Sea Strike

by James H. Cobb

  "Besides, Lieutenant," Amanda continued, "we've got more important things to worry about at the moment."

  Invoking rank wasn't the best save in the world to use with Chris, but it was all she could come up with at short notice.

  "As you wish, Captain," Christine replied primly, refocusing her attention outside of the car, the faintest trace of a grin ghosting around her lips.

  They came within sight of the Duke's moorage, and Amanda forgot the growing complications of her personal life. Loading operations had commenced, with a row of Navy deuce-and-a-halfs lined up at the foot of the aluminum gangway.

  Work parties were already hogging a steady stream of crates and cases across the well deck and through one of the watertight doors into the hangar bay.

  A final fuel top-off was under way as well. A heavy hose snaked up from a- dockside valve head and down through a deck hatch to an internal bunkerage point, carrying a flow of high-density kerosene into the destroyer's tanks.

  As Amanda and Christine crossed the sun-softened tarmac from the parking lot to the gangway, they noted a small group of people clustered at the gangway base. Three of them were Cunningham hands--the Officer of the Deck and the coverall-clad gangway security team. The other pair of seamen wore standard Navy dungarees and had seabags lying at their feet.

  They all snapped smartly to attention at Amanda's approach.

  "Good morning, Mr. Selkirk," she said, answering their salute. "What's going on?"

  "A couple of new hands reporting aboard, ma'am," the OOD replied.

  "Very good." She looked over her new crewmen, reading name tapes and ratings badges and opening a couple of new mental personnel files.

  "Seaman Kirby ... Seaman Langdon, I'm Captain Garrett, your CO. You've managed to sign on just as we've caught an emergency deployment order, so we're all going to be a little busy for a while. Check in with the exec, Commander Hiro, for your duty stations and quartering billets.

  Once we're at sea and we get things lined out, we'll get a chance to talk. Until then, gentlemen, welcome aboard the Duke." Amanda and her officers continued on up to the deck, leaving the two sets of enlisted hands to eye each other dubiously.

  Finally, one of the new men said, "Hey, we've never done a cruise with a woman captain before. What's the word?"

  The two veteran Cunningham ratings exchanged the bored glances of seniors putting up with the new kids in school.

  "The Lady's okay," the female half of the team replied, shifting the sling of her snub-barreled riot gun. "She sticks by the crew and she doesn't get in your face over the small stuff. The big thing is that you gotta do your job."

  "Yeah," her opposite number added darkly. "You let down the ship, and the Lady'll hand you your cock in a hotdog bun."

  PEARL HARBOR APPROACHES, OUTBOUND 0545 HOURS ZONE TIME; JULY 18, 2006

  Clad in a worn set of work khakis, with a Cunningham baseball cap tugged low over her French-braided hair, Amanda Garrett lounged back in the bridge captain's chair, one deck shoe braced comfortably against the wheelhouse grab rail.

  They were exiting out into the deeper waters of Mamala Bay from the gut of Pearl Channel. Already she could note the darkening blue of the surrounding waters. Likewise, she could sense the first tug of the great open-ocean rollers coming in from the Pacific.

  "All engines ahead standard. Make turns for twenty knots."

  "Aye, aye, ma'am," the lee helm responded from the central bridge console. Dropping a hand down to the lever studded control pedestal that separated him from the helmsman, he rocked the throttles and power levers forward.

  The rushing whine of the great turbogenerator sets increased.

  There was a palpable surge of acceleration as the Duke tacked on speed, the V of snowy foam streaming away from under her forefoot broadening in response.

  "All engines answering ahead standard. Making turns for two-zero knots."

  Amanda smiled to herself, reveling in the sensation, as a skilled rider might enjoy lifting a thoroughbred stallion into a canter.

  Off the starboard bow, one of the big Honolulu tourist schooners lazed along on a breakfast cruise, cheating on the wind with her auxiliary diesels. Her rail became a solid wall of camera and binocular lenses as the big man-of-war swept past, and humbly, the sailing ship dipped her flag in salute.

  "Quartermaster, reply with two on the siren, please."

