Virginia Class

7

"Ocean floor is dropping fast, Captain," Jorgensen reported. "Somebody just yanked the deck out from under us."

"Very well," Garrett said. "Helm, steady as she goes."

"Steady as she goes, aye, Captain," the man at the helm station replied.

Garrett sat in the center seat, surveying his domain. Virginia's control center was unlike that of any submarine he'd ever served aboard.

The periscope was gone, first of all. Input from Virginia's Photonics mast was displayed on the big forward screen for all in the control room to see. Without the massive, gleaming column of a periscope mount in the middle of the control room, there was room for a seat for the captain, set on a swivel so he could see every console and station without moving from the spot.

In front of him and to his left was the seat for the diving officer, and ahead of that were the side-by-side seats for the enlisted men at the dive plane and helm stations, their consoles set against the left-forward half of the control room bulkhead, just beneath the forward screen. On previous U.S. attack subs, those two stations had been controlled by aircraft-style steering yokes. On the Virginia, the yokes had been replaced by touchscreens and grip-contoured joysticks, giving them the feel of a simulator game in some fantastic, ultramodern video arcade.

As on earlier U.S. submarines, along the left side of the control room were the navigational consoles and the NAVSTAR GPS board. Down the right side were weapons and fire-control panels — including the Command and Control System, or CCS-2, from which Tomahawk missiles could be programmed and fired — and the BSY-2 — "Busy-Two" — board, which could track dozens of sonar targets simultaneously. The sonar shack itself was in a long, narrow room through a door in the aft bulkhead. Forward, well marked by glaring security signs, was the communications center, or radio shack.

Behind Garrett's seat, also on the control room's aft bulkhead, was the big automated plot board, where Lieutenant DeKalb and the yeoman of the watch kept careful track of Virginia's position, course, and speed. Garrett swiveled his chair to check the screen. Virginia's current location was marked by a moving circle at the end of a long and slowly growing green line.

As the boat's exec had just reported, the bottom was dropping away as Virginia's northwesterly course carried her through the McClure Strait, past the shallows of Banks Island and out over the black depths of the Canada Basin. A moment before, the water depth had been 100 meters. Now, as the sub flew out over the edge of a submarine cliff, the bottom was at 280 meters — almost 900 feet — and still falling. The deepest point of the ice-locked Canada Basin still lay 600 miles due west — and 15,000 feet down.

A screen showing the sub's key positional data continued to change as Virginia's navigational computer updated the information moment by moment. Garrett could read it from his chair, though a small screen by his left hand repeated it:

As he watched, the latitude changed to N74°27.55', the longitude to W132°5.12', and the depth below keel to 380 meters. In the old days, those cryptic navigational markings would have been made with grease pencil on a navigational chart every twenty minutes or so. In Virginia's paperless world, the chart had been replaced by detailed computer mapping. A keyboard command could call up an electronic chart for any portion of the sea bottom in the world — or of the land, for that matter, since Virginia might be called upon to launch a Tomahawk TLAM at a target a thousand miles inland. The boat's undersea passage so far was stored as a snaking green line from Baffin Bay to the Beaufort Sea, threading the twists and turns of the Barrow and McClure Straits. He could instantly review any portion of the cruise all the way back to New London. Far more — and far more accurate — navigational data was literally at his fingertips than he'd ever enjoyed on board the Seawolf.

"Incredible," Garrett said, whispering to himself.

"Just like the fucking Enterprise," Jorgensen said softly at Garrett's elbow.

"I assume you don't mean the carrier, Number One." Aircraft carrier bridges were known for their sheer spaciousness.

"I meant the starship," Jorgensen replied with a chuckle. "You look like Captain Kirk there, center seat and all."

"I wonder if Roddenberry's estate is getting royalties for this thing."

"Beg pardon, sir?"

"Back in the sixties, when Star Trek was first on TV, the U.S. Navy actually contacted Gene Roddenberry— the show's creator — and told him they were looking at his design for the bridge on his fictional starship as a model for the bridge on real-life Navy ships. Someone in the Navy's design bureau thought it made a lot of sense, putting the captain or the OOD in a chair smack in the middle of things where he could turn back and forth and see all of the consoles and screens around him without having to move. At least, that's the story. So… it took us, what? Forty-some years, but we've finally caught up with the USS Enterprise."

"Yup," Jorgensen agreed. "Though I'm not sure what the stores people ashore would make of a request for photon torpedoes."

