Kirov

by John Schettler

  A tone sounded on the ship’s intercom and the Admiral’s eyes glanced up at the overhead speaker, immediately recognizing the voice of Chief Engineer Dobrynin. “Bridge, this is Engineering. We seem to be having a problem with the reactors.”

  Volsky was up quickly, reaching for the microphone and thumbing the switch to speak. “Flag Bridge responding. What is your problem, Chief?”

  “Well, sir, we seem to be getting some odd readings.”

  “Radiation?”

  “No sir, the cores are stable and there is no radiation leak…But we are getting some unusual thermal neutron flux measurements—nothing critical, just unusual. Can we reduce speed? I’d like to take a closer look and see what happens if we lower the power output.”

  “Very well, chief,” said Volsky. “Keep me informed.” Then to his helmsman he said: “Ahead one third. Slow the ship down.”

  “Ahead one third, sir,” the helmsman made a quick reply, the big turbines beneath them slowing their rotations as the ship glided more gracefully forward, her bow spray diminishing in the calm seas.

  “Mr. Nikolin, signal the Slava to advise us of their current position at once.”

  “Aye, sir.” The radioman began intonating his hail. “Task force flag to target, come in please. Advise current heading, course and speed…” There was nothing but static on his headphones, and no answer from Slava.

  “Secure from active sonar. Now you can listen again, Tasarov,” said the Admiral. “Let me know the instant you have a fix on either Slava or Orel. Mister Nikolin, hail both ships. If you do not receive an answer within five minutes then contact Severomorsk. Advise them we have canceled the exercise. Note that we are investigating an emergency situation, and that we have lost position fix and contact with Orel and Slava. Asked them if these ships have reported home.”

  He turned to find Captain Karpov and Chief Orlov. “Gentlemen, please join me in the briefing room.”

  The three men proceeded to a secure room off the citadel, the eyes of the ever more nervous bridge crew following them as they went. Once inside the Admiral closed the door and leaned heavily on the table. “Your thoughts, Captain,” he said following proper protocol in engaging Karpov first.

  “I did what I thought most appropriate, sir.” Karpov defended himself immediately. “There was clearly an explosion of some kind, and it appeared to me that it may have been a detonation from a torpedo. I took evasive action as specified by command procedures.”

  “That is not what I am asking you,” said the Admiral. “Do you not find it even passing strange that a moment ago we were sailing in rising winds and seas, and now we're looking at calming conditions and fog? Did this explosion chase the wind away? Where's the weather front Rodenko has been warning us about for the last two hours? Did you notice the barometer? It was at 990 millibars and falling, but has now risen to well over 1000.”

  “But Admiral, we saw it, felt it!” Gennadi Orlov, the ship’s Chief of Staff seemed to side with Karpov on the matter. ”There was a detonation of some kind.”

  “Yes, I felt that as well. The shock wave nearly threw me against the bulkhead. My first thought is that something had happened to Orel, and the fact that we have no fix on her position now leads me to think Rudnikov may have had more of a problem than he was letting on. Yet if one of his warheads went off we should still see it well above the surface.”

  “You think one of his missiles exploded, sir?”

  “It has happened before,” said Admiral Volsky. “Do you forget what happened to the Kursk?”

  “I remember only too well what happened to the Kursk,” said Karpov, his voice laden with sarcasm. “It was attacked by an American submarine. Then the families were paid off with blood money shipped over from Washington.”

  Volsky frowned. Many in the navy knew the real reason Kursk had sunk, but few would have been brazen enough to state it as Karpov had. The Admiral shook his head. “That aside, what happened to the weather? I have known conditions in the Arctic seas to change suddenly, but never like this.”

  “Clearly, we need more information, Admiral.” Karpov folded his arms, a worried look on his face, his eyes darting this way and that as he considered. The logic of what the Admiral had asserted was plain to him, but it made no sense.

  “There has to be something wrong with the ship’s sensors,” said Orlov. “This was no ordinary explosion. It was very energetic, and we may have sustained damage. Yes, I feel it may have been a nuclear detonation, sir. Perhaps there is nothing on Rodenko's screen because his systems are all whacked up.”

