Final option, p.27
Final Option, page 27
After a moment, a voice came over the loudspeakers in accented English. But the accent sounded Russian, not Spanish. “This is the Chilean Navy ship Abtao. Shut down your engines and prepare to be boarded for inspection.”
Jefferson gaped at Vargas, astonished by the command. She took the mic from the XO.
“Abtao, this is Captain Rashonda Jefferson of the Deepwater. We have authorization from the Chilean government to conduct a research mission here. For what purpose do you want to board us?”
The Abtao emerged from behind the island, and Jefferson could see a 76mm gun on her foredeck. It was aimed directly at them. Men were manning two 20mm Oerlikon cannons that were also pointed in the direction of the Deepwater.
“Deepwater, we have reports of smugglers operating in this area. As you must be aware, the Chilean Navy has the absolute right to inspect any vessel operating in Chilean waters.”
The Abtao came to a stop in front of the mid-channel island next to a glacier that ended at the water’s edge. It was at point-blank range, bristling with menace.
Jefferson turned to Vargas. “What is going on here?”
“I have no idea. The Coast Guard should be in charge of stopping ships for inspection, not the Navy.”
Jefferson handed her the microphone. “You were in the Coast Guard. Explain that to them.”
Vargas spoke in rapid Spanish.
The response came back in English and ignored whatever Vargas said. “I repeat, prepare to be boarded.”
Vargas shook her head. “I told them who I was and asked them to check with the Coast Guard about our mission. It’s very strange that they didn’t respond in Spanish.” Her brow furrowed and her eyes widened. “Wait a minute. The Abtao isn’t scheduled to go into service for six weeks. I know because her home port is supposed to be Punta Arenas. Something is wrong.”
“New contact, Captain,” the XO said. “Another ship to the north behind the Abtao.”
“A second Navy ship?”
“I don’t know. But it’s much bigger. I’d say five hundred feet long.”
She raised the binoculars again and caught a glimpse of a dilapidated steamer before it, too, disappeared behind the island.
The name on the bow read PORTLAND.
Now she was even more confused. A ship that size in these channels was nearly suicidal. And why was it following the Navy ship?
“This is absolutely absurd,” Jefferson said, snatching the mic back and speaking into it. “Abtao, I’m calling NUMA, and they will contact your government to confirm who we are. We all need to get out of here before that fog covers us.”
She turned to the XO. “Get NUMA headquarters on the line.”
As the XO picked up the satellite phone, Jefferson saw fire spit from one of the Oerlikon cannons.
She shoved Vargas to the deck and yelled, “Everyone get down!” just as the 20mm shells blasted the Deepwater’s superstructure.
55
Because the Portland was still behind the island, with no clear view of the Deepwater, Tate was watching the feed from the Abtao’s camera. The Oerlikon’s gunfire ripped into the satellite dish and antennae mounted on top of the bridge, blowing them to bits. Now there was no way for the ship to call for help.
“Good shooting, Durchenko,” Tate said into the radio.
“Thank you, Commander,” Durchenko replied.
He switched the comm channel to the boat garage.
“Is the assault team ready?” he asked Catherine Ballard, who was in charge of the boarding party.
“Li has the RHIB ready to go,” Ballard answered. “Shouldn’t take us long to get over there. I’m not expecting any resistance, but we’re set if they’re foolish enough to try.”
“Excellent,” Tate said with a grin. The ambush had gone exactly as planned. “As soon as Durchenko has disabled their ship, head on over.”
“Can’t wait.”
He switched back to the Abtao. “Durchenko, take out the engine room. We don’t want them trying to escape into that fog. But remember, we want hostages, so don’t use your 76mm gun and sink her by accident.”
“Aye, Commander.”
The Portland was now rounding the edge of the island, so Tate had the main view screen in the op center switch to a view of both the Abtao and the Deepwater. The man on the Oerlikon swung its aim over to the Deepwater’s stern and began to pour shells into the hull.
