Hunter Killer

by Geoffrey Jenkins

  The resumption of conversation eased the tension.

  Call the depths,' commanded Peace.

  ' Five-twenty,' chanted the diving officer. Five hundred.'

  We were now 50 feet above the level of the ancient city.

  ' Take a sweep round,' Peace told the sonar operator.

  Without warning, the precision depth-recorder stylus gave a jerk and plummeted to 2,000 fathoms. There was a gigantic hole under Devastation! The patterned line of the houses and buildings fell away into abysmal depths.

  The sound reproducer of the sonarscope, still fully switched up, which a few minutes ago had dominated everybody, now was relegated to the background by the steady flow of orders and the comforting hustle of machinery. Devastation was changed from the stealthy killer of the deeps to a ship tinder way and her men were human again, not hyper-tense listeners on whose acuity of hearing depended their salvation. Then the sonar beam swung round. Something hit me like

  an express train.

  Deafening, pulsating, terrifying sound blanketed the control room—high-pitched, screaming, grinding, like a giant pencil being scratched across a giant slate. I saw Peace shouting an 75

  order, but his words were lost in the crescendo. Devastation shuddered under an immense crash. I was thrown sideways across the Control Centre. The lights went out.

  I and several others lay in a heap. A torch snapped on and I saw Peace, bleeding from a cut above the eye, crawl towards the diving-stand.

  Emergency circuits!' he shouted.

  The emergency lights flickered, disappeared in a flash of

  blue sparks. I dragged myself towards Peace.

  Battle lanterns!' he rasped. Break out the battle lanterns, for God's sake!'

  As the first dim light came on, I grabbed Adele and put

  my arm firmly round her shoulders.

  The floor of the control-room canted sharply downwards.

  The fathometer spun. We were racing for the bottom!

  Eight hundred feet!' I yelled.

  Men were crawling up the inclined deck to their stations—

  stunned, bewildered, but training and discipline brought them back to their posts.

  Peace snatched up the engine-room intercom. I heard his muttered Thank God!' as the emergency circuit came alive.

  The control-room became dimly, eerily lit as one battle lantern' after another—battery-operated lighting independent of the main circuit—came on.

  Eight-fifty,' I called. Devastation fell as if through air. Chief—'

  Peace started to say, but his voice was drowned. The sonar

  screamed like a madman in his dreams.

  Peace said, fear in his voice, She's still under power!'

  Nine hundred!' responded the diving officer. He was

  back on the job, all right.

  ' Christ!' panted Peace. She's going for the bottom!' `

  Bottom is twelve thousand feet!' I exclaimed. Devastation was designed to reach one thousand.

  Bob Peters returned, hanging, as I was, on to one of the overhead grab straps. Devastation spiralled down, twisting like an aircraft in a spin. Peace crouched, jammed with one shoulder against the periscope operating gear.

  Devastation was completely out of control.

  Blow all ballast!' roared Peace. The burst of high-pressure air made me swaliow hard and my eyes watered. Emer gency! Ahead flank! Left fifteen degrees rudder!'

  A planesman brushed a trickle of blood out of his eyes and yanked the control-stick. Peace was giving him every ounce

  of horsepower he could to get the planes on the sail to bite and pull her out of her death-dive.

  ' Sounding!'

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  Nine-fifty feet: falling fast.'

  Blow all main ballast—blow again!'

  Again the roar of air.

  Sounding!'

  ' One thousand feet.'

  There was fear in Bob Peters's voice. For the first time in Devastation, I smelled the smell of men who were afraid—

  desperately afraid. The faulty packing gland on the periscope gave a vicious spurt.

  Peace snapped: ' Ahead flank—emergency!'

  The planesman's reply was mildly reproachful. ' Answers,

  ahead flank, emergency, sir!'

  Then what the hell—'

  As if in answer, the long mournful wail of the oversteam

  alarm burst through.

  Blow main ballast tanks! Again!'

  Again the desperate rush of high-pressure air.

  Sounding!'

  Eleven hundred feet!'

