“I won’t. I’ve got a good feeling about me ship, and I don’t think it wants me to leave it.”
“I think you’re drunk with courage if you believe that the Goliath is talking to you.”
“It’s been talking to me for days. You just have to know how to listen.”
Cahill looked to the tactical display. His slowing had reduced the time to impact to less than a minute.
He had enough foresight to pile bed mattresses on the bridge’s deck, to lessen the effect of an explosion. Standing on them, he expected to see the detonation on the ship’s far side.
“I’m not changing your mind, am I?” Renard asked.
“No, mate.”
“Well then, I can only hope you prove that you are charmed.”
“Thanks.”
He finished his reply, and the seas erupted through the port bow. The Goliath’s prow heaved, rose from the water, and crashed back down.
When Cahill recovered from his fall to the deck, he noticed waves lapping the laser cannon and jagged metal forming rifts around the weapon. The frigate-like bow had been blown away, but the watertight bulkhead to the submarine section had held.
“Are you okay?” Renard asked.
Cahill fought to stand on sprained ankles.
“I’m fine, mate. I took the hit, but it looks like I still have control of the ship. The Kim’s untouched and the Goliath has survived, at least for the moment. But I’m open to any help you can spare.”
CHAPTER 25
Jake had requested that the Gwansun and its twins join in the search for other hostile combatants in what had been considered safe waters. He wanted to give Cahill personal protection during his slow trek to the safe haven at Donghae.
Antoine Remy’s ears provided the best diagnosis of the wounded transport ship.
“There’s a leak through the forward watertight bulkhead. I hear the water flow.”
“Can you tell how bad it is?”
“No worse than the list you can see through the periscope. It’s very hard to tell, but it’s worthy of concern.”
Leaning into the rail that circled the elevated conning platform, Jake called for Cahill.
“You were right, Terry. The watertight bulkhead didn’t hold completely. You’ve got a leak.”
“I’ve pumped as much as I can from me mid-ships trim tanks overboard to stay light, but I’ve also pumped to forward tanks on the starboard side to minimize stresses athwartships.”
Jake knew from his approach to the Goliath that Cahill had lowered the starboard bow under the stormy waves, bringing the water up to his bridge dome. With the Specter abeam of the damaged hull, the submarine’s periscope offered a profile view showing the waterline at the laser cannon and the larger waves lapping the Kim’s bow.
“That’s good thinking,” he said. “Just like a surface sailor.”
“Liam would be proud.”
“Well, maybe you can brag to him yourself.”
“I’ll wait until I get this ship home before I do that. You’ve got a point, though. This twin hull, multi-compartment damage control crap is best left for the surface skimmers. It’s not natural for me. I need to think each move through three times, and then second guess meself twice.”
“You don’t have to wait,” Jake said. “He’s grabbed a few volunteers and is coming back to help you. He’s going to land on your port hull and board you for damage control — with your permission, of course.”
“That’s encouraging. I’ll need his help lining up to pump water from the bilge. Having him aboard will be a lot better than the backup option I was planning.”
“What was that?”
“Crawl to the port side and line up the pumps meself.”
“Bad news, though. You’ll still have to unlock the hatch for them.”
“Right. Give me about five minutes. It’s a slow crawl.”
Through the periscope, Jake watched a helicopter approach and begin to lower Walker and the small damage control team. In the tossing seas, the loading required several attempts, but the men landed. The hatch rolled open, and Cahill’s head appeared prior to retreating below decks with the first of his returned crew.
When the aircraft lowered a gasoline-powered pump, Jake felt the turn of the tide in favor of the Goliath’s survival. Strapped to the back of the transport ship, two men unfurled and fed a hose through the hatch. Minutes later, they ignited the engine, and the pump spewed spray overboard from the ship’s bilge.
Cahill sounded short of breath in his report.
“I’m back on the bridge.”
“I figured.”
“You may not see it,” Cahill said. “But now that I can use the trim pump to suck from the bilge along with that contraption running top side, I’ve gained about a half meter of freeboard.”
“I see it,” Jake said. “You won’t make it home for dinner, but you’ll make it home for sure now — with your ship.”
A tugboat nudged the Specter against the pier, and Jake took one last look towards the Goliath in its anchorage. Two tugs illuminated the transport ship’s decks. With breakwaters providing the abatement of swells, the transport ship rolled in gentler seas, and the rain that had pelted its steel hide had also vanished.
Instead of the usual limousine that Jake expected, a white school bus awaited him on the pier. It brought him and his crew to the familiar room where he had heard the original brief. Given the late time and pandemic fatigue, the reunion between Jake, his teammates, and Renard was rushed.
Admiral Cho and his translator offered Jake and his crew the debrief. The room reached capacity with men leaning against the walls, and people considered of lesser import were dismissed.
Jake craned his neck and surmised that the Kim’s key survivors and the leaders of the Gwansun were seated around him. Rapid, public introductions proved him correct, and then the admiral began by updating his audience about their shared mission.
A diving team had already assessed the damage and the risk to human life for repair teams who would brave swimming through the jagged, cut metal. The most skilled underwater welders had agreed to the endeavor, and they had made the Goliath watertight in its anchorage.
The admiral added that Cahill’s torpedo had finished the work of his guns, sinking the Taechong warship. A surprising half of the North Korean crew had survived to be taken prisoner, and initial questioning suggested they had been operating independently when venturing into South Korean waters.
They had used chaff to create fake extensions of storms, hopping from one storm to the next, to maintain a hidden position near their enemy’s coast prior to ambushing the Goliath.
The Kim remained watertight with all the cannon damage above its pressure hull. It would remain aboard the Goliath until the transport ship could submerge for the normal unloading procedure.
The admiral declared the mission a success based upon the safe return of the survivors, their prisoner, and the damaged submarine.
Then came his barrage of questions for every crew in the room. He wanted each team to relive everything from its perspective. After rendering his answers and awaiting two-way translations with each exchange, Jake faded in and out of consciousness.
“How much longer?”
“I’ll request a break and order us some coffee,” Renard said.
As the hours passed, the admiral’s fatigue betrayed him, and he declared his inquisition complete before dismissing the audience. Seeking rest, the foreign crews scattered to their temporary waterfront quarters, while the native crews went home.