Warshot (The Hunter Killer Series Book 6)

by Don Keith

  Within a few minutes, the first patient was lifted up and into the bird. A minute later, the second one followed.

  “US warship, Sierra Seven-Zero. On behalf of the Taiwan Navy, thank you for saving one of ours. Safe journeys.”

  The helicopter disappeared to the north, flying low and fast, with no mention of the second new passenger, the Chinese national, the man who had been bombing and strafing the chopper pilot’s fellow warriors only a few hours earlier.

  Chet Allison hardly noticed. That particular complication was no longer his problem.

  But as he watched the chopper disappear into the curtain of stars, the skipper was thankful he, his crew, and the Boise had been able to possibly help save both young men’s lives.

  Even if that Chinese fighter pilot almost certainly would have sunk his submarine if he’d had the opportunity.

  Ψ

  Dr. Rex Smith watched the GPS display closely, its bright image reflected in the scientist’s eyeglasses. They were almost back to the correct location, but precision was essential. That would make it much simpler to navigate the Sea Raptor UUV back to the desired fumarole if the submersible started its journey from the very same location. Merely a few seconds off in either latitude or longitude could mean missing their goal by several miles when the UUV had descended ten thousand meters to the pitch blackness at the bottom of the Tonga Trench.

  Out on the broad afterdeck, the hot tropical sun bore down on the launch team as they worked furiously to complete final preparations to send the expensive submersible on its journey. Unsurprisingly, Mitch O’Donnell and Sandy McDougal were heavily engaged in another of their interminable arguments about how to best prepare the Sea Raptor. The brilliant sun shot diamonds from the sea’s soft ripples, causing the contentious pair to squint at each other as they verbally sparred.

  Bill Bix stuck his head through the bridge door, looked at Smith, and shook his head.

  “Doc, you better get down to the afterdeck,” the ship’s captain suggested. “Those two hot-headed Irishmen are at each other’s throats again. If somebody doesn’t go down and referee, one of them’ll end up in the water playing footsie with the sharks.”

  “Nursemaiding a kindergarten playground is what it is,” Smith muttered. “We picked those two because they were the best in the world at what they do. Trouble is, they are simply incapable of doing it together.” The scientist pointed to the GPS. “Bill, if you can get us on top of the dot and into auto-station-keeping, I’ll go take my turn at being the playground monitor.”

  Smith stepped out of the pilothouse and climbed down the ladder to the main deck, then headed aft. When he arrived at the UUV, the two protagonists were still standing on either side of the Sea Raptor and its cradle. Several other crewmembers stood back, out of the line of fire, watching the spat from a safe distance. A red-faced Sandy McDougal was flailing her arms about, shouting at the top of her lungs at Mitch O’Donnell. He stood there solidly, his feet firmly planted and arms crossed, staring stone-faced at McDougal.

  “Damn stubborn Paddy,” McDougal ranted. “Why won’t you listen to common sense for once?”

  “You be ‘a callin’ me a Paddy, are ye?” O’Donnell shot back in as thick an Irish brogue as he could muster. “Thick-headed Ulsterman! I mean Ulsterwoman. Oh, I’ll be PC an’ ye be an Ulster-person!”

  “Hey!” Smith shouted, interrupting the tirade. He stood at the bow of the UUV and gave a hard look to the two quarrelsome researchers. “Sandy, Mitch, can’t you two ever work together peaceably? What set off World War III this time? Bushmills versus Jameson Irish whiskey again?”

  Both answered loudly, each trying to out-shout the other. Rex Smith threw up his arms. “Okay then! Shut up, both of you!” The pair fell silent, mostly from the look on their angry boss’s face. “We’ll do this like the first grade. We’ll take turns. Sandy, you go first.”

  The petite red-haired scientist started, “This dumb Irishman…” Smith held up a cautioning finger. “I mean Mister O’Donnell here wants to take off a bunch of sensors and add on some extra sample-stowage baskets. He prefers that we fly blind so he can scoop up and haul up more gold.”

