by D F Capps
“Difficult to tell, sir.”
Jenkins drummed his fingers on the platform railing, deep in thought. “XO, send the detonation codes to the sonar room.”
Bergen turned and stared at him. “Our torpedoes are still more than a nautical mile from the target. Shouldn’t we wait and see what happens?”
Jenkins’s heart rate increased as did the pounding in his ears from the increased blood flow. He could sense something was wrong. He just didn’t know what. “If it was just one warhead, I’d be worried, but six?”
Bergen nodded. “Understood, sir.” The combined pressure wave would crush anything, especially at that depth. “Sonar has the detonation codes.”
The knot in the Captain’s stomach was tightening. “Sonar, con, transmit the detonation codes.”
“Con, sonar, transmitting detonation codes.”
Jenkins gripped the rail as he mentally calculated the length of time for the sound signals to travel through the water to the torpedoes. Distance to the target was now sixty-six thousand yards. The torpedoes would receive the detonation signal in thirty seconds. The growing knot in his stomach was the realization that the same time delay was also working against them. They were hearing only what happened at the target thirty seconds ago.
“Con, sonar. Multiple metallic snapping sounds coming from the target area.”
Jenkins looked at the tactical screen. “Any explosions?”
“No, sir. Just these snapping sounds. Never heard anything like it before.”
“Any other sounds?”
“No, sir. Snapping sounds have stopped. Just sounds of motion through the water, sir.”
Jenkins counted the seconds down in his mind: Five seconds. Two, one. From this distance he should be able to hear the sounds of nuclear detonations even through the hull of the submarine. But . . . Nothing.
He stared at the tactical display. The torpedoes should have detonated. The countdown timer continued. He had to wait to be sure. The timer reached zero and started into negative numbers. If the torpedoes had reached the target and exploded, he would know by the minus thirty second mark. He breathed out and closed his eyes as the timer reached minus thirty-one seconds.
“Sonar, con, anything?”
“No, sir.”
So our torpedoes were intercepted and somehow disabled, he thought. The snapping sounds? What could have happened to the torpedoes?
“Con, sonar, motion through the water sounds are heading for us. Estimated speed is ninety knots, sir.”
Jenkins’s eyes jolted open. Ninety knots? What in the world could travel that fast under water? “Helm, flank speed. Make your depth five hundred feet!”
“Flank speed, five hundred feet, aye-aye, sir.”
The St. Louis shuddered and rose at the bow. The need for silence was now lost in the need to escape. As the sub pushed up through nine hundred feet depth, the sound of cavitation began at the rear of the sub. The specially designed screw was creating pockets of vacuum as it sliced rapidly through the water. The collapsing vacuum pockets made noise as one wall of water smacked against its opposite side.
“Con, sonar, three objects now moving through the water in excess of one hundred knots. ETA is three minutes, sir!”
“Emergency surface!” Jenkins shouted. “Blow all ballast tanks! Get us out of here!”
The sub shook as the high pressure air was forced into the ballast tanks, giving the sub positive buoyancy and thrusting it to the surface.
“Radio room, con, send emergency SOS as soon as we breach the surface. Tell them we are under attack and send our coordinates.”
“Con, radio, emergency SOS, under attack and coordinates, aye-aye, sir.”
“Sonar, con, any surface ships in our immediate area?”
“Con, sonar, one freighter making for L.A. five hundred yards north. We’re not going to come up under anybody.”
“Acknowledged,” Jenkins said, as he gripped the railing trying to stay upright. “Sound general quarters. Battle stations. Close all watertight doors!”
The alarm shrieked through the sub as sailors teamed up to close the heavy doors between compartments. Jenkins glanced back and forth between the depth reading and the timer on the tactical screen. They were going to break the surface at about the same time as whatever was after them arrived.
“Raise periscope, ECM mast, and radio mast,” Jenkins ordered.
“Aye-aye, sir.”
The hydraulics hissed as the periscope shaft darted up, pulling the viewing lens and control handles out of the floor well.
“Con, sonar, three unidentified submerged objects have arrived. One in front of us, one on each side.”
Jenkins swiveled from the railing to the periscope handles and pressed his face to the eyepiece.
The bow of the sub breached the surface and rose swiftly into the air. As the periscope cleared the water, Jenkins scanned a quick circle with the periscope to see what was around them. A bright light swept through his field of vision. He stopped and turned the periscope back again as the sub began to level out, half in the air, half in the water.
“What the hell!”
A glowing white disk-shaped object hung in the air directly in front of the St. Louis. The captain’s mouth dropped open as an intense flash of light struck the hull of the sub with a sharp, loud, metallic crack.
The St. Louis leveled out and plunged back down into the sea. More loud metallic cracks came from both the forward and aft compartments.
Jenkins grabbed the microphone for the 1MC. “Damage control, report!”
He closed his eyes as the reports came in: Holes had appeared in the hardened armor-steel hull. Water was blasting into every compartment. The main ballast tanks were not holding air pressure. The St. Louis was sinking, fast. He looked at the tactical display and the seawater gushing into the command center from three places in the overhead. His eyes lingered on the depth reading as the electrical system failed, plunging them into darkness. The only question in his mind was: Were they going to drown first, or were they going to die at crush depth?