Garrett turned to face forward once more, glancing up at the main screen — another adaptation from Roddenberry's science fictional world. The Photonics mast view wasn't particularly informative at the moment. The scene showed an almost impenetrable murk, a deep, dark pea green shading to midnight black at the bottom. Myriad flecks of debris caught in the sail lights streamed past the camera like clouds of stars. Garrett could make out just a hint of the "ceiling," the underside of the polar ice cap stretched overhead like a dark gray, inverted landscape thirty feet overhead.

Submarines had always relied very little on the sense of sight. Except for those rare occasions when they might be tracking targets through their periscopes, submerged boats ran blind, relying instead on their sonar ears to tell them about what might be in the sea around them. Virginia's forward view screen threatened to change that… and not for the better, so far as Garrett was concerned. Even with the high-tech sensors of the Photonics mast, visual input carried very little useful information. Even with the lights on, visibility was at best a hundred yards. Virginia's sonar ears — honed by decades of the U.S. Navy's high-tech prowess in the field — were infinitely more sensitive and informative.

Here, too, the technology had transformed the nature of the submarine beast. Virginia's main sonar was the BQQ-10 Acoustic Rapid COTS Insertion system, or ARCI, an upgrade to the spherical bow-mounted BQQ-6 active/passive array, which was already acknowledged as the best sonar system in the world. The COTS acronym stood for Commercial Off-The-Shelf, a measure designed to keep the Virginia class's per-unit cost down, but also to allow for easy upgrades as technology progressed. Besides her TB-16 towed and

TB-29 thin-line towed sonars, she also mounted the new BQG-5A Wide-Aperture Array. The WAA had been designed as the premier sensor for tracking what the Navy anticipated Virginia's number-one prey would be: diesel-electric submarines operating in shallow littoral waters.

At the touch of a screen, data from any of those sonar systems could be displayed on the main screen, or on the small console screen mounted on Garrett's armrest.

Some things did not change with the technology, however. The sonar was still operated by enlisted men trained to use their ears as well as the computers, visual sonar displays, and computerized sound libraries. The men at the various control-room stations remained calm and alert, focused on their jobs. Commands were, as ever, repeated back word for word in formal litanies designed to make certain that the order was heard, that it was fully understood, and that it was being properly carried out. Stress or overeagerness could make a man anticipate an order and get it wrong. Repeating a command back assured understanding and helped disarm what could become crippling stress.

The key word was professional; the boat's crew were consummate professionals, very, very good at what they'd volunteered to do.

Which, at the moment, was probing the underbelly of the Arctic ice cap. Virginia's operational orders included an under-the-ice passage from Baffin Bay, west of Greenland, to the Bering Strait between Alaska and Siberia. While under the ice cap, they would thoroughly test Virginia's under-ice sonar and navigational capabilities. An add-on to those orders required them to take periodic soundings of the ice along the way for NOAA, the quasi-naval National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration. Information gleaned from this run would be added to the database now being compiled on the worldwide effects of global warming.

"Conn, Sonar," a voice said in Garrett's headset. "Sonar, this is the Conn. Go ahead."

"Sir, the ice is thinning. Looks like we have an open lead coming up."

"Very well."

On the view screen, the water appeared to be lightening substantially. A touch of his armrest controls angled the Photonics mast camera upward. Murk-gray-green gave way suddenly to an explosion of white radiance. Shafts of sunlight sliced through the water overhead, dwindling rapidly as they descended.

The ice was a lot thinner than normal for this latitude at this time of the year. The first time Garrett had crossed under the ice, as a junior officer on board a Los Angeles boat almost two decades ago, the ice here a thousand miles from the North Pole had measured around two or three meters thick. Now, the ice was only rarely thicker than half a meter, and there were frequent leads of open water.

Would it reach the point that the North Polar ice cap melted away completely, he wondered? And what would happen in warmer climes if it did? The Arctic ice held something like 8 percent of the world's supply of fresh water. The sea levels worldwide were bound to rise, at least a little.

He considered ordering Virginia to stop and surface — part of the test of her under-ice capabilities— but decided to put that off for a while. A moment later, the sunlight overhead was eclipsed by gray shadow once more. He returned the camera to its forward-looking position.

Time passed in dark seclusion, the silence broken only by the gentle hum of electronics. "Captain? Request permission to enter the Conn."

He turned his chair aft. "Sure, COB. Come on in."

Senior Chief Bollinger came closer. "A word, Captain?"

"Of course. What's up?"

The COB leaned close, speaking quietly. "Nothing major, Captain. But some of the men are wondering about the Blue Nose ritual. Are we still going to have one? Or are we canning it for this voyage?"

Garrett smiled. Over the centuries, a number of navigational crossings had become time-honored rites of passage, markers for the men who sailed the seas… and beneath them. Crossing the equator was one, a ceremony bestowing the Order of the Shellback on any officer or man who'd not made the passage before. Crossing the international date line was another, bestowing the Order of the Golden Dragon.

