"El Jefe, the hull is near completion, as you can see," Zurko began. "The control systems and the navigation electronics will arrive next week. We have bought, through our sources in Pakistan, the control system directly from the Servdovinsk Shipyard. It was originally built for a Project 1832A Zibrus mini-sub and will fit our needs as precisely as if it had been designed exclusively for us."
De Santiago interjected, "I would expect nothing less. Our Russian guests designed that boat, after all." He nodded in the general direction of the three stolid Slavic men who were standing quietly to one side, smoking cigarettes and watching de Santiago warily. Their pallor and thick, heavy bodies were contrasted with the dark Latin features and muscled physique of de Santiago. And even Zurko who, though tall and slender, was still well honed from his fighting days.
"El Jefe, the Zibrus was an inspired design,” Zurko said. “A submarine that can crawl on the sea bottom. It is indeed unfortunate that the Swedes found its tracks outside Karlskrona."
The Russians in the room noticeably bristled when they heard the mention of “Karlskrona.” That’s where the Swedes had discovered the first attempted operational use of their mini-sub, even if quite by accident. If it hadn't been for the navigational error of the stupid captain of the archaic Whiskey-boat, if he had not foolishly run aground inside Swedish territorial waters, their prize would never have been discovered. Now they, not the captain who had made the unfortunate mistake, were the butt of all the jokes about "Whiskey on the rocks.”
"Phillipe, you have lectured me at length about the control system on this submarine. And you have described over and over the caterpillar tracks that allow it to be driven on the bottom of the sea. I know more than I would ever need to know about its navigation system.” Juan de Santiago paused pointedly for breath, then looked at Zurko through his dark, bushy eyebrows. “What you have been carefully avoiding telling me about is the power plant. What drives this boat, my friend? What makes her go?"
Zurko sputtered, started to say something else, but bit his lower lip instead. Former Captain Third Rank Rudi Sergiovski, the middle one in the group of three Russian submariners, cleared his throat. In halting Spanish, he began, "Perdoname, El Jefe, but I have thoughts on the subject. The Zibrus was designed for short missions with power to be supplied by the batteries. She is a boat with a quite limited range. You have demanded a much larger boat with much longer range. The batteries, of course, will not be enough."
De Santiago looked hard at the Russian then back out at the boat that was being assembled before him.
"Very well, El Capitan, what do you suggest? Do we equip her with a set of oars and row our way along? I remind you, we have already spent thirty million rubles on this boat and we would prefer that there be some way to propel her through the water."
The implied threat hung heavy in the air.
"El Jefe," Sergiovski answered, "the only solution is an air-independent propulsion system. We have three choices. The Swedes have a fuel cell technology. The Germans have adapted a liquid oxygen system to drive their ‘type-209’ diesel boat. And the Italians are using a liquid oxygen/hydrogen power plant." He paused for effect. "We merely have to acquire one of these."
"When we go shopping, which one of these devices do you propose?" de Santiago asked, the sarcasm heavy in his voice. "I should remind you, Capitan, our arrangement was for a delivered submarine, not for suppositions or a boat that runs on horse shit."
"Don’t worry. We shall have our solution quite soon, I believe," Sergiovski said with a conspiratorial wink. "Now, if you will only join my comrades and me for a glass of wodka, I will explain precisely how we will do it."
Lieutenant Yani Zurkoskovich silently broke the surface of the glassy, calm water. The midnight black was heavy, impenetrable.
What was it the American SEALs said? "The night is your friend."
Most of his life had been spent preparing himself to fight against the Americans in the Great War of Liberation. Years of SPETNAZ training had honed him. He was a fine, killing machine, one of the powerful weapons his nation would use against the capitalist devils when the time came to spread the revolution to the Americas. Now it had all fallen apart. His once-mighty country had been split up. Reduced to nothing more than a jigsaw puzzle on a confusing, demoralizing map. Here he was. No longer a weapon of the masses, but a prostitute mercenary, swimming his way through frigid Swedish waters in the black of the night. All for a few rubles so he could feed his wife and babushka and buy enough coal to keep their squalid little apartment from freezing over.
He shook off his rising depression. He still had skills that were in demand, if not by the Russian people, then at least by someone. Someone he didn’t know and who he preferred remain anonymous. And tonight, he had a job to do. A job that would require his ultimate concentration.
The lights of the shipyard pierced the night a few hundred yards to his right. They danced and sparkled on the water’s surface, guiding him toward shore. He could see the headlamps of the trucks barreling down the E-22 far off in the distance. His eyes adjusted. He could make out the tendrils of mist rising from the ice-cold water into the even colder air. Sea smoke, they called it.
Two more heads broke the surface on either side of him. The other two members of his team looked at Zurkoskovich questioningly. He pointed toward the pier. With hand signs, he told them to rendezvous there.
Lieutenant Zurkoskovich took a careful bearing on the pier and dropped below the surface. He hoped there was enough air in his re-breather to make it in and out again. They would be cutting it very close. The current farther out was stronger than he planned, the swim much harder and longer than anticipated.