  The Duke's air horns blared, echoes returning faintly off the receding shoreline.

  The schooner drew away astern, and Amanda shifted her gaze to the row of repeater monitors mounted above the brow of the bridge windscreen.

  Seeking out the navigational radar, she checked her clearance with the cruise vessel.

  Okay, looking good.

  "Navicom status, please?"

  "We are at initial point, Captain," the duty quartermaster replied from his workstation. "SINS and GPU cross- referenced and verified. Course is on the boards and Navicom is ready-to engage."

  Another brow telescreen displayed a computer-graphics chart of the Oahu approaches, and a glowing set of departure headings now materialized on it, angling away to the west.

  "Very well. Helm, engage autopilot and go to Navicom."

  The helmsman tapped a pattern into his systems keypad.

  Smoothly, the Duke's prow began to come around into the rising sun as she hunted for her new course.

  "Steering two six five degrees true, Captain. Autopilot tracking on marked headings."

  "Very well. Pass the word to all compartments. Stand down from Condition Zebra. Set cruise mode in all spaces as per Plan of the Day."

  At that declaration, the bridge crew could allow themselves to relax.

  They were clear of the harbor, and from here, if necessary, the Cunningham could take herself to the rendezvous point ten days away off the coast of China Amanda pushed herself out of her chair and stretched

  "Okay, Mr. Freeman," she said, addressing the Officer of the Deck

  "You've got the con and the start of a beautiful day out here Enjoy "

  She went aft to the hot-water urn in the chart room and made herself a mug of tea from her private stash of Earl Grey Flying in the face of the purists, she dumped a packet of creamer into the brew along with a couple of sugar cubes Sipping appreciatively, she went forward again and out onto the starboard bridge wing

  Crossing to the rail, she assumed the traditional Navy slaunchwise lean against it, a few inches down from Ken Hiro She'd noted that her exec had been lingering out here during most of the departure

  "Misa and the kids weren't dockside this morning," she commented quietly

  "Is everything okay?"

  Rather guiltily, Ken straightened He was generally a little stoic, but today Amanda had taken him by surprise

  "Uh. sure, Captain, everything's fine They never come down to the pier anymore when we haul out this early Instead, we have this thing that we do I say my good-byes the night before, then I sneak out of the house the next morning before anyone else is awake Misa has an alarm set, and after I'm gone she gets the kids up and they drive out to Keahi Point "

  He nodded toward the shoulder of the passage they were sweeping past

  "They watch us clear port from there It's just something that works for us "

  "Sounds like as good a way as any," Amanda replied, nodding in sympathetic agreement Looking aft along the weather decks, she noted that Ken wasn't the only one drawing out his farewell Little groups of Cunningham sailors were lingering along the rails, watch mg Oahu disappear into the haze behind them It was an endemic situation in the New Age Navy The somewhat older, more career oriented crews meant more hands with dependents to leave behind It was the trade off that had to be made for their experience and professionalism Amanda could understand their feelings, but she couldn't say that she shared them For her, whether she was conning an 8,000-ton man-of-war or a twenty-four-foot cruising sloop, heading out had always been a time of renewal, a chance to shake free of the dirt of the
land and find new challenges She knew that this mind-set stemmed partially from the fact that she wasn't leaving anything of real import behind her Early on in her career Amanda had realized that, if she was to gain a ship of her own, she would have to travel light Accordingly, she had organized a life that could be carried in a pair of suitcases or contained in a set of cabin lockers, deliberately avoiding all long-term entanglements, either physical or emotional

  This total independence had worked well for her, and for some time now she had lived as contentedly self-contained as a turtle Recently, though, she had begun to wonder if she hadn't been a little too efficient with how she had engineered her world Generally she managed to brush the thought aside as just a symptom of looming middle age, but, sometimes, looking at Ken and his family, she found herself thinking that maybe having something permanent somewhere to come home to might not be all that bad "Captain," the OOD called from the wheelhouse hatchway "Retainers Zero One and Zero Two are inbound and on rendezvous approach "

