Pi Day Doomsday

ASEA

The Osprey loaded them in Seal Beach and turned north toward MCAS Tustin, heading for the Adam taskforce pickup. The old base below showed two immense hangars visible out the windows; a large circular tarmac pad separated them. They were hovering several thousand feet up, dropping quickly.

“Holy hell,” said Cross, peering below, “what are those buildings below us. They’re gigantic.”

Norton smiled. “They’re hangars. They once housed blimps, dirigibles, during World War II. Each one housed six to seven blimps at a time. The structures are said to be the largest wooden buildings on earth, six acres in area, and twenty stories tall. The round tarmac area between them is our landing pad. Once used to lunch and land blimps, it’s almost a half-mile across. See that small group off to the side by the parked cars? That’s our team.”

Edging closer to the window, Cross marveled at the sight. He had heard of the huge hangars before but never imagined they would be so overwhelming. From the Osprey’s height, members of the team were still unrecognizable, but he saw a few hats and uniforms that he already knew. The campaign hat, worn by a uniformed CHP officer, surprised him.

“Please tighten your harnesses for landing,” announced Harper. “Welcome to Marine Corps Air Station Tustin, home of the largest hangars in the world.”

With the rotors spinning to a stop, the door now open, the team filed up the stairs into the cabin. Lt. Poole, then Dover, then Strong, then Gibbs boarded, nodded as they entered, and filled the jump seats around him. Then another face he didn’t recognize, he assumed was Gruber, and finally a uniformed figure wearing the CHP campaign hat. He knew the face! It was him, the Briscoe he knew from long ago.

“Chief Briscoe!” he shouted over the whining turbines.

The look on Briscoe’s face was indescribable. He stared at Cross, squinting his eyes. “Matthew Cross, is that you?”

He stood, dropping his duffel bag off his lap, and hugged Briscoe. The team sat watching, smiles growing. “What are you doing here, you young whipper-snapper? Are you still in the Navy?”

“No, I got out right after Point Mugu. I couldn’t take the regimentation any longer.”

“Aww, was I too tough on you?” said Briscoe, snickering.

“Well, maybe. That and the Navy wanted to put me in a desk job to diversify my talents.”

“So really, why are you here, Matt?”

“The Navy chose me and my mini-sub to lead the search for Adam. I just flew down from up north, by Monterey.”

“Where’s your sub?”

“They’re bringing it down on the ship we’re headed for.”

“Damn, boy! You’re that good?” Briscoe beamed, “So I must have taught you well. I had a hunch you were going far.”

Blushing, Cross said, “Here, sit by me. We’re lifting off,” offering the adjacent seat. “Let’s talk.”

“No, Matt I can’t. I’m still radioactive. Best to stay a few feet away until the drugs I’m on dump the isotopes from my system.”

“Well, it’s so great to see you again, Mica,” Cross said. “I’m glad you’re on the team. I can always use a co-pilot for my sub. I never thought I’d see the chance to have the master himself working with me.”

Briscoe smiled, said, “Um-hmm,” and sat in a rear jump seat.

Ten minutes passed before the intercom crackled, “Folks, we’re approaching the Trident Tine. Five miles offshore of Dana Point. Please check your harnesses in preparation for landing. If you’re prone to vertigo, don’t look down, it’s a small landing pad.”

The landing was smooth, smoother than their police helicopter’s landings. The door flew open, the stairs dropped at the crewman’s touch. “Watch your step. It’s a long way down.”

Single file, they met Broward at the bottom of the stairs. Jovial, joking, and courteous, he eagerly awaited their information. He had imagined strange scenarios involving lost Russian submarines, downed spy satellites, and even alien spaceship crashes, but he never imagined what he was minutes from hearing.

The group assembled in a large wood-paneled wardroom on the second deck, down the hallway from the mess hall. Aromas of breakfast cooking drifted through the room, drawing their attention from him.

He could hear stomachs growling, rumbling as he spoke. “Welcome to the R/VS Trident Tine, the largest and finest search vessel in our Navy’s fleet. We’ve been called out on your request, Lieutenant Poole, but I haven’t the slightest idea why. Now would you please tell me why the hell I’m out here with over one-hundred-fifty sailors picking our noses waiting for instructions?”

She wanted to scream back, but remained calm. She knew tensions were running high, expecting the worst, but hoping for the best.

She passed him a thick folder, marked ADAM from her briefcase, and answered, “Captain Broward, it’s a very sensitive, complex situation. Even Washington doesn’t know all the details. We have Agent Lashawn Gibbs from the Department of Homeland Security on our team, and that’s as far as it goes. They say it’s California’s problem, even though they estimate thirty-one million people across the southern half of the U.S. will perish or be affected if we fail.” Gibbs nodded confirmation.

