buttons.
'Willy: hammer!' The sonar sent out five ranging pings.
'Zero-one-nine, range nine hundred!'
Ralston set search depth and pattern. O'Malley brought his thumb across the stick and dropped the torpedo.
The submarine went to full power and turned left away from the helicopter while the torpedo plunged to eight hundred feet before beginning its search. O'Malley growled to himself that he'd launched from a bad angle, but it would have taken too long to reel in and reacquire. He held the aircraft in hover and listened over his headset as the whine of the torpedo screws chased after the deeper thrum of the Charlie's powerful twin screws. The nuclear sub maneuvered frantically, trying to turn inside the pursuing torpedo.
'They're on the same bearing now,' Willy reported. 'I think the fish has him-hit!'
But the Charlie didn't die. They heard the sound of blowing air, then it stopped. A wild cacophony of mechanical noise followed as the contact moved off to the north, then faded as the submarine slowed. O'Malley didn't have enough fuel to pursue. He came around west and headed for Reuben James.
'Hammer, Romeo, what happened?'
'We hit him, but he's still alive. Stand by, Romeo, we're coming in skosh fuel. Five minutes out.'
'Roger that, we'll be ready for you. We're vectoring another helo onto the Charlie. I want you to join Hatchet.'
'How come we didn't kill him?' Ralston asked.
'Almost all Russian subs have double hulls, and that dinky hundred pound warhead on the Mark-46 isn't gutsy enough to give you a kill every time. You try to attack from the stem if you can, but this time we couldn't. If you get a stem hit, you pop the shaft seals and flood his engine room. That'll kill anybody. They didn't tell you to go for a stem shot in school, did they?'
'Not especially.'
'Figures,' O'Malley growled.
It was good to see the Reuben James after four hours. It would have been even better to visit the officers' head, O'Malley thought bleakly. He brought the Seahawk over the port comer of the frigate's stern and paced the ship. Aft, Willy opened the sliding door and tossed down a messenger line. The frigate's deck crew attached a refueling hose to the line and Willy hauled it in, plugging the hose into the fuel tank. The procedure was called HIFR, for helicopter in-flight refueling. While O'Malley fought his helo through the roiled air behind the ship, fuel was pumped into his tanks, giving him another four hours' endurance. Ralston kept his eyes on the fuel indicators while O'Malley flew the aircraft.
'We're full up, Willy. Secure.'
The petty officer lowered the fuel hose and retrieved his line. He was glad to close the door and strap himself back into his chair. Officers, he told himself, were too smart to do what he just did.
'Bravo, this is Hammer, where do you want us, over?'
'Hammer, Bravo, come right to one-three-zero and rendezvous with Hatchet eight miles from Bravo.'
'On the way.' O'Malley curved around Reuben James and headed southeast.
'Hammer, Romeo, be advised Sea Sprite from Sims just finished off that Charlie for you. We got a 'well done' from the screen commander for that prosecution, over.'
'Tell the Commodore 'you're welcome.' Bravo, Hammer, what is it we're after, over?'
'We thought it was a twin-screw submarine. We're not quite so sure now, Hammer,' Perrin replied. 'We've fired three torpedoes at this target now for zero hits. He got one off at us, but it prematured in our wake.'
'How close was it?'
'Fifty yards.'
Ouch! the pilot thought.
'Okay, I have Hatchet in sight. Bravo, it's your ball game. Where do you want me now?'
Morris had allowed himself to fall far behind in the hunt for the now dead Charlie. On his command the frigate went to full speed, closing on Battleaxe at twenty-five knots. In response to the multiple submarine contacts, the convoy was turning slightly south.
O'Malley's Seahawk hovered seven miles from Battleaxe while Hatchet ran back home for fuel and sonobuoys. Again the process of dipping and moving began.
'Nothing,' Willy reported.
'Bravo, Hammer, can you give me a rundown of what this target's been doing?'
'We've nearly gotten him twice atop the layer. His course is generally south.'
'Sounds like a missile boat.'
'Agreed,' Perrin answered. 'Our last datum point was within one thousand yards of your position. We have nothing at this time.'
O'Malley examined the data transmitted from Battleaxe's plot. As was usually true of submarine course tracks, it was a collection of vague opinions, shaky judgments, and not a few wild guesses.
'Bravo, you're a sub-driver. Talk to me, over.' This was lousy radio procedure, but what the hell?
'Hammer, the only thing that makes the least bit of sense is that he's extremely fast.' O'Malley examined the tactical display more closely.
'You're right, Bravo.' O'Malley pondered this. A Papa, maybe? he wondered. Twin screws, cruise missiles, fast as a thief.
'Hammer, Bravo, if we proceed on the assumption that he's very fast, I recommend you go east until Romeo comes off sprint and can give us a bearing.'
'Concur, Bravo. Give me a vector.' On command from Battleaxe, the Seahawk ran twenty miles east and began dipping his sonar. It took fifteen minutes to load another pair of Stingray torpedoes on Hatchet, along with fuel and sonobuoys.
'What do you think we're after, skipper?' Ralston asked.
'How's a Papa grab you?' O'Malley asked.
'But the Russians only have one of those,' the copilot objected.
'Doesn't mean they're saving it for a museum, mister.'
'Nothing, sir,' Willy reported.
Reuben James came off sprint, turning to a southerly heading to bring her sonar to bear on the remaining contact. If only Battleaxe still had her tail, Morris thought, we could triangulate on every contact, and with two helos…
'Contact, evaluate as possible submarine, bearing zero-eight-one, bearing-changing slowly, looks like. Yeah, bearing changing north to south.' The data went at once to Battleaxe and the screen commander. Another helicopter joined the hunt.
'Down dome!' This was the thirty-seventh time today, O'Malley thought. 'My ass is asleep.'
'Wish mine was.' Ralston laughed without much humor. Again they detected nothing.
'How can something be exciting and boring at the same time?' the ensign asked, unconsciously echoing the Tomcat pilot days ago.
'Up dome! You know, I've wondered that a few times myself.' O'Malley keyed his radio. 'Bravo, Hammer, I got an idea for you.'
'We're listening, Hammer.'
'You have Hatchet dropping a line of buoys south of us. Deploy another line west. Then I start pinging. Maybe we can flush the guy into doing something. You ever get herded by a dipping helo when you were driving subs?'
'Not herded, Hammer, but I have gone far out of my way to avoid one. Stand by while I get things organized.'
'You know, this one's a nervy bastard. He's gotta know we're onto him, but he isn't breaking off. He really thinks he can beat us.'
'He has for the last four hours, boss,' Willy observed.
'You know what the most important part of gambling is? You have to know when it's time to quit.' O'Malley circled up high and turned his search radar on for the first time that day. It was not very useful for detecting a periscope, but it might just scare a sub running near the surface into heading back under the layer. The sun was
