As Andy Reed sat before Houston’s green wardroom table an hour before midnight, he understood the inner conflict other commanders had faced in past wars. His elbows were planted firmly to either side of a mug of cold coffee, and he massaged his temples with the fingers of both hands, his red-lidded eyes shut tightly against their demand for sleep. The cold he had inherited from his youngest son had shifted from his head to his chest, and the headache had disappeared, to be replaced by a hacking, dry cough that made breathing uncomfortable. His voice had grown deeper, a prelude to laryngitis, he was sure. He’d read many biographies of famous admirals and was sure that not once had history ever recorded whether or not colds had influenced the outcome of a battle. He wasn’t sure why.
Reed never noticed one of the junior officers enter the wardroom, seat himself at the other end of the table with a mug of coffee, then think better of disturbing the exhausted admiral. Rising quietly from the table, he tiptoed silently out. Beside one elbow was Reed’s message board containing the brief action report from Olympia. That had changed his outlook tremendously. He knew that Danilov had been sent out with three submarines, and that two of them were gone. Six other attack submarines had been dispatched by the Russians. He was sure that there were no others to the east and that Seratov was alone. That allowed him to accelerate Olympia’s speed, sending her directly across the top of the world. His orders were for her to transit in deep water north of the Queen Elizabeth Islands until reaching a point opposite Perry Land near the northernmost tip of Greenland. Then she was to head north with the intention of coming in behind the additional Soviet submarines.
His greatest concern of the moment was not Abe Danilov or any of the Soviet attack submarines. He was sure that Danilov would attempt to keep a reasonable distance between himself and Imperator, delaying any attack until his reinforcements were closer. The Russian admiral already understood more of Imperator’s capabilities than he should have—and that was the crux of Reed’s problems. Hal Snow’s too-quick decisions and instant retaliation had spawned a gnawing concern in the eyes of his commander.
Since Imperator was a task force within a single hull, it had originally appeared easier to command that task force from another unit, and distance offered the advantage of added perspective. But the more Andy Reed considered Hal Snow’s reactions to date, he wondered whether he shouldn’t be sailing with him. Reed was positive that if there was any weakness on Imperator, Abe Danilov would be searching for it. It meant a great deal for Imperator to move cautiously on cat’s feet. At one time, Snow would have been the man almost everyone in the sub force would have chosen for the job. Andy Reed wasn’t so sure he was that man today.
Hal Snow was restless. Imperator could go faster than they now were moving, but he was limited by Houston’s speed. Snow desperately wanted to catch up to Danilov, sink him as rapidly as possible, then look for more Russians. To him, that was his singular goal and there should be no deviation. Sweep away anyone in the way, and charge on in to finish the job!
He climbed out of his bunk, slipping on wrinkled trousers and shirt, and wandered down to the wardroom. It was deserted. All the old magazines had been neatly stacked before someone headed for his own bunk, and there had been no one in there recently to mess things up. Snow had no interest in disturbing the watch. Finally, he decided to stop by Carol Petersen’s room. She’d been pleasant enough the previous evening.
The curtain had been pulled over her doorway, and no light peeped through. He considered calling her name, but that seemed a crude thing in the middle of the night, nor was there any reason to disturb any of the others along the corridor. Finally, he tapped lightly on the bulkhead, hoping she might also be having trouble sleeping. There was no answer. Snow decided there was no further reason to bother anyone. He shuffled back down the corridor in the direction of his own room.
As the footsteps disappeared down the linoleum passageway, Carol Petersen relaxed with a soft sigh of relief. She sensed how troubled Snow was, but there was no time now to comfort him—nor did she care to encourage his attention.
Only the watch section remained awake through the artificial night induced by Imperator’s computer. Caesar drove the immense submarine through the icy arctic waters toward the North Pole with only the slightest hum, one that her crew had become quickly inured to. There was no sound for them—there were watches, drills, periods to eat, periods to sleep. With the exception of normal security patrols that Snow had begun, as a sort of backup to the time that Snow feared Caesar might fail, most of the crew remained in the after section of the ship.
If Imperator’s length could be divided into four football fields, the hindmost would take up the engineering and propulsion spaces; only those who ran the equipment entered that area. The control and living spaces were ahead of that section—the thinking, fighting part of the ship, as Snow liked to say. Ahead of that was the main storage compartments; here were the tanks and helicopters and armor belonging to the marine contingent. Though Caesar also watched over this area, Colonel Campbell had established duty sections to patrol his heavy equipment. Like Snow, he could not be convinced that Caesar was able to control everything. From the day he was commissioned, it had been drilled into him that marines protected their own weapons, and it would be no different now. It also kept busy a marine unit that had little idea why it had been transferred at sea to a monster submarine that was taking them to an unknown destination. Colonel Campbell had explained to Reed that these marines were no different than any others—they were always ready to fight, but, if they didn’t know where or when, they had to be kept busy. So each marine stood one-in-three watches, having no idea what lay in the after half of this immense ship or what unknown element guarded them as they patrolled their spaces.
What no one else understood was that the captain sensed the eeriness of the situation as much as they did.
