Arctic Fire

CHAPTER 3

Colonel Rogov returned to the submarine after the initial camp setup, leaving the Spetsnaz commandos huddled inside their sleeping bags inside the creaking, groaning cave carved out of the cliff. The small raft had barely made the trip back to the submarine safely, taking two waves completely over it and being turned into a miniature version of its mother ship several times.

He watched the men move around the submarine’s control center, noting with disdain the black circles under their eyes and the fatigue in their every movement. Europeans, all of them. The strong Slavic stock of their ancestors bred out of them and diluted by the effete blood of inbred royalty. None of them would have lasted long under his command. And none of them could have endured the conditions ashore in the ice cavern.

Not that the submarine’s crew would have seen it that way. They saw themselves, he knew, as vastly superior to the Western Europeans that inhabit France, Germany, and England. He snorted. If they only knew. Approximately half of the crew was Russian, the last remnants of a grand race that had done its best to extinguish everything noble and superior in its bloodlines in the coups that destroyed the czars’ line. The remaining crew members were primarily Ukrainian, with a few mongrel Georgians, Azerbiijanis and Armenians thrown in. All in the latter group were at least half Polish, some even with strong German stock mixed in with the historic blood that had first flourished in the fertile steppes of the Ukraine and in the high, craggy mountain regions of Azerbaijan, Georgia, and Armenia. Had they but seen what they would become, he doubted that any one of them would have chosen to consort with the invading hordes that swept east from Europe from century to century. Instead, they would have preferred to fight to the last man and woman, chosen defeat over the hybridization and bastardization of their blood.

Not so with his ancestors. The Cossacks, driven out of their homeland surrounding the Black Sea and on the Crimean Peninsula, had remained a closed, insular nation without a country, warlike and incapable of being defeated. The best the Russians could manage was to drive them out into the vast desolation of its most eastern areas, consigning them to Mongolia, Siberia, and the rugged alien terrain of the eastern Soviet Union. Yet even centuries of forced relocation had failed to extinguish their strong tribal instincts, their sense of who and what they were. Primary among those attributes was their identity as Cossacks.

He watched the men again, noting the pale faces, the languid, almost feminine movements as they carefully monitored the complex array of sensors, weapons, and electronics installed on the small submarine. Such a powerful submarine, even for its small size. The Kilo combined ham-handed Russian design with frighteningly advanced electronics and computers obtained from Japan, Korea, and yes, even the United States. A powerful ship, one that deserved better than the masters she now had. That would change.

He felt the submarine captain watching him uneasily. He turned and faced the man full on, letting him see the disdain flicker at the edges of his normally impassive expression. This man most of all would have to go. His hesitation when one of his crew members had been swept into the icy sea was just further evidence of his unfitness for command. While he might possess the requisite technical and tactical knowledge required of a commander, he lacked the single most important ingredient — the iron will so necessary for transforming a collection of equipment and machinery and men into a potent, irresistible fighting force.

The present situation illustrated that point perfectly. The Kilo submarine lingered ten miles away from the island, barely making steerageway through the silent ocean. Hours ago, the sharp pops and groans of the ice floe had subsided as the sun sank back down below the horizon. Now, the ocean was a silent, dark cloak of invisibility.

Had Rogov been the skipper, the submarine would have been snorkeling, topping off the last bit of charge on its batteries in preparation for any immediate tactical need to stay submerged for hours. True, the bank of batteries was currently charged to ninety percent, but one never knew when that additional ten percent of capacity would spell the difference between life and death for a submarine and its crew.

This skipper, however, after a brief communications foray to the surface to monitor the group ashore’s progress, had decided that the weather was too bad, the seas too rough, to inflict the nausea-inducing pitch and roll of a submarine near the surface on its crew. He fled the surface and returned to the depths, where the motion of the storm above them was imperceptible. The crew had all looked relieved at that decision.

Pah! The men ashore would hardly have it so easy. Even safe inside the ice cavern, the scream and howl of the winds alone would have been daunting. The winds had built steadily throughout the night until sixty-knot gales, at times growing to hurricane force, now scoured the desolate island.

“Captain,” a young lieutenant said suddenly. His quiet voice echoed in the tomb-like control center. “The other submariner I think — yes, it’s her.”

