Thunder In The Deep (02) (42 page)

"Captain, would you take him with us now? I'd have to strongly object. We're barely thirty miles from Stavanger,

and the gale is blowing toward the city. The population is fifty thousand Norwegians. The fallout—"

"I know, XO. I'd never ask you to concur and launch a weapon here." It would be in blatant violation of the ROEs.

"In another hour we draw abreast of Bergen, sir. The population there is a quartermillion-plus."

"I know, XO. I know"

There was no choice but to continue the desperate stern chase, and try to stay as close to Deutschland as possible, for as long as it took to get far away from Norway, and pray Eberhard couldn't open fire till Jeffrey could shoot back with nukes. Ernst Beck returned from using the head. A messenger brought him a fresh mug of tea. He savored the drink, the sweetness of the sugar on his tongue, the way the hot liquid dispelled the stale, metallic taste in his mouth. Deutschland fishtailed again, and he almost burned himself. He put the mug in his cup holder.

Eberhard sat at the command console next to Beck, drawing arcs and measuring distances with his light pen. "This is most unsatisfactory, Einzvo."

"Captain?"

"I need some way to lengthen the odds in our favor, or this action may become a double kill. Deutschland is far too valuable an offensive weapon to be expendable in exchange for Challenger."

"Concur, sir." What else could Beck say?

"At this rate it will still be hours before we're far enough away from Fuller to hit his ship down her throat from a safe distance. Before we can, he'll have separation for a lethal shot at us with his lower-yielding weapons. . . . It's unclear if we'll gain the separation we need to open fire before we both gain the Arctic Circle, at which point Fuller gets the ROE freedom he needs."

Beck knew the American captain and executive officer had to be thinking the same things. All either ship could

do was pour on the speed. If and when the water got much deeper, slight differences in pump-jet efficiency might reveal themselves, due to greater sea pressure, and colder water going through the steam condensor cooling loops.

Secretly, Beck prayed their stern chase did reach the Norwegian Sea. He thought of what the fallout from an atomic blast could do this close to Norway, with the water less than three hundred meters deep. The tons and tons of radioactive steam. The effect of iodine 131 on children and expectant mothers. The effects of unfissioned uranium, and plutonium by-products and worse, on innocent people's lungs and bones and blood. . . . There were German citizens in Norway, too, and occupation forces, caught in this terrible conflict. Beck's country didn't need more casualties for military hospitals'

overcrowded radiation wards.

But what was the alternative? If they reached the Norwegian Sea before achieving good separation, Challenger could sink them.

Eberhard told Beck to take the conn. The captain was going to his stateroom for a quick smoke and a piss.

Beck sat morosely at the command console, asking himself how this situation could ever have arisen. Not the fight between Challenger and Deutschland, but the whole war. What madness could ever tempt self-appointed national leaders to risk destroying the world, just to satisfy grandiose, self-referential dreams? All the people had to do was say No. Hadn't they learned that the hard way, in self-immolation under the Nazis?

Obviously not. Perhaps those who'd shared those awful memories firsthand couldn't pass on the warning strongly enough. Perhaps with the passing away of so many veterans, widows, orphans, and Holocaust victims, Germans forgot too much.

Beck shook his head to try to clear his mind of such troubling thoughts. He wished he could have another private talk with Jakob Coomans, to cheer himself and regain perspective, but he knew that wouldn't happen till the

confrontation with Challenger was resolved. Beck almost wished he could share Eberhard's hate of this Jeffrey Fuller—it would make the needed mental savagery come to Beck much easier. Beck knew himself too well: He was a man who found it hard to hate.

Beck called up the navigation charts, to lose himself in shop talk in his mind. He watched the gravimeter, as the left wall of the Trough raced by. He eyeballed the different system status screens. He thought of old battles fought near here, Nelson at Copenhagen two centuries ago, Dogger Bank and Jutland in the Great War, the destroyer fights in the fjords at the outbreak of World War II, then the German attacks on the Russia-bound Allied convoys. Deutschland fishtailed again.

Beck had an idea. It was his duty to report it, though now he hated himself, and did so all too easily.

Eberhard came back.

TWO NOUNS LATER,

ON CHALLENGER.

After a quick snooze and a hearty breakfast of bacon and eggs, Ilse sat at her console. She was sifting through Cold War-era data from the Navy Meteorology and Oceanography Command. If the situation weren't so scary, it would have been fun—

quite a switch from the tropics at Durban. For one thing, up here past 60° north latitude, there was little bioluminescence—the water was too cold. Ilse and Kathy had discussed using the ship's photonics sensors to trail the glow of Deutschland's wake if Challenger lost contact. It wouldn't work.

