Final Bearing

by George Wallace

  A jerk of the wrist on the control ring and the greased mast rose smoothly out of its well. Friedman squatted down and followed it upward. As the eyepiece rose out of the well, he snapped down the handles, pressed his eye to it, and started to step around in a slow circle.

  Friedman rotated his right wrist counterclockwise until the handle wouldn't turn anymore. He was looking almost straight up toward the surface, although in the pitch-black ocean, he couldn't tell for sure.

  Doug Lyman, the Diving Officer of the Watch, yelled, "Depth one-two-five feet, coming up."

  Bits of phosphorescence flashed by Friedman's field of view like jagged streaks of lightning. He rotated his wrist until he felt a slight detent and that lowered the elevation of his field of view. He continued to slowly walk a circle, moving the scope through repeated 360-degree rotations. “Dancing with the fat lady,” submariner's called it, the slow, vigilant rotation, looking all around trying desperately to see anything that might be in the way of the surfacing submarine.

  "Depth one-zero-zero feet"

  Still nothing but blackness, save for the flashes. Rotate the wrist a little more; look down a little more.

  "Nine-zero feet."

  Black as sin out tonight. Another click. Still nothing to see. Dance around another circle.

  "Eight-zero feet."

  Darkness.

  "Seven-zero feet."

  Friedman felt the ship level out a little. Must be about a five-degree up angle by now. Just right for PD in this sea-state. Still pitch black.

  "Six-five feet."

  Friedman finally saw waves breaking over the scope. Between the splashes he could just make out the brilliantly bright stars in the black, moonless sky overhead.

  "Six-two feet and holding."

  They were at PD.

  Friedman whipped the scope around, making two complete revolutions, looking at the horizon. No telltale hulking shadow blocking the horizon, no red or green running lights on some ship the sonar had missed hearing. They were all alone in this part of the ocean.

  Friedman yelled out, "No close contacts."

  Everyone breathed easier. They had been keyed for an “emergency deep” if someone was up there. Now, safely at the proper depth, they could go back to business.

  Friedman continued to search the placid ocean all the same. The stars formed a speckled canopy overhead. Far off to the east, the red lights of a jet airplane blinked as it transported a load of satiated sun-worshippers returning northward from the beaches of Mexico. A cloud slid aside and allowed a sliver of a moon to send a silvery trail down sea from the southwest.

  It was a calm, beautiful night up top.

  Ward broke the mood.

  "Steve, the message is ready in Radio. Raise the BRA-34 and transmit. As soon as you have receipt acknowledged, go to four-hundred feet and flank, course zero-nine-zero."

  They would head eastward, assuming help would come from the closest point of land.

  "Aye, sir. Chief of the Watch, raise number two BRA-34. Tell radio to transmit the released message when ready."

  Sam Bechtal, the Chief of the Watch, flipped a switch high up on the control panel he faced. A small green "housed" light flashed out and a red "up" light flashed on, indicating the antenna was out of its sheath and ready. "Number two BRA-34 indicates ‘up.’"

  Friedman heard a quick burst of static from a speaker behind him, hooked to an Intercept Receiver on the periscope. Radio had sent the message.

  Cortez listened on the phone headset he wore. Turning to Friedman, he reported, "Officer of the Deck, Radio reports message sent and acknowledged. No longer need the BRA-34."

  "Chief of the Watch, lower all masts and antennas!” Friedman ordered crisply. “Diving Officer, make your depth four-hundred feet."

  He slapped up the handles on the scope and reached for the red control ring. The scope slid smoothly back down into the well.

  Bechtal saw all the lights on his display panel light up with a green "housed" light.

  "All masts and antennas indicate ‘housed.’"

  Friedman ordered, "All ahead flank!"

  Spadefish dove back into the depths and leaped ahead.

  Jonathan Ward stepped into the wardroom. It was transformed from the pleasant, paneled, club-like atmosphere he knew. Two huge operating room lights protruded from the overhead, illuminating the table with their harsh, white glare. The brown Naugahyde was off the table, replaced with white cloth sheets and a green oxygen bottle. The serving buffet was littered with chrome pans of sterilized instruments.