  “Perhaps, but I do not need the Rodenko’s radar system to tell me what the weather is like,” said Volsky. “We will get the equipment sorted out, but for now we will proceed to rendezvous with Slava's last known position. It may be that Orel was damaged herself, and is not able to communicate, perhaps she has even suffered a more grievous fate. We will not know that anytime soon. But what we do know is that the cruiser Slava should be south of our position towing targeting barges, easy enough to find.”

  “Then why can't we see her on radar, sir?” said Karpov.

  “It's the equipment, I tell you.” Orlov was adamant. “There was an electromagnetic pulse of some kind. It may not have been strong enough to disable our systems, but there could be damage.”

  Orlov was a practical man, big, rough hewn, and easily irritated. Yet he held his emotions tightly in hand in spite of the obvious danger inherent in the situation. Something had exploded. Something was wrong. His was a mind and hand that would first reach for a wrench or spanner to fix the problem. Afterwards he would find out who was responsible and grill them to a hard char. His thick woolen cap was pulled low on his forehead, heavy brows frowning as he spoke. And when he mentioned possible damage, the Admiral could also perceive just a hint of blame in his voice, as if Orlov was already running down the system maintenance roster in his mind, looking to single out an unfortunate mishman, or midshipman, to goad and blame for the mishap.

  “Very well,” the Admiral intervened. “Initiate full, ship-wide systems checks. Every system, every component. Then, until we hear from Severomorsk, we will continue south to rendezvous with Slava's last known position. If there was such a pulse as you describe, Orlov, then she may have sustained damage as well. This would account for the radio silence.”

  “But it could be an attack, Admiral.” Karpov still had a nervous, anxious look on his face.

  “A single missile? A single torpedo? Perhaps, Karpov, but would you attack in such a manner?”

  “With nuclear weapons, one is enough, sir.”

  “True, but to miss by a margin sufficient to leave us afloat? This is very unlikely. And no follow-on attack? You are assuming that the enemy sensors are damaged as well, and that they do not know we are still here, steaming quietly at 10 knots with active sonar pinging away just a moment ago?”

  Karpov raised his eyebrows. It didn't make sense. And when things did not fit into his carefully ordered perception of the world he was soon at his wits end. If the ship were his to command he would be on an alternate evasive heading at thirty knots. “Have you considered the possibility that Slava may have been destroyed as well, sir?”

  “I am considering every possibility, Captain. And I take your concerns under advisement. That is why we will investigate this matter further. If Slava is there, then we will find her, or at least the targeting barges she was towing. If this was an attack, I do not think the enemy would have any interest and sinking them.”

  “But what if Slava was also targeted with a nuclear warhead, sir? The barges would have been destroyed as well.”

  “Time will tell. And to shorten the wait, let's get the KA-226 up immediately. It will be over Slava's position in 10 minutes.”

  He was referring to the KA-226 scout helicopter carried on the aft quarter of the ship. It was ideal when used in an extended reconnaissance role like this.

  “See to it, Karpov. Let us answer your questions once and fo
r all. Tell them to rig radiation detection sensors and drop sonar and infrared detection buoys if they make no visual contact with Slava after they reach her last plotted position. If this was an attack, then it should be obvious to us very soon. Even if Slava were sunk, we should still be able to detect the wreckage on the seafloor, particularly on infrared. In the meantime, the ship is at action stations and we will complete our systems diagnostics to assure ourselves we can function should it come to a fight. At the moment we have no targets, gentlemen. So there is nothing more to be done. Now, get that helicopter into the air at once.”

  Twenty minutes later they got their first report, yet even the radio transmission seemed distant, distorted and almost garbled at times. This merely added to Karpov’s suspicion that the atmosphere was still experiencing effects of a recent nuclear detonation. And when the KA-226 reported no sign of the Slava, or of any of her towed barges, the Captain was even more certain that the task force had been attacked. He paced anxiously on the bridge, his eyes searching the thickening fog ahead of them as if he expected to see incoming missiles at any moment.

