The Wrecking Crew

CHAPTER 9

The submarine plunged into the depths, steel hull groaning with long, low rumbles, creaks, and the pinging of re-settling rib joints. As gunshots continued to ring out within, Dr. Nassiri hunched over the chart table in the command compartment, his forehead sweating the type of itchy beaded sweat that only forms when your hands are inside the chest cavity of a living patient. The young man in front of him, mid-twenties at most, stared up at him, passing in and out of consciousness.

My kingdom for an anesthesiologist, thought Dr. Nassiri. But this was battlefield medicine in all its butchery, a fight between him and hemorrhaging wounds. No intubation, no ventilators, just a blade, bandages, and bare hands.

His young Russian patient came round into consciousness with an ugly, violent flailing that knocked off his own oxygen mask, gasping, wheezing, spitting up foam and blood. Sometimes they did this towards the end. Eyes wide, the man screamed in Russian. Something-something-something-babushki. Dr. Nassiri tried to translate it in his mind, but only recognized the word grandmother. The Russian didn’t have enough undamaged lung tissue to spare, and his left lung immediately began to collapse. He lapsed into unconsciousness again.

The doctor snuck a glance towards the gunshots echoing from the corridor leading towards the bow. Jonah and Alexis had taken cover behind a locker. Through the open hatchway, Dr. Nassiri had seen Jonah turn and catch his glance for a moment. Jonah’s look wasn’t judgmental, it was a quizzical what the hell are you doing? Why help a man who tried to kill us? Jonah would have no idea as to why he’d even attempt to save the Russian — after all, Jonah had done his utmost to put the man down for good. But when bullets started flying, all Hassan Nassiri knew to do was save lives.

A barrage of small arms fire rang out, and he heard Alexis cursing like he’d never heard a woman curse before. He wished he hadn’t allowed her to take his sidearm. Still, his gun was best with her — he preferred the knife if it came to that.

Another round of fresh creaking and groaning filled the air around them, echoing like a cathedral antechamber.

“We’re sinking,” announced Alexis, as if she hadn’t already said it just moments before, as if the ongoing gunfight was not enough to worry about.

More bullets flew down the corridor, bisecting the space between Dr. Nassiri and the two Americans.

“Want to take a stab at the crush depth?” asked Jonah without turning around.

“No idea,” said Alexis.

“What do we do?” shouted Dr. Nassiri to the Americans through the hatchway.

“Glad you could join us on Planet Earth,” said Jonah. “We can’t fight our way out, not unless they get sloppy.”

“Are they getting sloppy?” asked Alexis.

“No,” answered Jonah over the seemingly nonstop din of incoming bullets.

Theoretically speaking, they had to run out of ammunition at some point. No — no — no—more blood from some unseen nicked artery. Dr. Nassiri pressed his fingers deeper into the wound, trying desperately to find the source, somehow stop it.

“Hey fuckers!” shouted Alexis at the two mercenaries holed up in the forward bow. “We’re sinking! Cut this shit out!”

Jonah waved his hand in the corridor; the mercenaries tried to blow it off. Apparently they weren’t in a talking mood.

“Jonah, I have grenades,” said Alexis. “Two of them.”

“That’s a terrible idea,” said Jonah, smirking. “Worst I’ve heard all day.”

Without another word, he yanked one out of her hands and chucked it down the corridor.

“Cover!” screamed the mercenaries in near-unison.

The guns-for-hire dove into the far forward section, too fast for Jonah to get off an accurate shot, and slammed the heavy steel door behind them. Before they could change their minds, Jonah bolted after them, caught the handle and held it shut. Dr. Nassiri adjusted his body so he could watch the developments down the accessway while still keeping pressure on the Russian’s wounds.

“Is this your plan?” asked Alexis as she went after him, picking up the grenade. “I think you’re supposed to pull the pin.”

“I’m not suicidal. Fire in this compartment could set off the whole ship,” Jonah said. He winced and braced himself against the kicking door as the two men inside struggled to get it open again. Jonah had the upper hand, not from raw strength, but because he’d managed to brace himself in a way where it’d take a hydraulic press to budge it from the other side.

Jonah took his free hand and pointed up at a series of metal tubes running between their compartment and the barricaded bow compartment.

“Alexis, get an axe,” shouted Jonah. “And Doc, get the fuck in here, I need a hand.”

“I’m a bit busy,” snapped Dr. Nassiri from down the corridor.

