Suddenly, everyone began to look at the person beside them; wary eyes uncertain of what to think. The submarine dived, not into the ocean, but into the depths of silence brought on by fear.
Now MacGyver understood McKenna's expression once he'd boarded the U-boat.
Nikki was the first to question what the captain was saying, but then going on past adventurers, Mac expected no less of her. "How can you be so sure?" She demanded, placing down her cocoa in favor of grilling the officer.
"There's no way we should have missed the storm on radar," he countered. "At least, not unless it was tampered with. Not to mention shipping forecasts, we should have had radio warnings. And as I just said, the storm wasn't bad enough to sink a ship like her, and yet we took on water so rapidly…"
"Maybe the radar malfunctioned?" Nikki offered. "Could the ship have had a design fault? Or even human error somehow?"
McKenna shook his head. "No…the Eternal Flame was sunk on purpose."
The silence returned, only broken by questions from MacGyver. "So this leaves us with more problems and no answers, like who, and why?"
"Why is a good question," Pete pondered. "I mean, surely they knew they were putting their own life at risk?" He hugged the blankets Mac had given him just that bit tighter.
"I kind of have an idea about that." MacGyver let his gaze fall on everyone in the confined space of the U-boat. Maybe putting them on the spot would make them squirm. "If I'm right, well the person who did this might value their "cause" more than their own life, or anyone else's."
"And what's that supposed to mean?" McKenna raised a brow, but Mortimer interrupted him.
"It doesn't matter – at least not yet." The pilot's urgent gaze locked with Mac's. "We need to sort out those leaks; otherwise this old tub and everyone on it, including your possible bad guy will be taking a dive they really don't want."
MacGyver nodded. "Where do we start?"
Mortimer turned back into the compartment he'd come from, obviously expecting Mac to obediently follow. "I'll take the one in the officers' quarters," he suggested. "Can you get the one in the electric motor room?"
"I'm on it…"
"Mind if I tag along?" Mac looked over his shoulder to see Nikki in tow. She might be asking, but he knew she'd already made her mind up to join them. She was stubborn that way. It was one of the traits he liked about her, although he'd never admit it.
"The more the merrier." He squeezed through a hatch and held the metal doorway open for Nikki to follow. It didn't take long to reach the leak, but then it didn't take long to reach anywhere on a submarine the size of the U-boat.
As they entered the motor room, MacGyver instantly spotted the problem. The leak was coming from an overhead pipe that sat above the battery cells. The water ingress wasn't all that bad, but it was where it was dripping that bothered him.
The troubleshooter's face turned down into a scowl as he approached the trickling pipe and put his hand over the burst seam.
"What's with the frown?" Nikki demanded, eyeing the water as it seeped through Mac's fingers. "That leak is so small you could probably use some of your favorite duct tape and a safety pin," she teased.
Mac shook his head. "Nope, this is salt water we're dealing with, and if any decent amount of it mixes with the electrolytes in the batteries it could create chlorine gas – it happened during the war quite a few times after sub's were damaged by depth charges and mines."
It was Nikki's turn to scowl. "Chlorine?"
MacGyver nodded as he assessed the best way to deal with the situation. "Uh huh, the smoke when the two mix is pretty toxic, if you inhale it for long enough it can destroy your respiratory system and…"
"And it's definitely not something you want floating around a very small U-boat," Nikki concluded for him with a gulp. "So how do we fix it?"
Mac pointed to a valve at the other end of the pipe. "First up, we try the obvious and try and close this section off." He moved to turn the wheel, but a clang from the compartment door behind them made him spin around.
Engel, the communications officer from the Eternal Flame was standing in the doorway, staring at them, and he wasn't here for fun. In his left hand, he held a small, but very effective automatic.
"I've been thinking," Engel sighed. "And I really can't let you go back and tell the others just what your "idea" is about the saboteur."
MacGyver moved away from the pipe, trying to put himself in front of Nikki. He raised his hands as he moved, offering up surrender. "Engel is a German name, isn't it?" He questioned, even though he already knew the answer.
Engel's face turned into a sneer. "And proud of it." He nodded. "And I'm also proud to be part of Madam Brandenburg's group." He seemed to note surprise on MacGyver's face and grinned. "Just because she was sent to jail, doesn't mean our Aryan movement can be stopped!"
Nikki pushed back past Mac, one hand on her hip in defiance. "Are you nuts?" She demanded, and then shook her head as if it was already a given. "Okay forget that, can somebody just tell me what the heck this is all about?"
"Oh I'd guess Brandenburg has her little soldiers looking for more lost E.R.R. treasures, just like the ones they had hidden down that silver mine." Mac stole a glance at Nikki. "These guys have the original files on where the Nazis stashed their stolen goods. But a U-boat? How can a U-boat in this condition survive all these years without being found?"
