Dankleff piloted them upward to the flank of the Omega, perhaps eighty feet over their heads. As he approached the hull, Pacino could see the deep-diver submarine docked to the underside of the Omega’s hull. It was much bigger than in his imagination. It had to be over 250 feet long, he thought. He could see it had small but thick portholes in its bow. He hoped no one was in there peering out at them. No one had thought that could be a problem. Pacino kept his eyes on the Russian submarine’s exterior where it had curved to be vertical.
“Hey, U-Boat, I think I have the torpedo tube door, drive us aft.”
In the shallower water, with the pressure less on the mine, it had begun to get buoyant. Pacino hit the fixed function key on its operator panel to flood its variable ballast bladder until it behaved again. He wondered if there were some way to automate this, but the control system would add volume and weight — taking away payload for explosives. Still, it seemed a risk that the mine could get away from them.
“I don’t see it, Patch.”
“There, above you about five feet. There’s three of them. See them?”
“Oh, yeah, you’re right. Let me drive us about twenty or twenty-five feet farther aft.”
“Position us at the elevation of the middle tube.”
“We’re here. Now’s the hard part of the day. Open up the mine,” Dankleff said.
Pacino manipulated the operator panel’s fixed function key for opening up the mine, the software asking him if he were sure he wanted to do that. He hit the “YES” button and the mine slowly opened up so that its cylindrical shape became two half-cylinders. He maneuvered the mine to touch the rubbery coating of the hull, hoping it would be able to attach. While Pacino operated the mine, Dankleff’s job was to keep control of the propulsion unit. Pacino could hear the Mark 76 engine occasionally buzz as Dankleff kept it at their depth. Pacino touched the control panel’s “ATTACH” protocol section, and energized the “AUTO ATTACH” button. If the unit were able to cut through the rubber hull coating and weld itself to the hull, it would be an easy day.
The mine vibrated as the vacuum pump came on and the unit seemed stuck to the hull. It groaned as the mechanicals tried to cut through the anechoic coating. The sound changed as the welding rig went to work. The status panel read “COMMENCING WELD OP.” Eventually the noise quieted and the panel read “ELECTROMAGNET ON” and “VACUUM PUMP OFF.” Pacino tried gently budging the mine, and fortunately, it seemed to be holding fast to the Omega hull. The status panel changed to read, “ELECTROMAGNET OFF.” The mine still seemed to be holding.
“Arm it, Patch,” Dankleff said from behind Pacino. Pacino went to the control panel’s arming section and selected “ARM FOR SONAR SIGNAL.” He pressed the “YES” key and the unit again asked whether he were sure he wanted to do that, and again he pressed “YES.” In a moment the panel flashed green, the text reading “ARMED FOR SONAR SIGNAL.”
“Well, U-Boat, our work here is done. I’m disconnecting the mine’s cable from the Mark 76. Fishman should be showing up by now,” Pacino said. “Maybe he and Boozy ran into trouble. Think we should swim over to them and see how they’re doing?”
“May as well. You sure this thing is attached well enough?”
“Yeah. This thing ain’t going anywhere,” Pacino said. “Take us under the hull to the port side, and watch out for any seawater suction grates.”
Captain First Rank Georgy Alexeyev motioned First Officer Ania Lebedev to a seat at his stateroom’s conference table.
“I’m thinking we get the
“Yes, sir.”
While Lebedev called in the other officers, Alexeyev’s tactical circuit phone buzzed. He answered it. “Captain.”
“Sir, Watch Officer. The engineer requests to conduct a steam generator blowdown and the supply officer requests permission to dump trash.”
“Very well. Conduct steam generator blowdowns and dump trash. Any other shallow operations you need?”
“No, sir. We have a good navigation fix and we’ve downloaded our intel files. No messages for us.”
“Fine. We’ll be generating the message to Northern Fleet Command in the next few minutes. Have the radiomen ready to transmit it.”
“Aye, sir, understood.”
Alexeyev looked up to find Sergei Kovalov and his second-in-command Vlasenko coming into the room. Alexeyev waved them to seats as Navigator Maksimov and Communications Officer Shvets came in. Shvets shut the stateroom door.
“Shvets, you get our position from central?” Alexeyev asked the comms officer.
“Sir, yes, sir.”
