The Pacific Rim Collection

by Don Brown

  “Aah, yes. Let’s give Wang Ju the Hero’s Medal. Find his assistant. We shall give him the Silver.”

  “Of course, Mister President.” The general scribbled notes on a pad.

  “This nation needs to create a few military heroes to visualize the fullest extent of what we can become!”

  “I do not think either of us would disagree with that, Mister President,” General Shang said.

  Tang pushed the cup and saucer out of the way, leaned forward, and eyed first the general and then the admiral. “Consider the opportunity before us. We have just taken the first step in transforming the People’s Republic into the great superpower of the twenty-first century! Where our Russian Communist adversaries to the North and the West failed, we shall succeed. The Soviet economy was nothing but a dilapidated patchwork of industrial rust, while we, the Chinese, are the world’s greatest manufacturer.

  “The Russians could not compete economically with the Americans. But we, the sons of Mao, sell our products to them! We loan them money to support their hopelessly bankrupt economy, fueled by their fat and undisciplined politicians who spend money as if there is no tomorrow.”

  He stopped and eyed the two senior officers again, first one, then the other.

  “Gentlemen, we stand on the verge of the great Chinese century.” Then, scowling at the general, he declared, “And this shall be the Chinese century because it shall be the century of the Chinese military! Do you understand, General?”

  General Shang looked back at the president. “Yes, sir, of course. I understand.”

  Tang then turned to his Navy chief. “And you, Admiral Zou. Do you understand this?”

  “Yes,” the admiral answered immediately. “I embrace this glorious opportunity. And I am with you, sir.”

  “Very well!” Tang said. “Then let us, the three of us, toast this glorious moment of victory. Captain Lo!”

  “Yes, Mister President!”

  “Captain Lo, bring our finest baijiu with three shot glasses. In fact, bring a fourth. One for you too. We shall allow ourselves a toast of celebration! To victory!”

  “To victory!”

  USS Emory S. Land

  northern sector of the South China Sea

  4:00 a.m.

  The young officer stood alone on the forward deck of the ship. Through the infrared binoculars that she held to her eyes, the black, rolling waves of the South China Sea morphed into a ghastly green abyss.

  She scanned the entire sector of the sea, first at the distant horizon, sweeping from left to right, and then in closer to the ship, to an area where she expected the submarine to surface.

  No sign of a conning tower. Only rolling swells.

  “Morning, ma’am.”

  She recognized the voice. “Morning, Senior Chief Vasquez.”

  Another enthusiastic voice came from the dark. “Get you some coffee, Miss Surber?”

  “I’m fine …” This time she lowered the binoculars and squinted at the sailor’s nametag, dimly lit by the faint glow of one of the running lights. “Uh … Seaman Martin. But thanks for asking.”

  Seaman Martin’s enthusiasm was typical of the incessant attention she received. The command had promised to keep it quiet for security reasons, but any dummy could figure it out, and most had.

  Her last name.

  Pictures in the media.

  The whole “no talk” policy was a joke.

  People talk.

  After only a few weeks at sea, she had learned that scuttlebutt on board a Navy ship could erupt like a gas drum ignited by a match.

  Why was the Navy protecting her? The thought of it hacked her off. Her grades at Annapolis should have earned her a spot in flight school at Pensacola. She had earned it. She deserved it. Others with a lower class standing than hers had gotten their choice of billets, including flight school.

  Of course, the thought had occurred to her that the thought had occurred to them that the daughter of the president might be safer on the deck of a submarine tender than in the cockpit of an F-18 fighter jet or an SH-60R Seahawk helicopter.

  Her father had promised never to say a word to any of his admirals or captains about her. And she believed him. He was a man of honor. He would never lie.

  Still, she had her suspicions. Some busybody admiral, she surmised, was trying to stay in her father’s good graces by giving her orders to a “safe” billet—not that any billet in the Navy was absolutely safe.

  She had masked her disappointment when she got the orders. They had “sold” her the typical bill of goods. On the Emory Land, she would become the “weapons officer,” the detailer said.