The skipper stepped away from his normal post in the center of the small room, and stationed himself behind the sonar operator. “Where?”

The younger man pointed at the waterfall display. “It’s barely distinguishable from the background noise yet, Skipper, but this appears to be a line from her main propulsion equipment.” He pointed to a series of dots that looked to Rogov’s untrained eyes to be merely part of the noise.

Rogov allowed a trace of satisfaction to tug at the corner of his mouth. So far, all was going according to plan, although neither the Russians on this boat nor their larger counterpart knew it. The Oscar-class nuclear cruise missile submarine was one of the most potent ship-killers in the Russian inventory today. Equipped with SS-N-19 Shipwreck missiles, it had a tactical launch range of over three hundred nautical miles. It could obtain targeting data from any other platform, including the Tupelov Bear aircraft or the Ilyushin May-76 reconnaissance plane. When properly aligned, it could also download targeting data from Russian surveillance satellites, relieving it of the necessity of obtaining enemy positioning data from its own organic sensors.

The Oscar’s deployment had been suspended in the first few years following the breakup of the Soviet Union, but had resumed in 1995. It roamed with impunity the vast reaches of the Pacific Ocean, occasionally making forays into the smaller Atlantic. Her torpedoes, twenty-eight feet long and over five feet in diameter, could crack the keel of an aircraft carrier with one well-placed shot.

As it would soon, if necessary. He smiled, wondering what his Cossack ancestors would have thought of him, riding this massive underwater seahorse into battle again. A far cry from the days when his ancestors had swept out of the mountains and across the plains, decimating Ukrainian and Russian troops with their bloody sabers. While today’s Cossack might depend on invisible electrons and satellite data instead of a finely honed blade, the principles remained the same — attack, attack, attack.

The Americans would remember that soon.

The Ready Room was one of the larger single compartments on the aircraft carrier, and served as both a duty post and a central point of coordination for the VF-95 squadron. Ten rows of high-backed chairs took up the forward starboard portion of the room, arrayed in front of a chalkboard and overhead projector. The port side was a general congregating area, and its bulkheads were ringed with hard plastic couches and the all-important squadron popcorn machine. A battered gray table protruded from one bulkhead. Bird Dog, Gator, and their squadron commanding officer were gathered around it.

Bird Dog glared down at the chart spread out before him. A series of standard Navy symbols was penciled in on it, connected with a faint line representing the track of the contact. The Greenpeace ship had been meandering around the area south of Aflu for two weeks now, and there was still no discernible pattern to her movement.

“I still don’t see what the hell is so damned important about flying out to take a look at that ship,” Bird Dog grumbled. “Why not send an S-3B out instead? That way she can look for that Oscar at the same time.”

Commander Frank Richey fixed him with a pointed glare. “Lieutenants aren’t asked to decide what’s important, mister,” he snapped. “If the United States wants to make sure her citizens can count beluga whales in the North Pacific in peace and quiet, then we’re gonna make sure that happens. You got it?”

Bird Dog heard Gator, seated next to him, sigh and move away imperceptibly. Bird Dog nodded, acknowledging the rebuke with bare courtesy. When he was the commanding officer of a squadron — if that day ever came, which was looking more and more unlikely these days — he would remember what it was like to be a frustrated junior pilot, blooded on one cruise but still not considered an important enough member of the team to be fully briefed on the mission.

Fully briefed. He snorted. The skipper thought it was enough that he understood his flight profile, knew what his weapons load-out was, and was able to make the F-14 Tomcat dance around the sky like a ballerina. But no one ever bothered to talk about the bigger issues — why the United States was here in the first place, and just what the hell babysitting a group of peaceniks and long-hairs on a Greenpeace boat had to do with national security.

Although, he had to admit, the powers that be had proved right about the Spratly Islands. There, their routine surveillance of the rocky outpost in the South China Sea had been the first step in building stronger ties with the small nations that rimmed that body of water.

Still, would it have cost the skipper anything to give him a better explanation? He sighed. Maybe he’d wander down to the spook spaces later today, see if any of the Professional paranoids that lived in the Carrier Intelligence Center, or CVIC were willing to discuss the mission with him. Somehow, he had the feeling that if he just knew more, he might be a whole hell of a lot more interested in the mission than he was at this point. If it hadn’t involved flying, it would have been a complete waste.

