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I suddenly felt hot and tried to control my aching heart, the room whirled about me like an old carnival ride. I latched onto the walls to steady myself before following Gio from the area.
He led me to the next room, and I could already see the water reflecting off the tiled walls. Thorsten was there, and an older titan female sat next to him.
“You’re dismissed, Gio.” Thorsten looked at him as if he was not pleased with him at all, and the other bowed and closed the door.
“Let’s get a good look at you.” The woman called me over to the row of cushioned benches, where they sat overlooking the pool. I wasn’t sure if I should come up the steps or not, so I remained at the bottom near the pool.
“Well, you certainly can pick them. I’ll give you that.”
“Thank you,” I said, barely able to get the words out.
“What is that around your neck?”
I looked at Thorsten.
“My collar.”
She nodded as if understanding what this was.
“Loyalty undoubtedly won’t be a problem here.” She said, folding her arms. “How long have you been a diver?”
“Since I was a kid. I used to do small jobs to help my father and his crew, like swim through small spaces to place hooks they would then used to remove larger pieces of rubble.”
“Were you afraid? That sounds dangerous.”
“I was born in water, like a lot of kids with diver parents. They didn’t teach me to fear the sea.”
She nodded while Thorsten remained silent. “What’s your record?”
“Two hundred and twenty meters free diving and twenty-three minutes even of holding my breath,” I replied, having tackled these questions before from potential clients.
“Do you have a crew?”
“Um… no,” I said, thinking of Jaxon, but Jaxon wasn’t a part of any past crews I was in, and the one time he called me to join him, it was for a robbery, not a diving mission. “I’ve never officially had a crew. I helped my father until he could no longer dive. Afterward, I was enlisted into other teams and allowed to take whatever I found personally. Like every man for himself crews.”
“Do you only do retrievals or item location as well? If so, what equipment would you use?”
“Yes, and it depends on how large or small the object. Most clients would tell me they want something like a cell phone. I can do some out of water research on the hotspots where other divers have found similar objects and go from there. If it is more specific, like a family heirloom, I would ask the client the general location of the item. That’s much harder, but I can perform out of water research of the area and purchase maps—”
“And if the area is unmapped?”
“Then computer imaging equipment is the best option to map the terrain. It’s far more expensive, requires a boat large enough to house a crew. We may also need infrared gear and sound.”
“Sound?”
“Sonar navigation tech can map undersea topography and the movements of both animals, ships, and even the shifting of any unstable buildings and so on.”
“Have you ever mapped the abyss?”
“I just moved to Jötun not too long ago, but I have heard of it. It’s located in old Times Square. It’s claimed a lot of lives.”
Thorsten finally spoke up. “Prove your record right here and now. I’ll time you.”
I looked at the pool. “I would need a weight to hold on to keep me under.”
The woman nodded to the stack of weights along the wall, and Thorsten got up to get one for me.
“What is this about?" I asked him once we were away from the woman.