The little fishing boat out of Riga was the best cover they could manage on short notice and limited budget. No submarine to sneak as close as possible inside the Karlskrona archipelago this time. The fishing grounds were further out. The boat delivered them as close as they dared. He only hoped the sleazy Latvian fishermen he bribed would stay long enough to pick them up again. That the cold wouldn’t cause them to decide to forfeit the rest of their money.
He swam silently. Zurkoskovich felt rather than heard the slow, heavy beat above him. It was from the screw of the patrol boat. It passed ten feet above his back as it finished another of its continuous circuits of the inner harbor. If his intelligence was correct, the Swedes hadn't changed the patrol cycle since he was last here. They had exactly forty-four minutes until the boat returned.
The three men surfaced next to the wooden pilings beneath the long pier. No light penetrated here. He checked his watch. They had forty-two minutes before the patrol boat returned with its probing searchlights. With a few more strokes, they could feel the sandy bottom under their feet. Sand and shells washed up against the headwall to form a narrow beach.
They tore off their re-breathers and dry-suits. They wore Swedish Navy uniforms underneath. Zurkoskovich carried no weapons except the wickedly sharp fighting knife he always kept strapped to his back. If they needed other weapons, they had already failed this mission.
The diving gear was quickly buried in the soft sand.
Zurkoskovich peeked cautiously above the headwall. No one there. He lifted himself up the two-meter-high wall and looked around more carefully. Still no one.
Strangely quiet for the most important naval base in the Baltic, he thought. He knew that with his country now dismantled, the whole world had seemingly relaxed. A quick hand-sign and the three men stood together at the head of the pier. They were merely three sailors taking a break from their duties for a smoke in the brisk night air.
They strolled along casually. It was as if they belonged in this place, sauntering over toward the large brick building across the road from the pier. Zurkoskovich translated the Swedish lettering on the little brass plaque next to the door. "Headquarters, Submarine Design Bureau." He walked through the door while his companions stepped a short distance to the right and left before blending in to the landscape.
They were his warning if any unpleasant surprise should appear. It was unlikely.
The guard inside the door was barely awake. Zurkoskovich passed his ID under the glass grill. Sleepy eyes gave it a cursory glance before it was slid back to him. The red light beside the door changed to green. The guard was back asleep before the door swung shut.
The long halls were empty. The glass doors he passed on each side opened into equally empty offices. Down one long hall, turn right, then down another, just as he had been briefed.
The lettering on the glass door read "AIP Section." The door was locked, as expected. Zurkoskovich inspected it carefully. No telltale wires or contact pads. The Swedes weren't concerned enough about this section to install a security system.
He produced a little flexible plastic strip from his pocket. It made quick work of defeating the simple lock and Zurkoskovich was inside. He opened the door carefully, in case the Swedes had installed a more sophisticated alarm system. No bells or sirens. A good sign. He listened for armed troops who could be rushing his way without him knowing it, cued by some silent alarm. Nothing. His intelligence had proven to be correct. This highly sensitive area had surprisingly lax security. He went quickly to work.
Zurkoskovich booted-up the computer at a desk marked "Sven Harlinson, Chief Engineer." A few seconds later and he was in. The passwords his employer supplied him worked the first time.
He copied the files he needed from the computer to a Zip disk he had brought with him. He noticed there was an icon on the desktop of the machine for a program labeled, "Requisitions in Progress." He smiled as he double-clicked to open the file. He found the database for all the fuel-cell power plants now in production. Well, nothing ventured, nothing gained. Give it a try. It might well mean a bonus for him from his employer. A few keystrokes and one system ordered by the Royal Australian Navy and about to be shipped was now rerouted to a small Peruvian port. For good measure, he marked the invoice “paid in full.”
While the computer was copying files to the Zip disk, Zurkoskovich searched for hard copy files in the cabinets that lined the office wall. He pulled the miniature digital camera from a pocket and carefully photographed several papers and drawings; always keeping his senses tuned for any sign that someone might be coming.
Ten minutes at Harlinson's desk and he had the complete design for the fuel cell system on the disk. The pop-up window on the computer screen said, "All Files Copied." Nothing to be gained by searching any further here.
Zurkoskovich shut down the computer and carefully surveyed the office. No sign he had ever been there. He slipped out the door, locked it, and sauntered down the hallways. The door guard didn't even look up when he walked past him on his way out. He was sleeping soundly.
Outside, he gave a wave of his hand. His two sentries appeared from out of the shadows. They were three sailors, walking together down the street, a little unsteady, laughing and talking a bit too loudly, on their way back to their ship after a late night in town. No one who saw them would give them a second thought or even remember their passing.
They made their way to the headwall of the pier and stopped for a smoke under the streetlight. Two cars drove by. There were no sirens, no screeching tires, no hail of bullets.
Karlskrona slept peacefully, completely unaware of their presence.
The last car turned and drove out of sight. They were alone with the night. With a slight wave of his hand, Zurkoskovich sent each of his companions over the edge. With a final glance around, he dropped to the little beach below. The three struggled clumsily back into their dry suits. They strapped the re-breathers on their backs. Zurkoskovich carefully put the disk and camera in a waterproof pouch, sealed it, and zipped it inside the dry suit.
