Seas of Crisis

Jeffrey had contrived things so the battle would stay as a stern chase, proceeding along at the Amethyste’s flank speed of twenty-five knots, and the Russians would be dependent on Challenger for meaningful target tracking data.

And nothing says I have to be honest when I answer.

Challenger had a maximum speed advantage over an Amethyste of almost thirty knots. Jeffrey would order Bell to put on bursts of speed and make end runs to the north, cutting off the supposed German each time Harley pretended he was trying to escape toward and beyond the pole.

Chapter 34

Jeffrey’s pursuit of the Amethyste with the Russians was relentless. After twenty-four straight hours they’d covered half the distance to where the final reckoning, over the debris of a real Amethyste-II, would take place.

Jeffrey was doing this on purpose. He wanted the Russian captains, their senior officers, and the remainder of their crews exhausted. Each Akula-II had a total of about seventy men, barely half the size of Challenger’s and Carter’s crews. But modern Russian submarine captains did more delegating in battle than their U.S. Navy counterparts. Jeffrey was counting on his own combat-tested, iron constitution to outlast the Russian command teams, gaining a better mental — and tactical — edge. At Bell’s urging, Jeffrey allowed modified watch rotations once the stern chase seemed to have settled into a routine. It was important, Jeffrey knew, for Challenger’s people to eat, sleep, and relax every day, so the ship would be in ideal fighting form. Over the acoustic link, Harley confirmed he was doing the same for his people — but like Jeffrey, he neither wanted nor could afford even a short catnap himself.

Challenger’s battle-stations crew roster had recently rotated on watch again.

Then Jeffrey’s plan to wear down the Russians backfired.

“Hydrophone effects,” Chief O’Hanlon shouted from his sonar console. “Torpedo in the water, Russian UGST!” He gave the range and bearing. It had been fired by Wild Boar.

“Second torpedo in the water,” O’Hanlon reported. “Also Russian UGST!” This one had been fired by Cheetah.

In moments, each Akula-II fired a second torpedo.

“Target for all four torpedoes is Carter,” Torelli said. Jeffrey eyed the new torpedo icons on the tactical plots. They quickly drew ahead, chewing up the range to the Amethyste- Carter.

Shit. I told them not to open fire without my permission.

“Ru-ling, how did they coordinate without us hearing the conversation?”

“I think there was no conversation, sir.”

Bell glanced at Jeffrey. “Wild Boar must’ve gotten trigger-happy, and Cheetah used the excuse to join in.”

“Weps,” Jeffrey ordered, “confirm speed of the UGSTs.”

“They’re all making fifty knots, Commodore. That’s their maximum attack speed.”

“Commodore,” Sessions reported, “Carter signals, ‘Torpedoes in water detected by echoes off bummocks. Torpedoes closing my ship. What are your instructions?’ ”

Jeffrey stared at the plots. They seemed to dance around, and fade in and out of focus. He’d been awake for a lot more than twenty-four hours. His plan to exhaust the Russians — while pretending they all were ganging up to exhaust the Germans — was having an effect on his own ability to think straight. He hadn’t made proper allowance for how much his delicate negotiations and bluffs in Siberia drained him.

“Sir,” Sessions stated, “Carter sends, ‘Repeat, what are your instructions?’ ”

“Ru-ling, make signal to Wild Boar and Cheetah. ‘Why have you opened fire without my prior order? By word of your own commander in chief, you are under my command.’ ”

The chief typed on his keyboard.

“Commodore,” Sessions interrupted, “Carter sends, ‘Repeat, inbound torpedoes closing on me. Will impact before their maximum range if I maintain present course and speed.’ ”

“Okay,” Jeffrey said. “Okay.” He had an idea. “Make signal to Carter, ‘Go silent and go to all stop. When you hear me making flank speed, make actual flank speed as Carter in wide circle, return to starting location after twenty minutes circling.’ ”

Harley signaled he understood. Jeffrey waited five minutes.

“Ru-ling, what reply from Wild Boar and Cheetah?”

“Nothing yet, sir.”

“Repeat the message and add ‘Response imperative.’ ”

The Ru-ling typed. Jeffrey waited another five minutes. The four UGSTs closed the distance to Carter faster than ever, making fifty knots while she sat still.

This was getting dicey, but Jeffrey realized he needed to pull off another subtle, dangerous sleight of hand to set up the Russian captains for later. “Ru-ling, response?”

“None yet, sir.”

Jeffrey gave them five more minutes; the UGSTs would now be very close to where Carter went quiet and stopped. “That’s it. As far as they’re to know, they’ve gone too far and they’re ruining everything. Captain Bell, make flank speed and cut back and forth in front of Wild Boar and Cheetah, at one thousand feet below their present depth. I want to teach them who’s in charge here, and get them to behave themselves, but I do not want to break the wires to their torpedoes or we might lose Carter.”

Bell acknowledged and issued helm orders. Patel acknowledged and dialed up flank speed. Bell ordered rudder turns and Patel put them into effect. Challenger vibrated and banked steeply into each turn, first to starboard and then to port and then back again. Jeffrey knew Harley would be kicking Carter up to her own flank speed, which slightly exceeded that of the UGSTs. He’d outrun the torpedoes until they ran out of remaining fuel. Meanwhile, Jeffrey anticipated that his own flank speed noise and maneuvers — his angry reminder of Challenger’s tactical and sonar superiority over the Akulas — would mask Carter’s actual signature.

Using their own rebelliousness to outfox them. I hope.

For Jeffrey’s basic deception scheme to keep holding up, and for his gradually gelling final-engagement strategy to have any chance to work, it was vital that the guidance wires to the UGSTs not break, and that the Russian captains from now on did exactly what he said. Neither was guaranteed.

“Ru-ling, make signal to Wild Boar and Cheetah. ‘Have lost contact with target, unable to regain, believe it hovering under ice to evade UGST homing sonars. Reduce your own-ship speed to five knots to retain separation against a German counterambush. Engage gravimeter sensors and steer your weapons to search area near last known location German vessel. And maintain task force discipline or I will personally tell Russian president to reprimand you.’ ”

The chief, as he typed all this in Russian, couldn’t help chuckling at the tart tongue-lashing Jeffrey was giving to the captains of Wild Boar and Cheetah.

Jeffrey told Bell to maintain flank speed, while he kept an eye on the chronometer. If the Russians followed Jeffrey’s orders, the UGSTs would search in vain near one place for an Amethyste reactor compartment that wasn’t there. If they disobeyed, or had a fire-control malfunction, or the wires to one or more of their weapons broke, Harley could survive by outrunning the errant torpedoes — and would end up almost back where he started, as if he’d been an Amethyste, hiding, hovering all along and the Russian warheads had failed to find him.

Except. If a Russian captain’s UGST somehow made, and held, active and passive homing acoustic contact on Carter, with the guidance wire to his weapon still intact so he knew what his weapon and Carter were doing, he’d realize that something was way too