3
Tad could feel something. The swimmer’s itch. At sea, a swimmer never knew what they’d encounter during a rescue and had to develop “ten-eighty” awareness.
The best swimmer he’d ever met, Senior Chief Vernon, had insisted that knowing three-sixty degrees around you in water wasn’t enough. A collapsing mast could come from above, the lash of a snapping line from behind, a shark from below, and a wave from any damn direction it was in the mood for.
“Three-sixty around, three-sixty over, and three-sixty under. One-thousand-and-eighty-degree awareness at all times. Forget about a single slice of that ten-eighty and it will get you. You know what happens then?”
“You die, Senior Chief,” had been his naive answer.
“No, you i***t. The people depending on you to rescue them die. That’s a tho
