Wells felt his body shake with each smacking bullet that smashed into the steel walls around him, showers of sparks blinding the sea of nightvision he saw the cramped world in. He had never been trained for outright combat before and it showed, he was uneasy and erratic. One of the SEALs had put a hand on his shoulder and forced him down into a kneel in cover, patting his shoulder and nodding at him reassuringly. It took every bit of self control the diver could muster up to keep his head about him, breathing calmly in the crushing tides of sound and clattering lead death that chirped around the bulkheads. In short, this wasn’t his favorite place in the world, but he knew he could be valuable if they were underwater again. Another volley of bullets smashed in all directions, sending a splash of bright tracer rounds scattering like giant sparks from a grind wheel. One of the SEALs peaked around the corner and hazard a shot, tucking back in time for the thick beam of tracer fire to scramble night vision and cause Wells to stare into the wall two inches from his face until sight returned. The diver could barely hear over the racket when the firing was abruptly cut off and the sound of Hochberg barking on the comms filled his head.
“… toward ‘za Gyro station now. Let’s go boys!”
Hochbergs spry form dashed through the water tight hatch frame and turned on a dime to barrel through another narrow passageway the SEALs had been careful to monitor during the scrum. They didn’t say anything more, simply chasing after the old chief, careful to keep an eye ahead and behind for problems. Hochberg was in his element, feet clattering along the gridwork pathways as he finally reached the last ladderwell down to the final deck. With the skill and talent of a man who had practice trivial things for far too long, he hooked his foot under the floor hatch wheel and kicked it away, spinning open the mechanism and then ticking it upward with a hooked foot. It was a good thing too because the moment the hatch swung up and locked into a socket on the bulkhead a quick burst of weapons fire emanated from below. The old chief leaned back against one of this SEALs and reached down into his belt, snagging up a salvaged stick grenade. Letting go of his rifle meant the strap would take the weight and the weapon dangled, muzzle racking off his knee as his fingers quickly spun away the bottom cap of the grenade. For a moment he was back in Kiel-Wik. He could remember how the sun beat down on them in the training grounds mercilessly.
“No! You grip it further at the base and throw it with the wrist to get more distance! Use the weight to drag it forward!” Senior corporal Lenson was merciless. The boys had been sitting in the tight fox holes they had dug all day, wondering why in the world they had wasted their time learning infantry tactics when they were supposed to live and serve from an undersea tank.
Lenson knelt at the edge of Hochbergs parapet and leaned over the old chief, “Herr Obermaat, the boys are watching your every move. Once you get this right, they’ll get it right, ja?”
Hochberg nodded and wiped his brow clear of the sweat again. Their summer uniforms were better than suffering the training than being in the wool but it was still stifling. The old chief plucked up a stick grenade and fumbled the cap away, the cheap metal disk tumbling to the kicked around dirt at his feet. Fingers gripped around the glass bead at the end of a string and he spied the tree stump they had been throwing the explosives at all day. Lenson spoke calmly as he got onto his belly.
“Now, pull the cord and count to two, then throw it from the bottom of the handle and duck.”
The chief yanked down hard on the string, feeling it pull taut a moment and then give. Glaring at the shattered stump he craned his arms back and gripped the strick grenade nearly at the base of the wood, counting quickly in his head. Lensons voice came in calmly, like a clear conscious in a dazed fog.
“Now.”
The grenade went tumbling forward, end over toward the stump and the chief dropped into the tiny foxhole, crowding in with another sailor. The explosion thumped loudly and rung in his ears, in the back of his throat he thought he tasted copper. Lenson was cheering madly.
“That’s it! That’ll do it for Ivan! Ha-hah, if only we had a thousand more of you in the east!”
The SEAL behind Hochberg had watched the old Chief pluck out the grenade and wrench down on the little white bead. His eyes glared worryingly on the tense string that held the fuse. Hochberg pulled away the white bead and slowly edged down into a kneel, gracefully taking his time as he let the grenade fall out from his hands and he pulled his head clear of the ladder hole.
“Frag out.” The old chief said calmly and quite late for the rest of the team, though they had largely watched the matter unfold. A white flash erupted from the deck hole and Hochberg deftly leapt down into it, one hand gracefully tracing the hand guards as he expected to land quickly down below, weapon ready to fire at close range. As he landed a single heavy leather and brass dive suit fumbled with a its MP40 having just been blown up at close range. Black oil was already starting to trickle out around the elbows and hips. Hochberg landed hard, knees buckling and falling back to land between the ghouls’ legs and shooting straight up into the pelvis. The damage was instant. The heavy creature crumpled atop of Hochberg who shouted for assistance and the next SEAL landed with a thud beside the wriggling mass of struggling and brawling men. For a moment Hochberg couldn’t quite tell what was going on, when the ghoul crumped atop him he thought he felt the heavy brass connect with his belly and groin as he buried the muzzle into the crotch of the fanatic and pushed away. The old chief had been kneeing upward and scrambling on his back when he felt a close range shot smash into the deck behind him. There was shouting and lights turned on; flooding out his night vision and the world was a blinding place of punching and gunfire.
Hochberg was still on his back when he felt something heavy lift off his chest and then an impossibly hard blow connect with his head. The helmet bounced off the gridded deck and his vision was filled with floating dots. Another blow and the nightvision visor cracked and deactivated, the real scene suddenly coming into focus. A heavy divesuit was standing over him, looking down and stomping on his facemask, the first ghoul he had encountered was strewn over his body and pinning his weapon down under it against the chiefs belly. The ghouls leg drew back up for another kick, the bashed in face mask ready to implode under another blow. Hochberg released his weapon and reached out, catching the foot. His muscles strained under the weight and his elbows smacked into the ground, bone structure alone sustaining the effort of the stomp. There was a brief moment where the ghoul seemed legitimately confused as to how he could have been interrupted before a shower of sparks kicked off from the side of his head and he tumbled back from the ricocheted strike.
Hochberg looked down and spotted the second SEAL to have landed down the ladder, the pause in assistance must have been from when he flipped his night vision visor up and deactivated it, his eyes adjusting in the close quarters maelstrom. The SEAL fired again, this time the bullets shattering the heavy brass face-mask and the body clattering to the deck in a heap. Another SEAL dropped in and inched forward offering a hand down to the Chief as he was hefted out from under the dead ghoul. One final hatch remained shut ahead of them in the narrow passageway, slightly faded red letters stood solemnly: “GYROSKOP”. It was another tight entry point but there was no way around it this time. The ship had never really been designed to sustain a boarding party action and there had never been training of what to endure should such an issue arise. The ghouls who were so quick to leap and die for this place must have practiced for this event time and time again. Hochberg motioned to the team to prepared for narrow entry breach, pulling out the last of the stick grenades he’d salvaged from the last batch of crazy defenders.
“Engine team is in place at ‘za Gyroscope, Captain.”
Kessler peered back at the rising depth needle and nodded to Tylor, “Ring the bell, Taylor.”
The SEAL nodded and depressed the heavy button, flinching at how long and loud the sonar blast reverberated in the old Russian headphones.
High above in the water, bobbing along the surface and deep within the Pennsylvania, the sailor at the listening post turned and motioned for Captain White, looking alarmed.
Kessler turned back to lean on the periscope well and spoke into his microphone, “Seize the gyroscope, Chief.”