Phoenix

42. The special force

The steel corridors of the Sea Squirrel had become a pressurized furnace of adrenaline and shadow. While Arya had successfully lured her hunter into a chemical trap, Jin found himself in a far more desperate scramble for survival.

Fortune, a fickle mistress in the world of espionage, had turned her back on him.
​Jin knew the Alpha Team would divide and conquer, leveraging their superior numbers and tactical gear to sweep the ship. His only hope was to catch them in isolation, turning the ship's claustrophobic architecture into an ally.

He had taken the lower decks, leaving the labs and offices to Arya, hoping to find a structural advantage near the waterline.

​But the lower decks of a SWATH research vessel were sparse—mostly ballast tanks, SONAR arrays, and acoustic dampeners. There were no chemical cabinets here, no heavy machinery to drop. He was moving past the SONAR processing room when the metallic clack of a magnetic boot sole echoed against the deck plates.

​Jin froze. He was caught in the open, twenty yards of narrow, fluorescent-lit corridor separating him from the nearest bulkhead.

​At the far end, Melvin—Alpha-Three—stepped into view. He didn't hesitate. He didn't offer a quip. He simply raised his submachine gun and pressed the trigger.

​The roar of the automatic fire was deafening in the confined space. Jin dived, his body reacting with the fluid grace of a man who had survived a thousand such encounters. He rolled toward a corner, the air around him singing with the passage of 9mm rounds. Sparks erupted from the bulkheads where the bullets struck, a violent strobe light of friction and death.

​As he rounded the corner, a searing heat blossomed in his left shoulder. He slumped against the wall, his hand flying to the wound. His fingers came away slick and hot. The bullet had punched through the deltoid, a clean through-and-through, but the shock of the impact vibrated through his collarbone. He gritted his teeth against the white-hot flare of the pain, his breathing coming in ragged, shallow bursts.

​Keep moving. If you stop, you die.

​He sprinted toward a heavy hatch labeled: LEVEL 4: DIVING POOL – AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY. He threw the lever and tumbled through, sealing the hatch behind him just as a fresh spray of bullets peppered the steel.

​He was in the belly of the ship now. The diving pool was a circular "moon pool"—an opening in the hull that allowed divers and equipment to enter the sea directly from the center of the vessel.

The water inside was a deep, restless sapphire, reflecting the moonlight that filtered down through the observation ports.

​Jin scanned the room. There was a diving locker to his left. He burst inside, his eyes searching for anything—a spear, a knife, a flare. He found two harpoon guns, but he dismissed them instantly. Against a man in a Kevlar vest and a full-face ballistic mask, a harpoon was a toy.

​Then, tucked in the back of a rack of specialized deep-sea gear, he saw it. A five-foot-long aluminum pole, capped with a heavy, stainless-steel head.

​A "Bang-stick."

​A slow, cold smile spread across Jin’s face. It wasn't a firearm in the traditional sense, but in the right hands, it was devastating.

​A Bang-stick, or powerhead shark control device is a specialized tool used by divers to fend off large predators like sharks. It’s essentially a single-shot firearm mounted on the end of a pole. It doesn't have a trigger; it has a firing pin that ignites a high-caliber cartridge—usually a .357 Magnum or a .44—upon contact with a solid surface by a pressure sensitive firing mechanism.