Engel shrugged, the sneer on his very smug face becoming even wider. "The U-boat originally docked at a secret re-fuelling port in an inlet not too far from our current location – just like it had been ordered too, but for some reason it never left. We found it by accident, after following the paper trail."
"So how did it end up in the depths of the Baltic?" Nikki didn't appear bothered about the gun that was pointing in her direction. Engel at least seemed to appreciate her gall, and continued to explain.
"My group found the U-boat at the inlet five months ago, complete with the art. It was inaccessible from land to remove the treasure, both due to the terrain, and the current landowner's security measures. Rather than be defeated, we decided to move the whole submarine to a secret destination. The project required some clandestine work to the submarine via the inlet, but it was a matter of pride to get what should have always belonged to us back in Aryan hands."
Nikki wasn't impressed. "So how come it ended up at the bottom of the sea?" Nikki snarked.
Engel drew down a breath that suggested he was becoming annoyed. "We were running on diesels on the surface, just to traverse a short distance, but we were spotted by a small dive boat and were forced to submerge before the occupants realized they were looking at a Nazi submarine, not a N.A.T.O. one."
"And?" Nikki was really pushing Engel. "You guys couldn't get it back up again?"
Engel's face reddened and his eyes widened just a touch. The weapon in his hand began to tremble, ever-so-slightly. "We had a problem. We had to use the escape hatch, and hoped to return for the U-boat when things quieted down. By then, though, the Phoenix Foundation was poking its nose in and we had to take more drastic measures."
"You sank a whole ship and killed how many people, just to get art?" MacGyver was incredulous. It seemed inconceivable, and yet he knew it was true. Some people could, and would kill for material things.
"Not just art," Engel growled angrily. "A piece of Nazi history! And it will pay for more of my brethrens ventures back in the states. There's a ship already on its way from my people to pick me and the treasures up. It's a pity we can't take the U-boat as well now, but it's about to become another very sad war grave…"
He gestured with the automatic, forcing Mac and Nikki further back into the compartment, and as they shuffled, MacGyver's mind hit overdrive. Like any situation, there had to be a way out, it was simply finding it.
Engel didn't seem to notice his enemy's eyes, roving every inch of the motor room. Now that he had them backed into a corner, he turned to the leaking pipe and began to hammer on it with the butt of his weapon until the small trickle became a much larger gush.
The water splashed innocently down onto the batteries below and began to slowly find its way into every open orifice, true to its liquid form.
Engel smiled appreciatively at his work and then spun the gun around to keep it on his targets while he backed out of the compartment and closed the hatch behind him. As the metal lock spun into place, tiny tendrils of yellow-green smoke started to ebb from the corner of one of the battery cells.
It had begun.
MacGyver noted the wisps of chlorine and rushed back to the oozing pipe work, but there was nothing in the motor room to work with. He slapped both his hands over the hole, hoping to slow the ingress and give him time to think.
Nikki joined in, throwing her jacket over the nearest battery in an attempt to slow the water's progress and stifle the leaking gases. "What do we do?" She asked relatively calmly. "If we don't stop this it will kill everyone, not just us, and they won't even know its coming!"
MacGyver looked at the hatch that was locked, and then at the one the opposite end of the room. There was no one back there to warn, but maybe there was something else he could use?
Taking a risk, he let go of the pipe and dived into the next compartment. It was the aft torpedo room. A place designed for only one thing – killing, and yet, as the cogs in Mac's mind spun, he realized that for once, this place might be able to save lives.
MacGyver moved to the torpedo tubes and checked out the controls. This was more Mortimer's forte than his, but it looked like this variant of U-boat was capable of reloading at sea, and that was what he needed.
"Nikki! I think I got something!"
Two seconds later Nikki was at his side, her face scowling but her eyes filled with hope.
Mac knew she trusted him, and he only wished he had the confidence she did right now, but he was messing with systems he had no idea how to work, and his German was definitely not up to reading the controls to help.
"What have you got?"
MacGyver glanced at the torpedo tubes. She was going to think he was nuts. "Listen, the U-boat is stationary in the water and on the surface, right? So technically, if I can get outside, I can get back in via the con tower hatch and warn everyone, and then we can get back here to sort the leak."
Nikki shook her head. "Last time I looked there wasn't a door in the side of this overgrown cigar tube labeled emergency exit?"
MacGyver patted the nearest torpedo tube. It felt cold and frighteningly alien. He carried on anyway. It's either this or be gassed…
"I'm gonna climb inside a torpedo tube, and then you're gonna flood it and open the outer door so I can swim out."
"Are you crazy?" Nikki's eyes widened suggesting she thought this wasn't one of his greatest plans. "No way am I going to risk drowning you in there. I don't know how to work a model sail boat, let alone a submarine that's ancient and foreign!"
