Deep Sound Channel

by Joe Buff

  "My God," Jeffrey said out loud. "You can see right through her hull." He watched the sunrise glowing where the hangar deck had been, and in the other empty spaces lower down. Those once were all compartments, where her crew had worked and studied, slept and

  messed, written letters home. Tortured longitudinals were what remained of her first platform deck amidships, forward of engineering. Along her waterline arced the discharge from many pumps, undoubtedly P-250 portable gasoline-powered units, keeping her afloat.

  "They're finishing the detailed decontamination," COB said, pointing out the little figures in nuclear-biological-chemical protective suits on the hull, busy with the scrubbing and the sealing. "Aging will have happened on its own."

  "Iodine 131," Jeffrey said, continuing the idle shop talk in spite of himself, "radon 222, the shortest half-lived stuff."

  COB nodded. "The gross washdown would have been completed after putting out the fires."

  "The naval architects will claim her now, I think," Jeffrey said. "To improve their damageability models."

  "It isn't right," COB said. "She's a tomb, not a pile of data." Here and there patches of hull plating still clung to Ranger's side. The plates were pressed inward against the frame members, whose outlines stood out clearly. The plates seemed plastered to her flank like sheets of canvas in the wind, a devil's wind. Everything was black, deep coal-mine black, except for splotches where the fires and ocean salt had oxidized her steel a matte pastel red-brown.

  "She fought hard," a junior officer said with awe.

  "A Presidential Unit Citation for sure," a senior chief said.

  "Awarded posthumously," COB said, an obvious tightness in his throat.

  "The larger battle won," Jeffrey said, "but at such cost." It was better if they talked, he told himself. It eased the pain.

  Jeffrey saw two seamen wipe their eyes—maybe they'd had friends aboard, or maybe not. He watched as

  Ranger moved on through the lagoon, toward its closed end at the south point of the atoll'

  s miles-long V, toward shallow water and foul ground.

  "Message from Frank Cable, sir," COB said when there seemed no point in watching further, being formal for the benefit of the enlisted men, all petty officers themselves. " Captain's due back in fifteen minutes."

  A group of crewmen had been standing close together at the bow, huddling like at a funeral, near the dozen hatches for the Tactical Tomahawk cruise missile vertical launch system. The men got back to work, unbidden, at the torpedo loading gear.

  "Last one, correct?" Jeffrey said, eyeing the lethal cylinder.

  "Confirmed, last nuclear torpedo," COB said carefully.

  Jeffrey initialed the checklist, then held out his clipboard for COB to countersign. The old chief would have his thirty years in soon, Jeffrey knew, but with this war the navy wouldn't let him go. Not that he would want to, and victory was much too tenuous to plan that far ahead. COB, whose given name was never used aboard, came from a clan of Latino Jersey City truckers. Black sheep of the family, he instead had gone to sea. At least COB had a family who cared. Jeffrey sighed to himself, then stood up straighter.

  "Let me give you guys a hand."

  They positioned the crane's long burden carefully, then eased the two-metric-ton weapon onto the loading cradle and secured it. Jeffrey watched the cradle first elevate to line up with the channel through the hull, then trundle down toward the transit rack in the torpedo room three decks below.

  A variable-yield warhead, the cryptic markings on the fish's glossy green side said 0.01

  to 0.1 kilotons. Maybe that didn't sound like much, till you remembered these were meant to go off underwater. "Up to almost one percent of Hiroshima," Jeffrey said, mostly to himself. The casing at the back for the fiberoptic guidance wire was labeled NO STEP.

  COB cleared his throat. "The message said we have two guests. Passengers. No honors to be rendered."

  "Very well," Jeffrey said. He shrugged. "Security, I guess."

  "Gripes," COB groaned. "Please, no."

  "Watch that," Jeffrey said, but smiling. He'd seen why COB had cursed. Captain Wilson was coming down the gangway from the tender, accompanied by two uniformed figures. One had a beard and one was female.

  Jeffrey went to meet them at the brow, the portable aluminum stepway that led onto the hull. The brow was positioned at Challenger's so-called quarterdeck, a flat space behind the sail.

