Goliath (18 page)

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Authors: Steve Alten

BOOK: Goliath
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Aboard the USS
Scranton
Captain Tom Cubit slumps in his command chair, the hypnotic sounds of machinery pushing him deeper toward unconsciousness, his eyelids growing heavy from lack of sleep. After several minutes his eyes close, his head leaning back …
Cubit’s neck snaps back against the too-short headrest, jolting him awake. He wipes sweat beads from his forehead, then slips off his chair and staggers toward the galley to grab another cup of coffee. Halfway there, he changes his mind, turns back, and heads forward to the sonar room.
Sonar technician Michael Flynn is anything but refreshed from the seventy minutes of sleep he barely grabbed last night, on the floor by his station. Only his full bladder keeps him from falling back into dreamland. He looks up as the captain approaches.
“Anything?”
“Sorry, Skipper. It’s like searching for a needle in a haystack the size of New Jersey.”
“When was your last break?”
“Twelve hundred hours, but I’m fine—”
“You’re relieved. Ensign Wismer, take over at sonar.”
“Aye, sir.”
“Skipper, really—”
“Hot-bunk it, Michael-Jack. That’s an order.”
“Aye, sir.”
“Conn, radio, incoming message on the VLF.”
“Radio, Captain, on my way.”
Communications Officer Drew Laird hands his CO the folded message. Cubit rubs his eyes, trying to get them to focus as Commander Dennis joins him.
“New orders from COMSUBLANT?”
Cubit nods. “We’re being ordered to abandon our search and head to Spain, to the naval base in Rota.”
“A Med run?”
“Yeah.” Cubit hands the message to his second-in-command.
Dennis scans the orders. “They want us to join up with the Sixth Fleet’s Task Force 69. They must think the
Goliath
is heading for the Mediterranean.”
“We’ll never find that sub in the Med,” Cubit states. “Sonar conditions are terrible, warm water impinging on cold, salt water with fresh.”
“Naval Intelligence obviously thinks this Covah character may launch a nuke at Yugoslavia.”
Cubit thinks for a moment, then pulls his XO aside. “Plot a course to the Mediterranean, but don’t take us in. Before joining up with the fleet, I want to camp out a bit in the Strait of Gibraltar and give Flynnie another shot at finding that sub. The Strait’s pretty narrow. Maybe we’ll get lucky.”
Commander Paul Whitehouse is a no-nonsense veteran of the Royal Navy’s submarine force. In seventeen years, he has never questioned authority—until now.
The British officer leads his four guests into his ready room, mentally preparing his verbal assault.
Stay composed, Whitehouse. The Yankee general’s ego won’t take kindly to questioning his judgment.
“Well then, hope you enjoyed that little send-off. Captain Botchin will issue a statement later today announcing how the nuclear demonstration forced the Royal Navy to assign
Vengeance
to the Mediterranean. That should play well with what you’re intending to do.”
“Agreed.” General Jackson removes his cap, running his fingers through his short-cropped, auburn Afro. “The SEAL sub is ready to go?”
“Aye, sir, as per your orders.”
“Good. Now, if it’s all right with you, Commander, my team needs to get some rest.”
“Yes, sir. I’ve got you and your daughter in the XO’s stateroom across the passageway. Mr. Paniagua can bunk with my XO. As for Mr. Wolfe, I’m afraid the only open bunk we could find is in the torpedo room.” Whitehouse offers a false smile. “Sorry, best we could do.”
Gunnar looks at the Bear, but says nothing.
“General, before you go, if I could have a word with you in private?”
Jackson nods to Gunnar. “Wait for me in sick bay.”
Whitehouse closes the door after him. “Permission to speak freely, sir?”
“Go on.”
“With all due respect, General, I don’t like this assignment, don’t like it one bit. Using the
Vengeance
as bait recklessly endangers my ship and my crew.”
“Duly noted, Commander. Is that all?”
Whitehouse’s face flushes red. “No, sir. I take it as a personal insult that
Mr. Wolfe has been brought aboard my vessel. As far as the officers and crew of the Royal Navy are concerned, this man is a traitor to every sailor in the Western fleet, and should have been hanged for treason six years ago.”
The Bear exhales deeply, then eyeballs the British officer. “Commander, Gunnar Wolfe served his country under
my
command for the better part of a decade. Special Ops missions placed his life in jeopardy no less than a dozen times. His Ranger extraction team saved the lives of thirty men in Somalia, at which time he was wounded in battle. To this day, I firmly believe that he was and is innocent of all charges, and his presence on this mission is critical to its success.” Jackson stares hard into the man’s eyes. “As such, I highly suggest that you and your men allow
Captain
Wolfe to carry out his assignment without prejudice. Is that clear, Commander?”
“Perfectly clear … sir.”
 
