Tom said, “I was worried about you.”
Genevieve shrugged. “It takes more than a torpedo to kill me.”
Sam laughed. In her case, she probably meant it. She was probably the toughest person he’d ever met, male or female, and certainly the most naturally deadly.
Commander Bower ran his eyes across the gang.
Sam introduced everyone to the commander.
Commander Bower said, “I believe I’ve met your entire crew, except Svetlana,” the commander said before his eyes landed on Svetlana. “I don’t think I’ve met you before - what do you do?”
“She’s a spy,” Sam said, matter-of-factly.
“Oh good. One of ours?”
“Afraid not. She’s Russian. Actually, she was in the process of trying to track your submarine.”
“Of course,” Commander Bower said, cheerfully. “How did she end up here?”
Sam sighed. “It’s a long story.”
Svetlana glanced at the sonar monitor. “We’ve got incoming!”
Sam said, “Another torpedo?”
“No, depth charges,” she replied.
There was nothing the Omega Deep’s countermeasures could do about it.
Commander Bower said, “Brace for contact!”
A nearby depth charge rocked the Omega Deep.
The commander glanced at an array of instruments, forgetting about the spy on board his experimental and most secret submarine.
Another depth charge rocked the hull. Sam thought for sure the hull would be ripped apart any minute.
Sam asked the commander, “How long can she take this?”
“All day, if she has to. Those depth charges are being intentionally dropped too far away to cause any real damage.”
“Why?”
“Because Halifax doesn’t want to sink the Omega Deep any more than I do. He needs it still afloat if he’s to sell it.”
“They know where we are?” Sam asked.
“Sure they do.”
“How?”
“A man named James Halifax, my old XO, betrayed me. He sold the Omega Deep to the highest bidder but hasn’t been able to break the security code I placed on the computer’s main system. He’s been back and forth a few times, hoping he could starve me into submission. My guess is he’s marked the outer shell of the submarine with something so that he can identify her, despite the Omega Cloak still being active.”
Another depth charge exploded nearby. This one was much closer.
Sam said, “All the same. I’d rather not wait around here a moment longer than we have to. Can we get this thing underway?”
Commander Bower grinned. “You bet your ass we can!”
Chapter Fifty-Four
Sam looked in the rear-view-mirror at the top of his console at the commander, who seemed twenty years younger as he buzzed from station to station in the control room, checking readouts and making minor adjustments on the touchscreens. The task of leading this crack team of mariners was invigorating him, breathing new life into his emaciated form.
The commander had given Matthew a crash course in submarine piloting. Though substantially different to a surface ship, mastering the craft shared similar principles, so was not altogether alien to him.
Veyron had taken the copilot’s chair. The shifting of ballast and executive monitoring of all major systems was a no-brainer for him. Gravitational dynamics was his passion, so he quickly learned the parameters of the operations, and even started to test the boundaries. He flicked through all the menus on the screens and familiarized himself with the layout of the submarine systems. He customized a desktop for himself, prioritizing his access portal to the various functions of the ship under his control.
Every command was given to the pilot team by Commander Bower and repeated back to him as the movements and adjustments were completed. Sam watched the old captain’s excitement as his ship came back to life around him.
Svetlana manned the sonar systems, Tom the navigations, and Genevieve – weapons systems. They all shared the command center together. It was a bull-pit, a war room.
Once Commander Bower was satisfied everyone had a rudimentary ability to operate their assigned stations, he brought the ship alive, section by section.
He monitored the nuclear reactor systems himself, ensuring the powertrain held up after the grounding.
"Okay people, here we go." He said to the assembled crew.