  “Bullocks!” the Irishman exploded.

  “Damn it, Mitch, you’ll get your turn,” Smith heatedly told him. “Sandy? Your input on the matter?”

  “We need those sensors to even make this dive worthwhile,” she finished her argument. “There’s no telling what scientific discoveries we could be missing without those sensors. We need every camera and every single light to capture the most data we can while we can. Before weather, politics, or the environment way down there brings everything to a halt. The chem sensor package is vital to the fumarole study and the high freq side-scan is how we map them.”

  Smith shifted to face O’Donnell, whose belligerent posture had not softened one whit.

  “Pragmatic,” the Irishman started. “I’m just being pragmatic. Those sensors and their precious data won’t be payin’ the rent. At least not for a while. But with the boxes, we can be pullin’ up over a hundred pounds of gold on every trip. That’d be over three million US dollars each run. After only a few trips down and up, we’d be paying our own way. Once we have the rent covered, then we can go back to playin’ scientist, takin’ pictures of hot water geysers and weird-ass animals.”

  Smith rubbed his chin for a few minutes as he weighed the arguments Solomon-like. Finally, he told them, “Here is what we’ll do. We do need more samples to map the extent of the field, so we absolutely will need the side-scan. We’ll forego the fumarole studies on this trip, so we can add that capacity. We can extend the bottom time to cover more research area. That should about divide the baby in half, maybe, and if we are lucky, without killing it. You two satisfied?”

  The two frowned but then nodded reluctantly.

  The rest of the launch sequence went without drama. The bright orange device lacked the sleek torpedo-like appearance of UUVs meant for open-water operations. More squat and boxy to help tolerate the unbelievable water pressure, with sensors and arms protruding from the vessel at odd angles. But they were all plug-ins, easily added or removed. Its electric drive propulsion systems were contained in small pods that could be rotated for easier maneuverability, but flexibility came at the expense of speed and range. Just for the Sea Raptor to travel from the sea surface to the bottom of the Tonga Trench would take ten hours.

  The davit crane swung the UUV out and slowly lowered it into the water. After a few more checks were completed, divers released the Sea Raptor to slip smoothly below the surface. With nothing else to watch or argue about, and with the sun still brutally hot, the team repaired to the command center. From there, they could monitor the descent in air-conditioned comfort while enjoying cold drinks and a bite of dinner.

  As the afternoon shifted to evening and then segued into night, the novelty wore off. The bystanders began to thin out. By midnight, only Mitch O’Donnell and Sandy McDougal kept Rex Smith company.

  The trio quickly perked up as they were finally able to watch the Sea Raptor slowly approach the sea bottom, so very far below their keel. Since they were floating in an out-of-the-way corner of a very large ocean, and concentrating on a view only a handful of people on the planet had ever had the occasion to see, they did not pay any particular attention to the waters around them.

  It was the shattering noise of the radar proximity alarm that jolted them out of their fixation on the UUV control. Something had just approached within a mile of where they had the Deep Ocean Explorer keeping station.

  Rex Smith jumped up and ran out the command center door. When he burst into the ship’s pilothouse, he ran squarely into Bill Bix.

  “We got company,” the ship’s captain informed him, then turned and pointed out the window. A fast-approaching patrol boat was clearly visible in the moonlight, making no effort to maintain stealth. The brightly illuminated boat had a spotlight pointed at the Deep Ocean Explorer’s bridge, all but blinding Smith and B
ix.

  But even in the bright light, they could make out a wicked-looking thirty-millimeter autocannon aimed directly at them.

  “Pirates?” Smith asked.

  “Not way out here, I wouldn’t think. And not with that weapon.”

  Then, from the bridge of the approaching vessel, someone called out on a loud-hailer.

  “Onboard the ship, you are conducting illegal activities in Tongan sovereign waters. Stand by to be boarded.”

