Submarine on the Edge of Eternity

By Storm

Follows several years after the story Bugs on the Wall. Fourth in the series.

Captain Second Rank Igor Britanov looked at his orders with a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach, though his face revealed no trace of his consternation. He’d just been transferred from command of his Victor II attack boat into command of a boomer. Normally that was a step up. But the boat he was being transferred into this cold November day was an aging NAVAGA class boat, what the West called a Yankee-1. It was hardly a promotion.

The boat in question was the K-219. He remembered with a shiver the first time he’d really noticed him.

It had been five years ago, in 1980, when he had just been promoted to XO of K-244, a relatively new Delta class boomer. Something had happened on the way to the docks that first day, something that had changed his life. He’d found himself standing in the middle of the street, unable to recall what had just happened, but left with the feeling that it was momentous. As he’d wandered, almost distracted on down to the docks, his eyes had fallen on K-219 coming into the base. He’d gotten a cold shiver of premonition, strong enough that the next time he’d gone to sea, he’d surreptitiously made an offering to the powers of the sea to keep him safe.

Now here he was again - and he was supposed to be his captain! He felt like swearing, but with the Northern Fleet Base commander standing in front of him that was not an option. All he could do was salute and mouth something about being proud to serve. And then leave to go take formal command of his new boat.

All the way to the docks his mind was in a daze. He’d known for years now that he was a pawn in someone else’s game, but this! They had maneuvered him into command of a creaky, unsafe ballistic missile submarine that was probably more dangerous to his own crew than he was to his nation’s enemies. What was he supposed to do now? Write out his will and kiss his wife and children goodbye? He couldn’t help but shake his head in dismay.

He approached the docks with trepidation. K-219 lay moored with his starboard side to the pier. Pausing, he studied him. At four hundred and twenty six feet long, he had a beam of just over thirty nine feet. Powered by two reactors, new he’d have been capable of twenty seven knots. He knew he couldn’t do that now on his best day. His black hull held sixteen missile silos - but he only carried fifteen missiles. His eyes strayed to the number sixteen muzzle hatch. Welded shut. It was no secret that K-219 had suffered an explosion in that silo just a few years after he was launched. A leak in the seal had allowed sea water to flow in, mixing with a pool of nitrogen tetroxide, forming nitric acid. That in turn had eaten into a pressurized hydrazine line, allowing the two components that made up the missile’s fuel to mix. What had followed was an instant explosion in the silo that had resulted in the death of one sailor and enough damage to flood the missile bay. It was a wonder that he hadn’t been sunk.

Britanov couldn’t help but sigh as he wondered what sort of rejects he was going to have to whip into shape to try and sail this beast. Favored officers got the new boats. Obviously, he was now on somebody’s shit list. Well, there was nothing left to do except put the best face he could on it. Squaring his shoulders, he marched himself smartly down to the gangplank and requested permission to board.

The head that popped out of the main sail hatch was the first piece of good news he’d had all day.

“Igor Kurdin,” he laughed, “who did you piss off to wind up here?”

“Probably the same asshole you did if you’re our new captain,” came the cheery response. “I have the dubious honor of being your starpom on this beast.”

Britanov shook his head. At least he had one competent officer. “So who’s Chief Engineer? ”

“Krasilnikov.”

“Are you serious?” asked Britanov in surprise. What Igor Krasilnikov didn’t know about NAVAGA boats wasn’t worth knowing. “So who’s Main Propulsion Assistant?”

“Gennady Kapitulsky.”

Britanov couldn’t believe his ears. Kapitulsky was one of the best propulsion engineers in the Northern Fleet. To have two such qualified men on K-219 was a gift from the gods that communists weren‘t supposed to believe in. “What is he doing here?”

“He said he likes a challenge,” came the dry reply.

K-219 would certainly be that, thought Britanov to himself. “I’m certainly happy to have both of them. So who have we got as Security Officer?”

“Valery Pshenichny - and he’s a qualified watch officer.”

KGB - and a submariner? It was almost unheard of. He felt a thin trickle of unease at his sudden reversal of fortune. He had a boat that should have been scrapped years ago - yet his senior officers were some of the best in the fleet. Just what sort of madness was going on here? He shivered with a sudden sense of premonition that the game that had been moving around him for the past five years had now begun a countdown of some sort.

Still, he had a submarine to command and he’d best get to it.

*****************

Lee Crane eyed the pile of paper on his desk and sighed. No wonder Nelson had wanted so desperately for someone else to take over much of the day to day running of the Institute. When Crane’s promotion to one star admiral had come through two years ago, much to his own surprise, the job had fallen to him. He sighed again. Now that Voyager was in service, they had twice the paperwork as before. Chip helped as much as he could, but as Voyager’s skipper, he really didn’t have the time.

Neither did Crane. He was still serving as Seaview’s captain as well as de facto Director of the Nelson Institute. He had more time than Chip did though - Harriman Nelson was out of favor with the current administration in Washington, so not nearly so many jobs came Seaview’s way as had in times past. That helped. He’d also hired a full time administrative assistant of his own to support Angie. That also helped. But the hard fact was there just weren’t enough hours in the day to do both jobs.

He threw his pen down on the desk in exasperation. The new XO he’d hired for Seaview less than a month ago wasn’t really helping matters either. When Chip had first begun to work full time on the Voyager project three years earlier, Bobby O’Brien had taken on the task of Seaview’s XO and he‘d fit right in. But then this past summer Bobby’s youngest child had proved to be autistic and he’d asked for a shore position. The request had been granted. Unfortunately, replacing him was proving to be … challenging.

Crane got up to pace. At least his new COB was working out. He had to grin to himself there. When Sharkey had retired six months ago his one parting piece of advice to his captain had been that he should promote Kowalski to replace him. It had been very good advice, he’d found, for Ski was working out very well as senior Chief on the boat.

A knock on the door interrupted his thoughts.

“Enter,” he growled, not entirely happy about being disturbed.

A blond head poked around the doorway, blue eyes apprehensive.

“Lieutenant Riley.” Crane sat back down at his desk, a somewhat bemused expression replacing his scowl. “Come on in, Stu. My bark is worse than my bite. It’s been one of those days.”

“Yes, sir, Admiral.” The young officer entered and grinned back at his former captain; these days he was an engineer on Voyager, much to the astonishment of many who’d once dismissed the young surfer who’d joined the crew in Lee’s second year of command as an airhead. Stu’s only major fault then had been that he was young; now with the maturity that comes only with experience, he’d settled into Chip’s crew like an old pro.

“So what brings you into the lion’s den today?” he asked.

“Captain Morton sent me over with a message, sir. He said to tell you that you and Admiral Nelson can expect an old friend to put in an appearance around lunchtime.”

Crane arched his eyebrows. “That’s it?”

Riley looked uncomfortable. “Yes, sir. That’s all he said.”

Crane rubbed his right temple. Such enigmatic messages usually meant only one thing; Seldar would be dropping by with an update.

“Okay, tell Captain Morton that we’ll meet in the usual place. It’s his turn to buy the pizza and beer.”

Riley blinked in surprise. He wasn’t privy to the events that had transpired five years ago - only Nelson, Crane, Morton and Doctor Jamieson knew of the second meeting with the Federation agent named Seldar. Crane could tell he’d been wondering if this was ONI business, but the reference to pizza and beer had confused him.

“If you say so, sir.” Riley rose to leave.

“That’s it?” Crane asked.

“Yessir.”

“Dismissed, then, Mr. Riley.”

Crane waited until the door had closed to pick up the phone and call down to the lab. One of Nelson’s assistants answered. It took a few moments for Nelson to come grumbling to the phone himself. He didn’t wait for the admiral to ask, he simply said, “Our red haired friend passed a message. He’ll be here for lunch. I told Chip it’s his turn to spring for pizza and beer.”

A snort of amusement echoed down the phone line. Seldar had proved to have a fondness for pizza that exceeded even Chip Morton’s - and his capacity for beer, given his small stature, was nothing less than astonishing. It had to be his metabolism. No human his size could have possibly consumed as much beer as he could without drinking themselves into a stupor. Seldar seemed to never get more than a slight buzz, no mater how much he drank.

“I’ll be there as soon as I give instructions to Dr. James on what I’m looking for in our next series of experiments,” Nelson told him.

Crane grunted; since it was just now only a little after 9:00 AM, that meant he’d show up shortly before noon and Seldar’s arrival. In the meantime, arrangements needed to be made.

****************

Seldar was sitting glumly in the rocking chair on the porch when the three officers arrived at the small beach house they’d set up as a contact point. The men looked at each other in dismay; Seldar in a funk meant something was going very badly.

“Is there something we can do immediately about the disaster?” Crane asked him as he stepped out of the car.

The alien stopped rocking and looked at him with all four eyes for a long moment, before sighing heavily and answering, “No. The deed is done.”

“In that case, let’s eat while the pizza is hot and discuss our options.” This came from Morton as he pulled the cooler with the beer out of the back seat of the car. “Lee, get those boxes will you. Cheese only is on top, Supreme on the bottom.”

Seldar’s dejected posture straightened at the mention of cheese pizza. “Beer?” he asked hopefully.

“Four cases,” Morton told him.

“Good. Try to get drunk today, I think I will.”

Crane and Nelson eyed each other in consternation. Over the past few years Seldar’s English had improved considerably. When he dropped back into the sort of backwards English he’d spoken when they first met him it meant things were really, really bad.

“What’s happened, Seldar?” asked Nelson softly.

“Final play of game, in motion is. No more help can Elders give. Up to Britanov, now is.”

“How bad is it?” asked Crane.

“Change of command he has. No more Victor II. Is Yankee-1. Old boat - damaged boat. Leaky, dangerous boat.” Seldar hitched both pairs of shoulders to show his distress. “Already one explosion boat has had. Sailor died. Fire in missile bay. Bad, very bad.”

“An old boomer?!” exclaimed Morton, stopping in his tracks, dread written in his posture.

Suddenly the true extent of the looming disaster became clear to Crane. Things could have been dicey enough when the Chaos Lords were playing with a nuclear powered attack boat. But a boomer! And one that was in less than optimal condition at that. “My God,” he muttered to Nelson and Morton, “they’re trying for a nuclear accident. Maybe even a nuclear war.”

Seldar nodded unhappily. “Only good part is, Elders got him good engineers.”

“So now the game is to see if he can keep the boat in one piece?” Crane thought about it for a moment, then shook his head. “That’s too simple. There has to be another player, someone we’ve missed.”

“Someone to set up an accident or a confrontation?” asked Morton. “But that would mean…”

Nelson finished the sentence for him. “The other player is most likely an American. Probably the captain of an attack boat. Somebody who’s too eager, too ready to push the envelope, too willing to be reckless.”

“Is there anything the Elders can do at this point?” asked Crane.

Seldar shook his head. “Not and maintain peace. To interfere now would invite a war between the two factions. Even worse that would be.”

The three officers looked at each other glumly. Over the years Seldar had filled them in on the uneasy balance of power between the Elders of Light and the Chaos Lords. Like the Cold War between the US and Soviet Union, where both sides were too evenly matched to slug it out toe to toe in a conventional war - and a nuclear war would insure destruction of the entire planet - the two factions of Elders were also caught up in a similar scenario. So like the US and USSR, the war was by proxy, with the Lords of Light interfering as much as they could to interrupt the Chaos Lord’s deadly games - but only to a point. Beyond that point the players were on their own.

