Weapon exchange scenarios and probabilities became images flipping through his mind, and, for the moment, he trusted his defenses. But when a sailor announced that ballistic missiles appeared on the same northeast bearing as the inbound vampires, Stephenson went into a new mental calculation of a scenario that bordered on the surreal.
Another man’s voice penetrated the din, emphasizing that new inbound missiles approached from the south.
“Silence!” Stephenson said.
The room quieted, and Stephenson pointed at his watch officer.
“Report!”
“Six sea-skimming vampires,” he said. “Range two miles. Impact in sixteen seconds. I launched twelve birds at them from the rear launcher.”
“Popping chaff?”
“Yes, sir!”
The ship heeled to the left.
“We’re turning again?”
“To bring the cannon and close-in weapon system to bear on the six vampires. The twenty-four to the north splashed on their own.”
Stephenson looked beyond the shoulder of his officer at an overhead display of icons showing that twenty-four inbound missiles stopped dead in the water.
He gripped his chair’s arms to steady himself in the turn. His heart pounded as he grasped that synchronized attackers tricked him into wasting forty-eight missiles on decoys, diverted his attention to the north, and exposed him to an attack from the south.
Playing new probabilistic scenarios in his mind’s eye, he disliked the results.
As Stephenson heard the five-inch cannon’s rhythmic popping and the close-in weapon system belching a chainsaw chorus of depleted uranium sabots, he realized the six new incoming missiles were near.
He clenched his jaw as he accepted that some of them would slip through the Bainbridge’s defenses.
“Jake, Pierre, I have the Leviathan. Shut down your weapon,” Renard said.
He released the speaking button and hoped to hear Jake’s voice. As he repeated the sequence a fifth time, he heard grenades cracking forward of Gomez’ position.
“Forty seconds,” Gomez said. “Screw this. I’m pulling my guys…”
Jake’s voice, amplified and garbled by its journey through water, came through the box above Renard’s head.
“Command shutdown completed,” Jake said.
Renard exhaled and relaxed his shoulders. He looked to Marom, who nodded with verification that the Mercer’s torpedo had ceased its search.
“Thank you, my friend,” Renard said to the ocean.
His gratitude waned with the familiar whine and pressure change that accompanied the action of a torpedo tube’s impulse tank.
“They just launched a torpedo,” Marom said. “From the information in the system, it’s launched at a ship eight miles away. The same ship they shot the Harpoons at. For the moment, the command wire is still connected.”
Renard walked to the console, stooped beside the Israeli systems expert, and looked at the screen.
“It is a well-placed shot in wake-homing mode.”
“Shit,” Gomez said.
“I fear this torpedo will be a challenge. But if your men hurry,” Renard said, “you may be able to spare the target from having to dodge the next one.”
The crack of gunfire and the report of rifles rang in Renard’s ears. Gomez glanced forward and leaned back.
“They’re doing fine,” he said. “Two enemy casualties. Two to go. Give them thirty more seconds.”
“That may not be fast enough,” Marom said.
Renard walked to a panel that he recognized as controlling the Leviathan’s trim and drain system, its rudder and planes, and its high-pressure air. He scanned for the switches that lingered in the back of the mind of every submarine sailor.
Two silver knobs protruded from the top of the panel.
“Marom, do these control the emergency blow valves?”
“Yes.”
“May I?”
“Yes. Feel free.”
“Wait!” Gomez said. “What’s this going to do to my guys? They’re in a fight.”
“The deck may shift, but not much, since we are already at snorkel depth.”
“Why bother?”
“So that the targeted vessel might see us and know that we are the launch point of the torpedo they need to evade. Plus, I’m going to hail them. It will instill trust in our communications if they can see us.”
Gomez nodded in cadence with the clamor of small arms fire. Renard pulled the switches and walked to the elevated conning platform as high-pressure air groaned and hissed throughout the Leviathan. He pointed.
“High-frequency voice transceiver?” he asked.
“Yes,” Marom said.
Renard snapped the transceiver’s microphone from its clip and curled his fingers over it as he pressed his palms into the periscope control levers. He stuck his eye to the optics and swiveled the periscope toward the targeted ship.
A deep but muffled boom reverberated throughout the room.
“That sounds bad,” Gomez said.
“I believe that a Harpoon has found its target,” Renard said.
As the Leviathan’s rise expanded Renard’s horizon, smoke came into view.
“Damn,” he said. “I see mast heads and smoke. It appears to be a warship. Burke-class, if I’m correct.”
“One of the Harpoons hit, then?” Marom asked.
“No, I see two plumes. One must have hit too high above the waterline for us hear.”
“That can be crippling, can it not?” Marom asked.
“Possibly, but those ships have respectable armor and skilled damage control teams. However, if our torpedo finds its mark, they are all doomed.”
Renard felt the air moving around him and withdrew his eye from the optics. Gomez stood before him, his face frozen in a glare.
“What can a Burke destroyer do against our torpedo?”
“They have but one option, I’m afraid.”
“What is it?” Gomez said.
“Run.”
Salem’s ears throbbed from the grenades and small arms as he leaned into Asad’s ear.
“Did you cut the wire?”
“Yes.”
“Excellent.”
He watched Yousif tapping keys at a weapon control panel. The rotund academic proved adept at applying his knowledge of the operations room consoles to the local console in the torpedo room.
At the room’s far end, Hamdan appeared at the bottom of the ladder. One of his younger soldiers propped his feet on the ladder and reclined against the lip of the gap to the upper deck, his torso exposed while he returned fire at the team that was retaking the Leviathan.
Salem picked up a sound-powered phone and dialed the engineering spaces. Bazzi’s voice revealed terror.
“What’s going on?” the elder naval veteran asked.
“The ship has been breached and is being retaken by a commando team.”
“We’re dead then?”
The body of the young soldier on the ladder went limp and thumped the puddle of crimson fluid forming at Hamdan’s feet. Hamdan squatted, aimed a rifle upward, and fired.
“I give you permission to surrender,” Salem said. “That goes for all of you who retreated into the engineering spaces.”
“Hana?”
“I’ve protected you with ignorance. None of you has information of value to captors. I will not ask you to sacrifice yourself in an act of misplaced faith or valor.”
“What they do to prisoners—”
“Is better treatment than many see in the free world,” Salem said. “You will be a living inspiration instead of a dead and forgotten myth.”