  Sam Benitez lay on the table, pale as death. Tubing ran from his nose to the oxygen regulator. There was a horrible, telling rattle every time he breathed in and out.

  In all his years at sea, Ward had never seen anything quite so stark.

  "How is he, Doc?"

  Doc Marston looked up and answered as soon as he had finished checking Benitez' pulse.

  "Not good, Skipper. He has internal injuries I can't handle. No telling what all he has crushed in there, but I know he has punctured both lungs. He needs that blood drained off, like, right now, but a surgeon would have to do that. I gave him two ampoules of morphine and have him on oxygen. Otherwise, he’d be struggling so bad for breath we couldn’t hold him down. That's about all I can do." Marston shrugged helplessly and looked at Ward, pleading with his eyes. "Skipper, we got to get him to a hospital quick or we'll lose him for certain.”

  "Doc, we're doing everything we can."

  Ward listened to the noise of the young submariner’s distressed breathing, watched the jerky rise and fall of his injured chest.

  Never had he felt so helpless. Here, in the midst of all this technology, all this whiz bang gear and all these gizmos, there was no piece of equipment he or the doc could reach out and grab and make it better.

  No, he and all these highly trained men could do nothing more than stand there, their hands in their pockets, and watch this brave young man die.

  18

  Admiral Tom Donnegan laid the report aside so he could reach across the end table to grab the jangling phone before it woke his wife, sleeping in the bedroom next door. The blood red telephone in his home study almost never rang. It was the only official outside line that came directly into his house on Ford Island. All the others were routed through his Yeoman at COMSUBPAC headquarters. His heart quickened. It would have to be something important. Especially at this hour.

  "Donnegan."

  "Admiral, sorry to disturb you this late. This is John Bethea. Emergency message from Spadefish. They have an injured man. Ward says it’s pretty bad. One of his crew was crushed handling weapons. It looks like it’s touch and go for the guy. Corpsman says they need to medevac him ASAP or the guy won't make it. Can you help us expedite?"

  Donnegan removed his reading glasses and looked out the window. The warm wind gently rustled through the palms and bougainvillea, barely visible in the faint light. The sweet scent of plumeria filtered in through the French doors that led out to the lanai and filled the room with its pleasant perfume.

  “What’s their position?” he asked.

  "Ward reports they are five hundred miles west of Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, and heading that way at flank."

  "Okay, John, we'll take it from here. We'll set up a medevac and give them the water in that direction. Nobody’s down there anyway. If I know Jon Ward, he'll run at flank until he’s close enough for a helo transfer, whether he owns the water or not."

  Bethea acknowledged, said his quick thanks, and hung up.

  Donnegan dropped the red instrument back into its cradle and quickly grabbed the regular telephone. This was one of the bad things about being the man-in-charge. The sudden, late-night emergency calls, the little bit of action as he quickly put all the parts into motion. Then the gut wrenching anguish of waiting, knowing that one of his people out there was in trouble. And that he had done all he could do once he had pulled the levers necessary to set everything off. Nothing to do but wait
and pray, hope the injured sailor could hold on until he could be medevaced.

  Donnegan punched the speed dial number for the SUBPAC Ops Center. The Watch Officer answered on the first ring.

  "Yes sir, Admiral."

  "Commander, Spadefish needs an immediate medevac. Get CINCPAC on the phone. We need something with the legs to get to her quickly. She's five hundred miles off Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, heading that way at flank."

  "Yes, sir!"

  And that was that. Now, there was only the waiting. That and the praying.

  Commander Jon Ward stepped into the Chief’s Quarters. The quiet, dimly lighted space always reminded him of a small cave, like the ones he had played in as a kid when he spent summers with his father’s kinfolk back in Eastern Kentucky. Deep blue curtains hanging from the fore and aft bulkheads hid the darkened bunkrooms that were stacked along the walls. With the continuous watch rotation on a boat at sea, someone was always in there sleeping, and, sure enough, he could hear faint snores now.

