After opening the canopy, Thom unbuckled himself and kicked away from the sub and towards the transport. He looked down as he drifted upward, and had the first attack of vertigo in his life, staring down at nothing. His ears hurt, his chest hurt, the pure oxygen was already making him nauseous. He swam clumsily to the back hatch of the transport and breathed a tiny sigh of relief that the panel indicated the back of the sub was clear and ready for flooding. He keyed it to do so. He could hear pumps working to keep the sub buoyant as several tons of water crashed into the rear of the transport. A few minutes later the door opened, revealing the seawater-filled rear cabin. The water pressure had crushed the seat cushions and several of the bottles containing drinking water.
Thom pulled himself in, his eyesight starting to tinge red. Keying the door closed, the wait as the sub cycled out the water and pressurized was agony. But it did so, and he sank to the floor as the water drained. The suit auto-equalized, and he removed his helmet. For a moment he just lay there, wheezing.
From his vantage point on the floor, Thom could already see the damage the craft had sustained. The bulkheads were bulging and bent in odd directions, cross beams twisted. Shelving had been ripped away, dumping supplies everywhere. There was blood on the deck.
He opened the door to the cockpit, and checked the pulse of the two marines. They were alive. Thom took one last look at the various screens, aimed the sub towards their rendezvous point with the Uni, and throttled up, slowly. The transport shuddered, let loose a cacophony of creaks and pops, but got underway. He slowly trimmed off their depth.
After dragging the two marines into the rear of the transport, Thom settled down for a long, hopefully boring, trip back to the Uni. The console would announce any nearby ships, so his last thought before he passed out was to hope sleep found him before the inevitable decompression sickness had its way with him. It did.
XI
It was well into the fourth day before Thom was able to make contact with the Uni. The two marines had regained consciousness a few hours after Thom had. One had medic training, and was able to diagnose himself and his copilot with severe concussions, and bandaged their other wounds the best he could. The concussive blasts from the battle had done substantial damage to the transport, but not to any of the main systems. They became enamored with their hardy conveyance as it brought them home.
The Universalis was running, and running hard. At top speed, the transport was just able to creep up on them. Had the big ship started off earlier, or the transport any later, they wouldn’t have caught up before the transport’s food ran out.
“Say again, Traffic Control?” Thom said over the comm. The Uni was making such a mess of the water running at full speed it was affecting the communications.
“Transport 53A, we are unable to open any of the normal docking bays. You are instructed to proceed to the rear landing deck and dock manually with the airlock there.”
“They want us to do what?” Diier, the marine with the medic training said to no one in particular.
“Have either of you ever done that?” Thom asked. The others shrugged.
“They stopped using that part of the ship years before either of us joined up. I thought they decommissioned it with the rest of the war fleet,” Tegit, the other marine, said.
“TC, this is 53A. We are not sure how you expect us to do that,” Thom said back over the comm. There was a pause, then a new voice came over the transport’s speakers.
“53A, we are aware of your situation. We are currently running at full emergency power for reasons that will be made clear when you are aboard. We cannot slow down enough to open any of the bay doors without risk of damage or flooding. Approach from above; when you enter the lee space behind the hull, the microcurrents will pull you to the deck. Then all you have to do is maneuver into position near the airlock. Please get on board as soon as possible. TC out.”
Thom looked at the two marines, and they back at him. The Uni had come into view, and they looked out over the back of its hull. The propellers were making a churning mess of the water. Above the rounded stern of the ship, the arc of the back of the Uni sloped down smoothly, except for a small notch, where it dropped down straight then flat out till it continued the curve. In the war, this little notch was used to launch and recover attack subs at speed. Thom wondered if there was anyone alive on board who had ever used it.
The transport started to descend as soon as Thom had lined them up over the landing strip. He matched velocity the best he could. The Uni seemed to slowly rise up to meet them. As they got close, the turbulence from the hull tossed them around. The transport shook violently, then suddenly it dropped hard into the deck and was still.
Ever so slightly it scraped along the landing strip towards the lock. Thom increased the throttle, edging them closer.
Just before he reached the lock, in the lee of the hull, Thom spun the craft around, and mated the rear of the sub with the lock. Diier and Tegit took turns patting him on the back as the lock cycled. They left the transport tired, hungry, smelly, and in all cases in need of some kind of medical attention. It would have to wait. Two young aides to two different council members near dragged them to a waiting cart which shot off down the narrow passageway that ran along the spine of the ship. After a few minutes, they were shuffled down a side access tunnel.
What followed was a blur of staircases and corridors that ultimately led them to the main Command Bunker, one level below the bridge. It was a long space, but not very wide. Thom had never seen so much new tech in once place. It was as if the entire room had been taken out of some vid and brought to life. There was a pair of rectangular tables positioned longitudinally, each with embedded screens and terminals. Along the walls were stations with more screens, terminals, and controls. At each station sat a busy crew member. The room was dark, lit mostly blue and red by the glow of the terminals and the tables Even if he was a more hands-on kind of guy, each station was clearly just a newer version of equipment he'd used before. Thom identified his unease as not so much intimidation, but more the complete lack of a place to sit.