  The patrol vessel slid to a stop a few hundred meters from the Deep Ocean Explorer. The autocannon unerringly maintained its aim directly across the bow of the research ship. Smith and Bix watched anxiously as a team of heavily armed marines climbed from the vessel into a RHIB, obviously with the intent of making the short trip between ships.

  Bix grabbed his own loud-hailer and stepped out onto the research ship’s bridge wing.

  “Tongan Patrol Vessel, we are an American-flagged research vessel conducting legitimate research in international waters. Interference with our activities is a violation of international law.”

  The autocannon on the patrol boat suddenly spat twice, sending angry rounds over the Deep Ocean Explorer’s bow and into the sea beyond.

  “On the research vessel, you are in Tongan waters. Stand by to receive boarders. You are under arrest and your ship is impounded.”

  Smith and Bix looked at each other, mouths open, eyes wide. This was an eventuality for which they had not planned. Harassment? Sure. That happened periodically in some of the politically dicey waters where they sometimes found themselves. Maybe even being chased away. But the arrest of the crew and impoundment of the valuable and quite famous ship? This was a whole new level. Would they be held as prisoners, pawns to be bartered in a high-stakes game for control of the unbelievably rich gold field?

  It appeared they were about to find out. The RHIB full of marines was rapidly approaching. There was not much time to do anything. And they lacked any weaponry to defend themselves. Just the righteousness of their research.

  Smith bolted for the bridge door, shouting, “Get the word out to whoever you can, hopefully the Navy in Pago Pago. I’m going to take care of the Sea Raptor.”

  The marines were clambering up and onboard the Deep Ocean Explorer as Smith barged into the control room.

  “Quick! Put the Sea Raptor in hibernation.” Mitch O’Donnell opened his mouth to question. “Don’t ask why, just do it.”

  Turning to McDougal, he asked, “All our data up on cloud storage?” When she nodded, he ordered, “Delete everything onboard. I don’t want a single byte still here.”

  Someone pounded on the control room door.

  “Open up! You are under arrest.”

  Smith waited to open the door as O’Donnell hit the hibernation button and then powered down his computer. At the same time, McDougal hit the button to wipe the servers. There was not enough time to power them down, but there was no way for their attackers to stop the deletion of all the data on the servers either.

  The assault troops went compartment to compartment, herding the entire crew into the ship’s small wardroom/dining room. The Tongans then stationed a pair of guards at the door while the rest went to work getting the research vessel under tow.

  Smith sidled up to Bill Bix. “Did you get through to anyone?”

  The ship’s captain shook his head. “No. I left a voicemail with our Los Angeles office.” He nodded toward the Tongans. “They grabbed my phone before I got through to the Navy.”

  Dawn found the two ships already twenty miles away, steadily moving toward Vava’u, the nearest Tongan island and an unknown fate.

  19

  ORCA One threaded its way past ‘Eueiki Island and into the Ava Piha Channel. The channel was one of the passages through the scattering of coral islands that poked out of the water on the north side of Tongatapu, the main island of the Tongan kingdom. Tongatapu was also the last stop on the US Navy UUV’s mission to sow sensors around the major clusters of land that formed the nation of Tonga. Niuatoputapu, Vava’u, Pangai, and Tongatapu lay in a rough array about four hundred miles long, aligned from north-northeast to south-southwest.

  Spending a few hours placing sensors at each harbor entrance and avoiding the hundreds of tiny islands and coral heads, ORCA One had finally arrived off the main island. Planting sensors off Tongatapu would be a bit more complicated, though. There were really two harbors to monitor. Nuku’alofa was the main town and had been the traditional harbor for centuries. For all that time, the island’s shipping had used the northern route—Lahi Channel—to get to the anchorages and wharves. But those anchorages were not well protected from the frequent storms in the region, so when the Chinese came—with unlimited money and manpower—they decided to build an entirely new port with a protected deep-water anchorage at Niuatoputapu. After much dredging and blasting, the Ava Piha Channel was opened to the east for access to the Chinese seaport.

