Dale Brown - Dale Brown's Dreamland 04 - Piranha(and Jim DeFelice)(2003) (40 page)

 
          
“Yeah.”
Danny was now ten yards from the CIA officer. Part of Powder’s leg lay directly
to his right. “How the hell did they work around these mines?”

 
          
“Maybe
they weren’t armed. Get attacked, they hit the radio and turn it on,” suggested
Stoner.

 
          
“Yeah,”
said Danny, working closer. Even though the way looked clear, his paranoia felt
overwhelming.

 
          
“Protecting
something.”

 
          
“I
think that was a long-wave-communication device out by the shore they blew up,”
said Stoner. “Looked like big fishing poles? Use it to communicate with
submarines.”

 
          
“So
this was an Indian post?”

 
          
“Guys
looked Chinese to me.”

 
          
The
Osprey, already loaded with Liu, buzzed low over the water and headed out, its
large rotors whipping it toward its top speed of 425 knots, twice as fast as
any helicopter in the world.

 
          
“He
gonna
be okay?” Stoner asked.

 
          
“He
said he would. He’s just about a doctor, so he’s probably right,” said Danny as
he reached Stoner. “Now we go back the way we came,” he told him. “Easy.”

 
          
“Yeah.”

 
          
“My
footsteps.”

 
          
“I’m
right behind you.”

 
          
Bison
had started toward them with his gear, moving very slowly and marking the mines
with reed-thin flags. It was as if he were laying out an odd golf course.

 
          
“They
must’ve had some pretty high-tech stuff here,” said Stoner as they walked.
“They sure as shit fought to protect it.”

 
          
“Yeah,
they did.”

 
          
“That
hump down by the water didn’t blow completely. Was probably a radar.”

 
          
“Yeah,”
said Danny.

 
          
“Look
at it once the mines are clear.”

 
          
“After
we secure my sergeant’s body, yes.”

 
          
Aboard Quicksilver, over the South China
Sea

 
          
“We’re
ready,” said Jennifer. “We should have it.”

 
          
Zen
stared at the screen. “Nothing. Didn’t work, Jen.”

 
          
“All
right, hold on.”

 
          
Zen
pushed back in the seat. The
sim
program included a
short-handoff module, but it wasn’t much of a workout—on the program, the
screen appeared and you went.

 
          
No
screen, no go.

 
          
“All
right, let’s try again,” said Jennifer.

 
          
Zen’s
main screen turned green. White axis lines dissected it into four quadrants.
Two white blobs sat in the upper quarter, percolating like tiny
Alka-Selzer
tablets.

 
          
“Hey,
got radar feed,” said Zen.

 
          
“Sonar!”
corrected Jennifer.

 
          
“Yeah,
sorry. Got it. Okay, this is the synthetic thermal feed?”

 
          
“Right.”

 
          
“Looks
like I’m flying in soup. Except for the grid, there’s no reference.”

 
          
“You’re
swimming, not flying.”

 
          
“Whatever.
Running diagnostic set. You out there, Delaford?”

 
          
“I’m
watching everything you do,” said the Navy commander from Iowa, which was
orbiting the ocean a short distance away.

 
          
Zen’s
Flighthawk controls had been replaced by two oversized keyboards and a control
stick large, but considerably less flexible, than the Flighthawks’. While
Piranha’s full range of commands could be entered through the keyboards, Zen’s
interest—and training—was confined to a very small subset, which could be
handled by preset buttons carefully marked with tape. He could flip between a
view synthesized from either passive sonar or temperature-deviant sensors. The
computer automatically processed the contact data, displaying a small amount of
its information in captions beneath each of the white synthesized images on his
main screen; more information on each could be called up on the auxiliary
screen. His speed controls were also worked by dedicated keys on the left
board.

 
          
“How
are you looking over there, Quicksilver?” asked Delaford.

 
          
“Uh,
well, the sea is kind of a brownish green,” said Zen.

 
          
Delaford
laughed. “I can tell you how to change the colors if you want.”

 
          
“I’m
just fine,” Zen told him.

 
          
“All
right. Those two white blobs are our submarines. We’re twelve miles behind the
closest one. This is as close as we want to get. They’re oblivious to us. All
their attention is ahead. Pretty soon they’ll be turning around,” added
Delaford. “They’ll pull a quick spin in the water to make sure there’s no one
behind them.”

 
          
“What
do I do then?”

 
          
“Just
stop. Their active sonar can’t see us beyond roughly five miles, if that. Truth
is, we could probably get right on their hulls and they’d never know we were
there.”

 
          
“Okay.”

 
          
“Temperature
sensors are not nearly as sensitive. Here, look at the screen.”

