Crush Depth cjf-3

by Joe Buff

  "We've done well anyway, Captain?'

  But ter Horst was ralking mostly to himself "No, our first priority is defmitely to sink Challenger under the shelf" She was the Allies' only ceramic-hulled sub in this hemisphere, the only vessel that could threaten Voortrekker on anything like equal terms.

  Ter Horst and Van Gelder studied the navigation chart and gravimeter. Voortrekker was following a long trough of deep water, twenty-five hundred meters down. The trough slanted southeast, from the volcanic terrain of the Mid-Ocean Ridge behind them, toward the east end of the Ross Sea, dead ahead. Van Gelder thought of this local area as neutral-to-friendly territory: the helpful Russian base was nearby, while the American base at McMurdo was far away at the west end of the Ross Sea and the shelf. The German base was even further west than McMurdo, but the German forces — passed off as scientists — had aircraft and Sno-Cats to get around.

  Van Gelder skimmed the last part of the intelIlgence report. It said the Americans had issued a warning that an atomic battle would occur — they offered air transport for any research teams who needed to evacuate. The Russians ignored the warning, since they wanted to monitor the cmcial battle firsthand. The German troops, of course, were also staying, to fight.

  Van Gelder pointed at the chart. "We can turn due south here, sir, and aim to pass under the shelf edge here. That would put us thirty miles east of their hydrophone setup. We ought to be heard for sure by the enemy Ilstening post, if we make a burst of flank speed in the shallower water there:' Because the Americans' hydrophone line was so lengthy, it could pick up very long wavelength — low-frequency — flow noise and tonals from a goodly distance, sounds which would be missed by any small air-dropped sonobuoy.

  "Yes:' ter Horst said, "we'd be heard for sure, but too much for sure. Let's go here instead." He pointed at a different place on the chart, further east of the listening post. "

  We need to make this subtle, Gunther, Ilke we don't know the post is there, and they detected us through their own cunning." -

  Ter Horst talked to the navigator. The lieutenant ran calculations, then reported back.

  Ter Horst gave the helm orders. Voortrekker turned south and climbed out of the trough, toward the Antarctic continental shelf below and the Ross Ice Shelf above.

  Ter Horst glanced at Van Gelder and smiled. "This sequencing should work perfectly.

  The listening post ought to have just enough time to make their sighting report before the German troops on the shelf get there to take them out."

  On the ice shelf

  Ilse watched her console intently. The time-and motion estimates said Voortrekker ought to come by very soon. The wind was even stronger — Ilse could hear it right outside from down in the ice shelter. The wind also made noise on the sea, which her console detected and filtered out. But the sky still was lighr, and a nice blue-green translucence shone through the ice shelf's surface, which formed the roof of the dugout bunker.

  Just now Montgomery slept, looking to Ilse like a big polar bear in a white Gore-Tex cocoon. Clayton came inside from getting fresh air. He brushed a sprinkling of snow off his parka. He said flurries were beginning to blow from the south.

  The changing weather agitated the huskies chained outside — some of them barked and howled. Ilse heard whistling, then a loud crack. The ice shelf reacting to the wind stress again.

  The marine corporal threw himself into the shelter. "Incoming!"

  Montgomery bolted awake.

  "The Germans are attacking!" the corporal yelled.

  This hit Ilse like a slap in the face. They must've swung in from the south, using the blizzard to hide from Allied recon.

  Ilse heard more cracks, and stuttering roars, and bangs, and sharp concussions. The whole ice shelter shook. Rifles, machine guns, grenades, and… and mortars?

  The corporal's radio crackled. It was the gunnery sergeant calling from another dug-in position. He wanted to know Ilse's status.

  "Tell him we haven't made contact yet."

  The corporal repeated this into the radio. The sergeant said they'd try to hold the Germans back. The corporal dashed outside.

  "What if Voortrekker comes a different way?" Clayton asked. "If he doesn't get close enough to your Ilstening grid, we'd never hear him:'

  "Negative information is still good infonnation. It tells Challenger and the rest of our forces where not to look. We can't just pack up and run."

  Enemy mortar rounds began to land more briskly. Their fire was marching back and forth, as if searching for Ilse or her satellite uplink or her cables into the water. The shelter shook again from a near miss. Bits of ice broke off the ceiling and pelted Ilse and her console. Mortar shrapnel pinged against the steps into the bunker. Acrid fumes blew in and made her cough.