  The captain's male guest was a Royal Navy four-striper in summer whites, a full captain, not like Jeffrey's CO, who was actually a commander. The woman wore a khaki shortsleeved shirt and slacks, but from a distance Jeffrey couldn't make out her collar tabs. He watched the arriving threesome honor the national ensign at Challenger's stern, then exchange salutes with the in-port duty officer.

  "Commodore Morse," Wilson said, "let me introduce my executive officer, Jeffrey Fuller. . . . Jeffrey, meet Richard Morse." They shook hands. A commodore was a senior captain acting in the role of rear admiral, commanding more than a single ship. Jeffrey saw that Morse was qualified in subs—between the dolphins on his badge was a crown with inlaid rubies.

  "Welcome to our island," Morse said, smiling. Then he added puckishly, "Of course, hardly anyone here's British." Diego Garcia was a U.K. dependent territory, in the middle of the Indian Ocean, in the middle of

  nowhere. Its strategic value lay in being on the way to or from so many other places.

  "The commodore's with us as an observer," Wilson said. "He'll take command of a new undersea battle group when we get to the Cape Verdes."

  "HMS Dreadnought will be my flagship to escort the Allied buildup," Morse said, "so I'm quite interested in how you people go about things. You know our troopship and tank transport convoys to Central Africa will be crucial. German and Boer land forces are still hell-bent on linking up there."

  Morse's frame was compact, like Captain Wilson's, and his wan complexion seemed more so next to the CO's deep chocolate brown. Morse had erect posture by submariner standards, with slightly rounded shoulders that spoke of quiet power. Wilson's shoulders were squared off, always, conveying toughness and a not-soquiet power.

  "XO," Wilson said, "this is Ilse Reebeck. Miss Reebeck, Commander Fuller." A lieutenant commander was called "Commander" publicly, and as XO Jeffrey would have gotten the title in any case, a military courtesy. Now he could see Ilse was a civilian—

  no one had told her civilians don't salute.

  "How do you do," Jeffrey said. Ilse was slim, close to Jeffrey's height. She had a good figure and a good firm handshake, but her eyes were angry, or maybe sad.

  "Pleased to meet you," Reebeck said officiously in a not-quite-British accent.

  "Anything vital still not loaded?" Wilson said to Jeffrey, never one to waste his time or words.

  "How vital do you mean, sir?" Jeffrey said.

  "We've got mission orders," Wilson said, holding up his bulging briefcase, "but first things first. An Israeli Type 800 diesel boat just reported an inbound hostile PROBSUB

  contact, then didn't have the signal processing power to hold on to it."

  "The hostile's not nuclear-powered?" Jeffrey said.

  "No, it's too quiet, that's the problem. Helos are being vectored now to help confirm and localize. We're tasked to make the intercept before the bastard gets too close."

  "Understood, Captain."

  "Tell Maneuvering I want to get under way in fifteen minutes. You take the bridge until we dive."

  "Aye aye, sir," Jeffrey said. He knew Challenger's reactor had been kept critical. With her steam throttles cranked open and proper control rod adjustments, the ship would answer all bells almost instantly.

  "Weapons load-out completed?" Wilson said. "Yes, sir," Jeffrey said.

  "Everyone aboard? SEAL team squared away?" "We struck their gear below first thing."

  "Good," Wilson said, eyeing the flexible conveyor passing boxes from the tender. " Anything still waiting when we single up gets left behin
d. And once we're submerged, I want your recommendation on what goes in the torpedo tubes. So use your head."

  "Understood, sir," Jeffrey said.

  "You got grease on your good uniform."

  "Sorry, sir," Jeffrey said, didn't have time to change after the meeting with Admiral Cook."

  Wilson nodded. "Call me when we're ready to cast off." Wilson let the Brit precede him down the hatch behind the sail. COB followed, presumably to help Morse get settled in. Ilse Reebeck lingered. She glared at the armed enlisted man who stood guard by the brow. He instinctively stepped back. "I'm South African," she told Jeffrey, making it a dare, not an explanation.

  "I'm sorry," Jeffrey said. He thought she had nice hair. Light brown, like her eyes, straight and shoulder-length.

  "You were with the SEALs," Ilse said, pointing to his Special Warfare qualification badge.

  "Long ago," Jeffrey said. "I transferred to the SubForce. It's been more than fifteen years now." "Miss it?"

  "Excuse me?"