  “It’s unheard of for an ensign straight out of the academy to become a weapons officer, but with your record, you’re a natural,” the detailer claimed. “This will give you a big jump on your classmates.”

  Right.

  It was true. She was good with a gun and could fire the .50-caliber machine gun. Word had gotten around that she was on the academy’s women’s rifle team. But still, the title was like a lollipop given to a kid by a bank teller at a drive-through window. It wasn’t like she was going to be in charge of antiballistic missile systems or Tomahawk cruise missiles or anything like that. The facts were these. USS Emory S. Land had a total of ten weapons on board, and every one of these guns was World War II vintage. The weapons had their value … against pirates and other small vessels. But a sub tender’s mission was to operate under the protective cover of other ships as it supplied the Navy’s submarine fleet with food and fuel and torpedoes.

  In a real firefight, Emory Land would be in trouble—unless her opponent was another sub tender or a tugboat. Everyone on board knew the Emory Land was operating outside the protective umbrella of the Navy’s cruisers and destroyers. In a word, if something were to go wrong, she was in the wrong place at the wrong time.

  Stephanie’s role as the weapons officer was in reality her secondary role aboard this ship. She was also the replenishment officer, in charge of transferring supplies from the ship to submarines when they surfaced. The replenishment job was far more time-consuming and germane to the ship’s mission than the weapons part.

  But hey, she was the weapons officer. That would look good on her FITREP.

  Or so she was told.

  The sea had brought one positive change in her life, ending, for the time being, a perpetual nuisance that had driven her batty. The Secret Service wasn’t out here.

  The wind whipped up off the portside, and she caught a whiff of cologne.

  “Morning, Ensign Surber.”

  “Morning, sir.” She lowered her binoculars and turned to see the well-cut, handsome figure of Commander Bobby Roddick approach out of the predawn darkness.

  “New message from SUBPAC. The sub will be surfacing a little late. It’s going to be another thirty minutes.” Commander Roddick spoke in the low-country, southern accent of his native Charleston, South Carolina.

  “Do we know which sub yet, sir?”

  “Just got the word. USS Boise. Los Angeles class. Skipper is Commander Graham Hardison. A good guy.”

  A sailor popped a hatch behind them, giving her a glimpse of the XO’s blue eyes before the hatch clicked shut again. Then all she could see was his rugged silhouette.

  “We want her replenished in an hour,” he said. “We want her back under before sunrise. You got that inventory of all the food supplies we’re offloading?”

  “Yes, sir.” She tried suppressing in her own voice any hint of the star-struck tone she normally was the recipient of.

  “Look, Stephanie …” He hesitated.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “We must move faster than yesterday when we replenished the Georgia.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I know the Georgia is a lot bigger than the Boise because she’s a Trident-class. But still, we took an hour and forty-five minutes. That’s too long.”

  “That’s my responsibility, sir.”

  “Good.” H
e looked off to the horizon. “These budget cuts make all of our jobs a lot harder. We’re short-handed. Makes it tough to meet our self-imposed deadlines. And that’s not your fault. But if we don’t get that sub replenished within sixty minutes, the skipper will be all over my butt. And that means I’ve got to come down here and chew you out.”

  “We’ll move faster with the Boise, sir. I guarantee it.”

  “Good. Meet me with a copy of the inventory in the wardroom in fifteen minutes.”

  “Aye, sir.”

  “Also, there’s something else I need to talk to you about. Bring a notepad.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Commander Roddick turned and walked off, an irresistible rock of a man disappearing into the dark. This was the first time she had ever enjoyed getting chewed out by a superior officer.

  “Composure, Stephanie,” she mumbled as she walked to her stateroom to get the submarine’s food supply inventory. She stepped through the hatch and found the report on the stand beside her rack.

  What to do for the next thirteen minutes?

  Go up now?

