by Joe Buff
The unbearable heat of the initial flash and the rising fireball had done their work. The entire island was outlined in flame. The spreading landward shock wave swept up burning debris, dying sheep, telephone poles and houses, and flung everything into the air. In some places the force of the pressure wave would snuff the fires, in others they'd burn redoubled.
The fireball continued to rise and expand and cool. A pillar of black smoke and vaporized earth and rock was sucked up at its base. The suction grew stronger and stronger. Now burning cinders and flaming wreckage were drawn from all around, inward toward the pillar and up inside.
The airborne shock front reached the Osprey, and with it the first noise of the nuclear blast, like a volcano going off. The aircraft was thrown forward by the shock wave. Ilse held on as the plane shook madly. The starboard engine stalled. The shaking went on and on. The aircraft began to go down, not by choice this time. hi panic Ilse yanked her life jacket tabs. The flotation vest inflated in an instant and squeezed her chest uncomfortably.
Above the rumbling, roaring sound still coming from Chatham Island, the remaining Osprey engine grew even louder, and the engine's transmission noise became ragged and strained. But both propellers kept turning. Ilse could hear the pilot and copilot reciting a checklist to each other, shouting to be heard above everything else. The ocean was coming up fast, as the heavily loaded Osprey struggled to stay in the air. Finally the aircrew got the second engine restarted. Ilse was bathed in sweat.
One more time, she looked back to the island. The mushroom cloud was easily five miles high and rising. It tilted east because of the wind. The fireball no longer glowed, but lightning flashed at its top and inside the pillar. The pillar of smoke and debris continued getting thicker. It turned a reddish brown, like smog, from ionization effects. A purplish fluorescence lingered on the mushroom cap, from intense radiation.
The crown of the mushroom cloud kept rising, so high now it was nicely lit by the last rays of the sun from beyond the horizon; its east side hid in shadow, but its west side showed a fluffy, rosy pink. The water around the south end of the island wildly churned, as boulders and wreckage plunged out of the sky. The tiny spot of land that used to be Chatham Island was a solid sea of fire, a radioactive wasteland for centuries to come.
THIRTY-SIX
Simultaneously, on Challenger
In the control room, Jeffrey's eyes roved everywhere critically, in anticipation, making sure his ship and all aboard her were ready. By instinct and feel and long experience he assessed each crewman's state of mind, their level of energy, their spirit.
Overall, he was satisfied, considering what was about to happen, and what hadn't happened yet. The bomb, and Voortrekker.
He quadruple-checked the speed log and the depth gauge on his console. Jeffrey had Challenger hovering stationary, in the deep sound channel at four thousand feet.
Hovering reduced her self-noise. Using the deep-sound channel optimized the range of her passive, listening-only sonars.
Jeffrey reread the gyrocompass again: the ship was aimed to give the best coverage, tactically, to her side-mounted wide-aperture arrays. The starboard side pointed northeast toward the distant Stennis, just in case, and the port side faced the opposite direction, southwest — which now seemed Voortrekker's most likely route of escape. Jeffrey's sonar-status repeater showed that a towed array was deployed, strung out in the gentle current — to leave no blind spots, and to search for very-low-frequency noise.
"Still no datum on Voortrekker anywhere, Captain," Kathy reported.
"Very well, Sonar," Jeffrey acknowledged crisply. "Maintain search. Put passive sonars on speakers."
Jeffrey listened to the noise that began to fill the control room. From all around his ship, the Collins boats and active sonobuoys pinged.
The sound of freedom, he told himself, those friendly active sonars sounding in the deep. Challenger didn't ping, to disguise her location. She did use out-of-phase noise-canceling emissions, so Voortrekker wouldn't by chance steal an echo off Challenger's hull.
Jeffrey eyed the ship's chronometer. He realized Bell and Wilson were looking at it too.
"Soon now, sir," Bell said. He didn't sound happy. Wilson was stoic, expressionless.
As the three of them watched, the chronometer's minute hand crept toward the detonation time of the Axis bomb. From a hundred miles away on Chatham Island, it would take almost two minutes for the waterborne shock wave's diminishing force to hit the ship. Sound traveled through seawater at almost a mile a second — five times as fast as through air.
