Chapter 21 – Tails of Blue Water Part 2
The Sea Fox was nearing the location of the next dragon ball, and Tails was examining his displays. "That's odd..."
"What's up?" Goku asked. While his cockpit was separate from Tails', there was a speaker system between them.
"The phase harmonics in the dragon ball signal... I think it's covered by more than water. Uh... let's see... put the display mode to vertical... widen the side-band sensitivity... reformat the signal parameters... Aha!"
There was a small screen in Goku's cockpit, which suddenly lit up, showing a picture of the dragon ball surrounded by squiggles.
"You see?" Tails clearly understood it, "The dragon ball isn't just sitting on the sea floor, it's in an underground cave! We could have circled the place until our air ran out and never seen it."
Goku looked non-plussed. To him it still looked like a random set of squiggles. "And where are the Red Ribbon guys? I really want to fight this General Blue!"
"I won't know until I submerge. They're almost certainly in the area, and they'll know where we are. I chose fast and manoeuvrable over quiet when I built the Sea Fox. Of course, a Fenir isn't designed to be particularly quiet either."
He considered the display. "There must be a way into the cave system, but we'll need time to find it, and they'll be after us as soon as we go underwater. However, I have a few tricks that should buy us the time, if we're lucky. Let's just hope the cavern system is wide enough for the Sea Fox, if not you might be taking a swim while I distract them. Ready?"
From the outside, the surface effect vehicle appeared to nose up, lifted into a low arc by a boost from it's thrusters. As it reached it's peak, the vents on it's underside and tear-drop stern sealed themselves up. The big drill-like screw on the nose started to spin up, then the Sea Fox plunged down into the sea in a plume of spray, drilling downwards at a better than forty five degree angle. In seconds, it had disappeared completely.
On-board the Red Ribbon Army attack submarine Crimson Tide, the sonar operator, a narrow muzzled dog, looked up from his sonar display.
"Sir, we have an object entering the water approximately three kilometres away, on a bearing of one seven zero."
"What?" The man who responded could have been a poster boy for the SS. Unlike the ratings, who wore forage caps and jumpsuits, or the officers, who were in naval uniform with billed caps, he wore khaki drill and jodhpurs, and pillbox cap. He was tall, blond haired, well muscled and handsome enough to be almost pretty. However there was nothing pretty about his expression. "Has Blue Base shot down something?"
"No, General Blue, it's under power and moving. It's making a a lot of engine noise too... and it's fast!"
"Towards us?" The General strode over to stand behind the operator. The dog started panting, since he couldn't sweat, but bent closer to his screen.
"I'm still confirming a course... yes, not directly at us, but in our direction."
"Towards the area where the dragon ball is, in other words." General Blue turned on is heel. "Have we heard anything from Blue Base?"
Another systems operator, human this time, looked up from his panel, one earphone of a set held against his head. "No sir, nothing on standard frequencies, nothing on ULF."
"That moron Dark!" General Blue growled. He turned to a hippopotamus who was wearing a naval captain's uniform. "He's probably so busy grooming his moustache he hasn't even noticed. Remind me to have him executed, and the on watch crew as well when we return. I've wanted an excuse to do that for weeks."
"N... Noting it in the log sir." The submarine captain replied, nodding to the Chief of Boat, a black bearded human, who actually wrote it up. "Reason – Gross dereliction of duty."
"Yes, but mostly because of how fat he is!" The General shuddered. "All that flab, he's a disgrace to the uniform! And that horrible little moustache. Bleah! But gross dereliction of duty will do nicely as an excuse. Obviously no man could be as handsome, or as well groomed as myself, but you'd think he could at least make _some_ effort."
The captain sweat-dropped nervously, because as a hippo he was hardly a slender reed himself. He covered it by asking, "Orders sir? Shall we engage?"
"No! If they are a part of this group with the fox and the child they have a better dragon ball radar than our own. Colonel Yellow reported that much. Pursue them, and let them lead us to it's location. But load all tubes, and set the torpedoes for proximity detonation. If they try to evade, I want them unconscious and the ship disabled, not destroyed. I want to capture it, and the radar and any balls they already have."
"Could it be those two children, sir?" the captain asked.