Behind them, and through the compartment door, something popped and an ominous hissing began to fill their ears. Nikki licked her lips and dared to stick her head through the hatch.
After a few seconds, she returned, her face a mask of concentration. "There's more smoke," she admitted. "And it's starting smell funny."
Mac raised a brow. "We don't have long; let me show you how I think this all works."
"Think?" Nikki grumbled. "How you think, it works? You better more than think, bucko, because I don't want to be stuck in here to die on my own!" She turned to the torpedo controls and began to examine them.
MacGyver pointed out what he guessed were the right buttons and levers and ran through the sequence she needed to press them. Once Nikki was confident, he turned to the nearest tube, sucked down a breath, and opened the rear hatch as if he was going to load a fresh torpedo. Instead, he put a hand on either edge and levered himself inside.
It was cold, dark, and very claustrophobic.
Behind him, metal clanged and groaned as Nikki sealed him in, and he was plunged into complete darkness.
Mac took long, calm breaths, waiting for Nikki to bang on the door to signal she was going to flood the tube. In his mind, he couldn't resist the idea that the outer door would be stuck with age, or sea urchins, or maybe it had been damaged when the Eternal Flame's remains had pounded its hull?
His heart began to race, and it took all of his willpower to calm it again.
And then the water was gushing in around him. Had Nikki signaled? He hadn't even heard it.
Taking one last breath, MacGyver waited, hoping to feel the outer door open and release him from this very confined and watery tomb.
Seconds ticked by, and then the light somehow changed from total blackness, to a miry gloom. MacGyver kicked away from the tube wall and prayed his hands wouldn't hit metal.
They didn't, and within seconds he felt his body yanked into the icy Baltic that still swayed and frothed from the earlier storm.
His eyes and body adjusted to the light and temperature change, and he quickly swam towards the brightness above, breaking through the surface with just a few kicks.
The U-boat was behind him, and he turned in the water, desperately pushing towards its deck as the merciless sea tried to carry him away. There was little time, and like Pete, he could easily succumb to the conditions if he didn't get out of the frigid waves quickly.
Mac reached out a hand and grabbed for the mooring rope he'd used earlier, but his stiff fingers lost their purchase and he fell back into the water. Somehow, this wasn't quite how he'd imagined it when he'd described the plan to Nikki.
Nikki…stuck in the confines of the gas chamber Engel had created…
The thought spurred him on, and he snatched for the rope again, this time gaining a tenuous grip on the line. He took a moment to regain his waning strength, and then pulled, hauling his body onto the submarine's sparse decking.
It was cold, but not coma-inducing cold, like in the water.
Mac rolled onto his back and panted until he felt almost human again, then struggled to his feet on the slick hull. His feet slid, but he managed to reach the con tower ladder without falling back into the Baltic.
He reached out to the first rung, and then stopped as his eyes met with something else in the hazy distance.
There was a ship heading their way – probably the one Engel had spoken of – and that meant they had very little time to prepare before even more bad guys arrived. Assuming, of course, that they could stop the chlorine gas, and that Engel hadn't already killed everyone.
MacGyver's heart began to race again as his feet slipped and slid their way up the ladder to the con tower. He paused at the sealed entrance and took a moment to regain his composure. Engel could be below, and opening the hatch would alert him that the cavalry was on its way.
Still, Mac had to act now if they had any chance at all. Tentatively, he dropped down and slowly and quietly began to spin the wheel that opened the hatch. It creaked and groaned with age, despite his efforts, and he winced as he dared to lift the metal portal up slightly.
Below, he could hear raised voices as two, maybe more people argued. At one point, he could discern the Engel's distinct tones, and he sounded close.
MacGyver dared to raise the hatch a little more, but before he could peer inside, the sound of bullets, ricocheting off the inner hull almost made him draw back.
Instead, he yanked open the hatch all the way, no longer caring how much the metal cried out.
At the bottom of the ladder, directly beneath him, Engel was still shouting and letting off random shots at the rest of the crew. Mac couldn't allow that to continue. With no regard for his own safety, he dived into the opening, disregarding the ladder in favor of freefalling onto his target.
Engel screamed in fury as MacGyver's weight hit him square on the shoulders and knocked him to the deck plates. He tried to roll free, but Mac was ready for him, punching the Nazi square on the jaw with his best right hook.
Engel blinked, then fell back stunned as MacGyver shook his aching hand, as much out of habit as pain.
"I don't know where you came from, but…thanks." McKenna appeared and grabbed Engel's gun where it had slid under the periscope. Behind him, crewmen were rushing to help a fallen comrade, who was clutching at his side where he'd taken a bullet.
"Motor room," MacGyver muttered without really thinking about his answer. He'd come from there, and he had to get back there real fast if he was to save Nikki and stop the U-boat filling with gas.