They’d reached that point in the current game. Now it was up to Britanov to pull the rabbit out of the proverbial hat. They hoped he was up to it, because now it was just a matter of time before the fate of the entire world hinged on his actions.

********************

Igor Britanov listened to his Weapons Officer swearing like a madman over the intercom and sighed. The past two months on K-219 had been both frustrating and illuminating. Now here they were, on the surface of the Barents Sea in the middle of January, trying to do a live-fire launch into the test range near Novaya Zemlya - and the boat was doing his very best to not cooperate. Petrachkov had been working for hours now, trying to get the recalcitrant missile to launch with little result to show for his frantic efforts.

A sudden exultant “Aha!” caught his attention. He lifted the kashtan microphone - one of dozens that hung from the overhead - to his lips. “Petrachkov?”

“I think I’ve got it, Captain. Let’s see if this bastard will launch now.”

Finally! Britanov motioned to his other officers in the crowded and incredibly noisy Central Command Post - what the Americans called the Control Room. As he surreptitiously crossed his fingers, they once more began a countdown.

This time the missile roared away, accompanied by cheers and sighs of relief. Britanov could only sigh. There’d be more than the usual nit picking when they got back to the Soviet Northern Fleet base at Gadzhievo. But at least they had finally gotten the missile to fire. It would have been far worse if they’d had to go back totally unsuccessful.

The Missile Bay intercom buzzed. He again lifted the mike to his lips. “Yes, Petrachkov?”

“Captain….,” there was a heavy sigh, “Captain, I can’t get the damned missile hatch to close.”

Britanov closed his eyes and mentally cursed. If the hatch wouldn’t close, they couldn’t submerge - and they had already gotten warnings about worsening weather conditions. That meant they’d have to battle their way home on the surface right into the teeth of a winter gale. He rubbed both temples, feeling a headache coming on. K-219 handled like a log on the surface in good weather; he shuddered to think how he’d handle under the conditions they’d be facing if Petrachkov couldn’t get the hatch closed. There’d probably more than one sailor puking his guts up before they got back to Gadzhievo.

“Do what you can,” he told the Weapons Officer. Turning to the helmsmen, he ordered a change of course that would head them back to base. Calling the Chief Engineer, Krasilnikov, he relayed the bad news. “I want to head back now, on the surface, at the best speed we can make,” he told him. His answer was a sigh. Britanov knew why - the old boat’s reactors were touchy and unpredictable. Push them too hard and the results might be catastrophic. Or merely embarrassing. K-219 had a penchant for keeping them guessing.

As time passed it became obvious that no matter what Petrachkov did, the missile hatch wasn’t going to close. The temperature was dropping, the wind was rising, and with it, the height of the waves. The boat was starting to heave madly; the crew was hanging on to anything they could. He called the watch on the bridge down and climbed up himself; he needed to see the waves to be able to instruct the helmsmen on the course to best meet them, otherwise there was a good possibility K-219 might get heeled over on his side. With the open missile hatch that could be a disaster.

He closed the sail hatch behind him and looked out at the churning sea. Their last meteorological report had the wind at almost forty knots, gusting to fifty. The waves were running almost five meters - twenty feet - high. These were conditions that would be bad for any small craft and uncomfortable on many large ones. For a nuclear submarine they were madness.

He soon realized the sea spray was starting to freeze on contact to anything it touched; the hull of the boat, skin, clothing. Within moments he was coated with a rime of ice. Fortunately he was well bundled up under his oilskins, or he would have frozen to death in a matter of minutes. Bracing himself against the heaving motion of the boat, he began his vigil.

For the next five hours K-219 battled his way on the surface of the sea, while Britanov stood alone on the open bridge, with both the sail and himself accumulating a thickening coat of ice. Finally the gale began to abate and as the wind and waves lessened, so did the corkscrewing motion of the boat. When it reached the point where Britanov felt it might be safe for him to go below and post the regular watch back on the bridge, he found he couldn’t move at all.

Fortunately he’d left the intercom open. “Igor,” he grunted painfully, “come up here and help me.”

In less than a minute his starpom poked his head out of the sail hatch and gaped in astonishment at the sight of his captain frozen immobile in a position uncannily like that of a religious icon.

“Isn’t that carrying your little sign a bit too far, Captain?” Kurdin asked dryly after calling for buckets of hot water to try and free Britanov from his icy prison.

Britanov snorted, or rather, tried to. His moustache had frozen along with his oilskins. He knew the sign Kurdin was referring to - he’d skirmished with the worm of a political officer Sergiyenko over it from the first day he’d hung it in the CCP. It said SUBMARINE LIFE IS NOT A SERVICE, BUT A RELIGION. Sergiyenko had disapproved; Britanov had told him to mind his own business. Since the KGB Security Officer had declined to object, the plaque stayed.

The first buckets of hot water began arriving. As his starpom and men worked to free him, Britanov found himself wondering if this was a glimpse of things to come. If so, life on K-219 would be many things, but dull would never be among them.

***************

Lee Crane put down the report that Seldar had given him and tried to control the expression on his face. He looked over at Morton; his expression was vacillating between disbelief, astonishment and outright laughter.

Laughter won. “That,” said Morton, shaking a finger at him, “is just the sort of damn fool stunt you would pull!”

As much as Crane wanted to object, he knew he couldn’t, because what his friend had just said was completely true. In Britanov’s place, he would have done exactly the same thing. He could only shrug wryly as Nelson smiled and shook his head, himself on the verge of laughter. Not because the situation was in itself funny, but because in so many ways Lee Crane and Igor Britanov were so much alike. Although Crane did have to admit, the pictures they had of K-219’s captain frozen in place - and his XO’s comment - were funny, now that the crisis was past. But like Britanov, they had to wonder what the future would bring.

********************

Igor Britanov stood on K-219’s bridge as he once more made his way down the channel on his way out to sea, escorted by a pair of tugs. In another two months he would have had command for a full year, but this three month voyage was being made without his experienced starpom Kurdin. He sighed. Only time would tell if his new officer in the position, Sergei Vladmirov, would prove as reliable.

Making the last turn in the twisty fjord that led to Gadzhievo, the rolling waves of the open sea began to lift the submarine in their swell. One of the tugboat captains leaned out of his wheelhouse, hand raised in question. Britanov waved back and saluted, effectively dismissing the pair of tugs. They both turned and headed back down the sheltered channel, leaving K-219 on his own. As snow closed in around them, even the land disappeared, leaving the submarine isolated in a world of grey. Once they’d passed the first sea buoy, the boat would dive; it would be ninety days - the first week of December - before they’d breath fresh air or see the sun again. Giving one last look around before going below, he thought again on his orders. Mad they were, but he supposed necessary. K-219 was to patrol off the coast of the northeastern United States.

It would take all of his skills to keep the noisy old boomer from being tailed by the Americans. The first task would be to run the gauntlet of specially equipped American INTEL submarines that would be lurking on the bottom off the coast, listening for any vessel exiting or entering Soviet ports. That they would hear K-219 leave was a given. There was nothing he could do about it - ports were rather fixed in their positions. Then he’d have to get across the SOSUS line in the Greenland-Iceland-UK gap. But later, once he’d reached the open waters of the Atlantic - well, the ocean was a big place in which to hide, even for a boat as noisy as K-219. Britanov might have a trick or two up his sleeve that would surprise even the Americans.

Britanov checked to make sure the hatch was sealed, then descended into the CCP. The first dive of the voyage was always nerve-wracking. K-219 whooshed as air was expelled from the ballast tanks to be replaced by water. As pressure increased, the hull creaked and groaned. The tension in the CCP was palpable, especially among the newest crew members. An especially loud pop made the new starpom jump and turn his head to find Chief Engineer Krasilnikov with a broken pencil, laughing. At thirty-nine, the Chief Engineer was the oldest man on the boat, and known as Grandfather by the crew. It helped to reduce the tension when Vladmirov grinned back sheepishly.

Britanov took the course from the Navigator and had the helm set, then ordered Damage Control to have all compartments report. All reported promptly, except compartment four. The missile bay. Damage Control called again.

************

The Weapons Officer, Petrachkov, was on the horns of a dilemma. Silo six had shown a leak when they’d first submerged, but it had now slowed to a near stop. If he reported it, they’d have to turn around and go back and be delayed who knew how long. No, he’d say nothing, just keep an eye on the silo.

“Compartment four, manned and ready,” he reported.

***************

Two weeks into the patrol, K-219 arrived at a point two days sail from his patrol zone. Britanov ordered a thin wire unreeled from its fairing at the stern of the sub. Know as the “rectal probe”, it was in fact a sophisticated thermometer to measure the temperature of the sea, something of no small concern to a submarine. Different water temperatures in the ocean tend to indicate layers of differing salinity - and differences in salinity change the acoustical properties of the layers of water, so a sub in one layer is much more difficult to detect from another layer. Deep cold water is very transparent to sound, so what K-219’s captain was searching for were the warm waters of the Gulf Stream. In the right conditions, even a noisy old beast like K-219 could hide from his enemies.

They found the outer edge of the warm water and began edging in. Once it had reached a thickness of ninety meters, Britanov ordered a dive; they would just skim along the bottom until the current was one hundred meters thick, then go through, cut the engines and drift, listening. Then he would turn south and with the engines producing just enough power to match the speed of the current, hover in place. He suspected there was an American attack boat in the vicinity.

He didn’t know how right he was.

The closing phase of the Game was now in motion.

As K-219 rode the Gulf Stream, he picked up the acoustic signature of the Los Angeles class submarine that had been tracking him. As Britanov had planned, the other boat had lost them in the thermocline. Expecting the boomer to continue moving, the American captain had taken up a position where he expected her to come out of the current.

He didn’t. As the American sub searched on him passive systems, Britanov ordered a single ping of the sonar, just to let the cocky American know that the tables could be turned. The bright green spike on K-219’s sonar vanished; the American sub had retreated. Britanov grinned at his exuberant crew - sneaking up on a Los Angeles class sub was something that didn’t happen every day.

Had he known that the captain of the sub he’d just flushed signed his dispatches as Caesar Augustus, he might have realized that the other captain’s ego wouldn’t allow the slight to go unchallenged. Britanov had just issued the equivalent of a slap in the face to his opponent.

It would come back to haunt him.

****************

Admiral Lee Crane was awakened by someone pounding on his door. He lifted his head, senses suddenly alert. Was something wrong with Seaview? He couldn’t detect anything amiss - Seaview was still riding on the surface just as she had been when he‘d turned in. Turning on the light by his bunk, he grabbed his robe, and stepped to the door. Opening it he found Chief Kowalski standing there with a message in his hand. It was from Nelson - and marked Urgent.

A cold chill went down his spine.

Kowalski handed him the message, face grave. “Admiral Nelson just sent this, sir. He told us to immediately inform you and have you call him back.”

“Thanks, Chief,” Crane told him, taking the message. Retreating to the sanctuary of his cabin, he closed the door and laid the message on his desk. It was encrypted, but the first line was a code he knew by heart. The information was from Seldar; for it to be delivered like this meant the final act of the Game was in progress.

