“There were no deaths on his ship or ours, sir. You’d think we could hold a civil conversation, submariner to submariner.”
“He killed nearly thirty of our countrymen. We lost too many aviators and other good men who were simply doing their duty. And the disruption to the economy of Crimea is chaotic. There are already riots and rekindled separatist demonstrations. He’s no saint.”
“His impact on Crimea proves how important our mission was to protect its lifelines.”
“The mission was my failure.”
The executive officer gave an earnest stare.
“Our mission was a failure, but we were not failures. You were not a failure. You fought with skill and tenacity against a vicious ambush. The admiralty must see this.”
“The admiralty will gloss over my actions and grade me upon the results.”
“Not if I can help it. I don’t know if my family’s political reach can place your heroism in the proper perspective, but I will do everything in my power to help.”
For the first time, Volkov appreciated his late-blooming executive officer’s connections.
“I won’t be so humble as to refuse,” he said. “I thank you for your offer. But I suspect that my fate is my fate, and I expect to be relieved of command upon return to port.”
“Sir?”
“I pushed my ship and crew too far into danger and made us a liability.”
“The trap you fell into is only evident in hindsight. But when you review the clues you had at your disposal, it was unpredictable that we’d end up in that cargo bed. You can’t blame yourself.”
“I do, and they will.”
“But even if you grant that, you were a mitigated liability. The aircraft were still able to strafe the Goliath without harming us. And you had me convinced that you would have never turned off the mines, no matter the threat.”
Volkov checked his heart for a truth that remained unsettled.
“I’d like to think I would have remained stalwart against the threats of the Goliath, but I fear I would have conceded to spare the lives of my men.”
“No, sir. You would have called his bluff. He and the captain of the Specter have armed their ships and formulated their tactics to minimize the loss of human life. They wouldn’t have drowned us. They’re not saints, but they’re not monsters.”
“Thankfully, we’ll never have to find out how far he would have taken it.”
He reflected upon the Goliath’s commanding officer. Though he was a mercenary, Volkov believed that legitimate nations dictated and supported his actions, making him a fellow warrior. He doubted he would forgive him for destroying assets under his guard and for killing innocent men, but he respected his courage and skill.
“And I’m not going to hail him,” he said. “He knows what to do. Let him do it.”
“You’re right. Take a look, sir.”
As the hydraulic presses rolled back from his submarine, Volkov noticed the subtle creeping of the sea up the transport ship’s side. The water lapped the Krasnodar with its undulations, and the Goliath became a semi-sunken vessel.
A small cauldron of churning whiteness formed behind the escort Krivak, raising the rope from the water. As tension wrung droplets from the nylon, he saw a laminar wake ripple from his waterline. The ship that had held him captive slipped behind him while the frigate pulled him towards the awaiting formation of the Slava-class cruiser and its entourage of missile boats.
“Good riddance,” he said.
He gazed beyond his stern and saw the railguns of his former captor jutting through the waves. The Specter entered his field of view as it circled towards the empty cradle. A modern Dergach-class hovercraft lingered to supervise the eviction operation, and as he shifted his gaze to the west, he saw a pair of Fencers offering airborne eyes over the ships.
Beyond his departing enemies, three of his country’s minesweepers marched in formation through the abandoned delta that gave way to the Bosporus. Becoming dots on the horizon, helicopters swept for mines ahead of the ships.
Since his country had deployed and mapped the field, he knew that the cleanup effort focused on retrieving the unused ordnance for future use. The slowness of forward progress indicated the added caution with which his nation’s politicians had ordered the incident-free eviction of the tandem mercenary menace.
“Don’t you hope that a stray mine blows them to hell, sir? I mean, accidents happen.”
“I’ve already heard from three layers in of my chain of command that there will be no accidents during this eviction.”
“This doesn’t feel like justice. We’re letting them leave after what they did?”
“I’ve been told that the settlement was lucrative.”
“We’re too great a nation for our compliance to be bought.”
“True. But we’re also too great a nation to ignore a generous gesture that is supported by multiple nations of significant power. There’s careful politicking occurring beyond our comprehension.”
“Perhaps my father will know. I’m sure he’s been worried and inquiring.”
“Call him. I’ll send for the global satellite phone.”
The executive officer’s face brightened and then grew stern.
“I would love to, but I don’t want to abuse my privilege of rank. If I call, I would like every man to call, and I will go last, unless you wish to.”
Volkov narrowed his eyes.
“Where have you been for the last year and a half? Until we absorbed that torpedo hit, you presented yourself as a much less capable man.”
“Mortal fear, sir. I was reborn when that torpedo hit us and we survived. I didn’t plan this. It just happened.”
“But you’re exercising qualities I didn’t know you had. You’re showing judgment, courage, foresight, tactical ability… I gave up training you a year ago because you were unresponsive.”
“I admit to being lazy because I didn’t know any better, but that’s changed now.”
“I’m still stymied by how you’ve gained such experience without demonstrating it.”
The executive officer shrugged.
“It was easy, sir. I may have been lazy, but I couldn’t help myself from learning by watching you.”
Unsure how to respond, Volkov nodded his head in a gesture of respect and appreciation. He lifted a microphone to his mouth.
“Control room, bridge,” he said.
“Bridge, control room,” the gray beard said.
“Have the satellite mobile phone sent to the bridge and set up a rotation for each man to have one minute of liberty to call home.”
“Right away, sir!”
The echoing clang of a young sailor’s boots against metal rungs rose from underneath the grate at Volkov’s feet. He stepped back, opened the trap door, and pinned it against a latch. The crewman climbed through and offered the phone.
“No, I will go last,” Volkov said. “Make your call. Mind you, the executive officer and I will be listening to make sure you share nothing confidential. Tell your loved ones that you are alright, but share nothing of the ship’s location, actions, or condition.”
“Yes, sir.”
“You’ll brief the next man on the rules of communication before he uses the phone?”
“Yes, sir.”
“And so on and so forth.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Make your call.”
While eager-eyed sailors paraded to the bridge, vented their emotions, and then scampered back into the Krasnodar, Volkov heard a crackling voice in a bridge-to-bridge radio. He recognized the frigate’s commanding officer, a man with whom he had consumed respectable volumes of vodka and beer after training exercises.