Deep Star

by Jerry Ahern

  Hooks nodded. “I will try but you have to understand... I have to not only look at your wishes, Michael. I have to look into the legality, our national security, hell, even our national image. This transition will have to be so tightly managed; we will have to plug gaps that don’t even exist at this moment. And... we have to structure and manage for a future; a future that also doesn’t exist yet.”

  Michael stood and extended his hand to Hooks. “My Dad always told me to focus on today; not on yesterday which is already gone, but plan for the tomorrow that isn’t here yet.”

  Chapter Seventy-Seven

  Otto Croenberg was no longer wearing the Darrel Johnson disguise as he sat with Paul Rubenstein. He said, “You are serious about this?”

  Paul nodded. “Michael is. There will be a lot of moving parts to this Otto. Some of them... well they may belong to you. Sarah told me about your conversation with her. Thank you for that, it meant a lot to her. It means a lot to the rest of the family and if we can get John back, it will mean a lot to him.”

  Croenberg nodded. “I hope I was able to convey I meant no disrespect to you or Michael.”

  Paul smiled. “You did, have no concerns, and again, my family thanks you for the offer.”

  Croenberg said, “Honestly Paul, on one hand I want to go with you on this search...”

  Paul stopped him. “Not this time, maybe another. Michael, Natalia, Annie and I discussed the possibility and we are in agreement. We need and want you here to watch not only over Sarah, but Emma and the baby. While your continued role as Darrel Johnson is a real probability... they need to be your primary focus.”

  Croenberg said solemnly, “I will guard them as if they were my own family. In a way they are. Plus, I don’t want to have to deal with an angry Jew and the rest of the Rourke family if I fail.” He smiled.

  Paul smiled back. “Don’t screw this up, you Nazi bastard.” Then they shook hands.

  Croenberg said, “I think it is time for me to have a conversation with the Aqrab.”

  Tuviah Friedman sat across from Otto Croenberg, a situation he had not contemplated. After studying Croenberg, Tuviah asked, “Why are you telling me this, Herr Croenberg?”

  Croenberg smiled. “You told Mr. Delys and Mr. Shaw that you work for an organization which hunts Nazis, more accurately Neo-Nazis. I believe it is called the Aqrab?”

  Friedman nodded as he stoked the Meerschaum pipe to life. “Correct.”

  “You believed I was part of a plot to harm Paul Rubenstein, I am not.” Friedman nodded again and Croenberg continued, “You also said that the Aqrab was not a ‘well known entity’ and you sought neither ‘acknowledgement nor accolades.’ The Aqrab concerns itself with beginnings and endings and focuses on protection, not necessarily of the individual but the essence of the Jewish people.”

  “Again Sir, you are correct.”

  Croenberg smiled. “Then Tuviah, I am giving you a gift. The beginning of the ending of the Neo-Nazi movement.” Friedman’s eyes widened for an instant but said nothing. “I have a man on the inside and a plan in motion, but it will require your people to complete it. It cannot be tied in any way to an individual; any individual. Are you interested?”

  Tuviah Friedman stared at the former Neo-Nazi with a glare. “Why, Herr Croenberg, are you giving me this gift? What is in it for you?”

  “A fair question, Tuviah.” Croenberg sat back, thinking. “The answer is a simple one: my redemption.”

  Chapter Seventy-Eight

  Fred Williams was tired, but excited. He and his team had been crunching data and numbers, and then they crunched them two more times. He was confident he had the answers his president needed. He made the call to Tim Shaw.

  “Shaw.”

  “Mr. Shaw, this is Fred Williams.”

  “Hello Doc, how is it coming?”

  “I think I have your answers. I think it is time to meet again.”

  “You sure?”

  “I believe so, Mr. Shaw. We’ve been over the data enough; I’m willing to say, yes.”

  “I’ll make the call then. Stay close to your phone and be ready to move when I call.” Shaw broke the connection before Williams could answer.

