Across the small compartment, the short executive officer also shook his head. “The task force’s second helicopter holds the Goliath stationary, right where it’s been since we heard it. It’s… wait. Here we go. You should read this for yourself, sir.”
As Jazani read the characters on a screen, he unmuted his microphone. “The helicopter hears something, sir?”
The task force commander’s tone was tense. “Right. I’m hearing it now. I’m going to pipe it through to you directly, both the recordings and the aircrew’s reports.”
Over the earpiece, a rhythmic thump of rotor blades and the whine of a turboshaft engine became the background for a helicopter crewman’s voice. “We hear both screws in motion now. The Goliath is accelerating.”
Muting his connection to the task force’s leader, Jazani called out to his technicians. “Are either of you getting the acoustic feed?”
The quiet one nodded as the thin one answered. “It’s coming now, captain. I’m listening. I… uh something’s strange.”
“Go on.”
“The helicopter crew didn’t call out the Goliath’s speed.”
“I suspect they don’t care. When you can outrun your targets by a factor of four and always drop your weapon in front of them, you don’t worry about intercept shots or torpedo tail chases.”
“I see, sir.”
Jazani raised his voice. “The speed?”
“Sorry, sir. I was recalculating the torpedo’s trajectory. It’s not changing much. The Goliath’s only making turns for three knots.”
“But you’re sure it’s the Goliath? You’ve got a count of blades on two propellers of a submerged ship?”
“That’s correct, captain.”
Jazani crossed one quiet concern of his mental list. He then talked through another incongruity. “Three knots isn’t a torpedo evasion. The Goliath’s moving for some other reason.”
“That’s a fair assessment, captain.”
The Ghadir’s commander unmuted his microphone. “Sir, we correlate the audio information from the helicopter with our own and believe the Goliath’s making three knots. That’s not an evasion. It’s planned movement.”
“Wait.”
Stunned by the terse order, Jazani watched his submarine’s tactical system increase his torpedo’s time to impact by scant seconds based upon the Goliath’s acceleration to a crawl.
The task force commander’s deep voice returned. “The analysis here agrees with yours. Three knots. Keep your torpedo at runout speed with its seeker silent. Nothing changes.”
“Understood, sir.” Despite the tactical status quo, Jazani’s mind became a hive of questions. What if the Goliath heard his weapon, surfaced, and sprinted into Omani water before his torpedo hit? Should the helicopter launch a weapon to divert the cargo vessel back into Iranian waters, or would that accidentally alert an ignorant crew to hidden danger? Was the small armada of American surface ships and aircrafts on the other side of the international boundary prepared to retaliate? “Sir, I…”
“What’s that commander?”
“Nothing, sir. I appreciate the backup on my team’s calculations.”
“Of course.”
Moving beyond the nagging doubts, Jazani verbalized his next question. “But I was wondering, sir, about the possibility of capturing the Goliath.”
A loud snort preceded the answer. “A dozen other men with stars on their epaulets were wondering as well. But after we tried an approach that could be described as an attempt to capture the American Virginia-class, the admiralty’s appetite for a repeated attempt is gone. And if there’s anything interesting to capture, it’s the railguns, which can be salvaged from the bottom. Perhaps good fortune will allow one of them to survive.”
“I see, sir.”
“You’re the point of the spear, commander. Killing is never an easy task, but it’s your duty, and it’s my duty to make sure that you do yours. We’ve done our diligence, and the time for questioning your orders is over.”
“Understood, sir.” As Jazani gathered his thoughts, a final uncertainty invaded his head and stunned him into the silence the task force commander wanted. He opened his mouth to speak it, but his throat blocked the words, and the question morphed into a blend of fear and exhilaration. As he realized his alertness had shifted from half-asleep to tactical myopia since finding the Goliath, he understood why he’d missed the logical disconnect.
But now, clear.
His orders precluded him targeting an American submarine, but he wondered what could have caused the creaking sound in the doomed ship’s cargo bed.
CHAPTER 18
Jake hovered over his sonar ace. “Nothing?”
Turning, the toad-head exposed a tight jaw. “I’ll tell you if we hear something.”
“It’s not a matter of ‘if’, but of ‘where’. Which asset shot at them? They must’ve taken the shot.”
“Terry’s not completely helpless. He can listen for himself.”
“Yeah, but he doesn’t have the superhuman ears of Antoine, Julien, and Noah on his team.”
Ignoring the praise for his apprentices and himself, Remy turned his head, refocusing his attention on the waters around the Specter.
Taking the hint, Jake retreated to the central table and viewed the tactical chart. Below his nose, the latest feed revealed possible explanations for the delay in the Iranian response to the Goliath’s damning noise exposure.
The display showed the Persian task force shifting eastward in anticipation of the Indiana’s crawl to Pakistan. Two Ghadir submarines had eluded Volkov’s reach on their northeasterly trek ahead of the American submarine, a frigate with helicopter support established an anti-submarine blockade at Iran’s eastern nautical edge, and a Fire Scout helicopter drone had seen an Iranian Kilo-class submarine snorkeling forward of the injured Virginia-class.
As he’d watched the Iranian movements, Jake had wondered how his adversary had figured out the damaged American submarine’s plight. He concluded they’d been lucky, had shown great instincts, or had simply stacked the correct assumptions together to discern their wounded adversary’s most logical escape route. But the Iranian’s skilled sleuthing worked against them as their conservative estimates drew their vessels far to the east.
With expected freedom to maneuver, Jake protected the northern flanks behind the absconding Goliath and its passenger, Volkov sanitized the escape route to the south, and the California exercised freedom to hunt threats around its sister ship. If not for the accidental creaking from the cargo bed, the Specter’s commander would have expected an easy path to safe harbors.
But the creaking was damning to any competent hunter, and the Persians had proven their skill.
Henri joined his commander at the table. “It’s been five minutes already, but you still refuse to believe that fate would allow the noise mistake to be forgiven?”
“I’m not sure it was a mistake.”
“What else could it have been?”
“Random bad luck. Cruel fate. Shit. I don’t know. All I know is that it sucks.”
“Not until the Iranians respond.”
Jake refused to believe the Persian task force would ignore the Goliath’s metallic groans, despite the thin and eastward-biased spread of their assets. “They’re preparing to act. They’d be fools not to, if they’re really out for blood.”