McKenna looked at the con hatch with a scowl, as if to question how Mac could have arrived from the motor room via the tower, but MacGyver didn't even notice – he was already racing through the galley and diesel engine room back to the motor room.
Arriving at the closed door, he quickly removed the rod Engel had wedged through the rotating handle and spun it open.
The putrid stench of chlorine hit him hard, evoking a coughing bout, and he quickly pulled his wet t-shirt over his nose and mouth before going inside.
The compartment wasn't quite as smoke-filled as he'd expected, at least, not yet.
Nikki, where's Nikki?
Mac spun around on his heels, but she was nowhere to be seen. Then he remembered he'd left her in the torpedo room and guessed she'd had the sense to remain there, as far away from the leak as possible.
His eyes began to sting, and he resisted the urge to rub at them as he made a beeline for the aft compartment.
"MacGyver! Your dumb plan actually worked!" Nikki had covered her face with a piece of old rag that was disintegrating with age, and she coughed apologetically as Mac approached.
He put an arm around her, taking some of her weight and quickly urging her to the now open motor room hatch. Nikki nodded she understood and let her savior take the lead.
Once they were both clear, Mac pulled off his impromptu mask and slammed the door temporarily closed behind them. He sucked down grateful breaths of stale, but so far un-poisoned air, and then looked hard at Nikki. It was going to be difficult to get her to leave, but he needed the others to know what was going on, while he tried to stop the leak.
"Listen, I need you to go back and tell McKenna and Pete what's going on back here, and I also need you to warn them that Engel's rescue ship is on its way, and its close."
Nikki leaned forwards, hands on her knees and coughed for over a minute before answering with a deep frown and an even deeper, deadly serious voice. "No way am I leaving you. You need help to stop that mess in there!"
Mac let his deep brown eyes bore into her until she stopped her rant. "Do you know exactly how to stop the leak? No? But I know from experience you do know how to open your mouth. Now will you just go tell Pete?"
Nikki's jaw dropped, but she seemed to know better than to try and fight back. She shook her head in disdain. "You just be careful, you hear me?"
"Yes, ma'am…" MacGyver winked, and Nikki scowled again before scurrying into the next compartment and into semi-darkness.
Once she'd gone, MacGyver turned back and looked at the motor room door. He rubbed at his chin, ran a hand through his soaked hair, and then headed straight for the galley.
...
It was funny how you could save a bad situation with just a few ordinary, humdrum items, and the fact never ceased to amaze MacGyver. Of course, you had to know just how to use those items, and that was where Mac always excelled.
Right now, he was rummaging through cupboards and drawers, his hands moving like the wind. He was so engrossed in the task at hand, he never even heard Mortimer clamber into the galley behind him.
"What the heck are you doing? The leak is back in the motor room and you're searching for cutlery?" Mortimer's wide eyes watched as Mac continued his urgent sifting.
"Actually, I'm looking for baking soda. Wanna gimme a hand here?" Mac didn't look up.
Mortimer opened his mouth to respond, but MacGyver suddenly grabbed at a small tub from the back of a shelf and sighed with relief. "Gotcha!"
Without explaining what he was up to, Mac took a bowl and mixed the soda with some water. Satisfied he had the right strength mixture; he turned and picked up a towel that had seen better days. He slid a hand to his pocket, pulled out his knife, and cut the towel into two pieces, then soaked it in the solution he'd concocted.
"Please tell me you've not gone mad and are going to try and stop the leak with that?" Mortimer face was a picture of both curiosity and horror as he spoke.
"I've not gone mad," MacGyver confirmed, prodding his creation to make sure the towel was sopping wet. "And I'm not going to try and stop a leak with this. What I am gonna do is hopefully stay alive with this. Bicarbonate of soda has properties that can help neutralize chlorine, so I guess you could say I just made us two gas masks." He pulled out one rag and handed it to Mortimer, then wrapped the other around his nose and mouth. "What say we go fix that pipe?"
Mortimer looked at the rag, scowled, and then followed Mac's lead, wrapping it around his face. By that time, MacGyver had already dived into the next compartment and back towards the leak.
As they grew closer, Mortimer paused in the engine room, patting Mac on the shoulder. "Maybe we can find a pipe clamp in here?" He began rummaging through oil and grease covered tools from a bygone era.
Mac considered helping until he spotted a spiraling tendril of smoke ebbing from the bottom of the motor room door. Originally, the hatches would have been made airtight, but after all this time, something in the old submarine had given, and that meant everyone would soon be susceptible to the gas.
"There's no time, the gas is coming through the compartment door." MacGyver bit into his bottom lip, and then clambered back the way he had come, leaving the pilot to continue his search.
In his mind, Mac already knew what he needed, and he also knew where to find it. Earlier, he'd worn a life jacket, and that jacket was now going to become U-boat first aid.
