Peter Pišťanek - The End of Freddy

Lieutenant Kolesa turns to Kubeš and wipes the sweat off his face.

“I think it’s going well, sir,” he shouts.

“Will it take long?” Kubeš roars into his ear.

“I can’t say exactly, sir,” Kolesa replies. “Five, maybe seven more hours.”

Not fully reassured, Kubeš goes back to his cabin. This engine breakdown has made him ponder all the problems to be expected on future voyages to Junja. He sits on his bunk and tries to imagine what form the Russian blockade of the island takes. He thoughtfully observes the strange movement that his jacket, hanging on a hook, makes as the boat pitches. He has studied his data so thoroughly that he could draw by heart a detailed map of all the islands in the Junjan archipelago, but he looks at them again, looking for any new detail that he has forgotten to remember.

“Commander: daybreak,” his intercom announces.

Kubeš checks his watch. It’s six thirty. Yes, time to go to the bridge and get some fresh air before diving. He puts on waterproofs and boots and approaches the ladder in the command centre. Kraus reports a slight change of course, otherwise nothing unusual has happened.

The sky is overcast and the waves are capped with foam. Icy spray hits him in the face, so he pulls the hood down over his face.

“Will the diesel be working soon, commander?” asks the third officer.

“Yes,” Kubeš answers dryly and aims his binoculars at the brightening horizon. The clouds break, showing areas of clear sky. Kubeš lets the binoculars fall on his chest and observes the stars turning pale against the ever brighter sky. Then he turns to Kraus.

“We’ll dive in a moment,” he says.

They both clamber down to the command centre. Kubeš goes to the intercom and pushes the button.

“This is your commander speaking,” he says, and his amplified voice echoes through the entire submarine. “Gentlemen, the Junjan archipelago is very close. Soon we’ll find ourselves within operational range of Russian ships. Engineer Rajter has to finish repairing the right-hand diesel engine, and then we’ll immediately head for the Russian blockade. If we’re lucky, we’ll sneak through unobserved. If not, we’ll have to play a cat-and-mouse game with the Russians. Somehow or other, we’ll get to Junja and then use another way to get back. Of course, if we are to survive, all my orders, and those of all our officers, simply must be carried out precisely.”

As Kubeš speaks, he observes the faces of the four men in the command centre. He sees tense, grimly determined faces. None betrays any unwillingness or inner disagreement. Kubeš has in his crew either only superb sailors, or only superb actors, he thinks.

“We have on board a few dozen self-targeting anti-aircraft Stinger missiles for the Slovak guerrillas in Junja,” says Kubeš. “Two of them have been re-programmed by Engineer Kolesa to hit surface or naval targets. If the Russians really fuck with us and get us in a corner, we’ll show them.”

Kubeš hopes that it never gets to the point of using these weapons, but neither does he want his crew to feel totally defenceless.

Kubeš can hear, despite the barriers between the compartments, his words generating noisy approval and applause.

“Anyone who has nothing to do, I mean not on duty, or in the engine room, should now go to their bunks and get some sleep,” Kubeš goes on. “No videos in the mess room! The men on watch will wake the cooks at three p.m.; we’ll eat at five. During the approach manœuvre, there’ll be no hot food, only sandwiches that men can eat at their posts. Everyone gets a bar of chocolate, too. We’ll be saving electricity, so all lights, unless needed, will be turned off. Nobody should move more than necessary, so we use less oxygen, as we may be diving for several days. No noise! We’ll be very deep down, but the Russians’ instruments might detect us. We shan’t surface; the batteries will be recharged via the snorkel, if needed.”

Kubeš pauses and then adds:

“It’s in everybody’s interest to be well rested and in good form: that’s why we have to sleep now. Good night!”

Then they dive.

Kubeš goes to his cabin, closes the door over its high threshold, and takes off his cap. He falls into his bunk and remains lying there for a long time, not thinking about anything. Then he gets up and runs a hand through his hair. His eyes fall on his open notebook on a table. He sits down at the desk and opens the ship’s log. He begins to write:

22.2. South-westerly, 7–6 knots, overcast. Overnight, boat moves southwest Junjan archipelago (see tracker record). In the morning, set coordinates as per GPS and a dive.

He puts his fountain pen away. He should now mention the broken bearing in the right-hand engine crankcase, but he’d rather not. He takes his jacket off, stretches out on the bunk and turns his light out. Light comes through the ventilation opening in the door of the captain’s cabin, but then someone turns the light off in the corridor, leaving only the night light on. The cabin is immediately plunged into darkness. Occasionally the noise of repair work on the engine comes from the engine room.

In the rear, behind the partition of the command centre, five feet from the cabin, Kubeš can hear the watch whispering in a monotone. Here and there is the gurgle of water in a pressure tank and the conning tower.

Kubeš opens his eyes and tries to estimate how long he has been dozing. He listens hard, but he can hear no noise from the engine room. He hears only the murmur of the men on watch nearby. He cannot wait any longer, gets up, puts on his shoes, draws the curtain and quietly goes towards the engine room. The coughing and movements of men turning on their beds behind the plastic walls and doors prove that he is not the only one up. As he quietly passes the open door of the warrant officers’ cabin, a few heads are raised to see who is walking by.

It’s almost dark in the engine room; only a small lamp illuminates Rajter’s face bent over the engine room log. Immersed in his work, he doesn’t hear Kubeš come in and only straightens up when Kubeš taps his shoulder and quietly asks: “Has it all worked out as you thought?”

“Yes, I think the problem’s solved, sir,” says the chief engineer. “We’ll know for sure only this evening, when the engine’s running.”

Kubeš frowns.

“Look, no joking, Mr Rajter,” he says. “The engine has to work and properly, too. You know very well that I’ll be asking the engine to do the impossible. It mustn’t fail before Junja and certainly not on the way back. If you’re not utterly sure, better tell me while we have time. Is that clear?”

“No worries, sir; the engine will work fine. I see no reason for another breakdown,” the chief engineer assures him very calmly.

“Good, Rajter, that’s what I needed to hear from you,” comes Kubeš’s conciliatory reply.

Rajter’s answer calms him a bit and yet astounds him. Apparently, the idea of sailing into the Junjan archipelago area with improvised repairs to an engine did not bother the engineer at all.

Kubeš lies down in his cabin and promptly falls asleep. After reveille and dinner, most crewmen return to their bunks: they’ve nothing to do.

Kubeš, all three warrant officers, steersmen Petrovič and Sebera and the electronic systems operator, Anděl, are in the command centre. The submarine is running at a depth of one hundred metres.

“Sir, we’ll have to ascend higher,” says the chief steersman Petrovič. “The seabed is rising and soon we’ll get to the shelf slope.”

The submarine proceeds blindly, by the map, as the sonar is turned off, since there may be enemy vessels about.

“Rise thirty metres,” Kubeš orders.