Onslaught

by David Poyer

  A hesitation; then a taken-aback voice said, “Uh, we can set that anywhere from twelve to thirty miles, Captain. If you really want it to go slow.”

  “How fast is slow?”

  “Twenty knots?”

  “Set it up,” Dan told Mills. And clicked to VHF. Mustering all his persuasiveness, he said, “War Drums, this is Ringmaster actual. Over.”

  “War Drums actual, over. Hello, Dan. Side by side we ride into battle.”

  “Uh, right. About a torpedo attack. Excellent idea. Propose we execute coordinated torpedo attack at time thirteen. All units. Then execute simultaneous turnaway, time one five. Over.”

  “This is War Drums. That’s extreme range.”

  “We’ll put ASROCs out there first, to slow them down and sow confusion. At low speed, our regular fish will arrive just as they’re milling around. While we’re withdrawing to fight another day.”

  He waited, fidgeting with the headset. “Think he’ll go for it?” Mills muttered. Dan shrugged. Rolled his eyes. Caught everyone in the space staring at him. He forced a confident smile, but he didn’t feel like smiling.

  “This is War Drums. You don’t want to close to gun range?” The Korean sounded doubtful, as if Dan proposed taking away something he’d long dreamed of.

  “Can’t risk it, Min. I can gamble with my force, but your ships are too important to Korea. We need you out of here in one piece.”

  Another too-long pause. Then, “War Drums. Agreed. Fish in the water at time thirteen. Turn away together at time fifteen. Out.”

  “Vampire, vampire … multiple seekers, bearings two four zero to two eight zero,” the EW petty officer announced. “Eight, ten … sixteen … too many to count. TAO, EW: exceeding jamming, spoofing capability.”

  “Time on target,” Mills muttered, bent over the keyboard. “Roughly … ten minutes.”

  “On the ASROC—”

  “Curtis Wilbur, Chokai, Mitscher. Total round count, twenty-one. How many of them do we hold back?”

  “None,” Dan said. “This is our chance to inflict serious damage. Pass range, bearing, course, and speed on the formation.”

  The TAO looked uncertain. But just said, “Setting up to fire.”

  Dan pushed both hands over his hair. The palms came away cold and wet. He wouldn’t be within range, for the surface-launched torps, for another five minutes. The incoming wave of sea-skimmers would hit them in the middle of their turn away. According to his inventory board, he had eight evolved Sea Sparrows and four SM-2s left. He could expend them all, and still not … but wait … the incoming missiles would see, not one, but eight different targets.

  Unfortunately, the first line they’d hit, coming from the west, would be the Koreans. And they had little more than point defense. He’d have to cover them. He passed a warning to Jung, brought Mills up to date on his intent, then checked the clock again. Four more minutes. He clicked to Weps Control, confirmed that they were prepared to fire, and that all the fish were set to minimum depth. There wasn’t a discrete antisurface mode on the 46, but he had to believe they’d attack a ship. Otherwise all a sub would have to do was surface, and the torp would ignore it.

  Then he sat back, trying to pull his head out of the now and look down from ten thousand feet. If they could extricate … return to barrier patrol? But what good would it be holding the sea north and south of Taiwan if the island itself fell?

  “It’s up to us now,” Fang said softly, as if reading his thoughts. “But, like I said. It is a battle we have been preparing for for a long time. They will not find it easy.”

  “Mitscher, damage report … stand by … Mitscher reports another hit. Midships this time. Warhead failed to detonate, but they’ve got a fuel fire—”

  “TAO: tracking 0823, 0824, 0825, 0826—”

  “Take the ones vectoring for the starboard line with Standard. The ones coming for us, with Sea Sparrow,” Dan told Mills. He reached out and kneaded his shoulder. “Keep cool, Matt. We’re gonna pull through this.”

  “Think so, Skipper?”

  “Leaker, leaker!”

  They both jerked their heads up to see, in the aft camera, a scarlet pinpoint, terrifyingly close. The camera jerked up, following it, as a solid stream of white-hot light reached up. The bass BRR BRR BRRRP of the Phalanx shuddered from aft, along with the thuds of IR flares. A pop-up, Dan thought in that frozen second. A low, fast, possibly supersonic missile attacking from astern. Neither Aegis nor the EWs had picked it up until its final maneuver. The hot red star of its exhaust drifted downward, past and through the white-hot beam of 20mm shells, and passed out of the field of view.