  "Do you miss being in the SEALs?" Ilse pronounced each word distinctly, as if Jeffrey were retarded or Tightly deaf.

  "Frankly no."

  Ilse pointed to his uniform blouse again, below the gold twin dolphins. She jabbed two of his ribbons. "Silver Star, Purple Heart. Somewhere in Iraq, the captain said. . . . Did it hurt much?"

  "Yeah." Jeffrey wondered what this woman was all about. "It was months till I could walk again." "Feeling all right now?"

  "Yes," Jeffrey said too quickly. Times when he went short on sleep, his left thigh ached badly.

  "Good," Ilse said. She looked him up and down. Jeffrey met her gaze. She responded with the coldest sneer he'd ever gotten from a woman.

  Ilse walked to the hatch, then glanced back at Jeffrey as she started climbing inside. "I suppose nobody's told you yet," she said. "You're coming with me on the raid." Jeffrey asked the junior officer of the deck, the JOOD, to stay with him up in the tiny cockpit on top of the sail, the conning tower, to watch and learn—maneuvering on the surface wasn't like underwater. Jeffrey glanced at the sky. The sun was noticeably higher. Today would be hot, in more ways than one.

  "First question should always be, where's the wind?" Jeffrey said.

  "Still light from off the stern, sir," the lieutenant (j.g.) said.

  "Not that that matters much," Jeffrey said. "Subs ride so low in the water, and these days have such tiny,

  stealthy sails, wind's usually the last thing you have to worry about when getting under way."

  "Just like I read, sir. Just like in the simulator."

  "What's the latest fallout report?" Jeffrey gestured to the intercom. Of course, he already knew the answer.

  The young man cleared his throat and pressed the button. "Control, Bridge. Radiology, how's the air?"

  "Milliroentgens per hour and counts per minute well inside normal tolerances, sir."

  "Very well," the JOOD said.

  "Good," Jeffrey said. "Frank Cable's met staff predicted that, but you should always check. Weather forecasts are still just weather forecasts."

  "Understood, sir."

  "Meltzer, you ever been to Diego Garcia before?" A rhetorical question, since Jeffrey had the night before reread young David's file.

  "No, sir. This is my first time overseas, not counting summer cruises at Annapolis." Jeffrey looked down from his vantage point atop the sail. He'd done Naval ROTC

  instead, at Purdue. "The tide's running out, from right to left. See the way that buoy's listing with the set?"

  "Two knots maybe, sir. Not strong."

  "The lagoon here's huge, but the opening at the north end's pretty wide. There's lots of room to ebb and flow without making nasty currents."

  "Should we use our auxiliary propulsors, sir?"

  "Nah. That makes things too easy." Jeffrey smiled. "We hardly ever get to ship drive on the surface, right? Besides, it's fun."

  With his bullhorn Jeffrey had the deck hands take in two and three: the forward and aft breast lines that were crossed to keep the boat from sliding back and forth. Then lines one and four, the bow and stern mooring lines, were singled up. Jeffrey ordered four brought to the little capstan on the deck, the after capstan.

  Ile asked for lots of slack on one and had four take a Strain.

  "From here it's mostly feel," Jeffrey said. "You get the hang of it with practice. We have all these extra visual cues on the surface, but the sea state has much more effect, sonar doesn't work as well, and there are only two degrees of freedom." Gradually Challenger's bow began to lever from the tender as she rotated against the aftmost deep draft separator. Before her stern parts could make contact Jeffrey ordered all lines taken in, then had the deck gang go below.

  "Control, Bridge, rudder amidships," Jeffrey commanded into the intercom. "Ahead one third, make turns for six knots." He used the bridge horn toggle to sound a lengthy blast. He checked again that all the bridge instruments were working.

  Water began to surge from Challenger's shrouded pump-jet main propulsor, a design innovation first used by the Royal Navy. The turbine churned up a wake and the boat moved forward, quickly gaining steerageway.

  "Subs are notorious for squishy directional control at dead-slow speeds. Know why?"

  "Their rounded bows, sir, and rudders forward of the propulsor wash."

  "Yup. We're moving now, so that's one less thing to worry about." Jeffrey leaned to the intercom again. "Control, Bridge. Rig for dive." He turned back to Meltzer. "That won't take them long."

