by Joe Buff
It was dark, and the sun wouldn’t rise for some time, but floodlights on the freighter’s decks shone brightly. Crewmen from the freighter kept waving and gesturing for the plane to somehow land and help them, or lower a rope and lift them off, before it was too late — this was a sure sign of panic. On top of everything else, the freighter’s radar failed. In the night they wouldn’t even see an iceberg bearing down upon them in time to man the lifeboats, and the crew knew that in this rising weather the ancient lifeboats were a death trap.
It was one more part of Jan ter Horst’s master plan.
SIXTEEN
Wilson, satisfied by the periscope photo, ordered Jeffrey to continue with the rendezvous. As shown by live periscope imagery, Challenger was directly under the Prima Latina now.
Jeffrey watched in amazement and then horror as the merchant ship split apart at the keel. A mine? Kathy reported new sonar transients — machinery noise, not breaking-up sounds. Jeffrey saw that this was supposed to happen: the ship’s bottom was a giant double door.
“Here’s your ride through the canal, Captain,” Wilson said. “This wasn’t my idea. It goes way above a mere commodore’s pay grade, I assure you. I’m just following orders, as well as giving them.”
“Understood.”
“Surface your ship into the covert hold.”
I was afraid he was going to say that.
“Can’t we have her go any slower?”
“No. If she slows or stops it’ll look suspicious. She’s being painted by dozens of radars we know about, and watched by God knows how many spy satellites we don’t know about.”
Jeffrey thought hard how to do this. Challenger would lose speed as she surfaced, because of the power wasted when her hull began to make waves and the pump-jet propulsor’s loss of suction at very shallow depth. Meltzer would have to speed up to compensate, but by how much? An impact by the bow or stern, between Challenger and the Prima Latina, seemed unavoidable. Jeffrey felt his blood pressure shoot up fast. His first priority as captain was the welfare of his ship.
“Commodore, we need to make some practice approaches first.”
“Don’t worry overly much. There are large rubber bumpers up there in case the two ships touch.”
“We’ve never performed an evolution like this.”
“The computer simulations said it could be done.”
“Simulations aren’t real life, Commodore. A bad collision could sink both ships.”
“Get yourself up in there quickly. We’re passing the shoals already. Once through we’ll be in open water again, and the seas will be much higher. This will get even more dangerous than it already is.”
Jeffrey and Meltzer talked it over, discussing tactics. Jeffrey called Lieutenant Willey on the intercom, and they talked it over too. Then COB and Bell offered their advice.
Finally, as Jeffrey snapped out orders, Meltzer brought Challenger shallower. The first try was to get the hang of matching speeds as the two vessels closed, to get the feel of the buffeting and suction effects of trapped water coursing between the two hulls. The first try didn’t go well.
On Voortrekker
“Very well, Number One,” ter Horst said. “You have the conn. I’ll backstop you. Bring us up, and prepare to put us into the Trincomalee Tiger’s belly.”
The freighter in distress, ter Horst had told Van Gelder, was a clandestine submarine tender. Her engines and rudder were perfectly fine. She was faking the equipment casualties as an excuse to stop on the high seas, to make Voortrekker’s docking easier without arousing suspicion. The orbiting maritime patrol aircraft and the approaching Australian destroyer were all part of the double bluff.
Van Gelder had to admire ter Horst’s cunning and his guts. Not every submarine captain would willfully call down upon himself front-line enemy forces while he rendezvoused with a covert milch cow hiding in plain sight.
Van Gelder issued orders to the helmsman and chief of the watch. Voortrekker rose from the depths, and Van Gelder raised the digital periscope mast. The picture appeared on screens in the control room, looking straight up. The underwater keel doors of the freighter were already open, and the well-lit secret hold beckoned invitingly. Blue-green lights flashed steadily, outlining the hold. These let Van Gelder judge the surface ship’s roll and drift, giving him his aiming point. Van Gelder could make out the bulk of the vessel’s massive buoyancy tanks, lining the inside of the hull, surrounding the secret hold. The Trincomalee Tiger was, in effect, a camouflaged floating dry dock.
“Surface impacts, sir,” the sonar chief warned.
