Submarine

'All compartments make your reports.' Farge ordered, on his feet again, leaning against the steel tube of the search periscope. 'Begin from aft.'

And in those next few minutes, Farge's worst fears were realized: the after-planes, the rudder, both propellers — all inoperative. She had stuck her after-ends deep into the mud.

'Control — engine-room.'

'Control?'

'Water flooding into the gland space.'

'Roger.'

'Captain, sir,' Foggon said. 'Number two HP air accumulator is almost empty. Both pumps are failing to cut in.'

'Is number one reservoir empty?'

The MEO nodded.

'Control — engine-room.'

'Control?' Farge shouted aft through the engine-room door.

'Six and five main vents jammed open. We can't shift them in hand.'

Foggon met Farge's glance, then shook his head slowly.

'No point running the compressors on atmosphere, sir.' He was gasping for the air which was not there, as another active ping blasted the boat.

'Everybody for'd,' Farge rapped. 'Into the fore-ends and for'd accommodation space.' He glanced at Tim Prout:

'Number One, take charge in the fore-ends. I'll take the accommodation space.'

The captain stood aside, watching his men streaming through the engine-room bulkhead door: some with flesh wounds and bloodied faces, others smeared with grease, clothes sodden, helping each other as they struggled up the slippery deck which had settled at a forty-degree angle. The comedians were chiakking each other, even now.

Farge had lost track of time. He knew only that Orcus was crippled, unable to move. With the after main vents jammed open he could not blow his after main ballast, even if he could produce HP air by running the compressors on atmosphere to a slight vacuum — there was precious little atmosphere remaining. The jammed after main vents explained the disastrous angle. His propellers were damaged, the shafts probably distorted if water was streaming into the gland space. Then he heard, above the noise of the last of the hands clambering through the control-room, the whisper of a destroyer's propellers passing overhead. How often had he heard that sound reproduced in the simulator…? He cocked his head to one side, listening, as the wardroom steward poked his head through the door. Riley, a handkerchief at his mouth, was crimson in the face, coughing and gasping for air:

'There's gas, sir,' he choked. 'Coming up through number two battery boards.'

Riley was pushed aside and Prout's head appeared between the legs of the last stoker clambering through the doorway:

'Chlorine, sir.'

Farge nodded: the battery cells must have been damaged and seawater from the flooded Ds was seeping into the battery bilges. He waited until the reverberations from another active blast disappeared, then faced Prout 'What's the keel depth in the fore-ends?'

'454 feet, sir.'

'We've got a chance, then.'

'Yes — if everyone keeps his head.'

'Abandon ship: prepare for a rush escape,' Farge commanded brusquely. 'You take the fore-ends.'

'Aye, aye, sir. Able Seaman Hicks is missing: the doc turned him in in the after messdeck.'

Farge turned to his cox'n who, the last man in the control-room, was waiting patiently by the panel.

'Go aft, please, cox'n. Check that everyone's for'd.'

Bowles was already slithering downwards to the engine-room door. Farge watched him disappearing into the shadows of the machinery space as the first lieutenant shoved the last stoker through the for'd door:

'Better get dressed, Tim. Don't flood up until I give the order.'

'Right, sir.' Prout met his captain's eye. 'Good luck, sir,' he said. 'See you in Vardo.' He turned briskly and disappeared for'd up the passageway.

Waiting for Bowles to return, Farge was on his own. He could smell the faint tang of chlorine. He'd better grab a suit and start dressing. He reached up to the deckhead lockers and pulled out escape suits for Bowles. Hicks and himself. Amazingly, he felt quite serene as another active blast invaded his boat. He could do no more.

The enemy was having a field day… and fleetingly he wondered whether the Russian captains would machine-gun survivors in the water. In peacetime, they behaved as sailors the world over. They'd just sunk their submarine; they'd not wallow in blood. If only some of Orcus' company could survive, even a few, to tell 'em in Dolphin what Orcus, the old lady of the squadron, had tried to achieve — perhaps they'd install her shield in the Submariners' Church, with all those others who had never returned. At least, she'd carried out her mission. Janner Coombes could be on to his prey, might even have sunk the Typhoon by now?