Red Storm Rising

27. Casualties

"At First we thought that they simply drove off the cliff road. We found this in the vehicle." The major of field police held up the top of a broken bottle of vodka. "But the medical corpsman who collected their personal effects found this."

The major pulled the rubberized sheet off the one body that had been thrown clear when the vehicle hit the rocks. The stab wound in the chest was unmistakable.

"And you said that the Icelanders were as peaceful as sheep, Comrade General," the KGB colonel observed sardonically.

The major continued, "It is difficult to reconstruct exactly what happened. There was a farm a short distance away whose house was burned to the ground. We found two bodies in the wreckage. Both had been shot."

"Who were they?" General Andreyev asked.

"Impossible to identify the bodies. The only way we knew they were shot was the bullet hole in the sternum, so that was likely done at very close range. I had one of our surgeons look at them. A man and a woman, probably in their middle years. According to a local government official, the farm was occupied by a married couple with one daughter, age"-the major checked his notes-"twenty. The daughter has not been found."

"What of the patrol?"

"They were southbound on the coast road when they disappeared-"

"No one spotted the fires?" the KGB colonel asked sharply.

"There was heavy rain that night. Both the burning vehicle and the farmhouse were below the horizon for the neighboring observation patrols. As you know, the road conditions here have upset our patrol schedules, and the mountains interfere with radio performance. So when the patrol was late getting in, no particular note was made of it. You can't see the vehicle from the road, and as a result they were not spotted until the helicopter flew over it."

"The other bodies, how did they die?" the General wanted to know.

"When the vehicle burned, the soldiers' hand grenades cooked off, with the obvious results. Except for the sergeant here, there is no telling how they died. So far as we can tell, no weapons were taken. All the rifles were there, but some items are unaccounted for: a map case and some other minor things. Possibly they were blown clear of the vehicle by the explosions and fell into the sea, but I doubt this."

"Conclusions?"

"Comrade General, there is not a great deal to go on, but I surmise that the patrol visited the farmhouse, 'liberated' this bottle of vodka, probably shot and killed the two people who lived there, and burned the house. The daughter is missing. We are searching the area for her body. At some time after this happened, the patrol was surprised and killed by an armed party which then tried to make their deaths look like a vehicle accident. We should assume that there is at least one band of resistance fighters at large."

"I disagree," the KGB colonel announced. "Not all the enemy troops have been accounted for. I think that your 'resistance fighters' are probably NATO personnel who escaped when we took Keflavik. They ambushed our troops, then murdered the farm people in the hope of stirring the local population against us."

General Andreyev shared a furtive look with his major of field police. It had been a KGB lieutenant commanding the patrol. The chekisti had insisted that some of their people accompany the roving patrols. Just what he needed, the General thought. Bad enough that his crack paratroopers were consigned to garrison duty-always destructive to unit morale and discipline-but now they were jailers, too, and in some cases commanded by jailers. So the arrogant young KGB officer-he'd never met a humble one-had thought to have himself some fun. Where was the daughter? The answer to this mystery certainly lay with her. But the mystery wasn't the important thing, was it?

"I think we should interrogate the local inhabitants to see what they know," the KGB officer announced.

"There are no 'local inhabitants,' Comrade," the major answered. "Look at your map. This is an isolated farm. The nearest neighbor is seven kilometers away."

"But-"

"Who killed these unfortunates, and why, is unimportant. We have armed enemies out there," Andreyev said. "This is a military matter, not something for our colleagues in the KGB. I'll have a helicopter search the area around the farm. If we find this resistance group, or whatever it is, we will deal with it as with any band of armed enemies. You may interrogate any prisoners we manage to capture, Comrade Colonel. Also, for the moment any KGB officer who accompanies our security patrols will be an observer, not a commander. We cannot risk your men in combat situations for which they have not been fully trained. So. Let me talk to my operations officer to see how we will handle the search. Comrades, you did well to bring this to our attention. Dismissed." The chekist wanted to stay, but KGB or not, he was only a colonel, and the General was exercising his legitimate prerogatives as commander on the scene.

An hour later, a Mi-24 attack helicopter lifted off to check the area around the burned farm.

"Again?" Toland asked.