“Sonobuoys?” Van Gelder demanded. Are the Allies on to us so soon?
“Uh… no, sir. Sounded like an air-dropped life raft package and survival gear.”
Good, the enemy plane’s still falling for the playacted desperation on the freighter. Van Gelder relaxed, but only slightly. Voortrekker was nearing the freighter’s bottom.
A rogue wave’s surge and suction threw Voortrekker bodily toward the freighter’s hull. Van Gelder snapped out helm orders, fearful of a collision. The rogue wave passed. Van Gelder hesitated to close the distance further lest another rogue wave hit.
“Surface impacts! Air-dropped torpedoes!”
Van Gelder jolted. Jan ter Horst cursed.
“Torpedoes are inert!.. Confirmed, torpedoes are sinking!”
“Ha!” ter Horst exclaimed. “You see, Gunther? They dumped their weapons to give themselves longer on-station time over the freighter. That aircraft’s no danger to us at all now.”
“Sir,” the sonar chief said uncomfortably, “I only counted two torpedoes dropped. That type of aircraft holds four.”
On Challenger
Jeffrey had Meltzer return to a depth of 150 feet, and then try again. This time as Challenger rose she lined up better with the hole in the Prima Latina. But when the ships drew closer, Challenger kept yawing from side to side, way too much.
“Captain,” Meltzer said, “we need to use the auxiliary propulsors for better lateral control.”
“Concur,” COB said, “but I have my hands full. When we do a blow and surface for real, if you can call this business surfacing, I’ll be even busier.”
“All right. Relief Pilot, I want you to handle the auxiliary thrusters.”
“Yes, Captain,” Harrison said. He did it the only way he could — he knelt on the deck next to Meltzer’s seat, and reached in past Meltzer for the joysticks that worked the thrusters. Meltzer was totally occupied using the main control surfaces — bowplanes and sternplanes and rudder — to manage Challenger’s basic depth and course. The use of junior enlisted men to separately work sternplanes and rudder went out with the Virginia class, the first of which had entered service in 2004.
“Let’s try this again,” Jeffrey said. “The key seems to be to anticipate the jostling as we get closer, but not overcompensate.”
Jeffrey told COB to activate Challenger’s hull-mounted photonics sensors, so the ship-control team and Jeffrey could get better close-range visual cues than with just the periscope. COB punched buttons. More pictures were windowed onto the console screens, viewpoints from the bow and stern and looking downward too.
Jeffrey grabbed the mike for the maneuvering room. “Engineer, do whatever you have to do to keep us moving at exactly nine knots as COB does a main ballast blow.”
“Understood, Skipper,” Willey said. “But what happens when we’re partway into the hold and the freighter pulls the surrounding water right along with her? Our speed logs will give false readings, saying we’ve slowed down. Then if we speed up, we’ll crash.”
“I know, that’s the hard part.”
“Sir,” Harrison said, “we can judge real speed over the bottom based on our inertial navigation system.”
Jeffrey nodded. “Hey, that’s using your head, shipmate!” Meltzer, impressed, slapped the ensign on the back, rather roughly, congratulating him but working in a little hazing too.
Jeffrey repeated the
ensign’s idea over the intercom to Willey.
“Sounds great,” Willey said. “Only problem is, if you’ll recall, Captain, we don’t have navigation readouts back here.”
A disappointed Jeffrey repeated what Willey said to the control room at large.
“Sir,” Harrison said, “feed him data through the ship’s local area network, and Lieutenant Willey can read it off his laptop. They can manage ship’s speed under local control that way, reacting instantly, from back in the maneuvering room.”
Geez, Jeffrey thought, this kid’s smarter than I thought.
The arrangements were quickly made. This was an all-or-nothing effort now.
On Voortrekker
Van Gelder went back to the docking attempt.
“We must do this quickly,” ter Horst urged. “The enemy destroyer that’s coming may get nosy when the Tiger’s engines and rudder miraculously repair themselves…. They may board the freighter for a close inspection, as is their right by international law.”
“Understood, sir.” Van Gelder tried not to be distracted as he studied his screens and issued more helm orders.
“The Aussies may dig their way through her dummy cargo, discover her false bottom, and find the hidden catwalk down to the submarine hold.”