  Michael Rourke’s new cell phone jingled. Shaw had insisted on a new, untraceable burn phone for conversations of this nature. “Hello,” Michael said.

  “The man with the magnetic personality wants to meet,” Shaw said.

  “Good news?”

  “Seems like it,” Shaw said. He could hear Michael take a deep breath and slowly release it.

  “Excellent, same procedure and location as last time,” Michael said. “Let me call the others. Call me back with the time and you handle transport like last time.”

  Shaw said, “Will do. He seems pretty excited Michael, this could be it.”

  “I’ll have my fingers crossed,” Michael said and broke the connection; he began calling the rest of the family.

  Natalia, assisted by several linguists who spoke and read Russian, was the first to find a clue. An obscure clue, but still a clue. Her team of linguists began to pour over the mass of data, yet again. She called Michael. “Hey, I think I have found something. What do you know about underwater habitats?”

  “You mean like Mid-Wake?” he asked.

  “Yes,” she said.

  “Not much,” he said, thinking. “According to what we learned at Mid-Wake, when we first found it, underwater structures had been around for a long time, mostly for underwater research on marine environments. Most of the early ones lacked regenerative systems for air, water, food, electricity, and other resources. However, recently some new underwater habitats allow for these resources to be delivered using pipes, or generated within the habitat, rather than manually delivered.”

  “Correct,” Natalia agreed. “They were also used to study the needs of human physiology and the physical environment.” Things like pressure, temperature, light, humidity and toxins associated with living at depth. Research was devoted particularly to the physiological processes and limits of breathing gases under pressure, and astronaut training, as well as for research on marine ecosystems.”

  “If I’m remembering correctly, didn’t the studies began in the early 1960s and were built by private individuals or governments?”

  “Yes,” she said. “The early ones were used almost exclusively for research and exploration, but there was at least one underwater habitat that had been provided for recreation and tourism.”

  “Okay, so what have you found?” He could hear her shuffling papers in the background.

  “I know the Russians had one,” she said. “But, I think I have evidence of another; I have found references to something called Gluboko Zvezda. In English that means Deep Star. It was built to study such things as microbes and how they develop when a person is injured and develops gas gangrene.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Bad stuff. There was an underwater habitat called La Chalupa that operated in Puerto Rico before the Night of the War and they had an accident,” she explained. “During the habitat’s second mission, a steel cable wrapped around one individual’s left wrist, shattering his arm, which he subsequently lost to gas gangrene. Gas gangrene is most often caused by bacteria called clostridium perfringens. Clostridium is found nearly everywhere, but no one had studied the effects at great depths. The bacteria grows inside the body, it makes gas and harmful substances or toxins that can damage body tissues, cells, and blood vessels.”

  “Interesting, but I don’t see the connection.”

  “Let me finish. Construction on Deep Star was begun in 1970s; it cost billions of dollars to build. In 1979, two years before the Night of the War, record keeping on the project was stopped and most purged from the Russian achieves. Our research indicates it was for more than some kind of underwater medical study. We found some of the old shipping records were missed in the purge, and dealt with supplies, construction and logistics. There are mentions of ‘special packages’;
that’s how the Russian government referred to nuclear missiles.”

  Michael frowned. “Do you have an idea where it was?”

  “Yes,” she said. “The same trench where the anomaly is located, that seems pretty coincidental, don’t you think?”

  Michael was quiet for a moment. “Too coincidental, good work; now all we have to do is figure out how to pierce Deep Star’s defense, gain entry and find my father and get out.”

  Chapter Seventy-Nine

  The top secret Lockout Team conference was underway. Retired Captain Daniel Thomas Hasher, former head of operations at the Hopper Information Services Center, said, “Mr. President, allow me to say this operation is speculative. The evidence is circumstantial at best. I am not seeing what I would call actionable intelligence.”

  Michael said, “I understand Captain, the decision to move or not move on this is, however, mine. And I have made it.”

