“Sir, the engineering officer reports that the shaft bearings came dangerously close to a meltdown. As long as the temperature remains constant, though, he feels that the damages incurred will be minimal.”
“And the cause of this unusual problem?” Shen asked.
“As strange as it may sound, it looks like our prop has been somehow snagged,” revealed Wang.
“A fishing net no doubt, or some other floating debris,” offered the commissar from his position at the weapons console.
“Surely such a net could be responsible for entangling our propeller,” added the XO. “Those overhead contacts that we encountered were most likely fishing vessels.”
“With the Lijiang being the catch of the day!” Guan Yin said with a chuckle.
The joke generated a soft, lighthearted murmur from the control-room crew, and Shen retook the initiative. “If our prop has indeed been ensnared, the only way to repair it is to go topside. Chief Wang, why don’t we head for engineering to see the extent of the damages. If it is a snag, we’ll have to surface to clear it. Per standard operating procedure, both the senior chief and I will lead the repair party. XO, I want you to open up the small arms locker. We’ll be a sitting duck and I’d rather we not be completely defenseless up there.”
It took another forty-five minutes to determine that something had indeed entangled their prop. Before giving the order to blow ballast and ascend to the surface, Shen made certain that sonar showed no threatening surface traffic in the area. Once this was determined to be the case, just enough ballast was released to poke their periscopes out of the water. Both the captain and the XO were relieved to find that most of the fog had lifted at last, and a full golden morning had arrived to this portion of the South China Sea.
With no contacts in sight, Shen ordered the sub to the surface. To a roiling blast of ballast, the now lightened submarine headed upward, where flat calm conditions continued to prevail.
Senior Chief Wang led the way up the Lijiang’s main trunk. Two sentries armed with AK-47s were at his heels, followed closely by Captain Shen and six enlisted men. Included in this latter group was Seaman Gui, who carried several pairs of heavy wire cutters.
To the submariner, the surface of the sea was an alien environment.
Shen felt noticeably uneasy as he climbed onto the Lijiang’s deck. A soft gust of warm, westerly wind hit him full in the face, and as he anxiously scanned the horizon with his binoculars, the ripe fragrance of the ocean filled his nostrils.
Swirling tendrils of fog still veiled the eastern horizon, and Shen supposed that if a surface threat were close by, then that would be the direction of its approach. Several stories above the deck, in the boat’s towering sail, a group of figures were visible, sweeping the horizon with their own binoculars. Shen recognized the tallest of these as his XO, while the stocky, bald-headed officer at his side was the boat’s commissar. The sub’s radar was operational behind them; it would spot any threat long before their binoculars.
“Will you just look at this mess!” exclaimed Chief Wang from the boat’s after fantail.
Shen joined the other members of the repair party in front of the Lijiang’s rudder. A tangled mass of wet netting completely covered the rudder, extending well into the depths beneath it.
“So now we know what’s responsible for snagging our prop,” observed Shen. “This section of net must have been immense. How in the world are we ever going to untangle ourselves without outside assistance?”
Chief Wang took one of the wire cutters from Seaman Gui and began the backbreaking chore of cutting them free. “It’s nothing that we can’t accomplish on our own, Captain,” said Wang as he cut loose a large section of net and tossed it into the sea. “Come on, men,” he added to the others, “let’s get on with it!”
The sailors were soon busy with this task. This left Shen free to supervise, and walk the deck along with the two sentries.
Surprisingly enough, even with the sun’s continued ascent, the fog was returning, and quickly. A virtual blanket of wet vapor soon enveloped them, and Shen, from an amidships position beside the sail, could barely see his men at work on the after section.
The Lijiang was dangerously exposed now. An enemy shell or an innocent collision with another vessel could prove equally fatal. Circumspection warned him to sound the boat’s powerful foghorn. But the ever present threat of the Philippine patrol boat kept him from doing so.
An hour passed, and Shen, impatient, returned to the boat’s after end for yet another update. He was relieved to find the entire rudder clear of netting. Chief Wang was busy supervising the progress of four of his enlisted men, who were now in the water supported by foam floats, in the process of removing the remaining net from the propeller.
“Radar contact, Captain!” the deep voice of the XO broke in from the top of the sail.
Shen’s stomach tightened with this dreaded warning, and he sprinted to the base of the sail where he joined his sentries.
“It appears to be a single sailing vessel, approaching from the east,” added the XO from above. “Sonar reports no trace of an engine signature.”
This was certainly encouraging news. Yet Shen still didn’t like their exposed position, and he cupped his hands and shouted up a single order.
“XO, sound a warning blast on the boat’s whistle!”
Ten seconds later, a deep, resonant tone emanated from the direction of the Lijiang’s bridge. The gathering fog seemed to swallow this blast instantly, though its reverberation could still be felt in Shen’s nervous gut.
Despite the fog, Shen raised his binoculars and intently scanned the waters due east of the sub. Like a ghost materializing out of another dimension, the blunted bow of a ship broke from the veil, a mere one-hundred-meters distant. It was a relatively small vessel, shaped much like one of the native junks that worked the Yangtze. Shen doubted that the blunt hull of this junk could do them much damage, but he was nevertheless relieved when the vessel responded to the Lijiang with a meager blast from its own foghorn.
“Ready those rifles,” Shen warned the sentries, “just in case we’ve stumbled upon some Philippine pirates.”
The captain unbuckled the safety strap of his own holstered weapon, a 45 caliber Colt pistol his friends in the U. S. Navy had presented him with. He looked on as a figure appeared at the junk’s bow.
“Greetings, comrades!” cried this individual in perfect Mandarin. “I do hope that’s a PLA Navy warship.”
Ever cautious, Shen ordered, “Please identify yourself.”
“My name is Lo Jung, and this poor fishing junk is the Moonfire, based out of Hainan. May I have the honor of knowing your identity, comrades?”
The junk was less than fifty meters distant now, and Shen could readily see the grizzled face of the supposed fisherman. He looked innocent enough, and Shen decided that it would do no harm to reveal their identity.
“I’m Captain Shen Fei, commander of the PLA Navy submarine, Lijiang.”
“Thank the stars that the fates led us to you on this tragic morning,” continued the fisherman. “You see, not only are our holds still empty of fish, but my dear wife, who serves as our cook, became deathly ill after last night’s meal. I realize it’s asking a great deal, but could your medical officer please have a look at her? She’s burning up with fever, and I fear that she won’t last through the day.”
Shen hesitated to respond to this request. But from the top of the sail, the commissar egged him on.
“I certainly don’t see how a quick look would hurt, Captain. After all, we don’t appear to be going anywhere at the moment, and our sworn duty is to serve the motherland and all her citizens.”
A bit surprised by the political officer’s degree of compassion, Shen readdressed the fisherman. “Go ahead and bring your vessel alongside, comrade. But be forewarned: I can’t allow her below deck for fear of infecting the rest of my crew.”