“Did the boat sink?”
“Eventually, sir. The crew were all rescued, but it was scary as hell for all the men on board.”
“These lifeboats are not sinking slowly enough for that. These ships are just… dropping!”
Another scream carried across the water. Krauser span, and squinted across the darkness. Kleiner grabbed the binoculars, and gasped. “Another one… it’s… the… God, the size of it!”
Krauser, buffeted by the wind, hurried to the chief engineer and snatched the binoculars, fumbling them as a large wave rocked the U-Boat. He cursed as they bounced off the hull and into the ocean. “What?” he demanded, gripping the rail again “What was it?”
“Shark!” the chief engineer shouted. “I saw the fin as it went below again and… Captain… it must have been two metres high.”
A loud booming wave came from the direction of the freighter, and Krauser span, expecting to see an explosion bursting from the hull of the Freyr, but instead all he saw was a massive spray of foam near where one of the lifeboats had been. Only one now remained, the men inside screaming as they rode the tumultuous wave of foam, driftwood and blood that swelled under, around and over them. From the ambient lighting of the rapidly sinking freighter, he saw the shadow of a fin, easily two metres high, glide through the water. What the hell could be so large?
He’d seen Great White sharks swimming two or three times when stationed in the Atlantic, and their fins could only have been half a metre high. A three metre dorsal fin just… wasn’t possible. Maybe the light and shadow from the sinking ship had thrown out his vision, the swell and movement of the water making the size impossible to judge accurately. Perhaps it could even be something else. An experimental submarine operating in these waters that he hadn’t been informed about.
Impossible. In any event, the Kriegsmarine wouldn’t launch a submarine whose sole purpose was to destroy lifeboats. There was a war on, but their mission was to sink the cargo and the ships; most captains – himself included – attempted to spare and save as many of the sailors’ lives as they could. It helped to alleviate the guilt some of them felt over how clandestine and underhanded submarine warfare was by its very nature.
Also there was the ragged, torn torso that the survivors of the Freyr had fished out of the water. No submarine would do that. No submarine could do that. An explosion, perhaps. A man dragged into a propeller, maybe. But not a sinking lifeboat.
He had a sick feeling in his stomach as he rushed to the entrance to the control room, bracing his feet on the sides of the ladder and sliding into the red, humid stink of the control room. “Half speed ahead. Those sailors are in serious danger, and I intend to assist them.”
“We don’t have space to take on fifty survivors, Captain!” snapped Hertz. “Where could we put them? Even one of the toilets is filled up with food supplies. There’s simply not the space.”
“We don’t take them on board, Mr Hertz. I merely said that I intend to assist them. Three of those life boats have been sunk by shark attacks already, and I intend to make sure that the last one survives.”
“Shark attack? What sort of sharks does one find in the North Sea, Captain?”
Kleiner had followed them down and cocked an eye contemptuously at the second in command. “Angel Sharks, Blue Sharks, Thresher Sharks, Catsharks, Basking Sharks…”
Krauser suppressed a smile at seeing Hertz sufficiently berated. “Plus whatever that is out there. It’s big enough to sink three lifeboats so far. Could be a Great White. Perhaps they come here sometimes.”
“It’s possible,” shrugged Kleiner, “but that thing looked far too big to be a Great White to me, sir.”
Krauser nodded acknowledgment as he felt the engines kick in, powering the U-Boat towards the last lifeboat. “Let’s get some men up top ready to provide assistance if needed. Small firearms at the ready, in case our Norwegian friends are feeling a little excitable. I’d like Doctor Arnold informed. He may have some patients very soon. Warn him about the possibility of shark wounds.”
“Sir!” snapped Hertz and rushed off to inform the doctor.
Krauser estimated they could be on top of the lifeboat in as few as five minutes, and he intended to be ready to provide assistance – personally if need be. He ran to his bunk, grabbed, checked and loaded his Mauser pistol, and… for the first time today… managed to stop and grab his windbreaker before heading up the ladder, and onto the deck.
One lifeboat remained, and it was in a sorry state.
-FOUR-
The U-616 was a hive of activity as the submarine rushed to the aid of the last lifeboat. Captain Krauser was already up on the main deck, sprayed with salt and foam. Gripping tightly onto the handrail, he kept his eyes firmly fastened on the last lifeboat. With just a crew of four, the small vessel was thrown around, up and down in the chaotic waters around the sinking Freyr. The men inside shouted to each other in Norwegian, their hands tightly gripping the seats, the sides of the boat, the oars – anything they could grab a hold of in order to avoid being hurled into the freezing cold North Sea. The waves splashed up and over the prow, and the men were now ankle deep in the freezing cold water. They had pulled on life jackets, but Krauser knew that they would do little to protect them from either the freezing, black water – or the silent teeth and jaws that hunted them.
Krauser cupped his hands to his mouth and shouted through the wind and clamour that help was coming, hoping they could both hear him and understand German. When they were little more than a hundred metres from the lifeboat, one of its occupants looked up and saw him. Krauser guessed him to be in his early thirties, blonde and bearded. A mixture of relief, fear and resignation washed across his face. The man reached back, slapping a comrade’s arm, calling something to attract the rest of the crew. Two of them stopped to look over to the U-Boat and froze. Krauser shouted to his men to slow approach so that the submarine could be boarded easily by the survivors.
The last crew member of the lifeboat, however, did not react to either the shouts of his friend, or to the diesel engine chug of the submarine. His gaze remained fixed at a point in the water a hundred metres away to the stern of the small vessel. Suddenly, his eyes widened, his jaw dropped, and his face paled. Losing his balance, he fell clumsily into the boat, setting it rocking up and down on the waves once more.
The other three sailors staggered, grabbed their seats and shouted at their companion. Unheeding, still he gabbled and gibbered, pointing off to the stern of the boat. The U-616 was only fifty metres away now, and Krauser could just about hear them speaking, though he did not understand their language. The hysterical man’s voice was high and shrieking, as the others began gasping and looking in the direction he was gesturing. He turned to see what it was they had spotted, and adrenaline filled his own heart in a cold flush. His first reaction was that the massive, turbulent wake had to be a torpedo. He’d seen often enough the damage that these seven metre long weapons of destruction could wreak. Even if the lifeboat was the target of the attack, the shock wave could easily damage, and possibly even sink a U-616.
The surf above the wave broke, and he felt his knees buckle, forcing him to support himself on the handrail. The shark’s fin that smoothly rose through the spray like a knife through butter had to be two and a half, perhaps even three metres tall. That would make the shark itself… thirty metres long. Impossible!
Once, on shore leave, he had seen a Great White that a fisherman had caught and cut open. Even that monster of the sea had only been six metres in length; and all had said that was a large one. As the gargantuan fin sped towards the lifeboat, it slowly submerged again, the wake still speeding to the defenceless Norwegian crew.