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Authors: David Hagberg

BOOK: Countdown
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DR. VELIKANOV STOOD just within the attack center when Kurshin appeared from aft. His face was pasty in the dim red light, and his hair was plastered back with sweat from the exertion of climbing the sail.
“I heard a gunshot,” he said timorously.
“It was the officer from the bridge. I'd only wounded him.”
“Now he is dead.”
“Yes, Doctor, now he is dead, as is everyone else aboard except for you and me.”
Velikanov was looking at the downed crewmen. He was shaking his head. “And now what, Comrade Colonel?” There was blood on his hands.
“Begin clearing the bodies out of this space, the control room, the sonar and radio rooms, the officers' wardroom, and the galley.”
“Where shall I put them?”
“In their bunks.”
“Where will we sleep?”
“We won't,” Kurshin said. He brushed past the doctor and hurriedly climbed back up through the interior of the sail to the bridge deck, where he hauled up his equipment bag.
The fire aboard the
Zenzero
was all but out, and the cruiser's list was becoming more pronounced. She was also down at the bow. Not long now, Kurshin thought. He pulled out a portable radio from his equipment bag, switched it on, and keyed the transmit switch.
“Yes,” he said in English.
“Here,” a voice came back.
“Now,” Kurshin radioed, and he switched off the set without waiting for a reply, stuffed it and the grappling hook and line into his bag, and lowered himself through the open hatch, closing it behind him and dogging it shut.
Velikanov had already removed two of the bodies from the attack center. Kurshin laid down his bag and dragged the third body back through the control room, passing the doctor as he was coming forward.
“Most of them are already in their bunks.”
“Just the night watch was on duty,” Kurshin said. “At any rate we will have help in a few minutes.”
“The others are coming now?”
“Yes. I'll be aft, continue with your work,” Kurshin said, and he dragged the seaman's body past the open door to the comms center just as the printer came to life with five bells, indicating a top priority, most urgent message. He ignored it. The message would be from Sixth Fleet Headquarters at Gaeta. They would be anxious to know what was happening out here.
He dumped the man's body with the others in the dispensary,
then stepped back to the open door of the officers' wardroom where the other three bodies into which they had implanted the Labun canisters had been left.
One at a time he dragged them across the narrow corridor and into the dispensary.
When he was finished he was sweating lightly. He checked his watch. It was coming up on three in the morning. It had been less than ten minutes since he had given Captain Makayev the signal that everything was ready here. The auxiliary was capable of making twenty knots in these light seas, which put them another fifteen or twenty minutes out.
Over the past weeks while he had been on the mend in a Rome hotel, he had studied in great detail the information Rand had provided them, information which had also been sent to Moscow for Captain Makayev and the others. Included on the disk was the boat's complete physical layout, as well as information on her mechanical, electronics, and weapons systems, and her patrol station, called ROUNDHOUSE. In the Soviet Navy no mere lieutenant colonel, no matter his family connections, would have been privy to such devastating information. In that respect, at least, Soviet military operations were much more secure.
The
Indianapolis
was very large as submarines go, over three hundred fifty feet long and displacing nearly seven thousand tons when she was submerged. Driven by a water-cooled nuclear reactor, she was capable of speeds of around forty knots. In addition to her complement of 533-millimeter SUBROC antisubmarine missiles, antiship missiles, and Mark-48 torpedoes, she carried two varieties of the TLAM Tomahawk cruise missile, one of which was loaded with 200-kiloton nuclear warheads for deployment against land-based targets.
She was a powerful, expensive, and important weapons system. One the Americans would certainly fight for.
“But we will give her back to them, Arkasha,” Baranov had said. “Because there is simply no way for us to get her out of the Mediterranean without detection. We're bottled up.”
But the Mediterranean was a very big body of water. And deep, where secrets could be hidden for a very long time.
Forward, in the radio room, Kurshin pulled the bodies of the two radio operators out into the corridor. Velikanov was just dragging a body out of the control room. He looked up and their eyes met. He seemed on the verge of collapse.
