Barracuda 945 am-6

by Patrick Robinson

  The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, wary of putting their golden eggs at the very end of the program, had now moved up the award for Best Actor to an estimated one hour from the conclusion of the ceremony. And the Kodak held its breath, as they announced the nominations and ran the clips, two minutes for each film, showing the shining moments of the best male acting performances of the year.

  "And the winner is" (roll on the drums) "… TROY RAMFORD for Timeshare." And again the spotlights raked the audience in search of the tall, Nebraska-born Oscar winner, who was currently kissing Edna, waving to well-wishers, and trying to stand up.

  In a maelstrom of backslapping, whooping, and cheering, he walked up to receive his award, stepping out into the aisle and insisting that Ms. Carey accompany him. By the time the glorious pair were under way, Jake Milburn and Skip Farr, watching the security radar screen out on the western edge of the Lompoc power station, had spotted a line of four incoming flying objects screaming over the California coast. And they took longer to assemble their defenses than Troy and Edna.

  Both men saw the first missile come arrowing in, directly overhead, low and fast, 600-plus knots. Incredulously, they watched it dive and hit the massive generator building, which contained twenty-four 200-foot-long, 10-foot-high turbines, stacked in sets of three beneath the 80-foot-high roof.

  The entire structure was blown sky-high, the eight topmost turbines, weighing around 100 tons apiece, being hurled over 300 feet into the air, two of them intact. They had not yet crashed to the ground when the next missile hit the furnace room, blew the huge heating units assunder, and exploded in a 200-yard-wide fireball a half million gallons of fuel oil, recently unloaded from Union Pacific freight car tankers.

  The next missile vaporized the control room, and the last one blew up the entire fuel storage area, including its direct pipeline to the railroad terminus, where every last barrel of fuel oil was pumped out and into the power station. Both terminus and the power station were history, and the fires rose hundreds of feet into the twilit skies, black oil smoke billowing on a west wind across the Valley of Flowers and engulfing the entire town of Lompoc.

  It was impossible to see four yards on the freeway up to Vandenberg Air Force Base, where the Commanding Officer ordered all aircraft to red alert. That was two minutes after the first missile hit. And that was when the lights went out in the Kodak Theatre. Right out, that is. Not a glimmer. Troy and Edna stood in inky black darkness, film stars screamed, bimbos squealed, actors yelled, their minders cursed, and the management appealed for calm through microphones that no longer worked.

  All over the world, movie fans by the hundreds of millions were tuned to the Hollywood blackout. It quickly became obvious that this was no ordinary blackout. There was nothing coming out of the Kodak whatsoever. Nothing out of Los Angeles. None of the television networks could fathom the complete shutdown of their West Coast news operations.

  Within moments, there was complete chaos in the Kodak. The emergency generators kicked in five minutes after the power failure, but these were on a very small scale compared to the dimension of the lost wattage. There was sufficient light to provide a safe way out for a normal crowd in the electronic auditorium.

  But this was no ordinary crowd. This was a gathering of people who were unused to inconvenience. Many had not been argued with for several years. Some of them could not recall the last time they were interrupted. And this. This total indignity practically sent them over the edge. The Kodak had become a world convention of mass selfishness.

  Screams rent the air. Self-important voices demanded an explanation. It was all the stewards could manage to prevent a riot, as more than three thousand people stampeded for the exit, all of them demanding priority over everyone else.

  If any of them had time to stop and think, they might have realized they were in by far the best place, a large auditorium with some lighting, in a complex with sufficient power to allow them access to the adjoining hotel, which also had its own weak but useful generator system.

  Outside was dangerous. The lights were out throughout the city, all the way to downtown Los Angeles and beyond, south to Santa Ana and east to San Bernardino. That included streetlights, traffic lights, shop lights, security cameras, millions of telephones, and televisions. Miraculously, there were still lights in Malibu Canyon, which was operating off the San Gabriel South Mountain system. But Los Angeles was pitch black, grinding to a halt, the freeways already clogging as every street intersection began to experience crashes and permanent holdups.

