"Oh god . . . I don't know if I can. I'm sorry." Nina physically recoiled from the black hole on the top of the submarine. "I just can't. I'm sorry, I'm so sorry."
"Come on, Nina," Alexandr cajoled. "It is only a submarine. If you do not get in we have to leave you here with the skeletons."
She stood by the hatch, staring down into it, her head full of images of the tiny submarine surrounded by the vastness of the ocean. She could see the U-boat collapsing under the pressure of the water, or losing power and sinking like a stone, or running out of oxygen as they had so nearly done before.
"I can't," she moaned, digging her fingers into her scalp. Her breathing was harsh and ragged, and tears were beginning to stream down her face. "Please don't . . ."
Purdue was watching Nina from the bottom of the ladder. "She's not going to come down of her own free will." He turned to Blomstein. "We need her to get aboard. Take care of it."
Without a word, Blomstein climbed up to the hatch. Nina had sunk to her knees on the little platform and was clinging to the rails with one hand. The other covered her face. There was blood under her fingernails where she had anxiously dug them into her skin. Blomstein bent down to lift her up, intending to carry her bodily into the sub.
"Get the fuck off me!" Nina screamed. She lashed out at Blomstein with both hands, clawing at his face and kicking out wildly as he lifted her up. For a moment he struggled to keep his grip on her, but only for a moment. Nina's small frame was easy enough for him to subdue. She continued to scream and writhe as he pinned her arms to her sides and threw her over his shoulder. She landed several kicks on his abdomen, but Blomstein was indifferent to both her kicks and her shrieks as he began to climb down the ladder.
When they reached the bottom, Blomstein dropped Nina unceremoniously, knocking the wind out of her. "She is mad," he said, pressing the back of his hand against his bleeding cheek.
"No, she's not," said Purdue, helping her up. "She's just claustrophobic. Let's not rush to any conclusions, Ziv. Let's all get back to our stations. I'll take Nina through to Sam, he's helping Alexandr in the engine room. He can keep an eye on her."
"Oh, great idea," Jefferson sneered. "Get her boyfriend to watch her. Because he's going to be the first one to report it if she starts freaking out."
"He's not my boyfriend . . ." Nina whispered, still winded.
"If she's got the virus, we're all dead," Jefferson said. "We'd be doing her a favor by just putting a bullet in her head right now."
Purdue's face went a shade paler than usual. "Mr. Daniels," he said, gathering Nina close to him, "if I hear any further suggestions along those lines, it will not be her who gets a bullet in the head. She is perfectly well. Now go and ask Dr. al-Fayed if she is ready to set off. With Sam taking care of Nina, we will need you and Professor Matlock to run messages between stations this time."
With difficulty, Purdue helped Nina through the small hatches that led from one section of the submarine to another. Jefferson and Blomstein watched them go, then shared a silent moment of agreement before going about their assigned tasks.
"Open water!" Fatima's voice rang out through the submarine. "We're coming up for open water, dead ahead!"
Alexandr gave a jubilant whoop and waved the oil can in his hand. He was performing a complicated dance with the neglected machinery, racing back and forth as the legs of the motor whirred and thumped. Every time one of them stuck due to long inactivity, Alexandr would hear the missed step in the dance and rush over to oil it and manually operate it until it was back in rhythm.
"Not much longer now!" he called to Sam and Nina over the clatter of the motor. "Soon we will have fresh air and wide open skies, Nina! Think of it!"
Curled up in the corner of the engine room, Nina could not reply. She could hardly believe what she was hearing. All she could think about was the metal tube she was in, the crushing weight of the water that lay between it and the surface, and the walls closing in around her. She tightened her grip on Sam's hand and tried as hard as she could not to whimper.
By the time the U-boat broke the surface of the water, Nina was standing at the bottom of the exit ladder and Sam was at the top of it, his hands on the wheel that opened the hatch, just waiting for the all clear to open it.
"We're up!" Purdue dived through the little doorway, shouting the news at the top of his voice. "We are officially above ground for the first time in days! Let's see some daylight, Sam!"
