Gunfire ripped around him, pinging off the conning tower and open hatch, sending Jonah flying back behind the hatch for cover.
“What the fuck was that?” yelled Marissa.
“Somebody’s shooting at me,” said Jonah. “I hate to cut this short, but I’m kind of on the clock here. Remember that silver wreck we worked off the Horn of Africa?”
“I don’t understand — the SS Richard Thompson James?”
Jonah remembered the name now. The SS Richard Thompson James, an Allied Victory-class ship transporting silver coins to the Saudis in the closing days of World War II. An American ship pursuing American strategic interests but under British protection, the British allowed it to wander alone into the hunting grounds of a particularly prolific German U-boat. It was torpedoed and sank in nearly six hundred feet of water, abandoned until Jonah and a small team of salvagers ripped it apart for the silver within.
Another burst of gunfire rattled around him, interrupting his thoughts.
“What about it?” she demanded. “And why is someone shooting at you?”
“Pretty sure they’re trying to kill me. Look, I need the coordinates to that shipwreck, Marissa. I need them right now. I don’t have time to get into the details.”
“Fine, whatever,” said Marissa. He heard the sounds of her climbing out of bed, walking to her office around the corner of her bedroom, booting up her computer. Part of him missed her, missed her smell, her warmth, and the normalcy in which she conducted herself and all her affairs. That was to say, all her affairs outside of the one she shared with him.
“Thank you,” he said. “Seriously, thank you. You’re saving my life here.”
Marissa started rattling off a series of numbers, the coordinates to the silver shipwreck. Jonah memorized the numbers and aimed one final kick at the depth plane, forcing it back into alignment with a snap of metal against metal. A fresh salvo of gunfire clattered off the hatchway and conning tower, the ringing ricochets narrowly missing him.
“I don’t even want to know what you need this for,” Marissa asked. “Can I go back to bed now?”
“That’s all I needed,” said Jonah. “Thank you. Let’s, uh, do lunch sometime.”
“Lose my number, asshole.” Marissa slammed down the phone with the fury of a woman who’d probably be on the next flight out if Jonah would only ask. But he didn’t. Instead, he ducked back inside the conning tower and slammed the hatch shut behind him. He raced down the interior boarding ladder and re-secured his oxygen mask.
“Helm, dive now!” ordered Jonah.
Vitaly nodded and sent the Scorpion into a tight, stomach-churning dive at a speed and angle Jonah thought impossible.
“Make our depth five-five-oh feet,” said Jonah as he plugged the new coordinates into the navigational computer. Good news — they were less than fifteen minutes away, maybe less if Alexis drew the batteries hard and pushed the electric engine beyond spec. He stole a suspicious glance at Vitaly, who maintained his stoic vigil at the helm. Vitaly turned and glared back through the clouded plastic of his oxygen mask.
“That’s still within range of the depth charges,” protested Vitaly.
“Doesn’t matter,” said Jonah. “We can’t out-dive the explosives.”
“Rig for silent running?” asked Vitaly.
“No,” said Jonah, pressing the intercom to the engine room. “Stay noisy. Alexis, full power to the engines. I don’t care about range or endurance, just speed. Vitaly — follow my course, but be unpredictable. Run like a rabbit. I want them wasting depth charges. Doctor — report!”
“Fire in the engine room has been contained,” Hassan said. “We lost a few batteries, nothing crippling. Hydrophones are working again. Vitaly rerouted the systems past the damaged circuits. They’re still following us — and they’ve made no attempt at communications.”
“Do we still have those bodies in the freezer?”
“We do,” said the doctor, confused. “But why—?”
“Hand the headphones to Vitaly and follow me,” said Jonah, walking towards the bunkroom-adjacent galley. “I want those frozen bodies in the diver lockout chamber along with any trash from the galley.”
“Splashes!” came Vitaly’s tinny voice from the command compartment. The submarine abruptly changed course, speed and depth, sending the Scorpion jolting in a new direction, almost dropping Jonah and the doctor to their knees with the abruptness of the course change. They righted themselves and opened the small walk-in freezer where five lumpy bodybags were stacked against one wall.
“Two should be enough,” said Jonah over the distant popping sound of three underwater explosions. The mercenaries had missed again. Vitaly was a talented navigator, especially under such pressure. Whether or not he could keep it up for the next critical minutes was another question entirely.
“Let’s get the burned ones from the front compartment,” Hassan said. “They’re in pieces, should be lighter.”
“I like the way you think,” said Jonah, chucking one bag of body parts towards Hassan and grabbing the other for himself. They exited the freezer, each grabbing a stacked bag of kitchen waste as they did so.
“What’s happening?” asked Fatima as they both passed.
“I wish I knew,” Hassan said, closely following Jonah.
The mercenaries stopped dropping charges, not wanting to waste them on the seemingly panicked, fleeing crew of the Scorpion. Jonah and Hassan opened the body bags, gagging as they dropped the burned, chopped-up, frozen, and tattooed body parts into the lockout chamber along with two massive bags of galley waste.
“Go ahead and throw up if you need to,” said Jonah, dry heaving. “It’ll just add to the effect.”
“You never told me what we’re doing,” Hassan said, covering his face and mouth with one hand, unable to tear his eyes away from the horrific scene.
“Garbage shot,” said Jonah. “We blast this out of the lockout chamber. The bodies and trash float to the surface. They’ll think we’re dead.”
“Ah, clever.”
“Not really. It’s an old trick from World War II. Problem is nobody’ll buy it without a massive oil slick.”
“How do we do that?” asked the doctor. “Can we vent from the fuel tanks?”
“Not enough to sell it.” Jonah slammed the hatch to the lockout chamber shut.
“So what—”
Jonah cut him off. “You’re not going to like it.” Fingers punching the controls, Jonah programmed the chamber to over-pressurize.
“What do you need me to do?”
“Stay here,” said Jonah. “When my signal comes, press the green button. The outer hatch to the chamber will open automatically and the air pressure will evacuate the contents.”
Hassan stole a look through the small portal window into the chamber. “I’m about to evacuate my contents,” he said.
“And hold on,” said Jonah. “The ride is going to get bumpy.”
“Captain!”shouted a voice from command compartment below. “Come quickly!”
Jonah slid down the ladder, joining Vitaly at his helm console. The Russian brought up a passive acoustic reading to the main screen, rendering the underwater terrain as a crude, shifting 3-D model.
“What is it?” said Jonah.
“This,” said Vitaly, pointing at the screen. “I following your coordinates, but I believe there is obstruction.”
The screen depicted the forward-looking sensor reading of the Scorpion as it steamed towards a large, blocky object.
“It’s not an obstruction,” said Jonah. “It’s a shipwreck, the SS Richard Thompson James. I dove her during a salvage mission a few years ago.”