by Shaun Clarke
Masters checked his watch. It was 0550 hours. They would get to Charlie 2 by 0630. It would still be dark then.
‘We’re casting off now,’ the CO announced over the radio. ‘Good luck to all of you. Over and out.’
When the corporal switched off the radio, Masters stared around the sphere. The walls curved upward to meet above his head where a bright light was blazing. They were covered in gauges, the benches hid more equipment, and the spaces between the floorboards of the deck were filled with steel pipes and pumps. Masters blinked a few times, heard the drumming of the sea, looked at the three small, round windows and saw the dark waves outside. Then he heard the diver’s footsteps as he walked along the hull. There was a dull metallic sound from the stern as the tow-rope dropped off. This was followed by splashing and a scraping along the hull. The diver’s face, grotesque in his oxygen mask, appeared at the window. He stuck up one thumb. The pilot waved back. A white foam bubbled over the window as the diver swam off.
The pilot switched on the engines, which made a bass humming sound. When he switched on the outside lamps their light beamed into the dark waves. The pilot opened the vents and water hissed into the tanks; the sea rose up above the three portholes and gradually covered them. The submersible sank steadily, vibrating and humming deeply. Masters went to a porthole and looked out and saw the murky, deceptive depths. The beams of light cut about six or seven feet through the gloom. It was not very far; beyond the lights was total darkness. The only matter lit up by the dulled beams of the lamps was a drifting, grey-green mass.
The depth gauge registered a hundred feet, inched around to two hundred, and after what seemed like a long time finally registered three hundred. The pilot closed the vents, then turned on the radio. He checked that the other submersibles were all down and then turned the propellers on.
The submersible moved forward, its lights cutting through the murk. The vessel vibrated slightly, making a bass humming sound, and the hands on all the gauges were quivering, recording their progress. The pilot switched on the sonar set. After studying the small screen, he checked the gyro compass and settled back, keeping his eye on the lights through the windows.
‘What’s your name?’ Masters asked him.
‘Walters. Roy Walters.’
‘And you?’ Masters asked the blond giant.
‘Ralph Hubbert.’
Masters couldn’t stand upright, could scarcely move his arms; it was more comfortable sitting, so he sat there and studied the weapons. There were L34A1 Sterling 9mm sub-machine-guns and twenty-round magazines, all wrapped in specially reinforced cling film. He also saw a pile of white-phosphorus grenades, some police clubs, sets of handcuffs, and, to his relief, a couple of Browning 9mm High Power handguns, also wrapped in cling film, as were the holsters.
‘We’ve been well equipped,’ he said, picking up a holstered Browning and strapping it, still wrapped in its cling film, around the waist of his wet suit.
‘That’s what you wanted, wasn’t it?’ Hubbert said.
‘That’s right,’ replied Masters. ‘I got just what I wanted.’
Hubbert grinned laconically. He was sitting on the bench facing Masters, his blond head almost scraping the convex ceiling, his large hands on his thick thighs.
‘You think we’ll get them?’ he asked.
‘We’ve got to get them,’ Masters told him.
‘They’re a tough nut to crack,’ Hubbert said. ‘The IRA, they’re all psychos.’
‘You think so?’ Masters asked.
‘Yeah, I think so. They’re all psychos and fucking suicidal. It’s part of their rules.’
‘You’ve been in Northern Ireland?’
‘Nah,’ Hubbert said. ‘I haven’t fought them, but I’ve read all about them and they’re all mad as hatters.’
Masters said nothing.
The voyage seemed to take for ever. They were gliding through silence. The submersible was vibrating and humming, but it moved forward smoothly. Masters went up to the front, where he heard the pinging of the sonar; he saw the pinpoints of light on the screen and the beams of light outside, cutting through the dark sea. The darkness parted. where the light shone, then spread its wings around them. The beams lit up translucent fish through the murk. Masters could almost hear the silence out there, feel the cold of the sunless depths. He sat beside the pilot, who was still watching the gyro compass. The needle of the compass was quivering, but moved very little.
‘How long?’ Masters asked.
