“Three, two, one…”
“Got her! Sir, I hear underwater explosions — secondaries now,” the technician added, as the explosions from cold seawater hitting hot metal and machinery aboard the submarine followed the initial explosions.
“That’s it, then!” his TACCO crowed. “We did it!”
“Not exactly,” Rabies said. “There’s still a torpedo in the water. And it’s still headed straight for
The carrier was turning, but slowly, oh, so slowly. As he watched the overhead radar repeater, it seemed to Coyote that there was no way they would ever get the stern out of the way of the torpedo. And just how maneuverable was this one, anyway? Was it a wake-homer?
As
“Four seconds,” a voice announced over the 1MC. “Three, two, one.”
The impact, when it came, was felt more than heard. There was a sharp change in the vibrations under his feet, echoing up through the steel plates and strakes. A microsecond later,
The chaos started immediately. Controlled chaos, but chaos nonetheless, as damage-control teams raced forward to assess the extent of the damage, to check watertight doors and compartments, and guide corpsmen to anyone injured in the impact. Damage-control actions were coordinated by Damage Control Central, or DCC, but Bethlehem was monitoring every step. She slipped on a set of sound-powered bones and put the jack into the damage-control circuit. For the moment, Coyote was tempted to tell her not to micro-manage it, to let the men and women below do their jobs.
It wasn’t necessary — Bethlehem was simply listening, nodding her head in approval or frowning and snapping out a short order, her expression clearing as the DCC team revised its plans.
The angle on the deck grew steeper as seawater poured into shattered compartments. They were nowhere near a dangerous angle, but it was still distinctly ominous to feel the carrier that barely ever moved heel to the right.
An hour later, the verdict was in. The torpedo had smashed into the hull two decks below the waterline, destroying an auxiliary machinery compartment and flooding part of the anchor deck. The watertight doors had held, preventing the flooding from spreading, and the electrical connections and waterlines affected had already been rerouted. One sailor had been killed, smashed by a watertight door that had not been properly secured, and fourteen others were injured in the impact. After a final refueling, the strike aircraft were quickly recovered.
“Captain,” Coyote said when Bethlehem finally had a lull in the constant stream of reports and assessments flooding in. “A moment.”
Bethlehem put down her clipboard and followed him out onto the bridge wing, casting a glance back at the bridge as though seeing it for the last time. “Yes, Admiral?”
“Good job,” he said abruptly. “I won’t apologize — admirals never do. You’ll need to know that soon enough, I suspect.”
The faintest trace of relief spread across her face, and it wasn’t until that moment that Coyote realized just how much of her ass she’d put on the line standing up to him. His admiration for her grew. “Thank you, sir.”
“But if I were going to apologize, I’d probably start by telling you that when I was
“Captain, Fifth Fleet wants you,” the officer of the deck said as he stuck his head out and interrupted them with an apologetic look.
“I’ll be right there,” Bethlehem said without looking at him.
“Go,” Coyote ordered.
“Yes, Admiral.” She turned and walked back to the hatch. She paused for a moment, then turned back to him. “Next time we’re in port, have dinner with me.” It wasn’t exactly a request.
Coyote pulled back, startled. He started to voice a number of objections, then said, “Okay. I’d like that.”
“Good.” Bethlehem gazed at him for a moment longer, then said, “You’re a good man, Coyote. And a good officer. Never forget that.” She pulled the hatch open and stepped out of view.
EPILOGUE
Herbert Hoover leaned back in the deeply padded leather chair and blandly surveyed the three men sitting in front of his desk. There was no doubting their eagerness, their commitment to the cause. Passion burned in their eyes, spoke in every line of their bodies as they leaned forward on their chairs, eagerly awaiting his decision. Yes, they were truly committed patriots. There was no doubt about that.
And they were doomed to fail. They had no grasp of the larger consequences of what was going on, no appreciation for the subtleties of political maneuvering. Had they had their way, the war would have turned violent from the very first moment.
He shifted his bulk on the chair, trying to find a comfortable position. Old injuries ran deep in his bones and scarred his soul even more than his body. For just a split second, he wondered if there was more to his discomfort than his physical problems.
“I say we take them on,” one man said. Jack Sauers, a gaunt, hard man, face and hands darkened by the sun, his body underneath his clothes pale. Like Hoover, Sauers had been a Marine, on the ground and in the front lines in Vietnam. The years had not been kind to him, nor had the government. He had every reason to want revenge.
“Everything is in place,” the second man pointed out. There was a dry, precise tone to his voice that Hoover always found irritating. “The weapons and supplies have been checked and are quite safe. They will be disbursed in about”—he glanced at his watch—“four and a half hours, depending on the road conditions.”
The third man laughed. “And the way you run things, the paperwork will take another six hours on top of that.” He held up one hand to forestall protest. “Excuse me, five hours and twenty-seven minutes.”
Frank Woods, a machinist, younger than the other two. His military service had begun and ended with Desert Storm and Desert Shield. The others knew that he had a slightly unrealistic viewpoint of warfare based on those experiences. Desert Storm had been a cakewalk, nothing like the assorted affairs the other men had been involved
