by Tom Clancy
The new feed-water pump was everything the Master Shipwright had promised on the installation side, Captain Dubinin noted. They’d practically had to dismantle a whole compartment to get it in, plus torch a hole through the submarine’s double hull. He could still look up and see sky through what should have been a curved steel overhead, something very unnerving indeed for a submarine officer. They had to make sure that the pump worked satisfactorily before they welded shut the “soft patch” through which it had arrived. It could have been worse. This submarine had a steel hull. Those Soviet submarines made of titanium were the devil to weld shut.
The pump/steam-generator room was immediately aft of the reactor compartment. In fact the reactor vessel abutted the bulkhead on the forward side, and the pump assembly on the after side. The pump circulated water in and out of the reactor. The saturated steam went into the steam-generator, where it ran through an interface. There its heat caused water in the “outside” or nonradioactive loop to flash to steam, which then turned the submarine’s turbine engines (in turn driving the propeller through reduction gears). The “inner loop” steam, with most of its energy lost, then ran through a condenser that was cooled by seawater from outside the hull, and was pumped as water back into the bottom of the reactor vessel for reheating to continue the cycle. The steam-generator and condenser were actually the same large structure, and the same multistage pump handled all of the circulation. This one mechanical object was the acoustical Achilles’ heel of all nuclear-powered ships. The pump had to exchange vast quantities of water that was “hot” both thermally and radioactively. Doing that much mechanical work had always meant making a large amount of noise. Until now.
“It’s an ingenious design,” Dubinin said.
“It should be. The Americans spent ten years perfecting it for their missile submarines, then decided not to use it. The design team was crushed.”
The Captain grunted. The new American reactor designs were able to use natural convection-circulation. One more technical advantage. They were so damnably clever. As both men waited, the reactor was powering up. Control rods were being withdrawn, and free neutrons from the fuel elements were beginning to interact, starting a controlled nuclear chain-reaction. At the control panel behind the Captain and the Admiral, technicians called off temperature readings in degrees Kelvin, which started at absolute zero and used Celsius measurements.
“Any time now ... ,” the Master Shipwright breathed.
“You’ve never seen it in operation?” Dubinin asked.
“No.”
Marvelous, the Captain thought, looking up at the sky. What a horrible thing to see from inside a submarine. “What was that?”
“The pump just kicked in.”
“You’re joking.” He looked at the massive, multibarrel assembly. He couldn’t—Dubinin walked over to the instrument panel and—
Dubinin laughed out loud.
“It works, Captain,” the chief engineer said.
“Keep running up the power,” Dubinin said.
“Ten percent now, and rising.”
“Take it all the way to one-ten.”
“Captain ...”
“I know, we never go over a hundred.” The reactor was rated for fifty thousand horsepower, but like most such machines, the maximum power rating was conservative. It had been run at nearly fifty-eight thousand—once, on builder’s trials, resulting in minor damage to the steam-generator’s internal plumbing—and the maximum useful power was fifty-four-point-nine-six. Dubinin had only done that once, soon after taking command. It was something a ship’s commander did, just as a fighter pilot must find out at least one time how fast he can make his aircraft lance through the air.
“Very well,” the engineer agreed.
“Keep a close eye on things, Ivan Stepanovich. If you see any problems, shut down at once.” Dubinin patted him on the shoulder and walked back to the front of the compartment, hoping the welders had done their jobs properly. He shrugged at the thought. The welds had all been X-rayed for possible faults. You couldn’t worry about everything, and he had a fine chief engineer to keep an eye on things.
“Twenty-percent power.”
The Master Shipwright looked around. The pump had also been mounted on its own small raft structure, essentially a table with spring-loaded legs. They largely prevented transmission of whatever noise the pump generated into the hull, and from there into the water. That, he thought, had been poorly designed. Well, there were always things to be done better. Building ships was one of the last true engineering art forms.
“Twenty-five.”
“I can hear something now,” Dubinin said.
“Speed equivalent?”
“With normal hotel load”—that meant the power required to operate various ship’s systems ranging from air conditioning to reading lights—“ten knots.” The Akula-class required a great deal of electric power for her internal systems. That was due mainly to the primitive air-conditioning systems, which alone ate up ten percent of reactor output. “We need seventeen-percent power for hotel loadings before we start turning the screw. Western systems are much more efficient.”
The Master Shipwright nodded grumpily. “They have a vast industry concerned with environmental engineering. We do not have the infrastructure to do the proper research yet.”
“They have a much hotter climate. I was in Washington once, in July. Hell could scarcely be worse.”
“That bad?”
“The embassy chap who took me around said it was once a malarial swamp. They’ve even had yellow fever epidemics there. Miserable climate.”
“I didn’t know that.”
“Thirty percent,” the engineer called.
“When were you there?” the Admiral asked.
“Over ten years ago, for the Incidents at Sea negotiations. My first and last diplomatic adventure. Some headquarters fool thought they needed a submariner. I was drafted out of Frunze for it. Total waste of time,” Dubinin added.
“How was it?”