  Hasher nodded and began the briefing, “Sir, the Long-Term Reconnaissance and Combat System or LMRS drones, were designed to be torpedo tube-launched. Even the smaller LMRSs are equipped with both forward-looking and side-scan sonar. We’ll use two of them to pinpoint the target.”

  “Captain, I haven’t heard of this technology, is it new?” Michael asked.

  “Not at all, Mr. President. It is just not well known out of the naval community. As naval requirements changed, we had to develop a primary underwater ‘first strike’ asset.” He pushed a button and a new slide appeared on the screen. “The LMRS are the next generation of manned and unmanned underwater combat vehicles to be used in minefield reconnaissance, intelligence collection, trailing, tagging and deception. But we needed attack capabilities for potential future options, with command modalities that range from simple remote control to near-total autonomy.”

  Hasher changed slides on the big screen. “We also have Manned Underwater Vehicles. This one is the MANTA 6, our latest version. We are also sending ten of them as the main strike force. Each is sixty-five feet long and weighs fifty-five tons and carries a pilot, weapons officer and a squad of eight members of the 442nd. It is cramped but it can handle that many.

  “These are like underwater battleships and carry a variety of full-scale weapons. MANTAs can launch heavyweight torpedoes against enemy ships, submarines, and even shore installations. They are large, somewhat ray-shaped vehicles, and each of the main battle submarines carries four MANTAs externally. Four thruster pods make this our most maneuverable craft.

  “The propulsion systems for the smaller UUVs are similar but not as effective; the MANTAs use a vastly different system. In the last few years we have made progress in propulsion, control, hydrodynamics, and sensor technology as well as operating depth. For this mission we are deploying both MANTAs and UUVs in a coordinated attack system. The MANTAs will have radio control of the UUVs and direct their purpose or... their destruction as needed.”

  “Their destruction would be tied to using them as a weapon, I presume?” someone asked.

  “Exactly,” Hasher responded. “By using UUVs to complement the larger MANTAs, we can have a significant force-multiplier. They are simply a more cost-effective way of getting things done. They have enabled the development of more broadly capable vehicles and freed the imagination of naval planners to propose new and innovative operational applications for them. The UUVs are fifteen feet long and weigh in at about a thousand pounds.

  “DARPA, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, developed these vehicles to have a demonstrated range capability of sixty to one hundred nautical miles, at three to four knots, depending on payload, the most common of which has been side-scan sonar. They are powered by banks of upgraded alkaline-lithium cells and have demonstrated a mission range of slightly over fifteen hundred nautical miles.

  “Each UUV carries a total of six underwater mini-torpedoes; three forward and three aft. The MANTAs, designated to provide cover for the operation, each will carry the same compliment of standard ‘fish’ but will also have a multidirectional energy burst cannon controlled by the pilot. Additionally, these cover craft will have programmable torpedo pods.”

  “So Captain, you think the rescue attempt will be successful?” Michael asked.

  Hasher grew silent. “Mr. President, I can’t make any promises. However, like you I don’t see any other possibilities for finding your father. The discovery of this Deep Star anomaly is... it’s the only lead we may have. None of our efforts have been able to locate him. Obviously, he is not being held at any location we are aware of.”

  Hasher cleared his throat. “Here are our limitations. We don’t have enough information, number one. It is like he has disappeared from the face of the earth. Can I say for sure he is at Deep Star? No. But I can’t say he is not, either. I think we can assume that the docking hatches on Deep Star are no different than those we use at Mid-Wake, although they will be configured for Russian subs. The ones for the MANTAs have been converted to those. If you can gain access to an air lock and dock, you can offload your penetration force and begin your search.”

  “Yeah, then all we have to do is find John Rourke and get out of Deep Star. What about communications?” Jason Darkwater, Michael’s Vice President, asked.

