Bowles drew the column towards him. The bubble slid forward. The terse commands of the trimming officer and the distant whine of the motor were all that could be heard in the control-room.
'Stand by to snort, generating both sides,' Farge ordered. He had to hold her at a hundred feet for the completion of the snort drill, an opportunity to catch a trim which Eddie Foggon did not miss: Orcus was light and when the trimming officer had flooded Ds, the engine-room came through on the intercom:
'Ready to snort, generating both sides.'
'Periscope depth,' Farge ordered briskly. 'I shan't raise the snort mast until I've had a look.' He moved backwards from the gauges and took up his position between the periscopes. Still nothing from sonar.
'Eighty feet, seventy-five.'
'Up attack.'
The friendly hiss of the steel tube, sliding upwards again from its well… he opened the handles as the eyepieces came level.
'Sixty-two feet…'
He pushed his face into the eyepieces, heard behind him the MEO restraining the cox'n and his bubble.
'Sixty feet. Breaking!' The darkness merged swiftly with the grey underneath of the surface-daylight-and, as the smeared lens cleared, he saw the yellow-green tinge of the mud-stained sea, its creamy wave-crests curling towards him. He swung on his heel, taking in the horizon line of the southern sector- he could see no land to the eastward — then round to the north, to the north-west and 'Bloody hell!' he shouted. 'Down periscope! Stop snorting. Flood Q. Three hundred feet. Don't speed up, for God's sake.'
As he stood back from the periscope, the image of three, clumsy-looking Hormone helicopters etched indelibly in his mind, the control-room exploded into action. At sixty-five feet the first active pinging from the ASW helicopters blasted against the hull. At eighty feet, Orcus, still at slow one, but three and a half tons heavy with Q flooded, was sinking like lead.
'Shut off for counter-attack,' Farge shouted above the controlled chaos. 'Blow Q.'
The engine-room was coming through:
'Induction hull valve and emergency hull valve shut.'
Foggon was tapping Bowies' shoulder and pointing at the bow-down bubble.
'Can I speed up, sir?' The MEO'S mouth was a hole in his pale face: he had over-flooded Ds on the way up.
'Yes,' Farge snapped. 'To hell with the amps.'
'Group up, half ahead together,' Foggon ordered. Then, as the cox'n gained control again, the bubble slipping for'd, the boat began to porpoise.
'Two hundred feet.'
'Hard-a-dive on the fore-planes,' Foggon was shouting above the din.
Farge watched Bowles forcing for'd on his column, calm determination on his face as the boat began swooping down again. Then, seconds after another active ping from the attacking helicopters, a shattering explosion rocked the submarine. Farge glimpsed the curved frames springing toward him, felt the pressure on his lungs. Glass tinkled around him from the broken gauges, men slithered to the deck, hurled from their seats. A nuclear depth-bomb, not too distant…?
'Fore-planes jammed hard-a-dive,' the cox'n called out.
'Hydraulic pressure gone,' the wrecker shouted. 'Switching to secondary.'
'Fore-planes in hand,' Farge snapped. But with the broadcast system off the board and the bulkhead doors shut down for counter-attack, his orders could not be repeated by voice. 'Open bulkhead doors,' he shouted.
'340 feet — 380.' The bubble was against the stops.
'Blow one, two, three main ballast.'
As he held on to the pipes above his head, his feet slipping from beneath him, he heard the high pressure air screaming along the line to the ballast tanks for'd.
'410 feet- 420.'
In seconds Orcus would be smashing herself into the bottom. Holding his breath, Farge watched the depth-gauge pointer racing round the dial.
'Bubble's coming off, sir,' Bowles called out as the air emptied from the for'd main ballast tank to bring up her bows.
'430 — 425–420. Bubble's moving for'd.'
'Stop blowing main ballast. Group down, stop together.'
The wrecker shut his master blows. The screaming ceased in the air lines. Grady's voice broke through the sudden calm:
'Hydraulic pressure's on the line.'
'Planes are in power, sir.' Bill Bowles reported as he pushed his column for'd, while the bows continued to soar upwards: twelve degrees bow-up and still porpoising wildly. Farge must rid the tanks of any trapped air while the turmoil persisted:
'Open main vents.'
He heard the clunk from for'd as the mushroom-headed valves jumped open.
'One, two, three main vents checked open,' the report came back from for'd.
The boat was still cocked upwards at eleven degrees, but her rate of ascent was decreasing swiftly. She steadied at 240 feet; and then the depth started to fall away again. The MEO glanced over his shoulder at his captain:
'She's very heavy, sir.'
Farge nodded, acknowledging the trimming officer's misjudgement on the way up from deep.
'Open D port and starboard Kingstons,' Foggon ordered.
'270 feet.', The panel lights blinked as the Kingston valves were monitored 'open'.
'Blow D, port and starboard,' Foggon continued, his eyes on the panel.
Farge was listening to the hiss of the high pressure air as Grady opened his blows, when another- active ping reverberated through the hull, a nerve-twitching, eerie sound. As the noise died away, the sound waves disappearing into the distant ocean, the control-room suddenly split asunder.
An appalling shock hammered the boat at the exact moment that Grady was set to shut his HP air blows. Foggon yelled at Grady but the CPO had been flung backwards, his seat wrenched from the deck by the explosion. The submarine was being picked up by a giant's hand and hurled upwards. In seconds her bows were leaping towards the surface, the bubble '
against the stops. Men were scrabbling about the deck, trying to regain their feet, their hands streaming blood where they clawed among the slivers of glass and perspex from the gauges and instruments.
• Farge glimpsed Foggon hauling himself upwards, grasping at the metal frame of the wrecker's seat. Pushed from behind by Sims, the MEO was snatching at D's HP air blows, desperately trying to shut them.
The cox'n lifted his hands from his column, his voice inaudible as Farge shouted for Q to be flooded. The depth-gauge pointer was flying backwards behind its splintered glass, 160 feet and still swooping upwards…
Sims somehow opened Q and to the pandemonium was added the roar of its inboard venting as someone used his initiative. The angle must be over 60° bow-up, but for some reason she was steadying: 155 — 155 — 147 — 135, then began dropping fast. God, why weren't the bows coming down, with that extra three and a half tons right for'd in Q? And with D Kingstons…?
'Shut D Kingstons. Shut main vents,' Farge shouted above the diminishing chaos. 'Vent Ds inboard. Stand by to blow Q.'
The submarine was now dropping backwards, sliding into the depths stern-first. The depth pointer was slewing fast round its dial as she hurtled towards the bottom. 390 feet, 410: still she remained at this terrifying angle, the hands standing against the vertical surfaces as Grady fought his way back to the panel, to be held there by Sims and Grant.
'Blow seven, six, five main ballast,' Farge yelled above the din, as he tried to lift her stern. 'Group up, full ahead together.' Nothing was holding her now and the angle was not coming off. She was desperately heavy aft. 'Blow Q.'
Somehow Grady reached the blows and Farge heard the glorious sound of the HP air in the lines. The three men struggling at the panel had their eyes fixed on Farge while he gave the after main ballast tanks all the air he dared — but he continued blowing, listening for the rising whine of the main motors, feeling with the soles of his feet for the angle to come off, watching for a decrease in depth. He could waste no more of the precious HP air. 'Stop blowing main ballast.'