ASM-DT.
‘No, no, they will be here!’ the pilot squealed. ‘They will be, they will – there!’
He pointed off to the left. A faint line of lights appeared through the murk.
As they closed, the line grew longer. And longer.
‘Wow,’ said Nina, unable to conceal her amazement. ‘That’s a big-ass submarine.’
The craft bearing the lights gradually took on form. The mother ship was well over two hundred feet long, a sleek white shape resembling an ultra-modern megayacht – but one with the ability to plunge beneath the waves on a whim. Large circular portholes ran along the length of its hull, a long wraparound window marking the bridge atop the elevated, streamlined superstructure. ‘Must have cost a few bob,’ said Eddie.
‘Ninety million dollars,’ the pilot volunteered.
‘Did I ask for a fucking brochure?’ The man fell silent, cowed.
Nina spotted movement through a porthole. ‘Shit, they’ll see us!’ She hunched down, tugging at Eddie’s sleeve for him to do the same. ‘Where do we dock?’
‘Behind the bridge,’ the pilot hesitantly answered, ‘or on the keel.’
‘Go to the top one,’ Eddie told him, pushing the gun behind his ear. The man obediently guided the Mako upwards.
‘You sure?’ Nina asked.
‘Be a lot easier for us to get out by jumping down than climbing up. We’ll need to move fast.’
The larger submarine slid past the windows as its offspring moved into docking position. The area aft of the superstructure was revealed as a flat deck; on the surface, it could be used by passengers to enjoy the sunlight, but underwater it acted as a landing platform. Bright lights revealed a port set into it.
‘Can you dock on your own?’ Eddie asked the pilot.
‘Yes, it’s – it’s automatic.’
‘Good. Where does the hatch open, and how many people will be there?’
‘The docking port goes into the engine room. I don’t know how many people will be inside – three or four, usually.’
‘But there might be more,’ Nina said. ‘Coming to congratulate you for killing us.’
‘They won’t be celebrating for long,’ said Eddie grimly. ‘All right, dock this thing.’
Sweating, the pilot manoeuvred the Mako into position. A graphic of the docking port appeared on a monitor, crosshairs guiding him into the perfect position. A series of bleeps, and the crosshairs turned green; he pushed a button, and the computers took over to lower the sub into position. A couple of bumps and clanks from below, then the engines shut down as flashing text on the screen announced that the minisub had docked safely.
‘That everything you need to do?’ Eddie asked. The pilot nodded. ‘Cheers, then.’ He smashed the rifle’s butt against the man’s head, knocking him back into unconsciousness. ‘You’re fucking lucky I didn’t kill you.’
‘What next?’ said Nina as they headed for the hatch. ‘I don’t want to rush down there without knowing who’s waiting.’
‘We don’t have to,’ Eddie replied. ‘We’ll let them come to us.’
At the bottom of the docking connector, two of the submarine’s crew watched as an engineer released the hatch, stepping back from the residual drips of water before looking up into it. The Mako’s own hatch was already open at the top.
But nobody was coming down it.
Seconds passed. ‘Where is he?’ asked one of the men, moving closer to see for himself. The submersible’s cabin lights were off.
‘I don’t know,’ said the engineer. He called up through the hatch. ‘Moritz?’ No answer. Giving his companions a look of concern, he tried again. ‘Moritz! What’s the problem?’
‘Yours,’ said Eddie, stepping out of the gloom and firing the rifle down the shaft.
The nail round hit the engineer in the face and went straight through his head, bursting out behind one ear in a bloody spray. The man standing beside him only had time to flinch in shock before a second sharpened spike plunged into the top of his chest and ripped open his heart. Both corpses crashed down on the deck.
The third man turned to flee. Behind him, Eddie dropped from the docking port with a bang. Another shot, and six inches of steel punched through the running man’s upper back to clang off the bulkhead beyond.
There was only one exit from the chamber. Eddie stepped over the bodies and opened a hatch to find a flight of steep metal stairs leading down into the submarine’s engine room. Two more crewmen were in the compartment, one staring up at him in stunned surprise, the other already sprinting towards a door. The Englishman tracked him and fired. The recoil from a nail round was different from that