  "No, sir. We've been at material conditions ZEBRA and CIRCLE WILLIAM since we surfaced yesterday." "And these signify . . . ?"

  "Watertight doors and fittings shut, ventilation subsystems sealed or making overpressure, except when needed for reprovisioning and maintenance." Jeffrey nodded. "The torpedomen'll be starting final assembly of the special weapons warheads now, and

  they'll insert the exploders in our conventional ADCAPs too. . . . Now I'm gonna check for conflicting ship traffic again. You have to let the lookouts know you're relying on them, but you also need to make sure for yourself."

  "I understand, sir."

  "If anything goes wrong, anything at all, it's the OOD's responsibility. Get that in your blood for when you qualify."

  "Yes, Commander."

  "Since we're at EMCON, we can't use the Sperry BPS-16." That was Challenger's surface surveillance radar, shut down for electronic silence. "But visibility's good. Just remember we're very hard to see, 'cause of our low profile. Defensive driving counts." Jeffrey watched Meltzer take a thorough look around, practicing for when his time came.

  "Frank Cable's in anchorage area A-3," Jeffrey said, "about as close to the exit channel as you can get." He leaned to the intercom. "Left standard rudder." He looked at Meltzer. "I'

  m judging by eye the advance in yards and lateral transfer you'd expect for our present speed and rudder setting. The assistant navigator has all the tables."

  "I've studied them very carefully, sir. In training they said we shouldn't just rely on the computer."

  Jeffrey watched as Challenger turned into the channel. "Observe the wake. See the way we rotate round our pivot point? It's about a fourth of the way back along the hull, so part of the boat always swings out as we turn. That happens underwater too, but you don't get to see it."

  Meltzer's lips moved silently, as if repeating what he'd heard. "Quite so, sir."

  "You have to make allowances for that yaw around our track. More than one promising young naval officer has come to grief against a pier or shoal."

  "I understand, sir," Meltzer said.

  "The worst is if you hit another vessel in tight quarters." Meltzer swallowed.

  Good, Jeffrey told himself, the kid takes this stuff seriously. "And . . . just about now." Jeffrey hit the intercom again. "Rudder amidships." The sub steadied up on heading three one five. Jeffrey smiled. "I think I timed that well."

  "Very nice, sir."

  "Good shiphandling," Jeffr
ey said, "that's the key. Nothing impresses your seniors more, or disappoints them faster."

  Soon Jeffrey eyed the bridge gyrocompass again. "See, you want to keep your eyes moving constantly, take in everything, assume nothing. What's our course?" Meltzer looked at the instrument. "Still three one five, sir." Jeffrey glanced forward. "Straight down the outbound lane. Any nearby traffic?" A pause. "Negative, sir."

  "Very well. . . . Ahead one third," Jeffrey said into the mike, "make normal turns." The control room acknowledged.

  Jeffrey watched with satisfaction as Challenger's bow thrust the seas up on her foredeck. The water cascaded smoothly into standing wave depressions on both sides of the round black hull amidships. Some creamed up and around the curved juncture between sail forefoot and the foredeck. "That bit of streamlining's from the mid-nineties," Jeffrey said, "before your time."

  "I know, sir. It reduces flow noise and helps our quieting submerged."

  "I'd argue the Russians thought of it before we did." "The Akula and Typhoon classes, sir."

  Now and then Jeffrey and Meltzer caught some spray. "That is one disadvantage," Jeffrey said, wiping his eyes

  and laughing, "especially when you're in a heavy sea. Today's okay, though."

  "It's refreshing, sir. . . . Think they'll ever come in on our side? Russia/Belarus, I mean."

  "Doubtful," Jeffrey said, no humor in his voice now. "The Germans sent a message it would be hard not to hear, those two A-bombs in the Pripet Marshes on the Ukraine border. Then they backed that up with bribery, buying arms galore from Moscow."

  "But what if things between us and the Axis escalate?"

  "Let's just hope they don't. The Putsch leaders are coldly calculating, not insane." Jeffrey cleared his throat. "There's Eclipse Point." He gestured with his left arm.

  "Downtown Diego Garcia," Meltzer said. "Such as it is." Jeffrey gazed at the water tower and big antennas and all the low white buildings. For a moment he watched Challenger's wake spread out behind, foaming steadily, also white.