  “That goddamned second submarine,” Mills muttered. “The bastard’s behind us.”

  The whole ship shivered to a violent detonation. The lights flickered, screens flickered. Alarms began to beep and whine.

  “Missile hit forward,” the 1MC announced. “Repair Two provide.”

  The CIC officer pulled up the forecastle camera. Smoke was blowing aft. For a couple of seconds they couldn’t see anything. Then they could: the bright orange flicker of a major fire. Off on the horizon, more flashes and tracers where Mitscher was blazing away.

  “Don’t lose focus, Matt. We’re gonna have to buckle down if we want to get our cans out of here in one piece.”

  Mills looked puzzled. Then he smiled, reluctantly. “Nice pun there, Captain. You’re a cool one, aren’t you?”

  “It wasn’t a pun,” Dan said. “Oh. Yeah. I guess it was.”

  “Two minutes to torpedo launch. Stand by for hard left turn.”

  The EW operator called, inflection near despair, “Vampire, vampire. Tracks … too many tracks to count. And more behind them.”

  A hatch popped open in the light of the flames. The ship shuddered, and the camera went blank with the white blast of booster rockets. Answering roars growled from aft, and the five-inch guns began to bang. Savo leaned hard as the screen blanked again. Alarms beeped and whined, a deafening, pulse-racing chorus. On the rightmost display, the red carets of incoming missiles converged. Dan stared, entranced, horrified, and carefully lifted his hands from the keyboard.

  In full automatic mode, USS Savo Island fought on, for all their lives.

  21

  AISHA lay staring at the overhead, blanket pulled close. Her daughter’s picture was wedged where she could see it in the half-light from the porthole. A distant bell rang on and on. She squeezed her eyelids shut, waiting for another explosion. The first had shaken the bulkhead, made the picture jump and fall. After it, a stampede of feet, and frantic, uninterpretable announcements over the 1MC.

  For the past day, she’d been all but locked in here. Ryan had said she could wait with them in sick bay, help out, if they took casualties. She’d spent a couple of tense hours there, but at last had returned to her cabin. And cowered here since, hugging the curved yellow plastic of the emergency breathing device. As embarked staff, agents had been trained on what to do during emergencies. Unlatch the top, pull out the hood, bite on the mouthpiece. The oxygen flow started by itself. If she had to get out, she needed to be able to breathe. “Just remember, topside, fast as you can,” Differey had told her. “Get to the open air. There might not be a lot of time.”

  She’d interviewed the helo copilot the day before, in a makeshift ready room off the hangar. Though the term “hangar” was a joke here after the yawning, blocks-long cavern that went by that name on the carrier. Here it was just adequate to squeeze a helicopter into with its blades folded. Jeffrey Differey was tall, all right, with close-cropped sandy hair, bright green eyes, and a disarming smile. Yeah, she could agree with Ryan. He was cute.

  She’d begun, “You seem to be cutting quite a swath through the female crew, Mr. Differey.”

  “Call me Storm.” A disarming grin. “Hey, if anything’s happening, and I’m not admitting a thing, it’s consensual.”

  “I’m sure. Is that why you’re ranking number three on Gang Bang Molly?”

>   A frown. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” He leaned back. “I’m at sea here, Special Agent. So to speak.”

  “I have the rankings of the players, off the records Mr. Carpenter maintained, down in his little dirty sonar room. Number three, ranking Gangsta, name Storm.”

  “Sorry. Check my flight schedule against when this other guy was playing. You’ll see.”

  She’d actually thought of bumping the online time against watch schedules, but Carpenter had insisted that data had vanished when the CO had ordered the game scrubbed. “So you’re saying whoever used the player name Storm wasn’t you?”

  “Could be anybody. The Barfin’ Bears, our squadron, we got a tradition. Putting stuff over on each other. Could be the crew chief, one of the guys. Or anybody, really.”