Everyone in the room was busy enough not to have looked up when Thom, Diier, and Tegit entered. Gathered around the closest table were several council members that Thom recognized, but whose names he couldn’t remember. Closest to him were Larr and Jills. Across the table, standing rigidly like every picture he had ever seen of him, was Captain Sarras. The two marines next to Thom stood up a little more erect. Sarras nodded to Diier, who rattled off a report of what had happened. Tegit filled in where Diier was either unconscious or had a lapse in memory. Thom shuffled on his feet, growing uncomfortable as important people did important things around him. The only one to notice was Larr, who said nothing.
Before he could finish, Diier was interrupted as everyone’s attention focused on the door behind him. Leaning heavily on a cane, Councilman Gattley filled the entrance of the bunker. He stepped inside and made his way haltingly to the table. Despite his obvious illness, he still carried a quiet power that commanded the respect of everyone in the room, including the Captain.
“The marines here were just telling us...” Larr started, but Gattley waved him silent.
“It doesn’t matter. Captain?”
“Councilman Gattley, we are currently running at flank speed due to the skirmishes with the enemy corvettes.”
“Show me,” he said, moving around the corner of the table, forcing Larr to concede his space. Thom looked at the marines, who were clearly just as puzzled as he was. The portion of the table closest to Gattley changed to a map of the seafloor around them. It showed the Uni in the center. It zoomed out, showing a smaller version of the ship and larger area. It zoomed out again, and showed a red silhouette of a small ship.
“This is where we made contact,” the Captain said, motioning towards the red shape. “Then again here, here, and here,” as he said it, three more silhouettes appeared. Each was staggered, with the Uni seeming to follow a zig-za
g pattern bouncing between the enemy ships. The captain looked quizzically at the display, as if seeing it for the first time. Gattley stared at him.
“You see it now, don’t you?” Gattley asked. The other Councilmembers saw it as well. “Captain, I spend a lot of time in bed. More than I should. We all are so used to the way the ship feels. How it vibrates, how it moves. Lying in my bed, it feels different. I can listen to it. I can hear it. I knew we were running. Everyone could hear the engines. But I could feel when we were turning. I could feel by how much. How many watch changes have you made? Two?”
“With a third coming up.”
“With all the commotion of the attacks, with no one person navigating or driving, I can see from your face that this is the first time anyone has looked at the course.
“We were just running to put distance between us and them,” one of the Councilmembers said.
“That’s where you’re wrong. We’re not running. We’re being herded,” Gattley said. The Captain nodded distractedly, already on to the next steps in his mind. “Jills, we’re not going to have the time we wanted. We need to mobilize now, with whatever we’ve got.”
Jills, still fixated on the screen, agreed. Gattley looked up at the Captain, who made eye contact, and nodded definitively.
“Chief of the Watch, sound General Quarters,” Sarras said. From behind him, Thom could hear alarms reverberating down the corridors of the ship. “Navigation, I want charts and maps for everything that’s ahead of us, no matter how small.”
“Sir!” one of the crewmen acknowledged from a nearby terminal. The screen in the far corner of the table switched to a new map, and Sarras hunched over to study it. Gattley turned to Jills.
“Janner, I’m going back to my cabin. The boy here...” he said, motioning over his shoulder at Thom. “...is going to help me. Then he’s going to come back here and be my eyes and ears.”
“OK.” Jills replied, looking up from the table for the first time in several minutes. “Mrakas, we’re going to need you on this.”
“That’s what scares me.” Gattley turned and motioned for Thom to exit ahead of him. The two walked side by side down the corridor for a bit. As the passageway curved out of sight of the Bunker, Gattley reached out and put his weight on Thom. “I’m sorry, Thom, you’re going to have to help me back to my cabin.”
“Of course, sir.”
“Don’t sir me,” Gattley said. His voice sounded raspy. Thom turned his head, and the older man seemed to have aged a decade since he entered the Bunker. Their pace slowed but they made their way down the corridor.
“I have a feeling Ralla doesn’t know you’re out of bed.”
“Let’s keep it that way, OK?”
“You got it.”
“My daughter told me how you two escaped the dome.”
“I would have figured that was old news by now.”
“No, I mean she told me personally, not as a report or something. She’s really fond of you, Thom. And having rescued her like you did, I am as well.”
“Sir...”
“Mrak.”
“Mr. Gattley, we did what we did. There was no other way to do it or we wouldn’t be here. So I guess I just did what I had to do, and so did she.”
“Maybe so, but you did it and I’m grateful. I’m putting in with the Council for you to get a battlefield commission and commendation for your actions.”
“Mr. Gattley I don’t want...”
