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World War Z_ An Oral History of the Zombie War ( PDFDrive )

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bubble of surface pressure.

[He gestures to the compartments around us.]

Just like we are now—safe, protected, still on the surface as far as our bodies’ concerned. That’s

what an ADS does, its depth and duration only limited by armor and life support.

So it’s like a personal submarine?

“Submersible.” A submarine can stay down for years, maintaining its own power, making its own

air. A submersible can only make short duration dives, like World War II subs or what we’re in now.

[The water begins to darken, deepening to a purplish ink.]

The very nature of an ADS, the fact that it’s really just a suit of armor, makes it ideal for blue

and black water combat. I’m not knocking soft suits, you know, shark or other mesh rigs. They’ve

got ten times the maneuverability, the speed, the agility, but they’re strictly shallow water at best,

and if for some reason a couple of those fuckers get ahold of you…I’ve seen mesh divers with

broken arms, broken ribs, three with broken necks. Drowning…if your air line was punctured or

the regulator’s ripped out of your mouth. Even in a hard helmet on a mesh-lined dry suit, all they’d

have to do is hold you down, let your air run out. I’ve seen too many guys go out that way, or else

try to race for the surface and let an embolism finish what Zack started.

Did that happen a lot to mesh suit divers?

Sometimes, especially in the beginning, but it never happened to us. There was no risk of physical

danger. Both your body and your life support are encased in a cast-aluminum or high-strength

composite shell. Most models’ joints are steel or titanium. No matter which way Zack turned your

arms, even if he managed to get a solid grip, which is hard considering how smooth and round

everything is, it was physically impossible to break off a limb. If for some reason you need to jet up

to the surface, just jettison your ballast or your thruster pack, if you had one…all suits are

positively buoyant. They pop right up like a cork. The only risk might be if Zack were clinging to

you during the ascent. A couple times I’ve had buddies surface with uninvited passengers hanging

on for dear life…or undeath. [Chuckles.]

Balloon ascents almost never happened in combat. Most ADS models have forty-eight hours

emergency life support. No matter how many Gs dog-piled you, no matter if a hunk of debris came

crumbling down or your leg got snagged in an underwater cable, you could sit tight, snug and safe,

and just wait for the cavalry. No one ever dives alone, and I think the longest any ADS diver has

ever had to cool his heels was six hours. There were times, more than I can count on my fingers,

where one of us would get snagged, report it, then follow up by saying that there was no

immediate danger, and that the rest of the team should assist only after accomplishing their

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