“When you're finished, take these forward,” Kurshin said. “I've taken care of the officers' wardroom.”
Velikanov nodded, disappearing through the attack center hatch toward the crew accommodations forward of the sail.
If anyone fell apart, he would be the first to go, Kurshin decided. The man would have to be closely watched.
The radio room was a tiny equipment-filled space. A bank of three teleprinters was built into the forward bulkhead. One of them was connected to the satellite transceiver on which the
Indianapolis
had been communicating with Sixth Fleet Headquarters. Kurshin cranked the message off its roller.
280354ZJUL
TOP SECRET
FM: COMSUBMED
TO: USS INDIANAPOLIS
A. CONTINUATION RESCUE OPERATION AUTHORIZED
ONLY IF IMMEDIATE LOSS OF LIFE IS PROBABLE.
B. IMPORTANT NO CIVILIAN PERSONNEL BE ALLOWED
ABOARD.
C. IMPORTANT YOU IMMEDIATELY REPORT YOUR
PRESENT SITUATION.
D. ITALIAN COAST GUARD REPORTS LIBERIAN-
REGISTERED M.V. LORREL-E HAS DETECTED SOS AND IS
ENROUTE YOUR POSITION. ETA 0430Z. RESCUE
OPERATIONS WILL BE TURNED OVER TO THEM ASAP.
WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON OUT THERE, J.D.? KENNY
SENDS.
XX
EOM
280355ZJUL
BREAKBREAK
“Fuck your mother,” Kurshin swore half under his breath. Four-thirty Z—Greenwich mean time—was three-thirty by his
watch. They had less than a half hour before the Liberian ship would arrive.
Stuffing the message flimsy in his pocket, he stepped out into the corridor. “Speed it up, Doctor, we've got company coming,” he shouted as he rushed into the attack center and took his portable radio from his equipment bag.
The doctor was just coming back from the crew quarters forward. “What? What is it you were shouting?”
“There's a civilian ship on its way to us. Should be here in less than a half hour. We're going to have to be out of here by then, so hurry up with those bodies.”
“I don't know if …”
“Do it,” Kurshin hissed, the force of his expression taking the doctor back a pace.
“Of course.”
Kurshin turned and hurried aft through the control room, past the radio and sonar rooms, the dispensary, and finally through the equipment spaces, and missile storage area where he pulled up short for just a moment. The
Indianapolis
carried eight Tomahawk missiles, four of which were nuclear armed. Even nestled in their storage racks, their flight fins retracted into the casings, the missiles looked deadly. The raw power here was awesome even to Kurshin. The bodies of three crewmen on the deck heightened the effect.
But there was no time.
Continuing aft he passed the nuclear reactor itself, only one body crumpled in front of a control panel. Most of the power plant was contained in sealed units or behind hatches labeled with the danger-radiation symbol. He came to the access chamber for the after loading hatch. Two seamen were crumpled on the deck. Ignoring them, Kurshin climbed up to the hatch, undogged it, spun the locking wheel, and popped it open.
Immediately he could smell the sea and the still smoldering
Zenzero,
and hear the waves washing up against the hull.
Pulling himself up on deck, he switched on the portable radio. “Code three,” he spoke into the microphone.
“Understand,” Makayev's voice came over the speaker.
It was their prearranged code that they were on the verge of detection and time was of critical importance. Makayev would
be driving the auxiliary as hard as humanly possible through the choppy seas.
Kurshin turned and scanned the horizon, almost immediately picking out the white steaming light of the approaching Liberian freighter low on the horizon to the southeast, nearly the same direction Makayev and the others were coming from.
He debated warning them, but by now they had almost certainly spotted the lights themselves. Makayev, he'd been assured, was a highly competent submarine driver. He knew what was at stake here. And he knew what it would take to dive the boat and get away.
There was nothing left for him to do on deck. Makayev and the others would either arrive in time, or they wouldn't. At this point the question was academic.
Climbing back down into the boat, Kurshin left the after hatch open and hurried forward, where he began removing bodies from the crucial control and reactor room spaces.