He went to his wall safe and opened it, taking from within a small machine of Admiral Nelson’s own invention. Setting it on his desk, he plugged it into the outlet and as it powered up, lights went from red to green. Once all the indicators were green, he fed the message directly into the machine. It gently hummed as it scanned the paper; within seconds it began a soft staccato tapping as it printed out the decoded message. He was reading even as the print cleared the slot.

“Damn.” It was as he had feared. Things were happening in the North Atlantic. Grabbing a uniform, he hastily dressed. Heading to the radio room, he had the Communications Officer contact the Institute.

Nelson was waiting on his call. “How fast can you get to the North Atlantic, Lee?”

Crane looked over at the science mission specialists. They’d been sent up here to investigate unusually early thick ice in the Bering Strait that was blocking passage of all traffic through the area. Their current location was just south of Nome, Alaska.

Turning back to the vid screen he said with an unhappy grimace, “Admiral, the Strait is completely blocked. There’s no way Seaview can get through. We’d have to go south, around Cape Horn. That’s something like fourteen thousand nautical miles. It’d take us at least two weeks, if not more.”

At his words an angry hum suddenly echoed in his ears. Crane stood for a moment nonplused, then realized that it was Seaview herself that was angry, though not necessarily at him. Ah. He suspected that if he didn’t give the orders to try and get to Britanov, she’d do it on her own. He refocused to find Nelson looking at him with a perplexed expression. “I think if we don’t go, our Lady might just go without me,” he said with a wry smile.

Nelson closed his eyes and sighed. Crane knew the admiral was reluctant to accept Seldar’s theory that the boat was becoming self aware, but time had given credence to it, at least to him. She would now occasionally vocalize in a very limited fashion to him when no one else was around, though she seemed reluctant to show any of her abilities to Nelson, let alone speak. Chip Morton was the only other person she would respond openly to.

He thought she might let Britanov into her inner circle if they ever got him on board.

“Since it’s going to take us a while to get there, I’m going to ferry the science team ashore with the Flying Sub and let them continue their research from Nome.”

“Do what you think is best, Lee.” He could tell from Nelson’s troubled expression that he was remembering that they’d been told they would have to save Britanov. But from what was the big question.

“Do you have any more details on what’s happening, Admiral?”

“Umm.” Nelson reached for a sheet of paper. “The sub in question is the Augusta, commanded by…”

“Von Suskil,” said Crane tightly. It would be that lunatic.

Nelson looked up at the hard tone of Crane’s voice. “I take it you know him?”

“Unfortunately. Ever hear of Caesar Augustus?”

Nelson looked puzzled for a moment, then his eyes widened in comprehension. Immediately his expression darkened. “He does fit the profile, doesn’t he?”

“All too well. And from what you sent me in the message, Britanov suckered him good. He’ll definitely be back for a rematch and spoiling for a fight.”

“And if the fool sinks K-219, at the very least the summit talks will be cancelled. At worst…”

“World War III,” finished Crane grimly.

“I’ll see if I can shake some sense into anybody from this end. Do whatever you can to keep it from blowing up into a war, Lee.”

Returning to the control room, Crane issued rapid orders that brought all personnel topside scurrying below. Once all hands were accounted for and the hatches sealed, Crane ordered the great sub turned on a southerly heading. As she slid below the surface and picked up speed, Crane thought back to the day Seaview had first met Igor Britanov.

Seaview had been in the North Atlantic off the Norwegian coast when sonar had picked up a Soviet attack boat skulking around. Crane had already known who it was; it was his orders that had put them here, since Seldar had informed him of Britanov’s patrol sector and location days before. It was not out of his own curiosity, but Seaview‘s; she had displayed an unusual amount of interest in the Russian officer and had made it clear in her way hat that she be wanted to get a good look at him. Crane was curious to see what she thought of him, for Seaview had turned out to have an uncanny knack for identifying individuals that represented a threat to her or the members of her crew. So he’d given orders that would take them into Britanov’s patch of ocean.

The Victor II shouldn’t have had any idea they were there, but Britanov had turned with them, vexing Seaview’s duty crew. Seaview had, however, softly giggled in her own peculiar fashion, shocking him speechless. She only did that around people she really liked. Apparently Igor Britanov was one of those ‘special’ people.

After finding out that Britanov had been assigned to a new command, Seaview had insisted on going and checking out his new boat. At her reaction to K-219, Crane had briefly wondered if Seaview was going to grab the old boomer and forcibly remove her captain. He finally managed to talk her out of it, but his Lady had been upset for weeks about it - he’d come to realize that she considered it an insult to her Russian.

Her Russian. It had eventually become apparent that was how she thought of him and it had pretty well floored him when he’d finally realized it. It had flabbergasted Nelson when Crane had told him about it; the Admiral was still having trouble accepting the fact.

She’d encountered Von Suskil too. The year before, they’d gone into New London to pick up some equipment for a project they were doing for the Navy. Augusta had been in port and Von Suskil had come down to the pier where Seaview was berthed. She’d promptly bristled like a cat facing a pit bull and hissed. Literally. Von Suskil had remained blissfully unaware of the boat’s antipathy towards him, but the topside watch had all heard the sound. So did Crane. He’d hastened to the bridge from the control room to see what had upset his Lady. Upon seeing who was there, he’d felt like hissing himself. Von Suskil had been miffed when he didn’t get invited aboard, but with the boat showing such a strong dislike of the man, Crane hadn’t dared let him set foot on the deck for fear she’d do the idiot bodily damage.

Now he rather wished he’d let Seaview take her best shot - like dropping one of her sail planes on the fool’s head. He’d have explained it away somehow.

***************

Almost two weeks had passed since the encounter with the American attack boat. Britanov decided the time had come to shake things up a bit. If he was lucky, he might catch the Americans napping again; after all, they‘d had enough time to find K-219 for a second time. He turned to the crew in the CCP.

“Prepare for a Crazy Ivan.” As the starpom reached for the kashtan microphone, he added, “No, this is a warship. They should be ready for anything.”

The other officers eyed each other. Britanov must know what he was doing - after all, he’d caught the American sub earlier.

“Very well. Let us begin.”

Orders passed through the CCP; K-219 abruptly rolled into a steep powered dive as his screws thrashed furiously. He tilted like a jet, banking hard into a tight spiral turn.

It was a turn that would take him into disaster. As he dove abruptly deeper, he passed right under the Augusta - Britanov had been entirely correct that they’d been relocated - and the suction vortex between the two boats lifted the malfunctioning hatch cover on silo six, causing the seal to give way. A flood of water gushed in, drenching the missile. Alarms began to shriek. Gas. Petrachkov grabbed the mike and shouted to the CCP the news of the disaster. All thoughts of the American sub fled from Britanov’s mind. Only one thought dominated - K-219 had to get to the surface - now. He turned to the helmsman. “General Alarm! Make depth for fifty meters.” And then, “Battle Stations! Toxic gas in silo six! This is not a drill!” The sub was still driving for the surface when a massive boom resonated through the hull. Everything went black and the deck tilted down as the boat began to dive. Although Britanov didn’t know it, the missile hatch cover had been blown partially open. The boat was now taking on tons of water that was mixing with the missile fuel to form even more nitric acid.

“Planes full up!” ordered Britanov, but the boat refused to respond. “All ahead full!”

“Two hundred meters and still diving,” reported the planesman.

“Get ready to blow all tanks! Blow forward tanks!”

Still K-219 kept his bow stubbornly pointed down.

“Gennady, get the second reactor on line!” K-219 had been running on one unit to dampen his acoustical signature. But quick starting a cold reactor carried with it grave risks. Still, that was their only hope - they had to have more speed to overcome the additional weight the boat was taking on.

Time was running out. “All right, blow the tanks - all of them. Emergency blow.” He didn’t know if it would be enough, but it was all he had left to try.

At three hundred fifty meters the helm began to respond and as suddenly as he’d been going down, he was now going up- and suddenly there was another sound, metal on metal. The boat shuddered briefly and paused, but what ever had struck them hadn’t hit them solidly. K-219 resumed his meteoric rise to the surface, broaching like a wounded whale. Everything tumbled inside as he smashed heavily back down into the water and came to a dead stop under the moonlit night sky.

“All stop,” ordered Britanov. “I need damage reports. Someone go aft and find out what’s going on.”

************

Seaview keened softly, jerking Crane up out of his sleep. He sat up and turned the light by his bunk on. From the boat’s distress, something had finally happened aboard K-219. It wasn’t something he had any doubt about; during the last week, much to his surprise, he’d discovered that she could reach out and see what was happening to Britanov and K-219. It had been the only thing that kept her from worrying herself into a frantic state over the Russian captain’s safety.

“What’s happened?” he asked his Lady.

The boat made crackling noises that sounded eerily like a fire and followed with a whoosh like water flooding in.

“Fire? Flooding?” That was potentially disastrous. She answered with the short chirp he’d come to understand as her shorthand for yes.

“Is Britanov okay?” He thought the Russian captain probably was, otherwise Seaview would be even more upset than she was.

Another chirp, followed by keening. Britanov may not have been injured, but it was clear from Seaview’s agitation that he and K-219 were both in serious peril. He considered. Britanov was in peril, but not dire danger. K-219 must have made it to the surface.

“Are they on the surface?”

A much more relived chirp.

“Is Augusta still around?”

Seaview actually growled softly.

That was a definite affirmative. Damn. They were running at full speed now and were still nearly a day’s sail away. The Chaos Lords had certainly timed this one to their advantage.

Seaview revved her screws. It was an unmistakable offer to go to Flank Speed

Crane knew that she could - for a short while - but she would risk burning out the drive shaft bearings. He shook his head. “Even if you did, we’re still too far away. It’s up to Igor now. We’ll just have to hope he survives and then rescue him. That’s what the Elder said, remember.”

He could tell the boat wasn’t happy with his answer, but in many ways Seaview was a pragmatist. She had a sense of self preservation that a mere mechanical artifact would never have - and it wasn’t something that had ever been programmed into her computers. No, as far as her skipper was concerned, she was as much alive as he was.

The boat gave a deep sigh.

He felt the thrum of the engines take on a new urgency, despite what he‘d just said. While she hadn’t increased her speed to Flank, she had ratcheted up a couple of knots. He sighed himself, knowing that very shortly someone from engineering would be hesitantly knocking on his door with a report about the boat’s odd behavior. That had been happening a lot the last two weeks.

*************

The sonar operator on USS Augusta listened with increasing bafflement. Something had gone very wrong on the boomer they were following after she‘d passed perilously close under them with her Crazy Ivan maneuver. He turned to his captain.

“Sir, I just got an explosion, followed by the sound of a silo flooding.”

“Silo or torpedo tube?”

“Definitely a silo.” He watched as his display split into two objects, one smaller than the other. “Jesus. The boomer’s diving, but I have a separation!”

Von Suskil snapped around. “Ready tubes three and four…”

“Wait!” cried the sonar man. “No ignition! It’s just hanging there.”

“What?” Suskil wasn’t pleased at being interrupted.

“She’s blowing ballast. Sir, I have hull-flooding noises and she’s still diving. The missile just dropped out of sight. She may be breaking up.”