“So, I take it you’ve got the big picture now?” his skipper said, distracting him from his thoughts.

“Yes, sir, Skipper,” Bird Dog replied. “We’ll fly a routine surveillance mission over this area,” he said, tracing out a large square on the chart in front of him. “I’m to report the location of the Greenpeace ship, drop down to one thousand feet for a quick pass over her for rigging, then we’re to take a quick look at all the islands. Make sure none of them have moved.” Bird Dog winced as he heard the sarcasm in his voice. Damn it, when was he going to learn to keep his mouth under control?

“There’s islands bear close watching sometimes, Gator said softly. “Remember?”

“Hell, yes,” Bird Dog said in the same tones. “But that was Asia. The Aleutian Islands are part of Alaska — American property! Do you really think that they’re going to be blowing up like the Spratly rocks were?”

Gator shook his head sadly. “That’s what they pay us for, shipmate — to make sure that they don’t.”

Tim Holden, first mate on board the third and largest ship in the Greenpeace inventory, kept his hands firmly wrapped around the overhead stabilizer bar. The steel rod ran from port to starboard near the ceiling of the bridge on board the ship. In rough seas like today’s, crew members virtually hung from it, suspended like bats in order to keep their balance.

The former fishing boat had a deep draft, its keel extending some thirty feet below the thrashing waves around it. Even with that, though, the ship bobbed and twisted in the waves, her powerful diesel engines straining to keep her bow pointed into the long line of heavy swells that extended out to the horizon. Holden watched the helmsman make minor adjustments to their course. The man had good sense, far more than most of his counterparts, and could be trusted to take immediate action without Holden giving rudder orders for every small course change. It relieved the strain of standing watch in heavy seas. Although just why he was out here in the first place was something of a mystery. He knew what the Greenpeace people said. He’d paid attention during all the briefs, had been impressed by their starry-eyed innocence and fanatic dedication to their cause, but it still didn’t make much sense to him. Spending months watching for the occasional appearance of a pod of whales and trying to develop a complete census of the creatures didn’t strike him as doing much for world peace and endangered species. It’d be a hell of a lot more effective if the Navy put a couple of torpedoes up the ass of Russian fishing vessels that harvested them. Well, at least the wages made up for part of the misery of bobbing around like a cork in this storm.

He paused, squinting at Aflu. From this distance, the twenty-mile-long island was only a smidgen on the horizon, a bleak white outcropping of ice and rock. While the uninhabited island had played a major role in World War II, today it served mostly as a landmark for fishing vessels and ecologists searching for schools of fish and pods of endangered whales.

Like his current passengers. A nice enough herd, if a bit single-minded. After four weeks of listening to their unflagging enthusiasm, their nightly dinner speculations about the state of whales in the northern Pacific were starting to take on a wistfully plaintive note. As much as he begrudged it, he’d found himself eager to find something to cheer them up. One whale — that would do for starters.

Holden scanned the horizon again. He’d pit his experienced seagoing eyes against their array of techno-toys and sonar monitors any day.

Finally, he saw what had caught his attention. There was something between the Serenity and Aflu, a trace of darker color against the roiling blue-black, whitecapped ocean. He took two quick steps forward to the front of the bridge, grasped the railing there with one hand, and lifted binoculars to his eyes. The picture came into sharper focus.

Yes, something definitely was there. He reached for the ship’s telephone to call the scientists, already grinning with anticipation at the childish cries of glee that would shortly be filling the bridge.

“She’s surfacing, sir,” the sonar technician said.

“What the hell-?” the Kilo’s skipper muttered. He leaned over the sonar console, his face almost next to his technician’s. “Any indication she’s having trouble?”

“Could be, sir,” the technician replied. “I thought I saw some instability in her electrical sources.”

Rogov watched the Kilos commander analyze the possibilities in his mind. A reactor failure, a casualty of some sort, or, worse yet, every submariner’s nightmares — fire. He waited for a few minutes, then decided to intervene, and shoved himself through a mass of technicians and sailors to the sonar console.

“It is not our business,” he said neutrally. “We have our mission — nothing must interfere with that.”

