Silent Hunter

by Charles D. Taylor

  Olympia’s torpedo detonated just off the stem of the Russian, destroying her propeller and warping the shaft. As water spurted through ruptured seals, the Russian craft, suddenly powerless, had no option but to seek the surface.

  Olympia turned, listening for her quarry. The beat of the Soviet’s propeller was gone. Compressed air could be heard whooshing into ballast tanks, forcing water out as she struggled toward the surface, her forward motion negligible. There was no telling if she would still fire. Obviously she was suffering. No need to close if there was no forward momentum. A second torpedo was instantly on the way.

  The silent ocean carried the harsh squeal of only one high-speed torpedo. The Russian was totally involved in the struggle for survival. This time, Olympia enjoyed the luxury of monitoring the progress of her torpedo.

  On board Houston, Reed had no immediate clue to the effect of the initial two explosions that rolled back to their sensitive listening devices. He only knew that both submarines had fired, both torpedoes had detonated. The sound of a single, third torpedo meant one was going for the kill. This time the computer called the eventual winner before the torpedo ever located its target—the screw-beats were American. The frantic roar of compressed air never reached Reed’s ears. There was no way to tell how badly damaged the Soviet was, only that it was once again a target. Reed’s heart beat in sympathetic response to the Russian’s terrified efforts.

  Then the second blast came clearly to them, soon followed by the unmistakable, unforgiving sounds of a submarine breaking up. Though Soviet listening devices were shorter range, Reed was sure that what had just taken place might be just as obvious to the Soviet submarine accompanying them—it should already be evading! He also was sure that the Russians had to have a need for revenge, that sudden, natural desire for a parting shot. They had been prepared for more than twenty minutes. He gave the order quickly. In seconds Helena launched two torpedoes at the trailing Russian boat.

  There had been no hesitation in Reed’s decision. While it was his alone, his original orders sanctioned the act. It would be months before the Russians could prove a thing. Of course, the explosions could be heard over great distances underwater but no one could say for sure what had caused them or what the result had been. As far as Reed was concerned, the mission justified his reaction.

  The sounds of battle had been monitored by Imperator, and they understood what had taken place ahead of them though there was hardly a soul in the active navy who could remember actual submarine warfare. But they knew that when a submarine was killed, every man went down with her.

  Resting in her stateroom, Carol Petersen thought back to the early days of Imperator’s planning. Computer-aided design of standard seagoing vessels was an art. The giant submarine, however, had taken shape on a modular basis with various teams creating separate units of the vast ship. They worked on their own, using the specifications provided for their particular module while the consortium’s computer oversaw the project on a single, giant scale.

  The submarine was longer than four football fields laid end to end. Her reinforced hull was a cocoon enclosing compartmentalized units that other teams never saw. The reactor area and associated engineering spaces were a world on their own, as were human subsistence areas, command and control spaces, the massive storage areas, and navigational and sonar units. The consortium planned that there would be no chance she could be sunk by one torpedo, even two or three. She could sustain damage like the old battleships, and damaged or open areas could be automatically sealed off from the remainder of the ship. This compartmentalization was controlled by the computer to avoid the necessity of having a huge crew to operate her. Caesar managed many of these spaces, and his programs were designed to respond to the possibilities of battle damage. Carol felt increasingly secure as Imperator continued to prove the success of her design.

  Hal Snow also considered the effects of damage to Imperator, but at the same time he was reminded of her ability to annihilate almost any challenge. She was a creature born of futuristic technology. Her hull possessed aerodynamic features allowing previously unimagined underwater speeds, and she was driven through the depths in almost total silence by her propulsor system of shroud-enclosed blades. She became a creature of her environment, an immense shark, sinister and lethal.

  Her sensory system, under Caesar’s direction, could seek out the slightest variants in the marine world, detecting and identifying anything man-made well before her own presence was realized. This capability was tied into a fire-control system able to react instantaneously to a variety of dangers. Imperator’s kill capability was well beyond the range of any known submarine weapons. Her highspeed torpedoes could be fired either directly at a garget, or conveyed by rocket over the ocean’s surface to a target hundreds of miles distant.

  Perhaps the aspect that fascinated Snow more than any other was her ability to support a battalion-size marine amphibious unit. Missile systems were integrated into the fire-control apparatus to support the landing team with antiair or antisurface fire. Imperator was capable of either landing her force via undersea amphibious craft, ejected in the manner of a torpedo, or she could surface, defend herself against attack, and land her team in the normal manner. She carried helos for vertical envelopment, and artillery and tank units to provide close support to her ground forces. To Snow, she was a lethal machine beyond anything man had yet imagined, and her most dangerous quality was her ability to deliver this immense force without warning anywhere on the globe. Carrier battle groups and amphibious forces gave prior warning to their enemy. Imperator could literally strike without a sound. By herself, she was dangerous to any country who challenged the United States. If she was successful in this initial transit, the Northern Flank of Europe would be her goal. While Hal Snow and Andy Reed were certain they would be directed there, especially after the message to rendezvous with the amphibious force near the Pribilof Islands, they had yet to receive firm orders.