“Serves the bastards right,” muttered Von Suskil under his breath. He wasn’t aware that sharp ears in the control room had heard him - or the shock his attitude generated. “Sonar, put it over up here. I want to listen to this.”

The next sound was the high pressure whoosh of ballast tanks being blown - all of them. You didn’t do that unless it was your last option, because if it failed, you had nothing left. Suskil wondered if there’d be anything of interest in a Yankee-1’s bones to pick over. Provided this wasn’t a reactor casualty. Then there was a possibility much of the US east coast would be irradiated.

Suddenly the noise changed pitch - the damned Russian was coming up almost underneath them! A resounding clang echoed through the Augusta and she shuddered, heeling away from the point of contact. Von Suskil swore. The bastard had actually clipped them. He ordered Damage Control to report.

By the time all of the reports had come back negative, Augusta had followed the Russian almost to the surface.

“What’s the target’s heading?” he demanded of the sonar operator.

“No bearing change. He’s dead in the water,” responded the man.

Von Suskil stalked over to the periscope. “Let’s see what’s going on.” He rose with the periscope, spinning it to face the Russian boomer. Through the lens he spotted the other boat, a dark shape on the moonlit sea. He flipped to the light enhancement setting. A cloud of smoke was boiling up from aft of the sail. His first thought was that she was launching - but he quickly realized the smoke was too thin and the wrong color for a launch.

“She’s on fire,” he told his XO, looking away from the scope for a second. Putting his eye back he said, “Bearing … and mark.”

His XO looked at him like he’d lost his mind. “Sir?”

“Bearing and mark,” Von Suskil growled at him. Looks were exchanged around the control room. The Russian boat was on fire and disabled and their captain was setting up firing solutions? What the hell was he thinking?

***************

Repeated calls to compartment four and the missile bay had gone unanswered. Fearing the worst, Britanov was preparing to go back himself when someone finally spoke over the kashtan.

“Compartment four …. Heavy fumes in here!”

“Who is this,” demanded Britanov. “Where is Petrachkov?”

“He’s… unconscious.” A pause. “It’s hot in here! There’s … smoke and fumes everywhere. Water. Request permission to evacuate!”

A boomer captain’s worst nightmare. An accident in the missile bay, probably with a fire. He put the kashtan mike to his lips. “This is Britanov. All compartments don life support masks.” He chewed on his moustache. The Damage Control officer hadn’t reported in either. Could he had been in the missile bay with Petrachkov?

The doctor checked in from compartment five, ready to go into four to check for casualties.

“Is Voroblev with you, Doctor Kochergin?”

“No, Captain. Pshenichny is the only one I’ve seen.”

That seemed to confirm his worst fears. He just hoped the missing officer - and the rest of the men in compartment four - were still with the living.

It seemed an eternity had passed when Kapitulsky reported that the second reactor was now on line. Britanov called compartment four again for a report. What he heard wasn’t good. The silo had ruptured and poisonous fumes were rising from the bilges. The temperature had risen to one hundred twenty degrees Fahrenheit. His Weapons Officer was unconscious; all the rest of the missile crew was dead or injured. His radio officer Markov had also been in the compartment, his fate unknown.

Britanov turned to the boat’s navigator. “Markov is back there and right now I need a radio officer more than a navigator.” The man nodded acknowledgment. “Send a message to fleet headquarters and request emergency assistance.”

“Breaking radio silence is against regs,” broke in his starpom Vladmirov.

“So is sinking,” Britanov reminded him gently. “Send it.” He lifted the kashtan again. “Get everyone out of four and we’ll try to vent again.”

“There’s a fire in there,” growled his Chief Engineer. “Probably in the wiring.”

“What about the other missiles?” asked Britanov. That was a real danger; in the heat some of them could explode - or even try to launch themselves. The one thing he absolutely did not want was to be responsible for starting a nuclear war by accident. A small shiver ran down his spine. Was this what his watchers had been waiting for all those years? He made a decision. No matter what it took, such a thing would not happen as long as he drew breath.

“Who knows,” responded Krasilnikov gruffly. “We’ve lost all our remote readings from them.”

The kashtan buzzed again. It was his security officer Pshenichny. “Captain, We’ve evacuated to compartment five, but the hatch didn’t seal. The acid is eating the seals and we’ve got fumes in compartment five.”

Damn. The boat’s cut in two. No way to get them forward or get help aft. “Pshenichny, move everyone aft into compartment eight, then report in. Is Voroblev there?”

“I’m in six,” came the answer, “but I was in four when it went.”

“Damage estimate.”

“The muzzle hatch cracked open for some reason, then the explosion ripped the silo apart. We’ve got flooding, fire and gas.”

“What was that sound afterwards, like we hit something?”

“I don’t know, Captain. But the entire missile is gone from the silo and as near as I can tell, the hatch cover itself may be gone.”

“Did the missile knock it off?” asked Britanov.

There was a moment of silence. “I don’t think it could,” responded his damage control officer. “I think we hit something on the way up.”

Britanov snorted. So the Los Angeles boat they’d surprised earlier was probably back. He couldn’t help the brief wolfish grin. The bastard had gotten more than he’d bargained for again this time too. With any luck, their missing hatch cover was stuck in the idiot’s keel. He reached for his oilskins hanging on their peg and looked over at his chief engineer. “I’m going to take a look to see for myself. Want to join me?”

Krasilnikov rose immediately to his feet and followed his captain up the ladder to the bridge. Once there, they turned on their portable lamps and shined them aft.

Water sloshed over the missile deck, but the passing of each wave revealed a gaping hole where the hatch should have been - and smoke rising from an empty silo. But the most telling evidence was the bright streak of exposed metal where the rubber coating on the missile deck had been sheared away.

The chief engineer looked grim. “I’ve seen damage like this before, but only after a collision.”

Britanov turned his lamp to sweep the dark sea around them. Nothing. The American sub was only thing they could have hit that could have done this. Well, he’d already suspected that was the case; this merely confirmed it.

“Captain,” came a voice from below, “Message from Fleet.”

Britanov grimaced. “Let’s go below. When it gets light we’ll have Pshenichny take pictures of this.”

Once back in the CCP he read the decoded message - three merchant ships were being diverted to assist them. He had to shake his head at how quickly their fortunes had reversed.

The kashtan buzzed. Britanov answered to find his damage control officer on the other end. “Captain, I’ve tested all the compartments from four aft to ten and I have traces of gas as far as seven.”

“Seven! Are you sure?”

“Yes. And that’s not all. We’ve got wiring problems in four - we lost some of the bundles.”

A chill spread down Britanov’s spine. “Which bundles?”

“I can’t tell - it’s too hot to check for sure - but the reactor control cables run through the worst area.”

Great. He was about to issue orders to have the boat pressurized to try and force the gas out through four when the planesman shouted and pointed at the overhead ventilator grill. A thin wisp of brown mist was curling out. Britanov looked at it and bit back a curse.

“Increase the interior air pressure! Now!”

The misty brown death reluctantly slowed, then finally stopped. But for how long?

***********

Crane felt Seaview tremble, not from a mechanical problem, but from frustration. He reached out a hand to the closest bulkhead and muttered, “We’ll get there. Have faith.”

The boat sighed and grumbled, but steadied. Crane shook his head and turned to head back to the control room - and found himself standing face to face with Chief Kowalski.

Oops.

Kowalski gave him an enigmatic look and cocking his head to one side said, “Is there something going on I should know about, Skipper?”

It crossed Crane’s mind to deny it, but realized that Kowalski would know better - and it was trust in their officers - especially the senior command staff - that made Seaview’s crew so exceptional. He couldn’t break that trust now. He sighed, knowing that he was going to have to level with the COB, but not entirely sure how he‘d react.

“I suppose there is, Ski. Why don’t we find someplace where we won’t be disturbed and I’ll fill you in.” He saw the COB relax slightly and realized that the odd events of the last two weeks had gotten on the crewman’s nerves. He steered the Chief into one of the currently empty labs and shut the door so they wouldn’t be disturbed. Taking a pair of stools, he indicated that Kowalski should sit.

“Do you remember when Chip, Admiral Nelson and I wound up on Venus?” Kowalski nodded that he did, but was clearly puzzled as to what that had to do with the current situation. “You know that we met some aliens - not just the ones that snatched us, but the ones that got us back again? Especially the one named Seldar?” Again a nod of affirmation. Crane sighed. “We met him again two years later. The Admiral and I got snatched again - but so did Seldar.”

“I don’t remember you being missing,” protested Ski.

“That’s because the being that took us was able to suspend time. We came back to the same moment we’d left.”

“But why?”

“Seems there’s a Cold War of sorts going on out there too. There’s a race of advanced beings that likes to play Games with other species. Or I should say certain members of that race, known as the Chaos Lords. The others - the Lords of Light - believe meddling like that is wrong. We found out that the Chaos Lords have been meddling on earth in a big way…”

“And we’ve been at the center of a lot of it.” Kowalski wasn’t COB for nothing. He was intelligent enough to see where the evidence was going. “But what’s that got to do with the way the Seaview’s been acting?”

“According to Seldar, both sides in this conflict are energy entities. And if they spend enough time in a place, their energy can infuse into inanimate objects and then … well, they can take on a life of their own. And apparently the more complex the artifact, the more lifelike they become.”

“So Seaview has…”

“Acquired a mind and will of her own,” stated Crane.

Kowalski seemed to ruminate on the idea for a few moments. “Does Admiral Nelson know?” he finally asked.

The answer was a snort, but it wasn’t from Crane. Kowalski’s eyes widened.

“Yeah, he knows, Chief,” said Crane dryly. “He doesn’t much like it, would prefer to ignore it, but there’s nothing he can do about it.”

“Seaview? Is that really you?” asked Kowalski, wonder in his voice.

An almost musical note echoed softly through the lab.

Kowalski grinned. “I always thought you were more than an ordinary submarine - and the Skipper here always did call you his Lady. Guess he was right.” He turned serious. “So what’s the rush now? All we’ve heard is there’s some kind of problem in the North Atlantic and we need to get there as fast as possible.”

“I guess you deserve to know, Ski,” said Crane. “One of those Games I mentioned is in progress. The Chaos Lords are trying to engineer a nuclear disaster - if not a nuclear war - involving a Russian boomer. We’re trying to stop it. Admiral Nelson is in Washington trying to knock sense into certain people’s heads, but if he can’t, then it’s up to us.”

The Chief whistled. “Damn. Serious stuff. Are we gonna make it?”

“Seaview’s doing her best. She’s grown rather fond of Igor.”

“Igor?” asked Kowalski, suddenly looking confused.

“Captain Second rank Igor Britanov, commander of a Yankee-1 called K-219,” Crane told him. “That’s the boomer involved in this mess.”

“A Yankee-1? Jeeze, Sir, that’s scraping the bottom of the barrel!”

Seaview made a small noise of agreement, causing Kowalski to look a question at Crane that needed no interpretation. Seaview was obviously unusually concerned about the welfare of a man who was supposed to be their enemy.

“Remember the Victor II that turned with us that time? That was Britanov.”

“I remember that,” mused the Chief. “How the hell did he know where we were?”

“Apparently all that energy focused on him has made him sensitive to other objects and beings that also possess it. He wasn’t consciously aware that we were there, he just knew something was.” He sighed. “Seaview decided she liked him.” Kowalski’s eyebrows shot up. “As far as she’s concerned...”