"Hmph!" General Blue snorted. "From what little we know, they've never used vehicles before, though they do have access to advanced technology, possibly from their contact at Capsule Corps. If they're on that sub, they'll be passengers."
He sneered. "I've reviewed the footage from the Tenka'ichi Budo'kai, they may have some amusing little tricks, but they still need to breathe. Flooding their vehicle will put them out of action. And if they do survive, I will be more than capable of dealing with them myself."
The Chief of Boat called out. "Forward torpedo room reports tubes one through four loaded and flooded. Warheads set to 20 metres proximity detonation."
The captain turned to the helmsman. "Come to an intercept bearing and pursue! Twenty degrees down angle on the diving planes! Full power to the engine!"
As they levelled out above the sea floor, Tails was examining his instruments and testing his controls. The Sea Fox didn't plod through water like most mini-subs, it glided like an aeroplane, rolling as it changed direction, and swooping and soaring as Tails followed a nape of the earth course along the contours of the sea bed. He hadn't even pushed it to top speed yet.
Speed and manoeuvrability was good, the pressurisation system was optimal, and sonar and dragon-ball radar were working well. There was more turbulence than he'd expected across his bubble canopy from the drill propeller, but his forward view was still clear. It seemed everything was good to go...
"Man, I'm hungry!" He heard over the internal comm.
He should have know better than to even think that, Tails thought to himself. "Didn't you have breakfast?"
"Uh uh! Not much anyway. I was looking forward to getting back. Hey, I've still got some of those Senzu beans!"
"Whoa! Save those for if we get hurt!" While Goku's comment was a nice complement, the situation was awkward. He should have made sure the sai-jin had topped up before they set off from Blue base, heck, there had been an entire base worth of supplies if he'd wanted. "I've got half a Capsule crate of those MREs left, I'll get them out as soon as we surface..."
His sonar had started picking up something else, and his headset, designed to cancel out the noise of their own engine, was picking up a different sound. "Looks like those Red Ribbon goons have come to play! Do they really think I'd just lead them to the dragon-ball?"
His current course would take him past the position of the dragon-ball, but near enough that he should be able to circle and see if he could find an entrance to the cave system. He considered some angles and velocities, and flipped a switch. A group of a dozen Capsules were released from a hatch on the underside, and floated down to the sea-bed.
He let the bigger sub close on him, until they were at the right position. Then he cranked his speed up to maximum, dived closer to the seabed and started weaving from side to side. "Okay, time to juice and jam! Let's see how eager you are to get us..."
True to expectations, as soon as he started to manoeuvre, the sub behind him launched a spread of four torpedoes. "Wow! I guess they want us really badly!"
He watched the four torpedo tracks close on his sonar, and waited. Then at the last moment, he pressed flipped another switch. Four more Capsules were released, but these almost immediately popped, releasing wrecked hulks of Red Ribbon vehicles, passenger compartments caulked and holding enough air to make them neutrally buoyant.
That wasn't all they held, as salvaged tape decks started playing through battered loud speakers in the air-filled compartments. The noise would hardly make the top ten, but it was sweet music to the torpedoes, as it matched the engine noise of the Sea Fox. Screened by the decoys, Tails powered straight ahead towards the lip of an undersea canyon where his reconfigured radar suggested there might be an entrance to the undersea caves.
There was a trio of closely spaced explosions as three of the four torpedoes went home against the decoys. The shock wave could be felt even at the distance the Sea Fox was at, though it did nothing more than shake them. But the first one simply scraped the edge of one of the decoys, and kept on coming.
"Uh oh!" Tails spotted the leaker on his sonar. "One got through, they must have set the arming time incorrectly! Time for plan B!"
He calculated times and distances, remembering the specs listed for the Fenir's torpedoes, and that the explosions had come before the expected time of impact. They must have been proximity fused, and the prematurity of the explosions gave a good estimate of the range.
He started pressing controls, flooding the forward under-jet compartments and ballast tanks. The Sea Fox became nose heavy, even as the vulpine pilot kept it's nose up with upward angled bow planes.
The nose cone screw propeller sped up as he threw the batteries for the surface jet-mode system in series with the primary battery, and the little sub leapt forward. This emergency boost would damage the motor if used for more than a few moments, but that torpedo would damage everything else if it got too near them.