“There are one hundred and seventy-eight men on that submarine,” the skipper said. “If they have to abandon ship, we have to be there to pick them up immediately. Otherwise, even with the protective life rafts, they have no hope of survival.”

Rogov shook his head from side to side almost imperceptibly. “The mission,” he reminded the skipper.

For the first time, the man showed some signs of fighting spirit. “May God rot your soul,” the normally passive submariner snapped. “You saw what that sea does — ten minutes, at the most. We must-“

“And just where will you put all these men, Captain?” Rogov asked. “Have them standing in line in your tiny passageways? Will you jettison your torpedoes to make room for them in those tubes? No,” he concluded, “even if you were to reach them, you have no room for them on board. If they have problems, they must solve them themselves. I’m sure their captain is a resourceful man.”

“They could get to shore. Your camp there — at least they’d have a chance!”

Rogov stiffened. The breach of operational security was unforgivable. While every sailor on the submarine knew that the boat had surfaced, had noted the absence of the forbidden figures that had boarded it in Petropavlovsk, few knew any details of the larger mission. The captain himself had been Ordered to ensure that his crew remained absolutely silent on the matter, and to crush any speculation immediately. To blurt it out now, within earshot of every junior sailor in the control room, was completely unacceptable.

“A word privately?” Rogov said, moderating his tone to a respectful murmur. “Perhaps there are options-” Rogov stepped back to allow the submarine captain to move away from the console. He followed the other man aft down a small passageway to the captain’s stateroom.

The two men squeezed themselves into the tiny compartment and stood face-to-face. “These options you mentioned — what-“

Rogov’s hand slammed into the captain’s neck, cutting off the questions. He pinned the man against the steel closet set into one side of the cabin, increasing the pressure on the man’s neck. The submarine captain’s eyes bulged, fright and indignation warring in his face. He reached up and tried to pull Rogov’s hands away from his neck, but the Tartar’s massive fingers were interlaced behind his neck, his thumbs pressing against the captain’s throat. Panic flooded the man’s features as he realized the Tartar had no intention of easing up. With one massive thrust, Rogov crushed the man’s windpipe, ending the contest. He let the skipper fall to the deck, and watched the life fade out of his eyes as his brain ran out of oxygen. Just before the man died, Rogov kicked him in the crotch. No reaction. The foul smell of human waste flooded the tiny compartment as the captain’s dying brain gave up control over its autonomic functions.

When he was sure the man was dead, Rogov lifted the captain up by the back of his collar and positioned him carefully on the bed. He tossed a blanket over him, then turned the man’s face toward the wall, cushioning it on a pillow. He felt several tiny vertebrae snap as he forced the man’s head into position.

Although he was certain the ruse wouldn’t last for long, it was always handy to give men an excuse to do what their fear compelled them to. If they thought the captain had suddenly taken ill, and might eventually retake command of the boat, there might be less initial resistance. And by the time they were completely certain the captain was dead, it would be too late.

Rogov left the compartment and returned to the control center to take command of the submarine.

“There,” Holden said, pointing to the northeast. “Do you see it?”

“Yes!”

Holden could see a broad smile spreading below the binoculars, and shook his head. Why seeing one whale made up for the misery of being at sea in the North Pacific for these people, he would never understand.

“Can you get closer to it?” the scientist asked eagerly. “It’s huge; it could be one of the largest of the species ever seen.”

“We’ll try, sir, but the seas are a bit touchy right now.” Holden walked back to the navigator’s table and studied the position plotted for the whale on the paper overlay. Maybe, just barely, they could run northeast for a while without getting broadside to the waves. It would take some careful tacking and maneuvering, but it could be done. He looked up and met the navigator’s eyes, exchanging a brief look of disbelief.

“Yes, sir, I think we can do it,” he said finally, straightening up. “Helmsman, come right to course zero-one-five.”

The sickening yaw of the small boat increased, but was still within the limits of safety. Holden felt the boat shudder as the waves caught her more solidly on the beam.