  There was a crack in the planesman's even voice. ' Can't

  hold her, sir!'

  Devastation's nose pointed twenty degrees down.

  Peters called, Eleven hundred and fifty! Slowing!'

  I saw the prickle of sweat on Peace's upper lip. In my heart I blessed whoever had built that extra two hundred into her. The hull gave an ominous creak. A fountain spurted down the periscope barrel under the immense sea pressure. Peace had given the planes their chance to save us. They had failed. Now, the engines. But even if we pulled out now, there would be the mushing ' effect of a full-power downangle nose-dive, which would mean we would travel another 100 feet deeper. Devastation's hull was already past the point of no return.

  Blow secured, negative at the mark!' reported ballast control. We had blown every ounce of sea-water out of her

  —still we went down.

  ' Trim her a little, for God's sake!' urged Peace.

  Then he addressed himself to the planesman, as if he were the only person there. He spoke slowly and distinctly. All stop! Back emergency!'

  The planesman leaned forward and turned the engine-room

  annunciator.

  He said quietly, Answers, all stop, back emergency, sir!'

  Suddenly the floor tilted almost horizontal, a further sickening movement, and Devastation was on an even keel. 77

  The diving officer's face was grey. Something—something turned us like that, sir! It wasn't us.'

  Something!' I exclaimed.

  Sounding!'

  I felt the massive power-bite of the screw racing astern. The oversteam alarm whooped and bayed like hounds of death.

  Inclinometer reads zero,' said Peters.

  Devastation hung in her death-dive, held against the massive downward force by the reverse thrust of her screw. Now it was as dangerous to break loose as it was to be forced

  down, for if released the sub would shoot to the surface like a cork.

  Peace spoke into the engine-room intercom. ' Chief .. He

  paused. Main circuit shorting, blowing every time? Can

  something—' he glanced round= be outside?'

  The thunder of water racing past the cracking hull matched

  the braying of the alarms. _

  Adele was close to me. Is it very bad?'

  ' We're holding our own—just. The hull may go at any

  moment.'

  Eleven seventy five,' reported Peters. We had gained 25

  feet!

  Adele said, I think it's a devil-fish.'

  Peace, half-hearing above the din, extended the trolley-strap to the full to join us.

  What did you say?'

  Devil-fish,' she repeated loudly. The fishermen of

  Agalega think of them as gods. At night you see them glowing hundreds of feet down.'

  ' The electrics!' murmured Peace. That explains the ,

  short-circuits. What size is this thing?'

  Very big. The fishermen say, like an islet. The biggest of

  all big rays.'

  What else do you know?'

  Island cutters—big ships—have been pulled down by them.

  They are from deep—deep.'

  Eleven hundred!'

  `You won't hold her if she frees, Geoffrey!'

  Peace's face became set over the strong line of his law. '

  I'm going to try something,' he said. If this is a devilfish, it
may be a natural depth. I'll flood her to regain trim, and try to shake it off.'

  I gestured hopelessly. He slid back along the trolley-strap to the control-stand.

  `Stop all! Rig for ultra-quiet.' He turned informally to

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  the petty officer who had remained so stoically at the ballastcontrol panel. ' Trim her as best you can, will you? If she shakes free, flood her down, see?'

  Flood her down, aye aye, sir!'

  The ghastly cacophony of braying alarms stopped. With a

  sick feeling in the pit of my stomach I felt the strong backward thrust of our propeller cease. The silence was as

  ominous as the previous racket.

  Devastation hung suspended between life and death at 1,100 feet below the surface, nose down.

  The second planesman, stunned in the first violent dive, rose and staggered to his seat. He automatically felt the control. He turned to his companion. There was a note of hysteria in his voice.

  This bitch has got lead in her tits.'

  The other laughed. Lead! Christ! It's broken right

  through her flippin' bra!'

  A sharp hissing, like water on a fire, came from outside the hull. The angle of the deck changed.

  The planesman jiggled the control column.

  ' Answers now, sir!'

  The sonar shrieked momentarily as it was turned up.