Broward raised his eyebrows.

Clearing her throat, she continued, “The details of what I’m about to tell you are in that file. It’s all there.” Pointing to the folder, she paused. “We are the Adam taskforce, brought about by a madman. A deranged nuclear physicist. Our group has determined that a threat he made eleven days ago is a real and imminent threat, a danger to humanity.” She took a breath and continued, “He has submerged somewhere off the California coast, possibly right under us, an armed and time-triggered W-88 thermonuclear warhead with a half-megaton yield. He named it Adam in his message, thus our group’s name.”

Calm, eyes fixed on her, he responded, “Holy mother of God. When is it set to explode? Do you know?”

“Yes. In his encrypted warning, he sets March 14, pi day, as the day. It’s a long story why, but let’s leave it there for now.”

Standing, then walking to a calendar on the wall, he flipped the month from February to March. “Have you determined a search area, other than the whole Goddamned Pacific?”

She expected his comment. It had become the recurring concern in her meetings; each time it was mentioned, she cringed. “Yes, sir. Our current data indicates an area no larger than one-hundred-twenty-seven square miles, a ten-mile-radius semicircle, centered on Dana Point. We’ve stepped up our efforts to narrow it down.”

“Well, we’ll work with what we have until you supply more constraints. It’s just going to take longer. Can a member of your group refresh my memory of the W-88 warhead? That’s a pretty old weapon, if I remember right. Off a Trident missile.”

Gruber spoke up and answered his question, detailing the warhead. The only words that stuck were ‘six feet by two feet.’

Broward shook his head. “Well, we have found warheads before, but with radar signatures of their descents into the water. We’re basically working blind here, but we’ll get started.”

Focused on the task, not the problems, Cross redirected the discussion, “Do you have any towable scintillators on board, Captain? I’ve towed various sensors behind the Glider with pretty good luck. I can do that.”

“Yes a few. We also have scintillators pods for our Bluefins. We’ll outfit them for radiation detection. They can be running, searching by morning.”

Poole sat back in her seat. The conversation had turned.

The Captain put his hands together, thumbs under his chin, staring down, thinking, “Now I have a small problem here. If I tell my crew we’re sitting over an armed, time-triggered nuclear weapon, I expect to have a pretty low morale on board, possibly leading to a mutiny as pi day nears. I would rather keep it quiet, as you’re doing with the public. Panic will help no one.”

Poole nodded agreement.

He continued, “Obviously, I have to tell them what we’re searching for: a lost missile nose cone. Possibly nuclear. Nothing more. What I’d like to do is float that cover story around, aboard the ship. Our external cover story will be we’re doing cable repair on the CHUS submarine cable. The one tying the U.S. and China together. If we’re spotted, and we will be, that’s our story. Let’s get to it.”

Approving nods and cautious smiles rounded the table. Broward smiling, clapped his hands together and stood. “Now follow me into the Officer’s Mess; we’ll have some of that breakfast we’ve been smelling all morning. Then we’ll tour the ship.”

Following their meal, the Captain ushered the group around the ship on his standard visiting-dignitary readiness show. He had earlier submerged a tethered Remus UUV, and in the Operations Room, a lone sailor sat in a darkened room, lit only by surrounding screens, watching the drone he commanded. A large panel of displays around him relayed its data, flashing randomly, accompanied by occasional beeps and buzzes. The room smelled of electronics and hot metal.

“This is our Combat Information Center, also called our Operations Room,” he said. “We control our drones from here. We can have up to five out roaming the ocean simultaneously. Any more that that, we find the signals tangle, they lose sync, and we have to send divers or more robots down to find them. Kinda defeats their purpose.”

Pointing to another long section of seats, all centered on large displays, he continued, “Those stations supplement the bridge’s sonar, acoustics and radar capabilities. They’re much more sensitive and detailed. The bridge can see and hear ships, subs, weather and underwater hazards. We see the armaments aboard those ships, their draft depths, the types of hazards and, of course, track our own UUVs, UAVs and ROVs. We can even hear the clicks and whistles of whales, telling us what type and size of cetacean we’re dealing with. Some, like the enormous blues, can mimic fast-moving subs on our sonar. But their sounds give them away. We’ll be tracking, watching, and listening to Mr. Cross and his mini-sub from here as he searches below us.”

Awed by the capabilities, Poole and her group moved on, following Broward. Cross and Briscoe lagged behind taking to the sailor. They wanted to know more about the Bluefin, how it would carry the scintillation probe, and where its data would be displayed on the screen. Not surprised by his answer, that he knew nothing of a scintillation probe, they quickly rejoined the group on the upper deck.

