Echo Class (25 page)

He nodded when Ignatova stuck his head into the control room. “I am heading to the forward torpedo room, Comrade Captain.”

Bocharkov nodded again as the head disappeared. Ignatova would call him once he arrived.

“Passing fifty meters.”

He was bringing a Soviet nuclear submarine to periscope depth in the middle of an American fleet anchored and moored in an American-controlled harbor in Philippine territory. For a fleeting moment, he imagined how easily he could sink many of them with his torpedoes. A spread of eight, three for each of the carriers—the
Kitty Hawk
and the
Tripoli
—then one each for two of the smaller ships. His rear spread of six would also be useful. Then he would sprint to the opening of the harbor while his crew loaded another round. By then, fire and damnation would be erupting over Olongapo Harbor. With fire and explosions comes confusion. He could probably launch another spread from his rear tubes . . .

“Captain, we are passing thirty meters.”

He nodded. It would rival Pearl Harbor, when the Japanese sunk the American Fleet. It would also cause America to overreact, as they were prone to do. Within the K-122 he would be one famous Soviet captain until they surfaced near Kamchatka. By then, hundreds of missiles from both sides would have passed one another in the dark of space to explode across half of the globe, destroying the motherland of both nations. He swallowed.
It is good we keep these fantasies in our minds.

A vision came to him of his wife, his two sons, and the newest member of the family, his daughter. Without doubt, the same fantasies crossed through the minds of the Americans, along with realizing the fate of their families if they ever lived them out.

“Passing twenty-five meters.”

“Make your depth fifteen meters, Lieutenant Commander Orlov,” Bocharkov said. For tonight he had ordered his most senior officers to the important positions. His operations officer, Orlov, was the officer of the deck. The XO was to be with the Spetsnaz mission team until they had departed the boat. Then the forward torpedo tube team would man their position. He had given strict orders there was to be no preventive maintenance or anything that required opening the outer doors of the torpedo tubes. While he might imagine and bask in the fantasy of sinking the American fleet, he would only use the torpedoes to cover his escape. He glanced at the clock. It was five minutes to midnight. Sinking one or two American warships would not cause World War III.

The internal intercom buzzed. Starshina Chief Trush grabbed the handset. A second passed. “Captain, the XO is in the forward torpedo room awaiting instructions.”

“Very well,” Bocharkov replied. No one was going anywhere until he was assured everything topside was clear. Meanwhile, everyone was in place awaiting his orders. “Up periscope.”

Bocharkov swept the lens around the harbor. Every ship was lighted from bow to stern. On the farther side of the harbor, the American aircraft carrier
Kitty Hawk
was moored pierside behind the smaller amphibious carrier
Tripoli
. There were few ports with the depth of Olongapo Harbor, in which either of those two ships could tie up alongside the pier.

As he turned the periscope, movement caught his eye and he quickly turned the scope back to the left. A small landing craft was passing about one hundred meters dead astern. He focused the lens, then pressed the button. “Distance?”

Orlov replied, “Ninety meters.”

“Ninety meters,” Bocharkov repeated.

“Target?”

“Small boat,” Bocharkov replied, then leaned away from the lens. “What we call a landing craft. I believe they call them liberty launches—carrying the sailors and marines from the ships anchored in the harbor to the shore and back.” He continued his sweep. Less than three hundred meters in the direction of the stern and nearer than the carriers were several “small boys.” He counted at least one cruiser and three destroyers. The auxiliary ships—oilers, ammunition ships, repair ship—were anchored off to his starboard side. It must be from those huge ships that the liberty launches were plying their trade.

The intercom beeped again. Orlov grabbed the handset. “Control room.” Several seconds passed. “Captain, XO reports the team is ready when you are.”

