“Down ladder,” Dankleff called, then lowered himself into the trunk. Pacino followed, the bright light of the outside world vanishing, traded for the florescent lighting inside the 15-foot-wide cylinder. Inside, it resembled the escape trunk he’d used to leave the Piranha. And to come back inside it, he thought. Dankleff waved him through a large vertical hatch that opened into the aft part of forward compartment upper level. Pacino noticed the smell was exactly the same as Piranha or his father’s boats — an oily mix of cooking grease, amine atmospheric control chemicals, and ozone from the electrical equipment. It made his head spin for just a moment, the scent bringing back both the Piranha and Carrie Alameda so strongly it was if she stood right next to him.
Just like onboard the forward spaces of the Piranha, bulkheads forming the tight passageway were covered with a wood trim laminated coating in the few places where there were no panels, junction boxes, cable runs, piping or valves. Unlike the Piranha, on top of the deck of the passageways were twelve-inch diameter tin cans of food, jammed tight and overlaid with sheets of half-inch plywood, making the overhead a foot closer. Pacino had to slouch down to get through the passageway. He followed as Dankleff continued into a narrow passageway forward and ducked down a stairway to the middle level of the forward compartment. Pacino followed him, stepping off into the crew’s mess, which was oddly deserted. The deck was visible here — no plywood or tin cans. Tables and benches were gathered, café style, with a long food service line. Behind it the packed galley was likewise empty. Dankleff walked forward into the forward passageway, where the cans-and-plywood resumed, past a second set of steep stairs, where there was a door marked “XOSR,” for the executive officer’s stateroom.
“Listen, Patch, the XO is Lieutenant Commander Quinnivan, on exchange from the Royal Navy’s fast attack sub force. Good guy, but tougher than grandma’s leftover steak. In command is Commander Seagraves, who makes Quinnivan seem warm and fuzzy by comparison. So good luck in there,” he said, “and welcome aboard. I just hope you’re braced for a wild ride.”
Before Pacino could ask what he meant, Dankleff reached up and knocked on the executive officer’s door.
2
The executive officer’s stateroom was the biggest aboard the Vermont except for the captain’s, with a double rack against the far bulkhead, one wall with closets and cubbyholes, the other with two fold-down desks, a small pull-out sink in the corner.
Executive Officer Lieutenant Commander Jeremiah Seamus Quinnivan, Royal Navy, wasn’t English, but rather an Irishman from County Cork, having enlisted in the Royal Navy in his youth as a choice, since it was either that or being tossed into jail. It hadn’t taken long for the service to realize he had talent and after getting an engineering degree, he’d eventually found his way into a series of assignments on Astute-class fast attack submarines and from there to the U.S. Navy / Royal Navy joint exchange program. Quinnivan wore dark blue pants and shirt, with an emblem of his rank in the center of his chest, the emblem a dark blue background with three horizontal gold stripes, the middle stripe narrower than the others, the top stripe making a loop-the-loop in the center. On his fold-down desk was a black beret with a gold crown surrounded by laurel leaves as the center emblem. Over Quinnivan’s pocket were embroidered gold submarine dolphins, their design starkly different than the American version, but still recognizable. On one shoulder was sewn a patch with the flag of the United Kingdom. On the other was an embroidered patch with the Vermont logo.
Quinnivan was short and slight, his close-cropped hair salt-and-pepper, the gray invading his Van Dyke beard and mustache, both of which lent him a somewhat sinister look when he frowned, but when he smiled, his spirit seemed barely contained by his body as his eyes crinkled at the corners, revealing teeth that had been capped — some thought from a fight when he was young that had knocked them all out.
Quinnivan leaned back in his swivel chair and looked up at the captain, who stood in the doorway to their shared bathroom, the CO / XO head. Captain Timothy Talisker Seagraves was tall for submarine duty, his head threatening to bang into numerous valves tucked into the overhead, and solid as well. He had slightly longer-than-regulation black hair that swooped over his head with streaks of gray over his ears — gray arriving early for the 39-year-old — with heavy black eyebrows, dark brown eyes, a straight nose, stark cheekbones, thin lips and a square jaw, with a dimple centered in his chin. Quinnivan once joked with Seagraves that the captain looked like he could be a senator, a judge, a news anchor or a daytime soap opera star. Quinnivan considered that he and Seagraves must have looked an odd couple, with his humble looks and Seagraves’ physical near perfection. Seagraves stood with an attitude of unquestioned confidence and authority as he leaned casually against the door jamb. On the collars of his working khakis, he wore silver oak leaves. Over his left pocket he wore gleaming gold submariner’s dolphins, and below them, a gold capital ship command pin.
Quinnivan picked up his pad computer, which was displaying the classified service jacket of the newly reporting officer, Anthony Pacino. “Skipper, ya had a chance to look at this wee laddie’s personnel file?” Quinnivan’s Irish brogue was comically thick unless he was briefing senior officers, when his accent would calm down somewhat.
“I looked it over,” Seagraves said in a commanding baritone voice with just a hint of a Southern accent, Atlanta or Savannah, perhaps. “I got a call from Admiral Catardi, who recommended Pacino in glowing terms. You know we had to cash in favors to get NavPersCom to assign Pacino to us, right? Are there issues or concerns, XO?” Seagraves never called Quinnivan “Jeremiah” or “Seamus,” as he’d prefer to be addressed, only using his official title of the executive officer, “XO,” but not from stuffy formality but the feeling that he might lapse into calling the Irishman by the crew’s nickname of “Bullfrog,” from some forgotten rock ’n roll lyric about his first name.
Quinnivan stroked his short black-and-gray beard, his gesture when he was carefully choosing his next words.
“Ya know, Skipper, this kid Pacino, back home we’d call him a ‘chancer.’ He’s got a propensity to take risks, yeah? Smart lad, good grades at the Academy and his graduate school, but almost got kicked out of Annapolis for conduct offenses. Going over the wall at three in the mornin’, ya know, yeah? and then getting caught drinking in Baltimore as an underclassman. Then the kid parks his fookin’ hotrod Corvette in the parking space of the Commandant of Midshipmen. That was almost the last straw, since the commandant was late for a meeting with the admiral. Sure, Pacino’s brave, yeah? but reckless. I’m not sure how well I’ll sleep with him standing officer-of-the-deck watch on the conn.”