The Pacific Rim Collection

by Don Brown

  He tried to remove Stephanie Surber from his thoughts and felt his mind beginning to drift. Acres of sundrenched peanut fields, oak leaves swaying in the backyard in an early autumn breeze under the warm Virginia sun. Fishing for marlin off Cape Henry. Colonial Williamsburg at Christmas … football games at Lane Stadium on the VPI campus … Christmas at Corbin Hall …

  The rough bump against turbulence popped open his eyes. The engine was sputtering, like a staccato string of sixteenth notes.

  The chopper shook, jarred again, and started dropping.

  This wasn’t the first time he’d been up with cowboy chopper pilots who got their kicks out of trying to start a barf-fest among non-aviator passengers by practicing autorotations.

  Gunner squinted and looked up into the cockpit. “You guys are funny!” he shouted.

  But this time, no typical over-the-shoulder smug grins of satisfaction from flyboys showing off autorotation skills. Both the pilot and copilot were flipping switches on the control panel with a serious urgency. Something wasn’t right.

  “Check the backup fuel line,” the pilot’s voice came over Gunner’s headset.

  “I’m flipping the switch!” the copilot’s voice was less calm than the pilot’s and seemed to crack. “Nothing.”

  More midair bumping.

  The engine caught, then sputtered, then caught and sputtered again.

  “Commander,” the pilot said, “recommend you put on your life vest, sir. We’ve got fuel-line problems. I’m sending out a distress signal.”

  Fear crossed the copilot’s face.

  Gunner reached over for his life vest as the pilot’s voice blared over the headset: “MAYDAY! MAYDAY! To all ships and aircraft in the vicinity. This is US Navy SH-60R Seahawk. Mark position at fifteen degrees north latitude, one hundred fifteen degrees, forty-two minutes, eight seconds east longitude. Altitude ten thousand feet and dropping. Course two-seven-zero degrees. MAYDAY! MAYDAY! We’re losing fuel and descending rapidly!”

  Bridge

  USS Emory S. Land

  South China Sea

  Bridge! Radio!” The radioman’s urgent tone blasted over the bridge’s loudspeaker system.

  “Radio. Go ahead,” Captain Auclair Wilson said.

  “Sir, we’ve got an emergency distress call from SH-60R Seahawk en route from USS Vicksburg! They’re still airborne but having engine problems.”

  “Radar! Bridge! Range to that Seahawk?”

  “Seventy-five miles inbound, Captain.”

  “Radio! Open a channel to that chopper!”

  “Aye, Captain!”

  Captain Wilson looked over at Commander Roddick, who was biting his lip and running his hand through his hair. Another squelch from the loudspeaker.

  “MAYDAY! MAYDAY! To all ships and aircraft in the vicinity. This is US Navy SH-60R Seahawk, altitude now nine thousand feet! Still on course two-seven-zero degrees and still dropping!”

  “Seahawk. This is USS Emory S. Land. Keep talking and keep that baby in the air, Lieutenant. We’re headed your way.” He looked at the ship’s navigator and barked orders over more incoming chatter from the helicopter. “Navigator! Helmsman! Set course zero-nine-zero degrees. All ahead full!”

  “Zero-nine-zero degrees. All ahead full! Aye, Captain!”

  The voice over the loudspeaker said, “Don’t know how much longer I can keep us airborne, Captain!”

  “We’re coming, Lieutenant!” Wilson said. “Keep the faith.”

  The helmsman spun the wheel to the right, and the Emory S. Land listed hard to starboard. Captain Wilson grabbed the brass railing in the center of the bridge and kept barking orders. “XO. Notify the crew. Prepare for search-and-rescue operations. I don’t have a good feeling about this.”

  “Aye, Captain.”

  Junior Officers Quarters

  USS Emory S. Land

  South China Sea

  The First Daughter of the United States, standing in the small shower adjoining her cabin, eyes closed, enjoying the warm water running through her auburn hair and down her face, lost her balance when the Emory S. Land made its turn, suddenly listing to starboard.

  Her feet slipped, but she managed to latch on to the grab bar to avoid falling.