A third was reserved for sailors who first crossed the Arctic Circle, granting the Order of the Blue Nose in a hazing ceremony similar to the others. Virginia had crossed the Arctic Circle while traveling north through the Davis Strait five days ago, just before they'd reached the pack ice limit. At that time, Garrett had ordered Bollinger to hold off on the festivities. Virginia was coming up on a tricky bit of pathfinding, moving under the ice and through the narrows of Lancaster Sound and the Barrow Strait. Ceremony could be deferred, he'd decided, until they were in the unrestricted depths of the Beaufort and Chukchi Seas.

"Is old Neptune getting antsy?" he asked.

"Oh, I don't know about antsy, Captain," Bollinger replied with a grin. "Pissed, maybe. We are trespassing in his domain, you know."

"Just a second. Mr. DeKalb?"

"Yes, Captain!"

"Estimated time to arrival at the IDL?"

A blue line projected itself ahead of the green circle marking Virginia's position, extending southwest. The scale changed, pulling back to reveal the north coast of Alaska.

"Sir, that would be when we approach the Bering Strait. At our current speed, that's forty hours."

"Very well." He looked at Bollinger and cocked an eyebrow. "COB, I suggest that we do two ceremonies in one. Give 'em the Golden Dragon and the Blue Nose, all in one big party."

Bollinger's grin grew wider. "That'll be a hell of a party, Captain."

"It should be. The men have done a good job, so far. A very good job. They deserve it."

"Right you are, Captain. Would… lessee. Sunday night be okay?"

"Absolutely, COB."

"Thank you, sir. I'll make the necessary arrangements with his Oceanic Majesty."

"You do that."

"And of course Davy Jones'll have to put in an appearance Saturday night."

"Arrange it with the chiefs on the boat. Keep me informed."

"Conn, Sonar."

Bollinger patted the arm of Garrett's chair. "Talk to you later, sir. Thanks."

"Right, COB. Sonar, Conn. Go ahead."

"Conn, we have a pressure ridge coming up, bearing approximately two-three-zero through two-eight-zero, range five thousand."

Occasionally, drifting masses of pack ice collided, creating walls of ice extending deep below the usual ceiling depth, a kind of upside-down mountain range that posed a real hazard for submarines that weren't watching where they were going.

"Sonar, Conn, roger that," Garrett replied. "Where's the ceiling?"

"Conn, Sonar. Ceiling now fourteen meters above the mast… and dropping."

Garrett called up the new data to see for himself. Virginia's under-ice sonar was constantly pinging the underside of the ice cap, letting them know how much overhead clearance they had. Fourteen meters dropped to twelve as he watched.

There was plenty of room beneath Virginia's keel.

"Sonar, Conn. Estimate depth of the pressure ridge."

"Conn, Sonar. It's hard to say, sir… butI'd guess ten meters, maybe fifteen." Sonar was less than precise when it came to variables such as depth. A narrow angle between separate sonar returns was notoriously difficult to read. Besides, echolocation could be confused by thermal layers in the sea or by backscattering echoes off the ice or the bottom.

"Stay on it, Sonar. I need facts, not guesses."

"Sonar, aye."

"Diving Officer, make depth six hundred feet."

"Make depth six-zero-zero feet, aye, sir," the diving officer, Lieutenant Falk, said. "Planesman, set bow planes for fifteen degrees down bubble. Make depth six-zero-zero feet."

"Fifteen degrees down bubble, aye, sir. Make depth six-zero-zero feet, aye aye."

As the first class on the diving plane station pushed his joystick forward, the deck tilted gently forward. The murk on the main screen darkened until it showed a background of pitch blackness, relieved only by the illuminated specks of drifting crud which now, more than ever, took on the appearance of tiny stars streaming past the camera.

"Come up fifteen degrees," Falk ordered. "Zero degrees on the bubble."

"Coming up fifteen degrees," the planesman reported. The deck leveled off. "Zero degrees on the bubble. Depth six-zero-zero feet."

"Depth six hundred feet, Captain," Falk repeated.

"Very well." The down-thrust grasp of the pressure ridge slid harmlessly past, far overhead. The main screen still showed nothing but shadows and whirling specks of organic debris illuminated by Virginia's exterior lights.

A quiet trip, Garrett thought. Let's hope it stays that way.

"Our bearing is now two-nine-zero degrees," the helmsman reported. "As ordered, sir."

"Sonar reports depth below keel at twenty-five meters," the diving officer added.

