“Where are the other six hostiles?” hissed Jack to Sam.
“Below decks in the U-Boat, like I told you, it’s not good. I think they’re…”
Jack didn’t let him continue. “I couldn’t care less what they’re doing. I just need to know where they are.”
Jack edged his way toward Jameson, whose hands remained unrestrained. The German militia didn’t seem to rate a nuclear submarine captain as much of a threat. Or he was one of them? Jack didn’t even want to think about that. He had his suspicions about Durand, too.
“Got a plan Coulson?” The captain knew Jack well enough to guess that he did.
Turning his back to Muller and the other guards, Jack palmed the cutters to Jameson. “Cut me loose.”
Snip.
“Cut Sam free as soon as it starts.”
“As soon as what starts?” asked Jameson.
“Don’t worry, you’ll know.”
Muller slowly made his way toward the group, staying clear of the line of fire between them and his men. Jack kept his hands together, holding the cuffs in place and appearing to still be in discomfort. Every detail had to be just right.
Bullet-head still looked pissed at having been taken down by an unarmed man. A handcuffed one at that.
Perfect.
“How’re you feeling bullet-head? Want to get crash tackled again for old times’ sake?”
“Scheisse!” Bullet-head’s face turned red as he pushed his way through the group to where Jack stood. His gun was raised, not as a club this time, but ready to shoot. Jack heard the safety click off.
When he was a few feet away, Jack let go of the cuffs and moved to intercept, closing the gap between them before the guard could draw a bead on him and fire.
The man’s finger was already on the trigger and ready to fire. But the trigger guard was oversized to accommodate gloves, which the guards had taken off in the warmth of the submarine. Jack slid his finger inside the guard, piggy backing the soldier’s finger and aimed the gun at the other guard. A body shot would be a waste of time. They were all still wearing body armor.
A three round burst from the H&K turned the guards head into an explosive mist of blood and skull fragments. The bullets tore his head off before the sound waves from the gun even reached his ears. The man was dead before he knew he was even in danger.
Leah was the nearest to the fallen guard. Her hair a gruesome sight, matted with clotted blood and chunks of brain matter.
Jack turned the struggling bullet-headed guard to bring Muller into his sights. In his peripheral vision he could see Durand shuffling slowly toward the dead guard, his eyes locked on the nearest weapon — a holstered semi-automatic pistol. Jack knew there was something not quite right about that guy.
Breaking ranks, Leah swooped down and grabbed the man’s weapon before Durand could make his move. That was unexpected. Backup from cute Oceanographer. She had his six.
Muller’s arms were raised. His H&K clattered loudly on the hard concrete. Also unexpected. He was sure this monster of a man would have gone down with guns blazing.
“Nazi pussies,” he murmured.
Then he heard the slide of a H&K USP pull back, chambering a round.
Click.
Safety off.
For a lab rat, she knew her way around guns.
“It’s okay Leah. I’ve got this under control,” said Jack without taking his eyes off Muller.
“I’m sorry Jack, but I’m afraid you really don’t.”
The cold steel of the barrel pressed against Jack’s neck.
That was most definitely unexpected.
Chapter 49
Countdown to impact: 2 hours.
Chapter 50
Bullet-head hit Jack in the gut with the buttstock of his machine pistol, hard, doubling him over in pain.
Leah aimed her newly acquired handgun at the man’s temple and pulled the trigger. He dropped like a brick with a horrendous exit wound on the other side of his head. The sharp report of the gun made them all jump. The heat of the bullet had sizzled past Jack’s ear.
“Sorry about that, Jack. That little shit had it coming for threatening to shoot me if you tried to escape.” Leah’s voice was calm and devoid of all emotion.
“You haven’t changed a bit, have you, little sis?” Muller snatched his weapon from the ground, walked over to Leah and gave her a bear hug that made her look like a doll cradled in his enormous arms. “You still have that temper.” He smiled and wagged a finger at her like she was a naughty child. “You know I’m already desperately short of manpower, thanks to your boyfriend over there.” He pointed at Jack. “Now I’m another man down.”
“The man was too volatile. Besides, he started it. And for the record, Jack is not my boyfriend.”
Sam and Jack gave each other a ‘what the fuck?’ look. Until now, neither man thought that their day could get any stranger.
“You did well finding this place. I wasn’t expecting you to actually be here, though. What happened?”
“In a word? Russians. There’s a Russian sub down there. It fired on us and we came here to stay clear of it.”
“Why didn’t you blow it the hell up?” Muller spread his hands wide in a gesture of mock despair.
“No weapons. They stripped this thing,” she looked toward the Barracuda, “bare to the bone to fit in all the equipment we needed to find the bunker.”
Muller roared with laughter so loud Jack swore he felt the air vibrate.
“They took a perfectly good nuclear attack submarine, stripped it of its weapons systems, renamed it ‘Barracuda’ and turned it into a floating sonar buoy. All because I told them I had a new technology that had strategic military applications.” Her voice bubbled with pride.
“You were right about that, sis.” Muller clapped her on the back and broke out a hearty belly laughed again.
“How did you get the coordinates to Barnes without them finding out?”
“Easy, I hid a subroutine in the sonar drone’s systems and it’s been zipping around out there transmitting to Barnes’ secure satellite network. Even these two clowns had no idea. Like programming a drone is complicated.” She rolled her eyes.
Juan and Dave turned pale.
“You bitch!” Juan spat. “You used us for… for… this?” He pointed to the bell shaped object only feet away from where they stood before taking a step toward Leah.
Muller and the remaining guard trained their weapons on the group. Their intention to fire made clear.
Juan balled his fists in frustration and glared at her, pure hatred burning in his eyes.
Boots clanging against steel on the nearby U-Boat deck drew their attention. The soldiers who had been working below had emerged, one of them nodded wordlessly to Muller.
Job done, thought Jack. But what job exactly?
“Kurt,” Muller called out to the other guard, “cuff the rest of them but cut the big one free. We need him.”
Sam raised his cuffed wrists and gave Muller a one finger salute.
Muller instinctively aimed his weapon at Sam, then thought better of it. “There’s no point killing you. I need you to help move the device into the other sub.” He paused. “But we don’t need a chubby Hispanic to do that, do we?”