Silent Hunter

by Charles D. Taylor

  As she nibbled halfheartedly at the food she once loved so much, occasionally sipping at the champagne, they talked of the past, the places they’d lived, friends, their children. Their only daughter, married to an engineer living in faraway Irkutsk, had not been back to visit her parents in two years. One son was also a submarine officer, stationed in Petropavlovsk on the Pacific coast. The other was a doctor who seemed to spend more time in special schools than his father thought necessary. The youngsters had their own lives to live and the Danilovs had decided not to trouble them yet. The two older people had been comfortable with themselves. But Abe Danilov had decided to send them each a message before he departed from Moscow. He could see in Anna’s eyes that it was necessary for them to return home for a final visit with their mother.

  Later that evening when he saw her nodding, he said, “I need a few hours of sleep before I go. I think I’ll rest with you.” That, too, had become a ritual once she was unable to leave the apartment. He would change into some old pajamas and a bathrobe, and would climb into bed beside her. They would talk for a while, mostly about their absent children, and then they would sleep for a short time.

  This night, Danilov fell asleep long before he intended. Anna remained awake with her pain. Besides, she had one more letter to write him. There had to be ten if he was to be away ten days. As he snored peacefully beside her, she slowly penned the tenth letter, the last one before he would return to her.

  Abe Danilov was unable to sleep for long periods. Three hours later he was dressed in a fresh uniform, unaware that Anna had not slept. As soon as she finished her letter, she had been satisfied to cradle his head on her shoulder. Just to have him asleep beside her, she could almost forget the pain. He’d awoken in her grasp.

  When he slipped his arms through the sleeves of his greatcoat, she said softly, “Take these with you.” She extended the packet tied with a red ribbon. “You said you would be gone for ten days, I have written you a letter for each of them. So, you see, you have to be back before the eleventh day.”

  Danilov smiled. “All right. I see I have no choice. I wouldn’t know what to do with myself after the last one. I’ll be back in ten days, and we’ll dine again in the other room. The menu will be the same if that’s fine with you.” She nodded. “I’ll look forward to it.”

  He moved to the side of the bed and bent down to kiss her. His warm lips touched her cold ones briefly, then held them longer a second time while he stroked her cheek. “Ten days,” he repeated as he stood erect. Then he was gone. Anna Danilov’s eyes glistened with tears of love as she heard the door shut behind him. Abe Danilov’s were dry until the door was closed. Then there was one deep, gulping sob of loneliness as he descended the dark stairs.

  3

  VICTOR ULANOFF’S DEAD eyes seemed fixed on a star light years away, twinkling brightly down on the Pacific coastline of Washington. With the inherent realization that it was too late, which was simultaneous with the knife slashing across his throat, Ulanoff had accepted his fate. He had been staring in wonder through the night binoculars that Abe Danilov had entrusted to him a few short weeks before. Just as the admiral claimed, they were turning night into day.

  Until moments before, about the time the sensor under his upper arm had pulsed to tell him that the satellite was recording, Ulanoff had been extremely careful. As a matter of fact, he had survived longer than any of the others who had been sent out to infiltrate the Imperator project. But the emergence of the object in question, Imperator herself, was so exciting that his guard had dropped for just long enough. Watching that immense shape emerging from its pen would hypnotize any man . . . and it had.

  It was not a submarine pen in the sense of the old covered piers built in the past to protect submarines. To anyone—whether they were studying a satellite picture accurate to six inches, or even walking across what appeared to the naked eye to be a part of the land jutting out into a small bay on the Pacific Ocean—this was solid land, scrub brush near the water’s edge, apparently farmed recently inland. Waves broke over the rocks and whispered on the sand just as they had seemingly done for hundreds of thousands of years. It was idyllic, and peaceful.

  But nothing can escape the space lenses of the intelligence community for long, and the formation of this peninsula encouraged the attention of a number of Soviet agents, though the disappearances of so many of them failed to create much concern in the Kremlin at first. That is—until it was pointed out that too many of those inserted into the West Coast defense industry were simply dissolving into thin air. The fact that the Americans had penetrated one of their most deeply imbedded spy rings was not nearly as disturbing as the curious reason so many agents were vanishing.

