speed, thirty knots. Her depth was fifteen hundred meters, exploiting a temperature/salinity layer caused by conflicting currents deep in the ocean — excellent concealment from searching Allied planes and surface ships.
'Sir,' Beck said, 'recommend update target motion analysis on the carrier group. They may cease steaming semi-independently and close up with the convoy for the rendezvous.'
Beck knew his ship had a clear playing field here today, which meant she'd get no interference from Axis forces, but no help: The German Class 212's, and captured French SSNs, were striking Convoy Section Two way off to the south. This made sense, to avoid friendly fire, but Beck suspected Eberhard had had a hand in it: no friendly forces present, no credit shared.
'Concur, Einzvo, update the data. A more concentrated target for us if they do close up, but better all-around protection for them… which only adds to the time pressure.' Beck turned to the sonar officer, who sat at the head of a line of consoles on the Zentrale's starboard side. He was a likable young man, Werner Haffner, an Oberleutnant zur See — lieutenant junior grade — from Kiel, a major base and port on the Baltic. Haffner was earnest and talented, though high-strung.
Beck asked Haffner the optimum depth and course for a good passive contact on the enemy carrier group. Haffner conferred with his sonarmen, then responded to Beck. Eberhard issued the piloting orders. Jakob Coomans, the battle-stations pilot, acknowledged; Coomans sat at the two-man ship control station, on the Zentrale's forward bulkhead. Deutschland went deeper.
'Einzvo, prepare for arming nuclear weapons.'
Beck and Eberhard went through the sequence with their special keys. Deutschland had eight wide-body torpedo tubes, and sixteen vertical launch tubes for her cruise missiles. Soon, the Sea Lion deep-capable eels, German Navy slang for torpedo, and the Modified Shipwrecks, supersonic antishipping cruise missiles purchased from Russia, were ready to fire. Each carried an advanced U-235 warhead of Axis design.
Beck eyed Eberhard, standing there in his austere black jumpsuit and beautifully polished sea boots, with the diamonds of the Ritterkreuz glittering at his throat, next to his bloodred arming key. Eberhard looked eager for what was to come. That's the difference between us. I fight to make a better peace, and to protect my family. He fights because he likes it.
ONE HOUR LATER, ON USS CHALLENGER
Ilse heard a beep on her headphones: Someone was breaking in on the circuit she and Jeffrey and Clayton and Bell were using during this SEAL mission briefing. The air in the front of the boat was still toxic from the engine room fire, and the foursome wore spare sonar headsets under their respirator masks; this way they could talk more easily, and privately. Bits of duct tape made airtight seals for the lip mikes. At this point people had gotten used to pausing rhythmically to draw breath; Ilse hardly noticed the constant hissing and whooshing all around.
'Captain, this is the Conn,' Lieutenant Sessions's voice reported — he was the one who beeped.
Jeffrey turned from the digital navigation plotting table at the rear of Challenger's CACC.
'Your requested ten-minute update, sir,' Sessions said from the command workstation. ' The ship is at ordered depth, three thousand feet. We have fifteen thousand feet of water beneath the keel. Our course is three one five.' Northwest. 'Making for the Azores at top quiet speed, twenty-six knots.'
'Very well, the Conn,' Jeffrey said.
With water so deep, Ilse knew, long-range sonar conditions were perfect. Jeffrey wanted to stay above the deep sound channel now, to hide.
Another beep.
'Captain, Sonar,' Kathy Milgrom said. 'Your requested ten-minute update. One distant nuclear detonation, range and bearing match Convoy Section Two. No other new sonar contacts, sir.'
Ilse, standing next to Jeffrey, saw him face Kathy and give her an appreciative nod, mask and all — Some fences had been mended there. 'V'r'well, Sonar.' Kathy smiled behind her faceplate, clicked off the circuit, and turned back to her console.