Five submariners, a drunken doctor, and an assassin. Even now he didn't think it was possible.
CAPTAIN KENNETH REID STOOD just within the doorway to the communications center, sipping a cup of coffee.
“Nothing yet?” he asked.
Chief Petty Officer Sally Powell looked up from her console and shook her head.
“But we've still got the downlink?”
She glanced at her board. “Yes, sir. Unless they've got a malfunction aboard, they should be receiving us.”
Reid was a worrier, had been all of his life. Barely in his forties,
his expressive face already showed stress lines especially around his eyes and mouth. His blood pressure was on the high side of normal for a man his age, and his cholesterol level had gone through the roof with his assignment to Italy. Just now the base doctor was on his ass.
“I'll be in my office for a minute, buzz me if anything comes in,” he said, putting his cup down on top of one of the consoles.
“Aye, sir,” the chief radio operator said. She looked up. “Do you think anything is wrong?”
“I don't know,” Reid said, but he was developing a very bad feeling about this one. He walked down the corridor to his office and telephoned the CINCMED, Admiral Ronald DeLugio, at his home north of Gaeta.
“Admiral, we still haven't gotten any reply from the
Indianapolis
. We've got our downlink, but there's been nothing since their last nearly an hour ago.”
“What about that Liberian freighter, Ken? How close is she?”
“Should be on the scene within the next few minutes. I've held off communicating directly with her.”
“No, I don't want you doing that yet. J.D. is a good man, could be he's just got his hands full. What else have we got in the area?”
Reid glanced up at his status board. “Not a thing within a few hours. I've got an Orion standing by on the apron. Could be out there in under twenty minutes counting roll time.”
“All right, listen up, Ken. We're going to stop screwing around on this one. I'm on my way in. In the meantime, query J.D. one more time. Tell him it's imperative that he report his status. You can put the Orion up, but just for an overflight unless she detects trouble, then she's authorized to stay on station.”
“Will do, Admiral.”
“One more thing, Reid,” Admiral DeLugio said.
“Yes, sir?”
“Call our ASR crew in. Have them standing by.”
The suggestion took Reid momentarily aback, even though
he'd had the same thought himself. Just now the ASR 21 Pigeon was in port from her support mission on LOOKUP. She was designed for submarine rescue.
“Will do, Admiral,” he said.
“Anything comes up, Ken, anything at all, call me enroute. I should be there within fifteen minutes.”
“Yes, sir,” Reid said and he hung up.
Back in the communications center he scratched out a quick message and handed it to Sally for transmission. He had marked it with the Z designator for a flash message. If nothing else it certainly would get Webb's attention.
Z280417ZJUL
TOP SECRET
FM: COMSUBMED
TO: USS INDIANAPOLIS
A. MOST URGENT YOU IMMEDIATELY REPORT YOUR
STATUS.
B. ORION P-3C ENROUTE YOUR POSITION.
TALK TO ME, J.D. KENNY SENDS.
XX
EOM
280418ZJUL
BREAKBREAK
Reid picked up the phone and called Lieutenant Commander Morris Segal, the on-duty Air Operations Officer. “Morris, this is Ken. I want you to send that Orion up now.”
“No word yet?”
“Not a peep. DeLugio is on his way in. He says to have your people report back, but that they're to stand by on station only if there is an indication that Webb might be in some sort of trouble.”
“You got it,” Segal said. “But it won't be light for another couple of hours yet, won't be able to do much until then.”
“I know,” Reid said. “We've got the
Pigeon
standing by, just in case.”
“Jesus,” Segal said. “That bad?”
“I haven't a clue, Morris. I just hope to Christ we won't be needing her.”
Kurshin had just dragged the body out of the reactor auxiliary control room when he heard the distinctive metal clang of the after hatch being closed. Pulling out his pistol he stepped through the hatch into the machinery spaces forward of the reactor, and held up in the shadows.
After a second or two he could hear them coming forward. Their voices were hushed, almost subdued, yet he could hear their excitement. An act of this sort would be totally unprecedented, Baranov had warned him.