He patted the bulge and smiled. It had been so easy. Almost too easy. He checked his watch. Still eight minutes before the patrol boat would come back past. They had made it with time to spare. All they had to do was swim back to the fishing boat and make their way home. In a day, he would have his money, and he could already smell his wife’s cabbage and beef cooking on the stove, already feel her warmth next to him once again.
The three men slipped back into the water and quietly dropped out of sight. Not a ripple, not a bubble betrayed their passage under the icy cold water. Even if someone had been on the end of the pier, he would have never suspected three swimmers moved along directly beneath him, quickly moving toward the mouth of the harbor.
They swam just below the surface on a bearing that took them beyond the small in-shore islands. Little more than rocks breaking the surface of the inner harbor. Skirting the last of the rocks, Zurkoskovich changed course a few degrees to the south, aiming for the strait between Aspo and Tjurko Islands. In mere moments, they would be safely away.
He didn't see the small transceiver floating just above the bottom of the harbor. He couldn't hear the eighty-five kilohertz active sonar. It was far above the frequency range of any man’s hearing. But the pinging painted a clear picture of his and his partners’ passing for the harbor security control center.
The three had just entered the straits between Aspo and Tjurko when they heard the high-pitched whine of the patrol boat approaching from behind them. It was headed somewhere at deliberate high speed.
They heard another patrol boat coming from somewhere in front of them and it, too, was screaming through the water. The screw beat behind grew louder and more distinct, the one in front rose to a crescendo.
Zurkoskovich signaled and they quickly dove for the bottom. If they had somehow been discovered, they had no choice but to hide among the rocks and mud until the patrol boats gave up and stopped looking. The three swam with long powerful kicks of their flippers, moving quickly, just inches above the bottom. They were only a few hundred meters from the open waters of the Baltic now.
They could hear the two boats as they passed directly overhead. They wheeled around and raced by again. Zurkoskovich and his cohorts could not see the sailors on the deck of the two Type-80 Tapper Class patrol boats as they removed the safety locks from the ELMA ASW grenade launchers. He heard multiple splashes all around him.
The grenades, similar to the Soviet RGB-60 depth charge rockets, were meant to disable an intruding submarine. Each carried thirty kilos of high explosives. Even a single grenade detonating within fifty meters of a diver would be fatal. Now, six grenades from each of the two patrol boats sank in a rough ten-meter circle around the divers.
They detonated two meters from the bottom.
Yani Zurkoskovich felt the first fist slam of the concussion drive him hard into the muddy bottom and rip away his mask.
There was a blinding flash of white then nothingness.
The diver lay motionless on the harbor floor. The computer disk and digital camera still formed a bulge inside the wet suit next to his lifeless body.
11
Tom Kincaid slammed the telephone down in frustration. He had spent the better part of the last week placing phone calls that had played out almost identically to this latest one. Phone numbers from his past, most not even answered. He had long ago grown tired of the much-too-sweet but officious mechanical voice: "The number you have dialed is longer a working number." Even more tiring were the ones that did answer, then either pretended to not know who he was or slammed down the phone before he even had a chance to tell them why he was calling.
The most disturbing were those who alternately cried or cursed as they reported that the party he was calling was no longer among the living. And some even spat the blame right back at Kincaid himself.
“You promised him safety if he helped you,” they said. “You may as well have pulled the trigger. You killed him! As surely as the revolutionistas. You killed him!”
He only got the opportunity to explain himself to a couple of the people he called and they feigned deafness or a bad line and quickly disconnected. He had drawn a total blank.
Rick Taylor's political grandstanding had completely destroyed the invaluabl
e network he had spent so much time and personal capital wiring together. He was reaching the end of his contact database. Going through DEA channels was no option. If Taylor caught even the slightest whiff that Kincaid was doing more than “Just Say No” high school assembly presentations, that he was back in business and looking for information, he would drop a ton of bricks on him. Even worse, the bastard would likely have his storm troopers descend on the Pacific Northwest like a Vandal horde, accompanied by a mob of media types, all of them trampling into the mud any chance for a real investigation into what was going on.
There had already been six more ODs since the girl, Sandy Holmes, was found under the bridge. Smartly dressed young people, four women, two men, none with any record or signs of previous coke use, but with their systems loaded with enough of the stuff to kill a horse. There was another common thread. Each of the young women had been well used before they died or shortly afterwards. There was none of the usual evidence of a rape. No torn clothes, no bruising from a struggle, no skin from their attackers beneath their fingernails. None was typical. Each was a mystery. A damned deadly mystery.
Kincaid checked the clock on his office wall and came close to calling it a night. It was almost midnight on the east coast by then. His stomach was growling. He had forgotten to eat since a quick breakfast with Lt. Ken Temple in some cop café downtown.
There was one last number to try, one last hope. May as well make it a clean sweep so he could say he had left no stone unturned. Kincaid punched in the number from memory, a South Florida area code. It rang twice then went silent. He punched in another series of numbers from his mental database and listened to the faint click as several relays kicked in, the connection being re-routed to Cartagena on the Columbian coast.
Final Bearing Page 12