“You’re the captain.”
“Indeed I am,” Cahill said. “Set course for Donghae, maximum speed until we arrive.”
CHAPTER 7
Sinking into his crutches, Lieutenant Yoon digested the tactical scenario. Information from friendly airborne radar systems fed icons on his monitor, pinpointing the enemy’s search assets. The Kim remained outside the detection range of his hunters, but he wondered how long his luck could last.
Senior Chief Nang interrupted his thoughts.
“The welding is complete, sir. I took pictures on my phone.”
He extended his arm, and Yoon looked at the screen. Chains designed to hoist torpedoes connected the severed sections of the submarine’s shaft.
“It’s been a few years since I welded, but I think I did a pretty good job,” Nang said. “It should hold the shaft in place if the stern bearing fails.”
“Good,” Yoon said. “But I question if it could take the stress of torque, even at a crawling speed.”
“I wouldn’t risk it, and I hope we don’t have to find out. But if the rescue effort fails, we may have no other choice.”
“We’ll test your workmanship only if necessary. At the moment, we’re safe. We’re ten miles from the nearest threat.”
“Ten miles isn’t very far, sir.”
“I am grateful that our adversary had no information on our location when they began to hunt us. That uncertainty is why the nearest gunboat is ten miles away. That uncertainty is why we are still alive. I’ll take ten miles of distance as opposed to five miles or one mile.”
“You could plant a torpedo underneath that gunboat, and then the nearest threat would be fifty miles away, and the object ten miles away would be a sinking hull instead of a potential problem.”
Yoon leaned into his crutches, extended his arm, and ran his finger from the central icon to the second-nearest threat symbol, a red square representing a decrepit frigate. At fifty nautical miles, the target steamed outside the reach of his torpedoes, but he knew that his submarine could handle the old surface combatant if it shortened the distance between them.
“I know how to deal with surface ships,” he said. “I can kill them with torpedoes or missiles. They don’t concern me.”
As the words left his lips, he regretted the artificial bravado.
“But the intelligence report stated that a surface ship nearly sank the Gwansun, sir. If a gunboat can come that close to sinking our sister ship, then anything in our enemy’s arsenal poses a threat to us.”
“But it did not sink our colleagues. Instead, the Gwansun retaliated and destroyed its attacker, and it also took a Sango class submarine to the grave with friendly fire. I would call that a resounding victory.”
“Victory? Narrowly escaping a relic gunboat? Stumbling upon a Sango by blind luck and using it as a decoy for a hostile torpedo? The Gwansun was supposed to remain submerged and undetected on its way to help us. I consider it survival by the grace of God.”
“It survived,” Yoon said. “It’s still a victory, and it’s still coming to help us.”
“How can you be sure, sir? Our adversary could have followed the Gwansun here. This could be a trap. ”
“What sort of trap?”
“A Sango submarine could have trailed the Gwansun here, waiting for it to make noise when it tries to help us.”
“What of it? Then we and the Gwansun would dispose of that Sango submarine with torpedoes.”
Again, he sensed that his boldness sounded forced.
“Even if that were so, the explosions would attract the North’s entire navy,” Nang said. “You must face it, sir. Our only act of defense is firing a weapon, and if we detonate a weapon near our ship, we announce our position and commit suicide. Even with the Gwansun’s help, we need some good fortune to get out of this predicament.”
As he shifted his weight between crutches and lowered his head to the tactical monitor, his stomach sent a burst of pain up his torso. He pressed his palm against his bandages.
“You’re right, senior chief. We don’t know who’s listening for us. There may be a Sango within strike range, there may be a helicopter that’s approached since our last intelligence download, and there may even be a gunboat atop of us that escaped radar detection. We need to act as if all sound is deadly.”
“I’d like to think that our rescue planners thought of that.”
Yoon nodded, keeping his gaze on the screen.
“The Gwansun is supposed to be half a mile behind us now,” he said. “I find it eerie that our sister crew is so close and we can’t hear them. I’d like to verify their presence, but we can’t risk the exposure of any communication.”
“I’m sure they can’t hear us either, sir. Not while our propulsion plant is secured.”
“I’d bet a month’s pay that they’ve already passed underneath our hull and have visually located us through their periscope,” Yoon said. “Finding us is not the issue. The issue is them having a chance to surface and send divers over the side to create the towing connection.”
Nang scratched his chin and sat beside him. Facial oil glistened under whiskers, and the body odor reminded Yoon that his surviving crew hadn’t showered in days.
“You think that’s the only issue, sir? Getting divers over the side to wrap tow ropes around our stern planes?”
Yoon reflected upon the plan. The Gwansun would settle stern-to-stern behind the Kim and attempt to tow it backward by wrapping lines around the welded, static portion of its stern planes.
“Yes. The Gwansun’s crew can’t deploy swimmers any easier than we can. It’s a surfacing exercise, which requires waiting until nightfall, and they face the added challenge of an alerted enemy that’s scouring the waters for us.”
“Nightfall was forty-five minutes ago, sir. Per plan, they have already succeeded in deploying divers.”
Yoon dropped his head as he realized he’d lost track of time.
“Don’t worry about it, sir,” Nang said. “I see deploying the Gwansun’s swimmers as only the second greatest challenge.”
Yoon glanced to the senior chief, twisting his torso with deliberate care. He noticed sly wisdom in the man’s eyes.
“Then what’s the greatest challenge?”
“Our hull damage.”
“If you mean our lack of structural integrity, that’s why the Gwansun will use a nylon line and move slowly. The line will flex, in addition to being quieter than chain.”
The veteran’s eyes glimmered.
“That’s the point, sir,” he said. “The noise. I don’t know if anyone has thought this through, but any attempt to tow us risks making a loud creaking noise from every piece of our hull. We took too much damage when we went deep.”
“Surely, our rescue mission planners thought of this.”
“I’m sure they thought of it. But how good do you think the data is on a damaged submarine’s hull noise signature? I’m betting such data has never been gathered for any submarine, much less this class of submarine.”
Before Yoon could answer, he heard a dull thud. He looked up and noticed it had traveled from the after compartments.
“They’re here,” he said.
“The Gwansun? That could be the sound of rope sliding over our stern planes.”
“Get back there,” Yoon said. “Investigate.”
After the senior chief departed, Yoon heard the rubbing noise rise and then fall to silence. Then he felt a slight lurch backward.