by David Poyer
Dan blew out again, stymied by the insecure net. He wanted to discuss deployment. The last readouts, before the satellites had gone down, had shown ten South Korean units in the Tsushima/Korea Strait area, including Sejong The Great, Jung’s flagship, two destroyers, two submarines, and seven Ulsan-class frigates. They were heavy on ASW and surface armament, but light on antiair defenses, though the flagship had a full Aegis radar and combat system. The smaller corvettes and patrol boats had hung back in the Tsushima Strait.
But he had to assume the enemy was listening to each word they exchanged. He fingered his chin. There’d been a way, once, to get over-the-horizon data link without satellites. “Slow Lead” wasn’t fast, and using HF to communicate had other limitations. But if Jung had KG-84A crypto equipment, they could link. Once they got close enough for covered VHF, they could even coordinate their attack by voice, in real time.
He glanced down at the forecastle, then out at the stern of the tanker. Was it closer? Chief Van Gogh was aiming a laser range finder. He was relieved to see Cheryl Staurulakis standing by the OOD. “Uh, this is Ringmaster. Excellent. If the balloon goes up, we’ll need to move fast. If you would like to move farther in my direction, that will reduce the time necessary to join up. Over.”
Jung acknowledged, and Dan signed off. He resocketed the handset and stood watching as, down on the deck, an engineer twirled a finger in the “start pumping” signal.
* * *
OVER the next few hours he shifted Savo to 25 degrees 36 minutes north, 121 degrees 30 minutes east, twenty miles off Taipei. Close enough to keep a decent angle on any incomers, but nearer to the strait at its narrowest point. As each screen unit reported “fueling complete,” he assigned it to a new station farther west.
Once Kurama had completed fueling, and the tanker had disappeared over the horizon back to Hualien, he repositioned the helicopter carrier to the center of the strait. She would goalie. Unless the Chinese mounted a major push right there, right then, she and the fixed-wing ASW assets should cover his temporary absence.
After lunch from a tray at his command seat, he went over the plan once more with a fatigued-looking Mills and a very wilted Staurulakis.
Then they waited.
* * *
HE managed to squirrel away in his cabin for a nap, and fell asleep almost instantly. Into a dreamless, black void.
And woke, to his surprise, several hours later, almost refreshed. No one had called. He checked with CIC and the bridge on the phone. Then stepped into the shower.
He had a hand on the control before he noticed the tag-out. Only certain systems had been cooked with saturated steam. Legionella savoiensis might even yet be lingering. He pulled on gym shorts and a T-shirt. Got his Hydra from the charging station. Toed into flip-flops, and carried soap dish, shampoo, a towel, and a change of underwear, socks, and coveralls down to officers’ country. Showered, shampooed, shaved, he let himself out into the passageway feeling freshly issued.
To nearly collide with a short, rotund black woman in a flowered dashiki. Aisha Ar-Rahim was toting a bundle of papers locked to a clipboard. She clutched them to her chest, as if protecting them from him. She looked drawn, cheeks puffy. Behind her was a slight strawberry-blond woman he recognized after a moment. “Special Agent,” he said. “Petty Officer Ryan.”
“Good afternoon, Captain.”
No mistaking it, she was avoiding his gaze. The woman seemed to nurse some concealed dislike. For him? For white men? Christians? For all men? He cleared his throat, and dabbed at a trickle with the towel. “How’s it going? Any progress?”
“We’re narrowing down our list.” Ar-Rahim made as if to slide past.
He took her elbow to detain her. Big mistake. She flinched away, eyes blazing. “Don’t touch, Captain!”
“I wasn’t—sorry. Just wanted to ask if there was anything else I could do to help.”
“The investigation is proceeding, Captain Lenson. When I have a conclusion, I’ll let you know.” She grimaced, apparently catching Ryan’s horrified look, and backtracked. “Your people are being helpful.”
“Even the chiefs?”
“We’re making progress. Unfortunately, with the DNA gone, it will be more difficult to make a charge stick.”
“Well, I meant what I said. If you can narrow down to three, four suspects, we’ll lock them down. I don’t want this guy walking around. If I have to restrict the suspects to their battle stations, so be it.”