Earlier than Jeffrey expected, Kathy reported a powerful seismic rumble. He'd forgotten the speed of sound was even higher through the earth than through the sea.
So the bomb didn't fizzle. Now the Axis has sent their message to the world, and escalated the stakes another notch. Jan ter Horst can claim another triumph.
The sonar chief and his men were ready for what would happen next. Jeffrey was surprised by the intensity of the noise when the waterborne shock wave hit. It began as a roar that rose to a thunderclap crescendo. The roar continued while Chatham Island was shaken by the blast, and energy from the rising fireball pounded the land and the sea. The infernal commotion died off slowly, as more shock waves rebounded off near and far bottom terrain. The ocean itself seemed to protest, when reverb echoed through clouds of tiny particles throughout the water, and as noises reflected off temperature layers and blobs and sheets and schools of fish and plankton teeming everywhere.
Kathy had already put her staff to work. After several minutes of onboard supercomputer time, she reported to Jeffrey.
"No hostile contacts on ambient sonar or hole-in-ocean mode, Captain."
"Very well." Jeffrey had used the acoustic illumination from the blast to try to locate Voortrekker, like one humongous sonar ping. But the enemy sub had truly vanished.
The diminishing airborne shock wave at last passed overhead, the final thing to arrive from Chatham Island. A faint rumble and strident hissing came from above on the speakers, as if from a distant storm. Jeffrey knew the geopolitical storm had only begun.
It was time to answer that call from CINCPACFLT. Jeffrey ordered Meltzer and COB to bring Challenger to periscope depth.
On the Osprey
The Osprey's copilot told Ilse she was wanted on the radio.
The crew chief helped her take off her life vest and gave her a fresh, uninflated one. He handed her his flight helmet, complete with headphones and throat mike. He showed her how to use the mike, and plugged the wires into a jack near her seat.
Ilse found herself in a high-level conference call. Reception was riddled with lingering static from the nuclear blast, and the voices were distorted from the hyper-encryption processes, but the other people on the call were intelligible. Commodore Wilson and Jeffrey were speaking from Challenger. The commander in chief of the Pacific Fleet was speaking personally from his base in Hawaii.
The purpose of the call was to try to grasp Jan ter Horst's intent. CINCPACFLT, the four-star admiral, was a gentleman about it, but he made clear to Ilse he was aware she'd once been very close to ter Horst.
Everyone reviewed what they knew: the disposition of Allied strength, forming a cordon across that entire part of the ANZA Gap; the fact that ter Horst had used four valuable nuclear torpedoes to destroy the final SOSUS line by brute force; the fact that there was no contact whatsoever with Voortrekker anywhere.
"Could he just be sitting somewhere nearby, on the bottom?" the admiral asked.
Jeffrey admitted it was possible, but Ilse disagreed. "Jan isn't stupid, Admiral. He knows when he's outnumbered. He knows that by just sitting there, he'd let the nuclear subs from the Stennis escorts close in on him more and more and work cooperatively with Challenger."
"So talk to me, Lieutenant Reebeck. Tell me what you think he'll do."
"He'll want to even the odds. He'll also want to sink Challenger."
"How will he do that?"
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"I'm not sure I'm the best one to answer that, sir."
Jeffrey jumped in. "Let's look at what we know. Challenger and Voortrekker are the two fastest vessels in this theater, when running submerged at flank speed. They're also weatherproof, Admiral."
"Yes, yes. I know. A nuclear submarine can steam right under a category-five typhoon as if it isn't even there."
"Right, sir," Jeffrey said. "And no surface ship or aircraft can make that claim."
"You think he headed west, then, toward the tropical storm? But that would take him right at New Zealand, and the storm will pass through fairly soon."
"I understand, Admiral. I don't think he's heading west." The conversation paused. Ilse sensed frustration from the others on the call.
