“Check our weapons status again,” Weyrhauser ordered.
A quarter minute passed. “Got it!” Jethro Williams said over the intercom. “Weapons free.”
Weyrhauser felt a shiver of excitement run through him. They were about to make history.
He received another heading change from Williams. This time they would fly a mile-long, wings-level pass directly along the axis of the submarine’s last two plotted positions.
“Bomb bay doors open,” Weyrhauser ordered.
It was a calculated gamble, turning south and running for it. Manilov knew he was risking everything on the chance that the P-3 would lose its lock on the Mourmetz before the other aircraft and ships showed up. He would be outside the net of sonobuoys before they could reestablish the contact.
Only twenty miles. If he reached Socotra, they might escape. In the undersea wilderness off the island’s shore, sonar echoes were strewn like chaff in the wind. The submarine would be undetectable.
Did he make the right decision?
Strange, he thought. Never before had he questioned his own judgment. His objective had always been clear: Kill the enemy. To that end, every decision he made, each order he gave, was like the subliminal moves of a fencer. Thrust and parry. Act and react. Yevgeny Manilov possessed an unwavering confidence in his ability.
But something had changed. His single-minded obsession with sinking the Reagan was replaced by a different imperative: He wanted to live. More than that, he wanted his crew to live.
A rivulet of perspiration found its way past his brow, dripping off his nose and splashing onto the chart before him. His palms were damp. He felt a dryness in his throat.
Should he have remained in place? In deep water, beneath the thermal layer, the Mourmetz might have stayed undetected by the sub-hunting patrol plane.
Perhaps. It was a decision he couldn’t undo. Now they would live or die with it.
The earlier jubilation in the control compartment was gone. The crew wore expressions of grim determination. Borodin stared at the console of the MGK-400EM digital sonar. Popov busied himself scribbling on a notepad, ignoring the chirping pings of the sonobuoys.
Then another sound. A deeper, more sinister noise.
“Torpedo in the water!” shouted Borodin.
Each head in the control compartment swung to the sonar operator. “Bearing 025, seven thousand meters,” the sonar operator announced. “Forty knots, passive searching.”
Manilov’s thoughts raced ahead. It had to be a Mark 46 or a Mark 50. In either case, the torpedo would conduct its own private little search until it located a target within its programmed radius. Then it went into active sonar tracking and homed in like a killer angel.
He thought about firing another Igla, taking out the patrol plane. It was too late. Firing the missile would only betray their exact position.
“Ascend to fifty meters, steer 205 degrees. Ahead full.”
He saw Popov looking at him questioningly. “We’re putting our stern to the torpedo?”
“We’re buying time,” said Manilov. “We’ll run until he goes active. Then we make noise near the surface, turn and try to decoy it.”
Popov was still staring at him. It was contrary to the textbook Russian Navy tactic, which favored turning toward an incoming torpedo, making it overshoot. Manilov had never believed in the tactic.
Did he make the right decision?
There it was again. The doubt.
“Decoys, Captain?”
Manilov shook his head. “Not yet. Not until he goes active.”
The submarine tilted upward, ascending rapidly. Through the hull they could hear the sound of the torpedo’s high-speed screw.
“Three thousand meters,” Borodin called.
Then a new sound: rapid, relentless, high-frequency pinging. It sounded like the chirping of a maniacal insect.
“Active sonar!” Borodin yelled. “We’re targeted.”
In the mission computer display he saw the digital symbol of the torpedo with a flashing circle around it. He was right. It was a Mark 50.
“Hard left, full rudder, 020 degrees.”
“Aye, Captain.”
“Decoys now.”
Popov punched the switch for the decoy dispenser, spewing a trail of sonar-attracting decoys in the wake of the submarine.
At a speed of fifteen knots and accelerating, the Mourmetz sliced into the hard left turn. Manilov was gambling that the torpedo would sense the false mass of the decoys and continue straight for them.
By the time the submarine was halfway through the turn, Manilov knew it wasn’t working.
The torpedo wasn’t fooled.
The pinging reached a fanatical pitch. Manilov saw the flashing symbol on the display moving leftward, intercepting the submarine’s new course.
“A thousand meters, closing,” Borodin said. His voice was flat, without emotion.
Manilov nodded. He felt the eyes of his young crew watching him. Popov’s lips were moving in a silent supplication. Borodin’s face was solemn, resigned.
Manilov looked from one to the other, returning each man’s questioning gaze. They trusted you. They’ve placed their lives in your hands.
He knew what he had to do. Rising from his console, he picked up his Russian Navy officer’s cap and placed it on his head.
He turned to Popov. “Bow planes full up,” he ordered. “Flank speed, emergency ascent.”
Popov’s mouth dropped open. “Ascent? Captain, the torpedo… it will—”
“I gave you an order, Mr. Popov. Emergency ascent!”
Popov nodded and turned to his console.
Manilov gripped the brass handhold at his station as the hull of the Mourmetz tilted upward. He heard the nearly silent hum of the propulsion system deepen to a noisy throb. So much for stealthy running, he thought. The Mourmetz had no more need for stealth.
“Thirty meters, ascending,” called out Antonin in an unnaturally high voice. Manilov saw the digital depth gage unwinding in a blur.
In a forty-five degree ascent, the submarine was racing for the open sky.
“Twenty meters.”
Most emergency ascents, in Manilov’s experience, were showboat maneuvers. They were performed to impress bureaucrats and high-ranking officers and the media. In reality, bursting through the surface at such a speed and angle was guaranteed to inflict damage on antennae and planes and exterior running gear.
None of that mattered now.
Clinging to the brass handhold, Manilov kept his eye on the sonar display. The symbol of the incoming torpedo was blinking on the screen like a firefly. With each blink, it appeared closer to the symbol of the Mourmetz. The symbols were nearly merged.
Borodin saw it too. He glanced up at Manilov. Manilov just nodded.
In the next instant, he felt the bow of the Ilia Mourmetz shoot through the surface like an erupting geyser. He braced himself as the bow plunged back downward. He snatched the microphone from his console.
“Attention all hands, this is the captain. Stand by for torpedo damage. Prepare to—”
The torpedo smashed into the Mourmetz’s port side, just forward of the bow plane. The explosion ripped through the pressure hull, opening the submarine to a flood of seawater.
The control cabin went black. Manilov was flung against the bulkhead, smashing his head into a switch panel. He dropped to the deck, knocked senseless.
He was dimly aware of water sloshing over him. He saw the dim yellow emergency lights flicker, then come on.
Dazed, he struggled to his knees and looked around the compartment. In the flickering light, it looked like a scene from hell. The decks were awash. Torrents of seawater poured in through a ruptured bulkhead.