 
          
Delarod
fed in the display. It took Zen a second to realize
the orange funnels in the milky greenish-brown field were the target subs.

 
          
“Very
obvious what sensor you’re looking at,” noted Delaford.

 
          
“Clever.”

 
          
Delaford
ran through some of the routine, then repeated things Zen had already heard
from one of the Navy briefers as well as Jennifer. Zen felt a little like a
high school backup quarterback being crammed with information on the sideline
after the star went down. Best things to do, he thought, was just get into the
game and work it out on his own.

 
          
“Okay,
so eventually these guys split up. It’s not going to matter who you go with,
but once you do, you have to stay with him. Just make sure the other sub
doesn’t come back around and try and sniff you out,” said Delaford.

 
          
“I
thought they couldn’t see me.”

 
          
“Hear
you. Probably, they won’t.”

 
          
“Probably?”

 
          
“If
we could sneak past an American destroyer, I wouldn’t worry about a Chinese
sub,” said Delaford. “On the other hand, that’s kind of why we’re here, to
figure out what they can do.”

 
          
“All
right, I’m ready.”

 
          
“I
would go with the sub that heads west,” said Delaford. “That’s the one that
will be likely to be closest to the Indian ships, so if they’re going to do
anything fancy, that’s the one that’ll do it. We want to see if they lay mines,
fire torpedoes, that sort of thing. Be an intelligence bonanza, as long as you
don’t get in the way.”

 
          
“Okay,
I’m ready.”

 
          
“When
they surface, just hang back. They come up every so often to use their radio.
You know the auto-destruct sequence, right?”

 
          
“Yes,
we do,” shot in Jennifer.

 
          
“Our
preference is to pick up the probe when we’re done. You can hit the home
sequence. You remember?”

 
          
“Yeah,”
said Zen. “You know, I’m really ready to go. Let’s do it.”

 
          
“All
right, do a ten-degree dive for a hundred meters, then return to three hundred
meters depth,” said Delaford.

 
          
Zen
pushed the joystick forward, remembering he needed to move very slowly. A
bright red number appeared on the grid line as soon as he pushed on the stick
to its right, what looked like a compass with an artificial horizon appeared,
showing the attitude of Piranha’s nose. The depth climber—or rather,
dropped—through 310 quickly, but the attitude of the probe barely budged. It
was like flying in thick honey. Or swimming in thick honey—Zen had trouble
conceptualizing what he was doing.

 
          
“Good
enough,” said Delaford as he hit the mark, then brought the probe back. “Every
movement is very gentle. Very Zen-like, Zen.”

 
          
“Ha-ha,”
said Zen.

 
          
“So
when do I get to fly the Flighthawks?”

 
          
They
ran through a few more maneuvers and the detection modes. Delaford then
transferred complete control and watched over Zen’s shoulder for a while.

 
          
“We’ve
got great data so far,” the Navy commander told them. “What we get from here
out is just icing on the cake. Anything you find out—how deep they go,
weapons—it’s all icing on the cake.”

 
          
“Chocolate
or vanilla?” asked Jennifer.

 
          
Delaford
laughed, then signed off.

 
          
Dog’s
brief to Breanna was simple and quick, filling her in on the position of the
Chinese, where they’d dropped Piranha’s com buoys, and their encounter with the
fighters. There were some civilian commercial vessels at the far eastern end of
the patrol sector, heading south but obviously trying to avoid the Chinese
fleet. They also counted three Taiwanese spy ships in the search range. Breanna
already had the tanker tracks and contact info, and there wasn’t much to say
about the weather forecast, which was still predicting clear skies for
thirty-six hours or so.

 
          
He
told Breanna that at least one SSN had been detailed south to try to intercept
and trail the Chinese subs; Delaford though Woods would end the Piranha mission
once he was sure the attack sub was on the trail. In the meantime, other ASW
assets were moving in on the eastern side of the Chinese fleet. It was possible
they too would make contact, at which point their job would likewise, be ended.
The idea was to switch to the least sensitive method of data-gathering as soon
as possible.

 
          
That,
and to make sure Dreamland couldn’t grab all the credit.

 
          
“One
thing you want to watch out for, Captain,” he added when he had exhausted his
official brief, “is Admiral Woods. He seems to have a stick up his ass. He
takes it out and beats me with it at every opportunity. He blamed us for the
contact with the Chinese interceptors.”

 
          
“Well,
you shouldn’t have buzzed Beijing,” said Breanna.

 
          
“Stay
clear of the carrier air screen if at all possible,” Dog told her, not
particularly appreciating the joke.

 
          
“That’s
kind of up to them, isn’t it? If the subs keep going the way they’re going,
it’ll only take another two hours or so before we’re in their patrol area,”
said Bree. “Sooner or later they’re going to see us.”