Kessler’s world was churning around him. He swallowed hard and reached out to steady himself on a nearby console. Even in a kneel the deck felt like it was rising unequally under his body and his vision tunneled back into his mind. Everything was still slow motion in a daze, the last SEAL into the room had grabbed up the one armed ghoul and pulled the heavy corpse away, black goo spilling over Perrys body, mixing with the blood that smeared under his boots. Perrys hands struggled to plug all the wounds he had, reaching around frantically to press into his armor to stop the blood flowing out. The SEAL knelt over him and started to peel back Perry’s chest plate before looking at Kessler and yelling. The old captain was looking right at the man and could see he was being yelled at but could not hear him, it was as if he was just far enough away to miss everything.
He could feel his heart struggling with the trauma it endured. With his best guessing, his heart was literally bruised and was learning to beat a new way, the pause in effective pump action causing his blood pressure to dip so low that his brain was half starved as if recently freed from an effective choke-hold. He tried to steady himself better on the console but felt the nausea well up as the shock set in. In an instant he ripped his rebreather off and vomited over the steel plating. Bile splashing into the terrible mixture already seeping out from the bodies.
A hand grasped his shoulder and he looked back to see Ke leaning down. She wouldn’t be able to hear him without his helmet on and he couldn’t explain what we was enduring anyways. He raised a finger and pointed towards Perry and Royale, gesturing for Ke to help with that. Kessler looked back over to the face-down SEAL who had entered the room with Royale and ended up soaking in near full magazine of 9mm. The old captain patted the dead man on the shoulder as his vision began to focus again, thoughts becoming clearer. Slowly his hands found his helmet again and he wiped his mouth with a forarm before clicking the rebreather in place. His eyes took in the scene around him. The Navy war flag of the Kriegsmarine was proudly hung by its top edges, pinned to the bulkhead in front of the helm. Around the walls, wired into makeshift frames were pictures of famous U-Boat captains, all aces, all lost to the sea. Then a frame with a good ol’ Adolf staring down from beside the periscope well. For the moment Kessler sneered, wishing his own Führer could see this nightmare unfold. Something struck his side and he turned to see that Ke had chucked an empty MP40 magazine at him.
“Perry is critical, Royale might be too far gone.” Her words sounded far away, perhaps he wasn’t quite 100%. Kessler leaned forward on the console hard and struggled to his feet as his other hand clicked the comms to global, “Helm secured, one dead, two wounded. Engine team report?”
Two decks down, Hochberg and his team were tiptoeing through the blackness, night vision giving them the world. The passageways were narrow, space in a submarine was at a premium in the lower decks where men had to compete with machinery. They were nearing The Kettle, Hochberg remembered all those heavy steel woven pipes and rubber hoses and tubes that emanated from that terrible chamber. Kessler’s report hissed in everyone’s ears and the old chief paused for a moment to reply.
“Engine team is one room away from Kettle. Standby.”
Before them was the science bay, the long tube that ran just before the primary chamber itself. Hochberg knew his odds of seeing Burton again were at their best. He wondered if he would recognize him, if it would be possible to tell him apart from the other terrible looking figures in the heavy divesuits. One of the SEALs posted up by the hatch, ready to sling it opened on command. Hochberg positioned his team all around the narrow passage, aware they were in a tremendously dangerous kill funnel.
In house to house fighting, the most dangerous place to be is a doorway, it is a natural choke point and an easy place to fill with bullets to keep enemy away. Worse yet were narrow alleyways. During one of the endless skirmishes in Fallujah, ‘Iceberg’ held back an unknown number of insurgents by holding down a narrow alley. As the brave bastards kept coming Hochberg would fire one or two rounds and shred through four or more of them, they would trample over one another to escape and he would cut then down in the scrum. The old chief glances down the narrow passageway and then toward the hatch they were about to breach. He did not care for his odds.
Ke dragged with all her might at Perry who weakly kicked his legs in assistance. Ke repeatedly yelling at him to stop helping. Kessler and the last remaining SEAL had hefted up Royale’s limp and bloodied body and were close behind. It was not ideal to leave the recently cleared room undefended, but the circumstances were fairly extreme. The group waddled back to the repair shop where Doc was hard at work tending to the wounded, checking vital signs and rechecking interventions. As he looked down to Perry his gave a reassuring smile and set to work on him with Ke. In moments Perry was bare chested and the extent of his injuries were clear; across his belly was a gleaming mass of intestines that had been freed from the muscles from an extensive knife wound. Perry looked to the disembowelment and gave a wide, messy smile to Ke.
“I knew you Chinese ate weird food.”
And then he passed out. Ke had already begun to check the divers pulse and Doc was pulling his rebreather off, pushing an oxygen mask to his face. Perry still had a thumping and fast pulse at his wrists but his face was growing sheet white. Ke couldn’t see how much of his organs were shredded, worse case scenario he had a punctured descending aorta, or inferior vena cava; best case scenario he just had a bit of prolapsed bowel hanging out. Ke positioned herself to hold the oxygen mask to Perry’s face while Doc fashioned a moist dressing to protect the exposed intestines, drawing in Perry’s legs to slacken the abdomen.
Royale was laid down behind Doc who took a peak at the damage. The SEAL Chiefs helmet was crushed inward badly and the facemask was shattered. The two had been on more missions and operations than he’d counted but in that moment Doc had to bottle those emotions up and tuck them away, battle medicine dictated those who could be saved were first. As he finished taping down the air tight dressing to Perry he reached a hand out to feel Royale’s pulse at the neck. Ke looked to Doc for a reaction and the corpsman looked off into space a moment before shifting about to begin working on Royale.
“His pressure feels like it’s about to come out of his neck…”
Ke looked up to one of the wounded SEALs on guard and asked them to hold the oxygen mask to Perry’s face as she moved to assist Doc. Kessler looked into the makeshift hospital, bits of sterile wrapping that held medical assistance strewn around, bodies in various states of undress and bandaging, and men who were in terrible condition and in need of better hospital care. The old captain turned to the helm and called into the radio, “Engine team, we’re going topside, get your sector set for surface action.”
Down below, Hochberg had finally set up his team the best way possible and acknowledged the command. The engine team had withdrawn all the way back to the ladderwell save for Hochberg who was going to throw open the hatch. The SEALs would have to aim a little better at the distance but that was their bread and butter.
They were about to knock on the Devils door. Hochberg held one hand on the latch and the other under his vest, gripping the old Luger.