Scott knew that identifying the sound, whether it was a sub or just phantom noise, boiled down to an arcane mix of art and science and a sonarman’s skill at picking out the specific narrowband frequency from all the background clutter. And though the analyzer made the task easier, it was not foolproof. Sometimes even experts could be fooled into thinking a cooing whale was the slowly turning propeller on a submarine.
As the task of Target Motion Analysis — TMA — continued, time counted down to the ASDS’s liftoff from the Reno.
Jefferson bit his lip. “I’m thinking we’re fucked if that’s a Chinese sub and he hears us. Our window for insertion won’t stay open long.”
Scott said, “If he hears us we’ll have to deal with him.”
Jefferson’s grip on Scott’s arm was like a steel vise. “ ‘Deal with him?’ Jesus Christ, you mean sink him?”
“That’s up to the skipper.”
“What, and start a war with the Chinese? Are you nuts?”
Scott pulled his arm away. “Better tell the pilot and copilot to stand down, the others, too, until we get this situation under control.”
Jefferson, shaking his head, headed aft, to the compartment from which the ASDS was accessed via its lock-in/lock-out chamber mated to the Reno’s hull and after hatch.
“How are we doing, Chief?” said Deacon.
The tone line on the upper monitor had brightened, while on the lower monitor the sound’s intensity and frequency showed an increase.
“Got a turn count, Captain,” said the chief, after narrowing the acoustic search and weighing the evidence. “Indicates a speed of three knots. I’d say for sure we got us a PLAN Kilo 636.”
Aboard the Kilo, Captain Deng Zemin donned headphones and listened to a faint pulsing hiss, like an asthmatic’s labored breathing. As he listened, he studied the two MGK Rubikon sonar monitors on which a weak green blip, looking like one from an EKG hooked to a dying man, crept across the screen. Zemin shelved his lower lip: too weak to identify. He narrowed his eyes as if doing it would sharpen his hearing. Maybe what he heard was an American Los Angeles — class submarine. Then again, maybe not. He switched channels and heard the guttural boom of a pair of twin diesel engines heading due north. Fat’s White Dragon. Where to now?
The Rubikon’s audio spectrum analyzer sifted what it had collected, then recycled. An analyzed tone line appeared on the monitor and under it, in flashing red: UNDETERMINED.
The senior sonarman pointed to it. “Comrade Captain.”
Zemin switched back to the other channel and listened. Undetermined. If it was a U.S. 688I, Zemin was risking detection by the American. Still, he had to know. He tore off the headphones and commanded, “Main motors stop. Silence in the boat.”
The first officer repeated Zemin’s orders. A moment later the Kilo’s three-knot headway began scrubbing off.
Zemin climbed into the captain’s conning chair bolted to the deck in the attack center and folded his arms. “Now we will listen carefully to learn if we are hearing a ghost or a nosy American submarine.”
“Conn, Sonar. Sierra One just stopped his prop.”
Deacon toggled the mike. “Sonar, Conn. Do you still have him?”
“Barely, sir. Fadin’…”
Scott entered the sonar room. “There he is, Commander,” said the chief. “What’s left of him.” He pointed to two weak tonals. “This here blip is his shaft spinning down. This here one — you can barely see it now — is turbulence coming off his prop as it stopped turning. He’s just about dead in the water.”
“He’s got a silent creep motor and may be using it.”
“No, sir, I don’t think so, he’s stopped.”
“Maybe he heard something,” Scott said.
“Yes, sir. Us.”
The chief’s report triggered a “Man silent battle stations,” from Deacon.
The control room got crowded fast. Phonetalkers manned their sound-powered phones; a full complement of officers took their places in plot and at the attack consoles; a fresh watch took over the helm and planes.
“All stations manned and ready, Captain,” Kramer reported.
Deacon queried the senior attack coordinator. “Did we have a final bearing on the Chinaman before he went invisible? Come on, come on, we don’t have all day.”
“It’s one-four-four, sir.”
“Christ, that’s a thirty-degree shift, he must be damn close. What’s his range — and don’t finesse it… whatever you have.”
“Sir, under six thousand yards.”
“Less than three miles.” Deacon gave Scott a look. “It’s your call.”
Scott considered while the fire-control party worked a torpedo firing solution on Sierra One. The clock was running, the window closing. Not good, not good at all. “Shut her down. Let’s see if we can wait him out.”
Zemin scratched his cheek. He glanced at the ship’s chronometer: 2135. An hour had passed since their first contact with what he was almost convinced now, had been a phantom tonal, not a 688I. Almost but not quite.
They’d inched along on the Kilo’s utterly silent creep motor, the depth gauge needles hung at 195 meters. The Rubikon’s narrowband trace line lay dead flat on the monitor. Nothing. Zemin pressed the headphone earmuffs tight to his head and listened. An oil tanker and ro-ro to the west. Small craft — luggers, spit-kits, sampans, and coastal junks — swarming along the Taiwan coast.
The first officer said, “Comrade Captain, we have had no further contact for over twenty minutes. Perhaps we should shift operations to the north and commence tracking and reacquire the White Dragon.”
Zemin considered. Admiral Chou, commander in chief Northern Fleet, would not be pleased to learn that a 688I snooping around Matsu Shan had gone unchallenged.
“Why would a U.S. Navy 688I show up off Matsu Shan?” Zemin asked.
“Comrade Captain, with respect, we don’t know for sure that the contact was a 688I.”
“Wu Chow Fat and his White Dragon, Matsu Shan, the Sugun, the North Korean crisis — a coincidence, no?”
The first officer said nothing.
The Rubikon’s narrowband trace line still lay dead flat on the monitor.
“There is nothing more we can do here, Comrade Captain.”
Zemin stood. “I agree. These are my orders: Both motors ahead one-half; make our course due north; commence a search for the White Dragon.”
“Aye, Comrade Captain.”
Zemin hoped he had not been fooled by a clever skipper in a 688I. If he had, it would put Admiral Chou into a towering rage. He saw himself being led from his submarine in leg irons by Admiral Chou’s Navy police, to the submarine base brig at Bohai Bay.
“He’s on the move!”
“Where to, Chief?” asked Deacon.
“Due north at about ten knots.”
Deacon exhaled heavily and said to Scott, “It’s still your call.”
Scott felt Jefferson’s gaze boring into his back. He turned and said, “Ready to move?”
“Hell, been ready to move for the last hour and a half. Damn window’s almost closed.”
Scott said to Deacon, “All right, let’s jock it up.”
14
Scott looked through the ASDS’s open lower hatch and saw Rus Kramer’s upturned face.
“We’ll be waiting right here for you, Commander. Good luck.”
Scott sketched Kramer a salute, then sealed the hatch. Moments later, the midnight black, bullet-shaped vehicle lifted off its four latching pylons. Aboard the Reno, Deacon retrimmed to compensate for the sudden loss of fifty-five tons of shock-hardened titanium and steel and ten men and their gear. The mini-sub, maneuvering on its thrusters and a six-bladed prop powered by a compact lithium-ion battery, cleared the Reno’s afterdeck, and, with Deitrich and Allen at the controls, surged toward Matsu Shan.