"Twenty-three minutes," the TACCO told him.
The pilot was Duke Dolan, a graduate of Purdue University. His ambition had been to fly fighter planes from aircraft carriers, but the needs of the navy and his standing in his flight school class had conspired to put him in P-3s. There were worse fates, he often told his wife. "At least I don't have to go on a cruise on the big gray boat."
So now he was hunting one. USS America. She had gotten the name, he recalled, after the Kitty HawJ(-cass carrier named America had been scrapped. Rumored to be the quietest thing in the ocean, America would take some finding. The way to do it, he thought, was to actively echo-range, or ping, the sonobuoys.
But wasn't there another submarine out here someplace? No doubt the TACCO knew where it was, so the pilot didn't need to worry about it.
Indeed, the TACCO did know about La Jolla. He didn't know her exact position, of course, but he knew she was in this operating area. Which frosted him more than a little. With a friendly boat down there, he would need absolutely certain identification before he strapped on the pirate ship with a Mk-48 torpedo. Finding the damned boat was going to be tough enough, but an ironclad positive ID? And he wasn't going to be able to use active sonar because he might illuminate La Jolla for the bad guys. Hoo boy!
"Where did they say those missiles were going?" the copilot asked Duke.
"Probably don't know yet."
"Didya see the White House on TV after the bastards whacked it? Smoking hole, man."
"Yeah. I saw it."
"I hope they don't hit the O-Club, anything like that."
The copilot was an idiot, no question. How in the hell did he get in the navy, anyway? And by what twist of evil fate, the pilot wondered, did he wind up in my right seat on what is probably the only day of my naval career that I will hunt a submarine for real? Why me, God?
Five minutes after the first missile was launched, a pair of F-16 fighters, which had been on alert status at the end of the Dover Air Force Base runway, with their pilots in the cockpits, lit their afterburners and rolled. They made a section takeoff, raised their gear together, and punched into the overcast that blanketed the East Coast of the United States at about twenty-three hundred feet. Two minutes after takeoff they switched to the operational frequency of the E-3 Sentry aircraft, which was a Boeing 707 with a thirty-foot radar rotodome mounted atop the fuselage.
"We have three Tomahawks in the air," the mission commander aboard the Boeing told the F-16 section leader, whose name was Rebecca Allison. "Your vector to intercept is zero six zero. Estimated distance to intercept is four hundred twelve miles, recommend you use a max range profile."
"Roger that," Rebecca Allison said and noted the info on her knee board. She dialed the heading bug on her horizontal situation indicator (HSI) to the recommended heading and engaged the autopilot, which could keep the fighter in a smooth, steady climb while she punched the intercept data into her computer and checked the sym-bology on the heads-up display, or HUD. Each plane was carrying two six-hundred-gallon aux tanks, one under each wing, and each had a Sidewinder on each wingtip missile station.
The planes were climbing through cloud. Allison checked her wingman, Stanley Schottenheimer, who was tucked in nicely on her right wing.
They topped the clouds at ten thousand feet and continued their climb. Schottenheimer increased the distance between the planes so that he too could attend to cockpit chores.
"Anvil One, Eagle Four Two," Allison called on the secure UHF radio. "Do you have a projected destination for the bogies?"
"Looks like New York. Unfortunately, all three are on different flight paths. We'll put you down on the closest one."
"Do you have any other interceptors, over?"
"None that can intercept prior to the target area. You two are it."
"Why don't you split us up, give us each a target, over?"
"Okay. Wingman, state your call sign."
"Eagle Four Seven," Schottenheimer replied.
"Both of you stay together for now. We'll separate you in a bit, try to give you each a missile."
Three missiles, two planes. Uh-oh. And the missiles were Tomahawks, which flew right in the weeds. Allison tightened her harness straps and reached for her master armament switch. She would try for a Sidewinder shot, if she could get a lock on the missile's exhaust. If not, she would have to use the gun.
