The Will Of The People (Conspiracy Trilogy Book 1)

by Christopher Read

  The crew of the Gepard had informally expressed their opinion on the matter, and the attack on the USS John Finn had seemingly met with almost universal approval: basically, the Americans only had themselves to blame for trying to beat the blockade, and Karenin had had little choice. The crew’s brush with death was somehow reflected in the way each man went about his duties, a subtle mix of self-belief and pride endorsing their every action.

  “Conn, Sonar. Faint contact; bearing zero-five-two. Signal too distorted for classification; probable submarine – designate Wolf-One. Range and course unknown.”

  “Ahead slow; steady on course zero-two-zero.” Karenin was content to watch and wait. One disadvantage of a nuclear submarine was that coolant needed to be pumped continuously to keep the reactor from overheating. The Gepard’s designers had done much to subdue such unwanted sounds, but it was impossible to deaden them altogether, and Karenin was not so foolish as to assume the other boat was unaware of the Gepard’s presence.

  The contact was elusive; like the Gepard it might simply be curious, or it might be out for revenge. Karenin changed course every few minutes, guessing as to what the other boat would do, trying to keep the initiative. The Gepard crept slowly north, Karenin trusting that their target would edge his way to the west and the edge of the exclusion zone.

  Despite the potential for unwanted noise, he felt it prudent to add two more Shkval-3s to the pair already loaded into the torpedo tubes; a moment’s reflection, then he also ordered the loading of two Type-53s. To remove a torpedo from a tube and re-position it on the rack ready for future use was far more complex than just simply reversing the loading process; consequently, loading was normally left until the last possible moment. That was fine for the vast space of the Atlantic where a potential target might be picked up tens of kilometres distant, but in the cramped confines of the Baltic such protocols were best ignored.

  “Conn, Sonar. Wolf-One identified as a Virginia-class, USS Minnesota. Now bearing one-two-one; range 8700 metres; speed six knots; course two-four-five; re-designating contact by name.”

  Karenin kept his face impassive but this wasn’t quite what he wanted to hear. The Gepard was close to presenting its stern to the enemy, the noise from the submarine’s own propeller threatening to blank out all other sounds. The presence of the Minnesota just fourteen kilometres from the start of the exclusion zone appeared at best provocative, and at worst the prelude to an attack.

  “Right five degrees rudder;” Karenin ordered. “Come to course one-three-zero.”

  The Gepard and USS Minnesota jockeyed for position like a pair of lumbering and half-blind gladiators. Karenin knew the Virginia-class to be a more than capable attack submarine, and the Gepard would need to exercise extreme caution against such an adversary. The atmosphere in the control room was one of subdued confidence, the crew relishing their previous double success of torpedo attack and subsequent evasion.

  “Conn, Sonar. Minnesota now bearing one-two-six; drifting two-six-four; range 7300 metres; contact fading.”

  The Gepard too slowed, drifting idly as Karenin waited for the Americans to strike or flee. With the USS Minnesota outside the exclusion zone, Karenin had no authority to attack, but full authority to do whatever was necessary to defend the Gepard. Seven kilometres was uncomfortably close, the American submarine an unwelcome stranger encroaching upon the Gepard’s personal space. Close they might be, but neither boat could now hear the other, systems straining to catch a single unnecessary sound.

  The tension became like an unbearable itch: time was on Karenin’s side, the Minnesota with the ever present threat from the Russian surface ships and ASW helicopters. Cocooned inside the Gepard’s steel hull, the normal rules of life and death no longer seemed to apply, and Karenin was living almost entirely off nervous energy, barely able to sleep, yet still managing to stay one step ahead of the United States Navy.

  After some forty minutes it was Karenin who finally lost patience. “Ahead dead slow; steady on course one-four-five.”

  The Minnesota’s response took less than a minute. “Sonar contact; bearing one-zero-six... Tubes flooding!”

  “All ahead one-third!”

