Nikki smiled; this was the Nathan she knew. They both walked into the control room. Nathan stood by his Weapons Officer.
“Weaps, flood tube five. We’ll let Scooby off his leash.”
“Flooding tube five, aye sir.”
The Weapons Officer watched his display for a minute, then turned and nodded.
“Open outer doors, launch Scooby. Keep him quiet, Weaps; there’s no rush, let’s get him out of here. Send him north at a depth of 300 feet.”
A few minutes passed by. Benson looked over.
“Sir, I’ve integrated Scooby’s passive sonar with ours. No picture change; Tango one is still under us. He’s listening, waiting.”
Nathan gave Benson a thumbs up.
Scooby slowly moved through the icy depths below the ice. He was a blunt-nosed, torpedo-like vessel making his way through the gloom, under pale green ice ridges hanging from the ice ceiling above. Below was the black void.
Behind him trailed a cable leading back to his mother, USS Stonewall Jackson. He had a brain of sorts, bequeathed to him by Lockheed Martin and L-3 Chesapeake Sciences Corp. His passive sonar built up a picture of his icy ridged ceiling world and the two submarines to his south. The information was passed back to his mother, and some was passed to his AI computer control system for navigation through his icy world.
He’d avoid any obstacle he encountered on his way north. His job was to head slowly away from USS Stonewall Jackson and report. His time for action had not yet arrived. If it did, Scooby would be ready.
Or would he? His brain’s software had been created with a clear surface in mind; efforts had been made to cope with an enclosed ceiling and he had been tested under the ice. If Scooby could hope, he hoped that his design and testing had been sufficient.
The Virginia Visionary looked up from his sonar console. “Sir, Scooby is eight miles away now and he’s picking up a trace to his north. It’s faint and indistinct, but it’s there.”
Benson ran his fingers over the touchpad on his sonar control. “The contact classification computers can’t agree, sir; they’re giving a mixed probability. They just don’t have the level of information that they need yet.”
Nathan rolled his eyes. They needed to know and needed to act. Computers could sit there with their thumb stuck up their ass. He couldn’t. They were there to advise, but he had to act, enough information or not.
“Give me your best guess, Benson.”
There was a pause.
“Best guess is that there’s another Yasen out there, sir.”
Nathan wasn’t surprised. He had a gut feeling that that’s what was out there. So, it was two to one; all the more reason to get out of this icy tomb.
8
“Sir,” Nikki smiled, “why not let Scooby send the Russians a message? We can send him a recording of the compressed air feed breakage we had. Scooby can transmit it. The Russian skipper will think we’ve got the same problem again.”
Nathan nodded and grinned at Nikki. “Yeah, that might work. You’re a devious bitch, Kaminski.”
She headed out of the control room. “I’m off to see the Chief Engineer, sir.”
Nikki returned fifteen minutes later and took her tablet over to Benson. “Load this, ready for Scooby’s message feed.”
In a few minutes, he was done. “It’s ready, sir.”
“Commander Blake, we’re ready.” Nikki waited for him.
“Ok, Benson, get him ready to transmit it, and send the lat and long of the ice lead so he can return to us. Cut his wire on signal acknowledgement.”
“Ready, sir.”
“Transmit.”
The message ran to Scooby along the cable. The Pointer transmitted the acoustic signal of deception and cut the wire. Scooby was now free, swimming and reliant on his AI system.
The crew of the USS Stonewall Jackson now depended on him for air and power. Would The Krasnoyarsk swallow the bait?
“Momma Duck, this is Rubber Duck, over.” There was just the blowing cold wind.
“Momma Duck, this is Rubber Duck, over.” Whitt paused.
“Momma Duck, this…”
A crackling signal broke through.
“Rubber Duck, Momma Duck, over.” A woman’s voice came through. Contact.
Whitt smiled. “Momma, we are returning. Switch on your beacon for 20 seconds.” He picked up her signal and took a bearing. “Momma Duck, we have you. Remain where you are, over.”
“Copy, Rubber.”
The two SEALS pushed off towards the beacon’s position, skis swishing in the snow. For the third time, Ford waved his torch above his head in the bearing’s direction.
A light returned, waving left and right. Soon they saw the two subjects and skiied up to them.
“Hi. Alright, Marjan?”
“Yes, we’ve been lying up waiting for you. Did you get them?”
“We got some. They’re VDV, so there’ll be more of them.”
The Danish scientist stood and walked over to Whitt. “We’ve no chance, have we?” Nils sounded desperate.
“Nils, we do. We need to head west, keep away from them. If they’re following us, we’ll get back there and take some more out. It’s called attrition; we wear them down.”
Nils raised his palms. “How will they know where we are?”
“You transmitted on the handheld. Their satellites are very sensitive and may pick it up.”
Nils threw his hands up. “Then why did we do it?”
Whitt put his hand on the Dane’s shoulder; the man was losing it.
“It’s important we remain together. That’s how we’ll get through this: together. We’ll get out of this, trust me.” He passed Marjan three Russian grenades. “Can you use these?”
“Yes, RGD-5, Soviet. Hezbollah used them.” She put them in her backpack side pockets.
The four of them pushed off, skiing toward the west. The biting cold wind blew hard from the north, draining away their energy. Whitt knew the odds weren’t good, but they had to try. At least it would give Nils hope.
“Sir, sonar. We have a strong contact to the north, several kilometres away,” said CPO Natalia Korobkina.
Captain Volodin turned to her. “Do you have an ID?”
“Not a certainty, sir, but given the previous contacts, I’d say it’s very likely to be a submarine contact. Probably an enemy SSN with the same profile as last time. I think we have a boat out there with a fault; it’s the same pitch as last time and sounds like a strong gas escape.”
Volodin had had strong suspicions last time; now he was near certain. It was a NATO SSN, it had to be.
“Down boat, trim for 120 meters, forward 8 knots. Come to zero degrees. Keep a good ear on him, Korobkina. Weapons Officer, designate contact as Tsel one. What’s our weapon status?”
The Weapons Officer checked his monochrome display. “Tubes one to eight Type 53. Vertical launch silos one through four, Kaliber-PL, five and six Kh-101 hot tip. Silos seven and eight are empty, sir.”
Type 53 is a wire guided fish, of course. Kaliber-PL are anti-ship and land-attack cruise missiles. Kh-101 is a cruise missile armed with a nuclear warhead. Both have a range of approximately 1,500 miles.
Volodin stood by the Weapons Officer’s station and lowered his voice.
“It’s time Tsel one swallowed a Russian Navy fish. Calculate firing solution for type 53, tube at your discretion.”
The Weapons Officer smiled and set the controls selecting the fish. He knew it was stupid and would never admit it, but he selected his lucky tube. This one was Stesha, named after his first real girlfriend.
“Sir, tube two selected. Targeting contact Tsel one.”