Alexis pulled a fire axe off of the nearest wall.

“Hassan, I put two shots in his chest,” shouted Jonah, getting angrier by the second. “I assure you, he will die in minutes. I need you right-fucking-now!”

“I’m good with an axe,” said Alexis.

Dr. Nassiri glanced up as Jonah stared him down. It wasn’t as if the American could march over there and make him give up his patient. The door kicked again, almost opening enough to see moving shapes on the other side. Either Jonah was weakening or the men inside were getting desperate.

“Knock out that ceiling pipe,” ordered Jonah, pointing above his head.

Alexis took a single wild swing at the overhead pipe and the axe head clanged off, sending the uncontrolled blade flying downwards, embedding itself in the deck between Jonah’s legs just inches from his crotch.

“Try again,” said Jonah. “Aim for that pipe.”

Alexis scowled as she took aim at the overhead pipe.

The mercenaries behind the door heard the axe-on-metal clanging and renewed their efforts to escape.

Alexis swung the axe a third time, burying it into the pipe. Jonah plastered a wolfish grin on his face, excited by her initial success.

One more shot to the pipe and it came free, exposing a small opening into the other compartment normally reserved for air flow.

“First grenade, no pin pulled,” said Jonah. “Far as you can shove it in.”

Alexis pushed the first phosphorous grenade into the air pipe, bracing herself in the air so she could reach in almost to her shoulder.

“Good,” said Jonah.

“Now what?”

“Now we give them a chance to surrender. Ever seen video of what white phosphorus does to the human body? We put a live grenade in their compartment, it’s going to light up the whole forward like an industrial oven.”

Jonah adjusted his position, still bracing the hatch shut.

“Hey assholes!” shouted Jonah through the heavy hatchway. “Time to pack it in. You’re cornered. You’re outgunned. How about I open this door and see you on your knees, facing me with your hands raised? It’s either that or I swear to god, I will turn you into a smudge on the deck plates.”

The pressure on the other side of the door eased. They’d stopped trying to force their way through.

“What do you say?” yelled Jonah.

“Standing down!” rattled a voice from the other side of the hatch. “We’re standing down!”

Jonah stepped back from the hatchway and allowed it to open slightly only to see the black barrel of an assault rifle jammed through the opening.

“Shiiiiit!” he stuttered and kicked the barrel back into the forward compartment. Using all his strength, he dragged the hatch shut again with a ringing clang as the assault rifle shot twice, bullets ricocheting against the deck and through the accessway.

“Fuck these guys,” he growled, checking himself and Alexis for bullet wounds. “Get the second grenade. Pull the pin; shove it in deep into the pipe, past the dividing wall and into the forward compartment. Close the valve. Can you do that in the six seconds before it detonates?”

“Yes,” answered Alexis.

“Six seconds,” repeated Jonah.

Alexis stared daggers as she yanked the pin and plunged the grenade into the air pipe. She wrenched the pipe valve with all her strength, nearly succeeding in closing it when the explosion went off, shooting a five foot long jet of hot phosphorus flame out of the pipe and shaking the submarine to the keel. Alexis reached up again and just managed to cut off the jet before it set the nearby bunk beds on fire.

From the other side of the steel wall and three hatchways compartments forward, two men screamed as they burned alive. Ammunition cooked off with dull pops, precipitating a secondary explosion and more screaming. Jonah held the door closed against one last kick, waiting for the sickening silence.

Still bracing the door, Jonah grimaced and Alexis shuddered. Dr. Nassiri had seen burn victims, even treated a few; he couldn’t imagine celebrating anyone dying that way, not even a mortal enemy. And what of this supposed victory? Were they victorious in the fact that they would die moments after the mercenaries instead of moments before?

Dr. Nassiri glanced up at the depth gauge as they passed a thousand feet. The very thought of it gave him chills, water the distance of three football pitches weighed down on them. How much could the hull of this vessel take? Probably not much more, judging by the creaking and pinging sounds echoing through the submarine.

Jonah held the door shut for one more minute, then let it go. No sounds came from the compartment; his hands were bright red from the searing heat. The smoldering bodies of the mercenaries in the bow would have to be considered a loose end, at least for now. If the jet of white fire shooting out of the pipe was any indication, death would have been fast, a bright white light searing heat, a few screams and — once the brain cooked or blood boiled — nothing.

