D. M. Ulmer 01 - Silent Battleground (18 page)

Denver
stopped engines at fifteen feet and began backing.  She had just a bit of sternway when the anchor let go.  The current and a little bit of wind kept them off shore; a perfect situation.  To get the hole fully
above the waterline the ship had to be rolled slightly
to port by partially counter-flooding the ballast tanks.  The engineers already began welding the preformed plating to the upper side of the hole.  Their makeshift blanket tent did an excellent job of screening light from the arc torches.

An hour passed, two hours and then three.

Brent thought,
So much for the optimistic engineers.

Quartermaster Henri broke the silence with his 21MC transmission.  “Thirty minutes on the outside is the latest estimate on repairs, Bridge.”

“Bridge, aye, conn,” Brent replied then asked, “Tracks laid out for getting back to deepwater?”

Henri gave the expected reply.  “That’s affirmative, sir.”

“Aye, pass the word on to the cap—”

The topside port lookout interrupted, “Contact, sir!  One-nine-five and closing.”

Turning around, Brent spotted the running lights of
a small ship.  A simultaneous view of both sidelights meant the ship headed directly
toward
Denver
.

He ordered through a megaphone to the repair party, “Secure the work topside, all hands lay below on the double!”  Then on the 21MC, “Captain to the bridge.  Closing visual contact true bearing one-eight-zero, six thousand.”

Henri replied, “Captain has the word, Bridge.  We’re securing the deck hatch when the work party is below.”

Bostwick called out, “Captain up,” the edge on his voice apparent.  “What’ve we got, Brent?”

Brent pointed aft.  “Whatever he is, he just came around the point, sir.  This close to the field, my guess is a mine layer.”

The captain asked, “Can we get him with a torpedo?”

“Too high risk of missing, Captain, and it would alert him to our presence.  Shallow water and tight gyro angles.  Even if we did hit him, he’d radio the whole damn Soviet Air Force and they’d be on our backs before we reached deepwater.”

His voice betraying both anger and fear the captain snapped, “What do you recommend?” 

Brent calmly replied, “Sit tight, sir.  He’s not looking for anything and doesn’t expect us to be here.”

The captain said, “Why the hell did I ever let you jackasses talk me into this?” 

Once again, Bostwick proved
not equal to the pressure.

“Port sidelight beginning to mask, Captain.  He’ll pass astern, but not very far.”

The captain exclaimed, “Listen!  The son of a bitch is so damn close we can hear him.”

The
rum, rum, rum
of the ship’s single diesel engine could be
heard clearly and the bearings abruptly
drifted quickly left.

“Shsssh,” Bostwick hissed. 

Tension levels mounted.  Although no one aboard the unidentified ship could possibly
hear voices from
Denver’s
bridge, its closeness made silence a psychological factor.  The ship passed a scant half-mile astern then its propulsion sounds stopped.  The vessel began to drift slowly
away with the current.  Next, the red glow of her port sidelight reappeared, followed quickly
by the green starboard sidelight.  She pointed directly
toward them again.

Bostwick said, “Oh shit, they’ve found us.”

“No, sir,” Brent replied, “I think we’re just too good at selecting an anchorage.  We must be in her favorite spot.”

At that instant, the sound of the ship’s anchor splash and the running of chain through her hawse pipe rang through the still night.  Brent estimated the range to be a thousand yards astern and blocking
Denver’s
escape to sea.  She’d likely
run out fifty yards of chain and give
Denver
a little more breathing room.  But daylight would come in a few hours and illuminate the trapped
Denver.

An irate Bostwick said, “Okay, Mr. Smart-ass tactician, what the hell do we do now?”

Chapter 10

Dave Zane demanded of Dutch Meyer, “Now what the hell does that commodore of yours think we can do with that mess?”

They watched a 688 being towed around the breakwater, one of the partially overhauled ships Eric Danis had turned out of Bremerton on the eve of the attack.

He continued, “I told him yesterday it would be at least a month before we’re ready for work and already he loads us up.  That thing is in such pitiful shape, you have to be an expert to tell it’s a submarine.”

Dutch replied, “You really
want to hear what he expects?  He wants it fixed and sent to sea.  That’s what.”