  Shit. Maybe they're attacking now because they know ter Horst is coming this way.

  The noise of firing, both incoming and outgoing, grew heavier.

  The gunnery sergeant crawled down the steps and flopped into the shelter. "We're outnumbered. They have Sno-Cats working around both flanks. We're in danger of being pushed into the sea."

  "I can't leave yet," Ilse said.

  "Don't be crazy."

  "You don't understand what's at stake."

  "I've got orders from McMurdo to get you to the rendezvous drop-off now"

  "From McMurdo? Not Pearl Harbor? It isn't McMurdo's decision."

  "From Pearl, through McMurdo, I think. I don't know?'

  "Christ," Ilse said. Another mortar shell landed close. Ilse and the sergeant ducked instinctively. A big part of the roof crashed down.

  "That's it! Grab what you need and clear out. Head for the nearest vehicle?' The sergeant looked at Clayton and Montgomery. "A static defense is hopeless now. Our best chance is an aggressive-maneuver battle." Both SEALS nodded.

  Ilse and Clayton and Montgomery grabbed the equipment cases with their diving gear.

  Ilse took one last, longing look at her console readouts. Still no sign of Voortrekker.

  They left the bunker, crouching against the flying slugs of lead and fragments of steel.

  The corporal pointed them toward a Sno-Cat. He pulled the pin from a grenade and popped the spoon, poised to throw it down the steps to destroy the console and the bunker as they withdrew.

  Above all the other noises, Ilse heard her console beep.

  "Wait!" she screamed.

  The corporal cursed, and shouted, "Grenade!" He tossed it in the safest direction he could, and everyone near him lay flat. Ilse slid down the steps into the bunker. She felt the concussion through the ice floor as the grenade went off nearby. On her console screen she saw the data: Voortrekker, at flank speed. She memorized the time, the range, the bearing. She climbed out of the bunker.

  "Okay!"

  This time the corporal threw in a satchel charge. Everyone ran for their lives. As they clambered into the Sno-Cat, the sarchel charge blew. The whole roof of the ice bunker blasted into the sky. A tall column of smoke and shattered ice lingered in the air.

  Enemy machine-gun rounds began to find their Sno-Cat.

  "It's armored," the corporal said. "The window glass is armored too' The corporal turned to the driver. "Move out!" The Sno-Cat lurched into motion, heading east. Its winterized diesel engine roared. Irs four separare half-track treads, two on each side instead of wheels, gave the Sno-Cat impressive traction.

  Ilse jumped when a heavy machine gun mounted atop the back of the Sno-Cat suddenly opened up. It bellowed and the whole vehicle shook. Bright tracer rounds streaked through the flurries, strobing and piercing into the distance.

  Ilse could see other white Sno-Cats following hers in a loose combat formarion now.

  They too had improvised gun positions built into their roofs. She could identify the friendly Sno-Cats by small black stars stenciled on their sides.

  She saw flashes bebind her, further off, and caught her first glimpse of the enemy SnoCats — the machines, made in the U.S. by the Tucker Cor
poration, had been marketed worldwide before the war, and the Axis knew a good thing when they saw it.

  Ilse turned to Clayton. "That was a solid detection on Voortrekker. I know what I need to know."

  "Jeez, that cut it close."

  Ilse nodded.

  "The only problem now," Montgomery said, "is how in hell do we make the rendezvous in secret with all these Germans on our ass?"

  The corporal glanced in the rearview mirrors. "There's. more of them than of us:' Ilse thought this observation might be true, but wasn't helpful. Her Sno-Cat bounced and pitched as it hit a series of sastrugi: ice carved by the steady endless wind into low rock-hard ridges like speed bumps.

  The battle turned into a running, slashing dogfighr. Ilse's heart was in her throat as incoming tracer rounds flashed by on both sides of her vehicle. The heavy, glowing tracer rounds plunged on ahead of her Sno-Cat, moving infinitely faster.

  Mortar rounds began to land on the ice near friendly SnoCats — the Germans had big mortars mounted in some of their vehicles, firing through openings in the roofs. The mortar bursts on the ice were like near misses from enemy battleship shells. Snow began to blow more heavily, as the front edge of the blizzard closed in.