“I understand, Captain. I understand.”
“We need to have been and gone by the time the destroyer gets here, and we have a lot of work to do before then.”
On Challenger
Once more Challenger approached the Prima Latina from below. Jeffrey had Meltzer use the control surfaces and propulsion power to hold the ship as shallow as was safe until he felt satisfied the two vessels were lined up properly.
It was time to commit. On the live periscope image, Jeffrey saw Wilson was right — the surface swells outside were already stronger, as the nearby shallow banks and shoals fell astern. Prima Latina was rolling side to side noticeably now, making the docking maneuver even harder.
“Blow all main ballast!” Jeffrey shouted. COB’s fingers danced on his panels. There was a roaring sound, as compressed air forced water out through the bottom of the ballast tanks. Meltzer and Harrison handled their controls in grim concentration.
But as Challenger rose into the Prima Latina’s hold, Challenger’s bulk interfered with the freighter’s propellers biting the water. The freighter began to slow. Relative to the surface ship, Challenger seemed to speed up. Willey’s laptop was useless now — Jeffrey would have to do it by eye. Meltzer reported that Challenger was surfaced.
“Helm back one-third!”
Meltzer acknowledged at once, but Challenger still surged forward in the hold. They were going to hit, and smash the bow dome and the sonar sphere, and maybe rupture the ballast tanks and detonate the missiles in the forward vertical launch array.
This was getting too tough. Jeffrey seriously considered diving and giving it up, in spite of Wilson’s order.
“Contact on acoustic intercept!” Kathy shouted. This broke Jeffrey’s focus badly — Challenger and the Prima Latina were being pinged by another sub. “Contact has an active towed array! Contact is a surface ship. Contact’s sonar is Russian!” Not a submarine, a spy trawler, just as Wilson had warned.
Challenger was trapped: If Jeffrey dived, the trawler would surely catch her as a separate sonar contact. He simply had to make this docking work.
“Helm back two-thirds!”
Meltzer and Harrison walked a tightrope now — reversing on the pump-jet made Challenger’s stern slew sideways unpredictably. A bow collision was barely avoided, but then Challenger started drifting backward in the pool of water in the hold. They were going to hit at the stern, and smash their delicate pump-jet — and Russians were snooping somewhere near.
“Helm, ahead two-thirds!” Jeffrey could see the water around him churning and swirling wildly as he checked the sternway. He ordered, “Helm, ahead one-third,” so as not to gain too much headway.
Kathy announced more Russian pinging, getting closer.
Jeffrey saw the bottom doors start to swing closed underneath him; Challenger shivered from violent new buffeting and turbulence, which also affected the Prima Latina’s speed. Jeffrey kept having to throw the pump-jet into forward and then reverse. He and Meltzer and Harrison juggled like madmen.
The Russians pinged again. Do they know we’re here? Are they getting suspicious? Will they try to ram the Prima Latina, the way the Soviets played chicken with our navy in the old days?
The hold doors closed securely. “Helm, all stop. We’re in.”
Jeffrey had to sit down, then was surprised he’d been standing — he must have jumped up without realizing it as he issued his engine commands.
“Chief of the Watch, rig for reduced electrical.” COB acknowledged, and everyone switched things off. Jeffrey called Lieutenant Willey, and told him to shut down the reactor.
Jeffrey used the periscope to explore their cramped and secret hiding place, which looked more high tech on the inside than the tramp steamer did from the outside.
But Jeffrey dreaded what he might see at any moment. If the freighter hit a mine, her hull would burst inward with sudden flame and blasting water. Her flotation tanks would be ruptured and she’d take Challenger with her to the grave. If the Russian trawler rammed them, the freighter’s hull would burst inward with slicing steel and gushing water. Challenger would die. The Russians could always claim it was an accident, just another maritime collision.
Strange, urgent vibrations began, though Challenger’s pump-jet wasn’t moving. The periscope image showed the water in the hold was slapping around.
“Prima Latina engine noise increasing, Captain,” Kathy said.
Jeffrey turned to Wilson. “Is this supposed to happen?”
Wilson, frowning, responded, “I don’t know.”