They passed out over the edge of the canyon a few seconds before the torpedo caught up with them, and Tails immediately threw the mini-sub into a barrel roll. Most submarines couldn't do a barrel roll, but then most submarines weren't hydro-dynamic aqua-planes and doing speeds more appropriate to a light aircraft.
The small vessel swung to the side, looping up and over the torpedo as it whistled past, just evading the edge of it's proximity fuse's range. The homing torpedo tried to correct, but although it was faster than the Sea Fox, even under additional power, it was no-where near as manoeuvrable. After all, it's regular targets couldn't dodge that fast.
Tails continued the loop and came out of it nose down, powering into the depths of the canyon. He rotated the sub so their cockpits looked in the direction the torpedo had gone, and looking out, he could see it beginning a wide turn. As it reached half way, he cut the engines completely, the mini-sub slowing down to sink under it's own weight into the depths.
The torpedo continued looping back, but rather then start to turn down, it carried straight back over top of the canyon, back towards the sound of a still active decoy. A few seconds later there was an explosion, and Tails started to level out the Sea Fox and blow the forward tanks with a sigh of relief.
His dragon-ball radar was now showing a clear signal from a cave on the opposite wall, and he spun up the screw on low power, moving towards it.
"Woo hoo! Let's do that again!" yelled Goku.
"Let's not." Tails shook his head with a sigh of relief. At least they wouldn't be bothered by the Crimson Tide for the immediate future, they would shortly have their own problems to worry about.
"The target sub... It's disappeared!" The sonar operator exclaimed.
"What? I heard the explosions! If it's been destroyed, I'll have the entire torpedo crew executed!" General Blue came over to the system operator's console. "Show me the forward view!"
A forward facing camera with light intensification showed the view ahead. One of the decoys was still floating there, a stripped down Red Ribbon jet patroller, sealed off cockpit leaking air from previous shocks and with a big smiley face, tongue sticking out and one eye-lid pulled down, painted on the canopy.
A few seconds later, the returning torpedo reach the correct proximity, and blew up, the shock wave knocking the decoy aside, and rupturing the weakened seals. It flooded and sank, fake engine noise stopping.
"These impudent pests dare to give me the red eye!" yelled the General. "Find them! Prepare the mini-subs! Assemble a squad! Do some..."
There was a violent series of explosions, and the whole boat shuddered. Lighting flickered and was replaced by red emergency lights, and the submarine slowed to a stop.
General Blue hauled himself up by the back of the chair he'd grabbed onto when the boat rocked, leaving an imprint in the metal. "What... happened!"
Despite the ringing in his ears, he could hear the Chief of Boat as he lowered his intercom headset. "Engine room reports the propulsion turbine... It's wrecked, sir!"
The Crimson Tide, rather than a regular screw propeller, had a ducted turbine, similar in appearance to a jet engine nacelle. It sat in a conformal housing on the underside of the submarine, a thick grill across the intake to prevent foreign objects hitting the turbine blades.
Before General Blue could ask for further details, his questions were answered, after a fashion.
"Hello bad guys of the Red Ribbon Army! This is Tails the Fox, and that explosion you just heard was your engine going blooey!" The voice was everywhere, and quite loud.
"And this sound is coming from the speaker units that have magnetically clamped to your hull. They're designed to transmit this recording through the metal of the hull so no-one misses anything."
"How did he manage to sneak up and attack us?" yelled Blue. He turned to the sonar operator, pointing a finger. "Have that man arrested and shot for incompetence!"
"You're probably wondering how I managed to attack you. Well I didn't. I simply lured you into following me, close to the sea floor, and left some gifts behind. Capsules, with an attached CCD camera element, waterproofed in a block of plastic with a built-in bulls-eye lens, and designed to float pointing upwards."
"The processor circuit had your hull shape programmed in, and when a shadow that matched it showed against the light from the surface, they activated. The first few were bazooka rounds from your own Outpost Silver. I had to rebuild the propulsion system with a mixture of baking soda and a few other common chemicals to get a rocket that worked underwater, but it was enough. It's amazing just what you can do with some duct tape.
"From the diameter of the hull and position on it's CCD the processor could figure out your relative position and range, and launched them so they'd hit just ahead of your intake nacelle. The water flow did the rest. The first couple took out the grill, and the rest mangled your turbine. I estimated four rounds would have a 93% change of completely disabling you, so I dedicated six. I knew they couldn't breach your primary hull."