  The men were sleeping despite the sad scene in the middle of the room. Bill Ralston, tears streaming down his face, sat there at the table, his shoulders hunched and his body shaking with sobs. The Chief of the Boat, Master Chief Laskowski, and Master Chief Ray Mendoza sat on either side of the anguished man, each trying awkwardly, futilely, to give him some faint solace.

  Ralston, his eyes red, his face contorted, looked up as Ward entered.

  "I killed him, Skipper. I screwed up and killed him." More sobs. Laskowski put an arm across the man’s shoulder. Ralston slumped down, head in hands, and stared at the deck. "I thought everyone was clear, so I hit the hydraulics. I didn't know anything was wrong ‘til I heard Benitez scream. Oh, God, I still hear that scream! I know I always will!"

  Ward looked down solemnly at the seated Chief, wishing he could somehow find the words that might ease the man’s pain.

  "We're doing all we can for him, Bill. Doc is with him and we’ve got help on the way. He'll pull through. We’ve got to believe that. Just keep praying."

  Ralston stifled another sob.

  "I always trained them to be so careful. ‘Follow the book,’ I always preached to ‘em ‘til I know they got sick of hearing me say it. Skipper, they're the best bunch I ever had. And what happens? I'm the son of a bitch that screws up. How am I going to face them, Skipper? How am I going to look Benitez in the eye again?"

  It was Laskowski who answered him.

  "Bill, you aren't the first man in this Navy to screw up and you aren't the first Chief to accidentally hurt one of his guys, either. It’s tough duty down there and you know it as well as anybody. Accidents happen. No matter how well trained you all are, or how careful you try to be.” Laskowski gripped the Chief’s shoulder. “And if I know Bill Ralston, I know how you’ll handle this thing. You'll carry on. You’ll do your job. We got a mission and you and the rest of your guys are a big part of what we’re going down there to do. Just do like the Skipper says and pray Benitez makes it. Otherwise, just do your job, Chief."

  Ralston sighed and looked first at Laskowski then Ward.

  "Okay, COB. I appreciate it, buddy. That’s what I'll try to do."

  Ward rose to leave.

  “I couldn’t have said it better, COB. I've got to get up to the Conn. We need to get back up to PD. SUBPAC should have medevac instructions ready for us by now. We’ll get Benitez off. I'll keep you posted on how he's doing."

  The skipper patted Ralston on the forearm and turned away. He had seen Benitez, had seen the gray pallor of his skin, had heard the rattle in his shallow breathing. He suspected what that condition update would likely eventually be. And he already dreaded having to relay that news.

  The hazy gray MV-22 Osprey roared across the open water. The Mexican coastline had disappeared astern half an hour before and now, both the pilot and the co-pilot strained to try to pick out the little black shape in the vastness of the open sea. The Osprey wasn't designed at all to try to find a tiny ship at sea. It had been planned and built to carry Marines into combat. As such, there was no surface-search radar, only the eyes of the two men who flew her. Still it was faster than anything else available and had the range to meet up with the submarine to bring back the injured sailor.

  The co-pilot yelled and pointed excitedly just to the right of straight ahead.

  "There she is! On the horizon, bearing a little bit to the north of due west!"

  It took the pilot another few seconds to see what the man in the right seat was pointing to. Spadefish was no more than a black dot with a long thin white tail trailing behind.

  The Osprey banked slightly and headed directly for the surfaced sub. The co-pilot reached over to the radio on the panel between them and flicked the frequency selector. He keyed the microphone.

  "Hotel-Bravo-Four this is Romeo-Six-Charlie. I hold you visually."

  The reply was immediate.

  "Roger Romeo-Six-Charlie. We see you. Surface winds five knots from two-six-one. Sea state zero. Coming to all stop. Ready for transfer when you are."

  In the sub’s bridge cockpit, Jon Ward turned to Chris Durgan.

  "Mister Durgan, tell the COB to lay topside with the helo-transfer party."

  Looking back over his shoulder, Ward saw the hatch swing open. A group of men, led by the Chief of the Boat, climbed out onto the rounded, wet main deck. Each sailor wore an orange safety harness over his blue poopie suit. They clipped their traveler to the deck track as they stepped out.