  “High-speed screws; multiple contacts.” The sonar chief’s voice was tense, apprehensive. “Bearing one-zero-five; range 4700 metres; up angle five degrees. Confirm three Mark-48 torpedoes; designate – Alpha-One, Two, and Three. Minnesota: similar bearing, range estimate 4800.”

  Karenin’s brain seemed to seize up, his mind struggling to understand how the Americans could have crept so close; he had only a few seconds to react, certainly no time for anything subtle.

  “Left five degrees rudder; come to course one-zero-five; five degrees down angle.” He chose to drive the Gepard directly at the oncoming torpedoes, providing them with the smallest target profile. “Tubes one through four – match present bearing and shoot!”

  “Tubes one through four,” Alenikov confirmed, “automatic search on one-zero-five. Outer doors open...”

  The Gepard gave a gentle series of shudders as the four torpedoes were launched, and Karenin immediately rapped out new orders. “All ahead full!” Tubes five and six: set solution for the Minnesota, automatic presets. Reload tubes one through four with Shkval-3s.”

  Judging by their previous spar with the American torpedoes, the Shkval was only fifty percent effective – not an encouraging record with three enemy torpedoes to combat. With submarine and torpedoes now closing together at a combined speed of over 150 kilometres per hour, the slightest error or electronic misjudgement could yet prove the Gepard’s salvation.

  “Alpha-One has locked on,” the sonar chief announced. “Range 3100 metres and closing.”

  Karenin glanced across at Alenikov.

  “Shkval-One through Four armed,” reported Alenikov, eyes darting from one console to another while watching the technicians operate the torpedoes’ guide wires. “Shkval-One and Two have acquired… Solution confirmed on the Minnesota.”

  “Fire tubes five and six!” In the race to destruction the Gepard was running well ahead of its adversary, with barely time to launch an attack.

  Alenikov immediately depressed two buttons on the fire control console, and one after the other, the Russian torpedoes shot out from the Gepard, accelerating toward the USS Minnesota.

  Two of the American torpedoes were destroyed but the third continued to close. Karenin seemed to have stopped breathing, his body semi-rigid from the strain as the pings of the Mark-48’s active sonar grew ever louder. He glanced at a display to his left, impatient for the additional Shkvals to be loaded.

  Alenikov kept up his commentary, “Shkval-Three and Four continuing in search mode; wires cut... Alpha-Three has locked on; twelve seconds to impact.”

  “Launch noisemakers...” Karenin counted slowly to three, “Maximum down-angle.... now!” Karenin remained confident, the combination of high closing speed and the Gepard’s sudden dive requiring the torpedo to make a dramatic momentum change, testing the limits of the Mark-48’s manoeuvrability.

  It proved to be a false hope. A massive explosion ripped through the Gepard’s double hull near to the bow, destroying the external tubes housing the decoys and rupturing two of the main ballast tanks. Water at a pressure close to ten atmospheres drove its way into the torpedo room and crew accommodation, and even though the internal bulkheads were built to withstand far greater pressures, the hull breach was enough to accelerate the Gepard’s downward flight.

  Karenin’s memory was of a crashing wall of sound, as though the whole frame of the submarine was about to crush in on him. He was thrown across the control room, smashing into the planesman’s metal chair.

  The Diving Officer was the first to speak, his voice struggling to be heard against the squawk of an alarm. “Forward tanks one and two have been breached; depth now ninety-two metres; nine degrees bow-down...”

  “All back two-thirds!” Karenin ordered, desperation adding an edge to his voice. “Blo
w main ballast, three through eight!”

  There was the tortured scream of high-pressure air rushing into the ballast tanks. The numbers on the depth gauge immediately slowed their downward flight, and with a resentful sigh the Gepard started to lift – stern-first. It was somewhat inelegant but at least they were heading towards the surface.

  “All stop; cancel blow on tanks five and six.” Karenin’s tone was calmer now, the initial crisis having been quickly dealt with. “Sonar, report all contacts; your best guess if you have to.”

  Every console flickered with red lights, and guesswork and instinct would have to supplement what little technology was still functioning. Karenin needed to understand exactly what dangers were still out there – only then would he know whether the Gepard had any hope of surviving the next few minutes.