At the rate the seawater was filling the command center; they were going to drown first.
* * *
Conrad Kaplan reviewed his plan one more time. Flawless, he reassured himself. He used his encrypted phone and made the call.
“Gerard.”
“Mr. Gerard, it’s Conrad Kaplan. I have two jobs for you and your mercenaries: one in Poland and one in Washington, D.C.”
Chapter 24
Admiral Hollis slapped the report down on the table in front of Diane Zadanski, General McHenry, Colonel Novak, and Commander Pedder.
“We tried to destroy one of the Zeta Grey undersea bases. Not only was the base not destroyed, but we lost one of our best submarines. Here’s the SOS from the sub, and here is the eyewitness report from a cargo ship.”
Diane flipped through the reports.
“They got a photo,” she said. She looked up at Hollis. “It’s a Zeta Grey scout saucer.”
Hollis stood there fuming. “No one told me they could operate underwater!”
Diane raised her eyebrows. “Can we?”
Hollis shrugged. “I have no idea. Call Theo.”
* * *
Dr. Theo Shugart couldn’t stop smiling as he watched Diane’s fighter craft sweep into the landing bay at Ceti Research and gently touch down.
“You’re here,” he said as she approached him.
She smiled. “I am.”
They embraced in a lingering hug.
“First of all, the flash gun you used that ran out of power?”
She tipped her head. “Yeah.”
“We haven’t found a connection to recharge it.”
Her shoulders slumped. “Figures.”
“The good news is that it seems to be recharging itself.”
Her eyebrows rose. “Really? How long to fully recharge?”
He wobbled his head a bit. “Looks like a month, maybe six weeks.”
“Any chance of it over charging?”
He shook his head. “They are extremely well designed.”
Coming from Theo, that was a significant compliment.
“I’ve also been thinking about the Zeta Grey saucers maneuvering under the water,” he said. “It makes a certain amount of sense. Your fighter craft doesn’t really fly through the air. If it did the air resistance would heat the skin of your craft up to the point where it would come apart at about sixty percent thrust.”
She frowned. “I hadn’t thought about that. Why doesn’t the outside of the craft get hot?”
“The electrostatic field created by the craft that warps gravity and makes it fly also repels the air away from the craft. Even in the air, it essentially flies in a vacuum.”
She raised her eyebrows. “How far out from the surface?”
“About six inches,” he replied.
She nodded thoughtfully. “So if I flew my craft into the water?”
He shrugged. “In theory it should work the same way. The water would be closer to the outer surface, but it should work.”
“Have you tried it?”
He shook his head. “The only problem I see is that seawater conducts electricity. That would discharge the electrogravitics field. It would take a lot more power, but theoretically it should work.”
“What about pressure?” she asked. “Doesn’t water pressure increase with depth?”
He nodded. “It does. But pressure can’t be transferred through a vacuum. Again, theoretically, the deeper you go, the more power you’re going to consume.”
She frowned. “Which means we travel slower.”
“Theoretically, yes,” he said.
Her face brightened. “So, dinner?”
He glanced at his watch. “Theoretically, yes. I just thought we could work something else in before then.”
She smiled. “So the theoretical part only applies to dinner?” She ran her finger down the line of buttons on his shirt.
He felt a surge of excitement run through his body as her finger moved lower. “Yes,” he replied softly, trying to suppress a grin. “It only applies to dinner.”
* * *
Colonel Novak and Company One of the U.S. Space Command Army were back in Blackhawk helicopters heading for Sweetwater, New Mexico.
“Listen up. We’re headed into a hardened alien facility. Exact details are unknown, but from the intel we have, alien devices will be in every room and corridor. Some will render you unconscious, some will kill. All will operate without warning.”
The helicopters circled the large hangar in the center of the evacuated community, M60 machine guns trained on the hangar. At 2:00 in the morning, without the moon, it was pitch black.
“Squadron One Leader, this is Strike leader, what’s it look like?”
“Quiet,” Diane replied. “The place feels deserted.”
Novak lowered his head. Great, he thought, that’s when you lose the most men.
“Do you sense any booby traps?”
“Yes,” Diane answered, “lots of them. Be careful.”
Novak shook his head. “Large explosive devices?”
Diane hesitated. “Uncertain at this point. I’m not getting anything solid.”
Novak closed his eyes and nodded. “Okay, we’re going in!”
The helicopters swung in close to the hangar, touched down long enough for the men to hit the ground running, and lifted up twenty feet, machine guns aimed and ready.
Novak and his men rushed to the windowless back wall of the hangar, weapons on vaporize. They fired as they ran opening a section of the metal wall. The enhanced night vision goggles were set in overlay mode, allowing both the classic green images and the new grey thermal outlines to be seen together.
* * *
“Switching to full digital,” Sergeant Henderson said.
