Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters I have borrowed from M. . I do own Illya and Aggie Madison.
In a few minutes the three agents were back in their cell on their own. "Rose, you star !" exclaimed Carrie quietly, hugging Rose.
"You are proper clever girl," said Illya admiringly. He also gave Rose a huge hug. Rose blushed and couldn't help smiling. It was nice to be appreciated.
Oscar was sweating with the tension of driving the mini-sub through the underwater tunnels. He was using the sonar and looking through the port holes to try to keep the sub in the centre of the tunnel. Luckily it was quite large, but less luckily there were large pieces of rock lying on the bottom where they had apparently broken away from the roof. He wanted to drive as slowly as possible, but had to keep up some speed to be able to steer it properly. He breathed a huge sigh of relief when he saw the walls disappear on either side and the sonar indicated a large space of water ahead. He checked his depth gauge, but it wasn't giving a steady reading. He was going to have to play it by ear.
Slowly he let the sub rise, until it suddenly bobbed and he saw the surface of the water splashing past the portholes. He raised the periscope, but the chamber he was in was completely dark. This was good and bad news. The good news was that it was probably not in use by the new occupiers of the complex. The bad news of course was that he couldn't see where he was going. He tried to direct the sub's headlights to the side to try and find a dock to moor against. There was no way he was going swimming again !
Moving the sub slowly across the water, Oscar started to get a feel for how large this underground submarine dock must be. A wall loomed into view. He slowed and reversed the engines, trying to line the sub up against the wall. As the sub gently scraped along the side of the wall, Oscar gently whistled, hoping the sub could take it. Once he stopped the engines, Oscar put on a head torch and opened up the hatch. He looked around and found that the sub didn't reach very far up the wall. Either the sea level had dropped or the dock was built for much bigger submarines than Frank's. There was a metal ladder attached to the dock wall part way down the sub's side. Oscar dipped back into the sub and pulled out his rucksack. He also tied a belt with further equipment round his waist.
Closing the hatch he carefully put on his rucksack and picked his way along the hull of the sub to the metal ladder. He tested his weight carefully on the ladder. It had to be over 50 years old. It must have rusted badly in this environment. He breathed a sigh of relief as the ladder appeared to be strong enough. He climbed on to the dockside and gasped in amazement. The dock was huge. There were three huge bays like the one he was using. They were all big enough to take a full-sized naval submarine. The roof was high and any noise he made echoed around the chamber. He started looking for a door.
At the end of the dock, up a set of wide stairs was a metal door. There was a circular wheel attached, like the kind you found on ships and submarines. He tried to turn it but it was obviously rusted shut. He pulled off his rucksack and removed a small device from a plastic bag full of them. Replacing the bag and shutting his rucksack, he placed the device against the side of the door. He stepped back well out of the way and whistled loudly. The device exploded and the door jumped out slightly. Running back, Oscar pulled on the door wheel. This time he was able to pull the door open. It took all his strength to open it wide enough to squeeze through. He tried to close it again, but gave up. It might be better anyway to have an open door if they were in a hurry on the way back.
The corridor beyond the dock was also in darkness. Oscar consulted his map on the spy-pod and set off in what he thought had to be the right direction. He could feel the darkness closing in around him and it made him tense. He tried to focus his eyes on the beam of his torch. He needed to find another entrance which should be on his left according to the plans on the spy-pod. Oscar kicked himself for not counting his paces. At least he would have some idea how far he had come. It was completely disorientating in the darkness and he had no idea how far he had walked. Luckily, his torch finally picked up the shadow of another circular door wheel sticking out from the wall.
Oscar checked his plans. He needed the first door on the left. He hoped he hadn't accidentally passed another one. Again the wheel was rusted up. He took another small explosive out of his rucksack and set it on the door's side. It exploded, but the door didn't open. Worried, Oscar took another explosive out of his bag and set it on the door. He counted how many charges he had left and had a quick count of the doors he would have to get through. He hoped he wouldn't have to blast his way through every single one, because he didn't have enough explosives. The second charge went off and this time the door fell open. He pulled it a little further and slipped through into the bottom of a stair well. Result. This must be the right door. He started climbing.