Finding the vest in the crew quarters, he scooped it up, and then moved on to the galley. He recalled the Pamela Anderson mug and smiled, but that wasn't quite what he needed. He selected an uncrushed Coke can, and once again moved on further forward until he reached Commander Witt's cabin.
Mac hoped the officer still had clothes here, and pulled open the tiny wardrobe in anticipation. There was a waterproof all-weather coat sitting on a wire coat hanger. Perfect!
MacGyver took off the coat, discarded it, and took the hanger – the final ingredient in his recipe for leaky pipes.
Now, he just needed a couple of tools he was sure he'd just seen Mortimer with back in the engine room. He headed back there at full speed, hoping the gas hadn't gotten any thicker in his absence.
It had.
The engine room was now full of the deadly gas, and even though he was wearing Mac's mask, Mortimer was still coughing. His eyes lit up as he saw the troubleshooter emerge through the mist, then his gaze dropped to the items in MacGyver's hands.
"Okay, tell me you're not gonna fix the leak with those either?"
Mac grinned, although Mortimer couldn't see it beneath the rag over his mouth. "Oh but I am!" He set the can, hanger and vest down and wafted at the mist until he could make out the tools laid out on the bench. Selecting a pair of cutters and a screw driver, he nodded to Mortimer. "Open up the hatch, it's now or never."
Mortimer did as he was asked, waiting the other side for Mac to follow. "Just how is any of that going to stop the water?" He asked as MacGyver moved to the pipe with his homemade fix.
Mac took the life jacket and began to cut into it with his knife. "Easiest way to describe it, is that I'm kinda making a wound dressing for the pipe. These vests either have a rubber inflation tube or two rubber bladders. I want the rubber for my "gauze" pad." He pulled out a central tube as if to prove his point.
He set the tube down, picked up the cutters and began to slice down the center of the Coke can, completely removing both the top and bottom sections to leave a metal tube with a slit down the side. "This is gonna be the bandage over my gauze," he explained, then picked up the coat hanger and started to unwind it, cutting two lengths. "And finally, the hanger sections will be my adhesive strip…"
"You're nuts!" Mortimer hacked out, shaking his head.
MacGyver placed the thick rubber tube over the hole in the pipe. It was just the right size. Then he opened up the Coke can "tube" and wrapped it carefully over the rubber, closing it back together as tightly as he could with his hands.
The water ingress slowed slightly, but didn't stop. Things weren't quite taut enough yet. Taking the first piece of wire, he wrapped it around the left edge of the can then twisted the ends finger tight, making sure to leave reasonably long ends. He did the same with the right side of the can.
Once both sides were secure, he wrapped the wire ends around the screwdriver and quickly spun it clockwise to twist them further, shortening the length with each turn to tighten the hanger strips over the can and wad far more securely than could ever be achieved by hand.
The steady flow of water at last began to abate until it was nothing but a tiny drip.
Mortimer still held a hand over the cloth on his face, but managed to mumble out a sentence. "The can stops the wire cutting into the rubber, and keeps it tightly in place! I'd never have thought of that!" He seemed genuinely amazed.
Mac didn't have time for praise, however. He grabbed the pilot's arm and tugged him back towards the motor room hatch. Once they were outside, he slammed it closed, spun the wheel into the locked position, and then used his wet "mask" to pack in at the bottom where he'd seen the gas leaking through earlier.
Mortimer copied the motion. "Now what?" he asked as he pressed hard on the cloth, pushing it into the door seal.
"Get every hatch topside you can open, so if any gas that's left gets out, it will dissipate. I guess it wouldn't hurt to get the oxygen scrubbers going too, even though we're surfaced." MacGyver stood up, exhaled, and then remembered the ship he'd seen earlier. It would be much closer now. "I'm going to see if Engel's buddies are any nearer."
...
The atmosphere in the con was subdued as MacGyver entered, most of the spare crew had gone to try and either help Mortimer or man what controls they understood, but Pete, Nikki and McKenna had remained.
McKenna looked up as Mac breezed in, and his shoulders sagged as if he'd suddenly relaxed just a touch.
Does he have that much confidence in me? MacGyver wondered.
"MacGyver, did you stop the leak?" Pete was looking over at him, even though his eyes couldn't see.
"We got it covered – literally, with a Coke can," Mac teased. "What about the ship I saw earlier?" He asked, his tone becoming more serious.
McKenna rubbed at the back of his skull. "It will be on top of us in half an hour, max. No way can we dive, this thing just wouldn't take it, and even if we could, last time Engel's bunch tried it, they couldn't resurface for some reason. I don't even now how you guys pulled it off…"
"What about a good old fashioned run for it?" Nikki suggested. "Just because we can't go down, can't we just sail across, or whatever it is a U-boat does when it's not submerged?"
"It might help," McKenna agreed. "If we could run fast enough, and if we had a radio to call for help, but I don't think the diesels aboard this tub are a match for the ship out there, and the radio is bust!"