  The Americans normally attended to concentrated infiltration by ferreting out the leaders, tracing the source, producing ugly trials, or initiating exchanges for some of their own. But this time it was so different. The agents simply disappeared without a trace. Occasionally, a job could be botched and a Russian agent could turn up very dead with accompanying publicity. Both sides accepted that. But what was occurring now was extermination, a solution not normally directed by the Americans. So there was reason to find out exactly what had altered their reaction. There had to be something big somewhere on their Pacific Coast, and it was just a matter of time until the Russians found out what.

  In the meantime, the list of Soviet agents who simply disappeared grew longer, and the Kremlin became more impatient—with the lack of intelligence, not with the number of agents lost in the line of duty.

  In the end, Kovschenko’s persistence did pay off. The Imperator Project was discovered, though getting the details took a bit longer, The Kremlin anticipated a submarine well before Kovschenko confirmed its existence by his unfortunate demise.

  Now, on his last night on earth, Ulanoff had been literally hypnotized by the sight of Imperator as she slipped from her pen into the dark, cold Pacific. The people who designed the binoculars for Danilov claimed they turned night into day. That wasn’t quite true, especially when the object of curiosity was an immense, black-hulled submarine. The best way to place Imperator in perspective was by watching the sailors at their stations on her hull. What Ulanoff had seen was a vast expanse of low black submarine, slithering like a snake emerging from a log. The sail was well back on the hull—an awesome sight. The submarine was longer than an aircraft carrier, certainly wider at the waterline, and deeper by far between keel and top of deck . . . and there was so much that he could imagine but couldn’t see.

  As the stem of Imperator emerged completely from the pen, Ulanoff had swung his binoculars all the way back up to the bow to record the impressions of this craft permanently in his mind—which was when he felt the cold steel across his throat. There hadn’t been a sound—or if there was, he was too involved in Imperator to hear it—just the hand from behind lifting his chin at the same time the blade slicked through his exposed neck.

  In the end, Ulanoff was the only Russian ever to have seen the submarine. But the sight had also been recorded from above by an infrared-equipped satellite, and the signals from that inspection had been transmitted instantly back to Admiral Abe Danilov at the Soviet arctic base of Polyarnyy.

  The voice persisted until it became almost part of Danilov’s consciousness. “Admiral . . . Admiral Danilov . . .”

  The sailor would never think of actually touching the man. That was not only rude and ill-mannered, it would be considered intemperate by his seniors. However, the sailor had been with Danilov long enough to know his habits and he could tell that the man was slowly, very slowly this time, bringing himself back to a conscious state. “Admiral, we have satellite confirmation that she’s underway now.” The eyes flicked open, staring up with an intensity that would have shaken any man who did not know Danilov’s habits.

  Abe Danilov’s subconscious fumbled with the distant voice, momentarily rejected it, then reached out instinctively as the sound became more insistent. His sleep had been h
eavy, with no dreaming. There was hardly a man who could achieve that depth of relaxation, almost trancelike, so quickly. Whenever he recognized approaching exhaustion, Danilov simply lay down on his office sofa fully clothed, arms across his chest, and sank into a deep, satisfying sleep. But coming out of that self-induced hypnosis was more difficult, “How long ago?” There had been no movement; the arms remained folded across his chest, but the eyes burned now with an inner strength.

  “No more than ten minutes, Admiral. The duty officer confirmed the infrared readings with one of the technicians first. No doubt about it, Admiral . . . she’s underway on nuclear power.”

  With a sigh, Danilov stretched and eased into a sitting position on the edge of the leather sofa, raising his arms over his head and yawning deeply. “Nuclear power,” he murmured. “I told them it would be . . . no doubt about it when you’re sure of marine shipments up there. It had to be.” He glanced at his watch. “They got underway in the dark, I see.”

  “Yes, sir. It’s sometime after midnight on the American Pacific Coast.”