“Thom,” Mrakas said, cutting him off. “I don’t really care what you want. Events are unfolding that will have no outcome but bad. There are things you don’t know yet. This is far bigger than you understand. I’m having you commissioned as a Lieutenant. For now that will give you access to information and let you get a fighter out in this inevitable war. I know it’s strange to want to put you in harm’s way, but I’ve heard how you handle a sub and we need people like you right now. Past that, I don’t know.”
They had reached Gattley’s cabin. After toggling the door open with the wall switch, Mrakas shed himself of his human crutch and shuffled across the floor to his bed. He hunched over further and seemed to age another decade in the process. He waved Thom away.
“For now, go back to the bridge and keep me informed for as long as you can,” the elder Gattley said as he reached overhead and pressed a button that closed the door.
Thom stood outside the door for a moment, stunned. Not till he was running back to the Bunker did his brain register that the floor had been made of wood.
The Universalis lit up its active sensors, sending out ultrasonic pulses that bounced off the sea floor and any ships nearby, and returned to be picked up by microphones spread all over the hull. The turbulence the ship created at maximum speed affected the resolution, and by extension, the range. So the results were less than optimal. Worse, the massive wake created a cone-shaped deadzone behind them.
What was clear, to the crewmen manning the sensor stations, to the navigator, and to the Captain, though, was that the seafloor was rising. They were running out of maneuvering room. They tried deviating from their current course, and each time the sensors would pick up a handful of subs of varying sizes either on a parallel or converging course, just out of weapons range.
“Proctor Jills. I’m afraid we have no choice but to engage,” the Captain said, after his countless checks of the navigational charts.
“With what, Captain? Have you been secretly building up a fleet that I don’t know about?”
“We still have ammo for the defense batteries. That will have to be enough. I wish we had had the time you and Councilman Gattley had requested to get an attack fleet up and running, but we don’t. Hopefully we’ll have enough firepower to get us on a different course. If we don’t...” he looked down, and slid the chart displayed on the glass table in front of him across the console to be displayed in front of Jills. “We’ll either run aground, or be forced to surface. Personally I don’t like the choice of defenseless destruction or being irradiated. We’ll need to go on the offensive, such as it is.”
Jills stroked his narrow jaw as he stared at the navigation chart. Thom, who had been standing silently near the wall, stood on the tips of his toes to see the chart. Out of the corner of his eye, Jills saw him and waved him over.
“If you’re going to be Gattley’s eyes, then put them on this.”
Thom studied the chart, and nodded knowingly, knowing that he had no idea what the chart meant. To his credit, Jills moved on.
“How well are your men trained, Captain?” Jills asked.
“They’re trained, but on simulators. Since we sounded General Quarters, there have been teams on the guns getting them loaded. Most are in working order. It’s the best we can hope for right now.”
“How big are these other subs?” Thom asked. There was a pause as all eyes went in his direction.
“Big. Bigger than anything we’ve got,” the Captain responded. “They look corvette size mostly, with what we think may me some frigates.”
Thom’s eyes went wide.
“Did we ever have anything that big?”
Larr’s face flashed a momentary burst of annoyance, and then back to his usual stoic expression.
“Not since the war,” Larr mumbled. “Proctor, Captain, I would like to recommend we launch the few attack subs we have; perhaps they can buy us some time.”
The Captain shook his head.
“A dozen single seat subs wouldn’t even bother a corvette, never mind four. It would be a waste of men and equipment. No, we need to do this now. All agreed?”
Jills nodded immediately. Larr and the other Council members followed suit.
“Chief of Arms, notify all batteries to be ready to fire. If a craft comes within range, they are to destroy it.”
A man standing near a pair of terminals acknowledged and started talking to the two crewmen at his station. The Captain stood upright and pressed a button on the edge of the table.
“New heading. Come to sta
rboard six-zero.”
“Starboard six-zero, aye,” came a voice from over the speakers imbedded in the ceiling.
At speed, a ship the size of the Uni changed direction at an agonizing rate. But when passenger comfort wasn’t a concern, as now, it could turn much harder. Everyone in the bunker was forced to grab a hold of something nearby to steady themselves.
Far down and back in the Garden, hanging plants swayed against the turn. Plates and glasses slid from tables, a few people out in the open stumbled. Having heard the alarm for General Quarters, most had thought it was some drill for the military. Now people started to get concerned. Restaurants emptied. Public areas were vacated as people ran to their cabins.
“Captain, new contact!” shouted a crewmember excitedly.
As the Universalis made its broad sweeping turn, the sensor deadzone shifted as well. The area previously hidden became exposed, revealing the submarine Population.
All eyes in the bunker went to the sensor screen as a huge glowing blob revealed itself out of the noise.
“How’d they do that?” Thom asked, trying to hide his anxiety.
“They must have snuck up behind us when we were running, and were already in the cone before we starting popping active,” the Captain replied, still staring at the sensor screen. They watched as the Pop turned sharper, trying to cut the corner. In doing so they started gaining.
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