The ship started to gently shudder as the commander transferred thrust to the jet propulsion systems. The Omega Deep was heavily connected to the seafloor, and they needed to break the suction of the soft sandy bottom in order to move the ship up into the water. He set an initial power as a baseline and waited, monitoring the readouts on the screen before him. He called orders to Veyron and Matthew, asking for adjustments of the ballast, rudder, and bow planes. He sought to extract every bit of movement he could from the ship, without stressing her hull too much. He had been aboard this ship since it was three giant pieces in a Massachusetts hangar by the slipway. He knew exactly how much she could and couldn't withstand. With his hand gripping the edge of the control island, he felt his ship’s pulse as the power started to build.
They all waited. Commander Bower stood as a solid rock of determination, unmoving.
Taking his right hand to the screen the commander directed more power to her thrusters. The shuddering of the ship built to a humming crescendo. Again, he waited. It was a huge mass of steel he was trying to move, he wanted to do it as gently as possible – and his sixty-five years had given him patience.
He increased power to the starboard jets and steadily increased throttle at the stern. He was trying to unlock Omega Deep from the seat into which she listed with her 9,000 tons without destroying her driveline. Clouds of mud and sand started to swirl around the ship, clouding the vision from the remote cameras at the stern. The hum in the ship built to a discordant vibration.
Alarms on the consoles in front of Veyron and Matthew started lighting up red, one after the other. Reverberation shook the trembling room like an earthquake. Veyron jettisoned the last of the ballast, waiting expectantly for the ship to shoot to the surface like a rocket. The commander stared maniacally at the screen below him as he leaned over the main console island which stood in the middle of the room.
The ship rattled and ground against itself, vibration thrashing everything.
“Come on baby!” Commander Bower yelled above the cacophony.
The others shared momentary glances and looked about for anything that might disconnect itself from the ceiling and drop onto them.
The ship continued to heave against itself, like a jumbo jet under brakes at the start of a runway. She seemed as though she would tear herself apart. The thunderous noise of the water moving away from the mighty jets and the trapped energy in the boat were rocking her and her crew in a thousand directions at once.
Finally, the sea bottom relented and released its grip on the massive submarine. The fuselage issued a mighty metallic groan of relief, and the tension was relieved as she pulled up and away from the bottom.
“Hooray!” The crew cheered as one.
Sam looked at the commander and thought the old seaman might cry in joy and relief, as he pulled back the power to the reactor.
Veyron flooded ballast into the ship as fast as he could, and Matthew battled to catch and carry the ship as she jumped to life undersea.
Tom stood and climbed out of the navigation station. He turned to congratulate his father on the extrication.
It was at that moment the proximity alarm on Svetlana’s screens lit up in concert with a wailing siren, and the ship automatically deployed her counter-measure device against an incoming torpedo strike. In days gone by, decoys were deployed against torpedoes, but these days American submarines used high-tech Countermeasure Anti-Torpedoes (CAT’s) that seek and destroy incoming ordnance. CAT provides a rapidly deployable kinetic energy, hard-kill solution to use against torpedo threats. L
aunched in an instant, it homes in on the enemy torpedo and destroys it through proximity detonation and/or collision.
“Contact, starboard, 150 feet and closing!” Svetlana called.
Sam scrambled back to his station, roughly mashing the headset against his right ear as he dropped into the seat. “Torpedo!” he said, “Brace for impact!”
The torpedo chasing the Omega Deep was relatively small, intended to disable her by puncturing her hull - but not destroy her. The artificial intelligence in the CAT’s onboard computer triangulated a trajectory as far from the submarine as possible, yet close enough to confuse the targeting device on the incoming weapon.
Self-propelled, the Omega Deep’s CAT closed proximity on the incoming deadly underwater missile. Nearing the attacker, it released a sonic shockwave which produced both sound and an underwater wake. This confounded the hostile torpedo’s homing system, breaking its lock on the Omega Deep and successfully nominating itself as the target of choice. A few seconds later the two torpedoes made contact, and both weapons initiated their explosive systems.
Boom!!
A shockwave slammed over the Omega Deep from the starboard side, and the tubular vessel rolled violently 30 degrees to port, knocking the commander off his feet. He fell hard to the floor, striking his head on the counter as he went down.