  "Mister Durgan, tell the XO to send the injured man topside," Ward ordered, then watched as several of the group on deck clustered around the hatch. They bent to gently lift a wire stretcher basket out through the opening from below decks. Benitez, still on the stretcher, was carefully strapped inside. Doc Marston came through the hatch right behind his patient and knelt down beside him, hovering like a mother hen watching over a wounded chick.

  The Osprey swooped low over the submarine’s deck. The roar of the massive turbines was near deafening. The huge engine nacelles at the ends of the stubby wings rotated from a horizontal position to a vertical one. In one smooth operation, the aircraft transitioned from a normal turbo-prop plane to a twin-rotor helicopter, able to float in mid-air a few feet above Spadefish. The huge propeller/rotors whipped a deluge of wind-driven spray, soon soaking everyone below. The clean smell of the ocean air was replaced with that of the exhaust from the Osprey’s jet turbines.

  The starboard side hatch on the hovering bird slid open and an airman leaned through the hatch to lower a cable to the deck. Laskowski grabbed the cable with a tool that resembled a clear, plastic shepherd's crook with a heavy copper wire in its center. The wire emerged from the butt end of the crook and clipped to the steel deck of the submarine. Static electricity crackled and arced where the crook touched the cable as the electric potential stored in the aircraft discharged through the hull of the sub to the sea. Without the grounding tool, anyone grabbing the steel cable would have received a shock powerful enough to knock him to his knees.

  Doc Marston grabbed the hook that dangled from the cable's end and attached it securely to Benitez' basket. Looking up at the airman waiting in the Osprey’s doorway, Doc gave an exaggerated thumbs-up sign. The basket rose off the deck as the Osprey climbed higher, putting more air between itself and the sub. Benitez still dangled below as the Osprey picked up forward speed and started to transition back to horizontal flight once again.

  "Hotel-Bravo-Four, this is Romeo-Six-Charlie. We have your man aboard. The doctor is looking him over now. He’ll be in the operating room at Guadalajara in an hour. I'll make sure they keep you posted on how he’s doing."

  "Romeo-Six-Charlie, roger. Can't tell you guys how much we appreciate your help. Call us when we get back. Drinks are on us for a long time."

  "Hotel-Bravo-Four, we'll hold you to that. Even with the cheap hooch we normally drink down here, that could get expensive. Romeo-Six-Charlie, out."

  Ward glanced back at the main deck just in tim
e to see the hatch shut. Looking to the east, Ward watched the Osprey grow smaller as it raced for the eastern horizon. When it was nothing more than dim lights approaching the horizon, he spoke again.

  "Mister Durgan, come around to course two-zero-zero and ahead full. Rig the bridge for dive. I'm laying below."

  Chris Durgan answered a snappy, "Aye, sir," but the skipper had already disappeared through the hatch.

  Tom Kincaid pulled into the parking space the best he could manage. These damn SUVs were impossible to parallel park, but there just wasn't any other place nearby to leave the vehicle. Either these things were built too big or the parking spaces were too small. The thing maneuvered like a boat, but in this neighborhood and at night, he didn’t want to park too far from where he was going. He was confident he could defend himself from some mugger. It was just that he didn’t necessarily want to have to. Not tonight.

  He had the “land yacht” far enough out of the street to be safe, he figured. He ignored the fact that the back tire was up on the curb and the front fender protruded a bit out into traffic.

  He climbed from the car and surveyed his surroundings. The pavement was wet and oily, reflecting the orange-yellow glow of the old-fashioned streetlights that, at one time, had been considered quaint, but were now ugly. The street itself was lined with businesses that prospered a generation before. By the looks of them, most had fallen on hard times now. Several of the brick buildings were boarded up. Those that weren't had the unmistakable air of seedy futility and despair. The establishments nested there now shut down and went to roost when the sun went down. Feet protruded from doorways where homeless derelicts found shelter for the night.

  There were signs of life a half block away. Near the corner at a cross street. A flashing neon sign beckoned him warmly. “Harry's Neighborhood Bar and Grill,” it advertised. Sounded welcoming enough. He walked closer. It looked how one expected a “neighborhood” establishment to look in this neighborhood. He doubted he would find any grill in the place.