“Damage control!” Emelyanov gripped the intercom mike like a lifeline.
Around him the bridge crew was slowly stirring again. The lights flickered a
few times before the backup generators came on line. “Report!”
“He is damaged in the engine room. Stern compartments flooded.” The
damage-control officer was shouting the report over a confused hubbub of
background noise. “We have lost the screw and the towed array. Flooding is
contained, but we must get him to the surface.”
The torpedo must have hit just as the sub began to turn away, Emelyanov
thought. Had it hit forward, it might have taken the torpedo room. The
secondary explosions would probably have finished the sub then and there.
Not that they were in much better shape this way. Staying submerged was
a certain death sentence … but surfacing now, with an American sub hunter
still in the area, was just as bad.
But if even a few of the men would get off before the Americans destroyed
the boat, it would be worth it. Perhaps they would even accept a surrender.
In any event Emelyanov was not going to throw lives away in a useless gesture
of defiance when there was a chance some of the hands might survive.
“Emergency surface,” he said harshly.
“Surface! Surface!” Captain-Lieutenant Shvachko repeated slowly. The
starpom looked dazed but otherwise unhurt. His beefy hand gripped a steel
support that had come loose from the chart table, and he was looking at it
with a startled expression, as if he didn’t recognize what it was. But his
experience and professionalism were still unshaken despite his obvious
confusion. “Blow all tanks! Surface!”
“You don’t mean to surrender, Captain?” Dobrotin broke in, sounding
groggy. He had hit his head on the chart table in the instant of the
torpedo’s impact, and there was a smear of blood on his forehead. The blow
hadn’t dimmed the fanatic light in his eyes. “We must fight!”
Emelyanov shrugged. “I invite your suggestions, Comrade Zampolit,” he
said reasonably. “Our opponent is an American aircraft, and we cannot reach
him. Our propeller is ruined. We cannot escape. And remaining submerged
will put an unbearable strain on the hull, which is already weakened. How do
you propose that we fight? With Marxist rhetoric perhaps?”
“We are officers of the Red Banner Fleet. Surrender is a betrayal of the
Rodina!” Dobrotin took an unsteady step toward him. “You are relieved,
Captain.”
“Perhaps the blow to your head has hurt you more than we first thought,”
Emelyanov said in the same reasonable tones. He gave a single sharp nod.
Shvachko took a step forward, raising the hand that still gripped the
metal support. It slammed down across the back of the zampolit’s head.
Dobrotin sagged to the deck. Unconscious or dead, it didn’t really matter.
At least he was silent now.
“Idiot,” Emelyanov said. He spat. “Come on, you landsmen, look alive!
Surface!” He looked toward the communications shack. “Can you broadcast a
surrender, starshina?”
The radioman was the one who had been on duty when the orders came in.
Emelyanov remembered his excitement. He shoved the thought from his mind and
concentrated on the man’s reply. “Radio is out, Comrade Captain! I cannot
trace the fault!”
That meant they would not be able to call off the Americans if they were
waiting for the attack boat to surface. The Soviets would have to abandon
ship and hope the enemy didn’t attack until the life rafts were clear.
Emelyanov looked across at Shvachko. “Make preparations to abandon ship,
Comrade Starpom.” They were the most difficult words he had ever spoken.
The stricken submarine rose through the dark waters slowly, awkwardly.
Now he had two enemies to fear … the unseen Americans, and time.
0934 hours Zulu (0934 hours Zone)
Viking 704
Northeast of the Faeroe Islands
“There she is!” It was the pilot who was pointing this time, and
Magruder squinted into the morning sunlight. The submarine broke the surface
slowly. Even Tombstone’s untrained eye could pick out the clues to her
state–the decks almost awash, the stern lower in the water than the bow, the
plume of smoke that poured from a hatch aft of the low, narrow conning tower