The Bear

by Bob Thomas

  The Great Belt

  “Wow.”

  “Not very deep, is it?”

  “Not at all.” Captain Cleve Dawson studied the charts of the Baltic Sea as it traversed the Øresund Straits, the Great Belt, to be exact. “The sea itself is deeper, still not great for a sub. The straits, not so much.”

  “How do we get through?” Commander Tull stood and folded his arms across his chest. “We could go through at the surface?”

  “Not exactly the best plan. We want to go unnoticed.”

  “That’ll be difficult. Perhaps as night?”

  “Probably, but still not the best choice. Running without nav lights at night on a dark channel is reckless.”

  “We could go just below the surface.” Tull leaned forward again as he placed his hands on the table. “Still … “

  “What about a screen, sir?”

  “A screen, Flip?” The captain turned toward the com station where ensign Flip was stationed. “What do you mean?”

  “What if we had another ship screening us from sight? It could work.”

  The captain and his XO just looked at each other for a moment, stunned with the simplicity of the idea. Use a ship at night to screen another vessel on the surface. They each knew it wouldn’t be that simple to put in place. But it was worth a shot.

  “Who the hell can we call about this one, sir?”

  “We might have to try this on our own.” Dawson leaned against the metal rail, folding his arms across his chest. “We need a big one.”

  “Two would be better,” Flip commented. “One on either side of us.”

  “It’s kind of hard to just find two big ships running down the middle of the channel at night, just when we need them.”

  “Why do we have to go through here? Why not this smaller channel?” Tull asked.

  “It is even shallower. The Great Belt is wider, and although it has heavier traffic, it’s probably our best shot. It’s too easy to be seen from the coasts if we attempt the Øresund channel.” Dawson leaned in, tilting his head down toward the table. “The currents would likely be trickier since they’re funneled into the smaller space. Hard to drive a boat in that.”

  “So this Great Belt seems to be our best bet?”

  “I’d say so.” The captain ran his fingers through his hair as he straightened. “We’ve got a couple hours till it’s fully dark outside, and probably another one or two till shipping comes to a stop for the night.”

  “You seem to know a great deal about this area, sir.”

  “Not a great deal, Mr. Tull. Most shipping lanes work that way. These channels are part of the Kattegat. The waters of the Baltic drain through the channels before moving out to the larger ocean.”

  “I thought you said you didn’t know much about this area.”

  “Basic seamanship, Mr. Tull. Basic seamanship.” Captain Dawson turned and began making his way out of the control room. Call me in two hours. I’ll take the conn when we begin passage.”

  “Aye sir.” The XO turned as the captain left the conn, “basic seamanship my ass.”

  “Captain to the conn.” Tull placed the mic on the hook just as his commander walked back into the station. “About that time, sir.”

  “Any traffic about?”

  “You were right about traffic slowing down. There’s almost nothing running.”

  “Well, let’s get underway.” Dawson turned, giving the order. “Bring us up to scope depth, all ahead slow.”

  “Slow sir?”

  “We need to see what’s up there first, and we don’t want wake, even a small trail from that could become luminescent. You churn the waters at night, you disturb its life forms. It’s mostly carriers that people know about, but I don’t want to take any chances.”

  “All ahead slow, aye.”

  The constant hum of machinery faded into the background, the sub deathly quiet as the USS Columbus began her passage into the Great Belt. The black hull slipped easily through the dark waters as the overcast sky painted a bleak picture upon the northern world. The rush of current from the Baltic pushed past, doing everything it could to keep the intruder away from her shoals. The shallow bottom of the Belt was not the featureless abyss that was the cruising plain of the open ocean. Here, the ancient geology of the Kattegat islands and narrow passages, and sunken vessels from times long forgotten all conspired to swirl the brackish waters along the hull like thunder in the face of the intruder.

  “It’s okay to talk, people.”

  The collective exhale eased the tension, slightly. The boat rocked ever so slightly as she fought her way against the turmoil. Dawson looked down at the screens that displayed from the scope. He saw nothing but blackness.