Bell keyed the intercom switch clipped to his belt. 'Sounds like Section One is having a quiet day, Captain.' Bell leaned against the nav console, right next to Jeffrey, their elbows often touching. The tension between the two men had melted quickly — as had bad feeling in general — once Jeffrey had made public amends for losing his cool. His sincerity had been moving to see, and now, if anything, people felt more tightly knit than ever.
And it's a good thing, Ilse told herself. There was lingering tension enough from those Abombs going off like strings of firecrackers during their dose call with the 212 and 214. There was added tension from Challenger's new destination, their new target. The enormous responsibility placed on their shoulders was almost staggering.
'Play it again,' SEAL team leader Shajo Clayton said. He wasn't smiling. The assistant navigator, a senior chief, pressed buttons on his keyboard. Ilse watched the horizontal large screen on the plotting table.
The satellite image looked down at Earth from hundreds of miles in space. Northern Europe was shrouded in rainy overcast. There were gaps where the cloud cover was thinner.
The computer overlaid the northern coast of Germany and occupied Poland on the picture, tracing the edge of the land-locked Baltic.
At first there was nothing to see. Then it started.
There were quick flashes in some of the cloud gaps, unevenly spaced. The flashes occurred from west to east, from Germany toward Russia. They were arrayed in a line that stretched about a hundred fifty nautical miles. A very straight line. The whole thing took under a minute.
'Initially,' Jeffrey said, 'the Joint Chiefs thought it was a cruise missile training exercise.'
'Missiles ripple-fired from a line of frigates or submarines?' Bell said. 'That would explain it.' Ilse knew that Bell, as weapons officer, was in his element here.
'No,' Jeffrey said. 'The coordination of the flashes is too perfect. Computer analysis tracked one for a fraction of a second, and studied the engine's exhaust spectrum. There's no question we're seeing a single missile, liquid hydrogen powered, a ground hugger, doing Mach eight.'
'Jesus,' Clayton said as he stood next to Ilse.
Bell whistled. 'Nothing we own can intercept Mach eight… except for a nuclear area burst. We have trouble enough with ballistic missiles, the type that follow a nice parabola up in the sky.'
'Our side doesn't have something like this, too?' Clayton said. Jeffrey shook his head. 'NASA's work on hypersonic flight was all for high-altitude scramjets. Single-stage-toorbit reusable low-cost spacecraft, or something to replace the Concorde.'
Bell nodded ruefully. 'And that technology's not much use for cruise missile hardware. These platforms skim the wavetops.'
'There's a mole inside the missile lab,' Jeffrey said. 'Code name ARBOR. She was recruited by the Israeli Mossad long before the war. The Germans have been rolling up Mossad's network, but they haven't found ARBOR yet…. She worked her way to the top of human resources at the lab. She's our way in. The nuclear demolition itself is codenamed RECURVE.'
'And this satellite data proves ARBOR hasn't been turned,' Bell said. 'She's not feeding us false information under duress, as a trap.'
'I almost wish she were,' Clayton said.
'The location of the lab right on the Baltic makes sense,' Jeffrey continued. 'It was built, supposedly, as a hardened underground communications center, during the war scare in Asia five years back, when Germany started rearming in earnest. It's huge, subdivided, self-contained. Now it's been disguised as a depot-level repair facility for the German Navy'
Jeffrey gestured, and the nav chief brought another picture on the screen. Ilse read the caption. 'Greifswald.' The old houses and shops had exposed beams, Tudor style. The colorful church steeples were picturesque. Evergreen forests covered undulating hills beyond the town.
'Greifswald is near the Polish border, in what used to be East Germany. It's not far from Peenemunde, where the Nazis perfected the V-2 rockets. Isolated, easy to protect, with the Baltic as secure test range right there.'
'If we know where it is,' Ilse said, 'why not just hit the place with big high explosive bombs?'
Jeffrey sighed. 'Won't work. NATO ground-penetrator munitions can't get through the forty-foot composite