  “And Ulanoff, have we heard anything from him?”

  “No contact, Admiral.”

  “Thank you. I’m awake now.” He looked up and half smiled. “I won’t fall back asleep. I promise.” He stretched again. “Not now, not when she’s finally underway. Ask the duty officer to try to raise Ulanoff again.” The admiral stood and waved his hand to dismiss the other.

  He splashed cold water on his face in the tiny head, and when he looked up to observe still baggy eyes, he did it again. He also accepted the improbability of anyone getting in touch with Ulanoff. Even drawing his last breath, Ulanoff would have attempted contact if there was a chance. As far as Danilov was concerned, it was quite probable that he was dead, just like all the others who had in any way been involved in what he had finally learned was the Imperator Project.

  This must be similar to being born again, Snow mused in wonder. The immense gates leading to “the world”—that’s what they eventually called everything beyond the submarine pen that had been their home for so long—had opened soundlessly after the pumps brought internal water level equal with the Pacific Ocean. With small tugs cautiously hovering on either side of the bow, Imperator had eased slowly from underneath her camouflaged land canopy into the night ocean.

  Snow muttered the word “forever” (mostly to himself) because it seemed an eternity from the time the sailors on the bow first peered up at the night sky until he would see it. A thousand feet after those first sailors arched their heads back to search for stars, Imperator’s bridge finally inched into the open with a few hundred more feet of stern still to follow.

  Once they were in the open and the dimmed lights in the cavern behind no longer cast a glow over the bridge, Snow removed his red night goggles and bent his own head back to marvel at the stars.

  “Captain.” The speaker on the bulkhead murmured quietly. “This is Carol Petersen. Permission to come to the bridge?”

  “Permission granted.” Glancing over his shoulder, he saw that the fishbowl’s doors had swung shut. They would already be pumping the water out. Imperator would not return, would no longer remain a secret. It was time to begin construction of her sister. As the ship’s foreman commented when they shook hands—“The king is dead, long live the king”—it was time for new life. Imperator was now part of another world.

  The soft whisper of elevator doors behind him heralded Carol Petersen’s arrival. Turning, Snow watched her step from the faint, red glow of the elevator compartment onto the bridge. The doors closed with a hiss and the elevator was on its way again, perhaps returning the full twelve decks where Carol had just been—the engineering guidance center.

  “I take it Caesar has decided you’re not needed,” Snow commented as she climbed up to the piloting wing beside him.

  “Caesar never did need me,” she answered.

  In every sea trial over the past three months, though Imperator never once left the fishbowl, the computer had managed the reactor/engineering complex and had yet to miss a beat. “I had to be there, just to watch it operate under actual conditions.” She laughed quietly. “I never quite believed it myself, you know. I understand it, but it’s still hard to believe.”

  “Don’t for a minute imagine that I’ll ever accept it completely,” Snow remarked with a forced laugh. “Ships and men belong together.” The tinge of bitterness in his voice was evident.

  “They do. I agree. But this is a little too much ship for one man, I’d say.”

  Snow peered out at the sailors working on the smooth, wide bow. They were dim, unidentifiable figures a fifth of a mile away. He raised the night binoculars to his eyes and watched as they stowed the port gear in compartments along the outer hull. His brain silently acknowledged Carol’s remark, agreed it was much too much ship, but his heart said Imperator was his and he could handle her.

  At the sound of three soft beeping sounds from his parka pocket, he removed a compact two-way radio and responded, “This is Snow.”

  “Kimmelman here, Captain. I was right again. You owe me a sawbuck when you get back.” It was the security chief on shore.

  “No lights, huh?”

  “No way. One Victor Ulanoff is resting very comfortably at my feet . . . and you were right about the satellite . . . infrared. I found the instrument package under his arm. It told him when the eye had contact with you.” When Kimmelman confirmed the satellite waiting above them, there was no doubt in Snow’s or anyone’s mind that it was infrared. It was just waiting for Imperator to emerge, ready to confirm the heat from her reactor.