  “Surface contact dead astern.” The sonarman pushed the phones against his ears and closed his eyes. “It’s a big one, sir.”

  “Maybe we just got lucky.” The XO directed the scope astern, searching for the contact. “Starboard green. She’s coming this way.”

  “Range?”

  “Hard to pinpoint sir. Two miles maybe.”

  “Dead slow, conn.”

  “Dead slow aye.”

  “Let’s let them catch up to us. Maintain forward momentum against the current and glide right along beside them.”

  “Glide, sir?”

  “It’ll be a bit bumpy,” Dawson replied. “Riding along side a ship it going to make it interesting. Any idea what it is yet?”

  “No sir, but it’s what you wanted, something really big.” The seaman keyed several commands into his station before offering an opinion. “My guess is it’s a tanker.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “Just a hunch, but the signature just seems to fit the data.”

  “If you say so.”

  “It’s what you pay me for, sir.”

  “It is at that, son. It is at that.”

  The Columbus was nearly drifting within the pulsing currents as the captain let the surface contact catch up to them. Though she was nearly completely submerged, having a screen would help them pass unnoticed. The currents buffeted the boat as they slipped in beside the tanker, the flat hull of the massive ship made for shallow channels chunked through the dark water making travel beside it tricky. Dawson used the scope to make certain they stayed close to the tanker, but not so close that they could collide. It was a tricky maneuver in the shallow channel of the Great Belt, but one the captain knew his team could handle.

  “Half way through, sir,” Tull announced. “The bridge is just ahead. I hope no one is looking down from it.”

  “I hope not,” Dawson replied.

  The buffeting currents against the hull caused those standing in the control room to waver.

  “Keep her steady, conn.” The tension in the compartment was mounting. “Sounding?”

  “One hundred feet below the keel.”

  “What’s the distance to the tanker?”

  “Three hundred feet, sir.”

  “Move us to within two hundred feet forward amidships.”

  “That’s cutting it close if they want to turn sir,” Tull commented.

  “I’m aware of that. It’s not much of a margin, but it’ll make a smoother ride. The outer waves from the tanker will pass over the bow and not hit the side of the boat. Most of the chop will be behind us.” Dawson folded his arms and leaned against the rail that surrounded the scope. He needed to appear calm. He was the captain. He was the veteran. “If he has an idea of turning, I don’t know where he’d be going.”

  Dawson watched the display as his boat inched slowly toward the dark tanker. Its hull took up the entire screen giving him no visual reference to distance on a dark night. He reached down and pushed a single button to update the range. The laser measured the distance at two-hundred fifty feet.

  “Get us a little closer.”

  Tull wiped his forehead with his sleeve. He was sweating. He could feel the drops rolling down his temples. He’d never been this close to a ship submerged in a
live scenario. The XO looked around the conn trying to gauge the reaction of his men. He could feel the moisture on his tee shirt beneath his uniform. Surely he wasn’t the only one feeling like this. His captain looked as calm as a nun at Sunday Mass. Except for the dull hum of machinery that resonated through the boat, the conn was utterly silent.

  “He’s turning sir.”

  “Starboard rudder. All ahead slow.”

  “Starboard rudder. All ahead slow, aye.”

  “Depth?”

  “Depth is one-thirty feet below the keel, sir.”

  “Ease away from her. We’re coming up on Lolland. That’s where the channel turns. It’ll get narrower from here on out.”

  “Keep her at scope depth, no matter what son, unless we’re ready to hit the bottom.”

  “Aye sir.” The young seaman swallowed hard as he poured his attention on the screens in front of him. He had his orders.

  “I hope this channel isn’t too narrow,” Tull remarked.

  “Nothing we can do about it now,” Dawson replied.

  “Depth now ninety feet, sir.”

  “That was fast,” Tull announced. “I sure wish we knew what the hell we’re doing here.”