  Yet the Admiral sat calmly on his chair, his eyes narrowed with that vacant look of inward thought that so clearly signaled to the others that he was not be disturbed at the moment. What had happened to the rest of his task force? There were 465 men aboard Slava, and another 100 on Orel. Where in god’s name were they? The feeling that had bothered him all morning was back again. He had a clear sense that something profound had happened, but he could not discern what it was. What if Karpov was correct and this was war?

  Would NATO launch a surprise attack like this, perhaps from a stealthy submarine that had been lurking undetected in the region? Orel and Slava were gone, yet his ship, the only real threat in the task force, was untouched. The more he considered this the more he began to feel that this had been another accident. Yet if Orel had suffered an accident, where was Slava? She was farther away from the sub’s position than Kirov and should have been well outside the effect radius of a 15 kiloton explosion. These odd incongruities frustrated and blocked his thinking, like pieces of a puzzle that would simply not fit, no matter how hard he tried to force them into a coherent picture.

  The rest of the bridge crew sat silent at their posts, watchful, wary, and somewhat on edge. Tasarov had a pained, worrisome expression on his young face. He was checking and rechecking his system, adjusting settings, listening intently, his hand running through his hair at times as he adjusted his equipment. His brow was heavy with concentration, and it was clear that he felt somewhat responsible for the situation. If the ship had been attacked by a torpedo, why didn’t he hear it?

  Rodenko, the soft spoken Ukrainian, was equally disturbed. He was the eyes of the ship, where Tasarov was its ears. The fact that he could not even detect the weather front he had been monitoring was most unsettling.

  Nikolin sat at his cubicle on communications, flipping through a code book and checking his radio gain and reception bands. All his normal communication channels seemed strangely quiet, and the silence out of Severomorsk was very odd. He had sent coded emergency flash signals, and there should have been an immediate response.

  Some of the junior officers seemed lost in their spacious Russian souls. They leaned over their stations, eyes glazed with the milky luminescence of the screens and systems lights, their thoughts running with the old fairy tale hero, Yemelya, the great idler. Life at sea was often endless and dull for them. They could sense that something was amiss, but had not been privy to much of the discussion among the senior officers, and so they watched the interminable sweep of their radar scopes, tuning and adjusting their equipment. Some seemed lost, others alert and curious, their eyes watching the senior officers closely, as recent events had put them on edge.

  The remote helicopter reported no sign of radiation, however. And nothing whatsoever was detected by the sonar buoys—no sign of wreckage on the seafloor at all. They even patched the data through to Tasarov, so his better trained eye and ear could verify the findings. There was just nothing there. Infrared sensors, which would have easily detected heat from a ship that had recently endured combat damage sufficient to sink her, reported nothing unusual.

  Then Nikolin seemed encouraged as the signal strength from the KA-226 improved dramatically. He had much more clarity, and instinctively looked at Rodenko, who smiled as he reported. “I have a clear reading on the KA-226 now,” he said. “The interference is gone.” Kirov's systems seemed to be in perfect working order, the telemetry being received from the helicopter on Tasarov's panel was pristine. There was simply nothing else there to be seen, so Admiral Volsky ordered the helo to return. He stared out the forward viewports, noting the color of the sea had dimmed and blanched to a sallow gray again.

  “Any response from either ship? Severomorsk?” He broke his reverie, turning to his communications officer Nikolin.

  “No sir,” said Nikolin. “I have sent encrypted traffic using normal wartime protocols, but I received no response.”

  Karpov drifted to the Admiral’s side, his arms clasped firmly behind his back as he leaned slightly to one side and spoke in a quiet tone of voice, as if to prevent the other members of the bridge crew from hearing him. “What if Severomorsk was also attacked, sir? We could be at war.”

  The Admiral gave him a serious look, but said nothing.

  Part II

  The Fog Of War

  “God sets us nothing but riddles. Here the boundaries meet and all contradictions exist side by side…”

  —Fyodor Dostoevsky

  Chapter 4

  The fog around them was so thick now that you could barely see from one end of the ship to the other. The sea was calm and still, and the gray white mist of an ice fog slowly enfolded ship. Soon the gilded masts, radars and antennas were fringed with a hoary white frost, which also settled on the upper decks and superstructure of the ship until she appeared like a great pale white ghost ship silently sliding through the glassy sea.