"What about the bottom terrain?" CINCPACFLT said. The admiral mumbled something in the background. Ilse suspected he was asking his aide for a chart. Ilse asked the crew chief if they had any on the Osprey. He said the cockpit had digital navigation aids.
Ilse went into the cockpit. The aircrew were intent on their controls, and kept checking the status of all the Osprey's vital systems. It was dark except for the glow of instruments. The view outside, forward and sideways and up, was dazzling. Ilse could see countless richly colored stars, coming down to a smooth and unobstructed vast horizon.
She recognized the Southern Cross, and even made out the Magellanic Clouds, a pair of small galaxies that orbit the Milky Way. The Osprey still headed south, to give Chatham Island and its fallout cloud the widest possible berth.
Ilse looked more closely inside the cockpit. She saw that all the instruments were really digital images on display screens. The artificial horizons and the gyrocompasses looked just like regular ones, but they were video pictures, not actual instrument dials.
Ilse plugged her helmet wires back in, then apologized to CINCPACFLT for dropping off the call. She asked the copilot to bring up a nautical chart of the area. The one he had didn't show bottom terrain, so she needed to go by memory.
The admiral must have had a chart on a laptop or monitor in his office now. "I see these volcanic bottom ridges run north — south," Jeffrey concurred.
"So if he isn't just hugging the bottom till things blow over," CINCPACFLT said, "and he isn't heading toward the tropical storm and New Zealand, and he isn't heading northeast toward Challenger and our other main-line forces, what is he doing?… Lieutenant Reebeck, would he just retreat toward home, South Africa? Maybe he feels he's accomplished enough, with this explosion on Chatham Island."
"No, Admiral. With respect, sir, Jan ter Horst is not someone to ever feel he's done enough."
"We were talking about Voortrekker trying to even the odds," Jeffrey prompted. Ilse noticed that Commodore Wilson was letting Jeffrey do all the talking on Challenger; Wilson seemed good at knowing when to give Jeffrey his head.
"So where can he take on your vessel one to one, Captain," the admiral asked rhetorically, "with no interference from other forces? What can he do by using his speed, and where can he go to lose my ships and aircraft?"
"There's nowhere he can go, Admiral," Jeffrey said. "We can hunt for him everywhere. Even without the SOSUS working, Vikings and Orions from the Stennis and New Zealand can blanket the area. Voortrekker's crew can't live forever in hiding, sir, on just the charge she's got in her batteries and the air she's got in her tanks. Eventually they'd have to power up the reactor, run other equipment, move, make some noise. We'll hear it."
"I wish I had your confidence, Captain," the admiral said, "but I don't want to take the time pressure off ter Horst for any reason. Miss Reebeck, help us out here."
Ilse thought carefully. "Well, Jan is always one to pull something outrageous. His only weakness, if you could call it that, is he feels the constant need to outdo himself."
"Which means?…"
Ilse looked at the chart. His vessel's superior speed.. the need to avoid the surface ships and aircraft, even aircraft ten times as fast as him… his personal drive to meet Challenger head to head for a rematch. A rematch with no outside interference.
"Oh, God," Ilse said out loud.
"Repeat, please?" the admiral said.
"I think I know where he's going."
"Where?" Jeffrey said.
Ilse looked at the map on the cockpit screen. What she saw was on the screen. It wasn't sea-floor terrain. It was something huge, almost five hundred miles across, up to two thousand feet thick, and on the surface.
"He'll head due south."
"Why south?" CINCPACFLT said.
"All the way south. Antarctica. The Ross Ice Shelf. He's going to run under the Ross Ice Shelf and wait for Challenger to come in after him."
On Challenger
CINCPACFLT told Ilse to get off the line. The admiral continued the conversation via satellite with Wilson and Jeffrey. The admiral ordered Challenger to head south at top speed, using the bottom ridge terrain for acoustic concealment. Aircraft would concentrate their search along the route to the south, ranging between Chatham Island and the local sea mounts at one end, and the Ross Sea leading to the ice shelf at the other.
They'd try to make contact with Voortrekker while Challenger tried to catch up.
Jeffrey insisted that special rules of engagement be put in effect. Wilson concurred.
