Attack of the Seawolf

“Hey, I’m just giving the ship back to Captain Duckett. That’s not such a big deal.” Especially since privately he hated separating himself from the Seawolf. But that was the deal from the first.

Pacino moved back down the aisle of chairs to the south wall of the pier and looked out over the spread.

On the north wall of the pier the Seawolf was tied up, her sail ruined, smashed almost in two on the front edge. The jagged metal at the top of the sail begged for a shipyard crew to come and torch it off. Almost all the anechoic tiles were blown off her deck, revealing bare metal beneath — not even the paint remained after she had been depth-charged. She looked like hell, but she was his beauty. Or had been … Big white letters had been hung on the ruined sail that read SSN-21 SEAWOLF. Along the pier and draped over the ship were red, white and blue banners.

American flags whipped in the wind of the sunny day. All over the pier sailors and officers stood in their dress whites.

Pacino’s own whites were starched so hard they felt like cardboard, the high choker collar coming almost to his chin. Over his left pocket the gold of his submarine pin gleamed in the sunshine. Around his neck he wore the Navy Cross — Donchez insisted he wear it.

On his left hip he wore a ceremonial officer’s sword and on his head he wore a new white senior officer’s cap, the gold scrambled eggs shining on the brim. His captain’s shoulder boards were brand new, the four broad stripes laying perpendicular to the line of his shoulders.

On the sub’s deck a carpenter’s crew had made a platform and handrails, and on the platform was a podium with a microphone and the emblem of the Seawolf, its head facing out at the crowd.

Admiral Donchez came up to him.

“How do you feel, Mikey?”

Pacino let out a breath. How did he feel to be returning command of the Seawolf to Captain Duckett?

Over the last ten days he had become a part of the submarine, and it of him.

“I’m gonna miss this girl, Admiral. I admit it. Well, I guess I’d better get up there, we’re already late.”

Donchez reached into his pocket and handed Pacino an envelope.

“Here are your orders, Mikey. Now get up there and carry on.”

As Pacino moved down the aisle and up the gangway to Seawolf’s deck he heard the Circuit One PA. system blast out one last time: “SEAWOLF … ARRIVING!”

He proceeded up to the platform that extended most of the length of the hull aft of the sail, the seats near the sail for senior officers like Donchez and for him and Duckett. Pacino nodded at Captain Henry Duckett, the permanent commander of the submarine.

Donchez went to the podium, spoke a few words, led the crowd through the national anthem and a prayer. Pacino then stood, pulled his orders out of his pocket, and walked up to the podium.

The sun was in his eyes as he looked out over the crowd but he could identify the men from Tampa who had been well enough to leave their beds for the ceremony.

There in the front row were Sean Murphy, Kurt Lennox and their engineer, Vaughn. To their right, filling the rest of the front row and nearly all of the second, were the contingent of SEAL Team Seven, Jack Morris actually smiling up at him. For a moment Pacino stared as he saw his wife in the second row and next to her their son, Tony. The crowd quieted down as Pacino opened the envelope and laid the orders out on the podium, telling himself to get on with it, give Duckett back his ship and get on with his life.

But he held back, folded the orders for a moment and stepped up to the microphone.

“Ladies and gentlemen, before I turn over this lady to Captain Duckett, I’d like to say a few words. Less than two weeks ago … it seems like a lot longer … I took temporary command of this submarine for a particular operation that went pretty well, thanks to the SEALs of Team Seven and to the men of the USS Tampa and the Seawolf’s crew. To all of you, I want to say thank you. Thank you.”

The crowd was silent as Pacino unfolded his orders and squinted through the sun at them as he read:

“From NAVPERS, Washington, D.C.” to Captain Michael A. Pacino, U.S. Navy. You are hereby ordered to take permanent command of the USS Seawolf and—” Pacino stopped, stared into the crowd that burst into applause. It went on so long it was embarrassing. He felt his good eye blurring with water as if it were as sore as his injured eye.

Pacino was relieved when Donchez, next to him on the podium, pushed up next to the microphone.

“That’s right, people. This isn’t a change-of command ceremony, it’s a take-permanent-command ceremony. A reward for a job well done, Captain Pacino.

Besides,” Donchez grinned, “Captain Duckett says the boat is too much of a wreck to take back, so Captain Pacino, it’s now your job to get this boat put back together.”

Donchez saluted him, he returned the salute, and then the crew broke ranks and crowded around him, half-carrying him down to the pier.