“Oh, man, oh, man,” the scientist said happily, sounding like a child in a candy store. “If this just-“

“What?” Holden asked sharply. The scientist’s smile had disappeared. He lowered the binoculars slowly. His face was pale. “It’s not a whale,” he said shakily. “I think we’d better-“

Whatever the man had intended to say was lost forever. The fishing boat’s bow shot up out of the waves like a seesaw, standing her almost completely on her stern. Holden, along with the rest of the men on the bridge, smashed into the aft bulkhead, which now seemed like a floor beneath them. Holden was vaguely aware of the unnatural motion of the ship as it gyrated around on its stern, now truly resembling the cork it had been imitating earlier.

Someone landed on his back, the impact forcing the breath out of his lungs. Holden felt two ribs crack. The deck — no, the bulkhead — careened crazily underneath him.

Finally, after what seemed an eternity suspended in the air, the bow of the ship headed down toward the ocean. Holden was flung forward again, this time hitting the glass window in the forward part of the bridge. He felt it crack, quiver underneath him, the steel safety mesh embedded in it preventing it from shattering completely.

But steel mesh couldn’t keep water out. The bow and forecastle plunged down, water washing over the bridge and covering most of the forward part of the ship. It quickly filled the bridge, prying Holden off the shattered window and tossing him around on its roiling surface along with the other flotsam and jetsam on the bridge. Holden flailed, barely conscious, trying to lift his head far enough out of the water to try to breath. It was cold, so cold. Thirty-four degrees, he remembered from yesterday’s meteorological report. Survival time — well, in these waters, it was measured in seconds rather than in minutes. No danger of living long enough to ever see a shark or any other leviathan of the deep approaching.

Holden struggled bitterly to hold on to consciousness, knowing he had only seconds left to live. He had just managed to suck in a deep breath when the last bit of his consciousness faded.

SS Serenity twisted and rolled in the waves for two minutes longer. The water was already lapping over her bow and washing around the decks. Suddenly, she gave one last shudder and rolled to port, dumping her superstructure into the water. Her starboard side remained visible for a few minutes longer, until one particularly large wave washed over her and shoved her down into the depths. By that time, the core body temperature of the crew and scientists on the ship had already slipped well below the levels needed to maintain consciousness. They all drowned, not a single one of them aware that they were breathing seawater instead of air.

Rogov stood now in the middle of the control room, occupying the same position the captain had just hours earlier. The stilled, troubled looks on the crew members’ faces told him he had not yet solidified his command of the boat. But he would, and it would be sooner than these young men ever suspected. His Cossack ancestors had learned long ago that fear was a more potent motivator than any pretentious ideals of friendship or mutual respect. These men would understand that soon.

He stared at the sonar screen, examining what he saw there with the rudimentary amounts of knowledge he had. While he was a quick learner, his time on board the submarine had been too limited to allow him to develop much expertise in interpreting the arcane lines and symbols that streaked across the screen.

“What is that?” he demanded, pointing at a jagged-looking cluster of lines on the screen.

The technician swallowed nervously. “An-an explosion, sir,” he said nervously. “Some distance away from US.”

“The cause?” Rogov demanded.

“I thought-I thought I heard a torpedo just before that. Maybe. I can’t be sure.”

Rogov slammed his beefy hand into the side of the technician’s head, knocking him out of the chair. The technician sprawled on the deck, looking up at the Cossack. Fear glazed his eyes.

Rogov regarded him levelly. “Next time, you will not be so slow to bring significant matters to my attention,” he suggested. “You are not indispensable — none of us are. If you ever lie to me or tell me less than the complete truth — or, as in this instance, neglect to bring some matter to my attention — I will kill you.”

The technician nodded, a bare twitch of his head. Rogov pointed at the chair. “Resume your duties.” He turned to the rest of the control room crew, letting his cold gaze wander over them, impaling each one where they stood. “You have observed. It is up to you what you have learned. Learn quickly and you will live longer.” He turned back to the technician. “Tell me about this explosion.”

“it-it was far from us, maybe thirty kilometers,” the technician babbled, profound relief at still being alive making his voice shaky and uneven. “The Oscar — she fired, I think. Maybe a torpedo — I don’t know, I couldn’t hear it all, but-“

“The target,” Rogov demanded. “Was it the carrier?”