  Vince Arkady and his wingwoman, Lieutenant (j ) Nancy Delany, were coming home to roost "Very good, Mr. Freeman," Amanda called back over her shoulder "Go to flight quarters and bring the helos aboard at your convenience "

  "Aye, aye, ma'am "

  The vibrant growl of rotors filled the air and the Cunning ham's pair of SAH-66 Sea Comanches came into view astern Fenestron-tailed and sleekly hunchbacked, the two small machines bore the slightly odd aerodynamics of stealth technology A LAMPS variant of the U S Army's latest generation of scout helicopters, their low detectability was intended to complement that of their mother ship Tucked into a stylishly tight formation, they swept down the Duke's starboard side a meager fifty feet above the wave crests Maneuvering as if they were chained together, the two helos flared out and dumped speed, station keeping just off the snub wing of the bridge.

  Looking across into Retainer Zero One's forward cockpit, Amanda could see Arkady's helmet turn toward her. Even through the tinted visor she could sense that damnable grade- school grin of his. She lifted a hand in greeting, and he gave an acknowledging nod. The noses of the two helos then dipped in unison and they gained speed, pulling ahead of the ship. As Amanda and Hiro watched, they popped up and into a flashy crossover break around the Cunningham's bow, heading back to line up on the helipad.

  Amanda took another draw at her tea and contentedly lounged back against the rail. On the other hand, there was still a lot to be said for being able to take everything that was important to you right along with you.

  SHANGHAI, PEOPLE'S REPUBLIC OF CHINA 2320 HOURS ZONE TIME; JULY 17, 2006

  The fast attack squadron held to the center of the broad Huangpu River channel. Running on displacement with their hydrofoils retracted, their dark blue-gray paint rendered them all but invisible. The air around them was filled with the deep-toned rumble of idling diesels and the peculiar combination of miasmas unique to Shanghai: the wet sewer and seaweed stench rising up from the Yangtze estuary, the waxy, raw petroleum from the great Zhongxing refinery complex, and the dry, choking haze of an uncountable number of small charcoal fires.

  To the west, the city itself was spectral, a place where the shadows had been granted free rule after the setting of the sun.

  Upstream, in what had been the old Foreign Settlements along the Bunt, dilapidated 1930s-vintage skyscrapers were silhouetted against the sky, dark and jagged like some ruin of the Second World War frozen in time.

  For all of the city's teeming millions, nowhere could more than a dozen lights be seen in a single sweep of the eye. There was no longer power to spare to illuminate the streets, and even such a simple thing as a lightbulb was now a precious commodity to be carefully husbanded.

  Lieutenant Zhou Shan could recall when the night skyglow of Shanghai could be seen from forty miles off the coast.

  That had been on his cadet cruise only a few short years ago.

  Now he sometimes wondered if the night would ever be held at bay again.

  The Five Nineteen boat was the trailer in the column, and Zhou's helmsman steered by the pale plume of wake produced by the craft ahead.

  They possessed none of the night vision equipment available aboard some of the Fleet's larger and more modern vessels, and even their elementary radar was useless in these confined waters.

  The Five Nineteen was an old copy of an older design-- the venerable Hushuan-class hydrofoil torpedo boat. No point defense beyond the manually operated twin 14mm machinegun mounts fore and aft. No guided weaponry at all except for the pair of massive 53VA antishipping torpedoes in their twin launching tubes. No extensive sensor suite. No countermeasures.

  Probably no real chance of survival against a truly state-of-the-art enemy.

  Zhou was not unduly concerned about the age of his small command. When one served in the People's armed forces, one learned to make do with less than the latest and the best.

  What was perturbing was not being able to maintain what he did have in the best condition possible. Beneath his fingers, he could feel where corrosion was eating into the paintless cockpit railing, and he could detect a faint, uneven slammer in the growl of the single engine they had on line.

  Their apportionment of sea stores and spare parts, frugal under the best of conditions, had grown almost nonexistent over the past few months.

  What was worse, ever since the beginning of the war, the squadron had been sitting uselessly in its home base at Changshandau, slowly rusting away, while bandits and counterrevolutionaries tore the heart out of the People's Republic.