Jonah scrambled to the control panel followed by Alexis, both now intimately close to Dr. Nassiri in the tight quarters of the command compartment. Dr. Nassiri kept his back turned — a few more staples and the bleeding might actually be under control—

“Blowing ballast tanks,” said Jonah. He inputted a series of commands into the controls console and was rewarded by a loud hissing sound as the external ballast tanks filled with air, displacing the heavy seawater and lightening the entire vessel. The depth gauge slowed as all three watched with held breath. The gauge just edged barely past fifteen hundred feet, almost stopped, then continued deeper and deeper, once again picking up speed. The groaning of the structural members continued with renewed intensity.

“This is not good,” Jonah said. “There’s too much weight from the yacht pulling us down. Alexis, give me engine power. Let’s push this ship off our backs.”

“Me?” Alexis looked at him as if he’d sprouted horns.

“You’re my engineer.”

“But I’ve never—”

“What happened to their engineer?” Dr. Nassiri asked.

“I think I shot him.” Alexis said.

“Dead man’s boots.” Jonah pointed at the controls. “You’re my new engineer.”

“Shit. Shit. Shit!” Alexis kicked the empty chair in front of the control panel, sending is spinning.

“I need you.” Jonah said.

“Fuck you.” Alexis said as she stilled the chair and sat down. Fingers flying, she pulled up a series of menus and engine diagnostics. “I can give you sixty seconds of full battery power,” she said. “Maybe ninety, then we’re running off emergency reserves.”

“Sixty?” demanded Jonah. “That’s it?”

“I may have also shot up the battery compartment,” she admitted.

“Can’t do anything about that now. Put the pedal to the metal.”

Alexis winced as she inputted the command. The long driveshaft of the submarine spun to life, chewing at the dark water, trying to gain traction. The entire vessel shifted, the bow rising as the stern fell, putting Dr. Nassiri in the uncomfortable position of hugging his patient to prevent him from sliding off the chart table.

The semi-conscious Russian hugged him back, and Dr. Nassiri could have wept with joy — with the bleeding contained and with the IV bag the Russian still had enough strength to move. The doctor took the opportunity to listen to both lungs. It wasn’t good news, but total lung collapse had been prevented. If they lived through the next sixty seconds, the Russian might just make it.

“Come on, you bitch!” Jonah shouted as the submarine shuddered and bucked under the intense power of the massive rear propeller. “Come on!”

One loud, long scraping sound, peeled along the skin of the submarine, and then another — the yacht wreckage above them was moving, but not enough. Not more than thirty seconds into the exercise, the engines died amid the howl of emergency warning klaxons.

“What happened? That wasn’t sixty seconds!” yelled Jonah over the cacophony.

“It’s the drag, we sucked down too much power,” shouted Alexis. “We’re down to emergency reserves. The computer is locking me out of throttle controls.”

“Down to bare knuckles and swingin’ dicks,” mused Jonah as the now unimpeded depth gauge rolled past 1700 feet. “Fill the ballast tanks, make us heavy.”

“What?” said Alexis.

“Fill them. I want to hit the sea floor with enough impact to knock this wreckage free. Doc, I need your help here. Fuck that guy — he’s already good as dead.”

“But we have no idea how deep the bottom is!” protested Alexis.

“You got a better plan?”

Dr. Nassiri ignored both Americans. There it was, the last bandage put in place.

“Am I going to have to put a fucking bullet in your patient’s head?” demanded Jonah. “If I kill him, will you please fucking help me?”

Dr. Nassiri cleared his throat, loud enough for Alexis and Jonah to look up from their stations. “Please allow me to assist,” said Dr. Nassiri. And with that, he took a massive syringe loaded with a bear shot of amphetamines and adrenaline and jammed it into the Russian’s heart, pushing the plunger fully down.

The Russian’s eyes jumped open, wide enough to see the whites around all sides. Nearly crazed, he yanked the syringe out of his chest and tried to jump to his feet while screaming in Russian.

“English!” shouted Dr. Nassiri.

“Who fuck you are?” he yelled, his thick accent tumbling out of his mouth for the first time.

Dr. Nassiri glanced down at his name patch — Vitaly Kuznetsov.

“Vitaly, we’re the ones your crew tried to kill,” said Dr. Nassiri. “All your comrades are dead and we’re sinking.”

“Is submarine. Is designed to sink,” said the Russian, as if this would be obvious to anyone.

