When his mother was diagnosed with breast cancer, he had just turned sixteen. He opted to finish school early and quickly found a menial labor job to help bring in some money to help cover the mounting medical bills. Private insurance and specialists were expensive. When his mother became too sick to work, Jones looked for other ways to make money, eventually turning to one of his childhood friends who ran with the wrong crowd. His friend, George, was two years older and had been working for a local gang who made their money in the drug trade. It didn’t take long before Jones was working a corner, peddling their products to earn some extra cash. However, he was a lot smarter than the average street thug. In a short period of time, he’d moved up the ranks from street peddling to running his own network. Jones knew the real money to be made was not on the street, but in the financial district.
A friend of his from school had a father who worked for Barclays as an investment banker. When his friend’s dad caught them smoking weed one day after school, rather than chastise the boys, he joined them. Through a little prodding, Jones was able to learn that his friend’s father had other colleagues who would be interested in finding a confidential source for some drugs. Jones assured him that he could provide a steady source of cocaine if he wanted it. Because he didn’t know who these people were, he’d sell the drugs to his friend’s father, and then he could sell the drugs to his friends. That way it made things easy.
For six months, this little arrangement worked out well. Jones was making more money than he had ever dreamed of and he made sure his mother was given the best care and medicine money could buy. Unfortunately for Jones, he was paying for specialized care that was way above the national coverage his mother’s meager wages could have afforded. This behavior, along with a few unnecessary purchases, eventually caught the attention of local law enforcement. One day, a pair of detectives paid Jones and his mother a house call. They’d been observing him for nearly a month and had built quite a case against him. His mother was appalled once she learned of how he’d been earning his money; it broke her heart to see that he was squandering the future life she had worked so hard to give him.
The police detectives saw some potential in Jones, and in consultation with the Justice Department, agreed to not press charges against him if he provided the names of who was supplying him the drugs and who he was selling them to, and then enlisted in the armed forces. The prosecutor had served in the Royal Marines for a stint and told Jones that it had helped to set him on the straight and narrow, and he was willing to give Jones the same opportunity if he’d take it. During this ordeal, Jones’s mother had passed away from the cancer, and with no one else in his life, he agreed to take them up on their offer of redemption.
A month before his eighteenth birthday, he’d joined the Royal Marines and left for recruit training. Seven years later, Jones had served in both Iraq and Afghanistan, along with a few other hotspots around the world. He had one year left in his enlistment, though he’d decided the Marines was it for him. He’d enlist again and this time make it a career, not just an adventure.
One of his corporals pulled him out of his memories. “Sergeant Jones, how far do you think we are from Russia?” he asked. The rest of his men were just as antsy to get off the ship.
“From what I’ve heard, we’re roughly four days away from the Kola Peninsula and then the White Sea. How are the men holding up?” Jones asked.
The corporal shrugged. “They’re holding up fine. I’m working them as hard as our limited space allows. Lots of time in the gym, etcetera.”
Before the two of them could say anything further, the warning klaxons sounded general quarters again. Thinking this was just another drill, they turned back to continue their conversation before they heard and felt an explosion. It didn’t quite feel like their ship had been hit, but something near their ship definitely had. This clearly was not a drill, and something terrible had just transpired. Sergeant Jones jumped up and made it his mission to find out what had happened.
The HMS Duncan was one of the newest British Type 45 Daring destroyers, and a pivotal part of the Queen Elizabeth strike group. With the American strike group in the center and rear positions of the fleet, the Duncan, along with three other Type 23 or Duke-class frigates, was responsible for protecting the European carriers and their French counterparts. There were over sixty warships in Task Force One, which made up the bulk of the fleet’s striking power. In Task Force Two, there were an additional fifty-two warships, though these mostly comprised the amphibious assault ships, troop transports, and additional roll-on, roll-off or ro-ro ships. It was an enormous fleet, and by far the largest concentration of Allied warships.
“Any word on that underwater contact yet? Is it moving toward the fleet?” asked Commander Mike Shepherd, the captain of the Duncan.
Lieutenant Martin Nibs looked up at the captain, replying, “No word on the possible contact in sector G3. However, the Portland just registered a possible underwater contact in D5. They’re moving to investigate it further right now.”
They were all a bit on edge. Several of the frigates had detected an underwater contact at the outskirts of the fleet’s protective zone. Unfortunately, the storm was preventing them from launching their helicopters or calling in for land-based support from their antisubmarine planes, which meant they were left with their passive and active sonars. One of the frigates would pound the water with its active sonar, while the other ships would sit in passive mode, trying to see if they would hear the sonar pulse reflect off the hull of an enemy submarine.
The terrible weather had also prevented them from being able to effectively deploy their towed sonar array, making it much more difficult to differentiate the sound of heavy rain and waves crashing around them from the noise of an electric pump or propulsion used on a submarine. For the last hour, they’d been picking up faint signals, only to lose them again in the clutter of the storm and then suddenly have them spring up again much closer to the fleet.
Commander Mike Shepherd scratched his head as he looked at the map for himself. As he saw where D5 was in relationship to G3, it just didn’t make sense. “That new contact is way too far away from G3 to be the same contact,” he asserted. “We’re most likely looking at a new contact, if that is in fact what it is,” he replied to the lieutenant, his targeting officer.
Lieutenant Nibs’s brow furrowed. “Sir, if this is a new possible underwater contact at D5, then that contact is well within our protective bubble. Shoot, they’re almost within torpedo range of the Queen Elizabeth, if it is a sub,” he explained.
“Damn this storm. We need our helicopters!” thought Commander Mike Shepherd. He clenched his fist, frustrated that the pounding rain was blocking their sensing capabilities.
One of the petty officers who was manning a sonar display nearby suddenly turned in his chair. “Multiple underwater contacts!” he shouted.
Everyone’s heads turned toward the captain, who shouted, “How many and where are they headed?”
“It’s that possible contact in D5. It’s a sub. Holy hell, the contact just multiplied. We’ve got five confirmed submarines!” shouted Petty Officer Lee Davies. “The identification is coming in now… they’re Akulas,” he said. Seconds later, he yelled, “Torpedoes! I count eight torpedoes in the water, Sir. It looks like one is heading toward the Portland, and another toward the Lancaster. The other six appear to be split evening between the Queen Elizabeth, the Charles de Gaulle, and the Italian ship, the Cavour.”