  When the squadron had been ordered south, Zhou had hoped that at long last they were being committed to battle--

  possibly even against the gangsters of the Kuommtang who had dared to return from their island kennels

  Instead, they had been directed here to Shanghai, reasons unexplained Behind him the young officer heard tools clatter and bosun Hoong swear fervently in his thick North Coast accent The bosun and two other of Five Nineteen's deckhands were struggling with a frozen bolt at the foot of the hydrofoil's stubby radar mast That had also been unexplained--why they must be prepared to fold their radio and radar masts down parallel to the deck Zhou was estimating that they must soon be coming to the second of the right handed bends in the river's channel when he suddenly observed a shadowy form materializing out of the darkness, just off his course line "Stop engines'" he snapped at his helmsman Over the transmission howl, he heard the voice of Captain Li hailing him His squadron commander was holding the flag boat just off the central channel, one of his deckhands waving the other fast-attack craft past with a red lensed flash light

  "Is all well with you young Shan? No problems with the channel?"

  "All well, Comrade Captain No difficulties "

  "Good We are almost home The squadron is being dispersed to separate moorages along the eastern side of the river Stand on upstream until you clear the shipyards, then watch the left shore for a blinking signal light Your signal will be short, long, short Turn in toward it and follow the instructions of the guide Are you ready to lower your masts?"

  Zhou looked aft "Just another few moments, Lieutenant," Hoong gamted from deck level "Yes, Comrade Captain We are prepared "

  "Excellent Carry on, Shan"

  Zhou's combination of frustration and curiosity drove him to call out once more

  "Comrade Captain, can you tell us what our mission will be here?"

  "As it is everywhere, Comrade Lieutenant," Li replied, a faint reproof in his tone, "to serve the will of the people " That left nothing more to be said Zhou ordered his helms man to advance his throttle and the Five Nineteen boat gained way once more They were coming up on the curve of the river, with Shanghai's Fuxing Dao industrial district to starboard and the Hudong state shipyards to port Watching the east bank intently, Zhou thought he had spotted his moorage beacon Then he caught himself just before issuing the command to turn This flashing light had quite a different source Zhou realized he was looking at the rear face of the sh
ipyard's huge covered graving dock The entry way had been curtained off with a wall of tarpaulins and light leaked through at one point, the harsh blue white flicker of arc welding Bringing up his night glasses Zhou panned them across the yard As he did so he began to realize that more was going on within the seemingly dark and deserted facility than was first apparent Trucks rolled past, running on hooded headlights Many figures scurried through the shadows and more light leaks indicated that the lower floors of several of the machine shops and administration buildings were occupied and operating The young naval officer knew full well that shipbuilding, like most of China's other heavy industry, had come to a near-complete standstill because of the war Something very exceptional was taking place over there So intriguing was this concentration of stealthy activity that Zhou almost missed the true signal being flashed in their direction

  "Helmsman, come left "

  The Five Nineteen boat nosed in toward the bank, and the head of a pier solidified out of the gloom For a moment, Zhou thought he was to tie up alongside it Then he saw the guide atop the pier motioning them underneath it

  "Hoong! Lower the masts'"

  "At once, Lieutenant" Zhou observed that the pier's central pilings and underbracing had been cut away, leaving an empty shell As the hydrofoil's bow slid into the deeper, creosote-scented blackness beneath the decking, her hull squealed against preset fenders and dolphin boards Moisture pattered on the decks Reaching up from the cockpit Zhou's fingertips brushed a

  sheet of wet canvas suspended horizontally overhead He understood His nation no longer had functional reconnaissance satellites, but their capabilities were well understood The pier would shelter them from direct visual observation, and the water-soaked tarps would smother their heat signature, rendering them invisible to thermographic scanning The torpedo boat's engine grumbled into silence and the ever-efficient Hoong began to direct the line handling in the glow of a single battle lantern Zhou remained in the cockpit for a time longer, considering There was something in the wind here Something major Something they were involved in now