“We’re passing eighteen hundred feet,” said Jonah. “What’s our crush depth?”

“Difficult to say until actually crushed, no?” Vitaly gurgled. He dragged himself up against the wall, his head lolling.

“Fucking guess for me,” said Jonah, frustration building again.

“Maybe two thousand five hundred? What big deal, just blow ballast, make us very light for emergency surface.”

Nobody had to tell Dr. Nassiri that they were already past two thousand and still rapidly descending. Five hundred feet to go, maybe less given the violence of the collision. How long would it take, a minute, maybe two? At least the end of the ride would be quick enough, a sudden bang, a rush of water.

“We blew the ballast,” said Jonah. “We’ve got three hundred and seventy tons of yacht wreckage fused to the upper deck pushing us down.”

“No good, no good,” Vitaly said, realizing the predicament for the first time over the powerful combination of endorphins, pain, amphetamines, and adrenaline. “Battery power?”

“Down to reserves,” said Jonah, scowling at the man he’d shot. “We were going to try to drive the submarine into the sea floor, knock off the wreckage that way.”

“No good, no good,” said the Russian. “Your idea terrible. We must roll submarine. You certain everybody dead?”

“Your comrades are dead,” said Jonah. “How do we roll? Is that even possible?”

“I believe rolling only option. But rolling submarine only tried one time. Black Sea, nineteen-seventy-three by Russian Navy.”

“Did it work?” asked Alexis.

“Everybody die,” Vitaly said. “My father lose two cousins.”

The Russian threw an arm over Dr. Nassiri’s shoulder. The doctor guided him to the helmsman’s chair, inches from where he’d been shot through the chest.

“Brace yourselves,” Vitaly ordered as he secured himself in the mounted helmsman’s seat with a seatbelt across his lap and shoulder. Without further warning, he dumped the starboard ballast tank. The submarine suddenly lurched to the right like it’d just had a leg kicked out from underneath it. Alexis, Jonah, and Dr. Nassiri all fell to their knees, crawling over the jagged surfaces of the bulkhead mounted consoles that had once been on the right wall as the submarine turned over on her side.

Vitaly swore, pounding away at the command console, adjusting the depth planes and trim with furious speed, his fingers dancing over the controls as if conducting an eighty-piece symphony orchestra.

“Brace, brace,” he chanted. “We must show belly!”

The submarine lurched forward, propelled by emergency power that he had dredged from god-knows-where, her depth planes cutting through the water, forcing her upside down. Every metallic member of the submarine shuddered and rattled, every unsecured bunk, computer monitor, manual, loose change, everything came tumbling out of its place, spilling across the ceiling of the submarine as she showed her underside to the distant surface.

And for one perfect moment, there was stillness as the submarine plunged into the depths like a tuckedwing bird of prey, upside-down, passing 2500 feet. With one last scraping groan, the twisted wreckage of the Fool’s Errand peeled from the submarine and fell away into the darkness.

Vitaly hung from the ceiling in his mounted chair, arms and legs dangling like a dead deer ready to be trussed.

“He’s unconscious again!” shouted Alexis. Without prompting, she stood up and slapped him across the face, hard.

Vitaly snapped to consciousness, shaking his head and regaining control of the computer console.

“Da, da, da!” he shouted with such conviction that Dr. Nassiri actually found himself wondering if this was not the strangest position the young Russian had found himself waking to.

Vitaly’s fingers jabbed at the controls, plunging the bow further down, adjusting the depths planes — and then it happened. The submarine twisted, slowly regaining her equilibrium as the depth gauge nearly touched three thousand feet. Both ballasts blew simultaneously, rocking the vessel back upright, stopping the depth gauge cold and sending the unburdened vessel shooting upwards.

“No way that should have worked,” breathed Jonah. Alexis looked at Dr. Nassiri. She was more shell-shocked than happy, the sheer magnitude of the past hour weighing heavily on her shoulders.

Twenty-eight-hundred feet, read the gauge. Twenty-seven fifty. They’d break through the surface in minutes. Dr. Nassiri unbuckled Vitaly’s seat belt and carried him to the nearest bunk, laid him on the mattress, and set the IV drip to work. He injected Vitaly with a sedative and watched as the Russian’s eyes fluttered, then closed. It would be a rough couple of days, but the young man should survive his initial gunshot wounds. Whether or not he could survive this expedition — if any of them could — was another matter entirely.