  “I’m sure they’ll tell us soon.” Dawson studied the workings of the conn. Everyone was doing their job; they were focused. It was training. That’s why they were a top-notch boat. “I’ve never been to the Baltic Sea before. Maybe it’s just for a Sunday visit.”

  “Eighty feet.”

  “Keep her steady. We’ve got room below. How close are we to the tanker?”

  “Three-hundred fifty feet,” Tull replied after he took his finger off the scope’s range finder.

  “That’s too far. Bring us back to two hundred. We can’t get too far away in this channel.” Dawson leaned over the chart, placing his hands on the table. “Sure don’t want to hit something we don’t know is there.” His remark echoed silently through the boat. No one answered, but they all had the same thought. For all they knew, a hundred Viking longboats waited beneath the waves to extract their revenge against those still living. and plowing the waters of their homeland.

  “New surface contact dead ahead.”

  “Shit!” Dawson rotated the scope, pointing it forward of the bow. “Damn. Big bastard. Probably another tanker. Bow lights say it’s coming this way.” The captain looked up at the waterfall display, the chart showing where they were as another seaman marked the new contact. “Depth?”

  “Depth still eighty feet, sir.”

  “Distance to new contact?”

  “Fifteen hundred yards, sir.”

  “That’s not very far. How’d we not see them?”

  “Might have come out from behind the island,” Tull replied. “How close to each other will they pass?”

  “In a channel this narrow, they’ll give each other as wide a berth as possible,” Dawson answered, “at least without worrying about running into a shoal. They’ve probably got better maps of what’s here than we do.” The captain scanned the control room before making his decision. “We’re going to be squeezing between two large ships. I need everyone on their toes, boys. Move us to within one-hundred fifty feet of our escort.” Dawson moved over to the station and placed a hand on the seaman’s shoulder. “Be ready to come to a dead stop. If things go bad, we might need to bottom out quickly.”

  “Aye sir.” The seaman squirmed in his seat and focused on his controls. “One-hundred fifty feet, sir. I used to throw a football a lot farther than that, captain.”

  “Where was that? College?”

  “No sir. Jackson High School in Montana, sir.”

  “What happened?”

  “Fell into a crevasse on a hike in the mountains. Caught my foot on something beneath the snow, tumbled down into an opening and ripped damned near every muscle in my shoulder.”

  “Still got it in you?”

  “No sir. I couldn’t throw a Nerf ball across the control room. Nothing left.”

  “How far?” Dawson could almost feel the tension in the young seaman. He gave him a pat on the shoulder before stepping away.

  “Bow contact is about on top of us,” Tull answered. “They’ve moved off starboard. It’ll be close.”

  “How close?”

  “Two hundred yards,” Tull replied. “Maybe.”

  “Depth?”

  “Seventy-five feet.”

  “Damn,” Dawson said under his breath. “Keep her steady, conn.”

  “Conn aye. Steady as she goes.”

  The tension that coursed through the sub seemed thick enough to reach out and grab. The captain began to feel the slight shudder of the 688 boat as the wake from their escort began to mix with the bow wake from the second tanker as it was pushed along by the outflow from the Baltic Sea. The currents buffeted the six thousand ton boat as she held course.

  “Starboard rudder, conn,” Dawson said as the wake of the second tanker flattened out just as they came to the last leg of the Great Belt. “Move us away from our friend.”

  “Starboard rudder, aye,” came the reply.

  “Well done, son. Well done. Give our friend some space and let him get ahead of us.”

  “Depth one hundred feet and falling off, sir.”

  “We’re coming out of the channel and into the Baltic proper.” Dawson looked up at his XO. “Make new heading zero nine zero degrees. Make your way to the designated co-ordinates.”

  “Aye skipper,” Tull replied. “Conn, set new heading, zero nine zero degrees. All ahead slow.”

  “New heading, zero nine zero degrees. All ahead slow, aye.”

  Moscow

  “So, what do you think?”

