The blip smeared across the screen, so sudden and bright the watchers flinched. When the trace dimmed, it left only the by-now-familiar returns of spinning debris. The shrapnel from their TBM shootdowns had been incandescent hot. This chaotic, random flicker expanded across the screen like galaxies in a cooling, aging universe. “Direct hit,” Wenck said.
“Concur,” muttered Mills laconically.
“Good job, everyone. I really wasn’t sure we were going to make that basket. Report it on covered voice.” Dan leaned back, cradling aching kidneys with both hands.
Mills resocketed the red phone. “Strike One says Bravo Zulu on the shootdown. Savo Island, return to formation. Launch helo and sanitize Sector Hotel before the strike group passes through it.”
“Anything from PaCom?”
“They acknowledged.” Mills hesitated.
“What else?”
“Nothing, sir. They acknowledged the report. Asked how many rounds were expended. I told them, three.”
“Very well. Make it so,” Dan said. “Bravo Zulu” meant “well done.” But the lack of any comment from PaCom was less reassuring. Oh, well. They probably had more on their minds than patting Savo’s back. Though it would’ve been nice to have something to pass on to the team, over and above his own congratulations.
The ear-piercing shreik of the boatswain’s pipe made him plug his ears. “Now secure from condition three TBMD. Set condition three wartime steaming. Now flight quarters, flight quarters. All hands man your flight quarters stations for launch of Red Hawk 202. Stand clear topside aft of frame 315. Smoking lamp is out throughout the ship. Now flight quarters.”
Strike One scrubbed that evening’s exercises, and set EMCONs, emission controls, which restricted both radars and communications. Savo ran silent, except for her sonars. They were headed north as quietly as possible, then. He guessed taking down Object 20404 had been intended to help cover their advance. The Chinese had to know they were out here, but without a more exact localization, the battle group would be impossible to target. Red Hawk was out again after refueling and crew rest, taking turns with Hawes’s helo “sanitizing” the intended track for submarine threats.
He was sitting at the coffee table in the wardroom that night, holding a copy of Undersea Technology but not looking at it, just sitting blankly staring at the big Tom Freeman painting of the Battle of Savo Island, when Staurulakis plumped down next to him. “Hate to interrupt, Captain.”
He sighed. “What is it, XO?” Then, seeing “Sheriff” Toan behind her, he put the magazine aside.
Leaning in, the exec told him one of the female petty officers had reported she’d been raped. “She was on the way to her berthing area when the overhead lights in the passageway went off. Someone grabbed her from behind, pressed a pointed object to her neck, and steered her into an equipment room.” Staurulakis paused, then added, “He made her undress, and raped her. He’s gone all the way now.”
“Oh, no,” Dan said. “So, it wasn’t Shah, or the other Iranians. Is she okay? I mean, not is she okay, but he didn’t wound her, did he? This knife—”
“Superficial cuts. But she’s in shock. Grissett and Dr. Schell are treating her. Hermelinda’s there too.” Staurulakis looked at the magazine, and turned it facedown on the table. Added, softly, “It was the Terror.”
For a second he didn’t understand. Then, to his horror, did. “You mean, Beth… Petty Officer Terranova?” She nodded. “My God, I…” He abandoned the sentence. There was nothing adequate to say. “I’ll come right down.”
“If you don’t mind, Captain, better to give her some privacy. It might just be the shock speaking. But let’s let the medical people handle this for now. Get her calmed down, gather the evidence—”
The wardroom door banged open. Amy Singhe, cheeks livid. She stalked toward them between the tables, fists clenched. “I told you this would happen, Commander!” she shouted at Staurulakis. “I told you we weren’t safe aboard this fucking ship.”
Staurulakis bolted to her feet. She was smaller-boned than Singhe, but not much shorter. “Not here, Lieutenant. And watch your language.”
Singhe looked past her at Dan. “You’re telling him? Nothing changes. The chiefs still treat the women like peons. They still get groped, down in the working spaces. They come to me, not the command. Because the command does nothing. This has been on the way for a long time. And now it’s here.”
Another slammed-open door; Chief Tausengelt’s leathery visage was stormy. He rolled in fast, only to be whirled on by a furious Lieutenant Singhe. “Here he is. Tell the captain what you said, Master Chief.”
“All I said was—”
Singhe curled her lip. “All he said was, ‘She shouldn’t have been alone.” That ‘they all deserve it.’ Tell him!” She was almost screaming, jabbing a finger in the old chief’s face.
“You heard me wrong, sir. I mean, ma’am. That’s not exactly what I—”
“Amy,” the XO said warningly. “Better cool it. Lieutenant.”
Dan was on his feet. “We are not doing this here! My cabin, now!” This was getting out of hand. “We don’t have time to split the crew up over this. We’re headed for a hostile coast, coming in range of enemy air. We could be in action at any time.”
“You think the crew’s not already split, sir? That the chiefs can do no wrong? As if they don’t know who’s doing this. And maybe, even, shielding him?”
Dan kept from shouting, but not by much. “You’re really disappointing me, Lieutenant. Are you alleging some kind of conspiracy? That some people know who the fondler, I mean, the rapist, is, and aren’t sharing that with the command?”
Singhe just shook her head and looked away, folding her arms. “I’ll save it for the NCIS. That’s our only chance to get the maggots out in the sunlight.” She glanced at him, dark eyes both angry and, somehow, pitying. “It was part of the command climate, before you arrived. But now it’s taking place on your ship. Sorry if the fallout hurts you. I tried to tell you. But you wouldn’t listen. So now it’s all going to hit the fan.”
She wheeled and stalked out. Tausengelt grabbed Dan’s elbow. “That bitch… I mean, the lieutenant… she’s gone over the edge, Captain. I swear to you, if any of the chiefs knew anything about this, we’d have the guy in irons. We know this shit is tearing the ship apart. Taking it to the NCIS isn’t going to help.”
Another woman had come in: Petty Officer Redmond, hair up in braids; one of Terranova’s friends, Dan recalled. Deathly pale, she met no one’s eyes. “Sir? Ma’am? I heard, I heard that Terror—”
“Just a moment, Redmond. Only one thing will help,” Cheryl Staurulakis said. “Finding out who did it. Until then, everybody’s a suspect. And we don’t have any choice about calling in the NCIS. They’d have been here already if we hadn’t been in wartime steaming, with ship-to-ship transfers limited to operational necessity.”
Dan barely restrained himself from covering his face with his hands. “Shut up, all of you!” he shouted. They went quiet instantly, turning shocked faces to him. “Now listen up. I’m going down to see Terranova. Exec, draft a message to the carrier, requesting they send their agent at the first possible opportunity.”
“Aye aye, sir.”
“Master Chief, we’re locking down. Everyone who doesn’t need a knife in the performance of his work, turn it in to the chief master-at-arms. I don’t care what the regs say, I want all knives turned in, all lockers searched for compromising materials. All unmanned spaces will be locked when not in use. Passageways outside berthing spaces will be random-patrolled by the master-at-arms force.”