Gunnar is waiting in sick bay, watching the ship’s medical officer stow plastic bottles of pharmaceuticals into cabinets.
General Jackson enters. “You ready?”
“I suppose.” Gunnar stands, then drops his trousers to his knees and climbs on the table. “Does Rocky or David know about this?”
“No, and let’s keep it that way.” Jackson hands the medical officer a wafer-thin dime-shaped piece of hard plastic. “Insert it in the quad, just below the hip.”
The medical officer swabs the spot with alcohol, then makes a small incision with his scalpel. Several minutes and five stitches later, the homing device is set into position.
The medical officer leaves.
“The device is designed to relay signals at predetermined intervals, making it more difficult for
Sorceress
to detect, assuming the computer is active,” Jackson says. “Have you selected a code name?”
Gunnar finishes dressing. “Joe-Pa.”
Jackson nods. “Coach Paterno would be proud.”
The former Penn State tight end shakes his head. “I don’t think so.”
 
The designers of a nuclear submarine must optimize every cubic foot of space, often at the expense of the crew’s comfort. Sleeping racks, affording spaces no larger than small coffins, are stacked three high, and are often time-shared by several crewmen, one man sleeping while the other is on duty. As a result, the bedclothes are always kept warm, giving meaning to the phrase “hot-bunking.”
Seniority plays a large part in where submariners bunk. The worst sleeping assignment aboard a sub can usually be found in the torpedo room, where claustrophobia-inducing shelves are stacked beneath racks of explosives.
Gunnar enters the torpedo room, favoring his right leg. His commando sense jumps into overdrive as members of the crew gather behind him. The Chief Petty Officer looks up, offering a Cheshire cat smile.
“Wolfe, right? You’ll be bunking here, on the very bottom.” The chief playfully slaps a Tigerfish Mark 24 Model 2 torpedo, one of several stacked and secured to racks above two empty metal shelves, a thin mattress and bedding lying on each.
Gunnar can feel the eyes at his back as he ducks down to the floor and crawls in. He pulls up—too late, as the wetness soaks his arm and back, the smell of urine suddenly overpowering.
Gunnar rolls out of the bunk. The crewmen snicker, a few in the back mumbling the kind of venom he has heard too often over the past ten days. He stands, eyeballing the chief, fatigue fueling his anger and killer’s instinct.
“Sorry, Wolfie old boy, should ’ave warned you. Ensign Warren’s a bit of a bed wetter.”
More laughter.
Gunnar glares at the smaller man.
Let it go, G-man. Remember, discipline is a higher form of intelligence
. He removes his soaked shirt, then turns, and heads back the way he had come.
The crew closes ranks, refusing to part.
A bare-chested ensign steps forward. A large man, he is two inches taller and thirty pounds heavier than Gunnar, Heavily muscled, his chest and arms sport tattoos advertising his rugby team, his mother’s name, and the Christian religion.
“Lot of sailors died ’cause of you—” The index finger stabs Gunnar’s chest, the man’s chocolate brown eyes spewing hatred. “You got some set of balls coming aboard our—”
Gunnar snatches the index finger in his left palm, snapping the appendage backward until it dislocates, then, in one motion, he steps forward and slams his elbow down across the bridge of the taller sailor’s nose. The viciousness of the blow sends the nearest crewmen sprawling backward, allowing Gunnar to slip behind his would-be assailant, locking his forearm against the injured man’s windpipe.
“Back off,
chaps,
or I crush sailor-boy’s larynx.”
Threatening looks, but the crew steps back.
Gunnar feels warm droplets of the man’s blood on his arm. “Just for the record, I never sold
Goliath’s
plans to the Chinese. But I won’t hesitate to cripple or kill any man who tries to fuck with me.” He motions to the ringleader. “You, take off your shirt.”
The sailor grimaces, but removes his shirt, tossing it at Gunnar.
Gunnar releases his grip, pushing the tattooed ensign away from him. He
backs out of the torpedo room, grabs a blanket and pillow from a nearby berth, then heads forward, the men parting as he passes.
 
