“Doubt it, sir,” Giannotti replied. “Not while he’s getting a woody.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Last I checked, he was listening to humping whales.”
“I didn’t know there were humpback whales in these waters.”
Giannotti laughed. “No, sir. Humping whales, as in copulating.”
Kelly looked up and found Giannotti’s gaze as the strapping Italian American grinned. “C’mon. Are you shitting me?”
“Can’t make that stuff up, boss. The boy’s gifted, all right, but sometimes I really worry. I mean, look at him.”
Kelly turned back to see the native from Harlem, headphones on, eyes closed, leaning back, hands on his lap, palms up, fingers stretched. For a second the commander of the Mighty Mo thought the kid’s lips were moving.
“Yeah,” Giannotti added. “Forty-five-million-dollar sonar system and he’s listening to whales screwing.”
Kelly glanced down at his watch. He had less than forty minutes before he had to change course or there would be hell to be paid with COMSUBPAC, who would get in trouble with Commander, US Pacific Fleet, who would in turn get in trouble with Commander, US Pacific Command, and so on. The American armed forces, like most military institutions around the globe, had a chain of command when it came to ass-chewings.
Turning back to his sonarman, Kelly silently prayed that the kid from Harlem would give him something — anything — he could use to convince his superiors to let him hunt a submarine that every last fiber of his being told him had to be in the area preparing for a hunt of its own.
The clicks and whistles flowed in stereo through his headphones, transporting Chappelle to another world. He imagined the forty-foot-long creatures dancing in the deep, their music streaming in patterned sequences that repeated in bouts lasting hours, and even days.
But somewhere in the middle of this undersea romantic serenade, he detected another sound, mellower, deeper, but faint, distant. A tenor saxophone came and went amid the clicks and pulses of the baleen whales, there one second and gone the next, floating somewhere beyond the realm of the mammals, at times almost in harmony with their wooing ballad. But there was no hiding the cavitation of a large seven-blade screw cruising at two hundred feet below the surface. And, a moment later, the vessel’s hydrogen fuel cells blew gently in his ears.
Leaning forward, he said, “Contact! Bearing zero-four-zero. Range five-three miles. Speed one-zero knots. Depth two-one-zero feet. Definitely our girl, sir.”
Kelly jumped into action. “Turn to intercept. All ahead flank and set depth to six-zero feet.”
Giannotti relayed the commands to the pilot and copilot, while Kelly stepped behind the electronics technicians manning the radio station. “Who’s in that grid now?” he asked.
One of the sailors looked over his right shoulder and said, “The Morgenthau, sir. Sailing two hundred fifty miles west of the Philippines.”
With a look of confusion, Kelly asked, “But… isn’t that a Coast Guard cutter?”
“Yes, sir,” the technician replied.
“From Subic Bay?”
“Honolulu, sir.”
“What’s it doing so far from home?”
“Maybe the admiral ordered it to go meet up with Stennis, since you refuse to follow orders?” Giannotti offered with a shrug, before looking at his watch and whispering to Kelly, “and speaking of that, boss… our time’s almost up.”
Kelly frowned at his XO.
“Negative, sir,” the electronics technician replied, checking his system before adding, “Morgenthau isn’t going after Stennis. It’s been decommissioned.”
“Decommissioned?” Kelly said. “When?”
“Don’t know that, sir, but it says here it’s been purchased by the Republic of Vietnam.”
“Vietnam?”
“Yes, sir. A skeleton crew’s doing the delivery.”
Kelly made a face and looked at Giannotti. “Wasn’t Morgenthau used heavily during the Vietnam War, Bobby?”
“Yep,” Giannotti said. “My uncle was on it.”
Kelly shook his head. “Of course he was.”
“The ship got a bunch of commendations for its long service there,” the XO continued. “And now it’s being purchased by the same asshole that Uncle Lou, rest in peace, spent his career fighting.” Giannotti made the sign of the cross and looked up at the overhead pipes. “We truly live in a screwed-up world, sir,” he added.
“Copy that,” Kelly replied. “And what’s even more screwed up is that Morgenthau is the only warship within pissing distance of the bastards who made Swiss cheese of Stennis and blew up North Dakota.” The comment inexorably made him think of his family back in Danbury. He knew that by now the whole Kelly gang would be in tears, including his girls. His late nephew, Charlie, had been like an older brother to the twins. And speaking of older brother, his operational orders prevented Kelly from making contact with his brother, who had to be a complete mess by—
“What are your orders, sir?” Giannotti asked, tapping his watch again, his eyes pleading with Kelly not to piss off COMSUBPAC a third time.
Looking down at the sailor, Kelly ordered, “Contact Morgenthau as soon as we reach periscope depth, and brief them on the situation… and pray to God they have weapons aboard.”
Shifting his gaze to his XO, he added, “And then get me on the horn with the admiral.”
President Cord Macklin sat alone in the Treaty Room watching the scroll on the bottom of the TV, drinking his first cup of coffee. Normally he enjoyed his morning caffeine, but lately he had a permanent sour taste in his mouth. He wondered, often, how a president like Roosevelt or Truman would have done the job in the age of the internet and cameras on every mobile phone. Information constantly flowed — and most of it not good. Every decision analyzed and criticized in minutes, not days or even hours.
A knock interrupted his thoughts. When he looked up, he saw General Les Chalmers in his Air Force Service Dress Uniform standing in the doorway looking tired and concerned.
Macklin managed a faint smile. “Morning, Les.”
“Good morning, Mr. President,” Chalmers replied.
“What’s on your mind?” he asked, pointing to a chair across from him.
“We’re seeing more activity at the Chinese missile sites,” Chalmers explained, sitting down. “In addition, the Chinese destroyer Qingdao is closing on the Vinson group currently approaching the strait. Also, the aircraft carrier Liaoning is steaming south from Shanghai escorted by a Type 096 ballistic submarine.
“That’s their brand-new sub, sir, which approaches the capabilities of our Ohio-class subs, packing twenty-four ballistic missiles. The Liaoning’s expected to reach the strait in twenty-four hours, along with its complement of twenty-four Shenyang J-15 fighters, which are based on the Sukhoi-33—very capable birds.
“In addition, they have deployed over thirty Su-30MKKs and a similar contingent of Su-35S Flanker-Es to Fuzhou. That’s on top of the fighters already stationed there. They’ve also trucked over a million soldiers along the coast between Fuzhou and Shantou, supported by artillery, plus over two hundred amphibious-warfare ships. And further to the southeast, there has been a significant increase in naval activity at Yulin.”
“Jesus,” Macklin said. “That’s a hell of a lot of flexing.”