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.