  Her heart pounding, she wondered what happened. She thought a rogue wave might have rolled the ship, which had leveled off again. Stephanie stepped out of the shower, having washed the smell of gunpowder out of her hair and off her face. She grabbed a towel and wrapped it around herself.

  A shrill two-toned whistle blared from low to high over the ship’s 1MC, the shipwide intercom system controlled from the bridge.

  “Now hear this, this is the XO. We’ve just received an emergency distress call from the US Navy helicopter inbound to our position from USS Vicksburg.”

  Static … then …

  Commander Roddick’s voice came back on. “Communications with the chopper indicate that the situation is critical. We’re steaming at full power on a projected intercept course with the chopper. Be on high alert. By order of the captain, prepare to conduct search-and-rescue operations. This is the executive officer.”

  Silence.

  She stood there, wrapped in the towel, staring at the small mirror inside her small gray metal locker.

  Her face flushed crimson and her body was awash with anger. They had sent a chopper to pick her up because of who she was, because some captain or admiral wanted to curry favor with her father when he hadn’t asked for the favor, for the chopper.

  And now … now … someone might die because of her.

  “Dear Jesus, please no,” Stephanie said.

  What could she do? She felt like smashing the mirror, but “destruction of government property is an offense under the Uniform Code of Military Justice” played in her mind.

  Smashing wouldn’t help. Not now. Not ever. Neither would anger.

  She dropped to her knees in front of her rack. “Lord, protect that helicopter. Please, somehow get it here in one piece. Please don’t let anyone die because of me.” She paused. She had to get dressed. “In Jesus’ name, amen.”

  US Navy SH-60R Seahawk helicopter

  en route from USS Vicksburg to USS Emory S. Land

  over the South China Sea

  Gentlemen, we’re dropping fuel fast. Barring a miracle, we won’t make it to our rendezvous point with the Emory S. Land.” The pilot paused. “And even if somehow we could make it that far, I wouldn’t want to try and set this bird down on the ship. Not in this condition.”

  Gunner had once been aboard a light aircraft that ditched in the sea. That ditching, off the coast of North Korea, was part of a planned mission when the pilot had purposely crashed a Beechcraft Bonanza in the cold waters of the Sea of Japan. Gunner almost lost his life.

  “How much longer do we have, Lieutenant?”

  “Right now, the engine is stabilized. We’re still flying, making headway. The problem is, we’re still losing fuel. Maybe a leak in the fuel line. Unless we can get it fixed, we’ll run out of gas. To answer your question, ten maybe fifteen minutes, Commander.”

  Thirty seconds passed. “Lieutenant, how can I help?”

  “We’re going to have to jump before the chopper hits the water. Otherwise we could be decapitated by the whirling blades. I’m going to bring us down to fifty feet over the water to hover position. Pray that our fuel holds. There’s an inflatable life raft back there. Copilot Hodges will go back there and the two of you will drop that baby overboard. When it hits the water, it should inflate. Then jump. Lieutenant Hodges will jump right after you. I’ll put the chopper in forward and I’ll jump.

  “With the chopper flying forward, it’ll crash far enough away from us. We’ll be okay. Here, strap this on. After you hit the water, activate it.”

  “What is it?”

  “It’s a homing beacon. But when you hit the water, first swim to the raft. Secure it. Then hit the homing device. It’s working if you hear it beeping. That’s our only chance for get
ting spotted.”

  “Got it.” Gunner tightened his life vest.

  “Okay, I’m bringing her down.”

  Gunner’s heart was pounding as the pilot brought the chopper down closer to the water. The copilot, his life jacket strapped on, crawled back to the cargo bay area.

  “Okay, Commander, hang on tight,” the copilot said. “I’m gonna open the cargo bay door.”

  “Got it,” Gunner said.

  “Altitude one hundred feet,” the pilot said.

  The cargo bay door slid open. A powerful gust of whirling wind and noise rushed in from the overhead rotor blades.

  “Altitude seventy-five feet,” the pilot said. “Okay! Drop the raft!”

  “Roger that, Skipper,” the copilot said. “Commander, give me a hand here.”

  “You bet,” Gunner said.

