U-121 lurked beneath the waves of the Arctic Sea.
Greenland had become more than a frozen rock; it was a bridgehead.
Trade flowed like blood through its ice-choked veins, but so too did iron.
The so-called Joint-Arctic Research Outpost had sprouted steel antennae and hidden gun emplacements, a secret kept only by silence and snow.
The Allies knew it , but they could not prove it . And so, denied the pretext for war, they chose provocation.
Canadian destroyers had begun "inspections." Harassments. Thinly veiled intimidation. But today, they'd pushed too far.
Today, the HMCS Ottawa would cross a line that could not be uncrossed.
She floated proudly in the icy dark, engines humming like a lion waiting to pounce.
Her skiff carved white scars through the still waters en route to a German civilian freighter dead in the water, its engines idled, its crew compliant.
The Ottawa's guns were already loaded. The inspection was merely theater.
