Snow gradually became aware of a change in the atmosphere of the control room. His spirits were buoyed by the familiar words from the fire control officer… torpedo should be separated and in search mode now.” While he had been overcome momentarily by a part of the submarine world he’d never before experienced — the death of a boat—Imperator’s missiles had continued on their programmed track. Now it became a mission of revenge.
Quite similar to the Soviet missile in operation, the American weapons separated from the rocket and drifted by parachute to, the open water below. As soon as the protective nose cone had broken away, the torpedo went into its search mode, actively seeking the target inserted in its memory banks.
“Do you hold the torpedo?” Snow called out. “Negative, Captain. All I’ve got is a Soviet Alfa charging away from us.”
“Carol,” he called down to the computer center. “Have you got anything down there?”
“I don’t think we’re going to get anything but the Alfa on that bearing, Captain. Caesar agreed with you and sent those birds just ahead of the Russian. They should have plunked down in a lead about three thousand yards directly on his bow. The Alfa should be between the torpedo and us. No way to hear it now—”
“I got something here, Captain.” It was the sonarman shouting above the commotion in the control room. “That Russian just turned on the horses. Can’t tell yet, but I’ll bet he’s just about lying on his side trying to turn away from that fish… probably diving, too.”
The Alfa had been distant enough from Helena so that there was little she could hear during her torpedo’s attack. Seratov must have fired also, for there was no doubt that two torpedoes had detonated. Then they heard the telltale sounds of a submarine in peril… and finally the propeller sounds that had first attracted them were silent.
The euphoria overspreading Smolensk’s control room was short lived. A panicked sonarman, his string of words repeated constantly, was shouting, “Torpedo dead ahead… torpedo… torpedo…” The man echoed himself, screaming the word long after the captain had thrown his rudder hard right and called for a crash dive.
“Stop him,” the captain bellowed at the top of his lungs, jabbing his finger in the direction of the sonarman.
An officer clipped the man in the side of the head with a closed fist, knocking him to the deck. Another placed the headset over his own ears, eyes widening as he stared back at the captain. “It’s locked on,” he shouted over the commotion about him. The submarine seemed as if it would stand on end as it dived at high speed to evade. “Turning with us… must be same depth…” His eyes grew wider as he realized there was no escape. Their forward motion as the torpedo entered the water gave the weapon the advantage. By the time the Soviet submarine began evading, the torpedo was already too close. They couldn’t accelerate rapidly enough. It was a catch-up race… but the torpedo won.
The torpedo hit amidships with a violent blast that rocked Smolensk sideways. Bursting lights darkened the control room, then emergency lighting snapped on to reveal bodies strewn about the deck. The captain rose to his knees, shouting, “Damage reports!”
Silence was his only answer. Then the groans of the injured began, rising in volume as they comprehended their situation. Smolensk was still diving. “Up angle,” the captain shouted.
There was no movement. An agonized scream from the other end of the room increased the frenzy, squelching any further orders from the captain. He dragged himself over to the control panel on a broken leg, yanking back on the diving planes. Still there was no movement. He jerked harder but the resistance was steady and he was too weak. He glanced up at the depth indicator. Nothing — the glass had been shattered, the dial jammed near five hundred meters. Impossible! It wasn’t that deep here.
They were still going down.
“Back engines,” the captain bellowed. He was greeted only by the sounds of agony and fear. He pushed the annunciator to “Back Full.”
He thought that there seemed to be an answer from engineering. He listened for the high-pitched whine of reversing engines… but there was nothing. Smolensk was plummeting toward the bottom, her angle and speed increasing. In a moment…
That was his last thought as he was catapulted forward into the fire control panel. The glass shattered around his face as Smolensk impaled herself on the ocean bottom, her seams tearing open to admit the icy waters…
Smolensk’s death throes were evident in Imperator’s sonar room, as each of the telltale sounds described in detail how the Russian sub died. The Soviets had exhibited great confidence in their Alfas. They felt they were the equal of any American submarine they came in contact with. They’d never cataloged the abilities of Imperator.
To the north, another Soviet submarine had been listening to those last fateful minutes. Abe Danilov and the men in Seratov had recorded each event that had taken place to analyze later. There was no doubt that both missiles, Seratov’s and Smolensk’s had hit their target. The noise emanating from the wounded sub’s prop had been akin to waving a red flag. But the shot that had gotten Smolensk was something else to consider, beyond the fact that finding open water was pure luck!
Imperator was more than fifty miles away, so her listening capabilities had to be fantastic if she sensed Smolensk’s location, and her missiles even more amazing if she had been able to hit an Alfa at that range, one that was running full speed in the opposite direction and diving. The evasive tactics executed by both submarines were unknown to Danilov; they had been too distant to hear anything but the final moments. For Danilov, this was his first brush with the new American submarine, and it was impressive, teaching him two things: Imperator could detect an Alfa as if they were next to each other, and it could strike at unknown ranges with an uncanny ability to locate openings in what should have been an almost impenetrable ice pack.
Danilov ordered Lozak to take Seratov deep and to increase his speed very slowly. The best way to remain hidden was to remove any possibility of detection from an enemy he now held increased respect for.
The torpedo blasts had been just as obvious to the men on Houston. There was little difficulty in determining the outcome. But there had been two torpedoes that destroyed Helena—and they had come from separate sources! Sonar had been unable to determine their exact bearing, but the missiles burst from the tubes at different ranges, both to the north. One submarine had turned tail and run loudly. The other — the wise one… and the more dangerous — seemed to have tiptoed into the Arctic depths.
Reed ordered Houston to close Imperator. Snow had already given away a good deal of her capabilities, and now it would be wise to change tactics before their next encounter. It seemed to Reed that the submarine he had been ordered to protect might soon become his benefactor.
Andy Reed had poked an antenna above the surface to receive satellite pictures of the ice fields ahead. What had been broken floe ice six hours before was now a solid sheet of white, up to five feet thick in many places. A long lead, an open body of water, appeared about fifty miles to the north, northeast. He called to Snow over Gertrude to rendezvous there in two hours.