“Damn it, there’s nothing we can do to fix it now.  It’s only
gonna be in the way and delay us from doing more important jobs so let’s anchor it outside.”

The old mustang indulged himself a grin, “You tell the skipper that, Dave.  He’s been sitting on the bottom of Puget Sound for the past month, bailing out water from a leaky patch; his crew has no idea of what’s happened to their families, and the only
thing keeping them going is a desire to get their ship into action.  If you’re gonna tell him he has to anchor out, give me half an hour to draw a crowd, ’cause I can collect fifty bucks a ticket for this show.”

“All right then, what do you suggest?”

“We both go down to the berth, welcome him to the facility and ask what we can do for him.”

Grinning, Dave asked, “Am I really
getting that old, Dutch?”

“Yeah, and twice as ornery.  Let’s go.”

Mooring USS
Newport
showed the crew’s lack of practice since arriving at Bremerton more than six months ago.  The ragtag gang assembled by Dave had no experience at all.  Both ship’s crew and Dave’s men sensed the other’s problems and therefore performed the operation
devoid of bickering and catcalling as the gap closed between the ship and dock.

The
Newport
officer-of-the-deck ordered the brow
set in place and Dave went aboard.

What Dave considered an extremely
young officer gave the order, “Attention on deck.”

A crisp salute from the younger man showed Dave at least some facets of his day had survived.  Dave, caught off guard by the courtesy, removed his hands from his pockets and assumed a semblance of the military position, which had evaded him since completing active service.  He returned the salute in the prescribed manner of a retired officer by standing at attention.

The submarine’s skipper said, “Good afternoon, Captain Zane.  I’m Phil Reynolds, commanding officer.  Welcome aboard
Newport.
”

Dave thought, c
ommanding officer?
 
He looks younger than my paperboy
.  “Well,” Dave hesitated, but for only
an instant.  “Welcome to our base, Captain.  We don’t have much here yet, but seeing you’re our first customer, it’s all yours.”

Dave extended his hand and the submarine skipper took it with a firm grip and shook it.

Commander Reynolds said, “Please come below, sir.”

Both men proceeded to
Newport’s
wardroom where Dave accepted the customary offer of a cup of coffee.

Dave began, “Well how did you enjoy the bottom of our Sound?”

“Frankly, sir, I’ve only
been in a few places I liked less.”

“Perfectly
understandable.  How did things go back there?  You’re the first guys out.  What can you tell us?”

Shaking his head, Reynolds said, “Not a nifty place to be.  We heard the racket and just sat tight.  That place is now as hot as a firecracker.  Once in a while after the attack, we’d pop up at night and send monitors out to take background readings.  The Reds used some pretty dirty stuff.  Are you familiar with the term salted weapon?”

“Isn’t that when they capture neutrons in the material to be blown up?  Spreads around a lot of contamination.”

“That’s right, sir.”

Dave felt uncomfortable with the respectful form of address.  He’d rather be called by his first name but had to come to terms with being back in the Navy.

Reynolds continued, “From what we found, they used a cobalt sixty isotope.  Its half-life is five years.  It’s spread all over the southern part of Puget Sound.  Even with leaching from heavy rainfall, we can’t get back into Bremerton for at least a year.”

“How’d they do that?  The technique you described requires a pretty good-sized device.  It couldn’t have been delivered by a ballistic missile.”

“That’s right, sir.  I think we now know what the Soviets did off the Swedish coast a few years ago.  A Foxtrot submarine ran aground there; and nearby, the Swedes found marks of a remotely piloted tracked vehicle on the seabed.  Somehow, they got similar vehicles into Puget Sound undetected.  They loaded them with the dirty stuff, drove them to desired burst points and programmed them to detonate concurrently
with the missile attacks.”

It struck Dave that young Reynolds had gotten it all pretty well together.  His tone level steady and he took no delight in using his observations to focus attention on himself.  He didn’t need to.  Dave liked the notion that his country still produced officers of this quality.

“What made you think they used RPVs?”