The trapdoor swung open, sending an icy shower of salt water splashing down over Sam, Nina, and Purdue. Sam laughed aloud as the cold liquid crashed over his face. They were out of the ice station, they were alive, and he was elated. He pulled himself up through the hatch and onto the observation platform, making room for Nina and Purdue to climb up behind him.
Slate blue water stretched out ahead of them, dotted with ice floes as far as the eye could see. Behind them lay the ice field that they had just sailed under, and above them the sky was white and streaked with dark-grey clouds. It was the most welcome sight that any of the trio had ever seen.
Sam laid his hand over Nina's on the rail and gave it a squeeze. "There we go," he said. "You've made it."
"I've never seen anything so beautiful," Nina said, managing a faint smile.
"You'll be all right now," Sam reassured her. "We'll be able to stay up here until Purdue's boat arrives to pick us up. No more tin tubes for—oh!" Without warning, Nina flung her arms around Sam's waist and hugged him tightly.
"I thought we were never going to get out of there," she sighed. "I can't believe I lost it like that. I'm so sorry."
"Well, this is odd," Purdue muttered distractedly. He had his tiny communications device in the palm of his hand and was tapping it, staring at it, then tapping it again.
"What's wrong?"
"The boat is not receiving my communications." He frowned and looked up at the sky. "Extreme weather conditions would explain it, but there should be nothing interfering on such a clear day. The device is functioning perfectly." Frustrated, he sighed through gritted teeth. "I told them that only the captain was authorized to use that equipment! If I find out that someone else touched it and damaged it, I will make sure that not a single member of the crew ever sails again. Excuse me." He climbed back down the ladder, and as he descended Sam and Nina heard him calling to Alexandr, telling him that they needed to find the flares.
Captain Belvedere strode across the observation deck, halted beside Admiral Whitsun and saluted. The admiral was glaring out across the waters, watching the distress flares shoot into the air and flicker out as they fell.
"We have their position, sir," Belvedere reported.
"You do surprise me," Admiral Whitsun replied dryly. "Are they in the vicinity of those signal flares, perhaps?"
"Yes, sir . . ."
"Well then. Intercept course. And as soon as we have them in range—open fire."
Nina bounced up and down and waved her arms, nearly hitting both Sam and Purdue in the face. "We're here!" she called to the distant ship.
"They know, Nina," Sam laughed. "Look—they're heading straight for us, they'll be here in no time."
Purdue caught hold of Nina's arm, stopping her in mid-wave. His face was ashen. "That is not the boat I chartered," he said. "That's a destroyer. Luzhou class. Of Chinese origin. And it's—get down!"
He grabbed Sam and Nina and dragged them down just as the first missile crashed into the water nearby. It sent up a wave that drenched all three of them.
"Dive! Dive!" Purdue shouted as he pushed Nina onto the ladder. "Arichenkov! Blomstein! Dive, now!"
Sam was last down the ladder. With all the strength of terror he hauled the trapdoor into place and spun the wheel to seal it shut, then slipped and fell from the ladder as the submarine went into a steep nosedive. He picked himself up from the floor, only to be sent flying again as the U-boat was rocked by the impact from another missile narrowly missing them.
Blomstein dragged Sam to his feet. "You
need to take the rudder," he said. "Just keep us pointing in the direction we're going." The bodyguard dropped his large frame low to swing through the hatch.
"Ziv!" Purdue called after him. "Where are you going?"
"Torpedoes!" Blomstein's voice echoed back, then he was too far gone to communicate.
Sam rushed through to the navigation room and grabbed the wheel to prevent it from turning of its own accord. Purdue was hot on his heels and ready to read the displays, while Nina took up a position between navigation and the sonar, ready to relay information between the two.
The first torpedo did not fire. The mechanism was simply too old and rusty to discharge.
The second torpedo made it out of the submarine, but the motor propelling it was barely functioning. The expedition party listened for the sound of impact, of detonation, but nothing came. They could only assume that it had lost its momentum and sunk.