“Dull. The American submarine types are arrogant. Not very friendly back then.” Dubinin paused. “No, that’s not fair. The political climate was very different. The hospitality was cordial, but reserved. They took us to a baseball game.”
“And?” the Admiral asked.
The Captain smiled. “The food and beer were enjoyable. The game was incomprehensible, and their explanations just made things worse.”
“Forty percent.”
“Twelve knots,” Dubinin said. “The noise is picking up....”
“But?”
“But it’s a fraction of what the old pump put out. My men have to wear ear protection in here. At full speed the noise is terrible.”
“We’ll see. Did you learn anything interesting in Washington?”
Another grunt. “Not to walk the streets alone. I went out for a stroll and saw some poor woman attacked by a street hooligan, and, you know, that was only a few blocks from the White House!”
“Really?”
“The young crook tried to run right past me with her purse. Like something from a film. It was quite amazing.”
“Tried to?”
“Did I ever tell you I was a good football player? I tackled him, a little too enthusiastically. Broke his kneecap, as a matter of fact.” Dubinin smiled, remembering the injury he’d inflicted on the worthless bastard. Concrete sidewalks were so much harder than a grassy football pitch....
“Fifty percent.”
“Then what happened?”
“And the embassy people went mad about it. The Ambassador screamed a lot. Thought they’d send me right home. But the local police talked about giving me a medal. It was hushed up, and I was never asked to be a diplomat again.” Dubinin laughed out loud. “I won. Eighteen knots.”
“Why did you interfere?”
“I was young and foolish,” Dubinin explained. “Never occurred to me that it might all be some CIA trick—that’s what the Ambassador was worried
about. It wasn’t, just a young criminal and a frail Black woman. His kneecap shattered quite badly. I wonder how well he runs now? And if he really was CIA, that’s one less spy we have to worry about.”
“Sixty-percent power, still very steady,” the engineer called. “No pressure fluctuations at all.”
“Twenty-three knots. The next forty-percent power doesn’t do very much for us ... and the flow noise off the hull starts building up at this point. Run it up smartly, Vanya!”
“Aye, Captain!”
“What’s the fastest you’ve ever had him?”
“Thirty-two at max-rated power. Thirty-three on overload.”
“There’s talk about a new hull paint....”
“The stuff the English invented? Intelligence says it adds more than a knot to the American hunter submarines.”
“That’s right,” the Admiral confirmed. “I hear we have the formula, but actually making it is very difficult, and applying it properly is even more so.”
“Anything over twenty-five and you run the risk of stripping the anechoic tiles off the hull. Had that happen once when I was Starpom on the Sverdlovskiy Komsomolets....” Dubinin shook his head. “Like being inside a drum, the way those damned rubber slabs pounded the hull.”
“Not much we can do about that, I’m afraid.”
“Seventy-five-percent power.”
“Take those tiles off and I get another knot.” “You don’t really advocate that?”
Dubinin shook his head. “No. If a torpedo goes into the water, that could be the difference between life and death.”
Conversation stopped at that point. In ten minutes power had reached a hundred percent, fifty-thousand horsepower. The pump noise was quite loud now, but it was still possible to hear a person speaking. With the old pump this power level was like listening to a rock band, Dubinin remembered, you could feel the sound rippling through your body. Not now, and the rafting of the pump body ... the yard commander had promised him a vast reduction in radiated noise. He had not been boasting. Ten minutes later, he’d seen and heard everything he’d needed.
“Power down,” Dubinin commanded.
“Well, Valentin Borissovich?”
“KGB stole this from the Americans?”
“That is my understanding,” the Admiral said.
“I may kiss the next spy I meet.”
The Motor Vessel George McReady lay alongside the pier loading cargo. She was a large ship, ten years old, driven by large, low-speed marine diesels, and designed as a timber carrier. She could carry thirty thousand tons of finished lumber or, as was the case now, logs. The Japanese preferred to process the lumber themselves for the most part. It kept the processing money in their country instead of having to export it. At least an American-flag vessel was being used to do the delivery, a concession that had required ten months of negotiations. Japan could be a fun place to visit, though rather expensive.
Under the watchful eyes of the First Officer, gantry cranes lifted the logs from trucks and lowered them into the built-for-the-purpose holds. The process was remarkably speedy. Automation of cargo-loading was probably the most important development in the commercial shipping business. George M could be fully loaded in less than forty hours, and off-loaded in thirty-six, allowing the ship to return to sea very rapidly, but denying her crew the chance to do very much in whatever port they might be visiting. The loss of income for waterfront bars and other businesses that catered to sailors was not a matter of great concern to the shipowners, who did not make money when their hulls were tied alongside the pier.
“Pete, got the weather,” the Third Officer announced. “Could be better.”
The First Officer looked at the chart. “Wow!”
“Yeah, a monster Siberian low forming up. Gonna get bumpy a couple of days out. It’s gonna be too big to dodge, too.”
The First Officer whistled at the numbers. “Don’t forget your ’scope patch, Jimmy.”
“Right. How much deck cargo?”
“Just those boys over there.” He pointed.
