Nothing.
“The television was a disaster,” Manso said, after a few more moments of scanning the black horizon with his binoculars. “He was a wild man, even with the sedatives. I had the announcer say that he was rescheduled for tomorrow. I don’t think he’s going to cooperate.”
“Who cares?” Carlos asked. “He’s irrelevant. Right now, all the Cuban people know is that he missed a telecast. Unfortunate. But remember that they saw him at the Yacht Club only this morning. The Granma reporter was there, so it will be in the paper. If he ultimately refuses to go before the cameras, so what? You and Fulgencio will announce the change of government and that’s the end of it. Everything else is accomplished.”
“It’s better if Fidel does it, Carlitos,” Juanito insisted. “Easier for all of us. In the long run, the people won’t care. But, for now, I—”
“Listen. I have an idea,” Manso said. “I was talking after supper to the video technician. He tells me we can make him say whatever we want.”
“Of course we can always do that.” Carlos laughed. “Rodrigo and his silver scissors can make anyone say anything.”
“I don’t mean that way, Carlitos,” Manso said, looking at his crazy brother Carlos with eyes like black stones.
“You mean there is another way?” Juanito asked.
“There is a way to digitally alter his speech and lip movements,” Manso said. “As long as it’s kept very short.”
“How short?” Juanito asked. “You mean, like, ‘I quit, here’s the new guy’?” He laughed and took another pull on his flask.
“My God, look at that,” Carlos said. “Look!”
“Turn on the lights!” Manso said. Carlos flipped a switch mounted on the base of the channel marker and massive banks of floodlights above them lit up the storm-torn night.
All three raised their binoculars and aimed them in the direction Carlos had pointed.
“There!” he said. “See it?”
“Where? Oh…Mother of Christ!”
Out of the sea came the head of the monster, black and knife-edged, its V-shaped snout spewing not fire but boiling white water as it rose ever higher into the rain-whipped skies. It was a dull deadly black, looking like some evil engineer’s nightmare machine. There was in fact no more efficient killing device on earth.
“I told you you were going to see something, my brothers!” Juanito shouted. “Oh, my God, look at this thing! Have you ever seen anything so huge?”
The deadly thing was still rising, a froth of white water pouring off the sleek, sharp-angled sides of its twin swept-back hulls and diving planes. Then that amazing snout came crashing down into the sea and the submarine surged toward the jetties. It was immense.
Water broke over her V-bow. They heard an alarm and saw something rising slowly from the forward-most part of the hull, another sharply angled shape with faint lights glowing from within. Then the structure was looming above the decks, and they understood at once that this was the retractable conning tower. After a moment, they could see the small black silhouettes of men begin to appear at the very top.
A powerful searchlight on the sub’s tower was illuminated and swept back and forth across the river’s entrance.
Manso couldn’t make out any faces, of course, the men were just black figures at this distance, but he knew the identity of one of them. Then he caught a face in his powerful night-vision glasses.
“Commander Nikita Zukov,” Manso said under his breath. “Welcome to Cuba. We’ve been expecting you.”
The three brothers embraced, rain splashing on their faces. It was a moment they seemed to have been imagining forever. But their imaginations had been capable of nothing so grand as the events of the day and this sight and this historic night.
The mammoth black-winged creature from the deep was now entering the mouth of the river. It was the most stunning thing Manso had ever seen. He waved at the men atop the conning tower and they returned his salute.
“Well, my brave brothers, I have a question for you,” he said, gathering them together. “Walk with me.”
Arm in arm, they started walking back along the jetty, toward the sub pen. They wanted to be inside the newly constructed pen with the construction crews and all the on-shore support teams when the sub made its dramatic appearance.
“Just one little question,” Manso said, looking back at the sub sliding majestically toward them.
“Sí, Manso?” they replied in unison.
“I want to know, my brothers, exactly how does it feel to be a super-power?”
Laughing, the three men raced ahead of the submarine back towards the pen. The huge doors were sliding open, revealing the cavernous interior. Light poured out and so did many of the workers, charged with excitement at the sight of the approaching sub.
It was hard to say who was more excited, the Cubans or the Russians. There were over a hundred Russian electronic engineers, machinists, plumbers, electricians, and various nuclear technicians. They’d been working side by side with the Cubans for months, building the necessary machine and tool shops it would take to support such a sophisticated nuclear submarine.
As the giant sub finally eased into the wide mouth of her slip, there was a deafening roar as the men surged down the floating docks running along each hull, cheering wildly.
Commander Nikita Zukov stood atop the towering sail of his submarine, surveying the sea of activity taking place all around him. He had his hands over his ears to block out the terrible sound. It wasn’t the sound of the arc welders or the steelworkers still putting the finishing touches on the sub pen that bothered him. It was a small orchestra struggling through yet another rehearsal of the Cuban national anthem.
The band was practicing for the dedication ceremony. They stood at the end of a long concrete pier, only twenty feet from where the sub was moored. Commander Zukov thought that if he had to listen to one more stanza, he might well go insane.
“Not bad, not bad,” Admiral Carlos de Herreras said in Spanish. “I think by the time of the May Day ceremony, they’ll be perfect.” Zukov, who spoke fluent Spanish, looked at the man to see if he could possibly be serious. He was.
Zukov’s father had been a Soviet navy “adviser” to Cuba and had married a Cuban woman. So he’d grown up in a house where everyone spoke both Spanish and Russian. Born in Havana thirty-five years ago, he had not been in Cuba in many years. He was ten years old when his father had taken the family back to Moscow. He was accepted at the Naval Academy at eighteen, and became a submarine officer, gaining command of his own boat by age thirty.
Zukov’s Cuban background accounted for the fact that he happened to be standing here instead of any of a dozen former Soviet sub commanders vying for the job. He knew the language and the culture. He knew and loved the people. He had served his country with great distinction. And he’d never forgiven the politburo for their betrayal of his homeland. And his navy.
“The band, they sound pretty good to you, Commander?” the Cuban admiral asked him.
“Symphonic,” Zukov replied, straining to be heard over the orchestra, the arc welders, and the steelworkers.
A crew was already painting the sub’s new name on both the starboard and portside flanks of the gleaming black hull.
Zukov recognized the new name instantly.
José Martí.
Named in honor of the great patriot who had liberated Cuba from Spain after a long bloody war, the José Martí was a splendid symbol of the new Cuba. The excitement inside the submarine pen verged on hysteria. Flags and bunting hung from every corner of the building in preparation for the celebration of May Day, the great Communist holiday, just three days hence. The mood inside was frantic, but festive.