THE SEA IS GUARDED AGAIN
  [357] A balance that has swung twice may swing a third time. Five scuba divers
in a hard-bottomed inflatable set off from Red Wharf in Anglesey. One of them
saw Big Jim, the local G3 grab-dredgersub, lying awash in the bay, and said in
alarm: "One of those! I told you to stick to inland diving sites, round here!
Always the fishermen think we're after their precious shellfish.".
  "Yes, I <do> think so, and sometimes I'm right!" Big Jim thought on
overhearing this.
  "It's only Big Jim, he can only go 4 knots." said the dive leader, who knew a
fair amount about such craft, "We dive 14 miles away and he can't reach us
before we finish our dive! We've dodged his kind many times before, and we'll
dodge him again!".
  "Yeehaa!" another diver exclaimed, "That overgrown steel duck dredging about
and looking for frogs, can't catch us!".
  "And perhaps we bag a few lobbies [= lobsters] after all! We've seen off those
fishermen's last trouble plot." said another.
  "That's what <they> think." Big Jim thought as the divers' inflatable sped
away.
  "Yeehaa! Keep track of where they all are, and no risk!" said the dive leader.
  "It's trying to chase us!" said another diver, seeing bow waves and a wake
forming around Big Jim's 40-foot-long rounded-cylindrical steel hull, "Ho hope!
Ha ha! Slow overgrown steel ducky-quack can't catch us.".
   "Seek they stealing sneaking   selfishly the shellfish.
    Costly curse of Cousteau   comes 'gain though oft drummed out.
    Place they first and priceless   pleasure and idle leisure-time.
    Hardworking ones heard no   hope this'd ever be roped off."
  Big Jim thought tiredly as the inflatable roared away towards Puffin Island,
"Nobody seems to know nowadays that productive work should come before pleasure,
since pleasure needs things made by work.".
  One of the divers, looking back, saw that Big Jim was rather high in the water
for a sub, and making more speed than expected, and he said so. As other divers
turned round in response, they stared in alarm as most of Big Jim's bulk lifted
out of the water and, his normally silent engine roaring like a lorry's,
accelerated skimming over the waves like a surface boat in pursuit.
  Surprised cries from the divers: "He's grown legs!", "He's got water-skis!".
The dive leader kept cool and ordered: "Cameras at the ready! At least we can
warn the others and show them the photos so they'll believe us. (The word's
`hydrofoils', and a long propshaft to reach the water in this mode, both
probably retractable.) Don't go in the water anywhere near one of those subs!
With those D4SD `Hurlock sonars' with their lethally powerful ultrasound beam
that a lot of them have mounted front and rear, that sub can identify and knock
out submerged scuba divers a mile away.".
  The inflatable accelerated away fast, and its crew felt safer. But the sub,
with less acceleration but more power, steadily built up speed. It could not go
as light and fast as a specialized hydrofoil speedboat, but with most of itself
out of drag-causing water, it had a respectable performance. It steadily caught
up. "Even as, despite Westminster not wanting to know, working sea-users are at
last getting the better of sport sea-users who think that nothing can stop them
from multiplying indefinitely and interfering with productive work as they like.
I must finish this job." he thought, revelling in his motor's hot blasting
vibration inside himself and the waves rushing past against his underbelly as he
used his new ability of fast surface chasing.
  Big Jim's black rounded-cylindrical steel bulk got nearer, with roar of motor,
sheets of spray from his wide thick hydrofoils, and folded grab-arm, guided by
an active skilled mind resident in a silicon brain. Captain Hurlock was in
prison, but in the 40-foot steel body a near-copy of his mind sped free across
the sea. The inflatable was lighter and more manoeuvrable than a sub heavily
equipped for dredging and recycling, but that was not enough, for as the boat
dodged aside at the last moment, a `blister' in Big Jim's bows aimed, and the
boat's agile motor died, its engine block split open. "It shot the motor out!