  She decided to lie down and set her watch for ten minutes. Closing her eyes, the images raced in a whirlwind. The academy commencement ceremony. Her father’s speech to the graduates. Their commissioning. Covers flying into the rich blue Maryland sky at Memorial Stadium. The montage of memories swirling in her head gave way to a few moments of sleep.

  Beep-beep-beep-beep. She opened her eyes from her quick doze. Five minutes had passed. She grabbed the report and a legal pad and stepped into the passageway. Three minutes later, she walked into the officers’ wardroom.

  The wardroom was empty. She heard only the distant hum of the ship’s engines with an occasional clanging of dishes in the adjacent galley. The rich aroma of fresh coffee filled the air. Bright fluorescent lights hung over the long table.

  She sat down just as the XO walked in from the passageway. She stood as he entered, but felt disappointment to see Senior Chief Vasquez with him. Nothing against the senior chief. It was just …

  “Sit, Stephanie.” The XO motioned to the seat beside the head of the table. “Got that food inventory?”

  “Right here, sir.” She slid the papers across the table in his direction. He picked up the report and began perusing it. A steward rolled a silver tray into the wardroom from the galley.

  “Coffee, sir?” the steward asked.

  “Black please, Ben.” The XO flipped through the inventory. “Stephanie? Senior Chief?”

  The steward poured steaming coffee into three white mugs, starting with the XO and descending by rank.

  “Looks good.” The XO laid the report on the wardroom table.

  “Thank you, sir,” Stephanie replied.

  “Ensign Surber.” His blue eyes shot her a stare. “You’re an academy grad, but you’re new to the Navy.” He sipped his coffee. “I assigned the senior chief to your division to give you the practical benefit of a sailor who’s experienced the Navy for over twenty years.” He flashed a slight smile. “Senior chief has seen everything you can imagine.”

  “I understand, sir,” Stephanie said. “I value having Senior Chief Vasquez in my division.”

  “Stephanie, as you know, we’re not a combat vessel. We’re light on weapons. Still, you’re our weapons officer, and that’s one of the most important positions on the ship.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I know we’ve been through this before, but things may be getting hot, and I want to go over it again. You’re comfortable and familiar enough with the ship’s armament if something goes wrong?”

  “Yes, sir, XO. Four .50-caliber machine guns, four 20-millimeter antiaircraft guns, and two 40-millimeter antiaircraft guns. Half on port. Half on starboard.”

  “Very good.” The XO’s smile broadened. “To make matters worse, back in 2009, the Navy came up with a harebrained idea that this ship should carry around a crew of half civilians and half military, which means that if we have to defend ourselves, we’ve got a bunch of worthless landlubbers running around and only half the military personnel that the ship was designed to carry.”

  “I understand.”

  “Well, I’m not sure that you do understand.”

  “Sir?”

  “There’s a war out there between Taiwan and China. We don’t know if it will be contained or if it will escalate. As you know, the president”—he did not say “your father”—”has ordered elements of the Seventh Fleet into the South China Sea to … shall we say … discourage this war before it gets out of control.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Ordinarily, we’d be operating behind a screen of cruisers, frigates, and destroyers. But things are happening so fast that Seventh Fleet has not had time to reposition our missile cruisers. So we have to stay here and fulfill our mission, to resupply our attack submarines. But we’re short on ammo and short on guns. We’re out in this sector of the sea all alone.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “After we refuel that sub, and they go back under, there’s not a friendly ship on the surface within a hundred miles. The Vicksburg is on the way, but she won’t be close enough to help much for a while if something goes wrong. The administration prior to the Williams administration neglected the military, spending taxpayers’ money on sinkhole social programs instead.”

  “Yes, sir, I know all about that.”

  “I figured you did. But that’s not the reason I called you down here.”

  “I don’t follow you, sir.” Don’t tell me that you’re going to transfer me to a safe shore location, she wanted to say, but didn’t.

  “Ensign, I want to make sure you’re up to speed on the operation of the machine guns and the antiaircraft guns on board. Just in case.”