Everyone stayed in place as he examined the interior of the hangar. The full digital mode was slow reacting to the thermal images, making it unsuitable to an active field of combat. The goggles could pick up handprints and footprints until they cooled off over a period of several minutes. He could see his teammates and their tracks, but everything else was cold. As large as the hangar was he was able to pick out the minute heat signature of the alien devices mounted inside the facility.
“Good entry choice Colonel, both doors were booby trapped.”
The goggles were all interactive with the computer system in the command helicopter, allowing outlines of all of the alien devices to show up on his teammate’s goggles.
“Taking out alien devices now.”
Henderson fired at each of the alien sensors and defense weapons, vaporizing them.
“Hangar clear.”
Colonel Novak took hold of Henderson’s arm and guided him to the edge of the circular hole in the floor. The hole was about seventy feet across and allowed Zeta Grey saucers to enter in through an open hangar door and descend down into the lower levels of the facility. The hole appeared to be around a hundred and fifty feet deep.
“I see sensors and what appear to be defensive devices all the way down.”
“Take them out,” Novak said. “I’ll guide you around the perimeter.”
Henderson fired, removing the sensors, as they moved around the edge of the hole. With the circle completed, he said, “All clear, Colonel.”
Captain Connors rigged a belay line to a building column and fed it through a pulley on the back of Henderson’s harness. “You ready?”
Henderson took a deep breath and replied, “Ready.”
Novak and Connors tipped him forward, and fed him face down into the huge hole in the floor. The hole seemed to disappear into nothingness. He wrapped his legs around the belay line to keep himself face down. He didn’t want his legs going first, dangling in front of a weapon he couldn’t see. The descent was slow and methodical. About two thirds of the way down he stopped moving.
“Tying on another line,” Novak said.
The belay line was just under two hundred feet long. Counting the twenty feet or so from the building column, then down to his pulley and back up, he figured he was about eighty feet down, and still no sign of an opening. This was how the saucers got in, so there had to be an opening somewhere.
“Have Connors check the knot,” Henderson said.
“Relax,” Novak replied. “Connors is tying the knot, not me.”
Henderson smiled. “Good thinking. I can see more devices on the circular wall from here. Hold while I eliminate them.”
He fired some more, vaporizing the remaining devices.
The slow descent continued. He was beginning to wonder what they would do when the knot reached the pulley on his back, stopping his progress.
“Approaching an open area in the wall,” Henderson said. “Stop.”
His teammates held the belay line steady. As Henderson’s goggles communicated with the computer, a three dimensional map of the facility began to form in thin red lines on the lower section of everyone’s goggles.
“Devices on the ceiling,” Henderson said. “Some are spherical, probably multidirectional. Others appear to be aimed at the halls.”
He fired his flash gun, vaporizing each of the sensors and devices he could see.
“A little lower,” he said. He looked at the opposite side of the hole. More sensors and devices were in view on the other side of the hole. “Stop.
“I’m taking out all the ones I can see. There will be more to the side that I can’t get yet, but where I am should be clear.”
“Copy,” Novak said. “Can you see the bottom?”
“Yep. About another ten feet. Lower me a little more, I need to check for more devices.”
As he got a better view of the walls and ceilings in the halls, he said, “Stop.”
He vaporized more of the devices.
“Looks clear.” He swung his legs free of the belay line and pivoted to an upright position. “Down slow.”
As hi
s feet came to rest on the floor he crouched and looked around. “Area is clear. Care to join the party?”
Three rappelling lines clattered to the floor. Novak and two other soldiers zipped down and took up positions alongside Henderson.
“General McHenry was right,” Henderson said. “The best way in is the way the Zeta Greys use.”
* * *
“Okay,” Novak said. “There has to be some kind of master control room around here, let’s find it.”
Three more soldiers arrived via the rappelling lines.
“How many soldiers do you want down there?” Connors asked over the radio.
“I don’t know what we’re going to run into,” Novak said. “I’ll keep the six I’ve got, but have six more standing by the rappelling lines just in case.”
“Copy that. What about the Blackhawks and Squadron One?”
Novak looked around. “Have the Blackhawks land and shut down, but keep the fighters circling. We may be here for a while.”
“Copy. Blackhawks standing down, fighters on patrol.”
“Anything new from Jink?” Novak asked. He knew Diane didn’t like the nickname Jink, which came from her discovery that changing position by randomly jinking the control stick in the fighter craft, she could avoid being hit by the Zeta Grey weapon system.
“Negative,” Diane responded. “Still quiet as a graveyard.”
Novak cringed. “Not a word we care to use, Commander.”
“Sorry,” she said. “Quiet as . . .”
Novak looked over at Henderson, waiting to see what she would say.
“Let’s just go with quiet,” Diane finally said.
“Copy that, Squadron One Leader. Let’s hope it stays that way.”
Henderson slowly led the team down the nearest aisle.
“Another device at the intersection.”
He fired at it, but only part of the device broke loose from the ceiling. He released the flash gun from the rifle stock, slid it into a stiff pouch, pulled another one from his backpack, and snapped it into place. He fired again, vaporizing the damaged device.