The UUV, UAV and ROV storage deck was one of the group’s favorite stops on the tour. They were able to touch, stroke and examine the submersibles, wondering what stories they held, where they’d been, and which one, if any, would be lucky enough to find Adam.

From there they followed Broward to surround the little yellow sub, the Canyon Glider, sitting on a rail dock, waiting to be hoisted overboard. Cross stood proudly receiving questions. Sparse but to the point, they inquired about maximum depth of dives, length of dives and number of personnel it could carry. He answered, thirty-five-hundred meters, about two miles depth, ten hours, and two people: one pilot, one passenger. He then went on to explain the emergency break-away bathysphere inside the outer yellow hull. If the Glider were caught deep underwater, unable to surface, there was a lever inside that triggered explosive bolts, separating the hull from the life-sustaining capsule. In theory the sphere would float to the surface, saving the occupants. He stressed “in theory” because he had never been forced to use it.

The group wound around the large upper-deck and stopped at the helipad. They had spent three hours, oohing and ahhing the ship’s modern features. It was equipped for anything, including combat, if that ever occurred. It had not, so far.

They were convinced the search was in the best hands possible. Their fears were eased by the competence of the Captain and the capabilities of his ship. Although they wanted to continue, a few of them were feeling queasy. The Captain, listening to their comments, found they were ready to stand on firm ground again; the ocean had become rough, rocking and heaving the ship, frequently tumbling members of the group against walls, pipes or to the deck.

Looking up at the Osprey, he raised an arm, circled his hand in the air, and whistled. On command, the turbines started with a deep rumble, increasing in pitch to a loud whine within seconds. The air smelled of diesel exhaust. A crewman stepped out onto the pad, by the door, awaiting the team.

Broward looked across the group. “Mr. Cross, I assume you’re staying with us.”

“Yes sir, as long as needed.”

“We have a stateroom for you in Officer’s country. It’s a two person stateroom. Would anyone else like to room with him during our time on station? Does anyone else feel they have experience that may be of help to him and us?”

The group looked around at each other, shrugging their shoulders, then Poole elbowed Briscoe. “Officer Briscoe, they need you. You trained Mr. Cross. Your help could be invaluable. You’re a master diver; you belong with this effort.”

Fidgeting with a button on his coat, he looked out over the ocean. Storm clouds were brewing to the west, flashing lightning at regular intervals. He knew the sea would soon roughen more, a feeling he loved, like riding a rodeo bull. His first experience with storms at sea was off the coast of Indonesia. Skirting a typhoon, winds still reached seventy knots. While most of the crew on his destroyer was leaning over the rails heaving, he was running laps around the deck, learning to roll with the waves. His addiction was dragging him back in; something Poole could never do. He wanted to do it, but he had to ask Barb. Not that she would mind, since his radioactivity had forced them apart, anyway. The hugging, kissing and spooning had been put on hold until the chelates rid his system of the isotopes; isolation at sea would reduce the temptations.

“Yes, sir,” he said. “I do. I trained him. He was my star pupil. He was like a son to me. I’ll have to fly back tonight, pack a few things and tell my wife. She’ll be glad to have the radioactive monster out of the house for a while. My work will understand; most of the officers are skittish about being around me. They all want me to take sick leave until I stop glowing, anyway. Save that spare bed for me.” He chuckled, winked at Poole, and started up the ramp to the Osprey.

Seconds later, the Osprey lifted from the pad, rotors swirling overtopping waves over the deck, and headed east. Cross waved at his group, disappearing in the distance, then shouldered his duffel bag left by the crewman, and stared out at the approaching storm. Suddenly, he felt at home. He smiled and followed the Captain to his quarters.

“Make your self comfortable,” he said, opening the stateroom door. “I’m going down to engineering and start the crew on the scintillation probe modifications for the UAVs. I’ll have a towable linked up to your sub by morning. Meet me on deck by your sub at 0700 hours and we’ll start the search. The crane operators are ready and I have the UAV operators standing by; all I have to do is tell them about the new sensor suite. I hope that goes over well. Have a good evening.”

He turned to leave then poked his head back in. “I almost forgot. You’re ticketed in the Officer’s Mess as long as you’re on board. Use it for meals, relaxation, reading, watching TV or whatever you want. No phone calls though. Poole instructed me that we’re on a communications blackout. We’ll abide by that. If you have any problems notify me or the XO.”

“Thank you Captain Broward and thanks for allowing me aboard. I just hope I can live up to everyone’s expectations.”

“No problem, son. Either we get out of this together or we don’t. In my book, failure is not an option. See you in the morning.”