  Hasher said, “Yes, that’s all you have to do. Communications remain a problem area, particularly to and from underwater vehicles at depth. Despite the availability of undersea acoustic communication techniques, in which ‘channel-matching’ and intensive digital signal processing are used to sort out multi-path interference in shallow water, effective data rates will likely be limited to no more than several tens of kilobits per second. Short-range acoustic communications have been used for exchanging data and command information among nearby vehicles and docking stations, or when operating close to manned host platforms.

  “But because so much of the data that prospective long-range missions are intended to collect, are high-bandwidth-like imagery, electronic or communications intelligence, we will use a series of both submerged and surface buoys in contact with both GPS and communication satellites and as relays. Relatively short-range, two-way acoustic data links will establish connectivity between the vehicles and buoys for both data and command/control.

  “Main communication to the operational command will be in the ELF or Extremely Low Frequency bands. That will help avoid detection prior to the attack. As you all know, ELF or sub radio frequencies have a variety of uses. Not the least of which is to communicate with submarines and other submerged targets.”

  Darkwater frowned. “Earlier you had said the KI fleet, and whomever they are communicating with, use our own satellite system to bounce or ricochet messages on a frequency of zero to three hundred Hertz.”

  Hasher nodded. “As you know from your time in the Navy, Sir, it is not only what we use to communicate with our submersed ships, it is the exact system that was used by the old Soviet/Russian Navy using SIASs or Submarine Integrated Antenna Systems.”

  “Mr. President,” Hasher said solemnly. “We have been unable to find and track the flight patterns of the alien craft that took your father. It entered a storm front as it crossed into Canada. We lost it. This is not a strong lead, it simply is the only one we have at the moment. The investigation is continuing and if we find another possible location... we can develop an attack plan for it. Right now, this is the only possibility I see. Do we go?”

  Michael said simply, “We go. Vice President Darkwater, you will assume leadership while I’m gone. Is the cover story, explaining my absence, ready?”

  Darkwater nodded. “Pretty much the same story as the last time. We’ve set up a wing at Tripler Medical Center; part of the staff that removed the tattoos from Kuriname’s people will be used for the cover. I will again temporarily assume the presidency as called for by law when the President is not able to fulfill the office because of medical conditions. We will fake your entry tomorrow and release the story. I’m sure there will be a lot of speculation but we’re on top of it.”
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br />   Michael nodded. “Thank you. I give you my word, this is the last time we will do this.”

  Chapter Eighty

  The MANTA force was divided into two teams of five craft each. Call signs were by team color and sequential numbers: one, two, etc. CWO Wes Sanderson commanded Blue Team, his call sign–Blue One. Akiro Kuriname commanded Red Team, call sign–Red One. Red One and Blue One would be the primary penetration teams, with Red and Blue Two held in reserve until needed. The remaining ships would “fly cover” during the penetration attempt of the Deep Star.

  Sanderson’s ship was piloted by Chief Petty Officer, David Reynolds, a combat veteran and one of the chief instructors at the MANTA facility. Five feet, eight inches tall, Reynolds had dark stubble growing on his head and beard line, and sky blue eyes often described by the ladies as “stunning.” Thirty years old and recently divorced, Reynolds was the best pilot in the MANTA fleet.

  Reynolds’ number two instructor at MANTA, CPO Byron Flores, was Kuriname’s pilot. Flores, a mix of Hispanic and Scottish ancestry, was light skinned with short, flaming red stubble hair and clean shaven. Married with two daughters, Flores was simply called “Pop” around the facility. This was his last mission; after retirement Pop and his family were starting a small farm in southwestern Missouri.

  Squeezed into the cargo compartment, along with eight of Sanderson’s men, was Michael Rourke. Each wore the latest version of the underwater winged dive suit and hemosponges. However, at these depths, they would be useless in free diving but could prove useful in any flooded areas of the Deep Star; provided these did not open out into the Trench itself. The pressures were simply too great; if a MANTA was hit and the hull breached... it was a death sentence.