Strange was the hand of fate that led you to our glorious cause. Now come. Comrade. A toast is in order. And then we shall make certain that the Vulkan fulfills its rightful place in history.”
Without a word of comment, the grim-faced senior lieutenant followed Novikov out into the hallway.
Both men turned to their left as the door to Valenko’s stateroom hissed shut behind them.
Stefan Kuzmin enjoyed the change of pace that his current duty afforded him. The which man would rather be actively involved with a mechanical problem than merely sitting at a console monitoring a bank of instruments. Sensor operations could be extremely challenging, and there was no doubting its importance, yet he’d take his present task over it any day of the week.
Immediately after the Vulkan had encountered the unexpected explosion and resulting shock wave, they had discovered that the hydrophonic recording mechanism wasn’t operating properly.
Because of this unit’s failure, they had been unable to record the sounds the hydrophones had picked up before and after the blast. If the system had been operating correctly, the sounds could have been analyzed by computer, which would have identified the unfortunate vessel that had met its demise topside.
When the system was found to be malfunctioning, Kuzmin immediately volunteered to have a look at it.
The senior officer of the deck agreed to this and a suitable sailor was assigned to take over Kuzmin’s post at the sonar console.
His trusty tool box at his side, the which man squeezed into the cramped compartment where the recording device was stored — between the control room and the sub’s bow. The storage cell was packed with various electronic components. Most of this equipment was directly connected to the monitors in the control room. Kuzmin wondered how many of the Vulkan’s senior officers even knew that such a receptacle existed.
The warrant officer hooked an electric lantern onto the handle of a vacant storage bracket. The console that he wished to examine lay immediately below.
Awkwardly, he went down to his knees. He opened the tool box and removed a set of screwdrivers, then located the metal container where the sonar recorder was stashed. He determined the proper screw size and, after selecting the appropriate tool, began unloosening the metal cover plate Once this was accomplished, he began his work in earnest. The device was designed like a large cassette recorder.
After confirming that the unit was getting a proper electrical charge, Kuzmin checked the recording heads and then removed the circuitry panel. A tedious test of each individual circuit followed. When this operation failed to show any negative results, he reinserted the panel and took a second to doublecheck his previous work. From all that he could see, the system should be operating perfectly. On a whim, he decided to check the cassette tape himself. He pulled the thin plastic container off its spools and only then spotted the apparent cause of the malfunction.
Somehow, the permanent tape itself had broken.
Dismantling the cassette to resplice the tape would be a most difficult job. Though he never knew of such a component to fail, Kuzmin was confident that he could soon get the whole unit going once again.
Cramped and hot, he decided to work on’re splicing the cassette under more comfortable conditions. He pocketed the tape, resealed the recorder, stood, and carefully backed his way out of the narrow cell.
As he entered the adjoining hallway, four soft electronic chimes issued from the sub’s public-address system.
Spurred by the familiar tones, he checked his watch and reaffirmed the completion of yet another work shift.
For four precious hours he would be officially on his own. Conscious of a noisy gurgling in his stomach, he decided that his first stop would be the mess hall.
There would be plenty of time to complete his current project after dinner and a sound nap.
The galley area was two floors below. Kuzmin anxiously descended a pair of metal stairwells and turned toward the vessel’s stern. After passing that section of the sub reserved for the enlisted men’s living quarters, he ducked through an open hatchway and turned into the dining hall.
Being one of the first men there allowed him to miss the long lines that accompanied each meal shift. He picked up a tray and silverware, then proceeded over to the cafeteria-style serving area. Kuzmin nodded to the potbellied figure who stood behind two sweaty conscripts who were busy ladling out portions.
“Hello, Comrade Irkutsk. How is the world treating you today?”
Chef Anatoly responded heavily to the which mans greeting.
“As usual, I find myself fighting a losing battle. The little food that is fit to serve gets burned by these imbeciles who have the nerve to call themselves cooks. You should just see today’s waste! It’s going to be the sharks who dine well this evening.”