‘About ten minutes,’ Walters said. ‘We’ll have to start surfacing in five minutes. I think the sea’s pretty rough.’
‘How rough?’ Masters asked.
‘Bloody rough, Sarge. Those waves might be fifty foot high. I can’t be sure, but they could be.’
‘The rig?’ Masters asked.
‘The rig’s out,’ Walters said. ‘If we try to get under that bloody rig, we’ll be smashed to pieces.’
‘We’ll have to surface,’ Masters said.
‘That’s right: we’ll have to surface. We’ll have to come up well away from the rig and then put on our diving masks.’
‘That’s not practical, Corporal.’
‘Yes, it is, Sarge. We’ll keep our weapons in cling film, put them in a sealed bag, then drag the buggers behind us in the bag. No problem at all.’
‘What about the replacement plates? That crew can’t drag them through the water – they’re too heavy.’
‘No,’ Walters said, ‘they won’t be able to take the plates with them – but they will be able to take the welding equipment and that could be enough. Failing that, though it’ll take a bit more time, they’ll find plates on the rig.’
Masters swallowed hard as he thought of fifty-foot waves, imagining the men swimming through the water, beneath the sea’s killing surface. They would come up under the pontoons, at the base of their huge legs. They would climb the pontoon ladders to the surface and the waves would then find them. In waves like that, the men would have to be strong. Doubtless more than one man would be lost before he reached the top deck.
‘OK,’ Masters said, ‘I take your point. So let’s see if the CO agrees. Give me that microphone.’
When Walters handed him the microphone, Masters contacted Josephine. He asked for the CO and, when he got him, relayed the corporal’s theory to him. To his credit, Lieutenant-Colonel Edwards instantly agreed, saying he would instruct the other submersibles to surface right now, on the present grid reference.
‘Thank Corporal Walters for me,’ he added. ‘He must be a bright boy. Over and out.’
Masters handed the microphone back to Walters. ‘You’re a bright boy,’ he said.
‘Can we surface right now?’ Walters asked, as if not quite believing in his own wisdom.
‘Right now,’ Masters said.
Walters opened the tanks and the deep humming changed pitch slightly. Masters heard the tanks ejecting their water and then the craft started rising.
‘Bless us all,’ Walters said.
Hubbert slid off the bench, pulled some rubber bags from out under it, and passed one each to Masters and Walters. Each man then placed his weapons and other kit in his rubber bag, zipped it up, sealed it with water-resistant tape, then slung it on to his back and tightened the shoulder straps.
‘Well,’ Masters said, ‘it’s a start.’
As it rose slowly from the depths, the submersible started to rock from side to side. Hubbert sat on the bench beside Masters and gripped the arm-rest. Masters glanced through the portholes and saw light outside. The separate beams of light were rising up and down, splaying wide, disappearing. The submersible kept rising, rocking more as it neared the surface, and Masters heard the drumming noise from outside as the waves grew in strength.
‘Right,’ Hubbert said. ‘Here we go. Help me on with the cylinders.’
After putting on his flippers, he knelt by the bench and told Masters to hold up the heavy oxygen cylinders. When Masters had done this,
Hubbert put his hands backwards through the straps, then humped the cylinders on to his broad back. Masters then buckled the straps around his chest and Hubbert put on his oxygen mask. When he had finished, he nodded at Masters and held up his thumb.
The submersible was still rising and rocking more rapidly; it was coming to the surface and it was stormy up there. Masters put on his flippers and picked up his oxygen cylinders, but Hubbert stepped forward, walking awkwardly on his own flippers, and helped Masters put on his cylinders. Masters then covered his face with the oxygen mask, instantly feeling hot and suffocated, as well as half blind. He clipped the breathing tube in and turned around to look at Hubbert. They gazed at one another through their masks, then turned on the oxygen.