"Very well. Gently, now, Lieutenant Daulat," ul Haq told him. "Put us on the bottom."

"Yes, sir." Daulat studied the gauges and readouts on his board. "Planesman! Five degrees down bubble… Depth below keel now… eighteen meters… "

"Captain!" Noor Khalili was furious. "Why are we stopping now?"

No, ul Haq decided, turning to study the man, it wasn't anger that drove him. It was a restless, roiling impatience, a mental pacing that reminded ul Haq of a caged jungle cat.

"You should know, my Taliban friend. It is time for prayer."

"Allah the Merciful, the Compassionate, makes allowances for the faithful when they are engaged in holy jihad," the Afghan replied. "If we had stopped for prayer five times a day when the American devils came for us in Tora Bora—"

"But this is not Tora Bora," ul Haq said. "And the Americans are not coming for us." Not yet, at any rate, he reminded himself.

With a soft, grating crunch of steel on coral sand, the Shuhadaa Muqaddaseen settled gently onto the bottom, coming to rest with a slight heel to starboard.

Ul Haq picked up the microphone hanging on the periscope mount. "Attention, attention, this is the Captain. Shuhadaa Muqaddaseen is now at rest on the bottom. Face the bow, and you face holy Mecca."

A moment later, the voice of Shuhadaa's imam sounded over the intercom, intoning the ancient, wavering call summoning the faithful to prayer.

"This is insanity," Khalili said. "We are within a kilometer of our first target!"

"A good time to ask Allah's help, then." His prayer rug was already on the deck at his feet. Facing the bow, ul Haq kneeled, composing himself. "I suggest that you join us. For the sake of the crew, if not for yourself."

Khalili really was furious now, his face red, his eyes dark. But he kneeled nonetheless.

Good, ul Haq thought to himself. This one will be a problem if we do not bring him to heel immediately. He saw with approval that the Chinese liaison officer was also kneeling, performing the ritual series of bows toward Mecca. Hsing was supposedly of Chinese Muslim extraction, but ul Haq hadn't fully believed that. How could someone of an alien race, of such an alien culture, understand?

Perhaps, ul Haq thought with a sudden flash of insight, it was not the culture of Islam that bound Hsing so much as the culture of naval service within submarines. Whatever the man might believe privately, deep within the secret reaches of his own soul, he was an experienced submariner and knew the men who sailed such craft, knew how vitally important unity of spirit and purpose was to such men. Noor Khalili possessed an admirable warrior spirit, but he bordered too much on the fanatic for ul Haq's taste. Service on board an attack submarine did not require fanaticism. It required dedication, purpose, self-sacrifice for a common goal, and, above all, patience.

By observing the Prophet's commandment of five-times-daily prayer, ul Haq intended to deepen the bond of trust, dedication, and spirit between the men and officers under his command. They'd taken time for the ritual each day since they'd left Karachi, and it was his intent to continue for as long as possible.

Soon enough, when Shuhadaa Muqaddaseen became the hunted instead of the hunter, such formalities would be set aside. It would be insanity indeed to issue a call to prayer while American submarines were in the area with the keen ears of their sonars tuned for any noise within the ocean depths. And it would be insane to expect the Americans to allow the crew of the Shuhadaa time for their devotions once the hunt had begun.

But for now… Shuhadaa Muqaddaseen was the hunter and had the luxury of choosing its own time for attack. The target, a Filipino fishing boat, was utterly unaware of the submarine's presence in these waters, and, in any case, neither the Filipino nor the Vietnamese navy possessed advanced ASW techniques or weapons. There was some risk, he knew, but that risk was far offset by the benefit this simple ritual would bestow upon the crew.

And the fishing boat would not get far.

The imam's voice continued to waver from the intercom. "In the name of Allah, the Merciful, the Munificent… "

"Open the escape trunk, Mr. Kirkpatrick," Garrett told the first class electrician's mate standing next to the securely dogged watertight door. "Let's let our guest come on board."

"Aye aye, sir," Kirkpatrick replied, turning to the door. He didn't sound too certain about this.

Kirkpatrick spun the locking wheel and pulled the door open. Seawater cascaded into the passageway and the control room beyond, a spectacular splash washing across the deck. Most of the hands in the control room were crowded around the passageway entry to see the spectacle.

And spectacle it was. Davy Jones, Royal Secretary to His Majesty, King Neptunus Rex, stepped out of the dripping escape trunk, painted green from head to bare foot, wearing swim trunks and yard upon yard of fishnet and seaweed, with a curly white beard reaching almost to his navel.

"What vessel?" Davy Jones demanded, in a rumbling voice guaranteed to twig sea-bottom sonars as far south as Kamchatka.