Pete apparently wasn't so defeatist. "What say we try anyway, Captain? Maybe Mac can fix the radio. He can just about fix anything!"
McKenna looked dubiously at his superior, but nodded. "I'll tell the men to get everything they can out of those engines, and we'll head for the coast…"
Mac glanced at Nikki and smiled wanly. "I don't suppose you know where the radio room is?"
"As it happens I do. It was the first thing I tried when we got aboard this overgrown boy's toy." She jerked a thumb back into the next compartment and MacGyver followed her into a tiny side room with Pete in tow.
The room was barely large enough for them all, and held just a small seat and an ancient and very large radio set with headphones the size of a house.
Mac perched Pete on the seat and then tried the radio's' on and off selector. It was quite dead. No power then.
Taking out his knife, he let his fingers slide down the unit's metal casing until they reached four screws. He undid each in turn and gently lifted off the housing to reveal a maze of wires and strange, old-style vacuum tubes. He'd played with radios like this as a kid, even made them up from scratch, but those kind only received, and right now he needed to transmit.
MacGyver took a moment to survey the components, trying to recall what each one did. Then, in turn he checked each one until he found what he was looking for. Several of the contacts had become corroded with age, meaning current could no longer flow correctly via them.
Mac took the sharpest blade on his knife and began to scrape away the green oxidization on each until shiny metal was once again visible. Eventually, he tried the switch marked "Schalten Sie" again, and the radio crackled into life.
At first, it simply hissed and popped, but then MacGyver carefully and delicately changed the transmit frequency to something they had a chance of reaching a modern vessel on.
He handed the headset to Pete. "Okay, you two work your magic while I go help McKenna."
Pete smiled and wafted a hand as if to say he had everything in control, and Mac truly believed he had. Pete was the best at diplomacy and communication, and if all else failed he had Nikki as back up with her rabid tenacity.
And given their crazy story, and current mode of transport, well, they needed all those skills and more not to get taken as time wasters.
Mac left his two friends behind knowing if anyone could pull it off, they could, and headed back to the con tower. McKenna was waiting, barking orders to the few crew he had.
When he spotted MacGyver, he walked brusquely over and shook his head. "The ship's still gaining on us, and they have a deck mounted machine gun pointed our way. Think they'd actually use it, given what we're carrying?"
"They want the U-boat and art, not us. If they manage to board the submarine, I'm guessing we'll all be surplus to requirements." Mac glanced around and noted Mortimer showing a crewman how to work the controls in front of him.
Mortimer met his gaze, and offered up a suggestion of his own, although it was one MacGyver would never approve of. "The U-boat has a deck gun of its own. We could try and clean it up…"
Mac sighed. Why did everything always resort back to violence? "That's not the way to deal with this," he answered. "And besides, after all these years no way is that gun safe. You're more likely to shoot yourself than the bad guys."
Mortimer wasn't giving in so easily. "What about torpedoes? I just happen to know we can fire one from the aft tube of this puppy while it's surfaced."
"Does it have to come down to bloodshed?" Mac winced. "We can't just sink that ship to save our own necks. Kill or be killed doesn't work for me."
"So we just die?" Mortimer's tone said he was more than frustrated.
MacGyver didn't hear the suggestion. He was already working on an alternative plan in his mind. He chewed on his bottom lip. "Maybe we could fire a few warning shots at Engel's buddies until Pete can get help."
"If Pete gets help," Mortimer pointed out, wagging his forefinger. "And trust me, you can't just fire a warning shot with a torpedo, those suckers don't work that way. And you can't just do close enough to scare and not hurt with fifty-year-old tech, either."
"I think we can," Mac argued. "Torpedoes don't arm until they've traveled at least fifty meters, right?"
"What's your point?"
"If we fire at Engel's people with less than fifty meters between us, we can aim directly at them and the torpedo will simply break up on impact because it won't have armed." MacGyver was confident he could save lives – even the bad guys. "Maybe they won't realize we did it on purpose and will back off."
Mortimer's brow creased as he appeared to thing about it. Eventually, he slowly nodded. "It just might work! I can do the targeting from the con tower; can you deal with the torpedo room?"
Mac smiled. "I've already been there, kinda done that today, but from the torpedo's' point of view."
Mortimer frowned, obviously not realizing just how MacGyver had escaped the motor room earlier. Mac didn't stick around to explain, dodging back through compartments until he came to the area that had been filled with gas. The question now, was had it cleared enough to let him in the aft torpedo room?
Mac pulled away the rags they'd placed and spun the lock open. Tugging hard on the steel door he put his arm over his nose and mouth just in case.
The air beyond still wasn't exactly pleasant, but most of the smoke had gone and he guessed, or rather hoped so had any danger.