  More than four hundred miles to the north, the City of San Francisco suffered a similar fate within eight minutes of Los Angeles. The lights suddenly dimmed and then failed completely on the Golden Gate Bridge, which spans the narrow channel connecting the Pacific Ocean to San Francisco Bay. Within two more minutes, every light on the entire peninsula was down. Nob Hill was nixed, Fisherman's Wharf wasted, and the cable cars kaput.

  San Francisco just withered and died. The sensational night views over the city from its fabled forty-three hills, so vaunted in the tourist and hotel brochures, now permitted visitors only to stare down into a black abyss, lit only by distant car headlights and the occasional freighter on the bay. The mighty suspension bridge was a sinister black shadow in the night. In the same way, the heights of San Gabriel peered down into the ebony crater of the City of the Angels. Beyond the coast of California no one had the slightest idea what had happened. Jake Milburn and Skip Fan, still safe upwind of the fire in the security outpost west of the power station, were the only two people on earth who knew precisely what had happened. They had spotted General Rashood's missiles on their radar screens, then watched them swoop overhead and smash into the buildings.

  They ran, terrified that more attacks were coming in. They made Jake's car and hurled themselves inside, then headed for the coast, grappling for cell phones, trying to call the Lompoc Police and Fire departments. There was no use trying to get the power station's own emergency services. There was nothing left. Mercifully, there had been very few people on duty this Sunday night, maybe four, or at the most five, including the night patrol man whose jeep had been blown several hundred feet into the air.

  Jake correctly assumed everyone else was dead, and called his wife to tell her he was safe and to let Mrs. Farr know that Skip was fine too. All that Annie Milburn knew, at home in a valley east of the town, was that she never even got to see Troy Ramford get his Oscar because there'd been some kind of power cut in Hollywood.

  The Lompoc Police Department was already fielding calls from the media, who were quickly on the case, the radio stations having been alerted by several listeners who were able to see the inferno raging in the power station. Exactly like Grays Harbor and Valdez, the Lompoc Fire Department was chiefly concerned with preventing the spread of the blaze outside the town.

  Immediately when Jake Milburn's call came in, the Police Chief notified the FBI in San Diego, which was standard procedure at the merest suspicion the United States had come under attack. Jake had recounted that both he and his partner Skip Farr, both trained security men and ex-cops from Sacramento, had seen missiles, seen the attack, seen the cruises come in from the ocean, from the southwest, losing height as they honed in on the power station.

  That rendered it a matter of national security. And within moments, the NSA at Fort Meade was informed. Even though it was 11:30 p.m. in Maryland, the duty officer nevertheless hit the wire for the Director. But Admiral Morris had just left. His assistant Lieutenant Commander Ramshawe was, however, still in his office and picked up the telephone, hearing to his horror what had happened at Lompoc.

  Without missing a beat, he opened the Agency's hot line to the White House and told the operator to get Admiral Arnold Morgan on the line, fast, wherever he was, and whatever the time. Then he left a message on Admiral Morris's answering service to call him as soon as possible. Jimmy knew the Admiral would get the message within the next fifteen minutes.

>   The phone rang angrily. Admiral Morgan, who had been half reading, half watching the Oscars with Kathy, was on the line.

  "Sir, our man just destroyed the Lompoc power station. San Francisco and Los Angeles are blacked right out. Two security men saw the missiles come in from the sea — fast and low, smashing straight into the main buildings. The flames right now are several hundred feet high. Place works on oil, as we know."

  "JESUS CHRIST!" yelled Arnold Morgan. "This is the end of any kind of secrecy. Tomorrow the entire country is going to know we've been hit. It's gonna be like September 11. I'll have to organize a massive Naval search… Where's Admiral Morris?"

  "Just left, sir."

  'Tell George to sit tight at his desk. You get to the Pentagon now. Meet me in Admiral Dickson's office in a half hour. Bring everything that's relevant."

  "Yes, sir."

