“How much longer until we can launch?” Novikov asked firmly.
Hardly able to get the words out of his mouth, Leonov checked the depth gauge and softly answered, “Approximately thirty seconds.”
Taking in the information, Ivan Novikov cried for all to hear, “For the glory of the Motherland, we shall prevail 1” Seeing the demonic gleam that lit the zampolit’s eyes, Leonov inwardly conceded defeat. Not really certain how he became involved with this insane plot in the first place, the senior lieutenant swiveled around to face the firecontrol panel to which his destiny was now unalterably bound.
On the opposite side of the Vulkan’s attack center, Lev Zinyakin continued to do his best to monitor the approach of the homing torpedo, all the while absorbing the commotion that was coming from the launch station. There, the zampolit and the senior lieutenant were locked in an apparent power struggle. Not certain what had provoked the two officers, Zinyakin knew that if they didn’t do something quickly, the Vulkan would surely be hit.
There could be no doubting the torpedo’s intended target. Directed by an independent sonar device, the weapon was advancing toward them at a rapidly increasing speed. Already his initial intercept estimate was no longer accurate. Unless the ship’s officers had some sort of last-second maneuver in mind, Zinyakin knew that they were probably doomed.
Strangely enough, he found himself not really fearful of this final confrontation. Death at this depth would be quick and painless. With a vision of his beloved grandfather in mind, he gave full attention to monitoring the advance of the Grim Reaper.
As Zinyakin prepared himself to meet his maker, the Vulkan’s senior lieutenant did likewise. Even though it was only fifteen seconds before the first of the SS-N-18s would be released, he was certain that their motions were in vain. At the most, they would only be able to get a handful of missiles airborne. Far from their intended goal, he wondered if the resulting carnage would satisfy the plotter’s bloodlust. He listened to the zampolit anxiously counting off the remaining seconds as if it really mattered.
“Five … four … three … two … one … fire!”
Not wanting to make his sacrifice a worthless one, Vasili Leonov managed to depress the first of the blinking switches. Closing his eyes, he pictured the sequence of events that he had set into action.
Deep within the taiga, the first of the SS-N-18s received the signal to launch. In instant response, an outer hatch in the Vulkan’s superstructure popped open. This unmasked the tube closure — a rigid, dome-shaped shell structure designed as a protective cocoon for the missile. To shatter this closure, a series of linear-shaped explosive charges were detonated.
With the SS-N-18 now exposed, a small fixed rocket engine ignited. Its sole purpose was to direct its exhaust into the base of the launch tube, where a pool of cool water sat. The resulting steam pressure would ex pell the missile from the tube. Only after the SS-N18 had cleared the ocean’s surface would its liquid fuel boost motor ignite.
The first stages of this complex operation had gone quite smoothly. The tube closure had shattered and enough steam pressure had gathered to begin forcing the missile upward. But as the tip of the SS-N-18 cleared the Vulkan’s hull, the Tritons ASW/SOW plowed into the Soviet vessel’s sail. This violent concussion was followed by a massive explosion that vaporized the ascending SS-N-18 in a blinding wave of boiling flame. The Vulkan imploded in an earsplitting cacophony of rending steel. Exposed to the ocean’s great pressure, the crew had little time to suffer. In a matter of seconds their shredded bodies became one with the depths, as what little remaining wreckage plummeted ever downward.
Nineteen nautical miles due west of this spot, Lieutenant Charles Callahan was the first of the Triton’s crew to hear the results of their attack.
Warned by the abrupt halt of the SOW’s propeller, he ripped off his headphones in time to save his eardrums from the shattering explosion that followed. A fraction of a second later the blast was clearly audible in the interior of the control room itself.
Though a chorus of joyous shouts filled the compartment, Captain Cooksey’s words rang out loud and clear.
“All stations, General Quarters! Rig for a shock wave!”