In the same moment, the attacking torpedo tore into the CAT. Inside the broad casement of the CAT, a series of magnesium fueled fireballs in excess of one million degrees Fahrenheit each erupted one after the other, the last of which also ignited a charge equivalent to 500kg of C4 explosive. The torpedo’s TNT warhead detonated. The remainder of the missile changed course by 45 degrees, and exploded into four pieces, each now white hot and pliable as a rubber ball.
If what was left had struck the Omega Deep, it would have merely glanced off her armored side. As it was, the pieces traversed another 300 feet of water, sinking and disintegrating, brittle under the rapid temperature change. The whole event took less than four seconds.
In the command center on the Omega Deep, a siren mercilessly throbbed and the crew held on to their stations with both hands. Matthew pushed all his controls against the inertia of the explosion and pushed the submarine back over.
“Evasive maneuvers!” The commander called from the floor, reaching up to the counter-top to pull himself to his feet. “Elise, how much water do we have?”
“One forty feet sir, in another 600 yards east we can dive though. There’s a drop-off over two thousand feet.”
The commander hunkered over the powertrain control screen and swiped thrust to the propulsion to 100 percent. The ship silently leaped forward into the free ocean before her. This was what she was made for – combat.
“Power at 100 percent. Pilot!”
“Yes sir,” Matthew responded.
“Let’s make for the drop-off, then take us around to due east, and down to a thousand or so feet. We’ll skirt along the rim of the drop for a while and come about somewhere down the line. She’s built for hard angles, let’s put her through her paces.”
“Copy that,” Matthew replied.
“What’s our top speed, sir?” Sam asked
“She’s pretty comfortable at 40 knots,” The commander answered. “Elise, let us know the moment we can dive.”
“Will do, commander.”
“Pilot, keep her as low as you dare. Keep at least fifty feet between us and the bottom, but beyond that, it’s up to you.”
“Aye sir, fifty feet,” Matthew responded.
“Sonar, weapons, report!”
“Sir, one enemy sub,” Tom started. “Computer identifies it as a Russian Typhoon class – whatever that is.”
“A Typhoon! They were all supposed to be retired under the START treaty.”
The Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty was a bilateral treaty between the United States of America and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics on the reduction and limitation of strategic offensive arms. The treaty was signed on 31 July 1991 and entered into force on 5 December 1994.
Sam said, “I guess they were retired to the highest bidder because this looks like a perfect match.”
“Range?”
“4100 yards, speed 27 knots. We’re pulling away from her.”
“Well she can’t keep up, but she’ll give us a run for our money. That’s a monster of a sub – and God knows what she’s armed with. They used to run Type 53’s. And a bucket-load of ICBM’s, but those are definitely accounted for. Weapons, what’s your status?”
“Sir, we have fifteen more CATs, all four torpedo tubes are operational, and I’ve got Mark-48’s live, locked and loaded in each one.”
“We’ll run for a bit. Then we’ll come around on ‘em. Sonar, do not lose that ship.”
“I’m all over it,” Svetlana replied.
“Copilot!”
“Copilot,” Veyron responded grinning, apparently enjoying himself a little too much.
“How are my pumps and ballast?”
“All good sir, this tin can seems pretty tough.”
“Let’s hope so. I’m going to need your help to carry this boat around some hard angles if we’re to outsmart this Typhoon.”
“Let me know what you need sir. I think I’m getting the hang of her. You said it was a crash course, but this is a little extreme!”
“You’re a natural Veyron, I can sense it already.”
“Matthew?” the commander continued.
“All good sir. Plenty of power and she’s a lot more responsive at this speed.”
“Just don’t rip the bowfins off of her and we’ll be fine.”
“Aye sir, I’ll baby her all the way.”
“Good man.”
Commander Bower leaned in toward Sam’s station with a hand on the back of his chair. “Hell of a team you got here, Mr. Reilly, hell of a team.”
