Phoenix Sub Zero

The phone next to Pacino’s rack had buzzed an hour before the planned battle stations time at 0300 local time. He climbed from the rack, trying to shake the bone-deep fatigue.

The shower water was still ice-cold when he stepped in. He turned the spray to hot, then back to cold, then turned it off to conserve water while he soaped up, rinsing in cold.

A few moments later, clad in a black poopysuit and cross-training sneakers, he made his way to the galley on the deck above for a cup of coffee. The crew’s mess was deserted.

One of the mess cooks had put a CD on the stereo. The Doors pouring out of the subdued speakers.

Pacino sat in one of the dinettes and drank the coffee. He was alert when he put the cup in the wash bin and walked aft to the ladder to the middle level. He lingered a moment on the stairway landing, long enough to see that the new switch he had installed now had an out-of-commission yellow tag on it. He smiled — someone had noticed it and found that it did nothing. He flipped the switch to “off’ and continued around the dogleg of the passageway to the radio room, hit the buttons for the door combination lock and went in. The room was empty. On the clipboard hanging from a handhold was his last outgoing message to Admiral Steinman telling him to get the Phoenix out of the area of the Destiny submarine by 0500 local time. There was a good chance that Phoenix would not get the message and would continue trailing the Destiny, an event that would likely spell disaster for her. In other circumstances Pacino would never fire a volley of torpedoes with Phoenix in the line of fire, but with Donchez’s theory that the Destiny had a doomsday-missile aboard, he would have no choice. The Mark 50 torpedoes would be launched regardless of Phoenix’s position.

Pacino knew he might have only one chance, one shot. He intended that it be a good one.

He opened a locker in the wall and pulled out four oblong boxes, each slightly larger than a baseball bat, a small case resembling a notebook computer, then shut the locker and walked down the passageway to his stateroom. He put the boxes and the case on the conference table and opened them.

Inside the boxes were four slot buoys, submarine-launched one-way transmitters. The case held a small keyboard and viewing screen used for typing in messages to the slot buoys. Pacino spent ten minutes coding messages into the buoys, then with masking tape and a marker designated them numbers one through four. He carried them to the aft compartment upper level, the heat of the engineroom oppressive.

He put the buoys in a locker beside the aft signal-ejector and walked forward, back to his stateroom. Once there he found himself drumming his fingers on the table feeling like an athlete an hour before the game.

On impulse he wandered into the control room. Henry Vale’s section tracking team was stationed, waiting for contact on the Destiny, the BSY-2 sonar/firecontrol suite straining for signs of the UIF vessel.

“Anything yet, Nav?” Pacino asked Vale.

“Nothing but icebergs and the occasional whale, Captain.”

“Man silent battle stations at zero four hundred. Are we rigged for ultraquiet?”

“Modified only by the coffeemakers, sir. Everyone not on watch should be fast asleep.”

“I’ll be in sonar.”

Pacino stepped through the forward door to sonar, but just as Vale had said, the sonar screens were empty of all but the ocean’s vast amount of random noise. Pacino returned to his stateroom, stared at the chronometer, waiting for 0400.

USS PHOENIX

Mike Jensen squinted at the Pos-One display console of the firecontrol system, the dots neatly stacked on the sonar contact ahead. Target One, the Destiny submarine. The range readout on the sidebar indicated a range of 8,400 yards, the target speed steady at thirteen knots, course three five five.

The target had proceeded at the same course and speed through the entire midwatch.

Jensen felt the headache bloom behind his eyes as the first dot deviated from the neat lineup, the sonar system telling the firecontrol computer that the expected bearing to the contact was different than the actual bearing. The contact was turning.

“Conn, sonar, possible zig Target One,” rang into Jensen’s ears from his headset.

“All stop,” he ordered the helmsman. The order would screw up the determination of Target One’s new course, but with the Destiny just ahead Jensen was unwilling to drive into him if he turned around in a course reversal. “Mark speed two knots.”

Phoenix drifted under the partial ice cover overhead, waiting to see what Target One was doing.

“Chief, send the messenger to get the XO,” Jensen barked at the chief of the watch. Mcdonne was stationed during the midwatch as command duty officer to allow Captain Kane to get some sleep. Mcdonne had spent most of the watch in control with Jensen, but had gone down to find a snack.

“Sonar, conn, any change in Target One’s speed?”

“Tough to call, sir. Our guess is no. But we suspect contact is turning to his starboard.”

“Conn, aye.”