  While Snow slept, down in the depths of Imperator Caesar continued a ceaseless vigil. Over a one-hour period his sensory system detected and identified more than a hundred different forms of sea life. Other sounds cataloged included every surface craft that passed within his listening range. Water temperature was recorded every minute, and every fifteen minutes, tiny expendable bathythermographs were fired off to record temperatures surrounding Caesar for a distance of ten miles. The reactor was monitored for the tiniest alterations, climate in select spaces was checked on a programmed basis, and the shift of weight via human or liquid motion was monitored to adjust Imperator’s trim. And after the Russian submarines had been dispatched, Snow ordered that self-destruct communications packages be fired to the surface once every hour or that Imperator could either send or receive sixty-second messages on a special wavelength.

  The computer’s most impressive talents were being saved for weapons control. Caesar was Hannibal and Napoleon, Patton and Mac Arthur, nestled in a gray metal box.

  It was not in Abe Danilov’s nature to remain morose. There were times that Anna simply had to be dismissed from his mind. Just as there was no place for women on a warship, there were times when there was no room even for memories of them. The underwater transit was boring, like driving a car down a straight highway with no traffic or scenery. It could lull the senses. And when Danilov realized this torpor was allowing his sentimentality to overwhelm his mental agility, he forced himself to react.

  He called for a messenger to locate Sergoff—then aware how easy it was to wait lazily for another, he canceled his order. After changing into a freshly pressed uniform, he went in search of his senior staff officer, whom he found dozing in his own cabin, an open book on his chest.

  “Sergoff . . . Sergoff . . . wake up,” Danilov bellowed. “We’re growing lazy.”

  Sergoff sat upright, banging his head on the bunk above him. Never before had Danilov come into his stateroom when they were at sea. Sergoff shook himself like a puppy. “What is it, Admiral?”r />
  “One of us is going to find a polynya so that we can communicate with home base. Perhaps they already have data on Imperator that we can use. Then we’re going to play games among ourselves.”

  Captain Sergoff was loyal to Danilov in the old-fashioned manner. Soviet Navy officers often remained within the same command for many years. An officer on a destroyer or cruiser could gradually rise through the ranks to become commanding officer if fitness reports remained exceptional. The theory that constancy bred perfection was often transferred to the staff of senior officers like Danilov. Sergoff, commanding a submarine years ago in the admiral’s squadron, had later been selected for Danilov’s staff. And as Danilov rose in power, Sergoff’s influence also increased. Sergoff understood the benefits of such security. He knew his admiral well enough to know that Abe Danilov made few mistakes. But of even greater significance, the admiral’s mentor for more than twenty-five years had been the commander in chief of the Soviet Navy. Sergoff, even during moments of wonder at Danilov’s impulsive decisions, remained comfortable.

  When Danilov interrupted his nap, Sergoff’s surprise was momentary. As a matter of fact, he was pleased to see that Danilov’s spirit seemed to have returned. Sergoff knew that Anna was dying, as did everyone on Seratov. But there was no single person who could express to Danilov the sympathies of his sailors, not even Sergoff. Because Danilov kept both his love and his sadness so deeply within himself, those around him accepted his reticence and made believe they knew nothing of his problem. They watched his moods, their own seeming to rise and fall with the admiral’s.

  News of Danilov’s return to his old self spread through Seratov quickly. Sergoff made sure that it was also passed to Smolensk and Novgorod. The mood of the leader could easily infect his subordinates, and the abrupt changes in Danilov created a positive attitude for the men in the three submarines passing under the arctic icecap.

  The news, however, was anything but good when they rose to a polynya to communicate. Sergoff heard it first and even considered withholding the worst until he was sure his admiral’s attitude might remain unchanged. Yet even when he passed on the messages concerning the explosions in the northern Pacific, coupled with the failure of either Soviet submarine to report afterwards, and the disappearance of the intelligence ship, the admiral remained positive—a bit subdued, but still in a much better mood than the past two days.

  “Perhaps, Sergoff, that’s exactly what happened. The Americans sank them.” He paused momentarily, knitting his brows in a curious manner as he peered at his chief of staff. “Though I find it hard to believe that they could dispose of Captain Molikov that easily. He was a tough one. But maybe there’s nothing to the reports. The explosions could have been anything. Our ships could be playing a game. After all, their mission is intelligence, not war.” Sergoff nodded in agreement. “That’s a good point. No need to worry yet—”

  “But,” Danilov interrupted, cocking his head to one side, “that Admiral Reed is a cold-blooded son of a bitch, and the commander of Imperator . . . Snow”—he finally remembered—“he’s no better. Read the reports on them if you doubt me.”

  “I’ve seen them, Admiral.” Sergoff’s job, at which he had grown adept over the years, was to let his admiral speculate whenever he desired without interrupting with facts or further conjecture. When Danilov mulled over a situation, he often thought aloud. His words didn’t necessarily reflect what he believed. He was simply expressing each aspect of the ideas generated in his mind. Sergoff knew when a good chief of staff should add specifics of his own and when he should agree or keep his mouth shut. Danilov appreciated Sergoff’s wisdom and often talked directly with him when the time was suitable.

