Countdown to impact: 1.00 hour.
Chapter 56
Sam’s special skillset was anything to do with demolition and munitions or “blowing shit up,” as Sam usually described it.
He’d scuttled ships, destroyed bridges, deployed sea-mines and generally had a field day with every type of munition there was. But one thing had always eluded him — the Panzerfaust or ‘tank fist’ as it translated in English. Another groundbreaking design from the Germans during the Second World War, the one shot, recoilless ‘tank destroyer’ was light, easy to shoot and cheap to manufacture. The design principles of the Panzerfaust influence similar RPG weapons to the present day.
During the war, the Panzerfaust proved highly effective against even the most heavily armored Allied tanks. It was one of the first weapons to use a ‘shaped charge’ in the warhead, which would detonate on impact, concentrating the blast in the direction of travel and punching a hole in armor up to 2 inches thick with a plasma jet that would kill the tank crew.
Today, Sam hoped it would prove just as effective against the device on the dock.
“You won’t fire that,” Leah challenged. “If you don’t blow yourself up with that antique, you’ll kill all your friends.”
Muller herded the submariners, scientists and Jack closer to the shrouded bell at gunpoint.
“We all know the score,” Sam countered. “We’d rather die than let you Nazi nutjobs use that… monstrosity.”
“I’ll give you three seconds to lower that weapon,” Muller called to Sam.
Sam remained unmoved by the threat. He had the Panzerfaust. What did they have?
But Muller didn’t look as fazed as Sam had expected, given the threat he posed to what he’d been treating as a holy relic.
He felt it before he heard it.
The bullet tore through his shoulder, shattering bone and slicing through muscle and sinew before he heard the shot ring out.
The Panzerfaust clattered to the ground and Sam watched the bloom of crimson spread across his chest before he followed the Panzerfaust down to the concrete floor.
Chapter 57
“I’ve stopped the bleeding but he’s lost a lot of blood,” Jameson said, his voice betraying that he didn’t think Sam would make it. “I might have done more aboard the Barracuda, but here, the medical supplies are rudimentary and that’s putting it politely.”
“They want the Barracuda for themselves. That I get, but why have they locked us up in here?” Jack pondered.
Coulson was still beating himself up over being outflanked by Leah. Again. The cunning bitch had a sniper hidden in the conning tower of the U-Boat the whole time. She always seemed to be one step ahead.
Juan and Dave sat at the two planesman stations, the only place they could sit without getting in the way of Jameson’s first aid efforts. Krupsky was laid out on the floor so they could work on him before moving him to a bunk in the crew quarters. There was no sick bay aboard the U-2532.
Durand and Jack stood by the periscope.
“Hey Coulson, do you think this still works?” Durand asked rubbing his hand over the well-worn periscope handles.
Jack shrugged, not caring one way or another. He’d blown the mission. “I guess so. Everything else seems to be in working order.”
“Except the ventilation.” Durand screwed up his nose. “Cigarette smoke, diesel fumes and hydrogen sulfide. Nice combination.”
Durand flipped a small lever and the hydraulics pumped to life, raising the periscope.
“How did you…”
Then Jack remembered that Peter Durand spoke and read German.
“I haven’t used one of these since training. It’s kind of cool. Makes you think of how they did things before we went all high tech and electronic,” he mused as he turned the periscope through a full rotation.
“See anything?” asked Jack.
“Yeah,” Durand laughed, “a bunch of guys trying to get that bell into the Barracuda. Bet they wish they hadn’t shot Krupsky, now.”
Jack looked down at Sam. He was pale but at least he was alive. “I bet he wished they hadn’t shot him, either.”
“I think they’re going to try to shoehorn that thing into the empty VPT,” Durand observed as he zeroed in on something that caught his attention.
“VPT?” quizzed Jack.
“Vertical Payload Tube. It’s a big module that holds 6 Tomahawk missiles for vertical launch. But ours is empty and full of sonar gear for the survey. They’ve cracked the hatch and are stripping it bare to hold that thing.”
Juan and Dave heard that their gear was being dumped, but neither man reacted. They were beyond caring. They’d given up.
“They can’t get away, can they? I can’t see Muller as a submarine school graduate, can you?”
“They have something better than that.” Jameson joined the conversation.
Jack and Durand both stared at him. Jack with a look of confusion. Durand with a look of total shock.
“Shit,” said Durand as he slammed his hand on the periscope.
“What?” Jack turned from one man to the other.
“They’ve got Leah. She’s been in the control room day in day out, watching every move.” Jameson explained.
“And now we know she’s a computer expert,” Durand added.
“How does that help?” Jack didn’t understand.
“Every system on that boat is computer controlled. It’s literally a fly by wire nuclear submarine. She could almost take the damn thing anywhere she wants single handed. Punch in the GPS coordinates and the boat practically sails itself,” Durand explained. “She’s got more than enough manpower onboard to get underway.”
“We can’t just sit here with our thumbs up our asses while they disappear with that bell thing. We have to come up with another plan!” Jack ran his fingers through his hair as he tried to come up with something.
“Scuttle—”
It was Sam. He was trying to tell them something. Jack knelt down alongside him.
“What do you mean scuttle? Scuttle them? How?”
Sam shook his head and coughed. Droplets of blood shone on his lips.
“Scuttle charges. They’ve set scuttle charges. You need the rat—”
Sam’s head fell back on the deck plating. He was unconscious again.
“Scuttle charges? What’s he talking about?” Juan squawked, his voice an octave higher with the stress.
Jack remembered Sam trying to tell him something earlier, but he shut him down. Now he wished he’d listened. And what was that about rats?
“Those Nazi bastards have set scuttle charges on this boat. They’re going to send us to a watery grave after they set sail out of the bunker.”
Jack didn’t think Juan or Dave could get any paler.
He was wrong.
Chapter 58