“There will be no room for error, Arkasha. No room.”
“Yes, Comrade General,” he'd replied. “I have no wish to take a one-way ride.”
“No.” Baranov had smiled. “I have other great things for you. Do not fail me.”
Captain First Rank Makayev stepped through the hatch. Kurshin moved forward, placing the barrel of his pistol against the man's temple before he could react.
“The code,” Kurshin said softly.
Makayev shrugged away from the gun and looked into Kurshin's eyes. “That freighter was right on our ass, Colonel. So unless you want to serve her crew tea and blinis you'd better let us get to work.”
There weren't many men whom Kurshin admired, but he was beginning to like Makayev already. He lowered his gun, switched the safety to the on position, and holstered it.
“The after hatch is sealed?”
Makayev grinned. “There are no screen doors on a submarine. How about forward?”
“The boat is ours, and ready to go.”
“Then let's get the hell out of here,” Makayev said. He turned
back to his crew. “Aleksei, get started with your baby. I want her ready to go within the hour, just in case we have to bail out.”
“Yes, Comrade Captain,” his missile man snapped.
He turned to his
starpom
(executive officer) and sonar man. “Gennadi, take Aleksandr forward, get him set up on sonar, and then check the board for diving status.”
They brushed past Kurshin and hurried forward to the control room, leaving only the nuclear engineer, Captain Second Rank Ivan Pavlovich Abalakin.
“You're our most important crewman, Ivan Pavlovich,” Makayev said. “Think you can handle this monster?”
Abalakin shrugged and smiled, though it was clear he was extremely nervous. “I have studied the systems, Comrade Captain. The Americans have designed most of their controls to work on automatic function. I will manage.”
“Good,” Makayev said, clapping him on the shoulder. “We shall keep the ship's comms open at all times. We will talk to each other.”
Abalakin turned and went into the reactor auxiliary control room, and Makayev and Kurshin started forward.
“Have you ever steered a submarine, Comrade Colonel?” the captain asked.
“No, but I've been aboard one of our Alfa-class boats,” Kurshin said.
“Ah, she is a good boat, but much smaller than this one, and cruder too, I think. But this morning you will be our helmsman. I hope your hand is steady.”
Passing the sonar room, Lieutenant Raina had already donned the earphones and was fiddling with the controls on the center console.
“Watch that freighter, Aleksandr Ivanovich, and anything else in our vicinity,” Makayev said.
The kid looked up and nodded.
Makayev's
starpom,
Captain Second Rank Gennadi Gavrilovich Fedorenko, was busy at work when they entered the control room.
“How does it look, Gennadi?”
“The information we were provided was good, Niki. Very good. She's not so different from our boats. Same board.”
“Status?”
“All green, we're ready to dive,” Fedorenko said, his eyes shining.
Makayev studied the control room's layout for just a moment, then motioned Kurshin toward the helm. “Just like driving an airplane, Comrade Colonel. Turn the wheel right and we go right. Push it forward and we go down. Make only small motions.”
He hit the ship's comms. “Prepare to dive the boat. Ivan, how do we look?”
“Ready to give you turns for maximum speed, Captain.”
“Stand by,” Makayev said. “Aleksandr, what's our friend doing out there?”
“I put him at eight thousand meters,” the sonarman said. “Nothing else in our vicinity.”
Makayev turned to his
starpom.
“Dive the boat, Gennadi. Take us to one hundred meters, on a course of two-zero-five.”
“Aye, Skipper.”
“I'm ringing for one-fourth forward,” Makayev said. “Colonel, push your wheel forward, to five degrees down planes. The indicator is just over your head.”
CPO Sally Powell suddenly sat forward and flipped a couple of switches on her console. Reid stood on the balcony just behind her.
“We've lost the downlink with
Indianapolis
,” she called out.
Reid stepped forward, gripping the rail so hard his knuckles turned white. “Has she submerged?”
“I don't know,” she said, looking up at him. “We've just lost her.”

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