Attack of the Seawolf

After a moment he heard the sound again, and then nothing more. The trouble with interpreting sounds in water was the sound velocity. With two ears, listening in air, sound speeds were slow enough so that one ear heard a noise before the other, giving the brain a clue to the direction of the noise. Underwater, sound velocity was so quick that both ears heard a noise at the same time, making it impossible to determine what direction the sound had come from.

Morris decided to take another look at the pier. He tugged on his buddy-line to Black Bart and the two men slowly ascended to the surface between the bow of the seaward frigate and the stern of the neighboring destroyer. Morris was preparing to unbuckle the lanyard to Bart and climb up on the pier pilings when he saw the white plume of a rocket exhaust overhead, terminating at an orange point of light high in the sky above.

Quickly Morris submerged, pulling on Bart’s lanyard, pulling him deep. Morris hauled in the line, putting his mask up to Bart’s. Morris directed him to the outboard destroyer while Morris headed for the inboard destroyer. Only an emergency would make Morris split from his swimming partner. This was definitely an emergency … two cruise missiles were on the way in to hit the very ships on which his men were laying explosive keel charges. The demolition operation would have to be aborted; the men would have to be extracted and prepared for boarding the Tampa.

Morris gave hand signals to Bart in rapid Ameslan, the sign language for the deaf: “You and first platoon go to bow, attack ship immediately after missile impacts.”

As soon as the Javelins exploded, Bart’s bow platoon would board and take the hatch forward of the sail. At the same time Morris’s second and third platoons would board and take the aft section of the ship, third platoon going in the aft hatch to the engine room second platoon in the amidships access to the aft part of the forward compartment.

“If no impact in fifteen minutes, missiles are dead and we go back to kill the destroyers.” Bart nodded.

“Lennox goes with me,” Morris’s hand signs added. Bart gave an okay sign. Morris slapped his head, a SEAL gesture for good luck.

As Morris swam the length of the destroyer’s barnacle-encrusted hull, waving the men away from their demolition task, he had to consider why Seawolf had launched. What came to mind was that the Tampa crew were being moved and Pacino hadn’t had time to tell him. Morris bit angrily into the rubber of his regulator — he hated a plan that stumbled. Now the element of surprise was gone, risking his men even more, unless he could get aboard the Tampa while the crews of the surface ships and the guards were still confused over the damage from the missiles.

He gathered with the second and third platoons under the Tampa’s huge spiral-bladed screw and checked his watch. Bart would be assembling the first platoon at Tampa’s bow. He pulled the platoon leaders close. One shone his hooded light on Morris while Morris gave the hand signals that relayed his orders for the platoon assignments, adding that he and Lennox would go into the forward compartment with the second platoon. He looked at Lennox, who seemed under control, but his eyes were just a fraction too wide, betraying his fear. Hell, Morris thought, if Lennox were to check my eyes he’d see the same thing.

The only difference was that this was his job. And he was good at it.

Morris checked his watch again. 0249. He pointed to the surface and pumped his fins, taking his men shallow. The missiles should be impacting in the next few moments unless they veered off course or were shot down. He reached out, felt the steel of Tampa’s tapering aft-section under her screw and followed the curvature upward to the rudder, then continued forward to the top of the hull, still submerged. He put his fins on the top of the hull and swam the remaining few feet to the surface. The pier was lit with floodlights, as were the destroyer decks. The Tampa’s deck was lit only dimly by the wash of light from the neighboring ships. He caught sight of a guard hurrying into the forward escape-trunk hatch, a surprised look on his face.

Morris brought his watch up. 0250. He would have to wait another ten minutes before hitting the submarine’s deck. That or the missiles would have to arrive.

He ducked his head back below the surface and checked his men. All signaled okay.

For the next few moments Morris worked on a plan to hijack one of the smaller vessels, the seaward parked frigate, and drive it out of the bay, or at least to a point that he could meet Seawolf. But that would be putting a few SEALs in an unfamiliar Chinese frigate against the whole P.L.A Navy. Well, at least he could try his hand at driving a ship. He checked his watch one last time. In four minutes they would be committed.

Morris rose the four feet to the surface to take another look. As the water cleared from his mask, he took in a scene beyond his imaginings.

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