"Not a bank holiday, Commander," the group captain replied. "Two regiments of Backfires departed their bases twenty minutes ago. If we want to catch their tankers, we must move smartly."

Within minutes, two EA-6B Prowlers, designed to find and jam enemy radar and radio signals, were climbing to altitude on a northwest heading. Known with backhanded affection as the Queer, the EA-6B's most striking characteristic was its canopies, inlaid with real gold to protect sensitive onboard instruments against electromagnetic radiation. As the planes climbed, their pilots and electronics officers were already working in their gilt cages.

Two hours later they spotted their prey, radioed back the signal bearings-and four Tomcats rolled down the runway of Stornoway.

Cruising at an altitude of thirty-six thousand feet the Tomcats flew racetrack-shaped patterns north and south of the predicted course for the Soviet tankers. Their powerful search/missile-guidance radars were shut down. Instead, they swept the skies with a built-in TV camera that could identify aircraft as far as forty miles away. Conditions were ideal, a clear sky with only a few high cirrus clouds; the fighters left no contrails that might warn another aircraft of their presence. The pilots curved their fighters around the sky, their eyes shifting out to check the horizon, then in to check engine instruments, a cycle repeated every ten seconds.

"Well, lookie here…" the squadron commander said to his weapons operator. The flight officer in the Tomcat's back seat centered the TV camera on the aircraft.

"Looks like a Badger to me."

"I don't suppose he's alone. Let's wait."

"Roge."

The bomber was over forty miles off. Soon two more appeared, along with something smaller.

"That's a fighter. So, they have fighter escorts this far out, eh? I count a total of… six targets." The weapons operator tightened up his shoulder straps, then activated his missile controls. "All weapons armed and ready. Fighters first?"

"Fighters first, light 'em up," the pilot agreed. He toggled up his radio. "Two, this is Lead, we have four tankers and a pair of fighters on a course of about zero-eight-five, forty miles west of my position. We are engaging now. Come on in. Over."

"Roger that. On the way, Lead. Out." Two brought his interceptor into a tight turn and advanced his throttles to the stops.

The leader's radar activated. They now had two fighters and four tankers identified. The first two Phoenixes would be targeted on the fighters.

"Shoot!"

The two missiles dropped clear of their shackle points and ignited, leading the Tomcat to the targets.

The Russian tankers had detected the fighter's AWG-9 radar and were already trying to evade. Their escorting fighters went to full power and activated their own missile-guidance radars, only to find that they were still outside missile range to the attacking fighters. Both switched on their jamming pods and began to jink their aircraft up and down as they closed in hope of launching their own missiles. They couldn't run away, there wasn't enough fuel for that, and their mission was to keep the fighters off the tankers.

The Phoenix missiles burned through the air at Mach 5, closing the distance to their targets in just under a minute. One Soviet pilot never saw the missile, and was blotted from the sky in a ball of red and black. The other did, and threw his stick over, a second before the missile exploded. It nearly missed, but fragments tore into the fighter's port wing. The pilot struggled to regain control as he fell from the sky.

Behind the fighters, the tankers split up, two heading north, the other pair south. The lead Tomcat took the northern pair and killed both with his remaining two Phoenixes. His wingman racing up from the north fired two missiles, hitting with one, and missing with the other, as the missile was confused by the Badger's jamming gear. The Tomcat continued to close, and fired another missile. By this time he was close enough to track the bird visually. The AIM-54 missile ran straight and true, exploding only ten feet from the Badger's tail. Hot fragments ripped into the converted bomber and detonated the remaining fumes in its refueling tanks. The Soviet bomber disappeared in a thundering orange flash.

The fighters swept their radars around the sky, hoping to find targets for their remaining missiles. Six more Badgers were a hundred miles off, but they had already been warned by the leading tankers and were heading north. The Tomcats didn't have enough fuel to pursue. They turned for home and landed at Stomoway an hour later with nearly dry tanks.

"Five confirmed kills and a damage," the squadron commander told Toland. "It worked."

"This time." Toland was pleased nevertheless. The U.S. Navy had just completed its first offensive mission. Now for the next one. Information was just in on the Backfire raid. They'd hit a convoy off the Azores, and a pair of Tomcats was waiting two hundred miles south of Iceland to meet them on the return leg.