Kuzmin grinned in response to his typical complaint.
“As always, you seem to find a way to feed us most adequately. Comrade.
What’s today’s bill of fare?”
Anatoly answered while wiping his hands on his spotted apron.
“Sausage a la Baikal, Siberian cabbage and pickled beets. There will be some nice hot rye bread out shortly. You would have had it now, but my assistants here burned the first dozen loaves. Only minutes ago the smoke was so thick that I thought I’d have to call out the fire brigade.”
Kuzmin accepted a steaming plateful of food and sniffed at its aroma approvingly.
“Well, it sure appears tasty to me. Once more. Chef, it looks like you’ve accomplished miracles.”
“Enjoy yourself. Comrade. Of all those present, it can be said that you are one who has truly earned today’s food. Not like the shirkers I get stuck with.”
Nodding at this unexpected compliment, Kuzmin picked up his tray and turned to find a table. From the center of the large room, a single diner waved to him. Surprised to find the sonar chief well into his meal, Kuzmin joined him.
“How did you manage to get down here so quickly?” the which man asked.
Lev Zinyakin swallowed a mouthful of sausage and said, “You had to be there to believe it, Stefan. Five full minutes before the change of shifts was scheduled, who relieves me, but our own Vasili Leonov.”
Kuzmin looked startled.
“You mean to say that our esteemed Senior Lieutenant actually took over your watch so that you could break early?”
“As Karl Marx is my witness, so it was. If you ask me, it was the zampolit who put the idea in his head.
Do you know that Novikov was actually smiling as he made the rounds of the control room? I even heard him tell a joke or two.”
“Now that is something,” Kuzmin said. He cut into his sausage and decided to let it cool a bit before eating.
“I wonder what’s gotten into those two?
Perhaps today’s a national holiday that we’ve forgotten about.”
“I doubt that. Although, to see our zampolit smiling is reason for a holiday in itself.” After consuming a bite of cabbage, he continued.
“As usual, poor heartbroken Vasili didn’t have much to say as he strapped on the sensor headphones. What followed, though, was most out of the ordinary. Old Novikov himself patted me on the back and complimented me on the splendid job that I was doing. Then ‘the zampolit ordered me to ‘refresh myself,” as he so tactfully put it.
Needless to say, I almost fell over in shock. You can be certain that I got out of there as quickly as possible, before they changed their minds.” “Most amazing,” Kuzmin mused as he began to go to work on his beets.
“I wonder if the Captain had something to do with it. With this unexpected patrol and all, I’ve never seen morale so low before. The least the officers can do is be civil.”
“That’s a thought,” Zinyakin replied.
“Although I doubt that even Petyr Valenko could cause a smile to cross our zampolit’s face if his heart wasn’t in it.”
“Heart?” the which man quizzed playfully.
“Since when
has our political officer been outfitted with such a human organ?”
Both men laughed and looked up admiringly when one of the cooks dropped off a loaf of fresh rye bread at their table. Kuzmin ripped off the heel, soaked it in gravy, and consumed a healthy bite.
“There is nothing like Chef Anatoly’s sausage a la Baikal,” he sincerely observed.
After tearing off a hunk of bread for himself, the sonar chief added, “You know, I have it from a good authority that Comrade Irkutsk has a secret source for the sausage’s stuffing.”
“What’s that?”
Relishing the moment, Zinyakin grinned.
“My spies tell me that our dear chef stuffs the sausage skins with the remains of those unlucky cooks who have burned their limits on past patrols. Tonight we are probably dining on a poor departed seaman who hailed from the Lake Baikal region. Thus, this recipe’s name.”
Kuzmin answered his friend with a sarcastic smile.
Yet his grin soon faded as his hand went to his mouth and pulled out a long strand of yellow hair.
“See, he was a blond!” Zinyakin exclaimed and shook with laughter as the which man loudly belched, then pushed the tray away.