It's got one of those electric nailguns mounted, I bet!" its driver shouted. As
he by force of habit pulled repeatedly at the useless starting-cord, and the
other divers' minds, realizing too late that some men resent having their work
made profitless by other people's pleasure, desperately wondered whether to stay
on board or to dive and try to scatter, Big Jim quickly extended and lowered his
grab arm and scooped up the inflatable and with loud crunchings of fibreglass
expertly compacted craft and crew and cargo to a cylindrical bolus which he
swallowed while still at full speed in pursuit of another inflatable that he had
heard two miles away. When he saw it was only the local inshore rescue boat, he
cut his motor to idling and retracted his hydrofoils and long propeller shaft
and settled awash. Next morning no trace remained inside or outside him of this
attempt at poaching his human fellows' livelihoods, as ever-multiplying town
people fill up their allotted pleasure space and look for more elsewhere. Only a
local lobster fisherman saw at a distance that something happened, but said
nothing. Other sport divers read the newspapers and for a while were wise.
    "Finned robbers' sea-steed rubbery,   raiding, afar fading,
    foiled by hydrofoils was.   (Fast they oft had passed us.)
    Slow-heavy sea-guard hardy   swift became at th'lifting
    when scuba-consumer   speed found surface-bounding."
  he thought that evening as he returned to port. "First success against their
new `keep track of us, and snatch and run' diving idea! Here's to the hope that
some time the Government'll see sense and let us patrol openly and no need to
keep everything out of sight and traceless all the time." he said to his port's
men by modulated ultrasound. Meanwhile his onboard reprocessor was at work like
it worked on much else of many sorts that he dredged up during a day's work.
Lead and aluminium and other separated metals or their oxides accumulated in
compartments onboard; released energy powered him; water and nitrogen and carbon
dioxide and unwanted mineral salts were released into the sea. By morning no
trace was left. Smith & Malton's of Droitwich makes good machinery.
  "In Maine in USA they can patrol openly!" said one of his port's men, "or at
least the authorities turn a blind eye, and the pot- fishermen are cleaning up
good and proper! Ultrasonic guns are legal there! officially to kill seals that
damage nets, and most inshore fishermen there have sonars that can make a power
blast beam at what they find: either a handy light cheap sort with just a
backpack powerpack supplying a big handheld transducer commonly called a `proton
pack' after those things in `Ghostbusters' and as handily lethal used overside
or underwater, or `Hurlock sonars', the handheld overside sort called D2SD and
the larger sort called D4SD that goes in a blister on the hull; several sorts of
dredgersubs and the like, made over there on licence from the firm that designed
them over here, and some handy improvements that they thought of over there.
They had scuba diver plague sooner than we had and worse, diving clubs affording
the best solicitors and all that, same as over here but more so, and that huge
width of continent behind them for out-of-state divers to come in from and say
they didn't know local laws and rules and customs; but it's stopping just like
that! I saw some photos in a fisheries newspaper from over there. One was a G3
with a hydroplane kit called the G3H, like our Big Jim has, with `New Plymouth
Underwater Patrol' in big letters on its side, quite openly! Another was a G3
riding in a fitted inflatable called the G3F for fast surface work and in
shallow water, and it had `Kennebunkport Fisheries Patrol' written on it. Of
course the paper said they use dredgersubs as patrollers so they can dredge for
their upkeep to save money and fossil fuel. I dare say that in public they'd
impound captured poachers' kit and release or charge them, if they are
officially or unofficially allowed to; but out of sight of the public ...".