"Our losses have been murderous," said the General of Soviet Frontal Aviation.

"I will tell our motor-rifle troops just how serious your losses have been," Alekseyev replied coldly.

"We have lost nearly double our projections."

"So have we! At least our ground troops are fighting. I watched an attack. You sent in four attack fighters. Four!"

"I know of this attack. There was a full regiment assigned, more than twenty, plus your own attack helicopters. The NATO fighters are engaging us ten kilometers behind the front. My pilots must fight for their lives simply to get where your tanks are-and then all too often they are engaged by our own surface-to-air missiles!"

"Explain," ordered Alekseyev's superior.

"Comrade General, the NATO radar surveillance aircraft are not easy targets-they are too well protected. With their airborne radar, they can vector their fighters against ours to launch their missile attacks from beyond visual range. When our pilots learn that they are being attacked, they must evade, no? Do your tankers sit still to give their enemies an easy shot? This often means that they must drop their bombs to maneuver. Finally, when they do manage to reach the battle zone they are frequently shot at by friendly missile units who don't take the time to distinguish between friend and foe." It was an old story, and not merely a Soviet problem.

"You are telling us that NATO has command of the air," Alekseyev said.

"No, they do not. Neither side does. Our surface-to-air missiles deny them the ability to control the air over the battle line, and their fighters helped by their surface-to-air missiles, and ours! — deny it to us. The sky over the battlefield belongs to no one." Except the dead, the Air Force General thought to himself.

Alekseyev thought of what he had seen at Bieben, and wondered how correct he was.

"We must do better," the Theater Commander said. "The next massed attack we launch will have proper air support if it means stripping fighters from every unit on the front."

"We are trying to get more aircraft forward by using deceptive maneuvering. Yesterday we tried to feint NATO's fighters to the wrong place. It nearly worked, but we made a mistake. That mistake has been identified."

"We attack south of Hannover at 0600 tomorrow. I want two hundred aircraft at the front line supporting my divisions."

"You'll have them," the Air Force General agreed. Alekseyev watched the flyer leave.

"So, Pasha?"

"That's a start-if the two hundred fighters show up."

"We have our helicopters, too."

"I watched what happens to helicopters in a missile environment. Just when I thought they'd blast a hole through the German lines, a combination of SAMs and fighters nearly annihilated them. They have to expose themselves too greatly when they fire their missiles. The courage of the pilots is remarkable, but courage alone is not enough. We have underestimated NATO firepower-no, more properly we have overestimated our ability to neutralize it."

"We've been attacking prepared positions since this war began. Once we break into the open-"

"Yes. A mobile campaign will reduce our losses and give us a much more even contest. We have to break through." Alekseyev looked down at the map. Just after dawn tomorrow, an army-four motor-rifle divisions, supported by a division of tanks-would hurl itself into the NATO lines. "And here seems to be the place. I want to be forward again."

"As you wish, Pasha. But be careful. By the way, the doctor tells me the cut on your hand was from a shell fragment. You are entitled to a decoration."

"For this?" Alekseyev looked at his bandaged hand. "I've cut myself worse than this shaving. No medal for this, it would be an insult to our troops.

They were climbing down a rocky slope when the helicopter appeared two miles west of them. It was low, about three hundred feet over the ridge line, and moving slowly toward them. The Marines immediately fell to the ground and crawled to places where they might hide in shadows. Edwards took a few steps to Vigdis and pulled her down also. She was wearing a white patterned sweater that was all too easy to spot. The lieutenant stripped off his field jacket and draped it around her, holding her head down as he wrapped the hood over her blond hair.

"Don't move at all. They're looking for us." Edwards kept his own head up briefly to see where his men were. Smith waved for him to get down. Edwards did so, keeping his eyes open so that he could look sideways at the chopper. It was another Hind. He could see rocket pods hanging from stubby wings on either side of the airframe. Both the doors to the passenger compartment were open, revealing a squad of infantrymen, weapons at the ready, looking down. "Oh, shit."