The sixteen vertical launch tubes holding the Trident II (D5) nuclear missiles are set in two rows of eight, the towering pairs of silos containing the sixty-five-ton rockets that line the compartment like steel redwoods. Gunnar moves past the vertical columns, stopping at tube number seven.
Just need a few hours sleep …
He positions the pillow and blanket between the seventh and eighth silo and lies down, curling himself in a ball. He closes his eyes, fatigue dragging him quickly into dreams.
He is back in Leavenworth, lying on his mattress, staring at the bare cinder-block walls of his cell. Animal-like cries echo through the halls as yet another inmate bugs out, losing his mind, going ballistic.
Ten years …
One of the inmates had called the sentence Buck Rogers Time—prison slang for a release date so far in the future that it becomes too painful to imagine.
Alone, Gunnar grinds his teeth in the darkness beneath the sheet. Tears of anger and frustration and fear roll down his face, pattering softly on the bare mattress. The internal voice of the farm boy, the victim—begs God to awaken him from his hellish nightmare.
Ten years …
No Rocky, no Bear, no family, no friends, no comrades, no country—just animals, preying off each other’s fears. Animals, waiting for him to let his guard down, animals, waiting to sodomize him in the showers, to gut him in the yard …
Gunnar’s eyes snap open, his heart pounding. He looks up, gazing at the tight confines of the missile tubes, the claustrophobic surroundings reminding him of his time spent in solitary confinement. He recalls his experience in isolation, the punishment following his confrontation with the inmate known as Barnes. As he lay naked, on the stone floor in the dark, his tortured mind had been unable to cope with his sudden fall from grace. Stress and fear had caused the shadows to close in upon him, suffocating him …
On the brink of madness, his Special Forces training had taken over, his Ranger mentality becoming his compass, his salvation within the oblivion. Thrust into a world where he had no one, he realized he still had himself. Solitary became a blessing, giving him the time he needed to reroot his sanity.
Ten years …
One hundred and twenty months …
Five hundred twenty weeks …
Three thousand, six hundred and forty days …
Eighty-seven thousand, three hundred and sixty hours …
Five million, two hundred forty-one thousand—
STOP!
As Gunner paced naked in the stench-infested dungeon, his mind finally released him from the burden of hope. Yes, in the eyes of God he had sinned, committing crimes under the guise of war. Yes, he had hoped that by destroying the
Goliath’s
schematics he might achieve some sense of atonement. Perhaps Leavenworth was his real punishment. Perhaps one day, if he survived his sentence, he would have another opportunity to make good before he died. What mattered now was staying alive. Like it or not, he was in the jungle. Survival depended upon his ability to accept his fate and adapt to his new surroundings. Survival meant shoving his shame and guilt and anger into a lockbox and swallowing the key.
Naked, stripped of everything he had held dear, Gunnar Wolfe allowed his thoughts to change gears, his mind to settle into the mental pace of doing hard time.
 
Sleep tugs at his body, yet his mind refuses to let go, the hatred of the
Vengeance’s
crew still echoing in his thoughts. In the jungle, death is a numbers game, for both predator and prey. Zebra and wildebeests run in herds, as do prisoners. Gunnar might have been a lion in the outside world, but a single lion alone on the Serengeti still ends up food for the vultures. Survival in prison meant choosing sides, finding allies—families, who would watch your back, or so you hoped. Gunnar’s retaliation to Barnes’s attack had earned him the respect of a group of lifers, an older, more established prison gang, one that had the clout to keep Barnes and his Aryan Brotherhood away. Necessity forced him to join their group. On the inside, their company made him sick.
After three years, Gunnar had no idea who he was anymore.
The prison riot that took place during Gunnar’s fifty-seventh month at Leavenworth began at breakfast. Somehow a .22 caliber Beretta had been smuggled inside the compound, ending up in Anthony Barnes’s hands. The con knew the warden would be speaking to the inmates that day. The Aryan Brotherhood was ready.
In the melee that ensued, two guards were stabbed, another shot in the face. Cellblock C was sealed off, with Barnes threatening to kill the warden if he was not released.
The law of the jungle says you move on when your herd is not involved. The law of prison says an inmate does not intervene to save a boss.
The laws of Leavenworth state that a warden is no longer a warden if captured.
Barnes, left without his bargaining chip, decided to go out with a bang.
Whatever Gunnar was, whatever he had become in prison, the thought of the warden, a father of four, being tortured and killed by one of the cons struck at every fiber of his being. Without thinking, without any thought of repercussion, Gunnar allowed his commando instincts to take over as he made his way through the cellblock, stalking his enemy. After taking out half a dozen of the rioters, the former Army Ranger went after Barnes, snapping the man’s neck, never feeling the two bullets as they entered his abdomen.
Hooah.
Lying in his own blood, struggling to breathe, he smiled as the riot squad looked down at him and shook their heads in disbelief. The warden was whisked off to safety while the guards stood around, in no rush to save his life.

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