  "More ammo!" the gunner in back of Ilse's Sno-Cat yelled.

  "I'll do it," Ilse said. She got up and went in back. She began to hand up the heavy boxes of .50-caliber machine-gun belts each time the gunner ran low. Incoming rounds hit the window at the back.

  They pitted rhe bulletproof glass and obscured the outward view. The gunner kept firing from his semiprotected position in the root Ilse could hear Clayton talking on the corporal's radio, to the gunnery sergeant in another Sno-Cat, but she couldn't make out what they said. Her ears were ringing as the .50-caliber weapon kept up its pounding right above her.

  A German mortar hit an American Sno-Cat dead-on. The vehicle blew apart in a livid ball of red fire. Flaming fuel spread quickly, and there was a pyre of thick black smoke.

  Ilse saw two burning figures crawl out and then collapse.

  "This isn't working," Clayton said. "We can't afford to jusr keep dodging and hope the Germans run out of mortar shells before we all get killed. McMurdo's completely snowed in. We can't get air support!"

  A mortar round landed near Ilse's Sno-Cat. A big piece of shrapnel punched through the driver's-side window and took off the driver's head in a spray of gore. The vehicle swerved, skidded sideways, and slowed. Montgomery grabbed the controls — he knew how to operate the vehicle from his SEAL cold-weather training. Then the machine gunner was hit, and he Ilopped into the passenger compartment Blood squirted from a fatal wound in his neck. The corporal took over the machine gun. Ilse kept handing him ammo from the pile of boxes. The boxes were running low.

  Clayton's radio crackled. He responded, then put the radio down.

  "Hold on!"

  The Sno-Cat and the other friendlies all made fight U-turns, and charged straight at the Germans at top speed. Clayton held a satchel charge in his lap. The corporal had shifted his gun position with the turn, to fire forward. He chose one German Sno-Cat and tried to chew into its engine compartment with his bullets as the distance closed. It worked: something under the enemy Sno-Cat's armored front caught fire. A tread broke off the suspension system.

  The target spun wildly and slipped onto its side, remaining treads still churning in the air.

  The corporal fired at the now-exposed fuel tank. Ilse watched the German Sno-Cat blow sky high.

  We're still outnumbered

  German bullets slammed the front of Ilse's Sno-Cat. She could see the tracer rounds as they ricocheted off the armor and into the sky. The external air filter and both exhaust pipes were riddled. Some slugs smacked the front windshield. Again the glass was pitted and crazed; now the view was obscured by bullet hits as well as blood. The smell of the blood inside the Sno-Cat was coppery and thick.

  "Get ready," Montgomery shouted. The friendly and enemy vehicles were very close now, all driving at each other as fast as they could.

  Clayton cracked the passenger door. He yanked the cord that fired the fuse of his satchel charge. As Montgomery steered the Sno-Cat right down the side of an enemy vehicle, Clayton tossed the live charge onto the hood of the German Sno-Cat. The satchel charge blew a moment later. The concussion was so strong it shoved Ilse's Sno-Cat sideways, but her vehicle kept running. Bebind her, the enemy Sno-Cat was destroyed. She saw other American Sno-Cats try similar tactics. Friendly and enemy vehicles burned, and raised more smoking pyres.

  A Sno-Cat running out of control crossed Ilse's path, with flames shooting out of its back. As ammo cooked off inside in sparkling flashes, it plunged off the cliff at the edge of the shelf, leaving a trail of smoke.

  Through a spattered and sooty side window, Ilse saw an American and a German Sno-Cat collide head-on. The crews bailed out and continued the fight at close quarters, with rifles and bayonets — an American husky went for a German soldier's throat. They were left bebind as the surviving American Sno-Cats wheeled in unison to charge the depleted German formation again. The Germans swung inland, to try to catch the Americans from the flank.

  More bullets pounded Ilse's Sno-Cat. The corporal at the machine gun was killed outright. He fell inro the rear of the passenger compartment, on top of the corpse of the private. Counting the headless driver whom Montgomery had shoved aside, there were three dead in the vehicle now.

  But there was no time to think abour that. Ilse cIlmbed into the semienclosed gun position, bringing up boxes of ammo with her. The wind whistled strongly here, and the stink of vehicle exhaust and burnt cordite was choking.