A raucous horn sounded throughout the vessel as the crew scurried to secure their equipment and themselves. Callahan had barely braced himself against the edge of his console when a surging wall of compressed water smacked into the Triton’s bow.
Thrown hard to his left and then to his right, Callahan strained to remain upright. The sound of tumbling crewmates and loose gear broke all around him as the sub’s lighting system failed. Disorientated by the sudden plunge into darkness, he found himself once again struggling for balance — when their hull was pounded by yet another series of shock waves.
The damage-control panel was blaring loudly in warning by the time the turbulence passed.
Not long after, the lights blinked back on. Turning to check the room’s interior, Callahan caught sight of a tangled mess of fallen equipment and several prone seamen. One of the officers slowly picking himself off the floor was the captain. After helping Richard Craig get to his feet, Cooksey snapped into action.
“Someone please turn off that infernal warning buzzer! Damage control, I need to know our status on the double! Callahan, do you have a definite on that explosion’s source yet? Is the bogey still there?”
Abruptly called back to duty, Callahan swiveled around and remounted his headphones. Using the utmost caution, he scanned the waters in all directions.
The hydrophone search failed to pick anything up but the distant surge of the shock wave.
“All clear on passive. Captain. Can I utilize active?”
“Go ahead and zap them. Lieutenant,” Cooksey replied.
As the sensor operator activated the sonar system, the captain and the exec crowded in behind him.
Ignoring the incessant buzzing of the ship’s intercom, both senior officers studied the sonar screen. For a full minute, they watched the quivering white line that monitored the powerful sound waves being emitted from their bow.
The atmosphere was tense, but Callahan looked up and said matter-of-factly, “Whatever was out there sure as hell isn’t there anymore. Captain. We blew them to kingdom come!”
Grinning now from ear to ear, the sonar operator watched the captain and the exec react to the news.
“We got ‘em!” shouted Richard Craig triumphantly.
This incited another chorus of cheers from the control room’s staff.
Taking a few moments to join the celebration, Cooksey then turned to his next concern.
“Damage control, are we still in one piece?”
Warren Smith, the present watch officer, said, “It’s gonna take more than a little swell to take this little lady out. Skip. All stations remain dry and secure, except for the galley. The damned seal on the garbage disposal blew again. At last report Chief Bartkowski was up to his knees in seawater and potato peelings, but he’ll get a handle on it soon enough.”
Relieved, Cooksey allowed himself a real smile-almost as wide as that of his executive officer.
“Well, Skipper, it looks like we did it.”
“It certainly does. Rich. How does it feel, knowing that your new family has a reprieve?”
Shaking his head in wonder, the XO asked, “Was it really that close Skipper?”
Cooksey snorted.
“Rich, if even one of those warheads had hit its mark, the world would have been swallowed by a conflict the likes of which your worst nightmare couldn’t begin to approach. We got by this time, but we might not be so lucky the next.”
Then Cooksey’s tone lightened.
“Leaving you with that one to think about … why don’t you chart us the quickest route back to Pearl? I’ll handle the communique to Admiral Miller. By the way Rich, how’s your golf game lately?”
Chapter Sixteen
From thirty thousand feet up, Viktor Rodin could clearly appreciate the
urban sprawl of Southern California.
Never before had he seen such a widespread area of population. As they continued on north to Los Angeles, the stormy skies to the south gave way to a blue, crystal clear afternoon. Appreciative of the lack of turbulence, the Premier took in the coastline from the conference room’s single window.
Rodin was thankful for the time alone. Five minutes before, Robert Palmer had excused himself to brief his staff regarding the exciting news they had just received from Hawaii. Much to everyone’s relief, an American attack sub had reported the destruction of a Soviet Delta-class vessel in the Pacific near Midway.
The doomed boat could only have been the Vulkan.
With this threat to world peace alleviated, Rodin’s initial reaction had been one of pure joy. Yet, his happiness soon faded into melancholy as he considered the innocent sailors who had lost their lives because of this madness. Of course, these deaths were much preferred to a full-scale nuclear war.
