Alarm lights illuminated, and a buzzer heightened Cahill’s anxiety.
“Silence that.”
“It’s silenced,” Walker said. “Ten knots. Eighty-five meters. We’re approaching design test depth.”
“We have plenty of margin on our depth. We can go deeper than one hundred meters.”
“Terry, the presses are going to rip off!”
“Damn it! Very well. If we need to rise nose up, we’ll rise nose up. Leveling the deck. Pumping water from forward to after trim tanks. Coming to zero degrees on the stern planes.”
“Axial stress on forward presses is falling, but axial stress on rear presses is rising.”
“There’s still a huge air pocket inside that submarine’s pressure hull. They’re shoring up the holes, fighting for their lives. Coming to full rise on the stern planes.”
“Depth is steadying at ninety-two meters. Ship’s angle is down five degrees and rising. Speed eleven and a half knots.”
Cahill thought of reaching the surface and wondered if his adversary would attempt to escape through the conning tower. He wondered how much water weight the Romeo carried in its pressure hull and if the Goliath could support the entire ship above water. He wondered if the North Korean crew would surrender if given a chance. The permutations of possibilities perplexed him.
“Doctor Tan, lay to the bridge,” he said. “All hands help Doctor Tan find his way to the bridge.”
“Making thirteen knots,” Walker said. “Ship’s angle is ten degrees up. Depth is seventy meters and rising. Stress on all hydraulic presses is below alarm levels.”
“Very well.”
“What happens on the surface, Terry? I’m not sure I see your plan, or if I do, I don’t like what I’m seeing.”
“I fight to hold that Romeo in our bed, nose up in the air as high as I can get it while holding its ass underwater.”
“I got that part. I still don’t see a good outcome. It’s going to become too heavy, and it’ll backslide off our bed. If there’s one person left alive within it, some guy who was smart enough to stay alive by breathing forced air, he could shoot any or all of those six torpedoes out of the forward tubes on his way down.”
“That’s the plan, mate. If it backslides, it backslides, and I’ll ride it down and take me chances. But it may not.”
The shallow depths rocked the Goliath, and blackness yielded to gray. Then the bridge cracked the surface, and rain pelted the windows.
“I’m keeping our stern planes on full rise to keep our stern down,” Cahill said. “Weapons bays, mark your local depths.”
“Starboard weapons bay reads twenty-four meters.”
“Port weapons bay reads twenty-three and a half meters.”
“Sonar, do you still hear water rushing into the Romeo?”
“Yes, sir. Water’s going in the holes we shot through its pressure hull and air’s coming out the holes we shot in its ballast tanks. It’ll take a long time for it to empty its high-pressure air tanks through the holes.”
“I’m only concerned about the water flowing in. Let me know if you hear it stop.”
“It’s getting heavy, Terry,” Walker said. “Lateral stresses are rising on all hydraulic presses.”
The bridge door clicked open, and a small man with black hair and thick glasses appeared below Cahill.
“Do you need me?”
“Sorry, Doctor Tan,” Cahill said. “False alarm. I don’t expect to be communicating with any survivors after all.”
The translator nodded, turned, and departed.
“Hydraulic presses are at the alarm point,” Walker said.
“Damn it. All stop,” Cahill said. “We’ll backslide with it. I’m flooding into the central trim tanks, maximum pump speed.”
Rough waves slapped the windows as seas climbed up the domed glass. The pelting of droplets gave way to the silence of the subsurface world.
“We’re at twenty meters,” Walker said. “That’s for the bridge. The weapons bays are twenty-five meters deeper at this steep angle.”
“Right. Let’s see if I can level us off. I’m pumping water from aft to forward trim tanks.”
“Our up angle is lowering. We’re at fifteen degrees up. Now fourteen. Keep it going, Terry. The presses are handling the stress.”
“I’m going two degrees up on our stern planes.”
“Up?”
“Because we’re falling backward.”
“Right. I’m still learning these underwater concepts. Our angle is down to ten degrees up. Depth is fifty meters at the bow, sixty-four at the weapons bays. We’re descending at twenty meters per minute.”
Cahill looked at the stress levels on the hydraulic presses and saw them holding at tolerable levels. Then the sonar supervisor announced that the water flow into the Romeo had subsided.
“That’s it, then,” Walker said. “We’ve flooded its entire pressure hull. The only possible survivors are men lucky enough to be breathing forced air.”
“Increasing stern plane angle to five degrees up.”
“Ship’s angle is four degrees up,” Walker said. “Now three.”
“We’ve got this now,” Cahill said. “I’m accelerating to five knots to get better control of me ship.”
“Two knots,” Walker said. “Three knots. Rate of descent is dropping to ten meters per minute. The deck is level.”
“That’s good enough. I’m going to let the system handle this now automatically.”
He tapped icons and entered parameters. Speed five knots, ship’s angle level, depth sixty-five meters. The Goliath obeyed his wishes by pumping water overboard from its central trim tanks.
The lowered stresses on the hydraulic presses revealed that the Romeo’s living space had been flooded, offsetting the rising forces of its dry forward ballast tanks.
“We’ve got control, Terry. Now what?”
“Now we crush any survivors. I’m coming to one hundred and ten meters.”
“One hundred and ten?”
“Permissible with captain’s orders, and I’m the captain.”
He tapped keys, and the Goliath drove downward with a gentle angle.
“That’s good enough. That’s a whit more than ten atmospheres on any survivors.”
“Divers can endure that, at least for short periods, I think.”
“True, but let’s see how they deal with a rapid ascent. God knows what tortures I’m putting any survivors through, but I’m taking no chances.”
“I won’t argue.”
“Coming to thirteen knots, full rise on the stern planes. Let’s make one more trip to the surface and see if anyone is trying to talk to us. I’m sure Pierre has learned that we’ve exposed ourselves to radar by now.”
The deck rose as Walker tapped keys.
“Indeed he has. He’s been hailing us with the low-bandwidth communications for the last ten minutes.”
Gray opaqueness supplanted pitch blackness and then gave way to pelting rain as the Goliath’s bows shot through the surface. The prows crashed back down, and the stern sections nudged through the waves.
“Link me with Pierre.”
“Done.”
“Are you alright?” Renard asked.
“We’re fine.”
“What are you up to, man? You’re exposing yourself and you’re shooting your cannons at a target I don’t see.”
“Long story, mate. Short version is I picked up the wrong submarine. I’ve got a Romeo in me cargo bed. I shot holes in it and dragged it under. It’s completely flooded, but I’m not taking chances with survivors. So I took meself to one hundred and ten meters and then back up shallow again to cycle pressures on survivors.”
“Dear God, man. That’s gruesome. But it’s good thinking.”