Tate was capturing it all on video, a rogue Chilean Navy ship destroying an American research vessel. He wanted to see the CIA make sense of that.
The NUMA ship was turning, so the engine obviously hadn’t been disabled yet. However, it would only take a few more seconds of concentrated fire to tear the engine room completely apart.
The Abtao didn’t get the chance. An Exocet missile shrieked out of the fog and smashed into the bow of the Chilean boat. The resulting explosion was so powerful that it ripped the 76mm gun off its mount and shredded the men on the Oerlikons. The bridge’s windows shattered, and the hull was set aflame.
Tate leaped out of his chair. “What just happened?”
The missile boat began to take on water through the gaping hole in its front. It would go down quickly. Durchenko must have realized the boat was lost. He fired all four of his Harpoon anti-ship missiles at the same time that a second Exocet lanced out of the mist. It struck the Abtao amidships, breaking it in two. The bow end capsized while the stern settled into the water. They’d both be gone within a minute.
None of the four Harpoons targeted the Deepwater. Instead, they disappeared into the fog where the Exocets had come from.
The Deepwater’s screws were churning water behind it. It was about to escape into that same fog.
Tate screamed at Farouk, who was gawking at the screen. “Engage the sonic disruptor! We’re going to stop them one way or the other.”
The Egyptian engineer nodded. “Engaging the weapon.”
As he said it, a familiar shape loomed out of the mist like a nightmare. Tate recognized the distinctive bow of the Oregon.
The front of the ship was on fire, and there was a hole in the deck where the Exocets were launched from. The forward crane was dangling over the side. Still, with all that damage, she steamed forward like a juggernaut.
She passed the Deepwater and turned smartly to shield the NUMA ship, protecting it from the effects of the sonic disruptor. Obviously, the weapon was not having the desired effect on the Oregon.
“Fire our Exocets!” Tate yelled at the weapons officer.
“At which ship?”
“Both ships, you idiot!”
“Firing.”
Four Exocets leaped from launchers in rapid succession. Two streaked toward the Oregon, the others toward the Deepwater, which was now moving away from the Portland at top speed.
The Oregon’s Gatling guns emerged from hidden positions, and the six-barreled weapons began unleashing three thousand rounds per minute. The heavy tungsten tracer shells homed in on the missiles. Two of the Exocets were shot down halfway to their targets. One slammed into the bridge of the Oregon and erupted in a huge fireball.
Tate cursed because he knew there was nothing of value on the bridge. It was merely an observation post and decoy used for fooling visitors. Juan and his command crew were nestled deep within the ship in the op center, protected by the ship’s armor cladding just like he was.
The fourth missile shot past the Oregon and looked like it might take out the Deepwater before it could get away, but the Gatling gun on the opposite side of the Oregon blew it apart moments from impact.
The Deepwater was swallowed by the fog. At the same time, the Abtao’s two sections went down in a swirl of white water and foam. There was no sign of survivors.
Tate was furious. Unlike Juan, whose own anti-ship missile launcher looked too damaged to function, Tate could fire another spread of missiles. That was a futile tactic. They’d probably be shot down just like the last ones.
“Prepare to launch torpedoes at the Oregon!” Tate shouted. “I want that ship sunk!”
56
In the Oregon’s op center, Juan couldn’t get comfortable in his command chair. The sonic disruptor was setting his teeth on edge and making his skin crawl, like he’d had sixteen cups of coffee, and everyone around him looked just as uneasy. But they weren’t going crazy. Murph and Julia’s hull vibration solution to partially neutralize the acoustic weapon seemed to be working.
For the last two days, they’d been traveling at maximum speed to intercept the Portland before she reached her target, yet it wasn’t fast enough. Juan had been planning to surprise the Portland as she came through the islands. He was just going to wait until he saw her bow pass by as he hid in a cove, slamming four torpedoes into her before Tate knew the Oregon was anywhere near him. The planned sneak attack wasn’t sporting, which was exactly the point. Juan would have been very happy to send the Portland to the bottom without her firing a shot.