“I’ll get us some tea,” offered the still chuckling sonar operator.
Distastefully picking his teeth with his fingernail, Kuzmin hastily scanned the rapidly tilling room. A line had formed at the serving station. The crowd chatter was unusually hushed in response to the continuing state of General Quarters.
As he surveyed the filled tables, Kuzmin noticed an absence of senior officers. The captain was also nowhere to be seen. Previously, he had done his best to share this sitting with them whenever his duties allowed. Remembering the torn plastic cassette in his pocket, Kuzmin wished that Valenko would appear now, so that he could tell the captain of his finding.
Zinyakin returned with their tea. Over a bowl of fruit compote, discussion turned to their families.
Both men proudly displayed the latest pictures of their sons. Since both children were of a similar age, it was hoped that they would grow up together as friends.
But if the navy had its way, there was no telling where either of them would be shipped off to next.
Kuzmin left the mess still a bit hungry but in excellent spirits.
Without hesitation he made his way to his bunk. Far from being afforded the luxury of private quarters, his position as warrant officer still allowed him a greater degree of privacy than the majority of the enlisted men. Most of the conscripts slept in large communal dorms. Even their mattresses were “hot,” meaning that one man slept while another worked.
The which man shared his leisure space with a chief petty officer and two first-class petty officers. Though they had no walls between them, a drawn curtain around one’s bunk guaranteed privacy. Kuzmin kicked off his shoes and peeled off his uniform.
Clothed now in an undershirt and sciwies, he climbed into his bunk, pulled the curtain around him and crawled under the rumpled sheets. As he settled on his back, he burped loudly and again tasted the single bite of greasy sausage that he had consumed at dinner. Three belches later, he silently cursed Chef Anatoly and seriously reconsidered Lev Zinaykin’s tale regarding the mysterious source of the sausage stuffing.
Shifting to his side, he attempted to close his eyes, when an alien discomfort began gnawing in his belly.
This ache continued to intensify until he found sleep all but impossible. He gratefully remembered the bottle of antacid tablets that Galina had forced him to pack along with his few personal toilet items. He sat up with another burp and reached under his mattress for his leather shaving kit.
The thick white tablets had a gritty, chalky taste, yet he managed to force down four of them. Even then, his stomach still burned. To get his mind off his discomfort, he decided that this would be the perfect time to work on’re splicing the broken tape. Since it could just as easily be accomplished in the comfort of his bunk, he reached out for the cassette, grabbed a set of miniature screwdrivers and immersed himself in the job.
The screws that held. the plastic tape holder together were tiny.
After removing them, Kuzmin took extra care to place them in a spot where they would not get lost. Once the two halves of the cassette were separated, he began the delicate task of splicing together the torn ends of the narrow, plastic ribbon.
With steady hands, he used a tiny piece of clear masking tape to do the trick. Careful not to allow the spools to unwind, he screwed the holder back together and wound it tight with his pinky.
With the repair work finished, he decided to listen to the tape and see what it contained. Once again he reached under his bunk, this time removing his prized Sorry Walkman, which he had picked up a year ago in Cam Rahn Bay. This device had afforded him hours of listening pleasure, though both prerecorded tapes and batteries were often hard to obtain. Snapping the Walkman open, he pulled out his treasured tape of Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake and inserted the tape from the sensor recorder. With the miniature sponge-covered speakers clipped to his ears, he hit the play button and found himself startled by a deafening, grinding roar. Quickly, he reached over and turned down the volume.
Kuzmin was certain he was hearing the explosion that they had monitored earlier. When the sound abruptly ceased, to be replaced by utter silence, he knew that he had reached the spot where the break had occurred. He pressed the stop button and hit rewind.
As the which man sat up, he realized that his stomach ache had passed.
Gone, too, were all thoughts of sleep. Since it was evident that the recording mechanism had been functioning up to the point of the blast, he was confident that he’d be able to identify the doomed vessel. All he needed was access to the Vulkan’s computer.
