“I don’t trust the anti-air weapon, and it would reveal our location if used. But I’ll prepare it as a last resort.”
“Where the hell are all these helicopters coming from?” Anatoly asked.
“Yemen, Oman, and Saudi Arabia,” Volkov said. “At least that was what Pierre’s last report said. The more interesting concern is where they’re going to land when they run out of fuel.”
The sonar technician raised his finger and bowed his head. The Wraith’s commander folded his arms and waited while Anatoly tapped his screen and assigned a tag in the Subtics system to the new sound. An outline of a surface combatant appeared on the screen above the technician’s head, showing the threatening vessel’s tactical data.
“Warship,” Anatoly said. “A modern corvette.”
“Within weapons range?”
“No, barely audible. But it’s the answer to your question. I’ve classified it as an Omani Kareef-class corvette, based upon twin, five-bladed screws. It’s making flank speed and is capable of helicopter operations.”
Volkov stooped and glared at the corvette’s information.
“It’s incapable of anti-submarine warfare, but it can refuel these accursed shore-based anti-submarine helicopters that hunt us. The local nations have united to use it as a floating airport against us, and they deployed it awfully damned fast.”
For a fleeting moment, Volkov succumbed to doubts that Pierre Renard had recruited him and a Russian crew for the sole purpose of sacrificing them to an Arabian Gulf nation. Though unable to fathom a reason for such a sacrifice, he lacked complete trust in the Frenchman and knew his skill of navigating complex schemes. But he regained his foothold on reason by reminding himself of his boss’ emotional attachment to the Wraith, which escaped consideration as a bargaining chip.
“Do you want to target it with a torpedo?”
“No.”
“Not even a slow-kill weapon? Just to cripple it?”
“If you can get me a targeting solution, perhaps. Let Sergei know if you get one. I’m heading to the torpedo room to verify loading of the anti-air drone.”
“Will do.”
“Sergei!” Volkov said.
The young executive officer looked up from the room’s central plotting table.
“Yes, sir.”
Volkov allowed the formality when his men felt like calling him “sir”.
“Keep us at eight knots on course for the shoals north of Socotra. Don’t change course, speed, or depth unless Anatoly tells you a torpedo has been dropped and is a threat to hit us.”
“Understood, sir. And if a torpedo is a threat?”
“Then deploy countermeasures, get us to flank speed as fast as possible, and pray.”
Standing in the torpedo room, Volkov glared at the weapon’s casing that reminded him more of an empty shotgun shell than a torpedo. He grabbed a flashlight from his technician’s hands and aimed it down the cylinder’s open nose. The warhead of a Sidewinder missile stared back at him, and in the shadows he saw tail fins touching the hollowed launch system’s inner diameter.
“Install the cover,” he said.
A second technician joined the first and helped him slide a cap over the missile. The housing shared dimensions with a Black Shark torpedo but perplexed Volkov with its unlikely existence.
“It will remain waterproof to the surface?” he asked.
“Yes,” the elder of the two technicians said.
“How many times has it been tested?”
“Mister Renard said three, sir. All against drones.”
“Did they all succeed?”
“Two out of three. In the second test, the missile began too far off course, and the drone was too close to hit.”
“Meaning that the more dangerous a helicopter is due to its proximity atop us, the less chance I have of hitting it?”
“Yes, sir. I’m afraid so. The angular control of the launch system is crude in azimuth and negligible in altitude. The missile has to compensate on its own with the heat seeker.”
“Remind me why.”
“The sensors here give a good idea of the altitude and the azimuth.”
As the technician pointed to infrared sensors on the cover, Volkov recalled the limitations of the weapon he remained unsure he’d use.
“Then the limits are in the aiming of the launch?” he asked.
“Yes. The weapon bobs like a cork when it hits the surface. When air opens the seawater-sensing circuits and the infrared sensors detect a heat source, or the strongest heat source among many, the bolts explode to eject the cover and free the missile for launch.”
“But not straight up.”
“No. The low-pressure air tank under the missile will inflate selected sections of the annular bladder around the tail section, causing the tail to rise and tilt the missile toward the target.”
“For a two-thirds chance of hitting.”
“At least it gives a chance of hitting a helicopter whereas we’d otherwise be challenged to fight back.”
Volkov grunted and placed his finger on the plastic cover.
“And fortunately we have four of them. I have an option for a timer, should I wish to risk wasting one, do I not?”
“Up to two hours, yes.”
“Set the delay to one hour and load it in tube three,” Volkov said. “Then load two others without delays into tubes four and five.”
“You’d have me backhaul torpedoes from tubes four and five?”
“Torpedoes don’t help me with helicopters, and our dolphins are dealing with the only other vessel within range of threatening us.”
In the control room, Volkov briefed his team.
“Attention, everyone. I’m loading Sidewinder missiles into tubes three, four, and five. I’m going to launch tube three with a one-hour delay. The others have zero delay. I’m going to hold tubes four and five until I need them. God willing, I won’t.”
“Tube three indicates that the breach door was just closed, but I don’t have any wire connection,” a technician said.
“Very well, you won’t have a connection since you can’t control the weapon. It’s armed by an accelerometer when pushed from the tube. After that, it’s all automatic except for the timer.”
“Then tube three is ready, sir.”
“Launch tube three.”
The pneumatic torpedo impulsion system beyond sight in the ship’s forward compartment thrust a weapon into the sea while sucking air into its piping. The rapid pressure change popped Volkov’s ears.
“Tube three is launched,” the technician said.
“I hear it,” Anatoly said. “It just breached the surface.”
“And the helicopters?”
“Only two at great distance. Nothing close within the last ten minutes.”
“And the dolphins?” Volkov asked.
“Their last report was the detection of a submerged contact greater than ten miles from their location, bearing eight o’clock relative to our position of twelve o’clock.”
He looked at the room’s central chart and noticed icons of the mammals approaching the best interpretation of the Iranian Kilo submarine’s position. Natural sonar painted perfect hologram images of the hostile vessel in the minds of the dolphin duo, but communication barriers left Volkov with a crude understanding of their insights.
Seated at a Subtics console, the trainer turned his nose towards him.
“You could have them plant their charges on the Iranian Kilo whenever you want,” he said. “But I can’t guarantee that you’re close enough for your detonation command to reach.”
Volkov recalled that the detonation signal mimicked crackling shrimp, a sound beyond the cetaceans’ ability to emanate. He made note to have the charges’ acoustic trigger signal changed and to have the trainer condition his babies to detonate the explosives themselves for future missions.