Chapter Fifty-Five
On Board the Unidentified Enemy Submarine
James Halifax looked around the deck of the Arkhangelsk.
It was a Russian-built behemoth of a craft, 574 feet in length with a massive beam of 75 feet. A nuclear submarine, built as a launch platform for the now extinct ‘Sturgeon’ Submarine Launched Ballistic Missiles.
His financiers had purchased her at a steal from the shipyard Colonel in Severodvinsk. If you call fifty million U.S. dollars a steal, that is. She came equipped with twelve Type-53 torpedoes, which have always been in his opinion, some of the most effective ever produced. However, there were no cruise missiles, no SLBM’s, no mines, nothing else. He was depending on his torpedo man all the way. So far, it was close – but no cigar. He cursed the United States’ development of the CAT system – he should have the USS Omega Deep in his grasp already.
James Halifax looked around the control deck and smiled.
He marveled at how much technology the Typhoon class shared with the United States Ohio class submarines that he had served on, all those years ago. Crewed by Russians, and one of the safest war subs ever conceived, this ship ran as smoothly as anything he had commanded, and was a good deal wider in beam, which had its comfort advantages.
Out-of-work Russian ex-submariners were not in short supply, and these staff had been discarded like so many micro-fiche operators when the subsequent Borei class was commissioned. They chatted among themselves, light-hearted and obviously glad to be back in the saddle one last time.
He went across the pressure hull divide into the sonar room and leaned in.
“How are we looking for the next torpedo?”
The pasty, gaunt, heavily bespectacled Russian replied in a thick Georgian accent. “They’re still within range of the fifty-threes, but since we only have eleven of them left I’d like to be a little closer before we engage again. They’re pulling away quickly, but the torpedo is much faster than they are.”
“Lock one on as best as you can. I’d like to take the rear end off that thing and sink it to the bottom before they make the edge of the continental shel
f and dive.”
“They’re already diving hard.”
“So, hurry up God-damn it!”
The sonar operator lifted a microphone handset and passed the message in Russian, including co-ordinates for the programming of the torpedo. The scratchy voice on the other end came back, arguing with the sonar man. The conversation ended abruptly, and the sound of the torpedo launch bay doors rang through the hull as another Type 53 was issued.
The sonar man tracked the torpedo as it settled into the groove of wake left by the Omega Deep. It sensed turbulence in the water and snaked back and forth across the disturbed water layers that defined the previous location of its intended target. This time, however, it appeared that his enemy was waiting for him and the torpedo was destroyed by another CAT, this time at a range of 350 feet from the Omega Deep.
“God-damn it all!” the tall man barked at the screen.
The Russian sonar operator said nothing and stared at the green waterfall-style sonar monitor.
“Let me know when we’re closer!” he yelled at the skinny submariner.
“Yes, commander,” he replied without moving a muscle.
Halifax stormed off, returning to the bridge and berating the men with orders to speed the ship up, seek out, and disable that damned submarine.
The sonar room light started flashing at the copilot’s control station, and his phone rang. A moment later the proximity alarm began flashing silent bright red light through the command center.
After answering the phone in Russian, the copilot lifted the handset above his shoulder and looked to the tall man. “It’s for you.”
The sonar operator said, “We’ve got an incoming torpedo. It’s running hot!”
“A torpedo?” Halifax replied. “Where the hell did Bower get a crew to fire a damned torpedo? Evasive maneuvers! Countermeasures, fire!”
Chapter Fifty-Six
Command Center, USS Omega Deep
Sam glanced over Svetlana’s shoulder at the sonar monitor.
Their Mark-48 torpedo raced toward the enemy submarine. He found himself unintentionally holding his breath, as the 650-pound warhead raced through the water at a speed of 55 knots. Two interceptor CATs were fired from the enemy submarine.
Omega Deep (Sam Reilly Book 12) Page 24