Before Blomstein could activate the third, the U-boat was rocked by a depth charge. Even Alexandr gave a cry of alarm. It was close, and the boat groaned and strained under the impact.
"They're almost on top of us! Ten thousand meters and closing!" Fatima screamed. "Now, Ziv!"
Blomstein grabbed the lever that controlled the last torpedo release with both hands and wrenched it to one side. The machinery screeched and complained, but the motor snarled into life. The tank flooded, the charge fired and the torpedo shot out into the water.
For an agonizing ten seconds, they counted. No one dared breathe. Sam stole a glance at the rudder wheel, hoping that he had not accidentally nudged them a degree of course. This has to work, he thought. It has to.
Then the air was thick with the heavy sound of an underwater explosion and the scream of a metal hull being ripped apart, and amid the sounds of wreckage was Ziv Blomstein's primal shriek of triumph.
"Captain Belvedere, damage report!"
Admiral Whitsun strode along the deck toward the prow of the ship. In truth, the damage report was superfluous. He could see the thick black smoke billowing from the lower decks, and he could tell by the slight list of the ship that the damage was not negligible. However, he also knew that the destroyer could sustain a lot more injury than that and continue to sail. His temper had taken more of a battering. He was furious that they had not yet scored a direct hit on the U-boat.
"Admiral Whitsun, they're surfacing!"
"What?" Whitsun spluttered. "Why the devil would they—"
He leaned over the railing and squinted in the direction of the submarine. Sure enough, it was breaking through the waves. Snatching a pair of binoculars from Captain Belvedere, he watched as the trapdoor opened and Nina emerged onto the platform, a piece of white cloth clutched in her hands. She held it above her head, letting the wind blow it out like a flag, and waved it slowly back and forth.
"They're surrendering, sir!" Belvedere said. "Shall I send a craft to pick them up?"
Admiral Whitsun handed back the binoculars. "No," he said. "We shall get as close as we can, then we shall destroy them. See to it, captain."
Chapter 26
"SURRENDER?" Blomstein looked stunned.
"I think we must," said Purdue. "If it looks like that hit was sufficient to cripple the destroyer, then we needn't wave the flag. We can wait for rescue to arrive for them and be picked up at the same time. If they are not crippled, then they will be coming for us and surrender is our only chance of survival. No, don't snort at me, Ziv. What other option do we have? We have little fuel and can stay underwater for less than an hour at a time. Their sonar equipment is much more sophisticated than ours, and they can move a lot faster. We have no chance of outrunning them or hiding underwater. We have to surface. Which means we must be prepared to surrender."
The dark glare on Blomstein's face made it clear that he would never agree, but he was outnumbered. Nina volunteered to be the one to offer the surrender. While the others prepared to surface, she sped off to the bunks in search of a white sheet.
She got back just as Fatima called out to her to get ready. Sam was at the bottom of the ladder, preparing to open the hatch for her. He saw her twisting the sheet between her hands. Her dark hair was a matted mess, she had dark circles under her eyes and her clothes were disheveled. It was a far cry from the stylish, polished academic Sam had met back in Edinburgh.
"If this doesn't work they're going to shoot me," she said.
Sam opened his mouth to reassure her, but before he could say a word her arms were around his neck, her body pressed against him and her lips locked onto his. For a few precious seconds Sam was lost in the soft comfort of her kiss. He held her tight, barely able to remember the last time he had experienced these sensations. Then she pulled back, looked into his eyes and nodded.
"I'm ready," she said.
Standing on the observation platform, a white sheet held aloft, Nina could hardly believe that she was really experiencing all of this. She gazed at the destroyer. I've seen so many pictures of these ships, she thought. I've seen U-boats in museums and in films. Now I'm standing on a working—or barely working U-boat, signaling a destroyer. There's no way that this is my real life. Is this anyone's real life? Is that ship meant to be moving so fast?