Jogging inside, Mac stole a glance at the batteries. There was no more chlorine ebbing from them. He sighed with relief and carried on into the torpedo room.
The age-old projectiles were sleeping, as they had for many years on large metal racks. There was a hoist and straps to make it easy to load them into the tubes, and with a little maneuvering MacGyver was able to get one of the torpedoes into place relatively quickly.
He closed the small metal door behind it and remembered the sensation of claustrophobia he'd felt earlier when Nikki had shut him into the very same tube. He pushed off the feeling just as the sub's intercom crackled behind him.
"This is Mortimer, McKenna has us in position, is everything ready your end Mac?" The line popped and cracked like an old record.
Mac pushed on the "send" button, or at least that was what he hoped it said. "Torpedo in position, tube flooded and ready to fire…I hope."
There was a pause, as if McKenna and Mortimer were recalculating and repositioning, then Mortimer was back, his voice sounding suddenly more urgent.
"Fire now, Mac!"
MacGyver closed his eyes and slapped his hand hard on the controls. Would the torpedo even fire? Could he be sure it wouldn't explode on impact after all this time?
Guilt and uncertainty washed over him, but given the options, this really was their last chance. He waited, heart pounding in his chest for another call from the con tower.
"Mac, it worked! They're backing off!"
Mac considered waiting to see if another torpedo might be needed, but shook off the thought and raced back to the radio room where he'd left Pete and Nikki. What they needed now was contact with the outside world, but would his friends have actually pulled it off?
...
MacGyver wasn't sure he'd ever seen Pete Thornton with such a smug face before. His portly friend was sitting in the radio room with rather red cheeks and a smile from ear to ear. Nikki Carpenter's expression wasn't any less complacent.
"I'm guessing you guys made my radio fix worth while?" Mac asked, popping his head into the confined room.
"HMS Argyll is already so close Engel's people are trying to make a run for it," Pete explained. "It took a little while to convince the captain of a British frigate that I wasn't going nuts, but once he contacted Phoenix…"
"Just wait until he pulls alongside this tub," Nikki added. "Can you imagine the moment a British warship and a WW2 German U-boat sit side by side? And we get to see it first hand!"
Pete became more serious, cocking his head in the direction Mac was standing. "The Brits have alerted other N.A.T.O. ships in the area about what's been happening. I don't think it will be too long before Madame Brandenburg's' people are caught and arrested."
"What about us?" Mac asked.
"They're going to tow us to the nearest port and disown us," Nikki joked. "Maybe they heard you were onboard?"
Mac puffed out a breath. He was just glad it was all over. "Yeah well, so much for a fun, safe assignment. Maybe I'll go up to the cabin, slide under a blanket and never come out again. I think it's the only safe place for me!" There was amusement in his eyes as he spoke.
Nikki laughed. "Mac, with your reputation for finding trouble, I doubt even that would work!"
...
Four Weeks Later
Inlet off the Baltic Sea
MacGyver steered the small motor boat carefully through the waves as he headed towards the shore. He was alone, and thinking hard about the U-boat's story.
After being towed back by the British frigate, he really should have just returned to L.A. but something about U3524 had intrigued him, and once he was on a roll, Mac rarely gave in without a solution to a problem, or in this case, the truth behind something fast becoming a legend.
The submarine was simply too well preserved to have sat in some Nazi refueling port for forty-five years without anyone knowing about it. And why had it never been discovered? Where was the crew? So many questions and Mac needed answers to them all.
After doing some digging with Dr. Sand, he'd managed to find the location of the secret port where Engel had found the sub, but the land it was on was privately owned by an elderly gent. In fact, the man had owned the land since the war had ended, and still lived there in a cabin in the nearby woods.
Maybe this man was the only person left alive who really knew what had happened so many years ago?
MacGyver slowed the boat and eventually cut the engine, letting it slide into the port on its own momentum. It hit the old wooden decking and bounced backwards, but Mac was ready for it and jumped out onto the landing stage, securing his ride with a rope for and aft.
He took a breath and looked around, suddenly amazed by how well preserved the place was. It was like he'd borrowed a time machine and stepped back into another era.
There were high rock formations all around, and the outcroppings provided good cover for the hidden port. To help with the illusion of barrenness, submarines that docked here had obviously been covered over to conceal them, and the huge colored web for U3524 still lay discarded on the ground where Engel's group had removed it.
There was old fuel drums lined up like troops, rusting and corroded, along with rotting crates and lots more camouflage netting. Here and there, he could still see the swastika emblem, faded and worn away with age and sunlight.
If U3524 belonged anywhere, it was here.
Sitting across from the port on one of the crates was an old gray-haired man with a fishing rod perched in his gnarled hands. He seemed oblivious to having a visitor and simply stared out at the water with deep blue, very weary eyes.