“Very well.” She started away, Ryan at her heel like an obedient Labrador, then wheeled back, loose robe swishing out around her ankles. “One question.”
“Shoot.” He evened the ends of the towel; he needed to get back to CIC.
“These drills, repair, flooding, abandon ship—even at night—your crew seems very tired. As, if you will excuse me, do you.”
“We exercise all the time, Special Agent. SOP.”
“I’ve ridden a lot of ships, Captain. They don’t drill like you do. And the chief corpsman. Grissett. Do you know he’s worried about you? Your exhaustion. Your mental state.”
“News to me, Special Agent.”
“He’s afraid to tell you.”
“But asked you to mention it?”
“No. He didn’t. Still, you’re pushing too hard. Your crew. And yourself.”
“Maybe because I’ve seen what happens to a ship that wasn’t ready.”
“You mean Horn?”
So she’d read his record. He said evenly, “Yes. I don’t plan ever to go into harm’s way without being fully prepared. If that means I have to ‘push too hard,’ so be it.”
She met his eye at last. “You seem tense to me too, Captain. Do you expect a battle?”
“This is a warship, Special Agent. And we’re in a war zone. So, yes, we could see action.” He took a deep breath. “If you hear general quarters, lay to your cabin. If things go really bad, it might not matter if you catch this guy. We’ll all go down together.”
“That’s what Corpsman Ryan here was saying.”
“Well, she’s right. But until then, yeah, by all means, pursue your investigation.”
He evened the ends of the towel one last time, and turned away. But he could feel her gaze on his back.
* * *
THE hours oozed by. EW reported jammers going active, then shutting down, on the mainland. Like an orchestra tuning up. He considered going back to his cabin, but instead reclined his seat in CIC and tried to relax. Until, around 1700, strikes began lifting from the military airstrips. He still didn’t have linkage with ROC air defense, so all he had was Savo’s own Aegis. Still, it lit dozens of contacts. A swarm of hornets milled, coalescing, then turning east. They ate up the hundred-mile crossing minute by minute. More contacts winked on over the island. ROC fighters, dispersed, concealed, but rising now to intercept. He admired their courage. But there were so few. So very few.
Blue semicircles met red carets. Flickered, and went out. Red symbols vanished too. But the swarms inched onward, clicking closer to the island with every sweep of Savo’s SPY-1.
“We’re seeing a lot of surface radars coming on,” the EW petty officer called. Dan got up, back creaking, and went to stand behind him as he called out various commercial and military ship radars. Dan sent a Flash reporting the beginning of the invasion. He got an acknowledgment but nothing more.
Matt Mills and Chip Fang started a plot. By local dusk, putting together what Mills observed with the intel on the Chinese op plan Fang had brought with him, they were able to brief him. Two transit lanes were being set up, out of Fuzhou and Quanzhou. Fang suspected there might be more farther south, out of radar range. “The lead units are emerging,” he murmured. “A powerful force. Not just amphibious units. Also commercial transports. Hydrofoils. Surface effect craft.”
Dan braced with legs apart as Savo rolled. As the birds had predicted, the wind was rising. Which would pitch up the seas, but probably not enough to discommode a cross-channel movement. �
�Is it possible this is a feint?”
“Not with this level of effort, Captain. And not with the submarine pre-positioning Pittsburgh reported this morning.” Fang eyed the pencil sketch of the transit channels he’d laid out on the command desk. “This will be at least two divisions. Most likely, four. The northern elements are stronger than we anticipated. Which means the landing may not be on the southern beaches.”
“Okay, then what’s the landing point?”
Fang ran his fingers along the coastline. “Taiwan is mountainous. We have always considered there are only a few possible places they could come ashore. That, of course, is where we have concentrated our defenses. It does seem, so far, as if their analysis is the same as our own. With a significant exception. We expected several landing points. Instead, they are concentrating their preparatory bombing on one. On the military airfield and air-defense battery just south of Hsinchu.”
Dan peered at the map. A city. The mouth of a river. But the hydrography didn’t look all that promising. “Uh—where’s the beach?”