Those aircraft, and any friendly ships or submarines, had to hold their fire no matter what. Dropping sonobuoys was one thing, but Jeffrey didn't want anyone dropping depth charges or shooting torpedoes and hitting Challenger by mistake.
The admiral agreed. All supporting forces would confine their roles to searching for the enemy only. He ended the call.
"Chief of the Watch," Jeffrey ordered, "lower all masts and antennas."
COB acknowledged and flipped some switches. "All masts and antennas retracted:'
"Rig for deep submergence."
"Deep submergence, aye: " COB said. He altered the lineup of pumps. The word was passed on the sound-powered phones. More men were stationed to monitor backup depth and pressure gauges. Others went aft, to engineering, to be available in an emergency.
"Helm, rig for nap-of-sea-floor cruising mode. Make your mean course one eight zero."
South. "Make your depth ten thousand feet."
"Nap of sea floor, aye," Meltzer said. "Make my mean course one eight zero, aye. Make my depth ten thousand feet, aye."
Meltzer reconfigured his console displays. He pushed his control wheel forward.
Challenger dived for the bottom.
Crewmen took deep breaths, or flexed their fingers, to try to unwind. The ship was making another excursion to test depth, after a recent nuclear battle.
"Helm," Jeffrey said, "ahead flank."
Meltzer acknowledged. Challenger's speed began to mount.
The ship herself seemed to act with a feeling of purpose. At times like this, Jeffrey could most vividly tell that Challenger was alive, with a heart and soul as real and distinctive as any person's.
Wilson came up to Jeffrey and cleared his throat. "Commodore?"
"I'm not questioning the logic here. CINCPACFLT agreed."
"Sir?" Wilson was visibly fretting, which was exceedingly rare for the man. He got Jeffrey worried too.
"What if we're wrong, Captain? You said it yourself. We're Voortrekker's single biggest threat… What if this is all a trick? Ter Horst knows now that Ilse Reebeck is alive and on the scene. What if he intentionally used that?"
Jeffrey was shaken. "You mean, sir, used her attempt to read his mind, and turned it against us?"
"What if he got Challenger to rush south on a hopeless wild-goose chase while he slips past us and heads north?"
On the Osprey
As uncomfortable as the sideways canvas bucket seat was, fatigue and the steady droning of the Osprey's engines made Ilse start to nod off. She was surprised by a tap on the shoulder. It was the crew chief.
"We got more orders. We keep going south. Next stop is the McMurdo base. No midair refuel
ing available, given the timing and the geography."
"You mean Antarctica?"
"Yeah. The west end of the ice shelf. See all this equipment from the Stennis?" He gestured at the reels and boxes under the cargo straps and netting. "Same gear you were using on the island. You're gonna set up on the edge of the shelf instead. Lieutenant Clayton and Chief Montgomery are supposed to help you."
"But that must be two thousand miles from here!"
The crew chief nodded. "Should take eight or nine hours."
"We have enough fuel?"
"Barely. This particular aircraft has the Osprey's extended fuel package, for long-range ferrying flights. That's why you were put on it to begin with, as a contingency plan. That' s why we topped off from the other Osprey on the island."
"But two thousand miles?" There was no dry land along the route for them to make a forced landing if need be.
"Depends on the headwinds, Lieutenant. Keep your fingers crossed." He pointed out a porthole, at the ocean. "We run short and have to ditch, it's really cold and wet down there."
THIRTY-SEVEN
Six hours later, on Challenger
Jeffrey lay on his rack in his stateroom, trying to get some sleep. His natural inclination was to stay awake, and stay in the control room, until the final issue with Voortrekker was resolved. But the Ross Ice Shelf was two full days' flank-speed steaming time ahead. Commodore Wilson ordered Jeffrey to rest.
Lieutenant Commander Bell had the conn. Jeffrey reminded himself his captain's stateroom was just aft of the control room, and he was only seconds away if Bell needed him. Knowing it didn't help Jeffrey relax. His born personality was to always be in the thick of things. But being captain meant you had to delegate, come what may. Jeffrey tossed and turned.
