Chapter 255: Falling

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In a dim and narrow corridor inside the warship, two welders were in waist-deep seawater, welding a broken steel beam. As long as this area could be repaired to seal out the sea, the pumps behind them could pump out the water, and the warship could at least limp back to port, heavily wounded.

Damage controlmen, that is, the repair workers responsible for disaster relief on a warship, were like the ship’s personal doctors, an indispensable part of a warship. But it could be said that these damage controlmen had one of the most dangerous jobs, because they often appeared in the underwater parts of a warship and worked right at the site of the damage.

“Hey, George! I hear we were hit without even seeing a shadow of the enemy!” one of the damage controlmen shouted, holding a tool in his hand. From time to time, sparks would burst from the electrical wires around them, a very frightening sight.

“Shut up, Frank! You think our situation isn’t bad enough? This damned watertight door is leaking! It’s leaking!” George shouted, pounding on the twisted door as he complained. “All I know is that something just pierced two layers of deck and exploded about twenty meters ahead. If you have time to be curious, you might as well think about how to plug this damned door!”

“The rebar is here! We’ve brought the rebar!” two damage controlmen, wearing steel helmets and life jackets, came over, carrying a steel bar and wading through the waist-deep water. They then said loudly, “It was a German plane that bombed us. I really didn’t expect their planes could carry such big bombs.”

“Frank, hurry up and prop this rebar against the door! You and I, the two of us, will use our tools to flatten the door! You use these things to plug the remaining gaps!” George began to assign tasks, and the several damage controlmen began to get busy.

“George!” an NCO shouted from a distance. “The deck below has plugged the breach! The pumps are starting to work… The captain is asking for a damage report. Do you have any problems on your end?”

A cheer immediately broke out in the compartment. To know that their warship could continue to float on the sea was indeed a very exciting thing. Although they were all still soaked in the cold seawater, they suddenly felt much warmer.

“It’s a small matter. We can probably plug this door in about twenty minutes… As for the damage, we’ll have to contact the men in the stern to know exactly how many compartments were destroyed,” George said, looking at his cheering subordinates and replying loudly. “There’s only one boiler room left. If the external damage isn’t serious, we estimate we can still make about seven knots.”

“Can’t we go any faster, George… The Germans are bombing us. We need to increase our speed, otherwise we’ll be hit again,” the NCO asked again anxiously.

George shook his head. “Relay my words to the captain! He knows what to do. Also, tell him that if we are hit by a bomb like that again, the ship will sink!”

“I understand! Please be sure to control the flooding of the warship. We’re all going home together!” the NCO said with a nod. After speaking, he turned back and climbed up the openwork iron staircase to the deck above.

As a veteran damage controlman who had participated in the repair of the battlecruiser HMS Lion, George was not as easily excited as these new recruits. He knocked on the pipe beside him with the wrench in his hand and gave a loud command. “Follow my arrangements! Get to work!”

The speed at which the seawater was pouring in was getting slower and slower, and the frightening list of the entire warship had gradually been corrected. It seemed that this warship was saved. George let out a long sigh, then scooped up some of the oily seawater floating on the surface and randomly washed his face.

He leaned against the cold wall, and only then did he feel the piercing pain in his knees. After many years of service on warships, and most of the time in the company of cold seawater, both of his legs had severe rheumatism. It was probably acting up again.

“Sir! There’s no more danger here! You can go up,” Frank said with a smile as he started the water pump. “If there are any problems, I’ll go up and call you. We’ll start pumping out the water in a moment. The problem won’t be too big.”

George nodded, stood up from the wall he was leaning against, and, wading through the cold seawater, he walked step by step to the side of the openwork iron staircase. As he walked up, he reached out with his oil-stained palm and gripped the handrail of the stairs. He had served on this warship for a full nine years. At 50 years old this year, he had experienced the First World War and was one of the few old hands on this ship.

He walked up the stairs, looking at the twisted walls and the ceiling that had been pierced by a bomb, listening to the loud explosions outside, one after another. He took the work clothes hanging on the wall, then took out a cigarette from the pocket of the work clothes and placed it on his lips.

“George! The captain wants you to go up when you have time. He wants to know the detailed situation of the hull damage this time,” a sailor said, running over to George.

George nodded and followed the sailor up. Just as they reached the outside of the bridge door, they suddenly heard the lookout’s desperate cry from the mast above. “Torpedo! Port side! Torpedo! There’s a torpedo coming at us on the port side!”