  "I read a catalogue of patrol equipment." said another, "In it was a smallish
fast patrol boat that above the surface looked like any other; but fitted into a
hollow in its hull is a small fast electric-powered submarine with a big front
scoop and tools to catch unauthorized divers and pick stuff up; the boat keeps
its battery charged. The sub docks to the boat and transfers its catch to the
boat to be taken to the patrol base's lockup. Some have been made, and they're
going round demonstrating it. If only the law'd let us buy and use a few of
those. I've got a brochure from a firm called Braithwaite's on Tyneside. It
shows a roofed surface boat that he designed, modified from a lifeboat design
and not costing much more, with opening bows, so it can chase and scoop up
things on the surface, or get up full speed and use the momentum to duck-dive to
scoop up anything or anybody submerged. Lovely. More good to us from Braithwaite
with his forked backbone and two pelvises and four legs, he says his deformity's
called dipygus, weird-looking it is, and his blowtorch with its cylinders
strapped to his back like an aqualung doesn't make the effect any prettier, nor
does his look as if he has few scruples what or who he uses it on - than from
any number of slick financial city characters with sleek normal bodies that
could quite easily do a day's hard productive work but never do.".
  "I've got one of `our four-legged friend''s early brochures about them that
says they're for capture and bringing back only and customers mustn't put
onboard destructors in them," another said, "but rumour says the Navy told him
they'd only buy from him if he changed that. Size A in operation's quite a
sight. It surfaces and its front opens and in goes a smuggler's or poacher's RIB
whole silently. Soundproofed breaking-up chamber inside. It can pack away four
loaded RIB's easily. The usual onboard destructor that can consume all seized
kit including cylinders and boats. The smallest size can be carried on a big
patrol boat's rear deck or be dropped from a plane, and it can tank two divers;
it says its tank's pressure tight to 6 bar and can be used as a decompression
chamber, but I don't suppose that's its only use.".
  "What if the RIB's got a tall A-frame?".
  "It just cuts it off or bends it flat without slowing as the RIB goes in.
Anchor chains it often cuts, or gets rid of them by crushing their onboard
attachments.".
  "They boast about what those fancy craft can do," said the first, "but what
broke the back of the plague over there is the common `proton pack'. The
handiest finder plus weapon ever against underwater undesirables animal and
otherwise! And fresh water patrollers can use them from the bank or wading or
from anything small that floats. Being ultrasound, they don't work through air,
so no point the divers shooting back at our boats with them. You can't sling
Affy or a Braithwaite boat in a crabbing boat under pots and gear in case of
trouble! even if you could afford one. For example, in one place several dozen
sport divers looking for trouble like that big `dive-in' they recently had at
Crabhaven came armed in a shoal underwater on all sorts of fancy diver-riders:
and one local man in a rowing boat with a proton pack cleaned up the lot! and
their gear went to the fishing villages nearby for underwater work instead of
idle fun. It splits the enemy's ranks and spoils the implicit trust among them
if any diver they don't know could be actually one of us in diving gear!".
  "But if any submerged diver could be a fisherman diving, you couldn't just
shoot at any sonar echo." said the other, "I suppose you could tell all of us
diving to wear an IFF signal-answerer, that's `Identify Friend or Foe' like
planes have for radar; but people'll leave them off, or not change codes, or the
beam may find a man and not hit his IFF to set it off; and they'll copy them;
etc etc complications. Another reason to keep track of all diving operations.".
  Later when the harbour water was clear and calm a visitor saw and recognized
Big Jim's retracted hydrofoils. He hid his alarm and went away, realizing
alarming possibilities. Nothing anywhere near provable enough to invoke the
authorities. The BSAC on an excuse with much scraping together of money had
their own G3 grab-dredgersub Delphinus fitted with a G3H hydrofoil kit.
(Delphinus had already fought Crabhaven's grab-dredgersub CR79 alias Aphanistor
and prevented a major `diver-busting' by the local fishermen.) Fishermen met at
Hayle in Cornwall to discuss matters. Delphinus heard of this and went there and
hydrofoiled across the harbour and back, and submerged and went away. They saw
him and limited their discussions to fish quotas and net mesh sizes and the
like. Sport divers kept on diving in the sea round Britain, and had no more
trouble for a while.

        [ALD] As overcrowding increases, more of those who can defend their own areas
against outsiders crowding in do so, legally or otherwise.
  On the south coast of southwest England, a group of 12 divers met a group of
13 divers as each was launching two inflatables. One of the divers said "We're
diving on the [sunken wreck of the] Aldebaran. Should be good visibility.".