The seafloor was getting much deeper—one thousand feet and dropping to twelve thousand over the next few hours—but the sound speed profile prevented strong convergence zones and deep sound channels from forming. Again, the water in the top few thousand feet was just too cold. Again, the search to recapture a contact once lost would be hard—and Deutschland, if lost, might well find Challenger first. Ilse knew they'd get no help from NATO's North Atlantic SOSUS hydrophone nets; the Axis had nuked the SOSUS at the very start of the war.

Ilse listened on her headphones for a moment. The gale raged topside. It would probably reach force tenfifty-knot winds and fifty-foot waves—as they approached the winter Icelandic standing low-pressure weather system. This gale infused the sea with acoustic illumination, and encouraged both ceramic SSNs to hug the bottom for stealth; the seafloor here was smooth. The strengthening gale would also make it harder and harder for surface and airborne antisubmarine forces to function effectively. If Deutschland won the duel with Challenger, she'd escape Allied retribution—in the Norwegian Sea, Eberhard could vastly outdive any steel-hulled sub sent to attack him.

"The magnetic storm is getting worse," Kathy said.

"I know."

"NASA needs a new category," Kathy said. "G six." –"Beyond 'extreme.' Try '

cataclysmic.' "

Kathy hesitated. "I keep thinking about Roger." "Your boyfriend?"

"He died up where we're headed. Last summer. The battle for Jan Mayen Island." Ilse nodded grimly. The island was a nuclear wasteland now.

"Vaporized. His whole ship was vaporized. A cruise missile from Deutschland. I started having nightmares about it. I keep seeing him on the bridge, and then there's a flash, and his body boils away."

"Stop," Ilse said. She hesitated. "I know it hurts. I'm having nightmares, too." That was one main reason why she hated having to sleep.

Something appeared on the broadband waterfall display.

"Overflight," Kathy called out. "Low altitude, west to east. Mach point-eight-five turbojet, assess as an Allied ship-launched Harpoon."

"Very well, Sonar," Lieutenant Bell said. He had the conn while Jeffrey got some rest. More Harpoons went by, also launched in the shallow North Sea off to port, aimed at something amid the Norwegian islands and fjords to starboard. "The shooting's started again," Ilse said.

More transients appeared on the waterfall, slanting sharply in the opposite direction.

"Overflights, supersonic, east to west," Kathy said. Ilse listened. Each transient sounded the same, a sonic boom followed by a roaring, tearing noise that surged, then faded.

"Rocket-assisted projectiles," Kathy called out. "Norwegian coast artillery. Assess as Bofors rapid fire one-twentymillimeter guns." Manned by German crews.

"V'r'well," Bell said. "Surface forces skirmishing around our stern chase with Deutschland again."

Ilse knew no major warship afloat could keep up with their sustained fifty-three knots, especially in such rough seas. She knew none dared launch an undersea weapon for fear of hitting the wrong SSN. It was as if the ships and planes above Ilse were fighting a separate war.

The sonar tech next to her sat up straighter, and spoke to Kathy on a private circuit. Kathy sat up straighter, too.

"Aspect change on Master One. Master One is turning right!"

"Helm, don't lose them." Bell grabbed an intercom mike. "Captain to Control." Jeffrey showed in seconds.

"What is it?"

"Deutschland's up to something, sir. They've turned toward the middle of the Trough. New course zero three zero."

"I have the conn."

"You have the conn."

"This is the captain. I have the conn."

"Aye, aye," Ilse said, along with the watchstanders. "I don't like this, sir," Bell said.

"I know. They may have guessed we're favoring our left side for a reason." The damaged port wide-aperture array. "If we get in a turning dogfight we'll be at a sonar disadvantage. We're less maneuverable, too, with the top of our rudder shot up."

"Herd them back with another ADCAP?"

"With just two remaining, there's no point. He fires more AT rockets, and they're wasted. Worse, we'll telegraph we're low on conventional ammo, when we have to cease fire."

"So what do we do, sir? Keep following?"

"We have no choice. What's the separation now?" "Almost four thousand yards."

"Two nautical miles . . . Far enough apart he may pull something nasty among the coastal islands."

"Think he'll try to lose us and make a getaway? Hide up a fjord, or put in at Bergen?"