Kuzmin pulled back the curtain, crawled oft the bunk and got dressed.
To insure a private work space, he chose the sub’s attack center.
Located on the floor directly above him, this equipment-packed compartment would only be utilized during the times of actual combat.
Here, the Vulkan’s various offensive and defensive functions were monitored.
As he had hoped, the attack center indeed proved vacant. After positioning himself before the room’s central keyboard, he inserted the cassette tape into the playback mechanism and tapped into the vessel’s sensor identification banks. With the assistance of a pair of headphones, he listened to the distant surging that occupied the first half of the tape. Though he was unable to make any sense out of this jumble of noise, the computer had much better luck. When the monitor flashed alive, the which man quickly scanned the screen for his requested data.
Propulsion source: Geared steam turbines, 100,000 slip; 2 shafts, 34 knots.
Group Classification: Soviet Kresta-class cruiser. Sensor Deployment: 1 variable depth communications array.
Kuzmin pushed his headphones closer to his ears as an alien turbulence sounded above the steady hum of the cruiser’s turbines. Again he asked the computer to identify the signature.
Propulsion source: Stored chemical energy. Group Classification: Soviet SS-N-7 conclusion tipped torpedo.
Probable source: Alfa-class attack sub.
The significance of this data only sank in when the tape filled with the sound of the massive explosion.
The which man pulled the headphones off and stared out, wide-eyed. The vessel that had been blasted was indeed of Soviet origin. What shocked him was the puzzling fact that the weapon that had sent it to the bottom was also one of their own. Had a tragic miscalculation taken place topside, or was this attack somehow intentional? Kuzmin knew only one individual who could possibly answer this question. With a determined stride, he took off for the cabin of Petyr Valenko.
The warrant officer barely noticed the sour heaviness that lay in his gut as he traversed the hallway leading to officer country. Not really sure what he had chanced upon, he could only be certain that four hundred of his comrades most likely lay dead in the nearby waters
. If this meant that the alert they currently found themselves in was not a mere exercise, and a shooting war actually existed, one question remained: who was the enemy? He was still trying to puzzle it out as he turned down the corridor that brought him to the captain’s quarters.
Standing outside Petyr Valenko’s door was a grim faced senior seaman.
Kuzmin was shocked to find the sailor with a holstered pistol on his hip.
“Comrade Olenya, what is the meaning of your current duty? Is something the matter with the Captain?”
The big-boned Georgian sentry returned Kuzmin’s inquisitive glance with one of bored indifference.
“That will be for the zampolit to say, Comrade. I’ve merely been instructed to send all those who desire to see the Captain to Ivan Novikov’s cabin.”
“What are you talking about, Olenya? Step aside. I have important information for Captain Valenko.”
The guard’s hand went to his gun as he moved to block the door with his body.
“My orders are most explicit. Comrade. Please don’t press me to enforce them.”
Aware of the man’s sincerity, Kuzmin backed off.
“Something strange is going on aboard this ship, and I aim to get to the bottom of it. I will be back, Comrade. Of that, you can be assured.”
Ivan Novikov’s quarters were in an adjoining hallway, and the which man wasted no time getting there.
He had visited this particular cabin only a handful of times before, yet he remembered those meetings with great displeasure. It wasn’t just the hard-edged theories that the political officer was always so quick to promulgate, but rather the man’s personality that was so distasteful. Novikov was quick with advice but a poor listener. Too often he sounded as cold as a machine, while reeling off the Party’s current viewpoint.
There was no doubt that he was but a mouthpiece, with few ideas originating in his own mind.
Kuzmin gathered his nerve and knocked firmly on the door. Without a word spoken, its length slid open with a hiss. The zampolit was seated at his desk.
Above him was a large, framed representation of Lenin, the room’s only visible decoration. Upon identifying his visitor, Novikov beckoned him to enter.
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