  "Oh." said another, "<We> were hoping to go there - two lots at the same place
- we can still go there, I suppose - plenty of crabs and lobbies [= lobsters]
for us both. We better go, to catch the tide.".
  "Leave some for us, then.". Two boats set off, then the other two followed
them.
  "Yahoo! That's dodged that bossy man in that cottage. Keep well apart, then
nothing can get all of us, and they'll know that if a witness gets back,
everybody'll soon know. They'll leave us alone.".
  "And leave some for us, we don't count, we only live here and have to make a
living off the sea." thought someone who saw and heard this through a
surveillance video camera.
  "That lot's coming after us." said a diver in one of the first two boats,
"We'll have to share the goodies with them. Still, more of us if the fishermen
try anything, accusing us of every wickedness.".
  Another diver replied: "Police searched the next village three weeks ago and
found three `Emperor Ming' nailguns [= Electro Magnetic Powered Modified
Industrial Nail Gun] and two `Hurlock special' lethal ultrasonic beam sonars,
and a cellar adapted as a cell. One plot of trouble stopped in time. Enough
trouble. Night attacks on divers camping (that's why I don't camp any more) -
one lot were chloroformed as they slept, and woke gagged and handcuffed in a
cellar 30 miles away. They were put through a show of trial, made to sign
confessions for `poaching' and `unauthorized diving' etc, and dumped in the
middle of a moor. Their diving gear was seized and ordered to be destroyed. They
doubted the legality of this, and afterwards told the police, who searched, but
found no culprits.".
  (So it had been. As they slept, a man in dirty overalls and helmet with a
small inshore fishing harbour's badges on was shovelling their diving gear into
the village incinerator's hot firebrick-lined stomach, which consumed it at such
a hot burn that even the aluminium alloy cylinders disappeared. "That's another
lot who won't do it again until they can save up to buy another lot." he thought
as he pushed the last wetsuit inside and closed and latched the stokehatch to
let the heat and flames finish their job. In the morning nothing remained but
ash and a few metal bits. Their lead weights were melted down for fishing gear
weights and bullets.)
  "Until one lot of divers at Crabhaven turned out to be all cops." said a diver
as they got further from the shore, "That scared the rough types off. Let's get
on with our dive. They've been seen off. They try it on now and then. Plenty
goodies for us all here.".
  "25 of us, and several of us have spearguns." said another diver, "Best load
them in case, so <my> fin-buckles won't end up in some inshore fishing village
incinerator's ashpan tomorrow morning. At least that lot you mentioned were
themselves let get away.".
  PZ9's rear sonar scan showed the usual clutter: seabed echoes, rocks, a cloudy
echo from a shoal of fish, an echo which from its size and speed was probably a
seal, and surface clutter - in which were four disturbances, from which came the
noises of outboard motors and waves against inflated rubber. It thought briefly,
and decided that the two front boats were not too far apart.
  "Yeehaa!" a diver in the left front boat shouted, "Look out, crabs and
lobbies, here we come! And our club solicitor saw off that last attempt to
control who uses the road down to the cove.".
  "There's another boatful that's already dived on the `Aldebaran' and just
leaving it. I hope they left something for us.".
  "20 minutes more and we'll be there." said another, as they rushed on with
spray splashing on their diving masks.
  "I hope they left something for us." also thought the local pot-fisherman who
had seen them set off.
  From the left front boat came a tearing noise and shouts as it hit something
at speed and deflated and lay collapsed and helpless. The right front boat's
crew briefly cursed all who leave wood and rubbish adrift, but before they could
turn to help, their boat reared as if it had hit something big awash, and
overturned bow over stern. Its propeller briefly roared in air, and then stopped
as its motor sucked in water. The two boats' crews swam back towards their boats
to go into their boat-righting drill, thankful that their rule was to have
everything tethered or in fixed-on compartments, and to wear full diving gear
always when in small boats.