The noise from its turboshaft engines increased as the Hind came closer, and the massive five-bladed main rotor beat at the air, stirring up the volcanic dust that coated everything on the plateau they had just left. Edwards's hand tightened on the M-16's pistol grip, and he thumbed off the safety. The helicopter was coming almost sideways, its rocket pods pointed at the flatlands behind the Marines. Edwards could make out the machine guns in the Hind's nose, some kind of rotary gun like the American minigun that spat out four thousand rounds per minute. They wouldn't have a chance in hell against that.

"Turn, you son of a bitch," Mike said under his breath.

"What is it doing?" Vigdis asked.

"Just relax. Don't move at all." Oh, God, don't let them see us now.

"There! Look there at one o'clock," the gunner said from the front seat of the helicopter.

"So this mission isn't a waste after all," the pilot replied. "Go ahead."

The gunner centered Ins sights and armed the machine gun, setting his selector for a five-shot burst. His target was agreeably still as he depressed the trigger.

"Got him!"

Edwards jumped at the sound. Vigdis didn't move at all. The lieutenant moved his rifle slightly, bringing it to bear on the chopper-which moved south, dropping below the ridgeline. He saw three heads come up. What had they shot at? The engine sounds changed as the helicopter landed, not far away.

The gunner had hit the buck with three bullets, with little damage to the edible tissue. There was just enough in the eighty-pound animal to feed the squad and the helicopter crew. The paratroop sergeant slit the deer's throat with his combat knife, then set to remove the viscera. The local deer were nothing like the animals his father hunted in Siberia, but for the first time in three weeks he'd have some fresh meat. That was sufficient to make this boring mission worthwhile. The carcass was loaded into the Hind. Two minutes later it circled up to cruise altitude and flew back to Keflavik.

They watched it depart, the stuttering rotor sound diminishing on the breeze.

"What was that all about?" Edwards asked his sergeant.

"Beats the hell out of me, skipper. I think we better boogie on outa here. They were sure as hell looking for something, and I'll betcha it's us. Let's keep to places with some kind of cover."

"You got it, Jim. Lead off." Edwards walked back to Vigdis.

Is safe now?"

They've gone. Why don't you keep that jacket on. It makes you harder to spot."

It was two sizes too large for Edwards, and looked like a tent on Vigdis's diminutive frame. She held her arms out straight in an effort to get her hands out of the sleeves, and for the first time since he met her, Vigdis Agustdottir smiled.

"All ahead one-third," the executive officer ordered.

"All ahead one-third, aye," the quartermaster of the watch responded, moving the annunciator handle up from the Ahead Full setting. A moment later the inside pointer changed also. "Engine room answers all ahead one-third."

"Very well."

Pharris slowed, coming off a twenty-five-knot sprint to commence another drift maneuver, and allowing her towed-array sonar to listen for hostile submarines. Morris was in his bridge chair, going over messages from shore. He rubbed his eyes and lit up another Pall Mall.

"Bridge," called the urgent voice of a lookout. "Periscope feather on the port bow! Halfway to the horizon, port bow!" Morris snatched his binoculars from the holder and had them to his eyes in an instant. He didn't see anything.

"Battle stations!" ordered the XO. The alarm gong went off a second later and weary men ran again to their posts. Morris looped his binoculars around his neck and ran down the ladder to his battle station in CIC.

The sonar loosed a dozen ranging pings to port as Morris took his position in CIC. Nothing. The helo lifted off as the frigate maneuvered north, allowing her towed-array sonar to track on the possible contact.

"Passive sonar contact, evaluate as possible submarine bearing zero-one-three," announced the towed-array operator. "Steam noises, sounds like a possible nuke."

"I got nothing there," said the active-sonar operator.

Morris and his ASW officer examined the water-conditions board. There was a layer at two hundred feet. The passive sonar was below it, and could well be hearing a submarine that the active pings could not reach. The lookout might have seen anything from a spouting whale this was the mating season for humpbacks-to a streak of foam… or the feathery wake left by a periscope. If it was a submarine, he had plenty of time to duck under the layer. The target was too close to be bottom bounced and too far for the sonar to blast directly through the layer.

"Less than five miles," ASW said. "More than two. If this is a sub, we're up against a good one."