  Jimmy gathered up his charts, maps, and E-mails and headed for the parking lot, flung his packed briefcase onto the passenger seat, and gunned the Jaguar through the empty rows of stationary cars toward the main gate. He flicked on the radio and headed for the Baltimore-Washington Parkway, racing down to the junction with the Beltway, but driving straight on, to the Anacostia Freeway.

  From there he picked up 1-395 and charged straight across the bridges to the Pentagon. If he'd been stopped for speeding, he'd have asked for a police escort, and he was confident his NSA pass and Lieutenant Commander's rank would have done the trick. By now the entire world knew, not that the electric-power supplier to Los Angeles and San Francisco had just been flattened by a terrorist, but that Troy Ramford's speech, about to be delivered with his arm around the lovely Edna Casey, had been blacked out.

  The radio and late-night news programs were all over the story, already sounding the alarm for possible terrorist attacks.

  He drove directly to security, and told them he was going straight to the CNO's elevator in the underground parking lot. And when he arrived, Admiral Morgan was just disembarking from his White House staff car.

  Accompanied by a guard, they took the elevator to the fourth floor, emerging in corridor seven, right off E-Ring, the Pentagon's outer-office on all levels. A young Naval Lieutenant met them and mentioned that Admiral Dickson would be here in three minutes. He led them straight into the inner office and told them he'd have some coffee sent in immediately. It was a little after midnight.

  Exactly three minutes later, Admiral Dickson arrived, and before saying a word he walked over to the wide computer screen on the wall and switched it on, punching in the numbers that would provide a broad view of the submarine roads into the San Diego Naval Base.

  "Hello, sir," he said, nodding. "Lieutenant Commander, this is a very bad business. We're under attack, no doubt about it. And our chances of finding the culprit are still pretty remote. But we have made some progress, not, of course, where he is, but where we're pretty darn sure he isn't."

  "That's a kinda breakthrough, if accurate, Alan," said Admiral Morgan. "Because there is only one unassailable fact. After this character fired his goddamned missiles, he did not head due east. Because that would have put him on the beach. All other options are open so far as I can tell."

  "I think the Navy will do a little better than that, sir," replied the CNO.

  "Okay, old buddy, shoot… "

  "You'll remember I mentioned I had two submarines offshore, on their way in. Well, they're both Los Angeles Class boats, the Santa Fe and the Tucson, and we've had them patrolling four hundred miles off San Diego for the past week, on high alert for any foreign submarine, especially a Russian Sierra I, Barracuda Class.

  "They're around two hundred miles apart, which I realize is a pretty good distance. But between them we have a couple of guided-missile frigates, Arleigh Burkes, the Decatur and the Porter. We have all four of them in a kind of crescent facing east. Behind them, maybe three hundred miles, we have a cruiser coming in from Pearl, and it's watching for missiles. We've already checked. Whatever was fired at Lompoc did not sail over the masts of my ships. That means our quarry is very probably inshore… "

  "I agree," said Admiral Morgan. "It's possible he may have given them the slip, but unlikely. Also, I see from one of Jimmy's notes, right here, the security officers said the missiles came in directly out of the southwest. Which means they must have passed over the masts of your ships. That is, if he was farther offshore than we think."

  "That's precisely what I'm getting at," said Admiral Dick-son. "If we mark my crescent right here… and draw a straight line to the southwest from the Lompoc power station, it looks as though the submarine we seek was probably less than three hundred miles offshore. Somewhere here, in this area…"

  "Can't argue with that," said Arnold Morgan. "Just one thing, though. The missiles did take a kinda circuitous route into Valdez and Grays Harbor, so why do you suppose he fired 'em straight this time?"

  "The two Lompoc guys both saw the damned thing incoming from the southwest, that's directly out of the Pacific," Dickson said.

  "OK," Morgan said, "that circle you just put on the screen… the little bastard's in there, no doubt."

  "I've just talked to CINCPAC. They're diverting search aircraft, plus a couple of destroyers right in there ASAP. As you know, there's a ton of ASW kit on the frigates."

  "Plenty of torpedoes too, I hope," rasped Arnold. "What are their rules of engagement?"

  "Shoot to kill. No questions asked."

  "That's my language, Alan. We find 'em. They die."