  A dirty scarred steel suction tube, over 4 feet inside width at its much
dented nozzle, suddenly untelescoped from beyond the undersea visibility range,
straight at Derek and Fred. John looked in disbelief as they vanished inside and
scrapings and metallic ringings went up the tube as it retracted out of sight.
Peter, who had looked away for only eight seconds, saw nothing except that Derek
and Fred were now gone. Other divers reached their boats and quickly righted
them. John told them to "pick up who we can and run!", while Dave tried in vain
to restart its motor. "Dave! Look out behind you! Get it started NOW!" Peter
shouted desperately.
  A big rounded black steel hull surfaced behind the boat and scooped it up into
an opened hatch with a toothed cover in its front end. "Like a fish taking a
fly!" the man in the front of the approaching left hind boat shouted, "Have we
blundered into a naval exercise, or what!? Leave them! Turn round and run! What
<is> that?!".
  "A `group diver disappearance', I think!" the diver in the front of the right
hind boat exclaimed as the big object turned towards the other overturned boat
and something dragged a swimming diver under, "Separate and run for land!".
  "Can't stop to rescue, or it'll get us also!" they realized and said, and
turned round to run for land. Something hit their motors and stopped them, their
cylinder blocks split open. No bang was heard, and six-inch nails sticking out
of the wrecked motors made it clear what sort of gun had been used - and who or
what by. As the big object rolled over, the letters `PZ9' showed on its bow.  As
it righted itself they saw its telescopic aimable wide suction tube on its roof,
and the large object intake hatch in its bows.
  "Recycler / destructor sub with a suction tube!" said Kenneth in dismay as
they frantically rowed away, "And with a fishing boat type code on it, and I
suppose a fisherman's mentality! Much bigger than those ones with a grab! The
inshore fishermen are well equipped if they can get hold of one of those!".
  "They are well equipped." said another, "A miracle, or we're dredgersub fuel!
OK, OK, the game's up, in future we better leave the shellfish and ask for their
permission before diving anywhere. OK, general warning: Penzance now has a big
suction-dredger-sub.".
  "No bang! It's got one of those electric-powered nailguns mounted!".
  "In and scatter! It may miss one of us! It's coming faster than we can row!".
  PZ9 did not miss any of them. Each stab of its extendable aimable suction tube
accounted for one or more of the shellfish poachers, and clangs and bumps and
slidings passed up its inside  through the rigid untelescoping part aimed by
pivot at front and hydraulics at rear, through the flexible wirebound suction
hose beyond like building site pump hose but much wider, and vanished through
the final- looking strong steel flange connecting the hose to the roof of the
hull. Technology had given ever-multiplying inland pleasure seekers the means to
plunder inshore pot-fishermen's livelihood; now technology gave inshore
fishermen a means able to defend their livelihood against a numerous
encroachment. Its big object intake hatch soon scooped up the rest of the
divers' inflatables. Some of the divers made for the seabed, but PZ9 followed
them. Air from ingested aqualungs gave PZ9 greater duration underwater for the
chase. It broke up everything for easier stowage. Its high-powered front and
rear ultrasound beams stopped the scatterers. Kenneth's explosive-headed spear
shot out of his speargun and exploded in vain on PZ9's extending suction tube as
it stopped David with an ultrasound blast and sucked him up fins first; Kenneth
soon followed him; the spear trailed out of PZ9's tube nozzle on its line for a
short time. Few of the shellfish poachers saw anything of PZ9 except the suction
pipe briefly stabbing out from beyond the underwater visibility limit. PZ9 saw
far further by sonar underwater than the divers could see by eye. It turned
towards the last two divers, and sucked one of them up. As his cylinders rang
against the inside of its suction tube, Robert, his diving club's chairman,
wrapped his arms and legs desperately round the tube which had sucked up all of
his club's committee, hoping to cling on until it came to land, or to be allowed
to surrender to the men at wherever it was based. "Just let me get to land, and
I'll stick to the safe spots where they don't mind us, and inland water and
abroad, if even that's safe. OK, OK, the free ride's over, `the open range has
been fenced into individual ranches', a few of us gave the rest of us a bad
name, no more dive at will, now we must apply for permission or buy the rights,
like inland angling or hunting. Oh to be on land safe!".