  Kirov was still steaming slowly south by southwest at 10 knots, her sensors keenly scanning the surrounding ocean and airspace for any sign of an enemy of vessel or plane. They seemed to have perfect clarity, but only out to a range of about 30 kilometers, and Rodenko noted that radius slowly increasing. Tasarov’s sonar was clearing up as well, but he still had no contact on the Orel.

  Admiral Volsky had been trying to decide whether to continue the investigation or return to Severomorsk. He considered what Karpov had been arguing, that this was indeed a surprise attack by Western forces upon his nation. Both Slava and Orel were suddenly missing and, seen in that light, the explosion Kirov had experienced might have been a near miss attempt to destroy her as well. The fact that Severomorsk did not respond on normal naval message frequencies could mean many things. The base could be observing radio silence, or they could have sustained damage preventing communications. Then again, the base could have been destroyed as well. It was homeport of the Russian North Seas fleet, surely a tempting and vital target in any first strike scenario.

  Volsky called down to engineering for a status update on the reactors, pleased to learn that the system readings were now normal again.

  “It sounded a bit odd there for a while,” said Chief Dobrynin.

  “It sounded odd? What do you mean?”

  “I’m not sure, sir. It’s just…Well I’ve been around this equipment most of my career in the service, and you come to know a thing by how it sounds. The harmonics were odd—that’s all I can say. It didn’t sound right to me, but the readings are normal, sir. There is nothing to be concerned about.”

  “Very Well, Chief. Carry on, and report immediately if you hear anything else that disturbs you. Anything at all, yes?” The Admiral knew exactly what the Chief was trying to tell him. Years on ships at sea gave some men an uncanny sense that could detect the slightest abnormality in the ship—the way it sounded, or moved in the sea. Volsky settled into his chair, musing as he listened himself, thinki
ng he might hear an answer to their dilemma in the faint hum of the ship’s consoles, or the thrum of the turbines.

  Karpov lingered near Nikolin’s communications station for some time, as if he was waiting for a coded signal message to return from Severomorsk at any moment. Yet the time stretched out, and Nikolin waited with him, seeming edgy and somewhat discomfited by the Captain’s close presence. Karpov had a way of hovering over a workstation, and asking entirely too many questions. He was tense and uneasy as well. Somehow the sense of isolation in the long silence left him feeling strangely adrift.

  Severomorsk was not merely home, but also the rein of ultimate control on the ship. Orders might come from home port that could supersede those of Admiral Volsky himself. Volsky was Admiral of the Northern Fleet, but above him was Commander-in-Chief of the Navy itself, Gennady Alexandrovich Suchkov, and his Deputy Chief of Staff Vladimir Ivanovich Rogatin. Karpov had been slowly building relationships with these men, hoping they might be useful one day. Vlasky had succeeded Suchkov as Admiral of the Northern Fleet, and Rogatin had been a former Captain of the old battlecruiser Kirov before he moved on to higher ranks. Vlasky was also the most likely candidate to take the aging Suchkov’s place, so Karpov found himself well positioned to advance even further if recent history was any guide.

  Now the strange silence from Severomorsk was most discomfiting to him. A favorite tactic against a man of senior rank had always been an appeal to higher authority. Karpov had ingratiated himself with the Naval Staff as he wheedled his way into the command chair of the Kirov. Volsky was his senior, and by a wide margin, but he could always appeal to Severomorsk for a countervailing decision. So his first order of business was to seed the matter there with his own opinion as soon as he possibly could. He wanted to see if he could color the matter at hand in the eyes of senior officers back home, and possibly influence any decision that they might make about the situation. Yet more than this, he wanted to make certain his own actions would be viewed in a proper light; he wanted to begin, even in official discourse, the line of subtle truth-bending that was vranyo. The Admiral had countermanded his orders just now, and Karpov still burned with a quiet inner resentment over that. He did what he believed was proper, and in his mind the Admiral was remiss.