Tidal Rip

Stissinger raised his eyebrows. “Oh, a baron, is he?” Stissinger chuckled. “The way he’s been hiding and having messengers bring all his meals, there’s wide speculation he might even be a count. You know, Captain, as in Count Dracula?”

“Not so loud,” Beck said. “He’s right next door.”

“In what should be my cabin, with him sharing it as our guest.”

“He said privacy was needed, for security.”

“I believe it. The messengers say he’s always huddled over papers and maps and documents, and keeps scribbling on a thick notepad. Each time they bring a new meal tray, he turns everything upside down before asking them in. The previous meal, the leftovers, sit shoved in a corner. Besides his computer, he just has the reading light on, day and night. Never uses the overhead fluorescents, and the men swear his bed looks completely unslept in.”

Beck nodded. “He seems to take what’s going on very seriously.” He pointed at the door into the head, the bathroom he shared with von Loringhoven. “I’ve heard him take a shower a couple of times. And I know he pisses and shits like any mortal.” Beck grinned lopsidedly. “You can tell the men I seriously doubt he’s a vampire.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Anyway, let’s see if our baron wants to join us in the Zentrale for the latest excitement.”

The von Scheer was at battle stations, running deep. Beck and Stissinger sat at the command console. Von Loringhoven stood, wedged in behind them, so he could look between their shoulders at their status plots. Way over their heads, the surface Gulf Stream current ran northeast, back the way they’d come. The air and water temperatures were well above freezing here; there was rain and wind and heavy seas, but no ice.

“Sonar,” Beck ordered, “put passive broadband on speakers, volume low.”

Werner Haffner acknowledged from his console, past Stissinger’s seat on Beck’s right. Now Beck heard the sounds of biologics — lobster and herring that had so far survived the heavy oil spills of war — and the gentle murmur of bottom currents flowing along rough terrain. He also heard a steady eerie mechanical pulsating throb: the two submerged Russian submarines that concealed von Scheer from above.

Beck kept one eye on the tactical plot and the other on the gravimeter. His orders told him exactly which route to take. Ordinarily Beck would not have liked such restriction. But now, with the need to move in formation with the pair of Russian Sierra IIs — yet remain undetected himself — he understood the requirement for things to be organized in advance.

“This is good,” Beck told Stissinger. He knew von Loringhoven would be in the conversation too, simply by his physical proximity. “This is exactly what I would have done.”

“Jawohl,” Stissinger said respectfully.

“Explain,” von Loringhoven said.

Beck glanced at the diplomat for a moment, then pointed at the gravimeter display. “Our two friendly Ivans are taking the deepest part of the gap, right between the northern tip of Scotland and the Faroe Islands. The water here goes down a thousand meters plus, in most places. This valley between the European continental shelf, here, and the Faroes Rise, here, is ideal for us to hide in by hugging the bottom.”

“I see that,” von Loringhoven said. He gave Beck a look as if to say, Don’t you think I can read a nautical chart?

Beck decided to ignore his irritating attitude. Otherwise, this could be an extremely long cruise. “It’s all a very neat bluff. This route is shortest for the Russians to get from their home port to the Atlantic, so it’s natural they’d come this way, just as if they’ve nothing to hide. Plus, after we pass Scotland we go right down the west coast of Ireland, which is the last thing the Allies would expect the von Scheer to do. They’re much more likely to be looking for us way up near Greenland or Iceland.”

The two Russian submarines pinged on their sonars again. They were continuing to signal their presence as neutrals — to invite inspection by Allied antisubmarine forces and avoid accidental attack.

“We’re about to see how well this works,” von Loringhoven stated. “We don’t know how thoroughly the Brits will probe beneath the two 945A boats.” His tone was distant, almost sarcastic.

Is he really such an arrogant bastard, Beck asked himself, or is he just scared and won’t admit it? Either way, doesn’t he have the common sense to behave better in my control room, in front of my crew?

The Russians slowed to seven knots. Beck ordered the pilot to slow the von Scheer, to keep station. Then he ordered that one of his ship’s two nuclear reactors be shut down to reduce the von Scheer’s noise signature. In an emergency, it would take several minutes to bring the reactor fully back on-line. This would sacrifice a lot of the ship’s propulsion power when it might be needed most. But the von Scheer was truly boxed in — by dry land to north and south, and by minefields and enemy forces in other directions. Absolute stealth, not escape speed, counts the most. Beck ordered that the air-circulation fans, and other nonvital equipment, also be turned off. To further save amperage demand — and remind everyone to make as little noise as possible — lighting shipwide was cut to dim red.

The air in the control room quickly grew stale and humid and warm — from the people and from electronic gear. The repeated bass and high-pitched sonar tones from the Russians filled the control-room speakers every minute or so. It made Beck feel as if he were one of several vessels on the surface in thick fog, feeling their way half-blind in the days before radar.

Beck ordered Stissinger to launch two remote-controlled undersea probes through two of the von Scheer’s eight oversized torpedo tubes. These battery-powered, reusable probes would check out the bottom rocks and muck ahead for antisubmarine detectors that could be problems for the von Scheer.

Stissinger whispered with his weapons technicians and relayed orders to the torpedo room. Rapidly, the unmanned undersea vehicle probes were launched, attached to fiber-optic tethers; Beck windowed their sensor readouts on his console.

“Isn’t that risky?” von Loringhoven said.

“To not use the probes and trust to blind luck is riskier,” Beck mumbled. “And please keep your voice down.”

The ship’s copilot took control of one probe to gain cues to help the pilot steer Beck’s vessel. One of Stissinger’s senior-chief weapon technicians controlled the other probe. The darkened Zentrale grew hushed.

“Einzvo,” Haffner called out in a forced whisper. “New passive sonar contacts. Airborne contacts, approaching from east, assess as Royal Navy helicopters possibly based in the Orkneys or Shetland Islands.”

“Captain,” Stissinger murmured, “the Brits have sent their inspection team to take a good look at the Russians.”

Beck nodded. In a few minutes, he could barely hear the beating of rotor blades and the whine of engines coming straight down through the sonar layer, playing over the speakers.

“Aircraft are hovering near the Russians,” Stissinger said.

“Sounds of dipping sonars,” Haffner reported softly. The Royal Navy was using high-frequency pings, above the range of human hearing — for better image resolution of returns off the Russian hulls. “New surface contacts, weak, closing. Warship tonals.”

“Traces of blue-green laser light also now,” Stissinger said. “Assess helicopters making close inspection with line-scan cameras… And Royal Navy frigates, distant, approaching.”

“Fine,” von Loringhoven said. “They’ll see two Russian submarines.” The Zentrale crew became even more hushed.

“Our own acoustic masking routines continue to function nominally,” Stissinger said. “Line-scan cameras are too shallow to pick us up down here in the bottom terrain.”

“Very well, Einzvo.” Beck tried to sound calm, but he couldn’t allow himself to relax. He saw several crewmen hunch closer over their consoles, as if they were literally ducking to hide from the enemy undersea cameras way overhead.

Beck understood better than any of them how savagely fast this delicate ballet of deception could all come unglued.