The foxes voice continued. "The rest were just speakers, lofted by self inflating balloons. The same magnets that clamped them to your hull are also the drive coils of the speaker array. I'd explain about modulating the magnetic flux that holds them there to turn your entire boat into one big resonating chamber, but that would be showing off. Neat, isn't it? They're to convince you to surface,as they'll only shut off when the pressure switch inside is in less than 10 metres of water.
"I couldn't fix your mini-subs, not with the equipment I had available, so you might still be trouble. But while you've been listening to this message, we've been looking for the dragon-ball, and have by now probably found it. All in all, your general must be feeling pretty blue." The sentence ended with a chuckle.
"Which reminds me, Goku really wants to have a chance to fight you, General Baby Blue. So make sure you're nice and visible. I'll sign off, but to keep you company while you drift aimlessly, here's some light music."
The voice was replaced by a polka, played at ear-destroying volume, which segued into a military march, and then a heavy metal number. Tails had been forced to work with whatever left over tapes he could salvage from the junk yard, and it showed.
"WE HAVE TO SURFACE!" yelled the hippo, barely audible over the music.
"WHAT?" yelled back General Blue.
"WE'RE GOING TO HAVE TO SURFACE!" the submarine captain repeated.
"I CAN'T HEAR YOU! YOU'RE GOING TO HAVE TO SURFACE!" Blue screamed back, pointing upwards. "BUT I'M TAKING THE MINI-SUBS OUT PERSONALLY! AND WHEN I FIND THAT FOX, I'LL HAVE HIS FUR FOR A RUG!"
"Hopefully, my little message will make General Blue so mad he can't think straight!" Tails grinned as he re-pressurised the flooded compartments, levelling off the miniature submarine. "That was Sonic's trick, getting old Robuttnik so mad he did something stupid or hasty, rather than planning something effective."
They were almost to the cave entrance when the Sea Fox suddenly lurched. There was a massive venting from the rear cockpit as Goku opened his canopy,using the emergency lever Tails had shown him. Tails tried frantically to stabilise it as the sai-jin swum up out of his seat, and darted after a fish almost as big as he was.
He dragged it back just as Tails got the sub levelled out, and sat back down, then started looking for away to close the canopy. Before he could panic and damage something, Tails activated the automatic closing sequence, and re-pressurised the rear cabin. He glanced over his shoulder. Goku was already biting chunks out of the fish.
"Goku, you could have waited!" the young fox said exasperated.
"Sorry Tails, but I was really hungry, and then I saw this tasty fish..." Goku said between mouthfuls.
"I guess it's my fault for not seeing you got a proper meal beforehand." Tails sighed, as he guided the Sea Fox into the under-sea cave, which turned out to be a long tunnel. He turned on the forward lights came on as they got deeper in, the tunnel narrowing as they got further in. The cave also started to angle up until they surfaced in an underground pool.
Tails looked around in awe as he undid his seatbelt. "Oh wow! An undersea cavern? How does it have air?"
He grabbed the independent breather mask and fitted it over his muzzle, strapping the pressure bottle onto his waist. "Make sure you put your mask on! The air may not be breathable."
"Okay!" Goku put on his own mask, following Tails' instructions, while the young fox equalised the pressure and popped the canopies. Goku jumped to the dry ledge that ran around half of the pool, and led to a natural tunnel going into the rock.
"Goku, it's going to be too dark even for night vision when I shut the Sea Fox ddown, so just stay where you are." Tails hopped up out of his seat and shut the Sea Fox down, plunging the cavern into darkness.
A few seconds later, a powerful torch came on, held in Tails' hand. He hovered over the Sea Fox, closing the canopies then pressed the button to recapulise it. Plucking the capsule out of the air, he flew down beside Goku and handed him a second torch. "I should have added some sort of automatic illuminator into the design of the goggles. They don't need much light, but they do need some. "
They made their way along the tunnel, until Goku spotted a button on the wall. He pushed it before Tails could say anything, and a line of lighting fixtures lit up overhead. They were linked together by a ceiling cable, fixed into the native rock of the tunnel.
"Hoooo! I pressed it, and it got brighter!"
Tails was looking up in wild surmise. "But why would there be lights down here unless someone had already been here? But who..."
