On the bridge the excited flush of victory was well savored. Karpov ordered the KA-226 to scout out toward the position of the American task force and send back live video, and this time he trusted what he saw. The scene was still shrouded with smoke and burning oil, though the sole remaining American destroyer had limped away to the south, her decks laden with every man she could pull out of the sea. All too many were left there, either dead before they hit the water, or dead within the hour. O’Brien lingered as long as she could, but after CV Wasp leaned over and finally began to sink, her skipper felt it would do no good to the survivors if another attack came in and blew his own ship apart. He sped south, back towards the Mississippi in TF 16, which was hurrying north to render any assistance possible.
The four troop and cargo transports were immediately ordered to turn about and return to Argentia Bay. Two destroyers went with them, the remaining three hastening north at full speed to pick up the last of the survivors. Behind them came the heart of the task force, cruisers Quincy and Wichita, and the battleship Mississippi. But at 16:00 hours a signal came in ordering the ships to hold position, then turn about and steam for Argentia Bay as well. Apparently the Admirals wanted to get all their eggs in one basket, count them well, and then hatch some plan of attack against this lethal, unseen German raider.
Karpov studied the footage, watching the movements of the three destroyers closely, then assured himself that they were there only to rescue the fallen. Before long they, too, turned and steamed south leaving only the still burning flotsam on the oily sea. The men on the bridge gathered round the video monitor, their eyes alight at first, until the helo zoomed in on the floating bodies of sailors adrift in the wreckage. They saw the arm of one man raise up, as if he was trying desperately to call back one of the destroyers. Then exhausted or stricken by the cold, he slipped from the spar of a mast he had been clinging to, and was taken by the sea.
There is an unwritten law among men who go to sea that binds each one in a silent kinship. The essence of it is that they live or die at the whim of a force greater than any man can sound or fathom, and that a man alone in the water was every man among them in his place.
Watching that last man slip beneath smoky green-gray waves and die took the fire and light of battle out of the eyes of the young mishman on the bridge. It was a perceptible shift in the tone of the emotion they shared, and a sullen silence came over them, perhaps as each one realized now that they had made a mortal enemy of the two single powers that mutually ruled these seas, and that from this point forward, their lot was to fight for their very survival, or to die like the men they had seen on the video screen. And slowly, one by one, they drifted away, back to their posts, keeping the last of their thoughts to themselves the way a man keeps the review of each day he lives in the quiet minutes before sleep takes him. Orlov noticed it, felt it as well, yet his only way of understanding it was to channel the emotion into derisive anger.
“Those stupid bastards,” he said. “What did they think they were doing launching those planes at us? What did they think we were supposed to do, sit here and let them come in on us and put our balls in the sea? No. They got what they damn well deserved, and I hope to god they learned from it.”
The men glanced his way warily as he spoke, but no one said anything, the echo of Fedorov’s warning still in their minds. It was not as Orlov had told it, they knew. The Americans had no intention of attacking. They were unarmed. They had no idea Kirov was even there, and not one of them ever laid eyes on the enemy that had struck them down; butchered them with weapons and capabilities they could not begin to comprehend. Somewhere in that train of thought was a ripening seed of guilt, and each man sat with it, dealt with it in his own way.
For Karpov, it was his to retreat to the silence of command. With Orlov at his side, no one questioned him. So his mind was already leaping past any notion of recrimination and on to the next evolution of his maneuver to the south. Yes, he would have to explain his actions to the Admiral, but he could claim, and justifiably so, that the Americans had struck the first blow in launching those planes, just as Orlov had said.
Why was the engine room taking so long on the reactor cooling problem, he wondered? The ship had been making no more than ten knots throughout the whole engagement. He wanted to put on speed, and cruise south to get into the most favorable position for the confrontation he knew was only a matter of days and nautical miles ahead of them now. What was done, was done. He would live with it and waste no time brooding over his fallen enemy.
Karpov knew he had taken a risk here. It was a feeling that had come to him many times before when he had finally set his schemes and plans in motion against a potential rival, because he knew he might fail. The Americans were just another rung on the ladder he saw himself climbing, that was all. Tomorrow was another day, and anything could happen. A man could never be too careful, or too daring, he thought. Which would it be for him?
He had been careful most of his life. Careful planning, patience and a lot of quiet suffering had brought him to this place. Now he had finally done something daring, and he felt strangely light headed as he looked at the battle damage assessment feed. This must be something akin to what Orlov felt just after he punched a man in the face, he thought. It was a heady, self-satisfied feeling of power. Somehow it quenched the smell of shame that had dogged him all these many years, and it made him feel just a little bigger than he was before.
Now he focused his thoughts on his munitions inventory, and turned to Samsonov, asking him for an update.
“Sir, we have fired a total of 12 Moskit-IIs, 28 remain in inventory. We have fired 16 S-300 SAMS, leaving a total of 48. We have fired 32 Klinok/Gauntlet SAMs, and 96 remain. Our Gatling guns have expended 5 % of available rounds. Our forward 100 millimeter cannon has expended six of one thousand rounds. The 152 millimeter batteries and torpedoes are at full load, as are the auxiliary ship-to-ship missiles.”
The Captain rubbed his hands together. Aside from his Moskit anti-ship missiles, and the S-300s his inventory was near full, and not one of the better 152mm deck guns had come into play as yet. He also had two more SSM missile systems aboard, with ten missiles each.
“Did we receive additional missiles for the MOS-III Starfires? And what about the cruise missiles?”
“No sir, neither of those weapon systems were scheduled for test firing, and so they were not replenished. But we still have our standard load of ten missiles for each of those two systems.”
Karpov thought about this in silence. Adding in those last two weapons, he now had a total of 48 missiles capable of targeting and hurting an enemy ship. His two primary air defense systems were still well provisioned, but he would have to be economical in using his ship killers in the days ahead. There was one other point he wanted to check.
“And what about our special warheads?”
Samsonov looked at him. “I’m sorry sir, that information is not on my board. Only the Admiral is aware of our status for special warheads on deployment.”
Correct, thought Karpov, and the Admiral will have a key around his neck even as I have one around mine. “Thank you, Mister Samsonov,” he said calmly.
His problem now was that it would require both keys, inserted into Samsonov’s Combat Information Display, to activate and fire a nuclear warhead, at least if the default protocols were in place. If he wanted to get his hands on that other key, now was the time to do it, while the Admiral was indisposed. But how to present this in a way that would not cause undo trouble with the crew? He knew their love and respect for Admiral Volsky could become an insurmountable obstacle if it came to a confrontation over the issue.
He considered his situation deeply. Orlov was with him for the moment. Orlov loved a good bar fight, and he understood all too well the effect of direct and bold action when it came to dealing with a problem. The problem was not Orlov, he thought, it’s me! I’m the one still a little weak in the knee over what I have just done, still a little worried at what the Admiral might say and do when he learns of this.
He took comfort in the thought that Orlov seemed to back his decisions, but would the fiery Chief waffle and recede into the background should Volsky return to the bridge? What about the other officers? Rodenko would answer to whomever held the watch on the main bridge. He thought he might be able to rely on Samsonov, but clearly Fedorov was a weak sister, and Tasarov seemed lost, as always, beneath his headphones, his mind in the depths of the sea and concerned with little else. But what were they really thinking? A bit of the old doubt and fear that had always bothered him in times of trouble like this reasserted itself. But what was done, was done.
What was the Admiral’s status? How much time did he have before Volsky would be back on his feet? Could he reason with the Admiral; explain the situation to him properly? Could he force him to see the opportunity they now had before them? He could insist on the use of nuclear weapons all he wanted, but what if the Admiral refused?
