system for a high-tech weapon?”
“I probably wouldn’t want to say that,” said Chris contritely.
If the trawler hit the buoy, they would most likely lose their connection — and Piranha. It occurred to Breanna the ocean was awful big and the buoy awfully small — and yet the ship was uncannily on course for the device.
“Could they track the transmission, you think?”
“Well, the Navy couldn’t,” said Chris. “But in theory, it’s possible. That ship had been around — they might have seen the buoy launched.”
“Fentress’s — how’s your connection with Piranha?” Bree asked.
“As far as I can tell, Captain, they’re not interfering.”
“Going through two thousand feet to nineteen hundred, eighteen hundred,” said the copilot, belatedly calling out their altitude. “We’re getting low.”
“Is there enough time to auto-sink this buoy and launch another?” Bree asked Chris and Fentress as she leveled off.
“Sinking procedure takes a hundred and eighty seconds,” said Fentress. “I have the screen up.”
“We have to get the new one in the water first,” said Chris.
“Pick a spot about five miles away. Make it ten.”
“Hang on.” He worked on his screens, plotting a course. “Five minutes total. If they’re watching and they’re interested, there’s no guarantee they won’t see us, Bree. They’ll know what we’re doing and get at least a rough idea of where we launch. The Chinese may too.”
“I don’t know that we have any other choice. Give me the course. Kevin, be ready with the self- destruct.”
“I can’t get that panel once we’re trying to reconnect,” he told her. “What I mean is, it’ll take a few more seconds.”
“They’re just about alongside,” said Chris.
If Zen were here, she’d have him send the Flighthawks to buzz the spy ship.
So where the hell was he when she needed him?
“Think they’ll back off if we buzz them?” she asked Chris.
“Don’t know,” said the copilot. “Sure get them talking about us, though.”
Breanna slid the Megafortress onto her left wing, pirouetting back toward the trawler and kicking up her speed. ‘They may be armed,” said Stoner over the interphone.
“Don’t be so optimistic,” said Breanna. She pushed the EB-52 to just three hundred feet over the white- capped waves, the plane a black finger wagging at the trawler not to be naughty. They could see the people on the deck duck as they roared over.
“One more time,” she said, picking up the plane’s nose and then pedaling into a tight bank. “And this time, we’re going to one hundred feet.”
“We can snap their aerial if you want,” offered Chris.
“Don’t tempt me.”
“Two hundred fifty feet,” said the copilot. As he continued to read the descending numbers, a bit of a tremble entered his voice. They cleared the upper mast by maybe ten feet.
“They stop?” Breanna asked.
“Not sure. They’re on the deck.”
“One more pass. Prepare to deploy buoy,” said Breanna.
This time they cleared the mast by inches rather than feet, but the trawler had continued moving and was no practically alongside the buoy. Two or three crew members were leaning over the rail there.
“Getting static here,” said Fentress as they cleared the shop.
“Activate the targeting radar for the air mines,” said Breanna.
“Captain?” said Ferris.
“We’ll get their attention, launch another probe while we’re firing, sink the first, launch a third further away, then sink the second,” said Breanna. “Calculate it so we come close, but don’t hit them with the shrapnel.”
“I’m not sure I can do that. I don’t even know if I can get the gun on them.”
“You can do anything, Chris.” She swung the Megafortress through another turn so she could get her tail aimed at the spy ship.
“All right. We cross over the trawler, bank, take our shot, then launch.”
“You disappoint me,” she told him, hitting the throttle for more speed.
“How’s that?”
“All that potential and no sexual innuendo?”
“Yeah, well, you should hear what I’m thinking.”
IT wasn’t until he was four miles from the aircraft carrier that the Chinese destroyer picked up Balin’s submarine. Even then, the destroyer wasn’t quite sure what if had found, or where its quarry was — the ship began tracking north, probably after one of the other subs Balin’s men had detected in the vicinity. And so he managed to get nearly two miles closer before Captain Varja passed the word that the enemy escort was now bearing down on them.
“Prepare torpedoes,” said Balin calmly.
“Torpedoes ready,” said Varja.
“Range to target?”
“Three thousand, five hundred meters,” reported the captain.
The others in the control room were trying to strangle their excitement; the few words they exchanged as they prepared to fire were high-pitched and anxious. Varja, though, was calm. Balin appreciated that; he felt he had taught the young man something worthwhile.
“We will fire at three thousand meters,” Balin said.
A moment later, a depth charge exploded somewhere behind them. The boat shook off the shrudder and the helmsman managed to stay on course, but Balin realized this had only been the opening blow.
“Launch torpedoes,” said the admiral. “Sink them.”
In order to get the air mines where Chris wanted them, Breanna had to practically stand the Megafortress on its tail, fighting all of Newton’s laws — not to mention those of common sense. Breanna barely managed to control the big plane, sliding sideways across the waves at a mere thousand feet. She finally had to let her left wing sail downward; the front windscreen filled with blue before she could recover.
“Got a couple of shots on their bow,” said Chris. His helmet was touching the display where the Stinger target box was displayed. “I don’t think we hurt anybody. They all ran aft. Ship’s dead in the water, eight, ten feet from the buoy.”
“Get ready to launch,” said Bree calmly.
“Okay, right.”
“Fentress?” she asked.
“Not as much static. Geez, those bullets make a hell of a racket hitting the water. You should see them on the display screen — look like volcanoes erupting on top of you, then there’s this wild crisscross pattern in different shades of red and blue. Very 1960s. I had to hit the manual filter and—”
Fentress stopped abruptly.
“We’re at launch point,” said Chris.
“Wait,” she told him. “Fentress? Kevin? You okay down there?”
“Torpedoes in the water.”
“What?”
“Back by the carrier,” said Fentress. “Have two, three warning blocks.”
“Launch the buoy,” she told Chris. “Kevin. We’re launching. You sure about the torpedoes?”
“Yes ma’am. Have another sub.”