The control room was packed as America descended toward the depth Vladimir Kolnikov wanted, two thousand feet. Boldt was wearing the sound-powered telephone, so it was he who reported leaks in the engine room passing eleven hundred feet.
Kolnikov turned and glared at the crowd. "Have you never been on a submarine before? Check for leaks. Everyone should be at his post wearing sound-powered phones. Find 'em and fix 'em. Check every compartment." The control room emptied, leaving only Eck, Boldt, Rothberg, Turchak on the helm, and Kolnikov. And Hey-drich, who sat in the back at an unused sonar console doing and saying nothing.
Two thousand feet was three hundred feet below her certified depth, and everyone in the room seemed to be holding his breath. When the boat's hull creaked and groaned a bit from the stupendous pressure passing eighteen hundred feet, Kolnikov said, "That's deep enough. Take it back up to seventeen hundred and let's get the giggles and bangs out of it." When she stabilized at seventeen hundred feet, her certified depth, the noises stopped. Boldt reported that the boat had leaks here and there, but the crew was working on them.
"This isn't a dinner boat on the Seine," Kolnikov growled. Leaks were the bane of a submariner's life. They could develop at any moment.
"We'll not go lower than this unless we have to," Kolnikov said aloud, to no one in particular. "We must stay as silent as possible, or believe me, the Americans will find us." Kolnikov had not streamed the towed array. He planned to drift with no way on, so the array would end up hanging straight down on its half mile of cable, of little or no use.
At a nod from Kolnikov, Turchak let the submarine drift slowly to a stop. About two minutes passed before the inertial readout stopped going slower. The final speed was half a knot, which was probably the speed of the current at this depth.
The pumps that kept her trimmed seemed to work fine. She lay motionless in the sea, steady as a rock. Kolnikov put his head against the metal of the bulkhead to listen, then checked the computer screen that analyzed the ship for noise. Almost nothing. The ship was as silent as the sea itself.
"Just in case," Kolnikov said to Boldt, "while we are alone, have everyone make a head call, then secure the head until further notice. And let's flood tubes one and two and open the outer doors."
Turchak, at the helm, was also wearing a sound-powered telephone headset. He concentrated on monitoring the trim of the boat. He would ease the power lever forward for a few turns to establish steerageway — and plane effectiveness — if that became necessary. Eck and Boldt were busy with the computers, with Rothberg supervising, running from one to another, looking over shoulders, offering little explanations. Kolnikov stood mesmerized by the large, flat bulkhead-mounted sonar displays. Once again the impression that the displays were mere windows in the hull and he was actually looking at the ocean struck Kolnikov powerfully.
The screens were dark just now, for the sea at this depth was very quiet. Yet the darkness was not total — there were gleams of light here and there from the grunts and calls of sea creatures, fish and whales and dolphins, very faint and far away. The muted symphony also gave them tantalizing hints of hull and machinery noises, no doubt from distant ships and planes. And every now and then they were teased by low-frequency rumbling noises, perhaps from earthquakes or landslides, maybe deep-sea volcanoes.
He reluctantly left the sonar displays and was looking over Boldt's shoulder, studying the navigation data displayed there, when out of the corner of his eye he saw Eck press his earpieces tightly against his head. After a bit Eck held up a hand and said in almost a whisper, "I think I hear screw noises. Low-frequency beat
s." He removed the sonar audio from the control room loudspeaker so it wouldn't be returned to the sea.
Kolnikov donned the headset and listened. Meanwhile Eck was typing on his keyboard, initiating a track, labeling it. A symbol appeared on the horizontal tactical display and on one of the bulkhead screens. The men stared mesmerized at the symbol, which almost obscured a faint gleam of light hiding amid the darkness.
Turchak, wearing the sound-powered headset, told Kolnikov, "Tubes one and two flooded, outer doors open."
Kolnikov climbed onto the captain's stool and lit a cigarette. He was staring at the dim gleam that Eck said was the noise of a submarine when a tiny light flashed on the surface in the other direction some distance away, perhaps six or seven miles.