  They’d stared at each other until she’d drawn breath, glancing down again. “This questionnaire. ‘What should happen to the person who did this?’ You write, ‘Tie him down and let the girls have him.’ What exactly do you mean by that?”

  Differey had bared his teeth, a little-boy-caught-out expression. “Guess I didn’t take it seriously.”

  “I see. So what do you think, seriously?”

  “Rape’s a crime. If it was rape.”

  “If?”

  “That’s what I said. Word is, the Terror was pretty much green-decked for anybody.”

  “Green-decked?”

  “Cleared for landing. Ready to hook up.”

  “And you decided to give her a try?”

  The pilot had lifted his hands and winked. “Not me, Special Agent. Got other arrangements, if you know what I mean.”

  * * *

  THE ship had gone to general quarters shortly thereafter. But later that day she’d managed one more short interview, with the Iranian, Kaghazchi, in one of the supply offices.

  The minute he’d come in, she’d felt it. Maybe it was her head scarf. Or just her color: Iranians weren’t the most racially tolerant people around. But he’d seated himself without a word, folded his arms, and stared over her shoulder. Not at her, past her.

  “Storekeeper Third Kaghazchi.”

  He inclined his head regally, gaze nailed to the bulkhead.

  “You’re a storekeeper. With access to the storerooms.”

  “Correct.” A bass rumble deep in his chest.

  “D’you know Seaman Colón?”

  “I know her.” Guardedly.

  Colón had been attacked in one of the supply spaces. Aisha looked over his questionnaire. “You say here, ‘I write the absolute truth.’ I respect that.”

  He nodded, and she went on, “You say both the man who had intercourse with Petty Officer Terranova, and Terranova herself, should be whipped, then killed.”

  He nodded. “That is correct.”

  “I understand you’re Iranian. But you know we’re in the United States now?”

  “Of course. But you didn’t ask, what should happen according to the law. You asked what I thought. A woman cannot be forced to submit unless she is unconscious. The women on this ship are whores.” Dark eyes burned under beetled brows.

  “That’s … a strong opinion, Bozorgmehr.”

  “You ask me, I tell.” He shifted on the chair. “But I didn’t rape. Captain Lenson calls me to CIC, to speak on the radio. I don’t tell him what I think. Only translate what I hear. Say what I am told to say.”

  “And to the bridge? Sometimes?”

  “Yes. I speak on the radio from there.”

  “Where were you the night Terranova was attacked? On the bridge then?”

  “Working, doing inventory, back in the dry stores.”

  “Are you Saturn? Or Storm?”

  A moment’s hesitation. Then a lofty, “I have no idea what you are talking about.”

  “You don’t play Gang Bang?”

  “If you mean a game, I play chess sometimes. That is the only one.”

  She couldn’t shake his lofty rectitude. Which left her, when she finally let him go, deeply suspicious. The most outwardly sanctimonious were often the most depraved in private. And the ones who urged the harshest sanctions, oddly, were often those who deserved to have punishment visited on them.

  It seemed to be human nature.

  * * *

  SO she’d spent the rest of the day waiting for the shell or torpedo that would end everything, while bells rang, guns banged, and several times a hoarse roar shook everything, knocking her phone off the charger stand. The ship kept tilting and rattling, like a bus going over cobblestones at seventy miles an hour. The PA system kept warning people to stand clear of the main deck, or called so and so to lay to here or there on the double. Then the explosion had shaken the bulkheads, knocked the picture down.

  But gradually, as the hours wore on, the fear wore off. Or maybe she was just getting numb. And hungry, she’d had nothing to eat since morning. Eventually she turned on the desk light and started going over her notes. Sooner or later, if they didn’t get sunk, she’d have to report on the investigation.

  What did she have? Not much. No hard evidence. No eyewitnesses. She’d gone over the tapes from the flight deck cameras, with no real progress. Maybe eliminated a couple of possibilities … Carpenter, for instance. And the pilot, Differey. She’d looked at the flight logs, maintained by the air boss in CIC, and his alibi checked out; he could hardly have assaulted anyone if he was in the air.