Reynolds smiled.  “We bottomed near Hat Island.  One evening after we surfaced an irate local approached us in his boat and
raised hell.  He wanted to know if we were
responsible for destroying the clam beds.  Actually, Captain Zane, we found this refreshing.  Here we were, recovering from a nuclear attack, up to our buns in a full-fledged war, and this guy could still worry about clams.  The small space occupied by
Newport
could not have wiped out his bed, so I asked if he would show us where they were.  He did, and my divers uncovered the tracks.  Ivan had been there.

“We figured the rest by deduction.  But here’s the really
funny part.  The guy came back and let us have it again.  He claimed he argued against bringing the carrier battle group into Everett, Washington in the first place.  Had they listened to him, the Soviets wouldn’t have run their tracked vehicles in there and this reinforced his position.  After the war, he’d go to Washington, DC and say as much.  What a feisty guy.

“He’d been there two weeks when we saw him and he’s already a goner.  It would’ve done no good to tell him that.  We thought it best to let him live out what little time he had in a place he obviously loved.”

“You did the right thing.”

“From what we could tell, sir, Bremerton and Everett got hit hardest.  Lucky the battle group left port a few days earlier.  The Soviets likely intended to deny access to any port facility that we needed to conduct the war.  I suspect there’s a bunch of other places in the Sound with wiped out clam beds too.  Whoever directed the RPV movements reached station early
with plenty of time to practice.”

“As far as your ship went, how did things go?”

“On the plus side, we performed our mission.  We survived the attack and brought you a hull to repair.  But in the yard before the attack, we lifted the reduction gear casings and found wiped bearings on the port low speed pinion and high-speed gear.  We ordered replacement bearings but had to deploy before they arrived.  Unless you got a line on some, I’m afraid we’re nothing but a spare parts bin.”

“How long have you been in command, Phil?”

“I relieved my predecessor two months ago in the yard.”

Dave paused for a moment.  If he found the bearings, he had no one at the
Pitstop
capable of making repairs of this magnitude and did not wish to offer any false hope.  During their short acquaintance, Dave developed a fondness for young Reynolds.

“Look, son … er, Captain.  We’ve performed a kind of miracle here just getting this place set up.  We just might have another one up our sleeve.”

Jack Olsen said, “An armed boarding party is our only
option.  We can’t hide by bottoming with only
ten feet beneath the keel.  Slipping past them undetected is out of the question, unless they’re deaf and blind.”

Captain Bostwick addressed his hastily
assembled council of war, “What do we know about the target?” 

A long-term submariner contention is:
There are only two types of ships, submarines and targets.

Nodding, Jack addressed the weapons officer seated at the end of the wardroom table.  “Brent?”

Brent continued to function well despite the captain’s now open hostility toward him.  “Yevgenya class, sir.  No more than ten aboard.  Sonar got a make on her.  A one-lunger diesel propulsion system.  A couple of sweeps with a Don II Radar just before she anchored is consistent, although
common, with a number of warships that size.”

Bostwick asked, “Brent, any chance she detected us?”

“None sir.  We’re well inside the width of a Don II transmission pulse and no suspicious radio intercepts.  Real problem is the damn radio.  We intercepted her anchoring message and the power of the response signal indicated a transmitter’s fairly close.  Maybe even on the island itself.  We’ve got more reason than just the minesweeper for being out of here and submerged before daylight.”

Dan Patrick added, “If we get caught, we’ve had it.  The Soviets have the hardware they need to keep us from reaching deepwater.”

Captain Bostwick agreed to let the boarding party go.  “Okay.  It’s our only
chance.  Who’ll lead this?  Brent?”

Jack replied, “He wants to, Captain, but he’s too important to the success for the rest of our mission.”

The captain gritted his teeth as he asked, “Who then?”

“Woody, sir,” Dan replied.  “He’s right out of the Academy and he’s the most recently
trained in infantry tactics.  He’s also in the best physical shape.”

Considering Dan’s choice, Bostwick thought for a moment. 
True.  Green, but tough and smart.
  “Okay, Woody, you got it.  Some of my classmates led platoons in Vietnam as second lieutenants and gave good accounts of themselves.  We’re banking on you.”

Grinning, Woody said, “I won’t let you down, sir.”

Moments later, Brent assembled Woody Parnell and twenty enlisted candidates in the crew’s mess.  Quartermaster Henri, not a nominee, suspected a mission planning session in the works and slipped into the meeting uninvited.