While her sonar operator continued scanning the depths, Briana ordered a boarding team armed with M4 carbines to inspect the freighter. She also called battle stations, which meant manning only the two M2 Browning .50-caliber machine guns, since the Coast Guard had also removed the ammo from the 25 mm M242 cannons. And even then, the Coast Guard had left her with just the wimpiest of the .50-caliber ammunition type, the M33 Ball with a 706.7 grain, useful for personnel and light material targets.
Silently cursing her superiors, Briana watched the boarding party making its way over to the freighter on a RIB — a rigid-hulled inflatable boat. At the same time, the cutter’s HH-65 Dolphin helicopter lifted off from the flight deck and hovered near the fantail of the ship before climbing to one hundred feet and circling the freighter. But the sea now seemed calm under the moon’s silvery sheen.
Capt. Yuri Sergeyev expertly managed the ship’s remaining forward motion to position the submarine in a firing position a thousand feet from the port side of the Coast Guard cutter without using engines.
Manning their battle stations, his crew members wondered what their skipper contemplated. Shaken by the narrow escape from the cutter, Sergeyev glanced around the compact control/attack center.
He inspected the rows of gauges, controls, and banks of indicator lights. Six torpedoes were in their tubes, and all the systems and lights were normal. Sergeyev weighed his odds of remaining undetected or being exposed by the crew of Nuovoh Arana—or by his own guy left behind.
“Up periscope,” he finally ordered.
Normally calm under stress, Zhdanov hesitated a moment.
“Up periscope, Anatoli,” Sergeyev repeated sternly.
“Up scope, aye,” Zhdanov replied, breathing heavily.
Sergeyev grabbed the handles as the periscope rose, and he quickly swept the open sea, focusing on the cutter.
Shit, he thought, before saying, “Down scope.”
“Down scope, aye,” Zhdanov said quietly.
Facing a difficult choice, Sergeyev turned to his crew. “A boarding party from the cutter is headed for the ship. They have a helicopter in the air. We can’t afford to be compromised.”
No one made a sound as the crew exchanged glances.
“We need to sink that cutter,” Sergeyev added in a resigned voice. “We don’t have any choice. Otherwise, they’ll find the balance of our torpedoes and interrogate the crew.”
Popov cautiously asked, “Do you think they can overpower the boarding party?”
“I don’t know,” Sergeyev admitted. “But if we sink the cutter, I’m certain Captain Orlov will leave immediately — at least buy himself some time to dump the remaining torpedoes and any other cargo suggesting he was supplying a submarine. And that will also buy us time to get away… and get to our next target.”
Without vacillating, Zhdanov said, “What about the survivors? We can’t leave them to tell their rescuers what—”
“You’re right, Anatoli,” the captain grumbled. “We’ll have to surface… and shoot them.”
“What about the helicopter?” Popov asked. “They can probably radio a report to other ships or airplanes.”
Sergeyev regarded his sonar expert. “I don’t think the helicopter is armed. When they start searching for survivors, we’ll have to shoot it down as well.”
Zhdanov stared at his captain and said, “We’ll need some Kalashnikovs.”
Sergeyev nodded and turned to Popov. “Get three, Leonod.”
“Aye, CAPTAIN,” Popov said as he turned to retrieve three of the eight AK-47s in the small armory.
Sergeyev turned his attention to the cutter. “Up scope.”
“Up scope, aye, skipper.”
Sergeyev looked at the firing solution from the integrated control, navigation, and weapons system. “Fire one.”
“Fire one, aye,” Zhdanov repeated, initiating the firing sequence.
Sergeyev punched his stopwatch and took a quick look at the cargo ship. The boarding party had reached the hull of the freighter. “Fire two,” he said ten seconds later.
“Fire two, aye.”
The quiet night shattered when the first torpedo exploded forward of the cutter’s bridge.
Sergeyev swung the periscope to view Nuovoh Arana. The Coast Guard boarders played their powerful flashlights toward the stricken cutter. When the second torpedo slammed into it, the leader of the boarding party ordered them back to the ship.
Two secondary blasts lit the night, just as the water by the freighter’s propeller began churning the sea. It accelerated to flank speed.
Knocked to the deck by the first explosion, Commander Briana Sasso tried to regain her footing when the second torpedo tore through the engine room, followed by secondary explosions.
The turbines, she thought as her team reported water pouring through two gaping holes at an alarming rate, and fires raged aft of the bridge, the stern, and also near the bow.
Briana started shouting orders, and her skeleton crew scrambled into action, fighting the flames and racing down passageways to close watertight doors.
“Surface,” Sergeyev ordered, looking through the periscope and seeing the cutter was in flames.
“Surface. Aye, Captain,” Zhdanov replied, the stress of the moment filling his voice.
Sergeyev turned to face Popov. “I want you and the two designated shooters topside with me. I’m going to take us in close so you’ll have a better opportunity to take out any survivors.”
“Aye, Captain,” Popov said hesitantly.
When the 212A broke the surface, Sergeyev led his men topside in the sail. He immediately seized the conn and spoke to Zhdanov. “Ahead slow, come port ten degrees.”
Zhdanov repeated the order just as the Dolphin turned and headed straight for the submarine.
“Leonod, listen carefully,” the captain said in a terse voice, “I want the three of you to concentrate your fire on the helicopter when I give the order.”
“Aye, Skipper,” Popov said, shouldering the weapon.
Sergeyev waited until the helicopter began slowing by the sub. “Fire!” he shouted over the thumping rotor noise.
The fast rattle of three AK-47s echoed across the vast open waters, the intense volume of 7.62 x 39 mm rounds fired at a combined rate of 1,800 per minute had an instant effect. The helicopter sharply banked away from the submarine.
“Cease fire! Cease fire!” Sergeyev exclaimed as the boarding party raced back to the burning ship. “Get us closer to the cutter so we can finish this!”
Briana staggered to the closest of two .50-caliber machine guns, finding the young sailor charged with manning it lying on his side bleeding and screaming, hit by shrapnel.
“Hang in there, son!” she shouted as smoke swirled around them. Grabbing the handles of the M2 Browning and ignoring nearby flames, she swung the gun toward the dark silhouette of the submarine.
Sergeyev considered firing a third torpedo to finish any survivors aboard but thought the better of it. He had only loaded two from the freighter and fired two, meaning he had a complement of six left for—
The thundering reports from one of the Coast Guard cutter’s machine guns began raking the submarine, causing a flurry of ricochets and sparks in many directions.
“Emergency dive!” Sergeyev yelled to Zhdanov, surprised that the cutter’s crew had any fight left in them, given the fire and smoke bellowing from it. “Emergency dive!” He turned to Popov and the other two men. “Clear the bridge, get below!”