  The copilot was standing next to an orange cylinder about the size of a small oil barrel. “Raft’s in here. We’re just going to walk over to the edge and toss it. When it hits the water, the cord from the chopper should cause it to inflate. You grab that side, I’ve got this side. Don’t get your foot snared by the cord.”

  “Okay,” Gunner said.

  “Let’s pick it up.”

  “Okay.”

  “It’s cumbersome but not heavy,” the copilot said as he lifted one side and Gunner lifted the other.

  “Let’s just ease it over here to the side. Don’t get too close to the edge.”

  “Got it.”

  They inched toward the open cargo bay. Gunner hated heights. He hated leaping off the thirty-five-foot tower at Officer Candidate School in Newport, Rhode Island. He tried not to look down as they inched closer to the edge, but could not avoid it. They were at least three times as high as the diving tower at Newport. And in the tank at Newport, there were no sharks in the waters.

  “Close enough,” the copilot said.

  “Step it up, Lieutenant!” the pilot said. “We’re dropping fuel fast.”

  “Roger that. Commander, on three, we’ll toss this baby out.”

  “Got it.”

  “Ready?”

  “Ready.”

  “On my mark. One thousand one …

  “One thousand two …

  “One thousand three!”

  They hurled the barrel out over the sea, the cord uncoiling as it fell.

  The copilot stepped to his left, right into a loop of the cord on the floor that swirled around his ankle and snapped tight, yanking him toward the open bay, smashing his head against the floor as he was dragged from the aircraft.

  “Dear Jesus, no!” Gunner yelled. “Lieutenant! Copilot overboard.”

  “Okay! Hang on!” the pilot said.

  The cord uncoiled as fast as a line from a fishing reel with a big fish on the hook, then stopped with a snap.

  “When the raft inflates, detach the line and jump overboard,” the pilot yelled.

  Gunner looked down. The copilot was floating face down in the water, one leg being yanked up toward the chopper by the line that was wrapped around his boot. The orange life raft, complete with an orange tent, was inflating, like a butterfly emerging from a cocoon.

  “Commander! Detach the cord and jump!”

  Gunner looked down at the floor of the chopper. The end of the cord was attached to a steel loop on the floor just inside the cargo bay, held there by a spring latch. He reached down, unlatched it, and the end of the line slipped out the open bay.

  With one hand on the homing device that was strapped around his waist, he took a running step and leaped over the edge, feet first. His stomach seemed to slip into his throat. His feet angled up. As he dropped, he knew this would not be a vertical landing.

  His right knee and thigh struck first. Somehow, his entire body, life vest and all, submerged in the warm water. The sound of the rotors faded to a garbled bubbling.

  When he popped back up to the surface and bright morning sunlight, he heard the sloshing sound of the waves and felt the wind on his face.

  He squinted and looked around.

  Where was the raft? Paddling with his arms and hands to pivot himself around in the water, he turned to his right.

  The orange pup tent bobbed in the water, in and out of sight in the big waves, perhaps two hundred yards in front of him.

  He started swimming toward the raft. He couldn’t see the copilot or the pilot.

  Off to his right was the helicopter, just skimming the surface.

  KA-BOOM!

  The percussion from the explosion hit him like a wall. The helicopter vanished in a huge fireball that hit the water.

  Chinese freighter M/V Shemnong

  South China Sea

  between Da Nang, Vietnam, and the Paracel Islands

  course 180 degrees

  Captain!” the radar officer shouted. “Radar shows two aircraft approaching from the northeast! Range ten miles. Airspeed two hundred knots. From the direction of the unidentified ship.”

  Captain Fu Cheuk-yan looked over at his first officer. At that moment, for the first time, First Officer Kenny Chan saw a look of concern in his boss’s eyes.

  “No doubt attack helicopters,” Fu said. “Which tells me that we are dealing with one of the Kidd-class destroyers that the traitors bought from the US Navy.”

  Chan glanced at the radar screen. “I think you are right, Captain.”

  “Perhaps we should turn and steer a course into Da Nang.”

  “Are you asking my advice on this, sir?”

  “Yes. What do you think?”

  “I think it would be pointless, sir. Their choppers are faster than we are and so is their warship, if that is a Kidd-class ship.”

