Attack of the Seawolf

“I heard you say the captain has only hours to live if he isn’t operated on. We’re twelve hours from international waters, and there’s a fleet of Chinese warships between us and freedom. Number one — we could use the captain to help us out of this. Number two — he’s not only the captain, he’s my friend. I’m not going to let him die without trying every option, even if the option kills him. What are you worried about, a malpractice suit? Now get going.”

A voice came from the back of the room, the young SEAL lieutenant, Bartholomay, Morris’ XO.

“You heard him. Doc. Let’s go. Scrub up and get your stuff to the wardroom.”

Doc Sheffield looked at the two officers for a moment, shook his head and left the control room.

“Any word?” Kurt Lennox asked Black Bart Bartholomay, who had brought a pot of coffee to the control room.

“They’re still in there. It’s tough to say if Doc is making any progress.”

“Well, at least Murphy’s still alive or they would have quit.”

“I guess …”

“How about the crew?”

“They’ll probably be sleeping until we get to the Korea Bay. I wouldn’t be surprised if they’re still sleeping when the medevac choppers land on the hospital ship. I’ve seen hostages have a post-traumatic shock before, but never like this.”

“What did you guys find in the torpedo room?”

“A goddamned mess. Blood everywhere from gathering the Chinese bodies and loading them into the torpedo tube. I don’t think we’re going to be shooting anything.”

“Is there an intact torpedo?”

“Five or six, but they’re all locked in by broken units. From what I’ve been able to see of the hydraulic loading system, the only way to get a torpedo into a tube would be to push it in by hand.”

“What about the air rams?” Lennox asked, referring to the pistons that pressurized the torpedo-tube water-tanks.

“They look okay but I’m not familiar with the system.”

“And the tubes?”

“One and three are leaking bad. But the port tubes seem okay. The firing panel switches were rewired for them. The one on the port side is where we stuffed all the Chinese bodies. But as far as the tubes being able to fire, who am I to say?”

“Until I get a crew back, you’re it. So here’s the deal — we do this the oldfashioned way, with muscle power. Get your guys below and break some grease out of the auxiliary machinery room. We’ll fire a water slug out tube two to get rid of the bodies, then grease the racks and the weapons and shove two of the good ones into tubes two and four.”

“What about that?” Bart asked, pointing to the dead firecontrol panel.

“How are you going to shoot the fish if the computer’s broken?”

“We’ll set them manually from the torpedo room console.”

“How will you know where to shoot?”

“Manual plots. I’ll show you how.”

Lieutenant Commander Vaughn walked into the room from the forward door. His coveralls were soaked with sweat, his hair plastered to his bearded face. Dark circles rimmed his eyes. He slouched against the doorway. Bart and Lennox froze, waiting for the word.

“Well,” Vaughn said, “we’re finished. The captain’s stable, but Doc’s not sure if he’ll last more than another twenty-four hours. We need to get him to a hospital.”

“We’ll have to break radio silence to tell the fleet about what medical help we’ll need,” Lennox thought aloud.

“I want choppers standing by to get the boys off.”

“Risky,” Vaughn said.

“The bad guys could vector in on our position with direction finders.”

“We’ll send it in a buoy with a three-hour time delay They could still get a lock on our track, but it’s no secret we’re headed for the bay entrance at Lushun/Penglai Gap at maximum speed. My guess is the Chinese will be waiting in force at the Gap no matter what we do with the radio.”

“I’ll draft the message,” Vaughn said, walking aft to the radio room.

Vaughn loaded the UHF satellite message buoy, roughly the size of a baseball bat, into the aft signal ejector, a small mechanism much like a torpedo tube set into the upper level of the aft compartment. When the buoy clicked home in the ejector he armed the switch that would activate the unit, then shut the ejector door. On the way back to the control room he ducked his head into the maneuvering room.

“You guys okay?” he asked the reactor operator.

“Real beat, Eng,” the TO answered. The watch standers aft were the same who had been on watch aft for the five days of captivity. Other than Lennox, Vaughn and the SEALs, the single engineering crew seemed the only men aboard who were sane.

“Hang in. A few more hours and we’ll be out of the bay and off this boat—” “Off the boat?”

“There’s no way we can get this ship into Yokosuka with this crew — the guys on watch now are all we have, and by the time we reach Japan we’ll be asleep on our feet. I’m calling for a replacement crew as soon as we reach international waters.”

The electrical operator asked about the crew.

Vaughn told him the truth, his stomach turning as he finished the story.

“Do us all a favor, men,” Vaughn said.