Operation Underworld Read Free

in his fist, the Site Foreman was far too angry to notice the new man as they crossed paths. Making his way to the Site Overseer who stood behind a partially sheltered podium, the irritated foreman stared at the man hunched over his work and was greeted with forced cordiality.
    “Morning, boss. How’s… Holy shit! What now?”
    What now?’ As if you‘re the only schmuck in the yard that doesn’t know! Where are they?”
    “You talkin’about the riggin’the fire hose, fake leak in the hull thing?”
    “I’m in no mood, Eddie!” thundered the Foreman. “Do you know what this is? It’s a report! And guess what’s in it? Where are they?”
    Eddie inadvertently glanced over his boss’s shoulder and turning, the Foreman spotted his two victims. “Never mind!” He anaesthetised the Overseer’s agony and re-directed his fury. “ YOU TWO, BUD AND LOU! HERE, NOW !” The two workers were taken completely off guard and hesitated before slinking over to the gallows.
    “I just spent twenty minutes explaining to ten people that we really don’t have a leak in the forward hold!” By way of response, the shorter of the two was seized with a sudden urge to scratch his head.
    “See this? This is our quarterly safety review which happened to occur exactly the same day you two morons GAVE UP GOOD JUDGEMENT FOR LENT !”
    “But Boss, Lent ain’t til’…”
    “ STOW IT! ”
    “Stowing it, boss.”
    “Boss, we have no idea what you’re talkin’ about,” the tall worker responded with near sincerity.
    “I told you it was a bad idea,” prompted the co-accused.
    “The Personnel Department says I’m to sack you two jerk-offs! Friday. But I, in my infinite generosity and benevolence, I told them there are no more fitters down the hall. DON’T MAKE ME CALL ’EM BACK !”
    “Boss, we’re sorry. It’s just… the freakin’ boredom!”
    “It’s not really so much the boredom as it is the tedium!”
    “Just get your shit together, will ya?” he pleaded. “This big grey taxi has ta be ferryin’ dog-faces by mid-March and my Damage Control crew runnin’ around playin’ sophomoric pranks, disruptin’ operations don’t exactly help matters. Besides…”
    “It’s all fun ‘n’ games till somebody gets an eye poked out,” Tall Man interjected.
    “Then it’s a sport.” Shorty nodded in affirmation.
    “Get the hell outta here! Assholes !”
    The work on the vessel proceeded until the lunch break, when the loud cacophony normally present gave way to a relaxing silence. To avoid the long journey back down through the labyrinth of the vessel’s passageways and onto the pier, everyone more or less sat and began eating where they had been working. The topics of conversation ranged from the usual war news, to the tragic death of Carol Lombard in a plane crash in Las Vegas. Then, shortly after work had resumed, the routine on the 49th Street Pier, as well as the American war effort, was irreversibly altered.
    Insidiously, a narrow but widening plume of thick, black smoke slowly crept its way down the port-side passageway leading from the promenade deck. Ominously, the treacherous dark cloud rolled along the deck contained only by the freshly painted bulkheads as small red-orange flames crackled behind it, fighting to gather momentum. A minute later, the plume was a blanket covering the 50 or 60 square feet of the deck.
    Awelder’s helper shuttling tools back and forth for the workers rounded the corner and came out onto the promenade, and a wall of flames exploded out into the open air and over the rail 100 feet over the dock.
    To the crew members working on the pier, the trouble was not immediately apparent. However, as the yelling and the chaotic activity on the upper weather decks grew louder, an electrical sensation crackled through the air and was instantly recognised as something drastically out of sync. With animal-like instinct, each man of each crew throughout each successive deck level stopped what