Bocharkov nodded. He had a bad feeling about this, but emotions were something navy officers ignored when orders were involved. He mentally crossed his fingers. “Tell them about the liberty launches. I presume there will be more.” He turned the periscope aft so it pointed east to the area where the Spetsnaz team would land. At least the site for the mission was not near the main base. This was far enough way from the piers so the team could have some shadows. Rocks and concrete tridents filled the uphill beachhead between the slight waves of the near-calm harbor and the narrow road above it. He focused the periscope. There was the dark circular opening that must be the main flood drain Gromeko had described. The team would use it to store their flippers, tanks, and gear until their return. He turned the scope upward, glad to see stars. Maybe it would not rain, but then this was the Philippine tropics.

FINALLY,
Bocharkov stepped away from the periscope. “Down periscope. Lieutenant Commander Orlov, ensure Sonar is alert to any passive noise in the area. I want those small boats tracked as well as any new sources.” He looked at the clock. It was fifteen minutes after midnight—Monday morning. The sun would rise around zero five thirty.

“We are doing that, Comrade Captain.”

“Why do the Americans call them liberty launches?”

“ ‘Liberty' is the time the Americans are ashore corrupting the natives. The small boats take them back and forth in teams to continue the imperialist indoctrination of the natives with the American dollar.”

“Lieutenant Commander Orlov, you are filled with lots of information trivia.”

“I think I should say thank you, Captain.”

Bocharkov grunted and then turned to the navigator, who sat hunched over his charts at the forward end of the compartment. “Lieutenant Tverdokhleb, when is sunrise or false dawn? When is my periscope going to be easily seen from the decks of the nearby Americans?”

The officer leaned back, an unlit cigarette dangling from his lips. Tverdokhleb reached up and pushed his black-rimmed glasses back off his nose and against his eyes.

If the man ever looked at the sun, he would burn his eyes out, thought Bocharkov.

“Sir?”

“I asked, when is sunrise?”

Several seconds had passed with Bocharkov glancing at the clock when Tverdokhleb announced, “Zero four seventeen hours, Comrade Captain.”

Bocharkov nodded. That meant false dawn would be about thirty minutes before that, but the mountain range behind Olongapo should block that out. From his review of the charts earlier in the day, he knew that false dawn was just that in Subic Bay: false. Dawn broke suddenly when the edge of the sun came over the top of the mountains. By four seventeen, he needed to be in deep water or near it. After sunrise, any speed he might put on to make their escape ran the risk of creating a wake on the surface. A wake that would be invisible to the K-122, but easily discernible to an American lookout.

He cleared his throat. “Tell Captain Second Rank Ignatova that he may release the team to their mission.”

“Aye, sir,” Orlov replied.

Was that a smile he saw on the operations officer's face? Could it be that this “thing” they were doing was having a positive effect on the crew? The officers, chiefs, and sailors standing the watch seemed quieter, seemed more alert—but then they should be, in the heart of the American fleet. He smiled. Damn. It did feel good doing something to the Americans instead of diving, running, and evading them. Maybe what the K-122 was doing was a turning point for the Soviet Navy.

“And after the team has departed the boat, Operations Officer, start making preparations for us to leave. I want out of this enemy harbor before zero six hundred.”

Ignatova put the handset back in the cradle. “The captain says it is time. There are landing craft shuttling American sailors back and forth between their ships and the shore. You will have to be careful of them.”

“Aye, Comrade Captain,” Dolinksi answered.

Gromeko hoisted his tank onto his shoulder. “The escape hatch is too narrow for the tanks,” he said to the team. “You will have to carry them like so.” He held his single tank to his chest. “Once outside the escape trunk, put your tank on. I will be waiting.”

“I will go last,” Dolinski said.

“How about the gear you will need?” Ignatova said, looking at the two waterproof bags sitting between the two officers.

“I will take one with me,” Malenkov replied. He reached down and slid the bag between his feet. “Like this, sir, inside the escape trunk.”

“Then he and Chief Fedulova will carry it between them to shore,” Gromeko added.

“I and this starshina”—Dolinski pointed at Zosimoff—“will carry the other bag the same way. Ashore, we will only have one of them to carry.”