The radio traffic they overheard between the Deepwater and the Abtao changed everything. Juan recognized Durchenko’s voice from when he’d been held captive on the Portland. He couldn’t let the NUMA ship be taken by Tate. It would have changed everything. Juan ordered the Oregon into the fog using the ship’s LiDAR system to guide them through the narrow straits. As soon as they had a lock on the missile boat, he fired.
Unfortunately, so did Durchenko. Three of the Harpoons missed, but one of them made a direct hit on the Oregon’s missile launcher. It would take days to fix it even if it were in dry dock.
The rest of the damage report wasn’t much better. The same blast that took out the launcher also destroyed the controls for the torpedo countermeasures. And although the bridge in the superstructure was cosmetic only, the explosion from the Exocet also wiped out the radar atop it so any range-finding would have to be done manually. Luckily, the LiDAR was still operational, so they could disappear back into the fog after they’d given cover for the Deepwater to escape.
“Murph,” Juan said, “launch two torpedoes at the Portland.”
“Aye, Chairman,” Murph replied. “Torpedoes away.”
On-screen, Juan could see the torpedoes ejected from the launchers and splash into the water.
“Two minutes to target,” Murph said.
“Hali, what is the Deepwater’s status?”
“Her engines are severely damaged,” Hali replied. “Captain Jefferson says they’re limping along. No way they can make it all the way back to Punta Arenas without effecting repairs.”
“Tell her to take shelter where she can, and we’ll try to keep the Portland away from her.”
“Aye, Chairman.”
Hali was in secure radio contact with Jefferson. Although she couldn’t call out for help on the satellite link, she still had an operational short-range radio on board. The disabled satellite dish didn’t matter anyway. By the time any Chilean Navy ships could arrive, this would all be over, one way or the other.
Once the Deepwater was past the island, she could turn in any one of multiple directions, making it difficult for the Portland to find her.
But they had to give her time.
“Chairman,” Hali said, his tone urgent. “I just got a call from the Deepwater that the sonobuoy they installed in this channel is detecting two unknown high-pitched signals heading our way. At the speed they’re going, they’ll hit us in one minute.”
“Torpedoes,” Juan said. It was the drawback Murph had warned him about when he modified the sonar to counteract the sonic disruptor. They were blind to anything coming at them from under the water.
“Thirty more seconds for ours,” Murph said. “The Portland is backing behind that small island and has released countermeasures.”
Juan pounded his armrest in frustration. Those were exactly the tactics he would take himself, except he didn’t have the cover of an island to hide behind and he couldn’t deploy his audio decoys to lure the torpedoes away from the Oregon because they had been destroyed by the Abtao’s Harpoon missile.
Tate’s gambit worked. The Oregon’s torpedoes impacted harmlessly against the island, blasting chunks of rocks off the cliff that tumbled into the water in a minor avalanche.
There was one advantage to the Portland withdrawing behind the island. Juan could no longer feel the sonic disruptor’s effect ricocheting through his brain.
Murph’s jury-rigged version of the same weapon tied to the Oregon’s sonar, however, was ready to deploy.
“Murph,” Juan said. “See if you can disrupt the passive sonars on those torpedoes.”
“Activating it now.”
The sonar dome was now blasting out a signal that should cause the torpedoes’ sensors to malfunction. Theoretically.
“Stoney, move us out of the direct path the torpedoes would have been taking.”
Eric took a deep breath and said, “Not much room to maneuver in here, but I’ll see what I can do.”
He eased the Oregon over toward the closest island as near to it as he dared. The Portland’s torpedoes ran too deep to spot them visually, so the only way to know they’d missed would be by seeing them explode. Hopefully, far away.