"Great. Get the helo on him right now!" Morris examined the plot. The submarine could have heard his frigate as it sprinted at twenty-five knots. Now, at reduced speed, and with Prairie/Masker operating, Pharris would be very hard to detect… so the sub's fire-control solution had probably just gone out the window. But Morris didn't have one either, and the submarine was perilously close. An urgent contact report was radioed to the screen commander twenty miles away.

The Sea Sprite dropped a pattern of sonobuoys. Minutes passed.

"I got a weak signal on number six and a medium on number four," the sonobuoy petty officer said. Morris watched the plot. That made the contact less than three miles off.

"Drop some pingers," he ordered. Behind him the ship's weapons officer ordered the arming of the ASROC and torpedo launchers. Three miles off, the helicopter turned and swept across the target area, dropping three CASS buoys this time, which sent out active, nondirectional pings.

"Contact, a strong contact on buoy nine. Classify as possible submarine"

"I got him, bearing zero-one-five-this one's a sub, classify as positive submarine contact," said the towed-array man. "He just increased power. Some cavitation sounds. Single-screw submarine, maybe a Victor-class, bearing changing rapidly left-to-right."

The active sonar still didn't have him despite continuous maximum power pings down the correct line of bearing. The submarine was definitely under the layer.

Morris wanted to maneuver but decided against it. A radical turn would cause his towed-array sonar to curve, rendering it useless for several minutes. Then he would have to depend on sonobuoys alone, and Morris trusted his towed sonar more than the buoys.

"Bearing to contact is now zero-one-five and steady… noise level is down somewhat." The operator pointed at his screen. Morris was surprised. The contact bearing had been changing rapidly and was now steadied down?

The helicopter made yet another pass. A new sonobuoy registered the contact, but the MAD gear didn't confirm the presence of a submarine and the contact was fading. The noise level continued to drop. Morris watched the relative position of the contact pass aft. What the hell was this character doing?

"Periscope, starboard bow!" the talker reported.

"Wrong place, sir…unless we're looking at a noisemaker," the operator said.

The ASW officer had the active sonar change bearing and the results were immediate.

"Contact bearing three-four-five, range fifteen hundred yards!" A bright pip glowed on the sonar scope.

"All ahead flank!" Morris yelled. Somehow the submarine had evaded the towed sonar, then popped up atop the layer and run up his periscope That could only mean one thing. "Right full rudder."

"Hydrophone effects-torpedoes inbound, bearing three-five-one!"

Instantly the weapons officer ordered the launch of an antisubmarine torpedo down the same bearing in the hope that it would disturb the attacking submarine. If the Russian's torpedoes were wire-guided, he'd have to cut the wires free to maneuver the sub clear of the American return shot.

Morris raced up the ladder to the bridge. Somehow the submarine had broken contact and maneuvered into firing position. The frigate changed course and speed in an attempt to ruin the submarine's fire-control solution.

"I see one!" the XO said, pointing over the bow. The Soviet torpedo left a visible white trail on the surface. Morris noted it, something he had not expected. The frigate turned rapidly.

"Bridge, I show two torpedoes, bearing constant three-five-zero and decreasing range," the tactical action officer said rapidly. "Both are pinging at us. The Nixie is operating."

Morris lifted a phone. "Report the situation to the escort commander."

"Done, skipper. Two more helos are heading this way."

Pharris was now doing twenty knots and accelerating, turning her stem to the torpedoes. Her helicopter was now aft of the beam, frantically making runs with its magnetic anomaly detector, trying to locate the Soviet sub.

The torpedo's wake crossed past the frigate's bow as Morris's ship kept her helm over. There was an explosion aft. White water leaped a hundred feet into the air as the first Russian "fish" collided with the nixie torpedo decoy. But they had only one nixie deployed. There was another torpedo out there.

"Left full rudder!'' Morris told the quartermaster. "Combat, what about the contact?" The frigate was now doing twenty-five knots.

"Not sure, sir. The sonobuoys have our torp but nothing else."

"We're gonna take a hit," the XO said. He pointed to a white trail on the water, less than two hundred yards away. It must have missed the frigate on its first try, then turned for another. Homing torpedoes kept looking until they ran out of fuel.