“You’re right. It is not great terrain. Mudflats, mostly. But, as you recall, Inchon had mudflats. It does offers advantages to a small force with heavy air support. Which they have, from the Putian complex, across the strait.” Fang looked sober. “Our army will inflict heavy losses. But if they can take the airfield, and cut the main north-south road, they will isolate Taipei. It also gives them a small port. We will mine it, but they can send their air-cushion vehicles up the river to destroy the bridges. Again, reducing north-south movement and our ability to reinforce.”
A silence went around the table. Finally Fang murmured, “If America truly wished to help … Once the mainlanders are ashore, it will be difficult to dislodge them.”
Dan took a deep breath. The Koreans were on board. Enthusiastically, but that was Min Jun Jung’s way. The Japanese had made it clear they would follow Dan in, if he went. The only thing he was missing was Fleet authorization. And they’d be waiting on PaCom, who would be waiting on the Joint Chiefs. “I’m going to need a few minutes,” he muttered. The others looked down at the maps, or up at the displays. Where the first wave was setting out into the open sea.
It meant men would die. Chinese, yes. Americans, possibly. Koreans and Japanese, too, probably.
“I’m going outside the skin of the ship for a minute,” he told Mills. The operations officer nodded.
When he let himself out the sky was orange, peach-blossom, lavender. The colors burned like soundless fire under the high, fluffy, beautiful clouds common to the Western Pacific. Each detached from its peers, like them, yet separate, they skated past overhead. With a steady humming whoosh Savo churned through three-foot seas the color of burnt glass. Leaning over the lifelines, he tracked tiny sprigs of algae, no, some kind of weed passing down the side. They bobbed serenely, each, no doubt, freighted with its own tiny creatures. Until Savo’s bow wave creamed over them, tearing those universes apart.
War would tear many universes apart.
He lifted his face to a gleaming Venus low in the west. China had perceived weakness, friction, and opportunity. A tyrant had grabbed the levers of power, and steered her toward war.
But now was no time for regrets. It was a time for warriors. Not that he thought of himself as one, precisely. But ready or not, he seemed to be the guy on the spot.
He strolled aft, hands locked behind him, toward the boat deck. The whalelike bulk of the hoisted inflatable.
The Navy hadn’t carried out a night surface attack since 1945. He could lose a ship. Hell, facing the waves of aircraft, not to mention the bristling guard-line of destroyers and frigates, he could lose all his ships.
He had two choices. One: stay in position and request orders. Which obviously weren’t going to come until it was too late. It would be safer. Stay put. Wait.
Two: make the decision himself. Grasp the nettle. Strike when the invaders were at sea.
Savo’s motto. He’d never liked it, but it sounded right just now. Hard blows.
The sun glowered with a last despairing flash, heatless and sullen scarlet. The sea burned gold. Then, somehow, it sucked the sun down into it, the deep red orb shimmering like a stranded jellyfish on a brazen beach.
Dan stood watching, fingers tucked into the belt loops of his coveralls. Hoping they all would see it rise again tomorrow.
Then turned away, and let himself back into Combat.
20
THE word had gone out.
Dragonglass.
Dan sat back in his command chair, flash hood pushed back over his collar, and wondered if it might not be wisest to unsay it. Except for the rush of air-conditioning and the tremor of the deckplates beneath his boots, Combat was dead still. Everyone was already in flash gear, socks pulled over pants cuffs, sleeves rolled down. Not that it would do much good in the case of a direct hit. The Chinese, following their Russian mentors, believed in big missiles.
On the display, the blue circles denoting friendly ships were moving into position, kicked up to flank speed, running all out. He was taking his ships south in the classic night-attack formation. Line ahead, but in two separate columns. Mitscher led. The Burke-class, with its all-steel superstructure, Dan judged more survivable than Savo. Savo came next, though, at an interval of three nautical miles. Then the Japanese destroyer, Chokai. Curtis Wilbur, another Burke-class, brought up the rear now, but during the withdrawal, she’d face the enemy last.
If they actually got to withdraw.
The second line, ten miles to the west, was Korean. Dan had left its disposition to Jung. He had no doubt the Koreans would fight. Extricating them might be more difficult.