The technician shook his head. “No, Comrade, the carrier was too far away. It was another surface vessel, I think. There was a fishing boat — at least I think it was a fishing boat. It sounded like one, although it did not act like it. The diesel engine, yes, but no indication of trolling nets or any of the other activities I expect from a fishing boat.” His voice ceased abruptly, as though he realized he was babbling. “There is nothing else I can add, Comrade.”

Rogov seized the back of the man’s neck, clamping his vise-like fingers down hard. He felt the man’s pulse beat under his fingers, fluttering now like a bird’s. “Do not call me Comrade,” he said quietly, menace in his voice. “You may call me sir, you may call me Colonel, but never Comrade. You and I — we have no blood in common. You will remember that, along with your other duties.”

“Yes, Colonel,” the man squeaked, barely able to force his voice past the cruel pressure on his throat. “I will remember.”

“And so will the rest of you,” Rogov said, raising his voice slightly. “Your people have forgotten much, but I will ensure that you remember this much. A Cossack is no comrade to any of you,” he said, pronouncing the hated word with disgust dripping in his voice. “We remember what you have forgotten. You will learn, during the next weeks, how much that is.” He turned back to the navigational chart, pretending to examine their position relative to the Oscar, buying himself some time to think at the expense of the crew’s nerves.

It must have been the Oscar, he decided. Her orders were to stay in the deep waters that were her natural abode, using her speed and nuclear propulsion to interdict any vessels that approached too close to Aflu or threatened to compromise the mission. For now, at least. Later, she’d have other missions, ones that made better use of her potent ship-killing capabilities.

But why surface to fire? He puzzled over that for a moment, trying to peer into the mind of the other submarine commander’s mind. Maybe to get a visual on the contact, to better weigh the delicate considerations that went into deciding to fire. With the American carrier in the area, the Oscar’s commander would have wanted to make sure he was not attacking within clear view of any warship. Unexplained losses in the North Pacific were common since the poorly equipped fishing vessels plied unforgiving waters and treacherous, unpredictable seas, but killing one of them within sonar range of the battle group would have been idiotic.

That must have been it, he decided, and felt a sense of relief as the unexplained explosion slipped neatly into an understandable tactical pattern. The Oscar’s commander was also a Cossack, as reliable and implacably determined as Rogov himself. And, as with Rogov, the Russian submarine force’s chain of command had never suspected either man’s higher loyalties.

The engineering problems the sonarman mentioned — was it possible? He shrugged. There were contingency plans for just such an occasion. There always were. But before he could alter his own plans, he had to find out whether or not the Oscar was out of commission.

Rogov turned to the conning officer. “I wish to observe this boat that the Oscar has attacked.”

The conning officer nodded and gave the commands preparatory to surfacing the submarine. Facing the churning ocean above was far less dangerous than remaining submerged below.

Tombstone Magruder strode briskly to the front of the room. He paused behind the podium and surveyed the faces arrayed before him. The assembled media and camera crews had that eager, slightly slavering look he’d come to expect from the press. He had even seen that expression on Pamela’s face at times, and flinched away from it.

Where was — there she was, seated in the middle of the pack. He suppressed a smile, wondering what sort of mistaken maneuvering had earned her that chair. Pamela Drake, star correspondent for ACN, had never been in the middle of the pack — never in her entire life. Her normal seat at any press conference was in the front row, directly in front of the speaker, where her astute questions and bulldog glare could rarely be avoided. She must have arrived late, he mused, and wondered what had been the cause of that.

“Thank you all for being here today,” Tombstone began, shuffling the papers in front of him. “As you know, this is a sad but historic occasion for the Navy. Decommissioning a command that has served this nation so honorably is never a pleasant task, but in these days of downsizing — right-sizing, as some of you have chosen to call it — most of our forward deployed units are being pulled back to CONUS — Continental United States, for you civilians,” he added, noting a few puzzled looks. “Now, I’ll start with a brief-“

“Admiral Magruder,” he heard someone say. He turned away from the slide presentation he had been about to begin, covering the illustrious history of the P-3 squadron’s service in Adak, his eyes going immediately to the slim, all-too-familiar figure. Pamela’s voice still could cut through him to some warm, secret place deep inside. Memories of the last time he had seen her aboard USS Jefferson surfaced.