  Kimmelman couldn’t resist kidding Snow one last time. The captain had requested a call from shore by blinking light if they found Ulanoff where they expected him. But Kimmelman had laughed out loud and said the satellite would easily record the light, too. Why tell the people back in the Kremlin that we knew that they knew that . . . he went on and on laughing. Eventually Snow had laughed with him.

  “The sawbuck is yours, Sidney. Consider it done. Think I’ve been radiating long enough?”

  “I think they’ll love you in Moscow, Captain.”

  Snow turned to the woman at his left. “Time for the heat shields, Carol. Maybe they’ll think we’re going under.” He held the radio to his mouth. “Done, Sidney. We’ve wrapped her up. Out.”

  Snow could see whitecaps lapping either side of the black hull below the bridge, but there was no sense of motion aboard the submarine. It would take one huge storm to create any sea motion on Imperator. He could hear the muffled voices as Carol Petersen conversed with the computer room. It was his ship—yet was it really too much for one man? He’d given the order, but it was her computer seeing that it was carried out. A chill crept down his back as he once again experienced that feeling—which of them was more powerful?

  “She’s all zipped up, Captain. They might be able to pick them up on infrared.” She gestured toward the sailors still working on the main deck. “But there’s no sign of heat from the ship now.”

  “Let them try to figure that one out,” he responded, looking up as if he could pick out the tiny satellite hanging more than a hundred miles above. “We’re going to wink out . . . just like a star.”

  “Just like a star,” she echoed. They were silent, both imagining more than twelve hundred feet of submarine suddenly winking out like a star. That was but one of Imperator’s tricks, and there were so many more to come. It was a game of “catch me if you can,” and Snow had deliberately given the first signal that he was ready to start the game. Soviet directives had also been intercepted the past few weeks. He knew who Abe Danilov was and he understood approximately what the Russian’s orders would be. One of the critical factors of this cruise, the only one Admiral Reed had impressed on everyone, was that the transit be completed—regardless. That was the single, vital message that Imperator could send to the world—that the oceans and the meaning of seapower had changed forever. And that included defeating ever
ything the Kremlin could do to sink her.

  Abe Danilov glanced disinterestedly at the infrared prints, then tossed them on the table. It was all new and exciting to this watch section but it was of little import to him. It simply confirmed what he’d projected about Imperator, including her ability to effect heat shielding. Damn her captain! He’d dangled a teaser . . . on purpose . . . just to let Danilov and his superiors know there were to be more surprises. They’re still one step ahead of us, Danilov thought . . . and arrogant as hell.

  His staff officers, occupied with the mundane, made every effort to look busy. They awaited his reaction, never anticipating that his anger at the American captain would be directed at them. Then a chain of orders emerged, his voice increasing in pitch, and he later decided his reaction had been as nebulous as their efforts. His senior staff officer, Captain First Rank Sergoff, was once again plotting Imperator’s course, painstakingly laying out the same track that Danilov had done himself too many times.

  “What have you found, Sergoff, that has changed radically since we laid out that track yesterday?” His voice dripped with sarcasm as his thoughts drifted back to the previous days. He had not wanted to leave Anna in Moscow.

  “I beg your pardon, Admiral,” Sergoff said, lost for a moment, ‘Tm not altering their course, sir . . . just determining their time of arrival off Seward Peninsula now that we have a departure time.”

  “And?” Danilov demanded. His telltale eyebrows were once again menacing those about him.

  Sergoff considered all this as the admiral waited for an answer. The knit eyebrows reminded him for the thousandth time that Danilov utilized his resemblance to Brezhnev with tremendous effect. Sergoff was younger, taller, much better proportioned, more striking in uniform, and he’d been with Danilov for years—but he still reacted with awe to his senior’s temper. Now, he responded to Danilov’s question with a stuttered, “I . . . I’m not sure . . . sir. I’m still working on her speed of advance through the Bering Sea. You said that with the ice still heavy this time of year, she’d probably be reduced to a speed of . . .” It was spring and the ice was breaking up.