Five seconds passed before Eck said softly, "Sonobuoy. We have a P-3 overhead."
There were eight sonobuoys in the water when Eck gestured toward the submarine symbol on the panel display. "That isn't where it is. There's a thermal layer distorting the sound."
"Can you identify it?"
"We need a little more noise. He's closing, that's certain."
Three minutes later Eck said, "Los Angeles-
"Which one?"
"Still working on that."
A half minute later he said, "La Jolla. Her signature is in the computer."
"Jesus fucking Christ," Leon Rothberg said bitterly and sagged into an empty chair.
Toad Tarkington was at his desk in the Crystal City SuperAegis liaison office when the intercom buzzed. The unexpected sound made Toad jump. Without telephones ringing, the office was abnormally quiet, pleasantly so. The security officer in the lobby was calling. "Sir, there is a Mr. Carmellini down here asking for Admiral Grafton."
"Carmellini?" Toad drew a blank for several seconds, then he remembered. Oh yeah, the CIA guy from Cuba. "I'll be down to escort him," Toad told the guard. Carmellini. He was in Hong Kong with Admiral Grafton last year, Toad remembered, when the revolutionaries kidnapped Callie.
The building elevators were still out of service, so Toad took the stairs to the lobby. He recognized Carmellini and shook hands. "The admiral isn't here, but come on up," Toad said and led the way to the stairs. "Anything you'd tell him he'd refer to me, so you might as well eliminate the middleman."
"What floor are you fellows on?" Carmellini asked.
"Eight. I'm in training for the Boston marathon."
When they reached the office, Toad sank gratefully into the chair behind his desk and tried not to look bedraggled. He eyed Carmellini without enthusiasm. Several inches over six feet, with wide shoulders, impossibly narrow hips, and hard, callused hands, the guy looked to be in terrific physical shape. The eight-story climb hadn't made him draw a deep breath. His forehead wasn't even damp.
"Bet you don't get a lot of visitors up here with the elevator out," Carmellini said conversationally.
"You got that right. When most people drop by, I tell them to come back when the Redskins win their next home game. I hadn't been up the stairs in over an hour, so I made an exception in your case. To what miracle do we owe the honor of your presence?"
"I was in London. After the FAA grounded all the planes arriving on the East Coast, I was stuck. Flew to Montreal and rented a car, just got in."
"You came straight here?"
"Yeah. I have a story to tell the admiral, but since you're sorta his alter ego, I'll tell it to you, just in case my former employer figures I'm here and sends someone looking for me before he gets back."
"I'll let that alter ego crap go by if you'll tell me why the agency might be looking for you," Toad said.
"Let's put it like this. The folks at Langley don't know where I am and may or may not be in a sweat about that. I resigned Monday before I went to England, effective in a couple weeks, then I decided to quit early."
"I hope the bank doesn't repossess your car," Toad said, eyeing Carmellini skeptically. It was almost as if the man were too glib, too smooth. One half expected him to pull three walnut shells and a pea from a jacket pocket and ask if you wanted to make a friendly wager.
Tommy Carmellini casually glanced around to see who might be in earshot — there was no one — then began. "Antoine Jouany. The company sent me to England to raid his computer." He went on, telling Toad about it.
Captain Rebecca Allison's F-16 was pushing against Mach one when she dropped out of the overcast over the southern beach of Long
Island. Try as she might, she couldn't get her radar to pick the Tomahawk out of ground return. She shallowed her dive and began scanning ahead and below for a glimpse of the small missile.
The thick haze under the clouds limited visibility to about three miles. Finding out a tiny cruise missile was going to be extremely difficult, she thought, and wondered if she had already missed it and flown by.
"Should be dead ahead," the Sentry controller told her, "about two miles. The speed readout is five oh six." Oh, man, 506 knots. Right against the Earth.
She kept the fighter descending, glanced at her indicated airspeed__550—and quickly scanned her instruments. All well.
She concentrated on the view through the HUD.
"One mile, at your twelve."