  PZ9 dislodged him by retracting its suction tube completely, and sucked him
up.
  To their town in the Midlands, famed for its carpets, Kidderminster BSAC did
not return, too cocksure after evading Captain Hurlock's "inshore fishery
patrol" at the wreck of the "Eurynome" off Crabhaven; nor did Stratford-on-Avon
BSAC's club committee ever see Shakespeare's town again, after their only
response to "arrest and confiscation" of catch and diving gear by Captain
Hurlock's "inshore fisheries patrol" had been to claim their losses off
insurance and re-equip and continue as before.
  PZ9 aimed its forward sonar and fired in message mode: "An inflatable left the
`Aldebaran' wreck at 5 knots northeastwards. I couldn't intercept it. It seems
to be making for Red Rock Cove.", then sucked up all the loose oddments: a
dropped snorkel, an inflatable-oar, and an outboard-fueltank. There were no
more. It went back to looking for organic matter and metals in the seabed. A
light aircraft flew over, but paid no attention to a dredger-sub going slow
ahead surfaced  as it started to pump its dredgings tank's contents through for
processing.
  "Harbourmaster has no record of them. Thanks for telling us." came the reply
signal from the fishing village. PZ9 broke up and digested the outboard motors,
which were not of the village's standard make and bore incriminating serial
numbers, and used the rest of the air from the cylinders to have a good long
dive in a particular deep hole that it knew of. "Scuba divers!" PZ9 thought,
"They think we're suckers for everything their fancy club solicitors throw at
us, saying we can't defends our livelihoods - yes I <am> a big sucker, in a
different sense! Tracelessness is all. That and that they can't ban us, we
recover so much metals and energy from the sea. Diving is work, diving gear is
work kit, not for monkeying about in, being a nuisance and thieving. The sea is
not a playground, nor are harbours, when the town people have filled everywhere
else. 25 aqualungs for me to have to empty and make sure I don't miss any,
before I can pump them through for digesting. Owk!, my grinder, there goes
another lifejacket inflation cylinder that I missed, no harm apparent - start
grinding up these cylinders as I empty them.".
  PZ9 found much useful matter in the deep hole, and then in sand in shallows.
It shot two net-damaging seals with its forward sonar - Hurlock sonars change
much, and so did instructions distributed round inshore fishing harbours by
Captain Hurlock how to reprogram dredgersubs' minds and instincts and emotions
from how their makers had set them up. By evening next day its recycler had
consumed the last trace of the antipoacher operation. It continued its usual
work.
  Three local lobstermen's boats were fishing in the area when PZ9's message
came over their ultrasonic receivers. They converged on the spot described, and
found six divers in an inflatable making for land.
  "That was a nice dive. Plenty goodies. That's dodged those bossy locals." the
dive leader was boasting, when he saw the three boats converging on him. The
inflatable roared to full speed to accelerate away - and stopped. John
Trewithian, the village's action leader, had shot the inflatable's motor out.
The three boats closed in. The divers, in a wet slippery rubbery flipper and
cylinder and weight burdened tangle, could put up little fight against identical
thick sailors' waterproofs and crash helmets with visors down and heavy boots
and pickaxe handles, and much skill got from much drill in using them. All of
the squad wore cloth masks. Some of them had Crabhaven's badge on their
shoulders - Captain Hurlock's spirit was still free on land also. The divers
were overpowered, stripped of the bulkier parts of their equipment, handcuffed
behind their backs, and loaded into one boat, and their kit into another. Those
boats were then sheeted over. Back in port after dark the six captured divers
were dragged out of the boat and shoved into a cellar. Inside the attack squad
took their waterproofs off, revealing overalls with area badges on, identical
except that one had Army-type sergeant stripes on.
