David Gibbins - The Mask of Troy

‘ Anti-handling devices. This gets better every moment.’

‘The Luftwaffe had used them since the 1940 London Blitz, for delayed-action bombs. But we’re talking 1945 here. All the sinister genius of Nazi engineering designed to kill anyone trying to defuse this bomb.’

‘That means us.’

‘Okay,’ Costas murmured, both hands on the bomb casing, leaning forward to see as far as he could into the chamber. ‘Delayedaction bombs had a clockwork fuse. So you take that out, fine. The problem’s what’s underneath. The standard early anti-handling fuse was the ZUS-40. The jolt of impact would release a ball bearing, which would arm a spring-loaded firing pin. Or unscrewing the outer fuse would have the same effect, cocking the firing pin underneath. Or there could be another device entirely, a type 50 fuse with a mercury tilt switch that would arm itself when the bomb hit the ground, and then complete an electrical circuit if anyone tried to move it. Or there could be both devices.’

‘Okay. Okay. Just what do we do?’

‘Hold the tail unit.’

Jack backed off, then approached the bomb from behind and reached his arms carefully around the metal fins. He tried to stand on the base of the passageway, but the salt precipitate on the floor was viscous, slippery. He found a rock protrusion with his left fin and wedged it in. ‘Okay.’

Costas lifted the hammer and hit the edge of the rock cavity. Fragments came tumbling down around Jack. He hit it again, harder. Jack was barely breathing. Out of the corner of his eye he saw the Russian who had come down the passageway, watching them, hanging in the water just beyond the white haze about ten metres back, his exhaust streaming up into the gas pocket in the ceiling above.

There was a sudden jolt, and Jack flinched. He thought he felt the bomb move. If it slipped in his direction, there was no way he was going to be able to stop 250 kilograms of steel and high explosive from falling to the floor of the tunnel, pinning him down. But if that happened, they were finished. Costas hammered again, producing a shower of fragments, and then slipped his hammer back in his pocket and took out a tool like a socket wrench. ‘Okay. I’ve exposed the fuse pocket.’

‘What do I do?’

‘Watch our friend. I’ve seen him. He’s as likely to blow as this thing.’

‘How long?’

There was a ringing sound of metal on metal. Costas had taken out another tool. He was straining as he spoke, pulling the wrench. ‘Guy who taught the bomb disposal course I did once defused one of these in Portsmouth Harbour. Took him twenty hours to clear the rust around the fuses.’

Jack looked at his gauge. ‘We have ten minutes. Max.’

‘I think I need my hammer again for this.’

Jack cautiously released the tail unit, then let himself drift back, staring at the Russian. He was coming down, approaching the haze of human decay in the water. ‘Okay, Costas. I’m going to take him out.’

‘Just keep him away from me. Any disturbance and this thing could blow. Above those first bodies the fissure rises into a chamber, and I saw a surface. Must be a gas pocket. I saw a couple of miners’ picks on a ledge.’

‘Okay. I’ll be back.’

‘You better be.’ Costas’ eyes were glued to the bomb, inspecting the surface minutely, selecting tools by touch from his pockets. Jack remained still. The other two Russians were nowhere to be seen. Maybe they were sticking to plan, waiting further up until he and Costas returned. The man coming for them might have no method, no rationale. His mission was suicidal, but could still be murderous. Jack saw the glint of a wicked-looking blade in the man’s hand. He steadied himself. He heard the tap-tap-tap of Costas trying to free the fuse. He tried to remember Rebecca’s face, but it was not there. What he was about to do now was pure instinct, survival. He felt the adrenalin course through him. Not just survival. Rage.

He suddenly swam towards the Russian as fast as he could, grabbed the man’s jacket inflator and pulled it, sending them both rocketing upwards. He seized the man’s neck in a half-nelson with his left arm and clamped his wrist with his right hand to keep the knife away. The man’s eyes were wild, but his wrist was rock-hard and Jack knew there was no way he was going to move it. The tip of the knife was inches from his intake hose. They surfaced together inside the cavity in a welter of bubbles, creating a wave that sucked them down and then pushed them against the side of the chamber, ripping the left arm of Jack’s e-suit down to the Kevlar mesh. They bounced down again underwater, then up. Jack’s wrist began to shake, his grip loosening. The man had short, thick arms, massively muscled, and Jack’s longer arm could not hold against him, requiring far more leverage than he could muster. He felt a spasm of pain go down his back as he put every muscle in his body into holding the knife away. It was no use. He had only one option. He kicked with his fins as hard as he could, driving them both upwards. The instant he felt they had risen as far as they could go, he let go of the man’s neck with his left hand, reached up and pushed hard against the ceiling, forcing them back down deep underwater. He pulled the emergency inflate on the man’s jacket and it ballooned outwards, forcing them both upwards again and slamming the man’s head against the ceiling. Jack grabbed the head again with his left hand, let go of the wrist with his right and instantly balled his fist, ramming it upwards into the man’s face. It was the killer blow Ben had taught him, a massive upwards punch at the base of the nose that would splinter the bone and drive the fragments into the brain.

The Russian went limp in Jack’s hands. His mask quickly filled up with blood, his eyes still open behind it, like some ghastly avant-garde artwork. Jack ripped off the man’s mask and hood, spraying dollops of blood everywhere. His nose was a mess of blood and mucus and protruding bone fragments, and his eyes were covered in a film of red. Suddenly they flickered and he bellowed, pushing back from Jack and scrabbling to the far side of the chamber. He still had the knife in his hand and he leapt forward, swinging. Jack swerved sideways and caught the man’s head in a massive swipe with the flat of his hand, pushing it sideways into the wall. He had wedged his feet against the rock, and as he held the man, who seemed to hang there, limp again, he realized that the razor-sharp halite crystals on the cavern wall had driven into the Russian’s head. The man lurched again, snorting blood, his eyes crazed, and dragged his head backwards as Jack pressed on it, leaving a smear of blood and skin along the wall of the chamber.

Jack let go, and drew back, panting. The man would not go down. The Russian heaved himself half out of the water and stood there, panting, his head a blood-soaked mess, still holding the knife. Jack remembered the miners’ tools Costas had mentioned, on the ledge. He dropped down underwater, reaching blindly, and felt a handle. He wrapped his hand around it and pulled, releasing it from the salt accretion. It was a pick, with a flat, adze-like blade on one side, and a long, flat-ended spike on the other. He reared upwards out of the water, lurching sideways to give himself enough room to swing the pick in both hands. The man lunged again with the knife, missing and staggering back to the ledge. Jack swung the flat end of the pick, catching the man below the left ear, sinking it into his neck. He pulled the blade out and flipped the pick to the spike, bringing it back and swinging again, as hard as he could. The spike caught the man in the same place and went through his neck, protruding out of the other side in a geyser of blood. The man’s tongue lolled out, dripping blood, and he made a terrible gurgling noise, his eyes rolling upwards in their sockets.