The submersible was still lurching badly from side to side. Masters turned around and blinked through his mask and saw Walters sitting at the console, putting on his flippers. When he had done so, he stood up and reached for his cylinders. Hubbert helped him to put them on, though both were shaken by the submersible, which was rocking more violently all the time as it rose to the surface. Masters watched the two men. They both moved in total silence. The only sound Masters heard was his own breathing, the rhythmic hiss of the oxygen. Finally Walters was ready, and pressed his hands against the wall. Hubbert followed his example, so Masters did the same and then waited.
The submersible broke the surface. It soared up and crashed back down. It was swept along the trough between waves and then hurled up again. Masters timed the rise and fall, bracing himself beneath the hatch. The submersible raced along the next trough and Masters reached up above him. He turned the wheel very hard, wrenching with all his might. The submersible reached the crest of a wave and started racing back down again. Masters wrenched the hatch open, grabbed the handles on both sides, held on as the submersible plummeted down and spun around and rushed sideways. It ascended again, climbing a huge wave; and Masters took a deep breath and jerked his arms and pulled himself up.
He flopped over the curved steel sail. A monstrous wave towered above him. It roared and then curled above his head, before exploding all over him. Masters clung to the sail as the water swirled around him. When it poured back down the sides of the submersible, the wind started beating. The noise was incredible – Masters heard it through his mask. He glanced up and saw the sea’s rise and fall, the huge waves heaving skyward. Masters clambered over the sail and took the grip in one hand. He reached down with his other hand to let Hubbert reach up and take hold of it. Masters started pulling. A wave picked the submersible up. Masters felt the wind and heard the roaring wave and saw a valley of darkness. The water down there was black. It poured away and swept up again. Masters held the grip tight as the submersible plunged down and then was borne up on another high wave. He tried not to look around him, tried ignoring the roaring sea. Taking a deep breath, he pulled Hubbert up and knew that Walters was pushing him. Hubbert flopped across the sail, wriggled around and lay flat out. He took hold of the other grip, then he and Masters started reaching down for Walters. The sea roared and swept across them, sweeping Hubbert off the hull; then the submersible rose high on a great wave and Masters flew into empty space.
He didn’t know what was happening, but saw distant lights spinning, a huge wall of darkness rising high to block out the sea and sky. Then there was the void, streams of light through a blackness, and he kept spinning, turning rapidly upside down, bereft of any sense of direction. His head broke the surface as he rose on a roaring wave. He saw the lights of the rig straight ahead, soaring up to the sky. It didn’t seem real, was too fierce to be real. He was carried through the air, felt the wind, and then was hurled down again.
At that moment Masters sensed that he wouldn’t come back up. He saw a submersible spinning around not far away, then dark forms in the monstrous waves. Masters blinked and glanced below. He saw a black, concave void. He was plunging rapidly towards it and it roared and then swallowed him whole.
16
Masters didn’t rise up again. He kicked out with his flippers and went down, gliding through the dark, silent depths to where the waves could not reach him. A grey-green murk filled his vision, he felt as light as a feather, and he went down, levelled out and kicked his legs, heading straight for the rig.
There were other men around him in the calm and quiet, looking like strange, primordial fish, but kicking their legs and blowing bubbles, dragging bags on long chains. Masters was thrilled to see them, and proud too.
He saw the shadows increasing in number in the murk all around him, and coming closer. A lot of the men had obviously made it. That was due to their training. They were now swimming expertly all around him and still had their weapons, some in waterproof bags strapped to their shoulders, others in bags that they towed behind them on short, lightweight chains. Masters kicked harder and glided forward, hearing a hissing in his ears. It was the soft, rhythmic hissing of the oxygen, which was all he could hear. He glanced left and right, seeing streams of small bubbles, streaming back and upwards in silence, a dance of air and trapped light.
Masters felt divorced from his own body; apart from his own steady breathing, he could not hear a sound. The gloom ahead was unrelieved. Beyond it was total darkness which swallowed up the men ahead, the drifting bags, the kicking flippers. Masters headed straight for it, but it always moved on; the gloom parted and swept by on either side and the darkness receded. Nevertheless, he swam towards it, mesmerized by the silence. He started dreaming, drifting out of himself . . . and then he saw something moving.