  "Of course, we still have a big problem, sir. We don't know which way he's headed."

  "No. And I guess our biggest worry is he heads slowly northwest, maybe eight hundred feet below the surface. That way he'd be near certain to get away. Unless he runs over a SOSUS hot spot."

  "I know it, sir. But I don't think he can move to the west. We'd catch him if he did. Even if he was going pretty slowly. His options are really southeast, south, and southwest. In that ninety-degree arc he has his back to the wall, but if he moves slowly, the odds are still in his favor."

  "Hmmmm. That's the trouble with oceans," said Arnold. "They're altogether too fucking big."

  "If you had to make an assessment, sir. If you were him, which way would you go?"

  "Not westward. Because that's where I'd be expecting trouble. Maybe due south. Because from where he is positioned, that's into very deep open ocean way off Central America. However, I think he hugged the coast coming down from the Grays Harbor area, stayed in noisy water for maybe four days, and then headed farther offshore for his attack."

  "You think he'll pull the same trick now, sir?"

  "Dunno. But I would. I'd hug the coast of Mexico for a long time. I'd probably keep going at seven knots for two or three thousand miles, maybe three weeks. Then I'd angle off, come right to 270 degrees and charge for the South Pacific. His chances of being caught in there are around zero. The area's just too big."

  "You mean if we're gonna get him, sir, we'd better get him real quick."

  "That's what I mean, Admiral."

  "If only he had to surface, or refuel, or snorkel, or any damn thing, life would be a lot easier."

  "That's been the trouble right from the start, Alan. In that ship he doesn't have to do any of those things. And that's why we might not find him."

  "What will you advise the President to say?"

  "I guess he'll have to say we suspect terrorism. And that the oil installations were attacked by persons unknown. But I think we'll leave it very open-ended for the moment. I'll have him refer to the possibility of land-launched missiles, or even planted bombs.

  "But I cannot terrify the populace by admitting there's a foreign nuclear submarine, patrolling our shores, knocking down anything he fucking well pleases. That would cause mass panic: And worse, it would alert the controllers of our terrorists to be even more careful than usual."

  The CNO shook his head. And Lieutenant Commander Ramshawe climbed to his feet and walked closer to the big computer scree
n. He stared at it for a moment, then he turned back to the two Admirals.

  "May I say something, sir?" he said, staring at Arnold Morgan.

  "Sure, Jimmy. Go right ahead. Alan and I have exhausted our collective brains."

  "OK. Let us assume our theories are correct. Somehow China agrees to purchase not one, but both Russian Barracudas. And sends one of them all the way around the Arctic Circle to Petropavlovsk, with a view to making an excursion into U.S. waters, that's the relatively short passage across the northern Pacific past the Aleutian Islands.

  "At around the same time, they pop out the bloody decoy and send the bastard around the world. Except no one admits the decoy is floating, right? So when old razormouth starts banging out the refinery, then the power station, the decoy shows up, bold as brass, in Zhanjiang, proving beyond doubt it could not have been the Barracuda, because they know we think there is only one of 'em.

  "However, they had two mishaps. One, the decoy 'cuda gets heard off the coast of Ireland. Two, the other 'cuda hits the sushi boat, proving it's not where it ought to be, right?

  "So now we are alerted to the possibilities of two Barracudas, not one. Although we can't prove it either way."

  "So far, well summed up," said Arnold.

  "Well, sir, I think we would all agree that whoever came up with that scheme was one clever little bastard. And when you think about it, there was a kind of advantage in it for everyone. The Ruskies needed, and got, the $600 mill, right? The Chinese, in my view, are not the principals in this, but they may have acquired the submarines for someone else. It's dollars to doughnuts if they get caught, there won't be a fucking Chinaman on board that submarine.

  "But, a United States with a totally chronic shortage of oil is fantastic for the Chinese. They've picked up a whole bunch of contracts in the Gulf, they own the main southern pipeline out of Kazakstan, right across Iran to their terminus in the Strait of Hormuz. And crude's just hit seventy-five dollars a barrel. Not too bad, right?"