  Contact not evaluated,' said the operator laconically.

  In the tomb-like silence of ultra-quiet, every face was turned towards Peace. What would—could—he do? Tons of weight lay across our forward topside casing and bows. Could Peace take the risk of startling the creature to clamp itself again across the controls? Could he risk another massive electrical discharge like an outsize electric eel?

  Again, the sharp sizzling hiss. The monster moved slightly

  —placated by the silence, perhaps.

  Peace must make the captain's decision—a decision which

  would take a hundred men to a bottomless ocean grave, or

  back to life in Limuria's soft air. He reached for the microphone.

  ' Rig ship for hydrobatics!' he rasped. ' Right full rudder!

  Ahead flank! Six hundred feet smartly!'

  Hands clutched the trolley-straps in anticipation of the

  violent movements to foliow. In terms of aircraft, Peace

  meant to go stunt flying, to shake the creature free.

  The planesman turned the dial. The diving officer's knuckles were white on the back of his seat

  ' Answers, ahead flank!'

  Secure from ultra-quiet!'

  Peace knew there was no reason now to keep silent. He

  had cast the die.

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  The propeller bit full thrust. The control-column went hard over. I gasped and hung on. Devastation swung into a snap roll and her bow came up. Another sharp slithering hiss. Devastation gave a wild lurch and her bow came up. but the weight held it from the swift movement which would shake

  the creature free.

  Depth?'

  Eight hundred!'

  The bow dipped. Would she dive, never to come up again? Peace said, Man battle stations torpedo!'

  The heavy alarm for general quarters pulsed through the

  ship, striking at my chest like a drum. Peace would lighten Devastation by firing her bow torpedoes!

  Men hung on, trying to get some sort of attack discipline.

  He ordered, We will fire six. Speed high. Depth maximum.' '

  Speed high—depth maximum.'

  Make ready tubes 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6. Open outer doors.' '

  Torpedo-room—tubes 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6 ready in all. respects! Outer doors open!'

  Set!'

  ' Shoot!' Peace stood balanced.

  ' Shoot,' came the repeat.

  - Fire!' There was a faint jerk. A torpedo was on its way. ' One fired electrically!'

  `Set!'

  Shoot!'

  Fire!'

  Two fired electrically!'

  'Set!'

  Shoot!'

  ' Fire!'

  ' Three fired electrically!'

  Peace said, Left full rudder, ahead flank, six hundred feet smartly!' He turned Devastation into a full-speed 30-degreeangle turn in the other direction as he emptied her torpedotubes.

  `Set!'

  ' Shoot!'

  Fire!'

  Four fired electrically!'

  The bow jerked upwards. Outside there was a savage hiss like steam blowing and at the same time a heavy movement.

  ' Blow all the main ballast—handsomely now!' commanded Peace. The burst of high-pressure air drowned the firing orders. 80

  As it roared into the tanks, Peace whipped out, Right fifteen degrees rudder! Back emergency!'

  Devastation shook her head, like a crocodile's jaws savaging a great fish to death—a lash and whip from side to side. The propeller gripped, gathered sternway. There was a heavy rending and crackle outside.

  Devastation leapt free.

  Peace shouted: ' Hold her, Bob! Don't let her go!'

  The submarine spiralled upwards, a wild angle on the floor. Flood her down—emergency!' roared Peace.

  Again the choking burst of air pressure as tons of water boiled into the ballast tanks.

  A fusillade of helm, diving and trimming orders brought

  the great sub on to an even keel. As if to crown our escape, the main lighting came on. Control-room routine was reestablished. The turbine reduction gears and hydraulics hummed. We sauntered along, safe. Peace climbed on to the diving-control stool.

  Sonar, any contacts?'

  He's running like a bat out of hell—beg pardon, sir!'

  Bob,' said Peace. I'll take the conn. You get aft and have a spot of sleep.' He added briskly to the operators: Keep that fathometer and precision depth-recorder going. And send me some coffee, will you?'