Masters swam forward cautiously and approached shadowy figures. He saw a black wall that was darker than the depths, and the shadows were touching it. Masters swam on, gratefully breathing the oxygen, and the black wall became the immense bulk of the round pontoon.
He went into that darkness. The other men were spiralling above him, below him, beside him, vague figures drifting up and down languidly. Masters swam even closer until the pontoon curved above him. He went under it and swam around it and then went up towards the surface. He saw the base of the pontoon leg, still obscured by the murk. At least thirty feet wide, it dwarfed the swimming men, soaring above them to disappear into darkness. Masters swam close and touched it. A pair of flippers kicked above him. He glanced up and saw the bottom of the ladder, stopping short at the pontoon.
Masters took hold of a rung and started pulling himself up. It was difficult, so he took off his flippers and used his bare feet. The water was so icy his feet started turning numb within seconds; even so, other men were doing the same and discarded flippers drifted down past him.
Masters pulled himself up, trying not to go too fast. He knew that he would have to be holding the ladder when he broke through the surface. He kept moving upwards and saw the kicking feet above him; the water, cold and black, moved around him, filled with bubbles of trapped light. Masters heard his own harsh breathing, felt the tugging of the sea. The darkness weakened and let in some light and then the black became grey. Masters felt a sudden tension, but it passed away as he kept rising. He felt the swirling of that grey, icy mass and then he broke through the surface.
The noise exploded around him. He gripped the rung of the ladder. The sea roared and swept between the pontoon legs and then roared out again. Masters clung to the ladder, seeing men on the other pontoon legs. There were also men on the thinner support legs criss-crossing above him. The noise was appalling. The sea roared and hammered the great pontoon legs, exploding and shooting upwards and outwards, then pouring back down the support legs.
Masters gripped the ladder tightly as waves roared and swept across him. He was punched by the fist of a giant and nearly torn from the ladder. He clung desperately to the rung and watched the men on the support legs; they had jumars – metal clamps – attached to their belts and were fixing them to the rungs of the ladders. The jumars kept them from falling off, leaving their hands free for manoeuvring. Clamped tight to the rungs of the ladders, the men were helping each other
. The sea roared and exploded, echoing under the deck above.
The men were now opening their waterproof bags and taking out their weapons. They slung the Sterlings across their backs, and clipped grenades to their webbed belts. The spare magazines were in small, waterproof bags that hung from loops around their necks. Masters climbed up the ladder, then stretched out on a support leg. He took a jumar that was chained to his waist belt and clamped it over a rung. The sea roared and swept across him, almost tearing him from the leg. Though only six inches long, the chain on the jumar kept him from being swept away. The sea came in once more, its white foam streaked with black, roaring up and clawing frantically at the men and then rushing back out again.
With their weapons at the ready, the men were starting the real climb, snapping the jumars open and clambering up the ladders and then locking the jumars around the nearest rung when they had to rest or use their hands for something else. The sea roared and swept across them, making some of them disappear. The sea rushed away and took the men with it, leaving no trace at all. The other men kept climbing, only stopping to help each other. Masters saw them disappearing in the darkness, climbing up to the main deck.
Suddenly kicked on the shoulder, he glanced along the support leg. The sea roared and poured across him to drench him, then he saw a pale face. Captain Pancroft was shouting at him, pointing at his back, telling him to remove his sub-machine-gun from his waterproof bag and have it ready for use when they boarded. He did as he was told, removing the weapon from the bag, slinging it across his shoulder, then attaching the spare magazines to his webbing – all while lying stretched out on the support leg, whipped by wind and lashed by rain. When he had finished, he waved to Pancroft, then snapped the jumar open. The demented sea rushed at him, making him cling to the support leg. The sea pummelled him and poured all around him and then fell away. He slithered back down the leg to reach the main pontoon leg, stretching out with one hand and taking hold and then swinging across. He landed on the other ladder as the waves roared in. Fifty feet high, they towered darkly above Masters, and made an indescribable noise as they exploded around him. He clung to the ladder, feeling the jolting along his arms, as the waves howled past and rushed beneath the rig and poured out through the other side.
