Phoenix Sub Zero

“Scope’s breaking,” he called as the phosphorescence flashed against the periscope view. He turned off the light enhancer. The light from the surface was diffuse, as it would be in the dawn, perhaps an overcast dawn. “Scope’s clear.”

Kane spun the instrument in several circles, his vision obscured by fog and dense clouds close to the surface as well as the snowflakes whipping by the lens of the periscope. He found himself looking at the snow instead of the horizon.

The snowflakes were distracting, Kane thought, as he realized he’d never seen snow at sea. “Open the induction mast and put the low-pressure blower on all main ballast tanks.”

He picked up the UWT mike.

“AFT COMPARTMENT, CAPTAIN. WE ARE STARTING A LOW-PRESSURE BLOW ON THE BALLAST TANKS. TRY TO KEEP THE EPM UP FOR ANOTHER TEN MINUTES.”

He dropped the mike and looked out the scope, watching as the sea got lower. The added height did little to improve visibility in the snowstorm. Even as he watched, the wind picked up, the snowflakes suddenly accelerating almost to the horizontal in the wind. The waves sprouted whitecaps in the gust. Kane could almost feel the deck heel over from the force of the wind on the sail. He trained the view to the left, to the east, hoping to see a brightness from the sun, but the clouds were just as dense where the sun should have been.

Kane bit back disappointment. He had hoped to see the sun again, to seal the ordeal behind him and remind him that he was alive. Instead, there was a blizzard. He trained his view to the left, to the east, saw the sun rise over the horizon, a sight he had never thought he would see again.

The roar of the blower started, the ballast tanks filling with water. Soon they should be stable on the surface and he could talk to the men aft face to face on the hull.

Within ten minutes he could see the top of the hull in the gray water. The ballast tanks were dry, the ship surfaced.

“Secure the blow.” He picked up the microphone.

“AFT COMPARTMENT, CAPTAIN, WE ARE ON THE SURFACE. ALL STOP. OPEN YOUR ESCAPE TRUNK HATCH AND COME UP FORWARD.”

He trained the view aft, and watched as the hatch slowly popped open, the haggard men climbing from the hatch, looking dazed at the falling snow, unsure of whether to rejoice at reaching the surface or curse to be in the middle of a winter storm. As they walked they hugged themselves against the cold.

“XO, get those guys in here from the aft hatch.”

Mcdonne left to get the engineroom crew in. Kane looked out the periscope for a few minutes. They had, by God, lived. The Phoenix now drifted in the sea, its battery nearly dead.

He realized he needed to get to radio. He left Houser on the periscope and found Binghamton in the room, his parka and gloves on, his breath coming out in clouds.

“Can you bump up the bigmouth?” were Binghamton’s first words. Kane called the request to Houser. Binghamton handed Kane the microphone and they listened to static for a few minutes, then Binghamton waved Kane on.

“Norfolk Navcom, this is Echo Five November with an urgent Navy Blue, over.”

In the control room Houser took his face from the periscope and looked at the speaker of the UWT, disbelief in his eyes. It was unmistakable … “… ho ho ho! Ho ho ho! …”

There were many voices, the call repeated over and over, the sounds coming in distorted like a Halloween tape recording made for a haunted house. But haunted spirits up north, here at the top of the world?

Or was that ho-ho-hoing something to do with … Ho ho ho, like they’d learned in submarine school? An emergency escape? The other submarine, the one that was to take care of the Destiny but had shot at them, forcing them to run, and then what had happened, no one knew. Maybe the Destiny had won. It seemed to have left them alone so far but—

* * *

“Ho ho ho!”

It was worse than any nightmare Pacino had ever had. The sea around him was a black darkness. It was so cold he could feel his body shutting down. It was all he could do to continue to shout ho-ho-ho, his screams getting weaker the higher he rose. But then he began to hear things, his ears already damaged from the Vortex launch and the explosions, but now he could swear he heard a ghostly voice echoing through the deep saying strange things … Compartment, Captain, right twenty degrees rudder … level the ship … low-pressure blow … Captain …

An auditory hallucination … what else could it be? But it seemed so real, the voice so large, coming from a giant throat and echoing through the water.

“Ho ho ho,” he screamed.

The ascent seemed to go on forever. At last the sounds of the voices stopped. In the final hundred feet of his ascent he lost consciousness, no longer aware when the voice rang out through the deep again. He had stopped shouting but was breathing rapidly, his lungs giving up the air, which was fortunate … if he had breathed any slower he might have had his lungs explode.