A geyser erupted by the shore opposite to them. Murph’s disruptor had worked, causing the weapon to swerve off course.
But it didn’t work the same way on the second torpedo. It must have swung in the other direction because it exploded off the Oregon’s port bow, rocking the ship from water hammer effect. Juan had to grip his chair to keep from falling out.
Alarms went off, indicating a hull breach.
“Closing watertight doors in sections three, five, and seven,” Max called out as calmly as he could. “I’ve lost engine power in the port venturi tube, and maneuvering thrusters have been damaged. Flooding starboard ballast tanks to compensate for the portside flooding.”
With the Oregon severely wounded, they couldn’t wait any longer to give the Deepwater more of a head start. Juan had to get the Oregon out of there before the Portland could take another shot at them. But if they simply made a dash into the fog, the Portland would run them down before the Oregon could lose her.
What Juan wouldn’t give for some kind of roadblock . . .
His eyes snapped to the mid-channel island separating them from the Portland. It was only a matter of time before she came back around the island, and she had to take the port side because the starboard side was far too cramped for her to squeeze through.
But it was the remnants of the avalanche that caught Juan’s attention. He looked at the glacier flowing into the narrowest part of the channel. The ice came right down to the water’s edge.
“Murph,” he said. “I want you to fire two more torpedoes. But the target isn’t the Portland. I want you to hit that glacier dead center. Run them as shallow as possible.”
Murph followed Juan’s gaze and nodded when he understood what Juan was going for.
He tapped new coordinates into the computer and said, “Torpedoes away.”
As the Portland began to emerge from behind the island, the torpedoes sped toward the glacier, the propellers leaving bubbles churning behind in their wake just below the surface.
Fifteen seconds later, they blew up right beneath the part of the glacier that overhung the channel, causing massive chunks of ice to collapse into the water. The explosions set off a chain reaction that cleaved huge bergs off the glacier, blocking the path that the Portland would have to take. Even with her armored hull, ramming them could tear sizable holes in the ship.
Juan had to hope Tate wouldn’t take that chance. He would back out of the channel and go around the island to try to cut Juan off. By that time, Juan was betting he could disappear into the vast labyrinth of channels and fjords within the National Reserve.
“Stoney, get us out of here.”
Eric rotated the Oregon and steered her back in the direction she had come. Before the Portland could fully reappear from behind the island, the Oregon limped away into the fogbank.
57
Tate knew he had badly damaged the Oregon, and now he just needed to finish her off. But with the icebergs that Cabrillo threw in his path, he had to dash around the island by a different route to catch him. The longer course, coupled with the dense fog, meant that when he arrived at the other end of the channel, the Oregon and the Deepwater were gone.
He was now poring over a map of the area in the op center with Ballard, trying to plan their next move.
“Maybe we should wait for the Oregon or the Deepwater to come out of the Reserve,” Ballard suggested. “If they’re as damaged as you think they are, we could easily destroy them in the open ocean.”
“I don’t think, I know. You saw how the Oregon was listing right before it vanished in the fog. At least one of the torpedoes hit.”
“Then let’s wait—”
Tate slammed his palm against the screen. “No! We don’t know how long it will take for Juan to make repairs or if he’s called someone to come help him. We have to find him now.”
Ballard shook her head at the map. The intricate web of channels, fjords, and coves provided too many places for the Oregon to hide.
“But the Abtao is gone. Even with the Wuzong coming, our advantage is cut by a third. We can retreat and try this again another time.”
Tate rounded on her, enraged. “Are you insane or just stupid? We hit the Oregon three separate times with torpedoes and missiles. And we have a Chinese diesel-electric sub on our side. We’ll never get another chance like this. You haven’t shown a lack of nerve before. Don’t start now.”
Ballard looked around the op center to see Farouk and Li giving her embarrassed sideways glances, then she turned back to Tate and glared at him. Tate didn’t care. She needed to grow a pair.