  “I think I haven’t flown anything like this, in a long, long time.” Captain Will ‘Danil’ Jenner grabbed the yoke with both hands and felt the grain of the worn leather against his fingers. It was raw, cold in the dead of a Russian winter.

  “How does a Cessna come to be in Russia?”

  “Simple really,” Donald replied. “All sorts of things flooded into the country when the Soviet Union fell. It was a rush toward everything anyone could ever have dreamed of. And as money slowly began to get into people’s hands, things like this started to become more common.” Donald shifted in the co-pilot’s seat, turning toward Danil. “Since this is a bit of an older plane, it doesn’t draw attention. It’s the perfect plane of need, if something were to happen. And now, it seems it is in need.”

  “I could almost fly this with my eyes closed.” Danil looked over the controls, familiarizing himself with everything. He started with the most crucial first; thrust levers, the array of gauges in front of him and finally rudder and aileron controls. Donald watched as Danil closed his eyes and let his hands drift over the controls. It was like watching him fly blindfolded. He went through a series of steps in his mind. He seemed to be readying for takeoff, then, gently pulling the wheel back as he lifted the plane into the air with his mind. As he turned the wheel left, his hand began to tremble, and he pulled it away to his lap as he opened his eyes.

  “You okay?”

  “Fine.” Danil’s reply was low-key.

  “Look, if there’s something you’re not telling me … “

  “I just piloted an F-16 from Alaska to DC,” Danil replied, “I think I can handle a twin engine Cessna.”

  “There could be a lot riding on your ability to handle a plane, Danil.” Donald lowered his voice, his tone firm. “I don’t have the authority to cancel this mission, but I sure as hell won’t let things go bad if I think any one of you people can’t handle the job you’re here to do.”

  “You have no idea how big this is.” Danil sighed as the words left his lips. “I’ll be fine.”

  “You better be, Danil. You better be.”

  “I appreciate everything you’ve done for us, Donald. You’ve risked your own position, one I’m sure you’ve worked hard to keep secret over the years. But, this is more than just a solitary mission. I’ve been on many
of those. No, this has consequences far beyond anything I’ve ever been involved in.”

  “Welcome to the club, Danil.” Donald flipped open the door and slid off the cracked leather seat to the ground, his boots landing in the muddied snow. “It’s been my life’s work.” He turned, holding open the door as the wind whipped into the cabin. “You’re just seeing things from my point of view for the first time.” Donald lowered his head as if he were talking to the seat. “Every day here is a mission to maintain the balance of power. The Soviet Union never really fell, Danil. It just changed its name.” Donald straightened as he took a step back. “If you want to take her up, go ahead. You don’t really need a flight plan in these parts.”

  The door flopped shut, leaving Danil alone in the cold light. He placed his right hand on the levers resting in the center of the cockpit. He felt the cold metal against his dry skin as he scanned the array of gauges whose glass had clouded from forty years of service. This was his moment. This was why he was here.

  “You still out here?”

  “Yes sir.”

  “Don’t sir me.” Major Francis ‘Sasha’ Brown let the wooden barn door close quickly behind him. He still wasn’t used to Moscow’s biting cold. “How long are you gonna stay out here?”

  “I’ve got nothing better to do.” Captain Ruth ‘Anya’ Garrison slapped a new clip into the Makarov, took her stance as she pointed it down range and squeezed off three shots. She pulled it back and laid it on the board in front of her.

  “I don’t think you can get any better. That’s near perfect.”

  “Near yes,” Anya said. “But I lost a tournament last year to a snot-nosed lieutenant. First one in three years. I can get better.”

  “He was probably just lucky.”

  “She,” Anya replied, “was dead on. I’m just about done anyway.” She turned as she leaned on wood rail. She felt like the decrepit barn was ready to fall down. “What do you have in mind?”

  “We haven’t talked much, and we’re both Army. Ivan is too, but he’s so young.”

  “You’re saying I’m old?” Anya cracked a smile with the remark. It was something she had done little of to this point. “What’s up?”