"USS Virginia," Garrett replied. "SSN 774!"

"On what course?"

"Heading one-eight-zero… due south!"

"Very well! I have been awaiting your arrival."

"And we have awaited yours, Davy Jones. Welcome aboard!"

"Thank you. Are you the captain?"

"I am, sir."

"My congratulations, Captain, on your fine command." He looked about him. "And my condolences, sir, that you command such a scurvy lot as your crew!"

Garrett grinned. "They're not such a bad lot, Mr. Jones."

"That's as may be, Captain. I have orders for you and summonses for your pollywogs from Neptunus Rex."

"I'll be happy to receive them, sir." Davy Jones — actually Chief Kurzweil, though it was tough to tell through the beard and seaweed — produced an impressive-looking scroll bound in green ribbon. Opening it, he proceeded to read aloud.

"I, Davy Jones, come from the depths of the sea this night to bring from His Oceanic Majesty, King Neptune, Ruler of the Seven Seas, all the summonses for the landlubbers, the pollywogs, the sea vermin, the crabs and eels and slimy bottom dwellers that have not yet been initiated into the Supreme Order of the Deep. We of the great Neptune's Court bring serious indictments against those who still have traces of farm soil and city dust on their feet. No matter. All will be blue-nosed golden dragons after the rough treatment of the morrow, at which time those summoned will appear before the Royal Judge of His August and Imperial Majesty, Neptunus Rex, and there answer for offenses committed both aboard and ashore!"

"Sir," Garrett said, grinning, "I must respectfully ask for leniency of the Great Neptune. These are good men, and true…."

"No, Captain! King Neptune plays no favorites! All landlubbers since men first followed the sea have endured the strict initiation required by the King of the Sea! There will be no leniency! All pollywogs will receive appropriate punishment on the morrow!

"And remember! Sorrow and woe to those who resist or talk in a light and jesting manner of the ceremony or of His Majesty, the Ruler of the Seven Seas, or of Queen Amphitrite or of His Majesty, the Ruler of the Arctic Wastes, Borealis Rex! And woe on any who belittles Royal Members of His Supreme Court! Beware! Beware!"

"We will await the arrival of the Royal Party with keen anticipation, Davy Jones."

"Very well! Goodbye, Captain. I will see you with the Great Neptune on the morrow!"

With haughty dignity, Davy Jones turned and slogged through patches of seaweed and ankle-deep water back to the escape trunk. "Gangway for Davy Jones!" he bellowed, and Kirkpatrick jumped aside out of his way. He stepped across the knee-knocker into the trunk's dark recesses, and waited as Kirkpatrick dogged shut the watertight door.

For a moment, those crewmen present stood in what could only be described as stunned paralysis. "Let's get back to work," Garrett said, breaking the silence.

"All right!" Senior Chief Bollinger bellowed in a voice to rival that of Davy Jones. "You heard the man! What's this lollygagging in the passageways! Back to your stations!"

Garrett was thoughtful as he returned to the center seat. The ritual of crossing the line was ancient, its roots going back to Greek seamen passing the Pillars of Hercules, to Phoenician seafarers crossing the 30th parallel as they rounded Africa. There were a number of different modern incarnations of the rite. If the Golden Shellback and Order of the Dragon awards were the best-known line-crossing ceremonies, the Order of the Blue Nose had a special significance for submariners. That ordeal, supervised by Jack Frost, had attended submarine passages under the ice ever since the Nautilus and the Skate became the first submarines to reach the North Pole.

The ritual just announced by Davy Jones combined the Order of the Dragon with the Blue Nose ceremony. The old hands who'd been across the lines in question looked forward to hazing those who hadn't; those poor newbies who would face Neptune's court tomorrow would soon look forward to the time when they got to have their chance at the tenderfeet.

More important, though, the ritual would help the men bond. Once all were on the same side of the ceremony, they would be more of a team, even if they didn't think about that consciously. Because officers— especially junior officers — weren't spared, the ceremony would bridge the gulf between them and enlisted men.

Perhaps more important for a submarine crew, it would even help close the gap between those who'd won their dolphins already and those new to the service who were still in their year-long probationary period. Submariners were a clannish bunch and didn't easily accept outsiders, "surface swimmers," until they'd proven themselves.

That unity of spirit was a necessary prerequisite to a mob becoming a crew.

As captain of the Virginia, Garrett was prepared to sacrifice just a bit of his personal dignity and the orderliness of the vessel's daily routine to make that happen.

It was a sacrifice ship captains had been making now for several thousand years at least, a time-hallowed offering to the traditions of the sea.