The destroyer was moving toward them, which she had expected, but it seemed to be approaching at great speed. Nina was no expert, but deep in her gut she felt the absolute conviction that something was wrong. I'll ask Fatima to check it on the sonar, she decided, and leaned over the hatch.
"Sam?" Nina was taken aback to see Sam climbing the ladder, closely followed by Purdue, Fatima, Matlock, Jefferson, and Alexandr "What's happening?"
One by one the others squeezed onto the deck, which could comfortably hold two or three people but not seven. Purdue was yelling Blomstein's name over and over, along with demands to know what he was doing, but he got no response. As soon as they were all off the ladder, the hatch slammed shut and they heard the squeak of the wheel being turned to seal it.
"He's gone mad!" Purdue cried. "Is it the virus? He just ordered us all off the boat!"
With a sickening lurch, the nose of the U-boat began to tip downwards.
"He's diving!" Nina yelled. "Alexandr—with me!" She half-climbed, half-vaulted over the platform's railing onto the slippery surface of the submarine. Without question Alexandr followed, and together they heaved open the life raft container attached to the hull. The water lapped about their ankles as they unrolled the rubber raft, and as Nina popped the CO2 canister it was up to their knees. "Get in!" she shouted, pulling herself up over the side. "And hang on!"
They clung to the sides of the raft as the U-boat submerged, each one hoping that the flimsy vessel would not be capsized by the wave created in the submarine's wake. Purdue gazed at the water closing over the submarine, a look of perplexity on his face as Blomstein dived alone.
Admiral Whitsun permitted himself a slight smile as he lowered the binoculars. He had seen the expedition party abandon ship and watched as the U-boat sank beneath the waves. The binoculars were not powerful enough for him to make out facial expressions, but he could tell from everyone's body language that there was panic among the group. He allowed himself to imagine the look of terror on Sam Cleave's face as he realized that his only possible fate was a freezing watery grave. The sale of the biological weapons from Wolfenstein would go ahead, and the memory of the admiral's son would be avenged. All in all, risking a trip to the Antarctic at his age had turned out to be worthwhile.
"One has to admire their spirit," he mused. "Getting that thing working in the first place was quite a feat. However, it has let them down at the last." Once the U-boat was well and truly out of sight he turned to Captain Belvedere. "Change of plans. Shoot down their raft. I shall be in my quarters, arranging the rendezvous."
"Admiral Whitsun!" The voice of the navigation officer crackled over the radio. "Incoming! The submarine is approaching from the southeast, sir! It looks like it's on a collision course, aiming straight—"
&nb
sp; The young man's voice cut off as the U-boat crashed headlong into the fuel tanks.
"He's hit the fuel tanks!" Purdue laughed and punched the air. "Well done, Ziv! That will sort them out!"
Sam and the others watched in horrified amazement as the ship's fuel tanks exploded. Dirty orange flames licked up the side of the destroyer and twisted the metal hull into filigree. Tiny dark figures besmirched with streaks of fire leaped from the decks into the deadly water below, early casualties who could not wait for the lifeboats. The white sky darkened to a lowering black as the columns of thick smoke dissipated and spread out.
Eventually, after what felt like an age, they saw the lifeboats being lowered and men from the destroyer piling in. Their own little raft bobbed and rocked as the destroyer fell to pieces, sending aftershocks surging across the distance between them. In the constant diffuse daylight of the Antarctic, it was impossible to tell how long they sat silently watching the demise of the ship.
"Listen," Alexandr whispered. His head was cocked and he was trying to pick out a new sound, something that was not the scream of a dying ship. Suddenly he pointed upward.
"A helicopter!" Professor Matlock cried. "At last!" He stretched his arms as far as they would go and began to wave them frantically. It only took a split second for the others to join in, yelling and signaling until they nearly overturned the raft.
It did no good, though. The helicopter flew on, disappearing into the dark billows of smoke. Just as the expedition party was about to lapse into dejection, Fatima spotted another vessel on the horizon.
Ice Station Wolfenstein Page 21