There was nothing Morris could do. The torpedo was approaching on his port bow. If he turned right, it would only give the fish a larger target. Below him the ASROC launcher swung left toward the probable location of the submarine, but without an order to fire, all the operator could do was train it out. The white wake kept getting closer. Morris leaned over the rail, staring at it with mute rage as it extended like a finger toward his bow. It couldn't possibly miss now.

"That's not real smart, Cap'n." Bosun Clarke's hand grabbed Morris's shoulder and yanked him down to the deck. He was just grabbing for the executive officer when it hit.

The impact lifted Morris a foot off the steel deck. He didn't hear the explosion, but an instant after he had bounced off the steel a second time, he was deluged with a sheet of white water that washed him against a stanchion. His first thought was that he'd been thrown overboard. He rose to see his executive officer-headless, slumped against the pilothouse door. The bridge wing was torn apart, the stout metal shielding ripped by fragments. The pilothouse windows were gone. What he saw next was worse.

The torpedo had struck the frigate just aft of the bow-mounted sonar. Already the bow had collapsed, the keel sundered by the explosion. The foc's'l was awash, and the horrible groaning of metal told him that the bow was being ripped off his ship. Morris staggered into the bridge and yanked the annunciator handle to All Stop, failing to notice that the engineers had already stopped engines. The ship's momentum pushed her forward. As Morris watched, the bow twisted to starboard, ten degrees off true, and the forward gunmount became awash, its crew trying to head aft. Below the mount were other men. Morris knew that they were dead, hoped that they had died instantly, and were not drowning, trapped in a sinking steel cage. His men. How many had their battle stations forward of the ASROC launcher?

Then the bow tore away. A hundred feet of the ship left the remainder to the accompaniment of screeching metal. It turned as he watched, colliding with the afterpart of the ship as it rotated in the water like a small berg. There was movement at an exposed watertight door. He saw a man try to get free, and succeed, the figure jumping into the water and swimming away from the wallowing bow.

The bridge crew was alive, all cut by flying glass but at their posts. Chief Clarke took a quick look at the pilothouse, then ran below to assist with damage control. The damage-control parties were already racing forward with fire hoses and welding gear, and at damage-control central the men examined the trouble board to see how severe the flooding was. Morris lifted a sound-powered phone and twisted the dial to this compartment.

"Damage-control report!"

"Flooding aft to frame thirty-six, but I think she'll float-for a little while anyway. No fires. Waiting for reports now."

Morris switched settings on the phone. "Combat, radio the screen commander that we've taken a hit and need assistance."

"Done, sir. Gallery's heading out this way. Looks like the sub got away. They're still searching for her. We have some shock damage here. All the radars are down. Bow sonar is out. ASROC is out. The tail is still working, though, and the Mark-32 mounts still work. Wait-screen commander's sending us a tug, sir."

"Okay, you have the conn. I'm going below to look at the damage." You have the conn, Morris thought. How do you conn a ship that ain't moving? A minute later he was at a bulkhead, watching men trying to shore it up with lumber.

"This one's fairly solid, sir, the next one forward's leaking like a damn sieve, no way we'll patch it all. When the bow let go, it must have twisted everything loose." The officer grabbed a seaman by the shoulder. "Go to the after D/C locker and get more four-by-fours!"

"Will this one hold?"

"I don't know. Clarke is checking the bottom out now. We'll have to weld in some patches and stiffeners. Give me about ten minutes and I'll tell you if she'll float or not."

Clarke appeared. He was breathing heavily. "The bulkhead's sprung at the tank tops, and there's a small crack, too. Leaking pretty good. The pumps are on, and just about keeping even. I think we can shore it up, but we have to hustle."

The damage-control officer led the welders below at once. Two men appeared with a portable pump. Morris ordered them below.

"How many men missing?" Morris asked Chief Clarke. He was holding his arm strangely.

"All the guys made it out of the five-inch mount, but I haven't seen anybody from belowdecks. Shit, I think I broke something myself." Clarke looked at his right arm and shook his head angrily. "I don't think many guys made it outa the bow, sir. The watertight doors are twisted some, they gotta be jammed tight."

"Get that arm looked at," Morris ordered.

"Oh, fuck the arm, skipper! You need me." The man was right. Morris went back topside with Clarke behind him.