This time Oscar was counting. He needed Level B for the prison cells. He'd started on Level F so that meant he need to go four floors up. Breathing heavily, he arrived at the right door. He took the spy-pod and attempted to scan through the door. It wouldn't penetrate. Instead he laid his ear against the door and listened. He couldn't hear anything. Carefully he tried the door wheel. It moved a little. Oscar really hoped he could open it without explosives. He didn't want to bring the villains running if he could avoid it. It took all his strength, but he finally managed to turn the wheel until he heard the lock click. He carefully pulled on the door and light shone through from the other side. Oscar turned off his head torch and cautiously peered through the gap he had opened. As expected, there was a corridor on the other side and it was empty.
He stepped through the door and swung it closed behind him. The cells should be on another corridor round the corner. He silently ran to the end of the corridor and looked round the corner. He ducked back when he saw a guard sitting on a chair looking at his hand and another walking towards him. Oscar listened carefully. The new guard spoke to the first in English. "Oi, you lazy oaf. You're supposed to be on guard duty you stupid ape, not sitting around reading."
"All right, all right, keep you hair on," complained the sitting guard. "Who you expecting down here anyway ? Her Majesty the Queen ?"
"No, but if the Colonel turns up she'll have your guts for garters idiot," said the second guard. Reluctantly the first guard stood up and pocketed the device he had been holding. "What you playing on that ?" asked the second guard curiously peering at the device.
"Rat on a Snowboard," answered the first guard showing the second one the screen. They were both peering at the screen and Oscar spotted his chance. He quickly put on his gas mask and pulled a round cylinder off his equipment belt. Darting out, he pressed a button on the end and rolled the cylinder down the corridor. It landed right at the feet of the guards unnoticed. Suddenly it went off, hissing gas all around them.
"What the .. ?" shouted the second guard before he and the first guard collapsed to the floor. Oscar ran down the corridor and turned the corner to find a set of cell doors. In a second he was standing outside the cell of Carrie, Rose and Illya. They jumped up smiling. Oscar tossed three gas masks to them.
"Here, put these on quickly," he said, his voice slightly muffled. He took out the laser cutter and started working on the door lock.
"Are you feeling alright now Oscar ?" asked Carrie, through her gas mask.
"Yeah I'm fine thanks," he said, looking up and smiling. She couldn't see his mouth, but his eyes smiled. He was so different from his Mum. Her eyes never smiled.
He finally managed to cut through the locking mechanism and Illya swung the door open. Carrie dashed to the end of the cell block and looked down the corridor. It looked like nobody had noticed the commotion yet. She went back as Oscar was handing things out amongst them. He gave Illya another head torch. He gave Rose the spare spy-pod and showed her the plans to the complex. He gave Carrie some small grenades which she tucked into her pockets. Then he handed each of them a couple of energy bars.
"Oh Oscar, you know me too well. I'm absolutely starving," said Carrie, tearing into the wrapper. They were all very hungry and quickly ate through the bars. Meanwhile Oscar kept an eye on the corridor. When they were ready he came back and explained how the complex was laid out, according to the plans.
"I came in through the submarine dock down here," he explained. "We need to get there quickly. The Norwegian army are going to storm this base in about two hours time. We only have until then to get out of here. It's completely deserted down there as far as I can tell."
"Oscar, there's something we need to do first," said Rose. "We need to destroy as much of those gas weapons as we can. I think I know where they must be stored. I've worked out where they were carrying out the gas tests on us."
Oscar looked horrified. "They carried out tests on you ? Are you alright ?"
"Oh, it's alright," said Carrie airily. "They tried to carry out a test on me and Illya, but Rose sabotaged the equipment and it all went totally pear shaped. It was fantastic," she laughed. "Your Mum was hopping mad though," she added. Then she saw the look on Oscar's face.
"My Mum's here ?" he asked.
"Erm, yeah. Looks like she's running the show as usual," said Carrie, looking down at the floor.