Samant wasted no time in moving. He slid past Jerry and crawled down toward the access trunk. Petrov, on the other hand, continued to stare off toward the horizon, remaining motionless.
“Alex?” Jerry whispered.
Petrov sighed and bowed his head. “I’m coming,” he replied with a tinge of weariness. Slowly, the Russian captain crept below. Jerry followed immediately after. At 1945 local time, North Dakota dove beneath the waves.
Dinner was really late that evening; usually the first seating was before 1800, so the watchstanders could eat before they went on duty. But with the late departure from Guam, Jerry had decided to delay dinner and make it a “welcome aboard” event for their two guests. Its execution had been a masterstroke of diplomacy by the supply officer. It certainly served its primary purpose as an icebreaker for the members of the wardroom and the two foreign naval officers who were, technically, senior to their captain.
Lieutenant Steven Westbrook, the supply officer, had his cooks dish up a traditional Southern fried chicken supper with all the fixings, to include buttermilk biscuits and pecan pie with vanilla bean ice cream for dessert. Petrov’s nostrils flared at the aroma, and he dug into the hot chicken and mashed potatoes and gravy with gusto. Samant snickered as his friend chowed down on a thigh, and teased him about his lack of tolerance for spicy food. The Indian captain then went on to ask if U.S. submarines carried something with a little more “character” than Tabasco sauce.
Westbrook’s left eyebrow cocked up in prideful defiance. But his facial expression echoed his unspoken feelings — “Challenge accepted, Captain.” Excusing himself, the suppo went back into the pantry, and soon there was the sound of bottles being moved around. Jerry looked on with amusement — that is, until he saw his XO’s face. Thigpen’s eyes were as wide as saucers and he looked worried. Jerry’s quizzical look caught Thigpen’s attention, but all the XO could do was tightly shake his head no and very subtly tilt it in the direction of the pantry, as if he were trying to say, “Don’t let him do it!”
Before Jerry could say or do anything, Westbrook appeared from the pantry and walked back over to Samant. With a hint of theatrics, the supply officer placed a small bottle in front of him and said, “Here you go, sir. I’m sure this will be more to your liking.”
As the supply officer walked behind his skipper, Jerry heard him mutter indignantly, “Accuse my food of being bland, will you!”
Now Jerry was concerned, and he took a hard look at the bottle of orange-colored sauce in Samant’s hands. The label had a grim reaper on it; the scythe blade was a small red chili — not a good omen.
Addressing Samant, Thigpen said warily, “Ah, Captain, you might want to use that stuff sparingly. It’s pretty dang hot!”
Removing the cap, Samant took a sniff and replied, “Nonsense, Commander! It smells absolutely delightful.” He then proceeded to liberally sprinkle it on a chicken leg. Thigpen winced when Samant bit down on a section of the leg with just two drops on it. Everyone at the table, including Petrov, all watched intently to see Samant’s reaction. Some of them knew exactly what kind of assault Westbrook had just unleashed on the Indian’s mouth.
Initially, Samant seemed to be enjoying the chili sauce. But then he started to chew more slowly and his eyes got bigger. After swallowing, he let out a quiet gasp, and to everyone’s surprise Samant took another bite. Once he had finished the entire chicken leg, he waved his finger at Westbrook, who had a wicked grin on his face. Samant grabbed the bottle, raised it, and asked in a raspy voice, “What is this, Lieutenant? It’s quite wonderful! Very flavorful, and the heat!”
“That, sir, is a sauce made from the Carolina Reaper, the hottest chili on the planet,” explained Westbrook with smug satisfaction. “There’s more heat in that bottle than in the entire reactor core, I can assure you.” At first, Samant nodded his appreciation, and then applauded Westbrook’s boldness. Rising, he reached over to shake the supply officer’s hand. The rest of the diners joined in and clapped as well.
After the meal, Jerry had those officers not on watch attend the mission overview and intelligence briefings. Before they left Guam, the squadron operations officer, Commander Walker, had condensed all the available information into a short presentation, with more detailed data and explanations in a written report. It was incomplete, but the information would be useful to the three American submarines. Walker promised updates on Chakra’s position, as well as the location of Chinese and Littoral Alliance forces, as new information was received.
Lieutenant Commander Thigpen led off with the intelligence community’s estimated target list. While the crumpled-up piece of paper that Petrov and Samant found in the torpedo workshop had only ten ports on it, the actual number of possible targets was twelve. Both Hong Kong and Shanghai had two large port facilities. They were far enough apart that two separate weapons would be needed to take them both out.
“Fortunately for us, a number of the targets just aren’t reachable by a submarine-launched torpedo: too far up a river, and a couple of the ports are way, way inside the Bohai Gulf, which is not exactly prime submarine water. So the list gets whittled down to the seven most likely: the two ports at Hong Kong, the two at Shanghai, Ningbo-Zhoushan, Qingdao, and Dalian.
“According to a joint State Department/CIA economic assessment, taking out five of these ports will result in the destruction of fifty to fifty-five percent of China’s export capability, along with several large oil refineries, two major shipyards, and the two largest financial centers. Civilian casualties are estimated to be, at a minimum, four to five million from the blast, tidal surges, and radiation-induced illness. In short, China gets royally hosed if we don’t find Chakra before she deploys her five packages of liquid sunshine,” concluded Thigpen, sitting down.
The junior officers present just stared at the screen in stunned disbelief. The XO’s overview was beyond scary — it was horrific!
The ship’s engineer, Lieutenant Commander Philip Sobecki, finally broke the shocked silence. He turned slowly to Samant. “This is for real, sir? I mean, your old boat has been given orders to do this?”
Samant sighed. He was getting used to the fact that when a rational person was first exposed to the plot, they simply couldn’t comprehend that someone would actually attempt to murder millions. “I’m afraid so, Mr. Sobecki. And anything I could say would not answer your next question as to why. All you can do is accept what your first officer said and work with it.”
“Okay, people,” Jerry announced, “our squadron has been given this job because there isn’t another U.S. boat that has a prayer of getting into position before Chakra could arrive. Based on the scrubbed target list, the commodore has decided to have our boat guard the waters around Hong Kong. North Carolina has Ningbo-Zhoushan to Shanghai, and Texas is covering Qingdao and points north. The going assumption is that Hong Kong is the first target, and that’s why we’re here. This represents a best guess, folks, nothing more. And while I accept the squadron’s initial call, we can’t afford to focus on just one avenue of approach. So we’re going to have to develop our search plan with a lot of flexibility.”
Jerry turned to Petrov and asked, “Captain Petrov, in general, what were the improvements to Chakra’s sonar during her refit?”