9
ANDY REED HAD been captivated by maps since he was a kid, learning early on that they could make the world come alive. His father often explained that it was impossible to read a book about a place you’d never been if there was no map. Once the shape of a place could be pictured—the lakes and rivers and mountains, the locations of cities and the roads that connected them—then the actions of the characters in the book could be pictured with clarity.
As Andy grew older and sailed with his family in the summers, charts became just as appealing. He learned how to navigate his sailboat among the coastal islands and rocks, or into the harbor by sighting the church steeple and the water tower on the highest point in town. He could also imagine the ocean bottom in bold relief just like the landscape on a map, picturing in his mind the offshore trenches, the rocks where the lobstermen dropped their pots, and the broad banks where fish schooled.
Now, as Reed leaned over the chart table in the rear of Houston’s control room, he studied his position in relation to the North Pole and the land masses to the south and east. The chart displayed no land whatsoever, the closest being Ellesmere Island almost six hundred miles away. Overhead was solid ice broken only by occasional polynyas or leads that might close at any time. The floor of the Arctic Ocean was six thousand feet below as they raced northward five hundred feet under the ice.
Chief Quartermaster Gorham leaned on the opposite side of the chart table, watching Reed with obvious interest. The admiral was experimenting with various courses and speeds, plotting positions in relation to a Soviet submarine that had yet to be located. His methods were decidedly old-fashioned, at least to a quartermaster who had always located his position with the aid of satellites and computers and digital displays. This admiral was using a compass, a protractor, and his imagination. Chief Gorham had never served in anything other than a nuclear submarine and had no concept of balancing on a wildly gyrating bridge to shoot a star or take a noon sun line, more or less plot it manually in a tiny chart house to fix a ship’s position. There had been stories about submarine officers doing that even as recently as the sixti
es—but nothing like that in his experience.
Finally, the chief could contain himself no longer. “Can I give you a hand with anything, Admiral?”
“No. . . no thanks. Just playing, Chief.” Reed’s voice was still hoarse and he cleared his throat. After a pause, he added, “Gives me a sense of place . . . time . . . I know it’s deep as hell out here, but it’s always been a habit.”
It wasn’t a custom for quartermasters to chat with admirals, but Reed appeared interested in continuing the conversation. Enlisted men knew only what they were told when it came to where they were headed and what the ship’s orders entailed. The scuttlebutt that passed for information was regarded with more suspicion after each promotion until chiefs generally realized the worth of rumors.
“I still like to study the bottom and figure out where roads would go and where I’d build a house for the best view if it was all above the surface,” the chief offered. “I’ve started some very nice developments if I do say so.” He handed Reed a sharpened pencil.
“Well, what do you know. The only other guy I ever knew did that was a friend of mine on the Will Rogers
The chief pointed his finger knowingly at Reed with a wink. “Commander Folger. . .”
“Yeah . . . Brud Folger. That’s the guy, Chief. We were at the academy together . . . he was funny as hell then. Used to do comedy routines making fun of all the instructors.”
“Used to do the same thing, Admiral, when I rode the old TR with him. Hell of a funny guy.” The chief shook his head from side to side. “Captain caught him one time ashore doing an imitation of the commodore and almost busted him. Got any idea where he is today, sir?”
“You wouldn’t believe it, Chief. He started doing the same type of routines after he retired. You know, I wouldn’t tell on him if he was still active”—Reed pondered for a moment—“but he did a bit for some ladies’ group at an officers’ club somewhere around the District, and brought the house down. It seems the CNO’s wife was there and she passed the word around so now he’s in demand every weekend.”
“Mr. Folger sure was a funny guy.” The quartermaster looked down at the chart that Reed was contemplating. “Fine navigator too, sir. He was the one that taught me how to make believe the ocean bottom was actually above the surface. Said it was the best way to imagine where a submarine might hide if you got in a tight place. Sometimes late at night on one of those dull boomer patrols—running around inside a box—he used to teach me how to design underwater highways and that sort of thing.”
“You were only on boomers with him then.”
“Yes, sir, just the TR.”
“He served on attack boats, too. He was the one who taught me how to look at the bottom of the ice just like he taught you to look at the sea floor. Did he ever explain that to you?”
“Sure did, sir. But it’s a son of a bitch trying to do the same thing when it’s on top of you . . . sort of like standing on your head to figure out where you are.”
Reed had been hoping he wouldn’t have to interpret it alone. “Do you think you could do it again if you had to?”
“You mean turn upside down . . . look at the ice like a highway?”
Reed’s expression changed perceptibly. “That’s right, Chief, and navigate that highway overhead just like your life depended on it.”
The quartermaster’s expression never changed. There was still a smile on his face as he said, “I’ll bet my life does depend on it, doesn’t it, sir?”
“Sure does. Mine, too. You see, we’re going to have two OODs doing the driving, one just to make sure we don’t hit anything, and the captain’s going to be looking for targets with me. I need someone who can work with all of us. If you think you can help the OOD navigate, no matter how fast we want to go, and at the same time tell me where I want to go if I’m leaning over your shoulder, you’re going to become a super chief before you hit the beach next time.”
