must be okay. And with his help, I knew we’d come out all right somehow.
    “You were submerged in salt water. Q.U.I.P., I need to locate
Nestor
.”
    “Deploying GPS,” it said.
    My watch face opened, making a buzzing sound. A tiny titanium radar dish rose from the watch’s open face and deployed itself, turning this way and that to locate the nearest GPS satellite. “
Nestor
located.”
    “Distance?”
    “2.3654 miles.”
    Not too far—by my rough calculations, with fifteen minutes worth of compressed air, we would be able to get at least within sight of the
Nestor
.
    “Course?”
    “Seventy-five degrees south-southeast.”
    “You’ll have to guide me,” I said to Q.U.I.P. “I have no instruments.”
    “Aren’t you counting
me
as an instrument?”
    I shook my head in admiration. Had I really beensmart enough to design this tiny work of complete genius?
    “A little more to the left,” said
Q.U.I.P.
, telling me which way to point the air tank before putting it into action. “And … now!”
    I hit the valve, releasing the pressurized air in the tank. It worked like a charm and propelled us along at a slow but steady clip. All I had to do was make sure I didn’t let go of it—and hope that it didn’t run out of air before we found the
Nestor
.
    After about fifteen minutes I saw her mast appear over the horizon. “There she is!” I yelled.
    The noise woke up my wounded passenger. “Huh?” he said