  The captain seemed to think about that. “Perhaps you are right.” He wiped his forehead. “Well, grab your binoculars and let’s step out on the flybridge and have a look.”

  “Yes, Captain.” Chan could not shake the image he had seen in the bowels of the ship, nor could he shake the queasiness from his stomach. Yet he had to focus on the danger to the ship. He reached into a utility drawer and grabbed a pair of binoculars, then followed the captain out onto the open flybridge.

  “There! Out on the horizon.” The captain pointed off to the northeast. Two helicopters, flying in tandem, were lit by the morning sun. A slight smokescreen trailed each one. Just a moment later, they heard a sonorous roar.

  “Helicopters,” Captain Fu said.

  “Headed this way,” Chan said. He wrestled with a surrealistic sense of relief, almost, as if the enemy—the Taiwanese or even the Americans—would do something about what he had seen. As he watched through the powerful lenses of his binoculars, the choppers grew larger, more distinct—definitely two military choppers. The only question now was their origin, their nationality. Taiwanese or American.

  “I do not like this, Mr. Chan,” the captain said, his eyes fixed on the approaching helicopters as he looked through his binoculars. “What … what should … I do?”

  The captain’s voice had morphed from swaggering confidence to uncertainty—almost a hint of fear. He lowered his binoculars. His face was dazed. He looked at Kenny.

  “We must determine who they are, Captain. If they are Taiwanese, we must radio for help to the PRC Navy. Either way, we steam forward on course.”

  The roar of the choppers was almost deafening off the portside. Then, as the choppers banked to the right, Chan saw it. Painted on the fuselages was the red flag with the blue rectangular corner and the white twelve-point sun.

  “Enemy choppers, Captain! Taiwanese!”

  South China Sea

  somewhere between USS Vicksburg and USS Emory S. Land

  Gunner kept treading water, working his arms, as he tried to decide where to swim.

  He looked from the barely visible floating orange pup tent to the leaping flames and black smoke from the downed chopper. The raft and chopper were drifting in opposite directions, getting farther apart.

  “The pilot!” he thought. “Help the pilo
t!” If he could get to the pilot, maybe he could pull him back to the raft. He started fighting through the warm tropical water, swimming toward the burning chopper. The wind had picked up. The waves were getting bigger. Against the larger swells, Gunner tried a breaststroke. He rode the next swell down into the trough and wound up with a mouthful of seawater.

  He resorted to a freestyle stroke and swam up the next swell to its crest. The smoke and fire came into full view. And then he was carried back down again, hidden in a trough. The next swell pushed him up, back up to the peak again. This time …

  No flames! No billows of smoke! Just a remnant of smoke hanging in the air. The chopper was gone. He looked for the pilot and copilot, the raft.

  Dear Jesus … He rode the swell back down into the trough … Help me find them! Please help me find it!

  Was he swimming in the wrong direction? The next wave brought him back up to the crest again. He looked all around again. Nothing.

  No chopper!

  No life raft!

  Nothing anywhere except water!

  ROCS Kee Lung

  South China Sea

  Captain!” the radio officer said. “Our choppers have a visual on the ship.”

  “Put them on the loudspeaker!”

  “Yes, Captain!”

  “Dragon One. This is the captain! Report.”

  At first only static, then the roar of helicopter rotors. “Kee Lung. Dragon One. Ship is a PRC freighter. We have a visual. She is the M/V Shemnong. I see guns on deck. Chained down. Looks to be transporting antiaircraft guns, Captain.”

  “Hmm.” Captain Won Lee glanced at his executive officer. “They are cruising toward the Spratlys. Probably to deliver weapons to the enemy occupants.”

  The executive officer nodded. “That is a reasonable assumption, Captain.”

  “Then we must intercept that ship, and if we determine that these are in fact military supplies, such as weapons and ammunitions for the enemy, we must interdict the delivery of such weapons and supplies. Do you agree, XO?”

  The XO nodded. “Yes, Captain. I agree.”

  “Very well.” Won Lee nodded. “I shall order our helicopters to prevent the freighter from making a land run, and then we will bring the Kee Lung to General Quarters. We are going to board that freighter.”