Minutes later, on the ship's stern, two crew members lowered a submersible drone into the waters. Another crew member turns the camera on and directs the drone to the propellers. "Captain, we are ready for visuals," the drone operator called to the captain. Chris looked at the video feed. At first, there was only darkness, nothing but a black screen. The operator turned the drone's lights illuminating only a short distance, then from nowhere, a decaying body came into view.
Cecilia shrieked in fear, "What? Why is there a human corpse there?"
"That was the corpse of a missing person." Chief Bustamante answered, "The missing bodies of those who died end up here in the Kasanaan."
Chris rubbed his chin as he watched the drone's grainy video feed. He shook his head and gave out a sigh upon seeing a huge chunk of rock. "Must be three or four meters in diameter," he calculated based on the video. "It's lodged between the rudder and the propeller; the system automatically shuts down to prevent further damage."
Chris stood up from the chair. "Crewman, examine the entire haul, report back if you find any damage. The rest of the officers follow me to the conference room." He then instructed Cecilia on what to do: "Pink, go and join Chief Murillo, you are part of her crew after all."
The officers were seated around a rectangular table with Chris seated at the head. Chief Bustamante was standing at the front and delivered the current dilemma that the Twilight was facing. "As we can see here, a boulder three and a half meters in diameter is lodged between the propeller cone and the rudder. The rock is preventing the propeller from rotating properly, which is why the engine system has automatically cut power to the propulsion system."
Bustamante paused to change slides. "The rock came from this underwater volcano; it erupted the moment we passed above it. The force of the explosion propelled the rock. But right now, that is the least of our worries, as a secondary sweep of the area shows a second active underwater volcano, about sixty percent larger than the first one. It is just a hundre meters off our port bow; suffice to say, if we are caught in the eruption, it may mean catastrophic damage to the Twilight."
"Wait," All heads turned to Cecilia. "I thought that this was a literal ghost ship, the barge of the dead. How could it get damaged?"
"The Twilight is no ordinary ship, but a ship nonetheless. True, it is constructed from the woven energies of the living and the dead. However, it takes its form based on what you may call modern cruise liners. Granting that the ship is ethereal, it is still subject to what you may call mechanical problems. And any damages as substantial as the ones we see right now will need intervention to fix properly." The chief engineer explained.
Chris turned to see who had asked the question, only to be startled to see Cecilia sitting behind him. "Pink? What are you doing here? Didn't I tell you to join Murillo's group?"
Cecilia fiddled with her fingers. "I got kicked out," she confessed, her face exhibiting a goofy smile. "Chief Murillo told me that I was a walking disaster." She proceeds to tell the tale of how she pissed off Murillo. "She told me to serve the dishes, and I slipped and broke half of them."
"As I carried a tray of drinks, I failed to notice a patch of spilled juice. My foot slipped, and the tray flew. Drinks splattered everywhere — on the passengers, the floor, and, most embarrassingly, on Chief Murillo herself." Chris couldn't believe what he was hearing and slapped his forehead with his hand as he shook his head
"The last straw was when Chief Murillo and I were in the crowded elevator carrying toys for the kids. One of the toys I was carrying fell, and I bent over to pick it up. I didn't know that I accidentally bumped into her, and she got pushed straight into the closing doors. Her head got caught on the door." She smiled awkwardly as if it could help diffuse the tension in the room.
For a while, silence enveloped the room as the officers stared at her. Cecilia swore she could hear a pin drop. After a while, in perfect synchrony, Chris and the other officers turned their heads away from Cecilia and onto the image displayed on the screen. "Where were we? Give me options," Chris told the officers.
"How about the mana charges? We can blow that chunk of rock into sea dust," someone eagerly suggested.
"We can't," Chris quickly shot down the suggestion, "We run the risk of damaging the propeller or the rudder from the shockwave."
"Can we use the rudder to forcibly dislodge it?" Martinez voiced his idea sheepishly.
"Same outcome, it may cause more damage than good," Chris explained, his hands clasped together, covering his lips in contemplation of what to do next.
"Too bad no one could go underwater and just jackhammer that rock into pieces," Cecilia said out of the blue. Once more, all eyes turned to her. She saw their befuddled glances at her. "Well, you know, nobody can go into the river without … Kriikkhh!" She dramatically ran her thumb across her neck.
"Not without protection," Chris said. He then turned to the first officer, "Bustamante, don't we have diving equipment?"
"But, Captain, those are antiquated units; they were never upgraded. We stopped using them ever since the Twilight self-repair systems were activated. I don't even know if they are still viable." The chief Officer protested, noting that the gear in question was already old and obsolete
"We have no choice; that is the only option we have left, the drones do not have enough leverage to drill through that boulder." The captain explained, "Call the supply room."
He quickly went to the intercom and called the supply office, "This is Chief Bustamante. Do we have the deep-sea diving gear?" He paused for a moment as he waited for the answer from the supply room. "Is that so? Okay, bring it on deck."
"Captain, supply room reported that we only have one functional gear; the rest were damaged during the eruption," Chief Bustamante sadly reported as he ended the call.
Chris stood up from his chair and boldly declared, "One is all we need…because I'll be the one going down there."