The shark seemed to read Jeffrey's mind. It went right for him, swimming closer toward the surface. Jeffrey pulled the pistol from his bag.
I can't fire submerged. Water in the barrel will make it blow up in my hand. But the barrel plug is in. Jeffrey glanced at his dive data. Twenty feet, more or less. His pulse had topped 160. He switched his pistol off of safe to fire. The red diode glowed. The round-count readout said he had an armor-piercing bullet in the chamber. He prayed he wouldn't have a misfire — the only way to clear it was to first eject the clip. The shark started its attack, turning sideways to lunge for Jeffrey with its jaws wide open. At the last possible moment Jeffrey pushed the pistol into the shark's left eye, barrel plug and all, levered his torso away from its mouth, and squeezed the trigger.
Ilse was desperate to know what was happening. She twisted her body to try to turn the dolphin but that didn't help. Then she watched something approach her from above — the shark, going wild. It disappeared from view and she saw something else through her eyehole. A human hand. The fuel above her was still flickering, and it looked like there were clouds of blood in the water.
Something knocked on the SDV. Ilse screeched inside her mouthpiece. Then she realized it was Jeffrey. They worked the clips to release her from the dolphin. They were close enough to speak directly through the water, shouting inside their mouthpieces. Jeffrey told her he was okay, then made sure she was all right too. He reached inside her SDV with his titanium dive knife. He pierced the ballast bladders and the vehicle started to sink. Jeffrey and Ilse held onto it together, riding toward the bottom, their cyalume hoops glowing side by side.
Jeffrey used his dive computer INS to navigate an expanding-square bottom search, and they soon retrieved his dolphin. "Six, Four," Jeffrey called once he'd plugged back in. " Six, Four."
"Four, Six, g'head."
"Shaj, Ilse and I are okay, but there'll be more sharks coming — they'll smell the blood. We have to get away from here."
"Half our vehicles have mobility kills already," Clayton said, "and it's five miles to the rendezvous."
Ilse tapped Jeffrey's shoulder. They traded mouthpieces so she could speak, each with a hand on the other's hip, floating close. "Six, Five," Ilse said, "some of us could ride outside the dolphins. We could hold on to the dorsal fins of the ones that still are working."
Jeffrey took his mouthpiece back. "No," he said. "We can't leave the broken ones behind as evidence, and buddy tows would slow us down too much. Our battery charges are almost empty as it is. We have to call the ASDS to come and pick us up."
"But there's no place to hide here," Clayton said. "That wreck inshore by the Ohlanga mouth is much too small for the minisub."
"The ASDS doesn't have to hide," Jeffrey said. "There'll be lots of reverb from our demolition for a while, and settling from the landslide."
"It's not part of the plan," Clayton said.
"We have to change the plan," Jeffrey said. "I'll make the call." He turned up the power of his clandestine gertrude. "Whale One, this is Dolphin Four. Whale One, this is Dolphin Four."
"This is Whale One," Meltzer's voice came back immediately, scratchy and echoing from the range and the frequency-agile encryption. "Give me the recognition sign."
Jeffrey spoke slowly and crisply. "Recognition sign is beta sigma fy-uv niner. Give me the countersign."
"Countersign is copper purple granite apple."
"Confirmed," Jeffrey said. "Whale One, cancel Point Zulu rendezvous. Instead home on my IFF, retrieve dolphin team at my location now."
CHAPTER 17
Jeffrey saw Lieutenant Meltzer peering in as the ASDS forward pressure chamber hatch swung open after equalizing. "Where's everybody else?" Meltzer said. He held a Geiger counter.
"We had three KIAs," Jeffrey said.
The team all cleared their weapons and put the firearms in a gold-lined box, to shield the tritium night-sights. Once the box was closed, the sensitive Geiger counter didn't click too much — a thorough seawater rinse was excellent decontamination.
Meltzer looked at Otto. "Who's this guy?"
"An EPW," Jeffrey said.
"A prisoner?" Meltzer said. "I picked up the explosion on passive sonar. Did you fulfill the objectives?"
"Yeah," Jeffrey said. "All except the last one, making a clean getaway from the hostile coast." Jeffrey turned to Clayton. "You guys catch a breather in the transport compartment. I'm taking command as pilot of the mini-sub."
Clayton nodded and undogged the rearward hatch of the lock-in/lock-out hyperbaric sphere. Jeffrey and Clayton dragged Otto into the back and strapped him into a seat. Otto was coming round, so SEAL Two checked his vital signs and gave him another morphine shot. They returned to the pressure chamber and helped Ilse stow the critical equipment bags, the ones with lab records and missile parts and the captured walkie-talkie. Jeffrey went into the forward compartment. Ilse followed.
Jeffrey took the left seat and began reviewing screens and readouts.
"Sir," Meltzer said, "there's been another change of plan. You were right about a Boer safety corridor." He handed Jeffrey a message slip.
ASDS DATA PLUS ENEMY AIRCRAFT OVERFLIGHT PATTERNS AND
INSHORE MINEFIELD ANALYSIS CONFIRM IDENTIFICATION TODAYS
SUBMARINE SAFE PASSAGE CORRIDOR X WELL DONE X CHALLENGER
WILL MEET/RECOVER ASDS DOWNSTREAM SIDE BOTTOM HUMMOCK
POSIT REL POINT ZULU RANGE FIVE DOT NINE NM BEARING ONE FOUR
SEVEN DEPTH TWELVE HUNDRED REPEAT 1200 FEET X ASDS SIGNAL
CHALLENGER SOONEST WHEN TEAM PICKUP COMPLETED X WILSON
SENDS XX
"Great," Jeffrey said. "This way we'll make the docking two hours sooner."
"Yes, sir," Meltzer said.
"Twelve hundred feet, huh," Jeffrey said. "I guess the SDVs are expendable now." He turned to Ilse. "If their innards start to pop, enemy SOSUS'll just think that's Ms. Sperm Whale eating breakfast."
"Concur, Commander," Ilse said.
"Very well … Oceanographer." Jeffrey smiled, then turned back to Meltzer. "Let's call home and then get moving."
Clayton came into the forward compartment and stood next to Ilse. "I can't sit still," he said. "I came to watch."
"Post-action heebie-jeebies?" Jeffrey asked. His hand was firmly on the joy stick, his course following an underwater cable he could see on the low-frequency syntheticaperture bottom-penetrating sonar.
"Yeah," Clayton said. "The adrenaline's worn off." Jeffrey nodded. He understood. At least driving the ASDS gave him something to do. It would all catch up with him later, Jeffrey was sure. He thought of coming back sometime to tap this cable.
"I feel pretty spaced-out myself," Ilse said.
"We can all relax once we get back aboard," Jeffrey said. "Have a good shot of medicinal brandy, take a snooze, we'll be good as new."
"I guess," Clayton said. "I wish I could say that for all my guys."
"I know what you mean," Jeffrey said. "How you makin' out right now?"
"You know," Clayton said, "it's strange. I thought I'd be real down but I got over that part fast. I feel much older suddenly. I feel, I guess, I don't know, kind of seasoned. It's not entirely a bad feeling."
"It's like they used to say in another war," Jeffrey said. "You've seen the elephant and changed forever."
"Did this happen to you, Commander?" Clayton said. "Back in the Persian Gulf?"
"I wish. By the time they cut down the drugs enough for me to have coherent thoughts, I was in the orthopedic ward at Bethesda."