Now Chief Gorham’s expression altered slightly as he rubbed his jaw thoughtfully. “I guess I never should have mentioned Mr. Folger’s name . . . right, sir?”
“Wouldn’t have mattered.” Reed grinned. “I checked all the service records and decided maybe the two of you knew each other.” He tapped his forehead with an index finger. “I figured I didn’t have time to do it all myself, and if Brud Folger taught you, I figure I can run around those ice fields without a second thought.”
The captain’s stateroom had become Reed’s for the length of the voyage. It was the one place on Houston where he could be alone with his thoughts. Every possible element that could possibly affect the submarines under his command was evaluated, then reevaluated if he were to fulfill his responsibilities to each man aboard.
This was more than a simple showdown with a man he’d encountered twice at sea but never met—Abe Danilov. While each man understood his country’s strategy was the focal point, much more was required of them. Since Abe Danilov had to face a secret weapon—Imperator—his superiors were ensuring that he would face the unknown with superior numbers. Andy Reed, on the other hand, had to learn Imperator’s limits against those odds. In addition, control of the environment above the ice pack could be as important as that below, so each country was prepared to launch aircraft for inserting their specially trained arctic forces depending on surface conditions at the time.
While the weather below the ice never changed, that above now became a critical factor. There were two purposes for inserting combat teams. If a submarine was damaged, the only chance for survival might involve surfacing through a polynya or a lead to either vent smoke from a fire or make limited repairs. Whichever country controlled the area where a submarine surfaced would be able to protect their own or finish off an enemy. There was also the possibility of technical assistance during undersea combat. Though it had never before occurred, a surface support group could place either noisemakers or mines below the ice to give their own submarine an added advantage.
As Reed considered how long a combat team could be sustained, and studied the regional weather reports, he experienced a feeling of insufficiency. He understood submarines and how to fight them, but the vagaries of arctic weather were beyond him. He knew that navy SEAL teams could be inserted wherever he decided that Abe Danilov would stand and fight. They would be within range to assist him as long as they could survive the climate. Their odds of being extracted might be poor.
A chart of the Arctic Ocean was taped to the bulkhead above the desk. He stared at it until his eyes smarted. They were traveling at just over thirty knots on a course that would bring them close to the North Pole shortly. They were currently passing over the Lomonosov Ridge, a subsurface mountain range rising as much as nine thousand feet above the deep Arctic Ocean. Beyond was the Fram Basin and ten to twelve thousand feet of water almost to the edge of the ice pack.
As hard as he tried, he was unable to imagine how best to determine where Danilov would turn. Again, it was dependent on the surface weather. Intercepted reports indicated that Soviet strategy was little different from his own, and their weather analysis was equal to his. It all finally came down to plotting a larger area than desired where aid might be provided from the surface.
What would his old friend, Brud Folger, have done at this point? How would the master navigator balance the data on his charts with the weather in the Arctic and the wiles of an experienced Soviet submariner?
Reed slowly massaged his eyes and temples until relaxation overspread his body. It was an acquired habit and the end result was always the same—he began to doze and dream. Brud had been a sailor, too, They’d crewed together at Annapolis, and a few times in later years whenever they were stationed nearby. He remembered the time he and Lucy had agreed to vacation together with the Folgers. A yacht had been chartered in the Bahamas for a week, but at the last minute Brud’s submarine had been kept at sea and the Reeds were left with a yacht too large for two people to handle. What would they do with that big boat for just the two of them? It had al
ready been paid for and this was the last time he’d be able to get away for a long time. Lucy Reed had made the decision—we need a crew, she said, why not the kids? All six had been sailing since they were six weeks old, and even the littlest could follow simple directions.
Was she ever wrong about something like that when her mind was made up? he mused. Lucy arranged a small loan from the local bank to cover plane tickets for the kids, helped to prepare early homework with their teachers at school, and the day before they were ready to leave she had them all packed and ready. And it ended up being the most glorious vacation the Reeds had ever experienced.
Andy had fond memories of one moonlit evening in particular. They were anchored off Eleuthera. Their oldest had finally given up trying to stay awake and unrolled his sleep mattress by the bow. Andy went below and mixed the final Anejo punch of the evening. Then he and Lucy sipped and watched the moon reflect off the white sand along the shore.
“Here’s to Brud,” Lucy murmured. “He didn’t know it—and he’s probably still blaming the U.S. Navy for his troubles—but he’s done more for this family than a million dollars ever could.”
“Brud, wherever you are, we hope you know the Reeds are thinking of you with affection . . . for not being able to make it,” he added with a soft chuckle.
Lucy looked into his eyes in the moonlight, her face as serious as it ever could be. “We’ll never be able to do this again, will we? What I mean is that we’ll never have a chance again to get to know our kids like this . . . or for them to know us.” She wet her lips thoughtfully. “Do you know what I mean, Andy? It’s never like this at Christmas or any other holiday, and Timmy will be off to college next year. It’s hard enough to get kids to do anything with their parents when they’re teenagers—and we’ve got three teenagers with us!” she exclaimed.
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