But his disillusionment and depression grew as he surveyed the contents of the top-secret transmission just relayed to him by Olga Tyumen. This message, sent via satellite from MVD headquarters in Moscow, informed Rodin of two relevant phone calls recently made from his IL-78 command plane. Both calls had been placed by Admiral Stanislav Sorokin.
The first had been traced to the Kremlin office of Senior Politburo member Pavel Zavenyagin. Though Rodin had little personal contact with that particular individual, he knew much about the man’s checkered career. A thin, balding, beady-eyed figure, characterized by a full drooping moustache and a set of thick, bushy eyebrows, Zavenyagin was one of the last of the old-time hard liners Still living in the past glories of World War II, it would be just like him to support such a desperate act of treachery.
It proved to be the recipient of Admiral Sorokin’s second call that truly surprised the Premier. Konstantin Belchenko had been one of the Soviet Union’s most illustrious bureaucrats. Just as much a legend in his time as the admiral, the First Deputy of the KGB was someone who Rodin had always looked up to.
With his brave exploits during the Great War a matter of general public knowledge, Belchenko did for their intelligence service what Sorokin had done for the navy.
Rodin wondered if perhaps the sickness that Belchdenko had been fighting the past few months had pushed him to this extreme. Fever could distort a man’s perspective in a most subtle way. Although the Premier wished he could blame it on Belchenko’s infection, he knew that there had to be a solid motive behind the first deputy’s actions. Like Zavenyagin, he must have been still living in the past. Fearful of the new, enlightened world that was dawning, Belchenko had helped instigate the plot in a desperate effort to push back the hands of time. Conscious of the man’s position of power, the Premier had made the hard decision to immediately place Belchenko under arrest. Already units of the MVD were moving into the woods that surrounded his dacha on the banks of the Sura.
With him out of the way, there was only one more conspirator to face.
Stanislav Sorokin’s flight plan made it evident that he was headed for Petropavlovsk.
There would be a uniformed “welcoming committee” waiting for him there, courtesy of Viktor Rodin. His decision to place the admiral under arrest had been equally as difficult as that concerning the first deputy, but Rodin had had no choice. To apprehend one of the legends of their time could prove most unpopular, but the Premier knew that he could deal with that problem.
In the new world order that would hopefully follow, Sorokin’s talents would have been greatly appreciated.
The conversion from a wartime fleet would take a unique vision for which talented sailors such as the admiral were famous. Yet, like his coconspirators, Sorokin had decided to go out with a bang instead of a whimper.
As Rodin’s thoughts turned toward the future, he visualized that moment when Robert Palmer had first conveyed the news of the Vulkan’s demise.
Like young school boys, they had shouted for joy and embraced.
Although this day had come close to being the most tragic one the earth had ever known, the hand of destiny demanded that sanity prevail. Out of this black tide of tear and despair would evolve a new era of international cooperation, although neither leader fooled himself into thinking that such a conversion would be easy. Many obstacles would still have to be faced.
First on Rodin’s agenda was the reconsolidation of his power back home.
Unfortunately, that would necessitate a temporary delay in the present summit.
He had gratefully accepted Palmer’s offer to use one of the President’s command planes to fly back to the Soviet Union. There, he would bring to public justice the madmen responsible for this near tragedy. Then would begin the arduous task of working toward the lofty promises that both leaders had sworn to each other on this most eventful of days.
Looking out at the seemingly endless California city that hugged the coastline here, Rodin shuddered as he contemplated the consequences if the Vulkan hadn’t been stopped in time. So that such an occurrence could never come to pass again, the nuclear genie had to be contained forever. This was the ultimate purpose to which he would now devote his entire life. Only by banning nuclear weapons from the face of the earth could man’s continued existence be assured.
The frigid north wind blew icy gusts, and Konstantin Belchenko halted momentarily to pull the collar of his greatcoat closer to his neck.
