“The advantage shifts to the submarine as it approaches Turkish waters.” Floros said.
“Agreed. We can only protect the helicopters so far.”
“If there was ever an argument for a weapon that could force a submarine to surface without sinking it, this is it. Without such a weapon, it needs to only run to the safety of its waters, reposition, and then start its hostile work against us again.”
“Someone should mass produce such a weapon,” the Hydra’s commander said. “But today, we can only drive it away.”
“It forces me to consider sinking that damned submarine.”
“Are you, sir?”
“Considering it? Yes, unfortunately.”
The loudspeaker startled Floros.
“Bridge, operations center. I have two air contacts accelerating to supersonic speeds. Two F-16 Fighting Falcons.”
Icons appeared on the display.
“They’re heading south to bypass the island,” the Hydra’s commander said. “I expect they’ll turn west and attempt to overfly us to engage the helicopters.”
“That’s an astute estimation,” Floros said. “They must have noticed that we have their submarine under duress. Hail them and warn them to avoid Greek airspace or that I personally promise to shoot them down.”
An eerie look of surprise covered the commander’s face.
“Do it,” Floros said.
He overheard the translator speaking into a radio, followed by the Turkish reply.
“They say they’re free to fly in international airspace,” the translator said.
“Warn them again that our airspace now extends twelve miles into open waters south of Lesbos.”
The translator obeyed, but the Turkish pilots ignored him as they veered west towards the Hydra.
“How far away are they from us?” Floros asked.
“Nineteen nautical miles. Our lookout just spotted them with night vision googles.”
“How far from our airspace?”
“Sixteen miles.”
“Tell them we track them sixteen miles from our airspace and that I’ll launch weapons at them if they enter it.”
“Sir, the helicopter pilot requests permission to launch a torpedo,” the Hydra’s commander said. “He’s concerned that the F-16s will shoot him down.”
“Denied. But enter a targeting solution against the submarine into two of your ship’s torpedoes and warm them up.”
“Understood, sir. Also, the Turkish pilots say they’re free to fly in international airspace outside of the six-mile boundary around Lesbos.”
“Get ready to shoot them down.”
“Understood, sir. I’ll assign one missile to each F16.”
“Very well. Assign the missiles.”
As the Hydra’s commander prepared his ship for battle, Floros walked to the translator and glared at him.
“Do I look serious to you?” he asked.
“Yes, sir,” the translator said.
“Good. Now make the pilots understand that.”
The translator lifted a handset and shot his harried voice into it. He repeated his gesture twice, earning silence.
“Five miles from our airspace,” the Hydra’s commander said. “Four. Three.”
“They’re not turning away, are they?” Floros asked.
“No, sir. I request permission to release weapons.”
A pit formed in Floros’ stomach.
“Granted,” he said. “Shoot them down.”
The commander pulled a key from his pocket and slid it into a lock on a console. He turned it, and a red light pulsated. Then, reaching to press a button, he yelled.
“Launching missiles!”
A distant hiss echoed through the frigate’s steel, and bright streaks of reddish orange sliced the darkness. The evolved Sea Sparrow missiles climbed into the night and then exploded.
Every free pair of eyes on the bridge sought the outcome with night optics, but Floros averted his gaze from the carnage he knew he’d inflicted.
The voice from the Hydra’s operations center confirmed his expectations.
“Bridge, operations center, splash two bogeys.”
“Good job, commander,” Floros said. “Do you see any parachutes?”
“One, sir. Just one.”
“Over which waters?”
“Ours, sir. About nine miles from Lesbos.”
“Good enough,” Floros said. “Those are our waters, and no matter what the Turks say, it’s at worst international waters. Have the Ritsos send a skiff to rescue the downed pilot.”
“Understood, sir.”
“And while you do that,” Floros said, “I’ll let the vice admiral know that I’ve killed a Turkish aviator and started a war.”
CHAPTER 7
Terrance Cahill pressed his palms into the console behind him, leaned backwards, and craned his neck upward. Through the Goliath’s domed bridge windows, he watched the whitewashed water from the propellers of a Greek gunboat churn the moonlight above him.
“Don’t make a peep, Liam,” he said.
“You mean like telling me not to make a peep,” Liam Walker, his executive officer, said. “I wouldn’t worry. That thing hasn’t got a sonar system.”
“Unless they thought far ahead enough to mount a towed system,” Cahill said.
“They didn’t. They have no idea we’re here and not even a concept of our plans against them.”
“Right,” Cahill said. “Maybe I’m just paranoid with old habits, mate.”
“With all the Greek warships moving about, just be thankful that’s the only one that found its way anywhere near us.”
“Pierre’s data feed is magical, telling me without a doubt that there’s no sonar on that gunboat. Without it, we’d be running from the damned thing now, and God knows whose attention that might have caught.”
“Nobody’s, mate,” Walker said. “We’re submerged and undetected, just how you submarine types like it. It still gives me the willies being underwater.”
Cahill moved to the corner of the bridge that jutted from the ship’s starboard bow. Through the polycarbonate windows that interlaced steel bars backed and reinforced, he watched the undersea darkness while his eyes teased his mind with the phantom silhouette of the Greek warship’s sleek body fifty meters above him.
He blinked, cleared his mind, and realized the moon backlit the gunboat but failed to penetrate the depths’ darkness that enshrouded him.
“Stop torturing yourself,” Walker said. “They can’t see us or hear us.”
“Sure, mate.”
“You should be the one reassuring me. I’m still the newbie to this underwater life.”
“You’re the one who knows how truly deaf a gunboat can be,” Cahill said. “I can’t fathom the concept of a warship without ears. The deafness is just a bizarre concept to me.”
“Stone deaf, mate. Not a single sonar system.”
Cahill lowered his gaze to a display, noticed smudges, and then reached for a spray bottle. He aimed the nozzle and wetted the screen. While he wiped it, he glanced at Walker.
“How long until we can take action?”
“Huh?” Walker asked.
“Until that thing’s fifty miles away and we can shoot?”
Beside Cahill, Walker tapped his screen.
“About three hours.”
Cahill dropped the moist wipe into a trash can.
“You have the bridge,” he said. “I’m going to tour me ship.”
Walking off his anxiety, he passed through a door, latched it behind him, and descended a steep stairway to a tight, odd-shaped compartment under which welds held the bridge and rakish bow upon which it rested to the cylindrical, submarine-based section.
As he reached for a watertight door, a peek in the bilge revealed the inverted triangular keel section, which provided stability and added buoyancy, continuing underneath the ship. Swinging the door open, he stepped through its machined frame and into the familiar, circular-ribbed world of a submarine.