Piranha: Firing Point

The terms NSSN and SSNX had never been replaced with the name of the class — as previous classes had. Usually the initial ship name would label this family of identical ships, as had the Seawolf for the Seawolf class. But this ship would remain simply SSNX, as Pacino had insisted, resisting the urgings of his staff and the brass to lend the program a flashy name that would capture the imagination of voters and Congress alike. Pacino had continued to hold out, telling the Navy hierarchy that this ship was too important to rush to a name that was wrong. Names were vital, he argued — just ask the men who had named the Titanic or the Hindenburg. So, like a baby that went nameless until his parents could look at him, so did the new construction ship remain, as the banners and signs read, simply the USS SSNX.

But even without a real name, SSNX was breathtaking, from her smooth bullet nose forward past her sleek, tapered conning tower “sail” aft to the raked-back tail fin with the teardrop-shaped pod on top, the tail fin rising up over the hull as high as the thirty-foot sail. As the ship progressed in her construction Pacino began to feel a longing to take her to sea himself, although command at sea was in his past. He was a fleet commander now. Yet the feeling of wanting to return to the sea was the only positive emotion he had felt in these terrible days.

He checked his watch, not surprised to find that it was nearing eight at night. He had been there since early morning, and with the frantic schedule of Monday meetings, it made no sense for him to stay. But then, given the choice of pacing the dock or lying awake staring at the ceiling, perhaps this was the best option. Slowly Pacino climbed a steep steel staircase to the high wall of the dock and stood at the highest platform to see the ship from above. The shape of the hull seemed comforting, the smooth bullet of the ship seeming to glide through the water even as she lay there, high and dry.

That was another reason he was here at the Pearl Harbor facility, fitting out the SSNX rather than completing it on the East Coast. There were too many memories of Eileen in Norfolk and Groton, Connecticut— where the hull of the SSNX had been laid down. He had insisted that the ship be completed in Hawaii, and since he was now the bureaucracy’s equivalent of an eight-hundred-pound gorilla, the hull had been shifted to the portable floating drydock and towed here for its completion. The hull and mechanical systems were now complete; the remaining work centered around the electronics, the combat control system, and the weapons tubes. Once the latter construction was finished, the ship would be lowered into the water of the harbor, the interior work continuing for the next year. That gave him a year to try to rebuild his life before he would have to return East. Maybe by then he would be strong enough, but for now he would stay and finish this submarine. He told himself that when it was done, commissioned, and turned over to the fleet, he would step down as the admiral-in-command of the submarine force, and turn command over to Rear Admiral David Kane, the former commander of the Barracuda.

Looking out over the SSNX submarine, he wondered if he really should relinquish command of the fleet.

There was no doubt that Kane could command the force. Perhaps it was time for Pacino to leave the Navy altogether and turn his back on this part of his life. But as he beheld the submarine, he had the undefinable feeling that he would be leaving something undone. It was a thread to cling to, and though it made no sense, he would continue on until this undone thing was finished.

Maybe, he thought, finishing it would give him the peace he sought.

He was barely conscious of returning to the admiral’s quarters and falling asleep, perhaps even less of waking up and performing all the rituals of showering and donning his tropical white uniform. In his office, he found himself trying to concentrate on the Writepad computer display on his oak desk, another meaningless memo describing a critical problem with the Cyclops command-and-control system of the SSNX.

He swiveled his chair away from the desk and looked out the window. The shades were partially open, the glass polarization adjusted so that the bright sunlight wouldn’t cause too much glare to see the computer display.

It was just after six in the morning, and the sun was rising over the Pacific. Another hectic Monday would soon start. There would be a seven-thirty staff meeting, an eight-fifteen videoconference with the Norfolk staff, a nine-thirty videoconference with the Pentagon, a ten forty-five shipyard meeting, two meetings overscheduled at noon, and another five meetings in the afternoon. There were at least six hours of work Pacino needed to do himself when the day quieted down, and his personal assistant had requested the evening off.