  Then, Danilov spoke up, “What would you do if you were in Admiral Reed’s position, knowing what we both know about him?”

  Sergoff did not have to think before he answered. “I’d sink them both. There’s no way anyone can prove what happened right away. By the time Imperator completes her mission—if she does—those two submarines of ours will have little import. Yes . . . I’d sink them.”

  “Of course you would. I would, too. They’d be a damn nuisance otherwise. That’s why we’re going to play some games today . . . just like riding to the hunt. And we’re going to play the Imperator game. No, that’s not what I really mean,” Danilov decided as he looked more closely at Sergoff. “We’re going to play American commander, and I’m going to use my computer to act just like I think they do. In two days, Reed or Snow could be very definitely trying to get rid of us, too.”

  Later that day, as the Soviet hunter/killer group passed the North Pole, they conducted wholly original subsurface games. At a little more than three hundred miles from the geographical pole, they cavorted like a school of oversize dolphins in more than two thousand meters of icy water.

  Though Danilov had never seen Imperator, he entertained visions of her in his mind. According to the limited reports he’d received, she sacrificed nothing in maneuverability to achieve her immense size. The admiral knew that Imperator was exceedingly fast. Her hull design included experimental design concepts that imitated the dynamics of a fish. Combining knowledge of Snow’s personality with tapes of his style when he commanded attack submarines, Danilov developed a picture of what they might encounter. Contrary to what would normally be assumed, his immense quarry was not necessarily an easier target. Because drawings of her weapons suite were unavailable, he had to assume that her defenses were conducted by a computer that detected and analyzed threats. He then assumed it must counter them from individual defensive sectors along the sub’s length.

  Admiral Danilov alone decided when attacks were successful or thwarted. Three times before the end of the day, Novgorod and Smolensk had been sunk. Imperator’s retaliatory capabilities remained an unknown, and underestimating them could bring failure. His responsibility was to prepare his commanding officers for the unknown. Yet even Sergoff was unaware that his admiral bore a healthy fear of Imperator’s powers.

  There is a point in time when media involvement in a sensitive political situation may evolve into acceptance of a fact before it has occurred. It is almost impossible to pinpoint when the turnabout takes place, for it is a state of mind rather than an actuality. This oddity can happen in any country at any time. Two factors are required—the will of the people to believe what they are told, and the desire of the media to control their attention and be accepted. It becomes a matter of suspending belief—or disbelief.

  This was happening by the third day of Imperator’s voyage. From the American vantage point, the Russians might just as well have been occupying the Northern Flank. Americans pictured in their mind’s eye the Norwegians fighting a valiant, losing battle against Russian hordes sweeping across the country’ in blitzkrieg fashion. Though there was hardly a footprint in the snow around the Soviet border with Norway, the description of Russian forces poised for battle was enough to make invasion an accepted fact. Television news directors fought for viewers with a “what if” campaign that terrified the average American much as his parents had been in 1962—the specter of mass destruction became paramount.

  In the Soviet Union, which possessed total control of media events, the probability that American submarines were moving and would soon challenge Soviet forces in the Arctic graduated into a cross-ocean attack. Once again, it appeared that the Motherland faced a challenge no less fierce than Hitler’s strike into their heartland almost half a century before. The Soviet citizen was easily convinced that the Americans were finally making a move against their country.

  There was little difference in the manner information was provided. In the free media, analysis of a situation became reality in the competition for viewers’ attention. The controlled media was designed to get the people behind their government as a mass reaction to aggression. Both efforts were successful. Both might have been under the same system, because they brought the results that the media forces demanded—control of the viewers.
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  Citizens of both countries desperately needed to see something positive, anything that might win the day against fear.

  6

  THE DEEP WATERS of the northern Pacific quickly became shallow as Imperator rose to the surface for the first time south of the Aleutians. The lights of Dutch Harbor were visible to port when they navigated the shallows near the island city shortly before midnight under Caesar’s total control. After a late-night conversation on the underwater telephone, Reed and Snow concurred that Imperator would maneuver independently until exiting the Bering Strait into the Chukchi Sea. After the two Soviet submarines failed to report, intelligence monitors indicated the Russians had ordered their other boats to remain to the south, trailing the Americans at a safe distance. The Bering Sea was extremely shallow—no place to conduct undersea battle. Imperator would operate primarily on the surface. Cloudy weather that time of year would automatically negate Soviet intelligence satellites.

  Beyond the Aleutians, Imperator’s sonar identified sounds of surface ships approaching the rendezvous point a little more than a hundred miles to the northwest. Three hours later, with skies turning pale to the east, the amphibious force witnessed the approach of a massive black sea monster. A gray, choppy sea washed against a hull that seemed as long as an aircraft carrier. Any man among them who knew submarines understood how much more lay beneath the waves.