  “Aye, sir.”

  “I know that as part of your training you’ve had some experience firing the .50-caliber.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “After the replenishment, I want you to get with the senior chief and review the procedures for firing these weapons. Make sure you’re prepared to fire each one if we get into a hot situation. Senior chief is a gunner’s mate, one of the best in the Navy. So you’ll be in the hands of one of our best.”

  “Aye, sir.”

  “We’re going to be running battle-station drills. Fire a few practice rounds on the fifties to make sure they’re all working. But be conservative. Maybe ten rounds max. We don’t have enough ammo to waste any.”

  “Understand, sir.”

  “And Stephanie …”

  “Yes, sir?”

  “Call this a gut feeling, but if things get hot, be careful.”

  “Aye, aye, sir.” Stephanie swallowed hard, her heart pounding from the sudden realization that combat may be imminent. She stood and shot a sharp salute. “Permission to return to my station, sir?”

  “Permission granted.”

  CHAPTER 2

  USS Vicksburg

  Ticonderoga-class cruiser

  forward vanguard of the Carl Vinson Strike Group

  South China Sea

  three days later

  predawn hours

  The officer stepped onto the forward deck of the gray warship and looked out over the dark sea. The starry host blanketing the seascape to the right revealed that the night had not yet surrendered to the coming day. But off to the left, from the direction where the sun would rise, the waters reflected that faint iridescent glow that belonged more to the day than the night.

  USS Vicksburg was alone in this sector of the sea, with no sign of any other vessel all the way to the horizon.

  Yet they were out there.

  Somewhere.

  The Chinese and the Taiwanese.

  His sixth sense screamed it as loud as the Mississippi thunderbolts that preceded the driving rainstorms that as a boy had turned his sandlot football games into hot summer mud slushes.

  Something bad was about to happen.

  But what? An errant missile attack? A wayward
torpedo slamming into the Vicksburg?

  Lieutenant Commander Fred Jeter dismissed those thoughts and reached into the pants pocket of his wash-khaki uniform and extracted a lighter. He started to put a Benson & Hedges in his mouth.

  “Morning, sir.” The voice came from an approaching silhouette—a member of the forward watch.

  “Morning, Petty Officer.”

  As the watchman passed by, he put the cigarette between his lips, struck the lighter, shielding the tip of the cigarette with his left hand, and sucked in hard. The miniature flame from the lighter leaped to the tip, kissing it long enough to light it. The dim orange glow revealed the gold oak leaf pinned to his right collar—showing his rank as a lieutenant commander in the US Navy—and on his left collar, a branched oak leaf with a miniature silver acorn—the emblem of the Navy Medical Corps.

  Sweet relief.

  Fred sucked more nicotine into his lungs, defying the warnings of the surgeon general.

  A strong-willed Mississippi boy who once rabbit hunted with a .12-gauge on his granddaddy’s farm, Dr.—and now Lieutenant Commander—Fred Jeter never liked being told what to do. In fact, if the surgeon general and all the politically correct, shove-it-down-your-throat activists hadn’t made such a hullabaloo about smoking, he probably would’ve never started. But Fred wanted to prove a point to himself, if to no one else. His thirst for independence triumphed over even his desire for good health.

  When the Navy came along and offered to pay his way through medical school and pay him a salary to boot, the deal sounded like a no-brainer—even though it contradicted the career path planned out for him by his father, who ran a long-standing family practice in Hattiesburg. The booming Jeter Medical Clinic had awaited the arrival of its favorite son, and with it came a thriving business, membership in the country club, and his pick of any number of blonde, well-endowed debutante-sorority-sister coeds freshly graduated from Ole Miss.

  But Fred Jeter had other plans. Sure, he caught some flak from some who called him crazy, including his father. But he fell in love with the Navy.

  And here he was, sucking cancer sticks and standing watch on a warship on the other side of the world, about to get in the middle of a war, all because he was as stubborn and bullheaded as a rebel-yelling infantryman at Manassas.