She was down to three hundred feet on the radar altimeter now, and into the city suburbs. Streets and houses and schools flashed under the speeding fighter, giving her a sensation of speed that was sublime.
There!
Oh, so small! She was overrunning, so she picked up the nose and chopped the throttle, then dropped a wing to keep the missile in view. It was a hundred feet above the ground, maybe less, just clearing the highest obstacles as it roared along. Allison matched the missile's speed, then dropped down behind it into trail. It was so tiny, almost impossible to keep in sight.
She had never in her life flown so low and fast. The buildings were right there, she was barely clearing the roofs. Somehow she found the courage to glance at the weapons panel to verify the switch settings, then she squeezed the trigger on the stick to the first detent.
The Sidewinder gave her a tone, then dropped it as a cell phone tower whizzed past, only yards from the wingtip.
That rattled her for a second. She was right against the city, suicidally low.
Come on, Allison!
As she was trying again to get a heat lock-on, she realized that the missile was crossing over an airfield. It must be JFK! Without thinking she pulled up slightly, and in the blink of an eye was at five hundred feet. Below she saw the huge mat, runways, the control tower, the terminal with airplanes at every gate — she forced the stick forward and went rocketing by the control tower so low that she felt she could almost reach out and touch the thing.
The tower must have been a discrete navigation fix for the missile, she realized. Gritting her teeth, trying to ignore the blur under her, she added throttle, began closing the distance to the hard-to-see missile.
Stanley Schottenheimer found a missile, although unknown to him, it was not the one the Sentry controller had pointed out. Not that it mattered. There were three missiles, and if any of them could be shot down before they hit their targets, that would be a small victory.
The borough of Queens spinning beneath him unnerved Schottenheimer who, like Allison, had never flown so low and fast. No one did training like this — the risk was too great.
Schottenheimer gritted his teeth, forced himself to stay down on the rooftops and add throttle to close on the racing missile. With all the heat sources immediately below him, his Sidewinders also failed to lock on to the Tomahawk's exhaust, so he planned on using his gun.
Now the missile shot over LaGuardia Airport, the fighter only two hundred yards behind.
Closing, closing, he squeezed off an experimental burst from the twenty-millimeter Gatling gun mounted in the port wing root. And missed the tiny target.
The land fell behind as the missile shot out over the sound, then laid into a port turn. The radar altimeter went off, but the
damn thing always did over smooth water.
He could see the missile plainly for the first time, unobstructed by haze and a cluttered background. And he wouldn't be hammering Queens with the twenty-millimeter. This was his chance!
He steepened his turn, tried to pull lead on the missile as the radar altimeter deedled insanely. He could see the shore coming up ahead, knew he had only seconds.
Over smooth water on a dark day it is always difficult to accurately judge one's height; in any event, Schottenheimer had too many things shrieking for his attention. Inevitably he slid inside the mis-
sile's turning radius. As he tried to nudge the pipper in the HUD onto the missile, the left wingtip of the F-16 kissed the dark water. Still traveling at a bit over five hundred knots, the wing of the fighter tore off as it cartwheeled along the surface of Long Island Sound. As the fighter decelerated, spinning like a Frisbee, the eyeballs-out G ruptured hundreds of tiny blood vessels in Stanley Schottenheimer's brain, killing him instantly. He was dead when the fighter disintegrated. The engine made a mighty splash. The cloud of jet fuel and pieces that had been the rest of the plane grew and grew as the components of the cloud decelerated at different rates. The pieces of metal and sinew, wire and fiber and bone struck the water gently, almost like snowflakes, amid the rain of fuel droplets.
Tearing across the rooftops of Brooklyn at almost full throttle, Rebecca Allison succeeded in placing the HUD pipper on the tiny exhaust of the Tomahawk missile ahead of her and hesitated for a heartbeat. Some of her twenty-millimeter cannon shells were going to hit buildings and cars, doing God knows what in the way of damage. And if she succeeded in damaging the missile, it was either going to crash into a building or detonate immediately.
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