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It was a perfect cube of a room covered on all sides by lights and dials. Beneath the small desk of the EOOW were two rows of thick, black books like the one the lieutenant was reading. Hallorann considered himself a smart guy, had been told that by others: it was one of the reasons the Navy wanted him on a submarine. But he wondered how anyone could ever master all the information available in that small room.

“So, Hallorann, what are we doing out here?”

Hallorann knew he was being fucked with — and that being fucked with would be one of his primary duties until he pinned on his dolphins. Still, he preferred to give an answer that didn’t make him sound like a complete shit head. “Strategic deterrence?” he said.

A couple of the watchstanders actually glanced away from their panels at that, impressed.

“Wow, pretty good,” said the one on the right, who looked to be running the ships electrical system, a control panel that contained dials marked in units familiar to Hallorann: volts, amps, and kilowatts. “Officer material.”

“That is good,” said Lieutenant Hein. “And that would normally be correct. But that doesn’t seem to be the answer this patrol. Any idea what we’re doing here this patrol?”

“It’s a trick question,” said the one of the left, the steel wheel of the throttles in his hand. He seemed to be concentrating harder than the rest, and Hallorann got the feeling that the ship’s rolling motion was making his job harder, as he constantly adjusted the position of the wheel in his hands with each pitch and roll. The movement seemed to be intensifying. “No one knows what the fuck we’re doing out here on this patrol.”

“We’re going somewhere, that’s all I care about,” said the watchstander in the middle.

“You’re a lucky fuck, Hallorann,” said the electrical operator. “I made four patrols before I went anywhere. And that was just Pearl. God only knows where we’re gonna end up on this run.”

“I’ll bet the lieutenant knows,” said the thottleman.

“You bet wrong,” said Hein. “I’m a mushroom too right now.”

“You know why we’re mushrooms?” asked the Electrical Operator.

Hallorann nodded.

“Because they keep us in the dark and feed us shit.”

“It’s something different this patrol, that’s for sure,” said Hein. “Maybe we’ll end up with some kind of unit citation.”

“I’ll just be happy if I just get one day in a liberty port,” said the electrical operator. “Not all that concerned about the implications for my career.”

They plunged dramatically. Hallorann barely stopped himself from falling into the back of the electrical operator. An alarm sounded on the far left panel. “Watch it!” said Lieutenant Hein, and the throttleman spun the throttles to the right as all the others made adjustments.

“Screw came out of the water,” said the throttleman, as things settled back down.

“Steam flow hit 80 percent,” said the middle watchstander. “It was WAY out of the water.” Outside maneuvering, something crashed loudly to the deck.

Hein looked a little flustered. He spoke into the microphone on his desk, the words echoing outside maneuvering. “Engineering Watch Supervisor, verify stow for sea.” A few seconds later, the chief acknowledged the order into a mike.

“Shit falling all over the place out there,” said the electrical operator.

“Fuck, I can’t wait till we submerge,” said Hein.

It went silent for a minute as things got back to normal. Hallorann felt Hein looking past him, a little blankly. He wondered of he had been in there long enough to get the signature in his yellow book; he felt the need to speak.

“It’s pretty rough, isn’t it?”

All three enlisted watchstanders turned with raised eyebrows, and Hein grinned.

“This your first time at sea?” asked the throttleman.

“Yeah — how about you?”

The throttleman, without turning, pulled a ballpoint pen from his shirt pocket. “Hey, shit stain, see this pen? It has more sea time than you do.”

The reactor operator, in the center, chimed in. “I’ve got more time eating ice cream at test depth than you’ve got underway, nub.”

Hallorann laughed at that.

“Is the motion getting to you, Hallorann?” Lieutenant Hein asked, still grinning. “All this rocking and rolling?”

Hallorann nodded. “Not really.”

“It’s okay….everybody feels seasick once in a while.”

“Yeah,” said the electrical operator. “There was like three inches of puke in the aft head this morning. Mostly looked like scrambled eggs, but I saw some McDonald’s fries floating around in there, too, that one last meal on the beach.”

The reactor operator spoke up. “There was a line down there at both heads this morning, so Leer had to puke in his hat. It’s the only one he’s got so he was washing it out in the sink so he could keep wearing it.”

“Is that the same hat he shit in?” asked Hein. He turned to Hallorann. “He kept his hat tucked into his back pocket, and once last patrol he sat down to take a shit and the hat fell in the commode without him realizing it, and he took a big dump in it. Couldn’t flush it like that, had to pull it out, dump the shit in the bowl, and carry on.”