The other man grunted, then picked up a pair of binoculars from the holder. “Christ, they’re chained together!”
“That’s why we can’t strike ’em below.”
“Outstanding,” the junior man observed.
“I already talked to the bosun about it. We’ll have them tied down nice and tight.”
“Good idea, Pete. If this storm builds like I expect, you’ll be able to surf down there.”
“Captain still on the beach?”
“Right, he’s due back at fourteen hundred.”
“Fueling complete. ChEng will have his diesels on line at seventeen hundred. Depart at sixteen-thirty?”
“That’s right.”
“Damn, a guy hardly has time to get laid anymore.”
“I’ll tell the Captain about the weather forecast. It might make us late in Japan.”
“Cap‘n’ll love that.”
“Won’t we all?”
“Hey, if it screws up our alongside time, maybe I can....”
“You and me both, buddy.” The First Officer grinned. Both men were single.
“Beautiful, isn’t it?” Fromm asked. He leaned down, staring at the metallic mass through the Lexan sheeting. The manipulator arm had detached the plutonium from the spindle and moved it for a visual inspection that wasn’t really necessary, but the plutonium had to be moved for the next part of the finishing process anyway, and Fromm wanted to see the thing close up. He shined a small, powerful flashlight on the metal, but then switched it off. The reflection of the overhead lights was enough.
“It really is amazing,” Ghosn said.
What they looked at might easily have been a piece of blown glass, so smooth it appeared. In fact it was far smoother than that. The uniformity of the outside surface was so exact that the greatest distorting effect came from gravity. Whatever imperfections there might have been were far too small to see with the naked eye, and were definitely below the design tolerances Fromm had established when he’d worked the hydrocodes on the minicomputer.
The outside of the folded cylinder was perfect, reflecting light like some sort of eccentric lens. As the arm rotated it around the long axis, the placement and size of the reflected ceiling lights did not move or waver. Even the German found that remarkable.
“I would never have believed we could do so well,” Ghosn said.
Fromm nodded. “Such things were not possible until quite recently. The air-bearing-lathe technology is hardly fifteen years old, and the laser-control systems are newer still. The main commercial application is still for ultrafine instruments like astronomical telescopes, very high-quality lenses, special centrifuge parts....” The German stood. “Now, we must also polish the inside surfaces. Those we cannot visually inspect.”
“Why do the outside first?”
“This way we can be sure that the machine is performing properly. The laser will control the inside—we know now, you see, that it is giving us good data.” That explanation wasn’t really true, but Fromm didn’t want to give the real one: he truly thought this beautiful. The young Arab might not understand. Das ist die schwarze Kunst.... It actually was rather Faustian, Fromm thought, wasn’t it?
How very strange, Ghosn thought, that something so wonderfully shaped could ...
“Things continue to go well.”
“Indeed,” Fromm replied. He gestured to the interior of the enclosure. When run properly, the lathe trimmed off something almost like metallic thread, but thinner, visible mainly because of its reflectivity. A singularly valuable thread, it was collected for remelting and possible future use.
“A good stopping place,” Fromm said, turning away.
“I agree.” They’d been at it for fourteen hours. Ghosn dismissed the men. He and Fromm walked out, too, leaving the room to the custody of the two security guards.
The guards were not highly educated men. Selected from the Commander’s personal retinue of fol
lowers, each was the veteran of many years of combat operations. Perversely, their fighting had been more against fellow Arabs than their putative Zionist enemies. There was a plethora of terrorist groups, and since each drew its support from the Palestinian community, there was competition for the limited pool of followers. Competition among men with guns not infrequently led to confrontation and death. In the case of the guards, it also proved their loyalty. Each of the men on duty was an expert shot, about good enough to be on a par with the new American addition to the organization, the infidel Russell.
One of the guards, Achmed, lit up a cigarette and leaned against the wall. He faced yet another boring night. Walking guard on the outside, or patrolling the block on which Qati slept, at least gave them a variety of things to observe. One might imagine that there was an Israeli agent behind every parked car or behind every window, and such thoughts kept one awake and alert. Not here. Here they guarded machines that sat dumbly still. For diversion, and also in keeping with their duties, the guards kept an eye on the machinists, following them around the room, to and from their eating and sleeping spaces, and even on some of their less complicated jobs. Though not well educated, Achmed was a bright man, quick to learn, and he fancied that he could have done any of these machinist jobs, given a few months to learn the trade properly. He was very good with weapons, able to diagnose a problem or fix an improper sight as quickly and well as a master gunsmith.
As he walked around, he listened to the drone of the blowers for the various air systems, and on each circuit he looked at the instrument panels that reported their status. The panels also monitored the backup generators, making sure each night that there was sufficient fuel in the tanks.
“They are awfully worried about the schedule, aren’t they?” Achmed mused. He continued his walk around, hoping the indicator light would blink off. He and his companion stopped to look at the same metallic bar that had so interested Fromm and Ghosn.
“What do you suppose that is?”
“Something wondrous,” Achmed said. “Certainly they are keeping it as secret as they can.”