“Mine.” The word was just barely on the threshold of being audible; one could almost convince themselves they‘d merely imagined it. The hairs on the back of Crane’s neck stood up. They always did when Seaview actually spoke. Even Kowalski seemed taken aback.

“It gets better,” Crane told him dryly, after he‘d gotten over his surprise. “There’s an American sub involved. Remember last year in New London and Commander Von Suskil of Augusta?”

Comprehension lit Kowalski’s face. “So that’s what the hissing was all about. You really didn’t like him did you, Lady?”

The boat rumbled, a deep low note. There was no question of her feelings of antipathy towards Von Suskil.

“So we’re going to the rescue,” finished Crane wryly.

Kowalski shook his head. “Who else knows Seaview is alive?”

“Chip Morton and Seldar are the only other ones besides the Admiral,” said Crane, “Though I don’t think she’s ever actually spoken to any of them like she did just now. Though I expect,” he added “after this voyage is over, a lot more people may suspect something odd is going on. But for now though, Ski, let’s keep this just between us.”

“Like anybody’d believe me anyway, Skipper. But I understand your reasoning. Mum’s the word, sir.”

An eerie sound that could have almost been a chuckle echoed through the boat. It would send the engineering staff scurrying for the entire next shift trying in vain to find the source of the noise.

The two men looked at each other and shook their heads in unison.

******************

Dawn broke over the grey sea, four hours after the explosion. By now they’d had to evacuate compartment six and three deaths had been confirmed with another dozen or more unconscious. One of those was unfortunately the boat’s doctor. Britanov climbed back up to the bridge to reassess the situation.

Purple brown smoke blew in puffs from the damaged silo as he watched. Puffs? He looked more closely and realized that each time the waves washed over the deck, the smoke stopped. Could he use that to his advantage somehow? He contemplated the problem. The fire was raging unchallenged on the lowest level of the missile bay. The temperature in the fourteen remaining missiles was probably approaching critical levels - at some point very shortly they would start cooking off - and each missile carried two six hundred kiloton warheads. What the result might be he didn’t care to imagine.

Taking on more water by flooding the missile bay to try and drown the fire could sink them. On the other hand, doing nothing meant that eventually the fire would either consume the control cables to the reactors or blow the missiles. If they started losing the controls he’d have to shut the reactors down or risk meltdown. Either one would kill them all just as surely as drowning - and possibly contaminate much of the US east coast as well. He thought back to his watchers and his earlier vow. One way or another he would beat them.

He climbed back down to the CCP, a grim look on his face. “Igor,” he addressed his chief engineer by his first name, “I want to try something. It’s risky, but it may be the only way to save the boat.”

Krasilnikov eyed him uncertainly, knowing that whatever Britanov had come up with was likely to be unorthodox at best. “And?”

“I want to open a couple more of the missile hatches and dive. Not deep or for very long. But enough to try and put the fire out.”

Krasilnikov gaped at him for a moment, but once he got over his initial shock, he had to admit that at this point they didn’t have much else left to try. “Are you going to ask Moscow?”

“No. If this doesn‘t work, I‘d rather they didn‘t know we dived on purpose.”

“What about the American? If we open the missile hatches won‘t he panic?”

“If he’s that much of a fool, then whatever happens is his fault, not ours.”

**************

Von Suskil prowled restlessly around Augusta’s control room. Every so often he would raise the periscope for a quick peak at the Russian boomer lying dead in the water. He wanted the boomer dead, period. Anything for an excuse to take a shot and blow the bastard to kingdom come.

He turned once more to the periscope - and realized that two of her missile hatches were now open. “Bearing and mark!” he shouted, sending his crew into a confused frenzy. “He’s launching!”

“What?!” exclaimed the XO. “Let me see.”

The XO grabbed the periscope. “There’s no smoke,” he said. “He’s not launching.” He saw the sudden jet of air from the ballast tank vents and added, “For God’s sake, he’s diving.”

The whoosh of expelled air came clearly over the sonar, confirming the XO’s words. The crew paused, uncertain, as Von Suskil grabbed the periscope back just in time to see the Yankee-1 slip below the waves.

“What the hell? Who dives with the hatches open?”

“A man who’s desperate,” said the XO quietly.

As they waited breathlessly, they heard the boomer blow her ballast tanks and struggle again towards the surface. She was just feet from her goal when alarms suddenly began blaring loud enough to be heard across the interval between the two subs. The sonar man looked puzzled for a moment, but then his face turned ashen. Turning to his two senior officers he told them, “I think that’s their reactor warning alarms.” He turned back to his equipment for a moment as the other sub once more sluggishly broached. “She’s on the surface again.”

The captain and XO looked at each other for a tense moment. Von Suskil finally spoke. “Mark the position. Helm, move us away.” The Russian boat was doomed and everyone in Augusta’s control room knew it.

*******************

Britanov cursed as the alarms wailed through the CCP. As K-219 broached for a second time and settled again on the surface, he grabbed the kashtan and called his propulsion engineer, Gennady Kapitulsky.

“Gennady, what’s going on?”

“I’ve lost all the remote readings to the reactors - I don’t know what is happening, but if the alarms are for real and not just a malfunction, we have to shut them down.” There was the beginning of panic in the engineer’s voice.

“Gennady, listen to me,” said Britanov. “Belikov is back there. Have him revert the reactors to manual control. If the readings are real, he can scram them if he has to.”

Belikov quickly responded from the reactor compartment. “The readings are going crazy back here and it’s getting hot.”

“Read me the temperatures,” Kapitulsky told him. He did and the engineer couldn’t help the small groan that escaped. The numbers were far too high - and still climbing. He clicked back to talk to Britanov.

“Captain, if we shut down we won’t have any power except the diesels. It could just be an electrical malfunction.”

“And if it isn‘t, we meltdown like Chernobyl. Shut the reactors down, Gennady. Start with the hottest one. Do it now.”

“Okay. Belikov, unlock the gravity release for quench baffles one through four. That should do it.”

They waited for what seemed like a short eternity, but the reactor alarms kept screeching.

“Sir!” They could hear Belikov‘s voice quiver. “I can’t get the gravity release to work. The baffles won’t drop - the metal’s binding!”

“Captain… Captain, the scram was unsuccessful. The only thing we can do now,” Kapitulsky paused and swallowed, “is go inside and hand crank the baffles down.”

At Britanov’s side, the chief engineer stirred. “I’ll go back and do it.”

“No, I still need you here, Igor.”

“I’ll do it,” said Belikov over the kashtan, “but I need a new OBA canister. I’m almost out of air.”

“Go back to eight and get one from Pshenichny.”

As he spoke the alarms finally fell silent - the chief engineer had pulled the breakers, silencing them. It let Britanov collect his thoughts, though now all he could do was wait. K-219’s fate - and that of much of the eastern US - was in the hands of the young lieutenant. Time seemed to crawl.

“Captain,” spoke the navigator, breaking the silence, “the Fyodor Bredkin is fifty kilometers from us. Do you want to speak to her?”

Britanov felt a surge of conflicting emotions at the news. Part of him was relieved that help was there if they needed it, but a part of him was ashamed that it was some rusty old freighter that would be his crew’s savior. He’d almost rather it was another American submarine. Not the idiot that had been the source of his troubles of course, the Los Angeles class boat that was undoubtedly still lurking out there somewhere, but a boat like Seaview… He paused, wondering where that thought had come from. He shook his head as if to clear those disturbing thoughts.

“I’d rather see him. Ask what speed he can make.”

The navigator consulted with the freighter captain. “Captain, he says his ETA is just under three hours. He wants to know our condition.”

“He’s not the only one,” muttered Britanov just as a cry came from the radar operator.

“Captain, aerial contact inbound illuminating us with search radar. It looks like an American patrol plane.”

Irritated, Britanov clicked the kashtan. “Pshenichny! What’s happening back there?”

“They’re going back in now.” The security officer added with a hopeful note in his voice, “The alarm is off.”

“We killed the power to it,” Britanov told him, killing any hope that the alarms had been false.

The waiting continued as Britanov hung on the kashtan, listening to the conversations between the two men who were risking their lives to shut down the reactors. When Belikov collapsed from the heat and fumes, Britanov stirred; he’d go back himself and crank in the last baffle himself. But then Engineer-Seaman Sergei Preminin calmly told them he would do it.

Britanov wanted to weep, but he told the young man over the kashtan, “I know you can do it, Sergei.”

“Yes, sir, I will.”

They waited. Britanov sent Kapitulsky forward to start the emergency diesel generator. In a moment the rumble of the diesel echoed though the CCP.

“Switching main power bus to backup,” Krasilnikov told them. The lights blinked off, then back on.

“What is keeping him?” worried the chief engineer. “It shouldn’t have taken this long.”

After what seemed an eternity a weak voice came over the kashtan. “Captain?”

Britanov grabbed the microphone. “Sergei? Where are you?”

“Captain…” The voice faded.

“Sergei!”

“Captain, the reactors are secured.”

A cheer went up in the CCP.

“Then get the hell out of there!” Britanov told him. To his navigator he said, “Radio Moscow and tell them our reactors are shut down.” He heaved a private sigh of relief. Meltdown had been averted and flooding the missile bay seemed to have at least slowed down the fire - and hopefully cooled off the missiles. He’d bought them some more time, but that was all.

***************

Crane heard Seaview sigh and looked up from his desk. “Seaview? Did they get the fire out?”

There was a warbling, very unhappy chirp.

Uh, oh. That meant yes, but with severe reservations shading towards maybe. Damn. Something besides the fire and flooding must have gone wrong.

A small chiming in his desk drawer interrupted him. Seldar. Maybe now he could find out exactly what was happening. It was frustrating at times trying to communicate with the boat. Seldar had told him dryly that now she had definitely become self aware, that once she did find her voice, he might wish she’d stayed mute. Maybe so, but having accurate information could make the difference between life and death, especially where the Chaos Lords were concerned.

He fished the small voice only communicator out of the drawer and hit the receive button.

“Admiral Crane.” The voice on the other end wasn’t Seldar, but his second in command, Liam.

“I was wondering what was going on, Liam - Seaview indicated there was fire and flooding on K-219, but that now they’re on the surface.”

“That is part of what has happened, Admiral.” Unlike Seldar, Liam used a translator, so his English was very good. “They had an explosion in one of the silos - it looks like Augusta may have clipped them and knocked a hatch cover loose, then hit them again when they did an emergency blow and finished ripping the hatch off. They have a fire on board - it was in the missile bay, but Britanov opened two of the missile hatches and dived enough to let the sea flood the lower level.” There was admiration and wonder in the alien’s voice. “The fire isn’t completely out, but what’s left is in the wiring bundles behind the bulkheads. The water will keep the temperature down below the critical point in the missile silos. Unfortunately the fire severed their reactor controls and they had to scram both reactors. They’re dead in the water, with just an auxiliary diesel for limited electrical power. The Soviet government has diverted several merchant ships to aid them.”

Crane frowned to himself. From what he knew about Russian missile fuel, flooding the missile bay might help with the fire, but it would give Britanov other problems. “Britanov’s going to have a lot more gas to deal with though. I think he’s going to have to abandon ship when those freighters get there. How long will it be until the first one arrives?”