A huge explosion followed. George gripped the railing on the warship’s staircase with his hand and, with great difficulty, steadied himself. When he turned his head back, he found that the sailor who had brought him up had already fallen from the bridge, which was more than ten meters high, to the deck below.

This ship is finished! This thought instantly flashed through George’s mind. He hurriedly pulled open the door of the bridge and saw the captain, his face covered in blood, being bandaged by a medic. And the messy command bridge could be described as a complete wreck. The officers had just climbed up from the floor. The explosion just now had once again paralyzed the command that had just been restored.

“Captain! This ship is going down! You must order the crew to evacuate immediately! Get the men to the lifeboats, or it will be too late!” George shouted as soon as he entered. He didn’t want to die. He still wanted to return to the British Isles to see his little grandson, whom he hadn’t seen in years.

As he was speaking, dozens of meters below his feet, seawater was pouring into one compartment after another. The soldiers inside had no time to escape and were submerged in the cold seawater. The desperate soldiers pounded on the twisted watertight doors. They couldn’t open these iron doors, which had been damaged by the vibration, and could only watch as the seawater poured in and then slowly wait for death.

The seawater, mixed with blood and broken parts, rampaged through the body of the warship, flooding every place it passed. The damage controlmen had no time to plug the cracks and breaches and were flooded into new compartments by the seawater. Even more soldiers and damage controlmen were directly submerged by the seawater and had no time to escape.

Frank, who had just been joking with George, had had his head smashed by a collapsed steel beam. And the other two damage controlmen beside him had also drowned in the compartment because the place they had just plugged had burst open again, and too much seawater had suddenly poured in. They didn’t even have time to run to the staircase, which was less than five meters away from them.

“Immediately! At once! Announce abandon ship, Captain!” George said, staring at the stunned captain of the battleship Malaya. “If you hesitate any longer, hundreds of men will have given their lives for nothing!”

“The explosion just now could have been a secondary detonation! Not necessarily underwater! I have no right to order the abandonment of such an important battleship under such unclear circumstances!” the captain said, pushing the doctor away.

“No matter what that explosion was, the damage to this ship is enough for it to sink! I just came up from below! That place hasn’t been repaired yet, and now there has been such a big vibration. That place should be completely finished!” George screamed hysterically. “I’m begging you! For the soldiers below…”

He had not finished his words when a fountain pen that had been placed on the chart table rolled to the floor. Everyone looked at the pen, so shocked that they could not speak. This warship had just counter-flooded on the other side a few minutes ago to stabilize its list, but now the list had reappeared, which meant that all their previous efforts had been in vain, and the entire warship was indeed in danger of sinking.

“Send a message to all posts! Have them evacuate! Order the boiler room to shut down the power. All personnel to the deck! The anti-aircraft weapons will continue to return fire. Everyone must wear a life jacket,” the captain finally said, glancing at George. “You lead the damage control personnel and go down to take another look at the damage situation. If… and I mean if, there is still a possibility of saving it, please do your best.”

He then turned to his first mate. “Signal the aircraft carrier Eagle. Tell them our ship is sinking. Please organize a rescue operation.”

“Captain! The midship has been hit. The voice pipes and telephone lines of many compartments have been destroyed! The men in many compartments may not receive the order to abandon ship and escape,” George said loudly, not leaving, but reminding his captain.

“Send someone to notify each compartment at once! If it’s flooded, then shout for three minutes! Ensure that most of the men are rescued,” the captain said, closing his eyes helplessly, because he could already see that his command bridge was listing to a very serious degree.

Several officers frantically ran out of the bridge. They had been ordered to find the personnel who could not be contacted and to lead them to escape together. George also hurried downstairs. When he had just returned to the main deck, he saw a sea of sailors abandoning ship and jumping into the sea. More people were crowding around the lifeboats, and from time to time, the sound of gunshots and warnings from the military police could be heard.

George wanted to go down into the hull to find Frank and the others but found that the staircase he had come up was already full of seawater. He looked around, trying to find the figures of his colleagues in the crowd, but he found that it was all in vain, because the surrounding area was a complete mess. It was not the time to be looking for people.

He was pushed by the crowd to the side railing. He saw that the broadside, which had once been very far from the sea surface, was now less than three meters away. On the surface of the sea floated oil that had leaked from somewhere, and a dense crowd of British sailors. He was about to turn his head when he was pushed off the ship by the crowd, landing on the head of someone below. He choked on a mouthful of salty and bitter cold seawater, struggled desperately to surface, and suddenly saw, at the top of the tall mast, the ensign of the British Navy falling.