"Heck, no. Not Eberhard. He'll try to lose us and get off a nuclear snap shot."

"Challenger has followed our. turn," Beck reported. "Separation now thirty-six hundred meters, Captain." Two sea miles. Enough.

"Good," Eberhard said.

Beck studied his nav chart and gravimeter. Half an hour ahead on this course lay the rugged islands lining the coast of Norway. That's what Fuller was supposed to see, supposed to be thinking about.

"Brilliant decoy in tube eight is preset as ordered, Captain."

"Make tube eight ready in all respects, but do not open outer door." Beck relayed commands. He watched the low terrain ridge on the bottom come at him rapidly. He activated the laser line-scan cameras on Deutschland's stern and sail and bow. He called up the imagery.

The seafloor rushed by below. Beck saw mud, and

rocks, and caught a glimpse of a rusted oil drum, and a discarded liquor bottle. Then he saw a 150mm gun turret, lying on its side.

"Pilot," Eberhard said, "stand by for hard turn to port." Jawohl," Jakob Coomans said.

"Einzvo, stand by to launch the decoy in tube eight. Set valve lineup for silent punch-out with an elastomer membrane water slug."

"Jawohi." The membrane stored the force of ambient sea pressure; the weapon launch would be much quieter than with a water turbine or compressed air.

"Stand by to launch with same valve settings, torpedo tubes two and four." Beck thought again of the people in Bergen, Norway. Tubes two and four each held a nuclear Sea Lion eel, armed and ready to fire.

"He's going to top that ridge in a minute, sir," Bell said. Jeffrey nodded. "The time lag of echoes off the left wall of the Trough is less than twenty seconds here. Our bow sphere will cover to port. . . . We won't lose him." Beck watched the gravimeter closely as Deutschland topped the ridge. He was so close to it now, the gradiometers clearly resolved the sunken mass to port. It was a hundred and fifty meters long, widest in the middle, narrowing at both ends, sitting flat on the bottom. Now or never, Beck told himself. Would his idea work, or backfire?

"Tube eight," Eberhard ordered, "open outer door. . . . Decoy los."

"Tube eight fired," Beck said. Now came the tricky part. "Pilot," Eberhard said, "override flank speed rudder safeties."

Coomans acknowledged, his voice especially tough and confident now—no one knew better than Coomans how difficult this next maneuver would be.

"Port thirty rudder," Eberhard ordered.

Coomans acknowledged; the ship banked hard and hugged the terrain. Beck held tight to his armrests, and Coomans to his wheel—Deutschland weighed nine thousand metric tons submerged, a huge dead weight to try to turn so tightly at high speed. Coomans had to cut in the auxiliary thrusters to help. The copilot had to cut in on the stern-planes, to help Coomans maintain depth control.

"Decoy is operating properly," Haffner reported from Sonar.

"Stop the propulsion shaft," Eberhard ordered coldly as the g-force of the turn pressed Beck into his seat. "Full speed astern."

Deutschland shivered, strained, vibrated as she tried to slow. Beck tensed: Would Challenger hear? A red light flashed on Coomans's panel—the stresses on the rudder threatened serious, permanent damage.

Deutschland's way came off quickly. The red light ceased. Beck breathed again.

"All stop," Eberhard ordered. "Autohover." Coomans acknowledged once more. Beck detected the subtlest tone that Coomans was pleased with himself, at how well he'd handled the ship. But had Jeffrey Fuller heard?

"Shut down turbogenerators," Eberhard said. "Run essential systems off batteries." The copilot relayed commands. The air circulation fans ceased.

"Decoy is on course zero three zero," Beck reported. "Speed fifty-three point three knots.

" He was sweating; the air already felt stale.

"Challenger tops the rise in ninety seconds," Eberhard stated. He gave Beck a piercing look. "Now we see if your idea works."Beck swallowed and studied his screens—there was little time to fine-tune Deutschland's position. "Sir, recommend rotate ship on auxiliary propulsors onto bearing zero four five, and translate fifty yards to starboard." Eberhard gave the piloting orders.

Beck watched the photonics imagery screen. The mass on the bottom loomed out of the darkness. Deutschland's bow was near its stern, her stern next to its bow. It was a sunken World War II German destroyer—Hitler's Kriegsmarine lost many in the opening battle for Norway. This one's bow was smashed—from a bomb or torpedo or mine, a collision at sea, or from impact with the bottom? Beck couldn't tell. The superstructure was mangled. The masts and funnels lay every which way.