Cal looked around and noticed that the bridge, already crowded with the flight ops crew, had become even more so in the few moments he'd been out on the wing. BMC Gilmartin was behind the nav table, pretending to instruct BM3 Stamm on the finer points of charting the next way-point. HCO Harris was there, pretending she hadn't signed off on Suppo qualifying as helo control officer the day before. Suppo, a chunky chief warrant officer with merry eyes, pushed his glasses up his nose and raised an eyebrow at Cal, who repressed an answering smile, mostly because Harris was watching. EMO Olson was on the port wing, watching the small boat approach the skiff through binoculars, ET1 Jones behind the nav eval station, so they were more than covered if any of the electronics pooped out.
Taffy looked at him. They didn't have to say it out loud. The gang's all here, and then some. It had been a long patrol with very little action, and nobody wanted to miss out.
They all wore looks of suppressed excitement. He himself hated this part. Each second seemed to tick by more slowly than the last, and he had to rigorously suppress an active imagination that pictured hostiles on the skiff erupting from belowdecks and opening fire on his boarding team.
He knew that due to rigorous and continuous training his crew was ready for almost anything they might encounter. He knew that in thirty-five years of intercepting narcotics shipments in the eastern Pacific and the Caribbean only once, one time, had a uniformed member of the U.S. Coast Guard had a weapon pulled on him. He knew that in that instance the Coastie had been able to talk the asshole down without drawing his own weapon. He knew that the smugglers were very well aware of what would happen to them if they were caught with automatic weapons on the open sea. He knew that they also had a very lively appreciation of the penalty for injuring or killing an American citizen, and that they were well aware- none better-how effective the helo on Munro s flight deck was at stopping go fasts from, well, going fast. Or, for that matter, going. On occasion, when the smugglers saw one of them coming, they stopped their boat and literally put their hands in the air. Once one of Munro's small boats had reached the scene of a go fast disabled by the helo's.50-caliber to find the go fast's crew lined up on the deck, all of them with their bags packed and ready to transfer to the cutter.
None of this mattered. Cal still sweated out the time between the approach of the small boat and the boarding team leader's first report.
"Munro, Mark 1, ops normal."
"Mark 1, Munro, ops normal, aye," Ops said into the mike.
Cal raised his binoculars. The small boat had closed to within a mile of the skiff and was making a big, slow circle. They all jumped when the radio erupted into life. "Munro, Mark 1, we see four new Yamaha 200s on the stern of the vessel!"
Before Ops could reply, through the binoculars Cal could see three men appear suddenly in the well of the vessel. A wake boiled up from its stern.
"Holy shit," someone said.
"Set go fast red!"
"Go fast red, aye, Captain!" Behind him he heard BM3 Stamm pipe, "Now, set go fast red, set go fast red!"
"Set flight quarters!"
"Now, set flight condition one!" Stamm's voice echoed over the ship so immediately on the heels of the order that Cal knew Stamm had been anticipating it. "Close all doors and hatches! Remove all hats topside! The smoking lamp is out!"
"Munro, Mun 1, ops normal!"
"Mun 1, Munro, ops normal, aye." Cal watched long enough to see the small boat settle into pursuit of the go fast and then went out on the bridge wing in time to see the aviators head aft at a run toward the hangar deck. Back inside the bridge had become crowded with deck officers, phone talkers, ETs, and HCOs, and loud with radio chatter between the officer of the deck, the helo communications officer, the landing signals officer, and Combat. At one point the noise level got so high the XO raised his voice and said, "Okay, everyone, take it down a notch."
Cal couldn't blame them. Part of their mission was to act as sentry between the wholesale drug smugglers in Central and South America and their retail market in the United States. Insofar as Munro's very presence
was a deterrent, well and good, but going a whole patrol without even the smell of a bust was disheartening to even the most motivated, best-trained crew. Everyone was excited at the prospect of a chase.
The closed-circuit television screen showed the helo on the flight deck, its rotors accelerating into a blur. A voice sounded over the speaker. "Hangman, this is Tin Star, we're ready for the numbers."
Suppo's voice was quick and sure as he went down the list: wind speed and direction, altimeter, the pitch and roll of the ship. The aviator, a lieutenant commander who had driven ships for two years before going to flight school and who consequently had a better idea than most aviators of what was going on on the bridge at that moment, read the numbers back and requested a takeoff to port. Suppo looked at Cal. "Permission to conduct flight ops, Captain?"
Cal nodded.
Suppo keyed the mike. "LSO, HCO, helo is cleared for takeoff to port, take all signals from the LSO, green deck."
"Green deck, aye," the conn officer said.
"Green deck!" the phone talker said, and switched the hangar lights to green.
"HCO, LSO, green deck." Cal recognized Chief Colvin's voice on the speaker. On the screen he watched the chief make a counterclockwise circle with his right arm and point to port. The pitch of the rotor blades increased and the helo lifted off, put its nose on the small boat, and shot down the length of the ship with neatness and dispatch, fifty feet off the deck.
"Get us up on turbines," Cal said.
The OOD, a newly minted ensign named Schrader, relayed the order to the engine room, which order was repeated back at the usual full-volume engine room bawl. A moment later main gas turbine one kicked in with its distinctive whine and Munro began to move over the water like she had a purpose.
"All ahead flank," Schrader said.
"All ahead flank, aye," the helm answered, and then she said, "Wait a minute."
"What's the problem, Roberts?" Schrader said.
"The rudder, sir," she said, a little uncertainly. She looked up at the rudder indicator and with more decision said, "It's stuck."
"Stuck?"
"Yes, sir, stuck, at five degrees port." In sudden indignation she said, "We: re in the middle of chasing a go fast and they're throwing a drill at us, too?" She looked at Cal accusingly.
"This isn't a drill," Cal said. He exchanged a look with the XO, and had to admire the way both of them refrained from screaming with frustration. "All stop, and pipe the EO to the bridge."