He looked back down, right into the face of a skull, missing it's lower jaw.
"Yeaaagh!" Tails yelled as he sprung back, going into a defensive stance as Goku lowered the skull which he was holding up and laughed helplessly at Tails' reaction.
"Hey, that wasn't very funny!" Tails exclaimed with a frown.
"He he, sorry, but you're being so serious all the time." Goku put down the skull.
Tails sighed. "I have to be, while there''s a job too. Where did you find that thing anyway?"
"What, this? Over there!" Goku pointed to a full skeleton, picked clean. It wore old clothing, and an old fashioned sub-machine gun and tricorn hat with skull and crossbones laid before it.
Tails shivered. "Skeletons creep me out. Worse than those bodies we had to bury in Karin sanctuary. I know they're just bones, but they look wrong!"
"Hey, I really am sorry." Goku replied, looking abashed.
"It's okay, I need to learn not to fear them either. I can't afford to be weak." Tails shook his head, trying to clear it. "Besides, I know what this place is! Mr Lee Kei mentioned there were pirates around here once. This must have been their base. No wonder they couldn't be found!"
He started off down the corridor a way, then stopped. "I just thought of something! Here!"
He pulled out another Capsule from his case, and popped it, revealing a mostly empty Red Ribbon Army ration crate. "They're only MREs, but they should make up for breakfast. I'll keep my mask on, if you faint, I can put yours back on right away."
While Goku tore into several packs, Tails popped another Capsule case, and pulled out a device. Flying up to the nearest light fitting, he attached it just inside the wide cone that formed a lampshade. He fiddled with it, and his goggles for a moment, then made an approving noise.
"What's that?" Goku asked rather indistinctly.
"Remote sensor camera. If something passes underneath it, it'll send an image to my goggles and alert me. They may figure out where we went, and send someone after us. But at least it'll just be goons with guns. That I'm not scared of any more."
As Tails put several similar devices in his pockets, and retrieved his capsules, Goku said, "I hope General Blue's with them!"
"After the way I taunted him, count on it." Tails strode forward. "But this way they won't take us by surprise."
They quickly came upon a section of tunnel which changed from bare rock to white plaster. The lights in the ceiling were recessed, and the first section of corridor had small holes in the ceiling and a grid of raised pads on the floor. Goku strode past tails, but was stopped by the young fox's gloved hand on his shoulder.
"There's something not right about this..." He pulled out the flash-light, and reached it out over the first row of pads. Tapping a pad caused a short spear to spring out of the wall. "A trap! The pirates must have set it up to protect their base. The pads must trigger spears."
Goku looked thoughtful. "So as long as we don't step on those round things, we're okay, right?"
"Yes..." Tails started examining the walls. "There must be a concealed off switch or something like that. Hmm..."
After a few seconds examination, he saw a patch of stone that was slightly a slightly different colour to the rest. He prodded it, and it moved aside, revealing a button. Standing to one side, he pressed it with an outstretched arm.
There was rumble, and a doorway opened in the rock. "Yes! A secret passage way!"
He turned to show Goku, only to see him at the other end of the passage. "How did you get over there?"
"I flew, how else?" yelled the sai-jin, spinning his monkey tail a few times.
"Okay, I guess that works too." Tails grinned. He stepped inside the passage, and closed the door behind him, jamming the hinges. "That should stop anyone following us."
He rejoined Goku, and together they carried on.
Meanwhile, a pair of mini-subs bearing Red Ribbon logos surfaced in the same pool the Sea Fox had recently been in. They manoeuvred over to the edge of the pool, and two six man squads piled out, with General Blue leading them.
"An underwater cavern. Interesting." The cacophony or mismatched sound was still ringing in his ears. "They thought they could hide from the Red Ribbon Army? They will soon learn the error of their ways. Ohoho!"
None of the soldiers was going to mention how daft it looked for the General to laugh behind the back of his hand like some society girl, because they didn't want him to revoke their breathing privileges. Instead the leading seaman, a walrus, came up and saluted. "Red Ribbon Army, ready to move out!"
"Excellent!" The General grinned evilly. "They have no-where to go. You shall bear witness, as I cleverly destroy them both myself!" More maniacal laughter followed, causing the assembled soldiers to sweat drop.