Peering out toward the narrow footbridge that crossed the surging Sura, he caught sight of the ancient birch forest on the river’s opposite bank. Like a fleet of sailboat masts bending in a blustery breeze, the white, shaggy trunks swayed in unison. The sound of the merciless wind rose in a howl, clearly predominating over the steady crash of the Sura’s current.
When a raven’s harsh cry called in the distance, Belchenko looked up and caught sight of an ominous bank of dark storm clouds, gathering above the woods. Already, the first snow flurries were falling.
Soon the total brunt of the advancing storm would be upon them.
Oblivious to the threat, Belchenko pushed himself on toward the bridge’s tapered span.
Though his nurse Katrina had pleaded with him to remain before the fireplace in the dacha, the call had been much too loud for the first deputy to ignore.
Drained by the events of the day just passed, he knew of but a single place where his tangled contemplations would sort themselves out. As they had served for decades past, the birch forest remained his sole place of grace.
Aware of the sheet of ice that was rapidly forming on the bridge’s planked floor, he carefully crossed the expanse. Here the crash of the Sura was almost deafening. For an instant, he stopped halfway across and took in the swift current as it tumbled downstream.
Was it really that long ago that he had shared this same view with his father? Aware of the passing years, he remembered a time of glorious innocence when a fishing rod and a picnic basket had been his only concerns. It was during that period that the woods had first spoken to him like a long lost friend. Soothed by its message of primal simplicity, he had never failed to return in the crazed years that had followed.
Even during the Great War he had managed to spend some time there. In fact, it was on this very span that he had conceived the idea which first brought him to the attention of his commanding officer — the legendary Lavrenti Pavlovich Beria. Assigned to an NKVD intelligence batallion, Belchenko thought of a plan to place their agents in occupied towns dressed in the uniforms of the German SS.
With instructions to murder, rape and pillage, their agents would always leave behind survivors who could attest to the fact that the Germans were far from saviors. The psychological affects of such an operation had rallied thousands of potential defectors to the Rodina’s cause.
Pleased with Belchenko’s concept, Beria had given the young officer his own crack unit. Under the direction of the organization known as SMERSH, he had led a squadron of soldiers to the front. Positioned behind their
own Red Army units, it was their duty to shoot any of their comrades who tried to retreat in the face of German counterattacks. Though often distasteful, he was well aware of his duty’s importance and gave the task his all.
After the war’s conclusion, he again returned to Penza, this time as a full-fledged KGB agent. Recruited by General Ivan Alexandrovich Serov in 1954, the year that the KGB was born, Belchenko sought the first Eastern-bloc agents to crack the newly formed imperialist organization known as NATO.
Once more, he rose in the ranks.
In April of 1967, under the direction of Yuri Andropov, he went off to Vietnam. With tons of America’s latest captured war gear waiting for them, the KGB had had an intelligence field day.
Promoted to his current position when Andropov entered the Politburo, Konstantin had a free hand to run the KGB as he saw fit. Second to no other operation of its kind, all had proceeded smoothly-until Viktor Rodin’s ascension to power. Now, all his hard work was about to go for naught. Stirred by this somber thought, and a biting gust of wind, the first deputy turned from the water and continued on to the birch woods.
As he entered the treeline the crash of the Sura faded, to be replaced by the ever-present howling wind and the creaking of the birch limbs.
The snow began falling more thickly now, and he strained to pick out the footpath that would lead him to his goal. Barely visible ahead, he sighted the trail and surrendered himself to its gentle meander.
With the trees acting as a partial windbreak, the going was now much more comfortable. Soothed by the hushed stillness of the forest, his previously distraught thoughts gradually began sorting themselves out.
It wasn’t all that long ago that he had received the message from their KGB mole in America’s military command, informing him of the Vulkan’s destruction. At first he had refused to believe it, but then the harsh reality had sunk in.
Not long after, Stanislav Sorokin had called him.
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