“It’s our turn now,” Smith said.
Two more Harpoons came on fast. The antiair shells missed. The bullets failed to hit and the emitter—
Smith watched open-mouthed as both cruise missiles flashed past his Galahad.
“Is the emitter on?” Holloway asked.
“Look at your screen,” Smith said.
“What went wrong?” Holloway asked.
Before Smith could answer, the first Harpoon struck an ore hauler. The warhead exploded. The second cruise missile plowed into the wounded hauler a moment later, but the warhead failed to ignite. The kinetic speed still crumpled metal, and might have been the tipping point for the hauler. The long vessel split in two and both ends began to sink. At the same time, Sigrids slid into Lake Ontario and submerged as huge bubbles rose up. The drones headed for the muddy bottom.
“Lieutenant Smith!” the troop commander shouted over the radio. “Did you turn on your emitter?”
“Yes, sir, I did,” Smith said.
“Are you lying to me, Ted?” the commander asked.
“Look at your screen, sir. You’ll see that our emitter is still on. Sergeant Holloway can confirm that.”
“Then what—”
“Sir,” Lieutenant Fleck said. “I’m picking up a laser signal.”
“What does that have to do with—?”
“I’m sorry to interrupt again, sir,” Fleck said. “But the laser’s origin point is near the water four thousand meters away.”
“The sub!” Smith shouted. “The submarine is back.”
“What’s that, Lieutenant?” the commander asked. “What are you babbling about?”
“The American sub, sir,” Smith said. “It must be out there and it’s guiding those missiles into the ships.”
“We must find it,” the commander said. “We must find it before more Harpoons hit my convoy.”
Darius Green smiled so hard that his mouth hurt. This was glorious. He had helped destroy a GD troop transport.
I have four Javelins. Maybe I can destroy even more.
Could he work in close enough to—?
“Captain,” Sulu said in his earpiece. “The Galahads have spotted us. They’re coming our way.”
“How many,” Darius said into his microphone.
“Sir,” Sulu said. “You do realize that the Germans own the skies. Our planes have left. They were smart enough to plan to live again to fight again another day. Shouldn’t we do the same thing, sir?”
“Now is the moment to strike the enemy and keep striking,” Darius said.
“Begging your pardon, sir, but Allah has allowed you to act the part of a warrior. You are a warrior. I think doing more now would be pushing it and might even be an insult to Allah.”
Darius doubted that. The Galahads were fast, though. And likely there were nearby GD aircraft around. He couldn’t fight those. Maybe if he submerged and slunk around, he could do the same thing again later. What a feeling to destroy a large enemy ship. This was why he had joined the Navy: to fight like a warrior.
“Sir, those hovers are coming fast,” Sulu said.
Darius Green ducked in, shut the hatch and slid down the ladder. He hit the bottom landing hard and his feet slid out from under him. He banged his forehead just above his right eye. Ignoring the pain, he shouted for Sulu to take them underwater.
At emergency speeds, Sulu did exactly that.
Lieutenant Smith and Holloway remained in the area for twenty-five more minutes, hunting for the mysterious American submarine. They had several depth charges, and they used every one of them. Finally, a different hover approached to take over the hunt.
Smith licked his lips. He was glad Fleck had spotted the laser designator. Otherwise, the commander might still believe that he had been derelict in his duty. He’d turned on the emitter, but he had to admit, he was glad it had failed to attract the Harpoons. He was overjoyed to be alive.
Teddy Smith turned the hover around and kicked the Galahad into high gear, zooming across the waves, speeding to catch up with the convoy. The tip of the sun broke over the horizon, casting long orange beams across the water. It was beautiful. It was the most beautiful sunrise he’d ever seen.
Smith grinned wildly, and he laughed. Right now, he didn’t care if Holloway thought he was strange or not. Lieutenant Teddy Smith out of London laughed with gusto. It was good to be alive. It was glorious to zip across the waters in this fast machine.
After the laughter died away—Holloway had remained silent the entire time—Smith nodded to himself. It was daylight now. It would be harder for the submarine to do that again. Twice the American submarine had bested him. He wanted another crack at it. He wanted to sink the damned thing.
Yes, one way or another, he was going to get the better of the Lake Ontario Loch Ness Monster.
Paul Kavanagh squinted tightly as he scanned Lake Ontario with his binoculars. Dawn broke over the horizon. He’d been awake for three hours already, ever since the first enemy missiles had struck the city.
Behind him parts of Rochester burned. The worst hit had been at the airport, an artillery park and several dummy mobile shore batteries. The real shore batteries were big trucks with Harpoon cruise missiles.
He’d already been on the horn with the local SOCOM colonel. Romo and he were out here with a Marine company. The Marines had Javelins, some older TOWs and with a DIVAD system to take down the next low-level air strike. An Army battalion in the middle of the city was already supposed to be out here with them, but the soldiers were taking their sweet time to get into position.
“It’s too late for Rochester,” Romo said. He also lay on his belly, scanning the lake. “Look at grid 2-A-22.”
Paul swept his binoculars to the left. Oh yeah, he saw them now. Galahad hovercraft and bigger, infantry-carrying hovers headed toward shore. They moved fast and acted like a fleet. The difference would be that this fleet could keep right on coming, up the shore and into the city.
“We have to stop them,” Paul said.
“Of course,” Romo said. “What else would we do?”
They both wore body armor, and today they had some of their old gear on: helmets with HUD visors. Both of theirs were flipped up at the moment.
Paul figured there was one thing on their side today. This wasn’t a blue water Navy amphibious assault. This was something different because these were the Great Lakes, or one of them at least. Instead of destroyers, the GD had Galahads. Instead of light cruisers, the enemy had big hovers. There were no battleships and certainly no aircraft carriers out there. Unfortunately, the enemy didn’t need the carriers today, because the far shore held plenty of GD runways. That meant the enemy had plenty of aircraft. Some of Rochester burned because of enemy air strikes. The battleships, on the other hand—
“Down!” Paul shouted.
Other Marines took up the cry.
There were falling streaks in the sky: more SRBMs—short-range ballistic missiles—coming down fast at Rochester.
For the next few minutes, Paul endured tremendous explosions. His bones shook and his teeth rattled, until he remembered to close his mouth tightly.
They were stationed almost at the edge of the shore, behind buildings that fronted Ontario Beach Park. Some of the buildings vaporized under the missile barrage. Razor-sharp shards of wood and molten metal flew through the air and slaughtered half the Marine company. It left the others shocked and dazed, not knowing what to do.
Stirring, forcing himself to think, to act now while he had the chance, Paul raised his head. His brain throbbed. His body hurt. So did his right hand from clutching the binoculars so hard. He put the lenses to his eyes.