“Just under four of your hours.”

“And we’re still about eighteen hours away. It should be pretty much over by the time we get there.”

Seaview went silent for a long moment in an attitude of listening. The hair on the back of Crane’s neck twitched and he sat up straighter. “Liam, is there something else going on?”

“Let me check.” He must have turned away from the communicator, for Crane could just barely hear him speaking to one of the communication techs. He then came back on and said, “Augusta just got new orders. I’m not sure what they are yet, but there’s a Navy tugboat that’s been diverted and is now heading that way.”

Crane was aghast. “They wouldn’t!” The only reason to send a tug would be to try and take K-219 in tow - which would be a clear violation of Soviet sovereignty - and very likely scuttle the summit talks in Iceland.

“Admiral, remember who we’re dealing with here,” remarked Liam dryly as Seaview made a rude noise in the background.

“Okay, so Von Suskil is that stupid. But he doesn’t have the authority…” Crane slapped his forehead. “Weinberger. That fool!”

“You need to get there as soon as you can, Admiral. This isn’t over yet.” Liam sounded both worried and thoughtful.

“You’re right, I’m afraid,” Crane admitted unhappily. “Let me know if anything else happens.”

“You can be sure of it,” Liam told him before the device went silent. Crane sighed and put the communicator in his shirt pocket. He might not have time to come back to his cabin the next time he needed to speak to Liam or Seldar.

The deck took on a bit more vibration. He bit back a warning; Seaview knew what her limits were better than any man, including himself. Running at flank speed would shave several hours off their ETA - hours that might make all the difference in the world.

A knock at the door brought a grimace to his face. He’d probably have to find a whole new engineering crew when this was all over. The Chief Engineer had been demanding for the last two weeks to know what kind of experiment they’d done to the boat that he hadn’t been informed about. He thought briefly about telling Lt. Commander Morgan what was really going on.

That would to make for an interesting conversation, but he didn’t think Morgan would believe a word of it. No, Crane would simply stick to his story - which happened to be the truth - that they hadn’t done anything to Seaview that Morgan hadn’t been informed about.

***********

Since the Russians had apparently successfully scrammed their reactors and meltdown was no longer imminent, the powers that be had directed Augusta move back into the vicinity of the Russian sub - but now they had new orders and Commander Von Suskil was practically salivating over them.

He had been directed to quote, “MAKE ALL REASONABLE EFFORTS TO PREVENT SUCCESSFUL TOW OR SLAVAGE,” of the crippled Russian sub. Anything short of hostile action was authorized. This would pay the bastard back for surprising him. He glowered as he remembered that single ping. One way or another, he’d make sure the Russian boat never made it home. She’d either be on the end of a towrope attached to the American tug or on the bottom. Hopefully her captain would be with her.

************

Britanov was still mulling over his options when the kashtan clicked.

“Central, this Preminin. I can’t get the hatch open into eight.”

K-219’s captain straightened, concern on his face. “Sergei, are you sure the dogs are all free?”

A moment of silence, then, “Yes.”

“Don’t worry, we’ll get you out. Pshenichny, get that hatch open now!”

“We’re trying, Captain. We put a jack on it and it bent the bulkhead we were bracing against. Something’s jamming it,”

“Pressure,” said Chief Engineer Krasilnikov, “it’s got to be a pressure problem. Seven’s pressurized and eight isn’t. They’ll never get it open unless we either vent seven or pressurize eight.”

“Seven has gas,” Pshenichny reminded them over the kashtan.

“We’ll pressurize eight. Get ready.”

The lights dimmed in the CCP as the pumps started.

“Stop!” shouted Pshenichny. “There’s gas coming in!”

Krasilnikov killed the pumps and looked over at Britanov.

“Sergei.” Britanov waited for the young seaman to answer, to tell him he’d have to manually operate the vent system in seven to reduce the pressure, but there was no answer. “Sergei? Answer!”

There was no response, not even so much as a click. Britanov bowed his head in silent grief, knowing that it was now too late to save the young seaman who’d saved the rest of them from the runaway reactors.

“Captain?” The voice was Pshenichny’s. “We’ve still got gas coming in through the vents.”

The captain and chief engineer looked at each other. Everything was off. Unless the lines had been damaged - quite likely under the circumstances - there shouldn’t have been any flow at all. They were out of OBA canisters. There was only one option left.

“Pshenichny, get everyone aft to ten and prepare to evacuate. Leave no one. Get them out on the weather deck.” Britanov hung up the kashtan and wondered to himself, How do you loose your command? Gracefully? Heroically? The freighter was now only an hour away. He hoped K-219 would float long enough to get what was left of his crew evacuated.

*********

Seaview was slashing through the ocean at a rate that left Lee Crane amazed - and a bit worried that she was overextending herself. She was now pushing over fifty knots, beyond even emergency flank speed. It was not something she had been designed for. He knew her screws were howling; anybody listening was going to hear her coming. He could just imagine the shock waves that had rippled through SOSUS Control when they first started picking her up, because Seaview going somewhere in a big hurry usually meant big trouble. They’d had to be wondering what the hell was going on for her to be running this hard.

He had the added problem that his conversation with the chief engineer hadn’t gone well; in fact, as of this moment Seaview no longer had a chief engineer. When Crane had stuck to his story that there was no experiment of Nelson’s - or anyone else, for that matter - going on, the man had basically called him a liar, then taken off his collar pins and handed in his resignation, effective immediately. Crane had confined the man to his quarters for his own safety and posted a guard to make sure he didn’t do anything stupid.

Crane sighed - and noted to himself that he’d been doing that a lot lately. The XO was on the way to his cabin. When he’d found out the chief engineer was confined to quarters, he’d demanded to know why. He found himself wondering if Seaview would still have an XO by the time they got back to port - any port. Maybe he ought to ask Britanov if he would take the position. Seaview would certainly approve.

He laughed quietly to himself at the thought. He’d bet K-219’s chief engineer would be out of a job too when this was all over, so maybe the Institute could hire both of them as replacements. Wouldn’t Washington love that.

***********

When Security Officer Pshenichny had gathered what was left of the crew aft of the missile bay and counted heads, he found he had sixty men. They’d left four dead behind, including the weapons officer, Petrachkov. He didn’t feel right about leaving them, but there’d been no way to bring the bodies with them; Preminin they couldn’t even reach.

He took the kashtan. “Captain, we’re at the escape hatch.”

“Everyone?” asked Britanov.

“Everyone still alive.”

Another voice, the navigator, came over the kashtan. “Captain, the Fyodor Bredkin has us in sight. The captain wants to know what we need.”

Pshenichny heard Britanov tell the navigator, “Tell them to send over a launch and any OBA canisters. Tell them to stand by to accept casualties.” Then to Pshenichny, “Get the men up on the weather deck. We’ll send the injured over first.”

The escape hatch was narrow, allowing only one man at a time to pass through. The injured had to be handed up; there was no way to carry them through the narrow passage. Pshenichny was waiting at the end of the line; as senior officer present, he would be the last to leave. As the last man before him started up, he took a last look around and caught an odd, different scent in the foul air. Something prompted him to go look. He took a few quick steps to the nearest bulkhead and peered down a side passageway that led to ladder to the bilges.

Thick brown smoke was curling up the ladder, rung by rung. The fire was coming back.

Pshenichny went back aft and climbed into the light, shutting the hatch behind him.

***************

Forward, Gennady Kapitulsky had climbed up to the bridge with an armful of blankets for the injured and a fresh OBA canister for his mask, since the wind was blowing the poisonous smoke that still drifted out of the ruptured silo forward over the sail. At least that meant the men out on the exposed weather deck wouldn’t have to breathe it. The sun was hot and tropical, but the sea was still cold enough that exposure could be fatal to men already weakened. The XO, Sergei Vladmirov, was already there, sweeping the horizon with a pair of binoculars. He lowered them and handed them to Kapitulsky and pointed. When he focused in on what the XO was pointing at, he saw a mottled grey tube cutting the water less than half a kilometer away.

It could only be a periscope.

“I think that’s the that bastard hit us,” said Vladmirov, pointing back to the gaping hole that used to be the number six silo.

“Maybe so,” said Kapitulsky, “You’d better tell the captain about the periscope - I’m going aft to see what I can find out.” He could also see the freighter was starting to slow down so he wouldn’t run over the sub he was supposed to help. Good. Maybe that meant his master wasn’t a total idiot.

He climbed down the ladder from the bridge onto the missile deck just as the US patrol plane made another pass. Pausing, he gave the plane a one finger salute. He hoped the bastard on the sub saw it too. Holding his breath as he skirted around the edge of the raw wound in K-219’s hull, he made his way over the rest of the still intact hatches to seek out Pshenichny.

The weapons officer was on his knees over the still figure of the ship’s doctor, shaking, tears running down his face as he tried to wipe away the green foam that bubbled out of the doctor’s mouth. Kapitulsky took him by the shoulders and forced him to sit.

“He gave me his mask,” said Pshenichny between sobs. “He gave me his OBA when mine ran out.”

“And you took charge and saved the others,” Kapitulsky told him.

“Not all of them. Four are still down there.”

Kapitulsky gave him one of the blankets to spread over the doctor and handed the rest around. “Just how bad is it down there?”

“Eight and nine are hopeless. The fire is coming back down there and gas has come all the way aft into ten. It’s hell down there - the missiles could blow any minute.”

“Leave the missiles to me,” Kapitulsky told him, just as the whaleboat from the freighter approached to within hailing distance.

“Is it safe?” called out the coxswain in the boat. Kapitulsky could have cheerfully strangled the man and quickly made his displeasure known. The launch eased up against the side of the sub.

“The twelve on stretchers go first. Pshenichny, you go with them and make sure the men are taken care of.” He helped the Security Officer into the launch and was about to shove it off when another figure suddenly leaped from the sub into the small boat. He realized that it was Sergiyenko, the Political Officer. The coward! Pshenichny was looking at the man like he’d turned into a two headed snake. Kapitulsky would have liked to drag the man out of the boat by the scruff of his worthless neck, but the launch was already pulling away.

He spat. Well, he still had to go below and see just how bad things were. One of the warrant officers stood up and volunteered to go with him.

They climbed back down the escape hatch. The air was dim and the deck beneath his feet hot enough that he could feel it through the soles of his boots. If it was this bad in ten, what was it like in the missile bay where the fire had actually started? They started forward, but stopped in nine. It was already beyond bearable.

The two retraced their steps aft to ten. At the last intercom station, Kapitulsky stopped to pick up the kashtan. “Captain? This is Gennady in ten.”

Britanov immediately answered. “What have you found?” he asked.

“The temperature is way too high - we’ve got to have a fire below decks, because the decks are hot. Gas has spread from eight into nine and ten.” He paused. “Captain, the missiles could go any minute. With the remote instruments out, we’d have no warning…”

“I understand. Get out and seal the hatch behind you.”

Kapitulsky wanted to say that he was sorry there was nothing he could do, but what would be the point?