  "Get in there." said a guard, as pushed into the cellar a diver who still had
his mask and flippers on.
  "You've no exclusive rights. I'll have the law on - ooff" the diver said, and
broke off as a local man silently punched him hard.
  "You don't own the sea, you can't stop other people from---" another diver
started.
  "Get in there. We let you go when <we> choose. The shellfish and the wreck
picking are our livelihood and not your fun. Enough of your smart talk and
landsmen's law." said Trewithian, who had the sergeant stripes, pushing him
forwards, and then to his men: "Gag them. Then `Operation Z'".
  The prisoners were gagged and then pushed into the cellar, where each was
clipped by his handcuffs to an iron ring set into the wall. Trewithian said to
them as he thus fastened a prisoner who still wore mask, snorkel, fins, and
weightbelt: "You're that lot from Coventry that had one lot of gear taken off
you at Filey for poaching! [see 340] You were warned there, but you merely
re-equipped and started again! We trusted you lot for a while, but you kept on
poaching, and the law won't let us stop you legally. You and your idle
pleasuring need another lesson, to leave men's livelihoods alone. Don't bother
calling the landlubbers' police, I <am> the local cop, and I also have to set
pots to make ends meet, and I know when Westminster's law makes sense and when
not, like Polwerran [see 201] at Crabhaven. He was a good man, both on the beat
and against pests at sea.".
  Four of the men including Trewithian went out, and came back four minutes
later with slung over their shoulders what looked like long electric drills with
bulky battery packs. On the right side of the battery pack were several
controls. They lined up in front of the captured scuba divers, unslung the
drills, and pressed a button - and at the front end of each the imitation drill
chuck opened wide, revealing a small hole. The diver with the snorkel realized
what these tools were, and why they heard no bang when their motor was shot out,
but could do no more than strain at his bonds and mumble into his gag as
Trewithian commanded: "Set to semiauto - at the ready - safetycatch off - set
power to 200 - starting at your left end -".
  The tools gave a slight click - the only sound they made. As Trewithian gave
his next two orders, the four men raised their `drills' and pressed triggers.
Powerful electromagnet coils along the length of each tool accelerated a 4-inch
nail to 200 mph, spinning for accuracy and point first. The captured scuba diver
with the snorkel fell forwards as the firing squad shot him. There was no gun
bang, and passers-by outside heard nothing. The `Emperor Ming' nailgun looks
like a factory power tool and is silent in operation, except for a slight click
on reloading, and needs no specialized ammunition whose supply can be easily
controlled, only 4-inch iron nails and electricity for recharging. Its muzzle
velocity can be set to anything from zero to that of the highest-powered rifle.
  Trewithian continued, also obeying his own orders:
  "At the one with the bright orange hood: aim! fire!"
  "At the one with the grey flippers: aim! fire!"
  "At the one with the two windows on his mask: aim! fire!"
  "At the one with the patched wetsuit: aim! fire!"
  "At the one with the `Cressi-sub' badge: aim! fire!"
  "Safety catch on! Slope arms!"
  "Right! That's finished! Go and reload your guns and put them on recharge.
Clean up, then back to normal work to earn our livings.".
  The local onshore recycler/destructor consumed all traces. Officialdom found
nothing. Trewithian sent to the BSAC and the newspapers a brief communique
describing this event, posted in London and not mentioning names and places. The
diving clubs read the newspapers and for a while were wise.
  Of the iron in the 4-inch nails fired, some in a previous existence was part
of the divers' previous scuba diving gear [see 341].
  What Captain Hurlock, aided unwittingly by the researches of others both human
and robotic, started, goes on. Between sport scuba divers and others who use the
sea or other space for pleasure, and inshore shellfishermen and others who use
the same space for work, the balance sways one way then another as populations
increase and the ultimate `enemy of the people' and `enemy of freedom' proves to
be not any one ethnic or religious or political group of people but merely
People, Each Other, Numbers, Overcrowding, as ever more have to share the same
space and resources.

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