  The sonar chief struggled to make sense of the barrage of noise surrounding the Gepard, “Signals distorted, too much external noise... Possible contact bearing zero-five-zero, moving away; no close contacts detected.”

  Karenin kept his surprise to himself, trying to maintain an air of confidence. Perhaps the Gepard had a chance to make it home after all, the Minnesota unwilling – or perhaps unable – to take full advantage of their fallibility.

  The Gepard’s rush to the surface gradually became far more sedate, and as damage reports began to be relayed to the control room, it became clear that the submarine did indeed have a guardian-angel. For the eleven men in the flooded compartments, there was no hope; however, the Gepard was still basically in one piece, and the majority of the crew had escaped unscathed. The nuclear reactor was behaving normally and the submarine could still manoeuvre effectively, if rather more slowly than normal. With the torpedo room flooded and decoys destroyed, they now had no physical or electronic defence against torpedoes, nor could they launch the Gepard’s cruise missiles; in addition, their sonar capability had been severely reduced. In effect, the Gepard was a hunter-killer which couldn’t hunt too well and couldn’t kill anything anyway.

  Karenin shrugged off his disappointment; now that the immediate danger had passed, his thoughts returned to the problem of the American submarine. With so much external damage, the Gepard was probably as noisy as a love-sick whale and an easy target if the USS Minnesota so desired. Fortunately, the Gepard’s own wayward torpedoes would now be out of fuel and so no longer represented a threat. The surviving sonar systems were still behaving erratically with a range of spurious and distorted signals, and there was no knowing how close the Minnesota might actually be, or even if the Russian torpedoes had managed to match their opponent’s success.

  Karenin gave it another fifteen minutes, then opted to contact Fleet HQ.

  His report was received without comment, the details of the unprovoked attack by the USS Minnesota duly confirmed and noted. The corvette Boikiy had already back-tracked to investigate, and Karenin was ordered to make his best safe speed to the naval base at Kaliningrad.

  A deep breath to hide the frustration, then Karenin keyed the intercom. Despite his hopes and self-belief, he had failed to prove the Gepard’s true worth, the disabling of an American destroyer little enough to compensate for the Gepard’s own wounds. Now he would have to trust that his crew would be able to forgive his mistakes, as he most certainly could not.

  Moscow

  Anderson was feeling a little ill-used, hustled here and there without explanation and no clear sense as to what would happen next. That said, anywhere was probably better than what had awaited them in Gdansk.

  The remainder of their flight into Kaliningrad had been rather more routine, the helicopter landing at Russia’s Naval Base some forty minutes after the excitement of the missile attack. Anderson had immediately been hustled away, with no chance to speak to Charlotte, two guards marching him to a sad-looking room to be searched and questioned. Hours of questions, no force used or threats, just the same questions over and over again, each answer checked, re-checked and checked again. The unblinking eye of a camera lens had recorded every frown and shake of his head, various experts no doubt scrutinising each frame for evidence of Anderson’s lies and distortions. He had slowly found himself getting confused, unsure exactly what he was being asked, seemingly destined to wander endlessly from one prison cell to another.

  His watch had been confiscated early on, and Anderson guessed it to be late afternoon when eventually he had been reunited with Charlotte and Koval. It had then been a military flight to somewhere near Moscow, the three of them seated well apart, with no chance to talk. Charlotte had looked more angry than tired, Koval maintaining an air of studied indifference. Their future still looked very unclear, Anderson’s concern growing in direct proportion to their increasing distance from the UK.

  The final leg of their long journey had been by four-car convoy, traveling at speed through empty darkened streets before finishing in an underground car park; now there were just three cars, the one with Koval having diverted elsewhere.

  One of their escorts led the way into the adjacent building, Charlotte hustled towards a wide flight of stairs. Anderson was taken elsewhere, a confusing journey along narrow corridors, before he was finally directed into a small room: bare walls, three chairs and a desk – all the familiar hallmarks of yet another interview room.

