IX
They left me alone in the control compartment with the helmsman. His name was Ridder, Seaman Charles Ridder. “Call me Chuck,” he said.
Chuck seemed undisturbed by the events we had witnessed so far, and those that were unfolding now weren’t his job. His job was to steer the sub and keep it on course. With his eyes always locked on the indicators in front of him, he at least gave the appearance of working hard to do so.
I addressed the back of his head, which still was clad in a stocking cap.
“How long do you think they’ll be gone?” I felt tiny and vulnerable just sitting there waiting for something to happen.
“Who knows?” He rotated his head a few degrees toward me as he spoke, revealing dark, sleepy eyes set in a pale face. One front tooth capped, old burn scars evident on neck. He was short, about my height, and his hands seemed delicate and graceful on the ship’s wheel, like a pianist’s. “I guess the faster they get back here, the better their trip went.
Right?”
It was rhetorical. He already had returned his mental energies to the task of keeping us on an even keel.
I wanted to ask him another question. I needed to ask him another question. There was no more work to do now, nothing to occupy me while I waited for some resolution to this bizarre conflict I had descended into.
“So, you’re not worried, Chuck?”
This time he spoke to the control panel.
“Worried? About what? There’s no place to go. Nothing to do but wait to see if I get a chance to shoot anything.”
It might have been stoicism, but it sounded more like boredom. Before I could come up with another half-assed comment, he continued.
“Lieutenant Larsen knows what he’s doing. Doesn’t really matter whether they get the Serpent or not. If they don’t get it and it tries to get in here, I blast it. Ain’t but one way for it to get into this compartment. And right here is the only place you can run the boat from. We’re in control. Safest place in the world.”
Except anyplace else, I thought. Anyplace but a second-hand submarine filled with bloodthirsty soldiers and their predatory prey.
“Larsen said the boat could be sabotaged from outside the control room. That’s why they’re out there hunting it.”
“Yeah, it could stop us from moving. But all the diving controls are right here. We want to surface, we can surface. Not a damn thing it can do ’bout that.”
“What about the fuel tanks? It could start a fire.”
He shook his head. “Why would it do that? The sub sinks, the Serpent dies.”
More silence. I imagined I could hear-or feel-footsteps reverberating from other parts of the sub. But nothing concrete, nothing to tell me whether I had more or less to be afraid of.
My professional attitude had all but eroded. Shreds of it still lay draped across my consciousness. But the small part of me that could view the situation as a detached observer said I was less a doctor and investigator than an unwilling participant in a nightmare. That was eating at me. I could do nothing to influence my plight, not even make intelligent conversation with Chuck the sub driver.
“Do you know how to operate everything in here?”
“Well enough to do my job. I keep the boat straight and level, check the chart to make sure we’re not drifting.”
“Yeah, but what about the other stuff? The diving controls, for instance-if it came down to it, would you know what you were doing?”
“Why does that matter? I could get us surfaced or submerged, probably. The sonar might be a little hard. I could work the periscope. We all basically know how to work every station on the sub. Why-do you wanna launch a few torpedoes at some cargo ships?” He followed the witticism with a bray of laughter.
“You and I might wind up being the only ones left on this boat,” I said. Just trying to be rational. Just trying to evaluate all the options and possibilities. “Say we are. Could you get us to the surface safely? Call for help? Do you know how to operate the…” What was it called? “… the UQC?”
“I told you I could surface the boat. And the Gertrude is simple, like working a telephone. Just relax, OK?” Now his voice had a little emotion-annoyance. He chortled as another idea hit him. “Besides, if you and I are the last ones left, I’m sure we can find something more fun to do.”
Stepping away, I pretended to examine something on the deck. Not that he was watching me. But I had felt a shiver of apprehension at a clumsy come-on I should have ignored or ridiculed. You’re too wound up, I told myself.
I had to be more clear-headed and calculating. You’re not trying to solve a crime, I thought, you’re trying to prevent one: your own murder.
Because that’s what it was about now, right? Survival. Of the SEALs, sure, but it was becoming a lot easier to consider ways to get only myself out of the sub in one functioning piece. The SEALs could take care of themselves-they thought so, anyway, and had the military hardware to give themselves a better chance. All I had was a rubber band.
What I needed was a gun.
Chuck’s rifle was on the floor next to him. I doubted he’d let me borrow it while he drove. Maybe his knife? Would he give that up?
Wait, no: I didn’t have to beg for cutlery. There was another firearm, one that no one would mind if I borrowed. The Tokarev.
Chuck saw me move toward the forward door.
“Hey, where you going?” No surprise or alarm. What trouble could I get into, anyway, petite little girl that I was?
I contemplated lying. But why? Was there some reason I’d had this surge of distrust?
“I’m going to get a gun,” I said, watching his reaction. For a moment, he didn’t have one. Then a nod.
“Yeah, good idea. The more firepower the better.” Again without pulling his eyes from his work.
But before I could duck through the hatch, a sound interrupted the control room’s tranquility. I might have imagined it; the noise was fleeting and hushed. A glance at Ridder, however, told me my instincts were correct. It was a faraway gunshot.
Then another noise jumped into the still air around us. It was a soft whirring, like the breeze blowing across my ears.
After a moment, I figured out what it was. The intercom had switched on.
No one was speaking. But I could hear something in the background. Heavy, labored breathing, like a draft animal. And some scuffling, indistinct activity.
There was a moan, again in the background, but clear, identifiable and human. A hatch clanged open.
“What… Hello? Sir?” It was Vazquez. Despite the electronic distortion, he sounded drugged, or as if he had just awakened from a deep dream. “Where are you? Where are y—”
The word was cut off. And then he screamed.
The sound pierced my guts like an ice pick. I had never heard so much pain. There was fear, too, but the pain rose to the top like an oil slick, obscuring everything beneath. Somehow every raw vibration of Vazquez’s throat was evident to us there in the control room.
There was no modulation, no change in pitch. Just a long, hoarse cry that continued, continued, continued until it disappeared over a cliff. I heard a deep, ragged intake of breath and expected to be assaulted with another wave of anguish. But instead, Vazquez spoke. Pleaded.
“No. No, you don’t have — AGH!” He yelled, a high yelp that again was laden with undeniable agony. It was accompanied by a sharp crack. “Oh, God. Oh, God. Campbell, help me! Someone. Someone — AGH!” Another crack.
I sensed Ridder leaving his post and walking toward the speaker box, mesmerized.
“No. No! Please! No! Just kill me. Please. Just kill me. Justkillmejustkill mejustkillmeno! NO! NO! NOOOOOOO!” And Vazquez’s voice disappeared, cut off by another clang.