  She gripped both handles and tried to test the weapon but nothing happened. "What do I do?"

  "Lift the safety toggles with your index fingers," Montgomery shouted as he drove. "Push the firing button with your thumbs!"

  It worked. The long .50-caliber weapon kicked on its mounting; it was very hard to control. Above the din of the weapon and the engine noise and the wind, Ilse heard Clayton talking on the radio, coordinating tactics with the Marine Corps sergeant in command.

  Clayton told Ilse which German Sno-Cat to target, one that had finished a wide sweep to the south and then turned toward her. Montgomery steered the Sno-Cat to face the incoming threat, and charged. Ilse held on as they came through the turn. She began to fire at the driver of the enemy Sno-Cat. She aimed, then corrected, by watching where her tracers hit. The enemy gunner fired back at her. Bullets hit the armor plates welded at McMurdo to form the firing position. Ilse cringed at each impact, and wanted to scream, but she kept her thumbs on the firing button. Beneath her the Sno-Cat vibrated and bounced, and in front of her the machine gun recoiled and bucked. It spewed out hot spent shell casings the size of cigars, along with links from the ammo belt the weapon devoured voraciously.

  As the two vehicles closed the range, throwing up clouds of snow and fragments of ice, Ilse fired at the enemy driver. Eventually, her bullets would chew through his bulletproof windshield glass; her machine gun's barrel began to glow red hot. Eventually, the enemy gunner's bullets would find the chinks in her firing position, and kill her as the private and corporal had been killed.

  A bullet struck Ilse hard. There was blinding pain in the whole left side of her head.

  Blood spurted down her chin and all over her neck and soaked her parka. She could only see out of one eye, and thought her left eyeball must be gone or else her goggle lens was covered with her brains. She felt lightheaded and suddenly very cold. She struggled to stay conscious and keep firing. If I can only live long enough to kill that enemy driver…

  It worked. The German Sno-Cat's whole windshield caved in. The vehicle slewed sideways and stalled as Ilse's Sno-Cat thundered by. Clayton threw another satchel charge. It landed next to the enemy vehicle and detonated. When Ilse tried to see, the German Sno-Cat lay on its side, on fire. Montgomery steered due east again, parallel to the cliff edge, toward the rendezvous. Blood still poure
d from Ilse's head. Her remaining vision began to grow dim.

  She slumped down from the machine gun, into the passenger compartment, and collapsed onto the shaking, rocking, blood-drenched deck.

  Clayton heard the noise she made and turned. With her one good eye she read the honor in his expression, and knew for sure she was finished. She was afraid to touch her head, for fear of the mess that would be there where her face and skull once used to be. She was too weak to move at all now. She started to black out. Strangely, she welcomed death. Then she remembered she had one more job to do.

  Clayton came back toward her. She used every last ounce of will and fought to blurt out the coordinates of her contact on Voortrekker, so Clayton could tell Jeffrey after the rendezvous.

  Clayton told her not to talk. He knelt and cradled her head and opened a first-aid kit. She expected a final morphine shot, to die in drug-induced bliss.

  Ilse repeated the coordinates weakly. She begged Clayton to write them down or memorize them before it was too late. She felt herself sIlpping fast.

  Clayton pressed a wad of gauze to the side of her head, and held it snug with tape. He gave her a local painkiller shot.

  "It's just your ear. I think your left earlobe is shot away!" Clayton gingerly pulled off her bloodstained goggles, and Ilse could see with both eyes.

  Ilse felt alive again. The power of suggestion — her mistaken belief that Clayton knew she was dying-wore off fast.

  Which is fine, and maybe now I get a Purple Heart, but we still have a lot of big problems.

  "Who's following?" Clayton yelled to Montgomery.

  "I can only see one Sno-Cat. I think it's friendly. The snow's so thick it's hard to tell?"

  "How do we make the rendezvous without being spotted and giving everything away?'

  "Try to contact the other vehicle!'

  Clayton used the radio. The other vehicle was friendly — it belonged to the gunnery sergeant. "We need someone to drive while we suit up," Clayton told him. llse heard the encrypted radio crackle a response.

  Both Sno-Cats slowed. The sergeant ran from the other vehicle, and took over the driving from Montgomery.