In general, U.S. sensors outranged those of the Chinese. Which meant he’d have a slight advantage as he closed. That would vanish as he came within range of the ships and aircraft guarding the northern invasion lane. He’d thought about going in silent, radars off, but the risks were too great. They would go in radiating. Able to see, but also, unfortunately, losing surprise.
Next to him, Fang spoke urgently into the red phone. He was trying to arrange a coordinated attack. If the still-considerable ROC surface forces could pincer from the south as Dan closed from the north, maybe they could cut the lane entirely. And air cover, of course, would help immensely.
It hadn’t been gamed. But it was all he could come up with to give himself an advantage.
Someone cleared his throat behind him. Dan twisted, to confront Wenck’s blue eyes. “What you got, Donnie? I mean, Chief?”
“An anomaly. SPY-1’s picking up one of those funny high-altitude contacts again.”
Dan frowned. They’d seen them before in the Strait of Hormuz, then again in the Indian Ocean. Always close to land, but very high, very small, and moving so slowly and with such a small radar cross section that they couldn’t be aircraft. “How high?”
“This one, eighty thousand feet.”
“We gotta figure out what these are, Donnie. You report them, right?”
“Every time. But, you know, now I got an idea what to do about it.”
“Yeah? Well, look, can we discuss it later? This isn’t really the time. Okay?” He looked to Fang as the liaison hung up, muttering. “Any joy?”
“They will see if it can be done. You might have two F-16s.”
“Only two … How about jamming?”
“I don’t think you will have to worry about that. We’ve invested heavily.” Fang grinned. “And we have a few other surprises for them too.”
“Not mines,” Dan said, tensing.
“Oh, certainly. But not in your path. No. I have also checked that none of our submarines will be in the sector. Any you detect, you may attack.”
He couldn’t help blowing out. A relief … Pittsburgh already had two Chinese boats localized. He wanted to keep her covert as long as possible, though, so Red Hawk and Chokai’s helos were vectoring out. In a few minutes …
The ASW controller: “Fish away, Red Hawk 202.”
In Dan’s own headphones, tuned to the command net: “Ringmaster, this is Mount Shiomi. Torpedo away.”
A minute passed another. Then, a yell from behind the curtain to Sonar. “Detonation, bearing two two five. Range indeterminate.”
“Very well.”
“Breaking up noises, bearing two two five.”
He cradled his head in his hands, trying not to think about what was happening to the men in that crushing shell of steel. One sub down, but where was the other? Another minute ticked by. At last he clicked to Red Hawk’s frequency. “Stafer, this is the captain. We’re not hearing a detonation on your drop. Refire.”
“Red Hawk. Refiring.” The pilot’s laconic drawl.
From the Aegis console, Donnie Wenck: “Skipper, we got trouble. Four air hostiles, breaking off from that strike group I’m highlighting.”
“TAO: Tracking 0817, 0818.”
Dan blinked up at red carets. Each H-6D carried two C-601 antishipping missiles. Obviously positioned to orbit over the invasion lanes, in case of just such an attack as he was carrying out. Fortunately, his crew had encountered this missile before. The Chinese had sold them to Syria and Iran, and Wenck had ginned up a way of hijacking the altimeters that made them plunge into the sea. Still, he couldn’t assume the Chinese hadn’t updated the range gate circuitry. “Uh, Captain Fang … those F-16s you mentioned anywhere in range?”
“Not launched yet. Available in fifteen.”
“Uh, that’s gonna be too late, Chip. I’m going to have to take these guys.” Dan reached out to the Fire Auth switch. He flicked the protective cover up and snapped it to ON.
He said quietly, “Designate to Standard, TAO. Take ’em.”
Beside him, Mills repeated the command for two two-round salvos. He backed it up with the click of his keyboard.
With a thudding whunk, the vent dampers clamped closed. The ventilation died, the rush of cold air bleeding to a halt.
The roar penetrated the deckplates, the stringers, the hull. A white burning like an ascending saint climbed skyward in the aft display, illuminating everything around it with brilliant light and stark shadow.