*************

Britanov faced a decision. He had to find out what was happening in four. Since the missile bay couldn’t be reached from aft, that meant they’d have to try from this end. In the meantime… in the meantime he wanted everybody off except for a small damage control party. If K-219 decided to take an abrupt plunge, he wanted to maximize the probability that those aboard could make it off - and minimize the loss of lives if they couldn’t. He didn’t much care what Moscow thought about it either.

He already knew that the chief engineer would insist on being one of those who stayed. He turned to the others. “I need nine volunteers to stay behind with me and find out what’s really happening in four. If it looks safe, I’m going to hook us up to the largest of the freighters coming and make them tow us home.”

As he had expected, Krasilnikov was the first to volunteer.

“I knew I could count on you,” Britanov said. “Pick your repair party. Everyone else get ready to go. And start collecting the code materials. I don’t want anything left behind.”

The CCP staff fell to, collecting charts, communications records, codebooks - anything that might be of value to the Americans. Britanov even took the launch key from around his neck and put it in the last of the ten bags they’d filled.

He picked up the kashtan and called his XO on the bridge. “Vladmirov? Have a surface detail to help man the towlines. Which freighter looks the biggest?”

“Krasnogvardyesk.” He hesitated, then added, “There’s a foreign ship in sight now too. American.”

“What kind?”

The vessel Vladmirov described could only be a tug. They wouldn’t dare! was Britanov’s first indignant thought. But then again…. There was again that stubborn feeling that this game was bigger than it looked from the inside - and that the rules were ruthless.

“Get on the ship to ship and tell the master of the Krasnogvardyesk he’s going to do his patriotic duty and pull us home.” He turned to the chief engineer. “Let’s get set up for a tow.”

The chief engineer nodded and headed topside.

*************

He wasn’t gone long. After coming back down, he clambered into his old asbestos suit and broke out his private stash of OBA canisters. Two michman engineers followed him as he then dropped down the ladder from the CCP to the next lower deck. There was an airlock there that led back directly into compartment four. They held their portable instruments ready to read the levels of both radiation and gas in the air.

When Krasilnikov opened the hatch into the missile bay a dense white cloud of mist flowed into the airlock. Nitric acid. Walking into the compartment was like walking into an eerie poisoned forest at night. All of the silos were smoking, their insulation damaged by acid. Wires lay bare, sparking and smoldering. “Check the temperature on each silo,” he told them. “Anything over fifty C, tell me.” They’d blow at seventy C, but there wasn’t any point in scaring the two men any more than they already were.

**********

Britanov climbed to the open bridge to see how the preparation for towing the submarine was going. The steel cable had now been attached to K-219’s bow, but because of the difference in the height between the stern of the freighter and the bow of the sub, the cable dropped down below the surface of the water and then looped up. He looked the setup over and realized with a sinking heart that it probably wouldn’t work. The sub had no steering; the first time a wave hit them broadside they’d go veering off. He said as much to his XO.

“If he takes it easy,” argued Vladmirov.

Britanov shrugged. “Tell him dead ahead slow, or else it will break.”

The freighter’s stack belched black smoke and the single screw began to turn. As the slack came out of the cable, K-219’s bow began to turn. A small bow wave began to form.

“It’s working,” muttered Britanov, almost to himself. He picked up his binoculars to watch the cable - and became aware of something else.

A periscope was cutting the sea at high speed, heading right for the gap between K-219 and the Krasnogvardyesk.

It vanished, but Britanov knew the sub wasn’t gone. There was still the subtle boil of the ocean’s surface to mark the passage of the nuclear sub. It passed directly in front of them, followed by a jerk and a loud TWANG! The cable off K-219’s bow suddenly slackened.

“He cut it!” shouted the XO angrily, “The bastard cut our towline!”

************

Lee Crane had never heard such a sound from Seaview before. A series of high, sharp, almost knife edged pings from her sonar blasted through the ocean around them as the boat quivered from stem to stern in what Crane recognized as rage. They duty crew in the control room with him cringed, eyes wide, some with amazement, others with fear. It was common knowledge that the chief engineer was confined to his quarters and the XO was threatening to resign over it, so it was natural that the sudden speculation humming around the control room held that the ex chief engineer had done something to the boat.

Crane knew better, but didn’t think telling the crew what was going on was an option, because for one thing, he didn’t really know what had just made the boat so angry. He put a hand on the bulkhead and asked, “What just happened?”

The crew thought he was asking them.

“I don’t know, sir,” babbled the senior sonar man. “The instruments just went crazy.”

“Let me have a look.” The calm voice belonged to Chief Kowalski. He met Crane’s eye and with a slight tilt of his head indicated that the Admiral should go see what had happened that had set the boat off while he covered in the control room.

Crane nodded back and picked up the mike. “Engineering,” he barked, “what’s going on back there?”

“Sir, we don’t know,” came the frantic answer.

“I’m on my way,” he told them just as the XO came bolting through the hatch, panic on his face. Crane looked over at Kowalski. “Chief, take the sonar apart and see what caused that spike. Mr. Jackson, you have the conn. Do NOT change course or speed until I get back. Understood?” The XO nodded, though his expression was one of incomprehension. Crane and Kowalski shared another look - they both knew the COB would find nothing, but Kowalski’s expression told Crane that he understood that he was to find something to use as an excuse for the boat’s behavior.

Crane headed aft. Once out of sight he ducked into an empty compartment and pulled the communicator of his shirt pocket.

“Liam, what the hell just happened?”

“Britanov got a tow line from K-219 to a freighter. Then that …that bastard Von Suskil ran between them and snapped it!” He could hear the outrage and shock in Liam’s voice.

Crane’s mouth went to a thin hard line. “That sorry sonofabittch. I‘ll let Admiral Nelson know. We’ll get the SOB put on the beach - or turn in our own resignations.” He could tell his words to Liam were also beginning to bring Seaview’s ire back down to a lower boil. To the boat he added, “You have my word on it, Lady.”

Now he had to get to engineering and find an excuse there for the boat‘s behavior. He shook his head - he’d be glad when this mess had been settled and Britanov was safely out of harm’s way so Seaview would settle down.

*************

The sun was lowering towards the western horizon as Britanov and his chief engineer stood on the bridge and discussed their options. Krasilnikov had just told him that although the missiles were hot, they weren’t anywhere near critical. His little dip in the ocean had worked - but now he was starting to wonder if saving the boat had been a good thing. He looked out over the sea at the flotilla of ships that surrounded K-219; three Russian freighters and the American tug. Though he hadn’t shown himself again, Britanov knew in his bones the American submarine was still there as well. There was no doubt in his mind now that the Americans were trying to steal his command right out from under him while Moscow argued over what to do.

He came to a decision.

“Igor,” he said to the chief engineer, “it’s time to get everybody over to the freighter, while we still have light.”

“But we’re not sinking,” Krasilnikov protested.

And that, old friend, is turning out to be a problem. Britanov didn’t say so out loud. Instead he said, “I’ll be staying.”

Krasilnikov looked dubious. “What if something happens? The fires aren’t all out.”

“I’ll stay in touch by radio.” He gave his chief engineer a fleeting enigmatic smile. “We’re a long way from the Party, Igor, and sailors on the sea. It’s a big place - big enough to hold things no one understands - and maybe even a miracle or two.”

“It’s the Americans, isn’t it,“ insisted the Engineer, “you’re afraid…”

“Igor, do I have to throw rocks? I want the crew and those bags moved while there’s still enough light to see.”

Krasilnikov sighed. “I understand. But Captain, don’t stay too long.”

It didn’t take long to round up the last nine men and get the bags loaded into the launch. Britanov waved as they headed towards the freighter.

They were halfway there when Britanov saw the periscope again. As before, it was slicing through the sea at high speed - but this time it was headed straight for the launch. He grabbed the flare gun and fired it. The men in the boat saw it and as the coxswain started to argue, Britanov saw Krasilnikov grab the tiller away from him and start to turn back towards K-219.

Fortunately his chief engineer then spotted the periscope himself. Britanov saw the launch heel over and put on a burst of speed. The periscope missed them, but the spray from it splashed into the launch. The coxswain took the rudder back and made a beeline for his ship.

****************

Augusta was not a happy boat.

“Awfully close to that whaleboat,” commented the XO.

“Had to if we were going to film the code bags. We get that run on tape?”

“Aye,” answered a petty officer; disgust colored his voice but Von Suskil ignored it.

Walking away from the scope, he ordered, “Let me know if anything starts to happen. I‘ll be in my cabin.”

The sonar operator looked after him. Von Suskil had just come close to violating one of the sacred tenets of the sea - you do not run survivors down. Ever. There was another thought. If push came to shove, Von Suskil might just blame him to cover his own ass. Copies of his acoustic tapes might just be a good thing, even if it was against regs. He wasn’t going to take the fall for this ass-hole if everything came apart.

******************

“He did what?!” Crane’s roar of outrage could be heard in the corridors half the length of the boat. Most of the men who heard his shout thought he was referring to the now ex-chief engineer; no one else aboard had any idea of the near miss with the launch. It took all of Crane’s formidable will to not throw something breakable at the nearest bulkhead. He did use language that he normally was never in the habit of using. Some of it Liam’s translator couldn’t even render into Alyesk, but the alien understood anyway. Like seafarers, the sacred law of those who plied the void between the stars was ‘You never run down survivors - Ever.’ Von Suskil had just put himself on a shit list he didn’t even know existed.

Seaview wasn’t a happy boat either - her soft angry hissing was echoing through the ventilation system, barely audible unless you put an ear right up to the grill and listened, but it made more than one sailor turn a nervous eye to the little streamers that showed air was flowing through the system. They fluttered furiously, showing the air was moving fast, very fast. And it was cold. It didn’t take long for the temperature to drop enough that the men were sent scrounging for their arctic parkas. They reassured themselves that it was just a bug in the environmental system. The Admiral and COB would soon get everything put right - after all, Chief Kowalski had been with the boat since her keel had been laid and what Crane didn’t know about Seaview’s systems wasn’t worth knowing. Besides, it was common knowledge he knew more about the way the boat worked than any of the chief engineers they’d ever had on board. Morgan couldn’t have done anything to Seaview that the Skipper couldn’t fix.

In her rage Seaview had managed to squeeze out two more knots, but even at her current speed she was still two and a half hours from K-219’s location. One hundred and thirty nautical miles.

It might as well have been across the universe.

*************

Igor Britanov stood alone on K-219’s bridge and began to think about ways to kill his boat. He already knew that come morning Moscow would order the crew back aboard. It would be the K-8 all over again; admirals sending good men to die just so they could say to the politicians they’d done everything they could.

Not on his watch, not this time.

He pulled on his OBA mask and climbed down the ladder into the enclosed bridge where he pulled a yellow life raft out of a storage. Lugging the awkward bundle back up, he laid it out across the deck of the open bridge, uncoiling the line that attached to it. Returning to the ladder, he descended to the CCP. The most obvious choice of destroying the boat was denied him. K-219’s self destruct charges required electricity to be armed and detonated. He suppressed a bitter laugh. It had obviously never occurred to the boat’s designers that a situation could happen where the vessel would be left totally powerless. All of the missiles had self destructs as well, but like the ones for the boat, required power. That left him with two options. Only one was really feasible, but it was also the most dangerous.