Jeffrey felt the deck heeling under his feet. Challenger creaked against the rubber blocks holding her firmly in the hold. The heeling grew much steeper, to port — the Prima Latina was turning hard to starboard.
The vibrations and heeling grew stronger; the water in the hold all rushed to Challenger’s port side, slopping over the submarine’s hull, gurgling and roaring.
“She’s making an emergency turn,” Wilson said.
Above the other racket, Jeffrey could hear a warning bong begin to sound somewhere in the Prima Latina. He put two and two together fast.
“Chief of the Watch,” Jeffrey snapped. “Collision alarm.” The raucous siren blared. Crewmen tried to brace themselves.
The Russians are going to ram. Now Jeffrey heard a deep mechanical moan from outside the hull. Kathy said the freighter was sounding its horn, a lengthy, insistent blast.
The collision alarm kept blaring inside Challenger. Jeffrey watched through the periscopes, helpless, waiting to see the Prima Latina cut in half.
The Prima Latina turned sharply the other way. The heeling reversed. The maddened shaking and sloshing continued. Jeffrey gripped his armrests, hating having nothing to do. She’s trying to evade the trawler’s charging bow. All eyes were glued to the periscope pictures now, each person dreading to see what Jeffrey dreaded — an insider’s view of a freighter being skewered on the high seas.
The freighter sounded her horn again, an endless series of angry staccato blasts. She turned sharply back toward starboard. The shaking went on and on.
Then the vibrations died down. Challenger’s deck righted itself. By gyrocompass, Jeffrey saw the freighter was resuming her course south.
In a little while, a crane on a catwalk in the hold lowered a gangplank onto Challenger’s hull. Jeffrey watched a man swagger down the ramp and knock on Challenger’s forward hatch with a pipe wrench. Jeffrey recognized the scruffy seaman who’d been smoking the cigar
SEVENTEEN
On Voortrekker, inside the Trincomalee Tiger
Gunther Van Gelder sweated and his heart was pounding, both from exertion and from fear. He was truly caught between a rock and a hard place. Hur
ry up. But be quiet. Work faster. Not so loud.
Van Gelder and his men needed to maintain absolute silence, because the enemy was so near. But they also had to work quickly. The cruise missile vertical launch array was already reloaded, but there was so much still to be done. Van Gelder stood on Voortrekker’s hull behind the sail, next to the open weapons-loading hatch which led down to the torpedo room. He paused for just a moment, to wipe his dripping brow. He eyed his wristwatch and frowned. He glanced up from his labors and looked about the secret hold to take stock of the situation. The feeling of being on tenterhooks wouldn’t subside.
The Trincomalee Tiger was well equipped — with the special cranes needed to transfer weapons to a nuclear submarine, and with the nuclear weapons themselves. The German Kampfschwimmer commando team that ter Horst had told Van Gelder to expect was already below with their gear.
But the loading of torpedoes — Van Gelder’s major remaining task to supervise — was taking much longer than planned, in part because the seas around the Tiger had gotten so rough. Van Gelder thought the tropical storm off Australia must be stronger than forecast. Or maybe a different storm had formed unexpectedly off Antarctica; Antarctic weather often changed suddenly, violently.
The worse the weather outside, the longer the last of the loading would take. The longer the loading took, the worse the weather. Van Gelder just couldn’t win.
The biggest problem was that, because of these delays, the Australian destroyer arrived. With typical British Commonwealth seamanship and flair, the Aussies sent over a motorized launch with a well-equipped repair party. They were aboard the Trincomalee Tiger right now. Sometimes Van Gelder could hear banging beyond the aft end of the submarine hold, where Royal Australian Navy sailors were trying to help fix machinery that wasn’t really broken. Voortrekker’s weapons reloading was supposed to have been completed, and the fake mechanical problems on Tiger solved, well before the destroyer ever got there.
Outwardly, Van Gelder maintained the appearance of calm and confidence. He didn’t allow crew discipline to slacken in the least. Inwardly, the thought of enemy forces so close, with Voortrekker so defenseless, sent chills right up his spine. Van Gelder’s hands felt like ice cubes, yet he sweated all the more. He listened to his men whispering urgently while they worked.