Now, seeing her again after more than six months, the strength of his reaction surprised him. Memories of Tomboy should have erased every trace of Pamela Drake from his soul. Yet there was still something compellingly attractive about the strong, smooth curves of her body, the emerald eyes framed by dark hair now touched with gray, the easy athletic balance of her stance. He sighed. Pamela Drake had quit haunting his dreams five months ago. He supposed seeing her in reality was the payback for that. “Miss Drake,” he began coolly, “if you could just hold your questions, there will be plenty of time for them after the presentation. I think you’ll find that most of the information you need is already contained in this brief.”

Pamela regarded him bluntly, a slight tinge of amazement creeping into her expression. “Evidently you haven’t heard, yet, Admiral,” she remarked. “if you had, you would know that the decommissioning ranks a poor second against this current story.”

“And what would that be, Miss Drake?” Tombstone asked. The conviction in her voice gave rise to an uneasiness in his stomach. Whatever else she might have been, Pamela Drake was one hell of a reporter. If she was hot on the trail of another story, then there was probably something to it.

“About thirty minutes ago,” Pamela said, reading from a slip of paper in her hand, “the Greenpeace vessel SS Serenity disappeared fifty miles north of here. Immediately prior to that, an F-14 Tomcat was observed circling overhead. Did the crew of that Tomcat see anything that might explain the disappearance of this peaceful research vessel? And what is the squadron here doing as far as SAR goes — sea-air rescue?”

Tombstone rocked back slightly on his heels, stunned at her claim. He locked eyes with her for a moment and saw the determination burning in her eyes. “This brief will be postponed indefinitely,” he said abruptly. A protesting murmur arose from the crowd, quickly growing to a clamorous racket. “Miss Drake — please accompany my people immediately to my briefing room.”

Tombstone turned and strode away from the podium, aware of Captain Craig and two master-at-arms approaching Pamela. Tombstone heard her high heels clattering on the worn linoleum behind him.

Three minutes later, they were alone in the briefing room. “What is this about?” Tombstone demanded.

“No time for hi, how are you?” she said sarcastically.

“Not when lives may be at stake. Damn it, Pamela, what are you talking about?”

She met his gaze levelly. “Fifteen minutes ago, a fishing boat just south of the Aleutian Islands reported seeing a large explosion. The fishing boat was departing the area. The Greenpeace ship had been interfering with their operations, and their captain had finally given up trying to fish those waters. The captain claims to have seen a large fireball, and then the Greenpeace ship disappeared off the radar scope. Now what does that sound like to you?”

Tombstone swore silently, then turned to his operations officer. “Get everything we have airborne,” he ordered.

The operations officer said, “Admiral, there’s not much chance-“

“I know, I know,” Tombstone said. “With survival times in the North Pacific, there’s probably not much we can do. But I’ll be damned if I’ll sit here and hold a briefing while there’s a chance we can save someone. Go on, get moving!”

The operations officer had just reached the door when Tombstone thought of something else. “Captain Craig,” he said. “That squadron — they’re supposed to fly out for CONUS tomorrow morning, right?”

The chief of staff nodded. “The support staff will be here for another week, but the aircraft are leaving.”

“Hold back two of those P-3s and enough maintenance personnel to keep them up and ready to fly. And get a full load of sonobuoys and torpedoes on them.”

The operations officer turned back to him, and looked at him uncertainly. “You think that-“

“That the boat might have suffered a massive engineering casualty,” Tombstone said. “But based on my experience, the most common explanation for a surface ship sinking unexpectedly is a submarine. And if there’s one out there …”

He let the thought trail off. If the Soviets were deploying their submarines again — excuse me, the Russians, he thought bitterly — then it was the height of foolishness to pull this squadron back to CONUS. Now, more than ever, they might be needed at the westernmost point of America’s strategic envelope. He turned back to Pamela Drake. “Thank you for the information, Miss Drake,” he said. “We won’t be needing you here any longer.”

“Oh, but I think you will, Stoney,” she said softly. “Unless you want me to break the story of how ACN is now briefing Navy commanders on their operational responsibilities, I suggest you let me stay. And I’ll want full access to the crews of those P-3s when they return. Otherwise, you’re not gonna like my report when I file it.”

Tombstone groaned. In the span of ten minutes, Pamela Drake had gone from fond memory to nemesis.