On reaching the bridge, Morris dialed up engineering. The noise on the phone answered his first question.

The engineer spoke over the hiss of escaping steam. "Shock damage, Captain. We got some ruptured steam pipes on the number one boiler. I think number two will still work, but I've popped the safeties on both just in case. The diesel generators are on line. I got some hurt men here. I'm sending them out. I-okay, okay. We just did a check of number two boiler. A few minor leaks, but we can fix 'em quick. Otherwise everything looks pretty tight. I can have it back on line in fifteen minutes."

"We need it." Morris hung up.

Pharris lay dead in the water. With the safety valves opened, steam vented onto the massive stack structure, giving off a dreadful rasping sound that seemed like the ship's own cry of pain. The frigate's sleek clipper bow had been replaced by a flat face of torn metal and hanging wires. The water around the ship was foul with oil from ruptured fuel tanks. For the first time Morris noticed that the ship was down by the stern; when he stood straight, the ship was misaligned. He knew he had to wait for another damage-control report. As with an accident victim, the prognosis depended on the work of surgeons, and they could not be rushed or disturbed. He lifted the phone to CIC.

"Combat, Bridge. What's the status of that submarine contact?"

"Gallery's helo dropped on it, but the torp ran dry without hitting anything. Looks like he ran northeast, but we haven't had anything for about five minutes. There's an Orion in the area now."

"Tell them to check inside of us. This character isn't going to run away unless he has to. He might be running in, not out. Tell the screen commander."

"Aye, Cap'n."

He hadn't hung the phone up when it buzzed.

"Captain speaking."

"She'll float, sir," the damage-control officer said at once. "We're patching the bulkhead now. It won't be tight, but the pumps can handle the leakage. Unless something else goes bad on us, we'll get her home. They sending the tug out to us?"

"Yes."

"If we get a tow, sir, it better be sternfirst. I don't want to think about trying to run this one into a seaway."

"Right." Morris looked at Clarke. "Get a gang of men aft. We'll be taking the tow at the stem, rig it up. Have them launch the whaleboat to look for survivors. I saw at least one man in the water. And get a sling on that arm."

"You got it, Cap'n." Clarke moved aft.

Morris went to CIC and found a working radio.

"X-Ray Alfa, this is Pharris," Morris called to the screen commander.

"State your condition."

"We took one hit forward, the bow is gone all the way to the ASROC launcher. We cannot maneuver. I can keep her afloat unless we hit some bad weather. Both boilers currently down, but we should have power back in less than ten minutes. We have casualties, but I don't know how many or how bad yet.

"Commodore, we got hit by a nuke boat, probably a Victor. Unless I miss my guess, he's headed your way."

"We lost him, but he was heading out," the Commodore said.

"Start looking inside, sir," Morris urged. "This fellow got to knifefighting range and pulled a beautiful number on us. This one isn't going to run away for long, he's too damned good for that."

The Commodore thought that one over briefly. "Okay, I'll keep that in mind. Gallery's en route to you. What other assistance do you need?"

"You need Gallery more than we do. Just send us the tug," Morris answered. He knew that the submarine wouldn't be coming back to finish the kill. He'd accomplished that part of his mission. Next, he'd try to kill some merchants.

"Roger that. Let me know if you need anything else. Good luck, Ed."

"Thank you, sir. Out."

Morris ordered his helo to drop a double ring of sonobuoys around his ship just in case. Then the Sea Sprite found three men in the water, one of them dead. The whaleboat recovered them, allowing the helo to rejoin the convoy. It was assigned to Gallery, which took Pharris's station as the convoy angled south.

Below, welders worked their gear in waist-deep saltwater as they struggled to seal off the breaks in the frigate's watertight bulkheads. The task lasted nine hours, then the pumps drained the water from the flooded compartments.

Before they had finished, the fleet tug Papago pulled alongside the frigate's square stem. Chief Clarke supervised as a stout towing wire was passed across and secured. An hour later, the tug was pulling the frigate on an easterly course at four knots, backwards to protect the damaged bow. Morris ordered his towed-array sonar to be strung over the bow, trailing it out behind to give them some small defense capability. Several extra lookouts were posted to watch for periscopes. It would be a slow, dangerous trip back home.