  But what did that leave her with? The SCAN had netted more suspects, not winnowed them down. If there were two suspects, an Article 32 could be convened, with the covering Region Legal Service Office having buy-in. But she still had four or five. Benyamin, Peeples, Kaghazchi, Wenck. Lenson? She couldn’t rule him out. He certainly had access.

  Coming to the ship, she’d counted on the DNA. Maybe too much. A comfortable backstop that had all but assured she’d clear the case, given time for forensics in San Diego. But it had disappeared in the microwave.

  If she came up with no clear suspect, the case would go cold … meaning the file would stay open, but all investigative steps had been exhausted. That was the trouble with modern forensics. They made you lazy. She’d been around long enough to remember when they hadn’t had DNA profiling, or IR imagery, or even reliable testing, really, for blood type. Back then you depended on confessions. Sweating the truth out of scared men. Now, the new agents, coming in … if they didn’t have fingernail scrapings and hair samples, semen or blood, they hardly knew where to start.

  But she didn’t want to walk away. Not leaving a three-time offender loose aboard ship.

  Like the man in the stairwell …

  The harsh keen of a boatswain’s whistle. “Now secure from general quarters. Set the Condition Three underway watch. On deck watch section two. Battle messing will be available on the mess decks and in the wardroom until twenty hundred.”

  She lay for several more seconds, staring at the picture of her little girl. Then rolled out and headed for the wardroom.

  * * *

  THERE were only a few officers at evening meal. The darken-ship curtains were drawn. Plates of cold cuts, sandwich makings, a tureen of chili on the sideboard. The CO was nowhere to be seen. Aisha joined the line, and found herself behind the exec. “Commander.”

  “Special Agent.” Staurulakis looked haggard, pasty. She kept sighing, as if she couldn’t get enough air.

  “What’s happening?” Aisha asked. “All I hear is guns going off, and the engines. It’s sort of … terrifying?”

  The exec told her, in a monotone, that the Chinese had carried out a second major bombardment. The Taiwanese were fighting back, but no one knew how long they could keep it up. “You know we lost Mitscher, right? Hit by three missiles. Heavy damage. The captain ordered her to withdraw.”

  “I heard an explosion—”

  “A sea skimmer hit us. We’re still isolating damage, bridging the electrical power and firefighting loop, but it wasn’t as bad as it could have been. Minor casualties, no dead, thank God.”r />
  “Yes, thank God.” They got to the tureen. Aisha hoped it was beef chili. “Are we winning?”

  A shadow crossed the exec’s face. “Hard to tell when you’re down in the trenches. The Chinese are taking losses. But they started with more pieces on the board. We’re almost out of ordnance. We lost a Japanese destroyer, too. Torpedoed. Roosevelt strike group’s on the way, but if the enemy can hold the flanks, isolate the battlefield, they can come across the strait in force. And they’ll probably win a land battle.”

  Aisha sucked a breath. “I wish there was something I could do.”

  “I know, it’s hard being an extra wheel. Did Grissett talk to you about lending a hand in sick bay?”

  “Ryan will call if they need me. For … mass casualties.”

  Staurulakis started for the table, carrying her bowl, but stopped. “So where are we on the investigation? Have the questionnaires narrowed it down?”

  “Actually, they produced two fresh suspects. I eliminated one, but the other’s still viable.”

  “If I asked who the front-runners are—”

  “I couldn’t tell you.”

  Staurulakis nodded heavily. “We can’t let a monster like this make the ship his hunting ground. The best thing you can do for us right now is nail him. And give everyone a sense of hope.”

  Aisha followed her to the table. Looked at her bowl. Then pushed it away, and reached for the sandwich makings.

  * * *

  THE passageways were rolling violently. She started down to sick bay, but a damage-control team was busy at the bottom of the ladderway. She didn’t feel like picking her way through the hoses and cables snaked across the filthy deck. Instead, she backed away, irresolute. What now? Differey had suggested she cross-check watch bills with her suspects.

  She could do that. But suddenly she didn’t want to. She sighed, just as Staurulakis had, and turned and climbed the ladder again. Went aft, through empty passageways, dogging and undogging doors behind her, until she got to her cabin.

  She was reaching for the light switch before she realized her door hadn’t been locked.

  When she clicked the switch, nothing happened.