Cryptonomicon

But they have to surface because the V-Millionwasn't made to run at twenty-nine knots forever; she burns fuel, and hydrogen peroxide, at a ridiculous rate when both of her six-thousand-horsepower turbines are spinning. There is plenty of fuel remaining. But she runs out of hydrogen peroxide at about midnight. She has a few miserable batteries, and electric motors, that just barely suffice to get her up to the surface. But then she has to breathe air for a while, and run her diesels.

So the V-Million,and a few crew members, get to enjoy some fresh air. Bischoff doesn't, because he is dealing with new complexities that have arisen in the engine room. This probably saves his life, because he doesn't even know they're being strafed until he hears the cannon rounds drumming against the outer hull.

Then it is the same old drill, the crash dive, which was so exciting when he was a young man practicing it in the Baltic, and has become so tedious for him now. Looking up through a hatch he gets a moment's glimpse of a single star in the sky before the view is blocked by a mutilated crewman being fed down from above.

Only five minutes later the depth charge scores a direct hit on the stern of the V-Millionand tears a hole through both the outer and the pressure hull. The deck angles beneath Bischoff's feet, and his ears begin to pop. On a submarine, both of these are bad omens. He can hear hatches clanging shut as the crew try to stem the advance of the water towards the bow; each one seals the fate of whomever happens to be aft of it. But they're all dead anyway, it is just a question of timing now. Those hatches are not meant to stem five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten atmospheres of pressure. They give way, the pressure spikes upwards as the bubble of air in the front of the V-Millionsuddenly halves its volume, then halves it again, and again. Each wave of pressure comes as sudden crushing pressure on Bischoff's thorax, driving all the air out of his lungs.

Because the bow is pointed straight up, like a needle on a meter, there's no deck to stand on, and every time a bulkhead yields, and the water level shoots up towards the bow, it leaves them suddenly submerged, with crushed and evacuated lungs, and they must swim up and find the air bubble again.

But finally the mangled stern of the boat spikes into the seafloor and the V-Millionsettles down, the forwardmost cabin rotating around them, tremendous rock-crushing noises all around as a coral reef is destroyed by the boat's falling hull. And then it's finished. Günter Bischoff and Rudolf von Hacklheber are together in a safe cozy bubble of compressed air, all of the air that used to be in the V-Millionreduced to a pocket the size of a car. It's dark.

He hears Rudy undoing the latches on his aluminum briefcase.

"Don't strike a match," Bischoff says. "This air is compressed, it will burn like a flare."

"That would be terrible,"Rudy says, and instead turns on a flashlight. The light comes on and immediately dims and goes brown and shrinks to a tiny red speck: the glowing remains of the filament in the bulb.

"Your light bulb has imploded," Bischoff explains. "But at least I got a little glimpse of you, with that silly look on your face."

"You too have looked better," Rudy says. Bischoff can hear him closing up the briefcase, snapping the latches into place. "Do you think my briefcase will float here forever?"

"Eventually the pressure hull above us will corrode. The air will escape from it in a thin line of bubbles that will grow into gyrating nebulas of foul air as they rush towards the surface. The water level will rise and press your briefcase up against what is left of the pressure hull's forward dome, and it will fill with water. But still there will be a little pocket of air in one corner of your briefcase, perhaps."

"I was thinking of leaving a note in it."

"If you do, better address it to the United States government."

"Department of the Navy, you think?"

"Department of Spying. What do they call it? The OSS."

"Why do you say this?"

"They knew where we were, Rudy. The Catalinas were waiting for us."

"Maybe they found us with radar."

"I allowed for radar. Those planes came even faster. You know what it means?"

"Tell me."

"It means that those who were hunting us knew how fast the V Millioncould go."

"Ah . . . so that is why you think of spies."

"I gave Bobby the plans, Rudy."

"The plans for the V-Million?"

"Yes . . so that he could buy forgiveness from the Americans."

"Well, in retrospect maybe you shouldn't have done that. But I do not blame you for it, Günter. It was a magnificent gesture."

"Now they will come down and find us."

"After we're dead, you mean.

"Yes. The whole plan is ruined. Ah well, it was a nice conspiracy while it lasted. Perhaps Enoch Root will display some adaptability."

"You really think spies will come down to go through this wreck?"

"Who knows?" Bischoff says. "Why are you worrying about it?"