Ecstasy consumed him as the Kim started moving. But then Nang’s omen came true — a wretched, agonized shriek erupted from warped, protesting metal.
“Stop!” he said.
His command echoed in the control room, reaching nobody else’s ears. But the Gwansun’s sonar operators proved their attentiveness to his symbolic plea by noticing the condemning cacophony. The sound ceased as the rescue submarine stopped dragging his ship.
His ecstasy became fear as he accepted that the Gwansun’s efforts failed. The noise precluded being towed, and he was stranded beyond his nation’s ability to help. Worse, the attempt had just revealed his position to his hunters, and adrenaline coursed through him.
Nang returned, his eyes wide.
“They were surely attempting to tow us, but the noise was worse than I had feared. At least they were smart enough to stop towing us immediately.”
“We need to prepare to fight,” Yoon said. “I’m sure we just revealed our bearing to the nearest gunboat. I can only pray that no other hunters heard us to allow triangulation of our position.”
He looked to a tactical monitor and toggled its view to raw sonar data. Curiosity replaced his fear.
“What’s this?” he asked.
“You tell me, sir. I don’t deal with those fuzzy lines.”
“That’s our colleagues on the Gwansun. See how fast their bearing is changing? They’re moving away and ahead of us on our starboard side.”
“What’s going on, sir?”
“They’re heading after the gunboat.”
Yoon shifted his gaze to the bearing of the North Korean hunting ship. The lines representing its noises intensified, and he stifled a cry of pain as he reached down for a headset dangling beside the console and lifted it to his ear.
He heard the rhythmic chop of high-speed screws.
“And the gunboat is accelerating towards us,” he said.
For a long minute, silence ruled the control room. Yoon glued his eyes to the sonar system, and when he looked up, he noticed a handful of his surviving crew gathering.
He addressed his new audience.
“Who’s guarding the prisoner?”
His new onlookers mustered two names, satisfying him.
“What’s going on, sir?” Nang asked. “You’re seeing a lot but not saying much.”
“I need to see this in the tactical system.”
He called up a new screen and entered his estimate of the Gwansun’s velocity, based upon the maximum acceleration and speed of his own ship. The system matched the history of bearings to his comrades and estimated their course and location.
He then updated the enemy gunboat’s velocity to its maximum speed, starting at the time of the Kim’s accidental groaning steel noise. The outcome inspired him.
“Our colleagues on the Gwansun are leading the hunters away from us.”
“What’s that there, sir?” Nang asked.
Yoon refocused on the sonar display and noticed bursts of sounds from the bearings of his countrymen. He then stiffened his back, grimaced, and pressed the headset to his ear.
“Torpedo launch,” he said. “It’s a Seahake Mod 4, from the Gwansun!”
“Excellent,” Nang said. “No time wasted. Decisive!”
“Decisive indeed. Whether or not the gunboat radioed its discovery of our noise to its fleet, the explosion will confirm our presence. Rather, God willing, it will confirm the presence of the Gwansun. I believe that the commander of the Gwansun is trying to protect us by pretending to be us.”
“Right, sir. The enemy has no definitive evidence of two submarines. They may believe there’s only one of us down here.”
During a minute of torpedo travel, Yoon hoped that the weapon would eliminate the gunboat before its retaliation. Then the targeted ship stopped, deployed its sonar system, and blared out acoustic energy.
“Active transmissions from the gunboat,” he said.
“Could they possibly hear us?”
“No. We’re too far away. But I fear that the Gwansun isn’t so fortunate.”
He listened to his comrades driving away from the gunboat, trying to open range and escape, but then his heart sank.
“Hostile torpedoes!” he said.
“How many?” Nang asked.
The sounds in his left ear seemed like a death knell.
“One,” he said. “Now two. Two total.”
“Dear God,” Nang said. “Can their luck endure another attack? I don’t expect there’s another Sango behind which our colleagues can hide.”
Yoon glared at the sonar screen. Traces appeared as visual translations of the hostile weapons’ high-speed screws. He stowed the headset, ground his teeth as he reached, and toggled his display to the tactical screen. The system had estimated torpedo speeds, presenting an overhead view of the lethal exchange.
The rescue submarine’s torpedo carved a perfect intercept course towards the relic gunboat, but the retaliatory salvo’s aim also had merit.
“The Gwansun is sandwiched between the torpedoes,” Yoon said.
He reached again, bore the pain, and slid the sonar headset over his head to listen with both ears. With his finger, he moved a cursor across his screen to filter the direction of his hearing. To distract himself from the danger his countrymen faced, he focused on their weapon.
“The Gwansun’s weapon has acquired the gunboat,” he said.
“Is it going to hit?” Nang asked.
“The gunboat is accelerating — trying to evade. No! It’s too late. Terminal homing.”
The rumble filled his head.
“Explosion on the bearing of the gunship. I hear the hull cracking. It’s a kill.”
Quiet cheers filled the room as Yoon’s crew enjoyed the victory but respected the danger threatening their countrymen.
“I think they’re on a good evasion course,” Yoon said. “They’ve taken the proper vector to escape the acquisition cone of the trailing torpedo’s seeker.”
“What about the other torpedo, sir?”
“Not good. It appears to be getting active return from their hull. They just launched effervescent countermeasures.”
“Sir?”
“Bubble-makers. A wall of air to acoustically isolate themselves from the torpedo.”
He heard the torpedo pass through the bubbles, circle, and regain its target.
“Damn! The countermeasures bought them time, but the torpedo reacquired.”
“Are they going to make it, sir?”
“I don’t know.”
He removed the headset, leaned, and stowed it. He then called up the tactical screen to watch an overhead view of trajectories. Tapping commands, he invoked a projected view of the future.
His heart sank.
“Impact in four minutes,” he said.
“What can they do?”
“Sprint, launch more countermeasures, pray. I don’t know what else.”
During two minutes of quiet desperation, Yoon called up the sonar display on the screen above the tactical scene. He toggled his gaze up and down between the raw sound and the overhead view, hoping for a miracle.
A line grew on the sonar screen.
“There’s something,” he said.
“Another countermeasure, sir?”
“No. Too crisp. Slip that headset over my ears. I’m done pretending that it doesn’t hurt to reach for it.”
Nang obeyed.
“Now tap that left icon until the cursor settles under the new trace.”
The sound from the new trace confused him. It sounded like the Gwansun.