  We went, dead with fatigue and strain. At the bulkhead

  door I looked back. Peace in his turtle-necked sweater sat tireless, commanding, devoted—to what, I asked myself. I found the answer as my head touched my pillow. The sea. Peace belonged to the deep sea.

  7 T H E M A N F R O M A N A C O S T I A

  Up periscope!'

  With a cheerful hiss, the long barrel slid up from the well of the ship. Peace snicked down the hinged handles and looked into the eyepiece.

  It was three days later. We had made our rendezvous—St Brandon. Four hundred miles to the north-east lay the Saya

  de Malha.

  Fifty feet,' reported the diving officer.

  All stop,' ordered Peace. There were great shadows under his eves. He seemed never to have left the Control Centre during the long plot of an ocean-bottom contour chart of 81

  Saya de Malha. The abstruse technicalities of it had kept at bay the foreboding which grew in my mind as we approached

  the rendezvous. Peace still refused to aliow Adele to do a

  radio stint. She had been listless, almost a prisoner in the tiny cabin, but during the long hours of her company one thing

  was clear and I would have traded away Little Bear for it:

  her deep and growing affection for me.

  There had been no signals from the DNI, nothing to indicate that Willowtrack was converging on the remote reef to meet us. The isolation of being 500 feet beneath the widest ocean in the world, completely alone, preyed on my mind, shadowing my anticipation of the coming meeting with the Vice-President and making it seem unreal.

  On Peace's curt order the needlepoint of light under the glass-topped chart table slowed, halted.

  It was scarcely necessary for Peace or myself to consult it, since we had drawn the chart ourselves during our trip from Mauritius to the Seychelles in his yacht. It seemed years away now. The great boomerang-shaped reef of St. Brandon, twenty-six miles long and five wide, narrows at both extremities and is broadest northwards, diminishing to less than a mile in the south. Inside its enclosing horns are 22 islands an
d islets, all on the western side of the main reef. The islands are ludicrously small—even Raphael, which has a permanent population of little over a hundred, is less than half a mile long and a few hundred yards wide.

  ' Like a look?' Peace asked.

  I adjusted the focus lever, blinking at the bright sunlight. The day was brilliant. It seemed impossible to distinguish where the china-blue sky began and the china-blue sea ended. Dead ahead were two islets, no more than sandbanks, a strip of yellow sand, a few coconut palms, a millrace of water between them, back-dropped against a high misty curtain of spray which stretched out of sight westwards as 'far as the eye could see—the great St Brandon reef. Over this immense and awesome natural barrier the open ocean pounded and thundered, throwing spray high into the air, to be caught by the trade wind and flung far across the coral barrier.

  A big shoal of fish tore for the shelter of the reef, and above it, like a tenacious carrier attack squadron, hung grey noddy birds, sooty terns, startlingly white love terns and white tropic birds. Majestic and deadly, echelons of broad-spanned frigate birds crash-dived the mass to snatch a tasty morsel. The sunlight flickered, flashed, reflected off the wheeling birds and the churned-up sea ; it turned to pale pink and rose

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  against the two islets ; and then blurred into a breath-taking gauze of reds, violets, yeliows, greens and blues as the seaspray separated out the colours of the spectrum. Delicate as a water-colour, the tiny twin islands of Big Capitaine and Little Capitaine—our rendezvous-point with Willowtrack- stood out against the spume-filled mist.

  I drew back from the exquisite scene in the periscope. Peace was at the radar repeater. Its eerie green glow reflected his face as the electronic sweep revolved. Anything yet?' he asked.

  No, sir. Nothing yet. Plenty of land echoes.'

  Report any moving target immediately.'

  Àye aye, sir.'

  Peace glanced briefly into the eyepiece.

  No sign yet of Willowtrack,' he said. ' But—' glancing at his watch= we are ahead.'

  He went on, Let's get some fresh air. Down periscope!' A flick of the periscope jockey's hand on the hydraulic oil control and the steel tube slid out of sight.

  Stand by to surface!'

  Like a spring released, men went into action.

  All vents shut, sir, ready to surface,' reported the diving officer.