  Only the narrow and treacherous Makaha’a Channel connected the two ports by water. As a result, Chinese ships came in from the east and all other vessels entered from the north. Now, as programmed, ORCA One planted a row of sensors across the Ava Piha Channel where it swung south and narrowed off Talafo’ou. Then, that task finished, the UUV turned around and headed for the Makaha’a Channel. At its narrowest, the ship passage between the Makaha’a reef to the south and the Monoafe reef to the north and east gave barely four hundred yards clearance between the jagged coral outcroppings.

  At that narrowest point, ORCA One encountered a coral head not plotted into its electronic memory. As designed, its system smartly processed this new information and ordered a course and depth change around the obstacle. The little submersible boat came shallow and skirted around the coral head before dropping back down.

  A Tongan fisherman working the reef caught a glimpse of the black object silently appear out of the depths and then, just as quietly, disappear again. In an instant, two centuries of Christianity were lost to the fisherman and the Pulotu ‘Aka’aka—the spirit world—took its place.

  The ORCA dutifully laid a line of sensors between Fafa Island and Alakipeau Island, thus completing the coverage to all entrances to Tongatapu. This part of her mission accomplished, the UUV next headed up the Lahi Channel. While transiting, the UUV came shallow and communicated back to the control center aboard the Portland. It reported the completion of the laying of the sensor fields and received a significant change in its mission profile.

  After receipting for the traffic, it dropped down deep and promptly changed course to the northwest, heading out on its new assignment.

  Ψ

  Joe Glass was neck deep in a stack of forms and other bureaucratic paperwork, determined to find the bottom of the mess so he could get back to concentrating on the swirl of activity in the middle of which he had suddenly found himself. It took only a half-second of the annoying buzz of the secure telephone on his desk to wrench him back to the real world. He had left word with his aide to not disturb him unless it was of vital importance. He snatched the offending instrument from its cradle and growled, “Glass!”

  He immediately recognized the chuckle at the other end. It was Jon Ward, his old boss when both men rode submarines. Before Glass became a CO of his own boat and then moved to his new command. And before Ward became head of Naval Intelligence.

  “Joe, you need to work a bit on your people skills,” the Navy’s top spy suggested. “People will think your promotion made you a gruff old man.”

  “But, Jon, I was a gruff old man long before that,” Glass retorted. “Even before sub school. And then I enhanced my gruffness skills by learning from the best, if we’re handing out credit.”

  “Well, I got just the job for a gruff old man,” Ward replied. And Glass could feel the call turn in a totally new direction. Pleasantries were over. This was a business call. “I just got off a call with the New Zealand naval attaché. The Kiwis are all in a dither. It seems that the New Zealand government has lost
all contact with Niue. You may remember that little island is what they term ‘associated with’ New Zealand. It’s complicated and really too much lawyer talk for a couple of old sub sailors, but basically, New Zealand is responsible for Niue’s external security. Anyway, there has been no communication with the island for most of two days now. The weekly Air New Zealand flight was refused permission to land yesterday. The pilot reported seeing what looked like armed troops on the ground as he passed over and went looking for another freeway exit that had jet fuel.”

  “Wow!” Glass gasped. “Any idea what the hell is going on?”

  “That’s why I’m calling you,” Ward answered. “We don’t think it’s internal. Not a coup or civil war or anything like that. We’ve seen plenty of aircraft and boat activity that suggests something different. Maybe even a small-scale invasion. Since you’re already in the neighborhood working on your suntan, I figured you could get someone down there to take a look and see what the hell is going on. You got Cheyenne about ready to go, don’t you?”

  “Yep, she’s finishing up fast cruise today. The plan was to do a final stores load and then send her out to chase those Chinese diesel boats that intel says are supposed to be heading our way.”

  “I suggest you revise that plan,” Ward responded. “Send her down to do some recon work and then she can go out to chase Chinese subs.”

  “Will do, Boss.”

  “And Joe, one more thing. I recommend that you get your Marines ready to come off the bench for some action. I’m thinking we may need them in the game real soon.”