MacGyver guessed he was looking at Kurt Werner, the landowner – the man he had come to meet. Taking slow, deliberate steps he approached the old-timer and then pulled off his woolen hat as an act of courtesy.
"S'cuse me, sir, I'm looking for a Mr. Werner?"
The old man smiled as if he knew that already. "Then I would suppose you've found him," he offered with a very sharp German accent.
Mac abruptly felt sheepish, and he gripped the hat in both hands just a little more tightly. "Sir, I think you know why I'm here…U3524..?"
Werner set down his rod and sat forwards, clasping his hands together as if he were gathering some inner strength before speaking again. Eventually, he sighed, and began to talk. "My brother and I were crewmen on the U-boat, and at the end of the war we were given orders to take the art we were carrying to Argentina."
"But that didn't happen?"
Werner shook his head, his eyes becoming bleary with obvious pain. "No, many of the crew, including myself didn't believe in what the E.R.R. was doing, so when we docked here for fuel, we all refused to carry on. The war was over – we just wanted to go home to our families. That was never going to happen for my brother, Erik. There was a fight with one of the officer's and he was shot and killed…"
MacGyver looked down at the frozen earth beneath his boots. He was getting the real truth now, but at the expense of Werner's feelings, and that wasn't what he'd intended. "I'm sorry," he began, but Werner cut him off.
"Don't be. I've never forgotten about Erik, or his senseless death. You see, a few weeks after the war ended I came back here, and imagine my surprise when I discovered the U-boat intact – no one had found her. My family was wealthy in their own right, not from pillaging others, and I was able to buy this land and move here. I kept everything, even the U-boat just as it was. Call it a lasting monument to my brother." Werner looked over to where the submarine had been docked.
"And you weren't tempted to sell the art, or return it?" Mac asked mindful of the old man's feelings.
"NO!" The answer from Werner was sharp and gritty. "The submarine should have been left alone. She was a war grave, after all…" He paused, swallowed as if gathering himself and then continued. "One day recently I came here and she was gone. All those years of preserving her for nothing."
"You didn't just leave the U-boat to rust, though, did you? She lasted because you tried to work on her, to keep her just as she was originally?" MacGyver finally realized why the submarine had been able to run and function after so many years. Werner had been her caretaker – she had been his weird obsession for almost half a century.
Werner nodded solemnly. "You would tend a grave wouldn't you? Take flowers and such? This was my mausoleum for Erik, and I don't understand who would take this away from me? Was it about the art?"
"Kind of," MacGyver admitted, taking a crate to sit next to Werner while they talked. "You see the E.R.R. still has followers, and they discovered your U-boat. They came here at night and did some modifications to make her sea-worthy again so they could get her cargo. At least they thought they had, but she went down in the Baltic a few miles from here and they had to abandon her. A diver discovered her by accident, and the foundation I work for stepped in…"
"She's lost?" Werner was almost brought to tears by the news, and he looked away, scrunching his eyes closed to apparently hold back his feelings. "I knew some day when I was gone this might happen, but still…"
Mac put a hand on the old man's shoulder reassuringly. "Kurt, she's not lost. You looked after her so well we managed to surface her. In fact, I guess you could say she even saved a few lives, including mine."
"Where is she now?" Werner's eyes had become bright again.
"The German authorities have her. The bad guys have been arrested, and the art is being returned to its original owners, or their living relatives." MacGyver smiled. He was a sucker for a happy ending.
Werner nodded, as if he approved. "I should have returned the art myself, instead of keeping the U-boat as a shrine, then none of this could have happened. What will happen to her now? I suppose she will be towed to some salvage yard to be broken up?"
"No way!" Mac enjoyed giving more good news. "Peter Thornton, a very good friend of mine at the Phoenix Foundation has arranged for your U-boat to be put on display at a German transport museum – she's gonna be fully restored. That's one of the reasons why I came to find you."
"It is?" Werner was genuinely excited now.
"Yep, those folks at the museum would really love it if you could go over and see the boat being worked on, maybe give them some insight on her from your unique point of view." Mac's smile was creeping into a full-on grin as he spoke. It was good to give out a little joy, given how bleak the world could be sometimes.
Kurt rubbed at his chin, as if an idea was forming. "Do you think perhaps that the museum would allow a dedication plaque in my brother's name?"
"Heck, I don't see why not. In fact, I bet Pete could even arrange it for you."
"How can I repay you?" Werner was close to tears again, but this time out of happiness. "I would ask you to join me for dinner, but…" He looked down at the fishing rod and empty net and couldn't resist a small chortle. "I always was better at being under the sea like a fish, than actually catching one!"
MacGyver slid a hand under his thick padded jacket and pulled out a stick of chewing gum. The move drew a confused look from Werner, but Mac continued to unwrap it with a smile, being careful with the foil sleeve. "Oh, I think I just might be able to help you in that department…"
The End