He came to a stop in front of his plaque and read the inscription again with a new and deeper understanding. SUBMARINE LIFE IS NOT A SERVICE BUT A RELIGION. Most religions didn’t really require sacrifices of their followers - but submarine service required the time, expertise and courage of its adherents. On rare occasions it even demanded their lives.

He would have to sink K-219 with nothing but his own two hands. It could be done - but he might not make it out. The alternative was to bend to Moscow’s orders - and then he would still die, but his men would die with him. No. Neither Moscow nor his mysterious watchers would get the satisfaction. Kill him they might, but his crew would live. He took the plaque off the wall and tucked it inside his jacket.

Making his way forward, he finally found himself in the torpedo room. Now had come the moment of truth. His task was to open the outer torpedo tube door with the inner breech open - then run as a solid stream of water as thick as a tree came smashing in. He’d have to get all the way back to the CCP, pursued by a tidal wave of black water, in the dark, then get up the ladder to the life raft.

Taking a deep breath, he spun the handles that opened the breech - and then ran for his life.

The noise was deafening as the water roared in behind him. He made it to the bridge to find that the sub was already tilting to begin his plunge to the bottom. Looking aft, he saw the stern rising from the sea, a solid wall of water rolling down the missile deck and breaking around the sail. He started for the raft, but then clambered hastily up the short mast to cut away K-219’s flag. He stuffed it into his jacket, then grabbed the line to the raft, tied it around his waist and gave it a jerk.

To his consternation the raft only partially inflated. Still, that was better than nothing. He tossed the raft from the bridge; by now the boat had settled enough that it was only a short step down. He fell into the raft, only to find himself tossed out by a wave. Had it not been for the line, he’d have lost the raft at that point, but he was able to haul himself hand over hand until he could grab hold of the side. The stern of K-219 was still rising, becoming a black cliff; the rumble of cascading water was thunderous. It poured into the raft, nearly drowning him.

The hull of the sub was close enough to touch. Britanov knew he had to get clear or he’d pull him under when he down. He fought to get back into the raft, but every time he thought he’d made it he found himself tossed out again by the turbulent water.

The sail vanished; a huge burst of air and foam rose above it. He rode the wave away from the sinking sub, but then a whirlpool formed and sucked him right back. The raft swirled around like a rubber duck in a bathtub drain then vanished into the vortex. He got one last lungful of air before he went under.

Britanov looked up as K-219 pulled him down into the sea. He could see the play of light on the surface of the water above, see it darkening as he went deeper, feel the increasing pressure in his ears.

And then he remembered.

Remembered Seldar and Captain Crane and Admiral Nelson. Remembered the alien Elder. Remembered she’d said he save their country - and then they’d save him.

A sense of betrayal filled him. Where are you? he cried in his mind as the world started going black. He knew death wasn’t far away now.

The blackness suddenly lightened; everything stood in etched sharp relief. He became aware that he wasn’t alone. A glowing spectral sphere of blue-green light was streaking through the water towards him. Was this an angel - or one of the alien Elders - come for him?

He suddenly became aware of a second sphere of sullen darker green light; no, not a sphere, but a ribbon that had one end wrapped around his ankle and the other - he swallowed hard - the other end stretched down towards K-219. The blue-green sphere paused for a second in front of his face and he found himself with a lungful of fresh air. How? he wanted to ask, but the spectral ball of blue-green light had streaked downwards, toward the sinking submarine.

He peered down curiously, his mind observing in an almost detached fashion. Were the lights arguing with each other? It seemed he could almost hear words, soft sibilant sounds that murmured and hissed, but their meaning eluded him. Whatever had passed between them, it seemed the blue-green sphere had won the argument, for he felt the grip on his ankle lessen.

Then to his shock the words from below became clear.

“Avenge me, Igor Britanov,” whispered his sinking boat as he let go and disappeared into the blackness of the abyss.

Suddenly Britanov found himself rising back towards the surface. As his head broke though and he sucked in clean sweet air, the raft suddenly popped back up as well. To his amazement, he was now in the raft. He rested his cheek for a moment on the side as he tried to get his wind back. Had what just happened been real? Or a hallucination brought on by hypoxia?

He heard his name being called, not by a spectral voice from under the sea, but by his chief propulsion assistant. He weakly lifted his head just in time to see Gennady Kapitulsky leap from the launch into the water filled raft. “Gennady” he said, “I knew you’d come.”

Kapitulsky gathered him up and carried him back to the launch, which immediately spun and headed back to it’s mother freighter. Britanov shook uncontrollably in his propulsion assistant’s arms, face contorted, shifting between tears and wild laughter.

*****************

“Conn. Sonar! Something’s happening!”

Von Suskil and the rest of Augusta’s control room crew lifted their heads.

“Jesus, sir! She’s going down!” The sonar operator didn’t need to put the input onto the loudspeaker; they were close enough to hear the thunder of water rushing through the doomed submarine. As she picked up speed and depth, the thunder became a pandemonium of groans, shrieks and rumbles that sounded eerily alive.

“Mark the spot,” said Von Suskil.

“Five hundred feet and forty knots,” reported Sonar.

Take her five minutes to hit, thought Von Suskil to himself. The bottom was three and a half miles down.

“Fifty knots, one thousand feet.”

More like four minutes. “Sonar, I want your best estimate when she crushes.”

“Gone vertical. Two thousand feet.”

There was a low heavy thud.

“Though three thousand. Something just blew.”

The sounds began to fade as the dying boat dropped into the Hatteras Abyss.

“Through four thousand. Sir, she didn’t crush.”

“What?! She had to.” Von Suskil couldn’t believe it.

“Sir! New contact coming from the south.” He paused. “Jesus, sir! Twin screws making turns for over fifty knots!”

Von Suskil spun. Nobody had a sub that could go that fast. Not even the Russian Alphas - and they had only a single screw.

The sonar operator ran the acoustical signature through his computer and frowned, then repeated it before turning to his captain. “Sir, the computer says that’s Seaview coming.”

Seaview. Von Suskil began to get a bad feeling. He knew that Admiral Crane didn’t much care for him. And like the rest of the world’s submarine fraternity, he knew that Seaview going somewhere in a big hurry meant big trouble for somebody. And here she was screaming through the ocean faster than anybody had ever realized she could run - and coming his way. Suddenly he wasn’t so sure his orders would protect him from Crane and Nelson if what he’d done here had somehow displeased either of them.

Another thud shook the Augusta. “Conn, Sonar. That was impact. Eighteen thousand feet.” The operator added with awe, “She made it down intact.”

Von Suskil made a decision. “The show’s over here. Let’s head back north.”

Looks were exchanged around the control room behind his back.

**************

Seaview sighed softly and began to reduce her speed. Crane knew from her reaction that whatever had just happened that Britanov must have survived - but he feared that K-219 was lost, for there was a deep sorrow in the boat’s sigh. He put a hand on Seaview’s bulkhead, sharing her sense of loss.

It suddenly occurred to him to wonder if, like Seaview, the presence of the energies of the Elders had caused a similar change in K-219. Had she too become self aware? Had Britanov known?

“Seaview? Was K-219 like you?”

The soft sibilant sigh confirmed his fear.

“Damn,” he said softly. “I’m sorry. I wish we could have saved her too.”

The chirp of the communicator in his pocket interrupted. He pulled it out.

“Lee?” This time it was Seldar himself

“Yeah, Seldar.”

“The Russian boat is down, but Britanov was rescued.”

“I know.” The sadness in his voice caused Seldar to pause.

“Lee? Is there a problem?”

“Did you know K-219 was becoming like Seaview?”

There was a startled intake of breath. “Are you certain?”

“Seaview is.”

“I see.” Crane could hear the distress in Seldar’s voice. Since the transformation of inanimate objects occurred so seldom, it had simply never occurred to anyone that it might have happened to the other sub. Seldar sighed. “I was calling to tell you that there has been no leakage of radiation from the reactors or missiles. There is some chemical contamination from the missile fuel, but it should dissipate over a period of months. She went down relatively intact.”

“What happened, Seldar? K-219 went down awfully fast.”

There was a long pause. “Britanov sank her by opening both doors on one of the torpedo tubes. Moscow was going to order him to put the crew back aboard in the morning, but he was afraid that your government would board her in the dark and try to take her from him. He wasn‘t willing to allow either event to happen.”

Crane shivered, imagining Britanov’s mad dash through K-219’s corridors to reach a hatch and escape. “He’s lucky.” Actually, he figured it was more than just luck. He’d felt Seaview stretching away from herself during the time when the other sub was sinking. He was pretty sure she’d gone to make sure Britanov escaped.

“You do realize, don’t you, Lee, that Britanov is now in danger from his own government? That he still hasn’t been rescued as the Elder required because the Soviet government will want a scapegoat for K-219‘s loss?”

He was right, Crane realized. The Game itself might have ended, but the repercussions had yet to fully manifest themselves.

**************

Igor Britanov stood on the stern of the Fyodor Bredkin and looked out over the moonlit sea. The freighter was headed for Cuba. From there he and his crew would be flown back to the Soviet Union. His crew would be safe, but he and Krasilnikov would be lucky if they didn’t wind up with bullets in their heads. He shivered, wondering if he’d been saved from a watery grave just to meet one on land. If that was the case, he’d rather have gone down with K-219. He wondered again about his memories of his meeting with Nelson and Crane - and the words K-219 has whispered to him when he’d given him back his life.

Had any of it been real? Or had he finally simply gone mad?

Author’s Note: Much of this story is true. In early October of 1986, just a week before the Iceland Summit between Gorbachev and President Reagan, the Soviet ballistic missile sub K-219 under the command of Igor Britanov did sink off the US east coast. The American attack sub USS Augusta was involved. The Soviets claimed the US sub struck their boat; the US denies to this day it happened. The American captain did, unfortunately, behave just as I’ve portrayed here. Details of the events can be found in the non-fiction book Hostile Waters by Peter Huchthausen, Igor Kurdin and R. Alan White. HBO made a heavily fictionalized movie based on the book. I’ve combined elements of both. Rutger Hauer played Britanov in the movie - his portrayal is the basis for my Captain Britanov. Some dialog from the book is included in my story - the line of Britanov asking his chief engineer if he had to throw rocks to get him to leave the boat was just too good to change.

On a further note. The real Britanov faced prison or worse on his return to Russia, but in one of

those twists of fate that prove truth is indeed stranger than fiction, was spared when a kid named Matthius Rust took off from Helsinki, Finland and headed east in a rented Cessna. He flew until he ran out of gas - and then landed in Red Square. The Old Guard Minister of Defense who’d been about to put Britanov in prison for twenty years was suddenly out, to be replaced by one of Gorbachev’s people. While Britanov was expelled from the Communist party, effectively ending his career, he did keep a position in the naval reserves and his pension, not to mention what freedom was then available in the Soviet Union.

He deserved better for his humanity and courage.

As for Von Suskil - his crew was less than happy with him, especially when later in the same patrol, Augusta collided with a second Russian boomer, this time damaging herself enough that she spent the next year in dry-dock for repairs. The crew ratted Von Suskil out, first to his superiors, and then when the Navy showed no signs of caring about what he’d done, the media. At that point an investigation was forced on them and Von Suskil ultimately wound up on the beach himself. Personally, I think he should have been kicked out of the Navy with a dishonorable discharge, not just relieved of his command. JMHO.

Storm