  Anderson was now well-acquainted with the basic routine, readying himself for the next round of questions while knowing he’d have at least a half-hour to wait. He doubted he’d be allowed to sleep, but with nothing to distract him it was always going to be a losing battle. Even as his head began to droop, the door opened and a uniformed figure entered to sit down facing Anderson, pen and notepad resting on the table between them.

  “Welcome to Moscow, Mr Anderson; my name is Major Eskov.” The English was flawless with barely any accent, the man’s tone friendly and relaxed. “I’ve studied the transcript of your interview at Kaliningrad and we’ll go through everything in detail tomorrow; I’m sure you’re looking forward to something to eat and an uninterrupted sleep. For now, there’s just one aspect that I would like to clarify.” He paused, as though waiting for Anderson to respond, even though it was obviously a statement and not a question. “Please explain once again why you and Charlotte Saunders were aboard the Princess Eloise.”

  “It wasn’t something we volunteered for.” Anderson was on his guard, knowing full well how his version of the truth would be received. “Shipping us off to Poland was a convenient way of stopping us from publicising what we knew.”

  “Why just not kill you both, rather than sending you on a free cruise to the Baltic? I appreciate that it diverts suspicion away from this Erdenheim facility, but it still seems... unlikely?”

  “Unlikely or not, that’s what happened.” Anderson realised he was beginning to sound desperate. “If Martin Rebane had something else in mind then he didn’t share his plans. As it will say somewhere in one of your reports, Charlotte and I were locked in a cabin aboard the Princess Eloise, not free to roam at will.”

  “I appreciate you weren’t paying passengers, but it doesn’t mean you were actually prisoners. Some might see your confinement more as a minor inconvenience, and a sensible way to protect the crew from the curious gaze of a journalist.”

  Anderson stayed silent, mind numb and unable to think clearly.

  “And there’s no other reason for you to travel to Poland – a story about August 14, perhaps?”

  “We were prisoners with a padlock on the door, and I’ve still got the bruises from McDowell’s fists. No, I wasn’t expecting to get a story out of it, just a bullet in the head.”

  Eskov gave a weak smile, “Charlotte Saunders seems to suggest you were expecting an exclusive on August 14 and that’s why you were going to Poland.”

  Anderson held his surprise in check, annoyed with himself for almost believing Eskov’s manipulation of the facts; it would doubtless only be the first of many such mind-games. “I was held prisoner by Rebane and McDowell, and had to give Charlotte a good reaso
n for my sudden disappearance; the idea of an exclusive was a convenient excuse. An excuse, not reality.”

  Eskov changed tack, “I understand that your computer file on Erdenheim, with its photographs and notes, was kept updated onto cloud storage?”

  Anderson nodded, “I imagine it’s been deleted, unless you can somehow restore it.”

  “We have that ability, but there’s no evidence of anything having been deleted. I’ve read your article on Erdenheim, studied the photographs, and looked at your notes on Martin Rebane and Patrick McDowell. Surely, if Rebane was worried about how much you knew, he would have taken the basic precaution of erasing all such files? From what you say, Erdenheim has the expertise to hack into your account... Can you understand my confusion, Mr Anderson?”

  Anderson was equally confused and struggling to work out how he could convince Eskov of his innocence. Guilt by association would doubtless be assumed even if Anderson’s only perceived fault was co-operating with August 14 on some news article.

  Eskov persevered with the questions for another ten minutes, before finally leaving Anderson alone. Soup and bread arrived soon after, together with some sort of meat pie, washed down with black tea. Anderson ate slowly, thinking through Eskov’s words to try and find some clue as how the Russians really regarded their two guests. He couldn’t complain as to how he was being treated, but it was worrying that Charlotte and Anderson were being kept apart, their own words twisted so as to accuse the other.

  Meal duly finished, Anderson was taken by armed guard down to the basement and shown into a small cell, not that dissimilar to his room at Erdenheim. His watch lay on the bed, together with his clothes and other personal items from the Princess Eloise, all neatly laid out.