Ignatova nodded, then stepped forward and shook hands with each of them. “Go with speed and safety.” He glanced at his watch as he moved near the hatch to be out of the way of the departing team. “You have two hours twenty minutes. Time?”

“Gromeko looked at his deep-sea wristwatch, then at the clock on the bulkhead of the forward torpedo room. “Time is zero zero twenty-two.”

“We will work the two hours twenty minutes from zero zero thirty,” Ignatova said, looking at the analog clock with its small hand on twelve and the large hand on twenty-two. He doubled-checked his wristwatch against the bulkhead clock.

“Let's go,” Gromeko said, moving under the hatch. He pulled down the narrow ladder and climbed. A spin of the hatch wheel and in a few seconds he was inside. Fedulova climbed halfway up the ladder and handed Gromeko his tank before securing the watertight door.

Gromeko's shoulders touched the sides of the escape trunk. He clasped the single tank against his chest, pressing his back against the curvature of the trunk. In the darkness of the trunk, he could not tell how the tank was resting against the other side. The mouthpiece fit securely in his mouth, his teeth clenched on the rubber tubing, making sure the rush of water did not dislodge it. His right hand was above his right shoulder so he could reach the wheel once the hatch filled. The sound of hydraulics announced the flow of water.

Water began to fill the darkened escape tube designed for abandoning the boat rather than what they were doing. Gromeko's breathing was shallow in the tight confines. It seemed minutes until the seawater filled the trunk. Then, effortlessly, Gromeko spun the wheel above him and pushed upward against it using his feet for leverage. The hatch opened, and he was halfway out of the trunk when he was able to take his first deep breath of tank air. He was relieved to be out of the man-made tomb.

He let himself settle on the forward deck of the K-122 before reaching forward to push the hatch down. He spun the small wheel, securing the hatch for the next man. Then he slipped his tank onto his back. Down below in the forward torpedo room, the lights would have told those waiting when he had opened the outer hatch and when he had closed it. They would pump the water out and the next Spetsnaz would soon follow him.

By the time Malenkov emerged, Gromeko was fully outfitted, with his tank on his back and his flippers off his belt and on his feet. Malenkov handed his tank to Gromeko, did an about-flip in the water, and dove headfirst back into the escape trunk. A second later he emerged tugging the bag with him. Gromeko secured the hatch for the third member.

 

 

OLIVER
pulled the curtains back, careful not to spill the paper cup of “bug juice.” They frowned on having the sugary fruit-flavored drink everyone called “bug juice” drunk anywhere except topside and in the chow hall. But he was alone and he still had an hour of work—if he didn't find anything wrong—to finish.

He looked at the clock on the bulkhead. Midnight plus twenty-five. He was going to be one tired puppy in the morning, whether he caught any shut-eye or not. Why did the chief have to be such a prick? Maybe being a prick was part of the personnel qualification standards for getting to wear the khaki uniform with the anchor on the collar?

He set the cup on the narrow shelf, watching it closely as he leaned down to pick up the preventive maintenance schedule from the plastic sleeves taped to the side of the small file cabinet. He opened the two-page card and scanned it.

He took a sip of his drink and laid the PMS card in front of him. All you had to do with PMS was go down the card, step by step, doing each item as it asked. Thankfully, this card did not require any tubes. He just had to check each hydrophone individually for attenuation and sensitivity. What the hell did they think he had been doing for the past two days with that Soviet submarine? Sipping tea and telling shitty sea stories? For a moment, Oliver thought about gundecking the checks—mark them as being done and slip the card back in its plastic cover—but just because others might have gundecked their preventive maintenance did not mean he would.

Oliver flipped off the sonar connection to all the hydrophones and waited a few seconds for the electronics to wind down. Then he flipped on the starboard-side hydrophones.

He lifted the cup and took a deep swig of the drink, his cheeks wrinkling at the sugar surge going across his tongue. What was the difference between a sea tale and a fairy tale? A sea tale starts with “This ain't no bullshit” instead of “Once upon a time.” He choked at his own joke, spraying slight droplets of bug juice on the scope.