With a sudden jarring motion, the ship angled upward, and slowly the list came off, the wall once again becoming a floor. Trusov pulled the joystick back to rotate the thrust upward to get them off the bottom. A loud scraping noise sounded beneath them, and she could feel it vibrating through the mounting of the joy seat.
“Good,” Chernobrovin said. “Now straighten out the prop and keep backing down. You can ease it to 60 RPM.”
“Wish we had a depth gauge here,” she mumbled.
“That should do it,” the engineer said. “Can you get forward to the cockpit and hover the boat before we sink back to the bottom?”
“On my way.”
By the time Trusov got to the first compartment and the cockpit, she was wheezing and short of breath. She strapped herself into her seat and pulled on her tactical comms headset.
“Chief, once you get the reactor back, you need to restart atmo control, or else we’ll faint before anything else happens.”
Chernobrovin was silent for a long, frightening moment, but then came on, “Pilot, the reactor is back online. You have full propulsion. I am restarting atmo controls.”
“About time,” Trusov said under her breath. Her panel had come back to life. She rotated through the displays, examining ship systems’ status, then putting up the navigation display. She needed to get the boat to open water.
“Pilot, Engineer,” Chernobrovin said as Trusov was flying the boat southward to the entrance to the box-shaped area where Belgorod had fired its torpedoes at the American.
“Go ahead,” Trusov said.
“Be advised,” Chernobrovin said, his voice heavy, “we are severely nuclear fuel-limited.”
“I know,” Trusov said. Losharik had been overdue for a core refueling, but it had been postponed until after this operation. The mission profile had called for it to use minimal power to withdraw the Status-6 torpedoes from Belgorod and place them in the harbor bottoms, so it was judged that they could accomplish the mission with less than a hundred EFPH, or effective full-power hours, which was Sevmash’s estimate of the useable fuel level remaining in the core. “We need to find out what’s going on with Belgorod, then make our way to open water,” she said. “If the second-fired Gigantskiy blew up prematurely, there will be a close polynya in the box-shaped area.”
“Incoming message on Bolshoi-Feniks,” the Second Captain announced in that emotionless female computerized voice everyone hated.
“Read the message,” Trusov said, concentrating on the nav display and on power level to the propulsor. At 150 meters depth, she should avoid the bottom and pressure ridges. The side-scan sonar was no substitute for the under-ice sonar systems of submarines like Belgorod, but it was functional enough to get them through this ice maze back to open water.
“Message reads, ‘Belgorod damaged beyond repair and Belgorod crew requests immediate rescue from upper hatch of the escape chamber. Losharik requested to respond.’ The message is repeated over and over. Do you want me to read it again?”
“No,” Trusov said. “Prepare an outgoing message on Bolshoi-Feniks to Belgorod,” she said.
“Ready,” the Second Captain said.
“Losharik en route to Belgorod’s position. Stand by for rescue.”
“Bolshoi-Feniks fault,” the Second Captain said.
“What do you mean?” Trusov asked. “Specify.”
“Bolshoi-Feniks is not transmitting,” the Second Captain said.
“Are any circuit breakers open in the system?” Trusov asked. If the damned Second Captain were on its game, it would already have reported on the status of the system’s circuit breakers.
“All breakers are nominal,” the Second Captain said, maddeningly emotionless. “All Bolshoi-Feniks system self-checks nominal.”
“Well, obviously not,” Trusov said, “or else the fucking system would work.” But it was futile arguing with AI, she thought. She trained the side scan sonar to the right, then the left, then forward, seeking the hull of the Belgorod.
“Well, Mr. Pacino,” Captain Seagraves said, a bloody bandage on his head, “Good of you to join us. Where have you been?”
“Starting the reactor,” Pacino said.
“Who helped?” Vevera asked.
“Chief MacHinery.”
“You mean the chief started the reactor and steam plants and you watched?” Vevera said, standing near his firecontrol watch station.
“I guess you didn’t hear about what young Patch did at nuclear prototype,” Dankleff said.
“What?”
Dankleff grinned. “The entire place put down hundred-dollar bets young Pacino couldn’t start the reactor and steam plants all by himself. Then he actually did it. Then, no one believed he really succeeded, they all wanted him to do it again, double-or-nothing. So he did. Those hundred-dollar bets? They paid for his new crate engine for the Corvette, the supercharger, the transmission, and the new computer controls, with something left over for tires, since his new engine tended to shred them after a few months.”
“Dear Heavenly Father, was Naval Reactors aware of this?” Vevera said. Short Hull Cooper was staring with his eyes wide. Naval Reactors was the Navy’s version of the Nuclear Regulatory Agency, and more than one career had been torpedoed by the safety Nazis.
“Not in real time,” Pacino said, “but they heard about it eventually. I took a slap on the wrist, but the commander of prototype got a severe talking-to.”
“So we’re in the power range,” Quinnivan said, grinning.
“Half-power lineup on the port turbine generator,” Pacino said, “but there’s trouble with the starboard motor-generator. And we have bigger problems.”
“What?” Dankleff asked.
“Chief MacHinery thinks we’re flooding from the shaft seals,” Pacino said. “If that’s true, the aft compartment is going to flood, get heavy and drag us to the bottom. We need to dewater with the drain pump, and we need to do it now.”
Dankleff vaulted back into his pilot seat, brought up his displays, adjusted the valving to the drain pump to take a suction on the aft compartment bilges, then hit the function key to start the drain pump.
Instead of starting, a large blinking red light lit up his panel.
“Drain pump trouble light,” he said. “Dammit, do we have power available? Is the breaker shut?”
Pacino picked up the 1MC general announcing circuit mike. “Chief MacHinery, 1JV,” he said, then reached for the 1JV tactical phone and put the handset to his ear.
“MacHinery,” the chief’s voice said.
“Chief, check the drain pump breaker,” Pacino said. “And while you’re at it, check the trim pump breaker.”
“Stand by,” MacHinery said.
Pacino waited, impatiently. He looked up at the inclinometer mounted over the portside sonar lineup, and the angle had moved from two degrees up to five. The aft end of the ship was sinking.
“Control, MacHinery,” a breathless voice intoned over the phone circuit.
“Go ahead, Chief,” Pacino said.
“Both drain pump and trim pump breakers are shut. They both have power.”
“Thanks, Chief,” Pacino said, hanging up. “Drain pump and trim pump have power,” he said to Dankleff.
“Let’s try again,” Dankleff said, trying again to start the drain pump, but the trouble light flashed red again. “Drain pump trouble light. I’m cross-connecting the trim pump to the drain system.” Dankleff manipulated his panel, opening some valves, shutting others. “Cross-connection complete. Starting the trim pump to drain the aft compartment bilges.” Dankleff mashed the function key. The trim pump’s red pump trouble light lit. “Goddammit,” he said. “The trim pump has shit the bed.”