Barracuda: Final Bearing

“This is a direct order. You’re relieved as commander Pacific forces. You are to withdraw your forces immediately, return to base and stand by for—” Pacino clicked twice on the phone handset to the control room. In control, Paully White heard the double click in his headset, snapped the periscope grips up, lowered the periscope and shouted, “Emergency deep!”

“Emergency deep, aye, sir!” from the diving officer. The helmsman took the bowplanes to full dive and put a ten-degree down-bubble on the ship, rang up all ahead standard while the stern planesman put his planes on full dive. The chief of the watch at the ballastcontrol panel flooded depth-control one, making the ship hundreds of tons heavier in a half-second. He stabbed a toggle switch, lowering the BIGMOUTH radio antenna and at the same time reached up to the circuit-one microphone.

“EMERGENCY DEEP! EMERGENCY DEEP!” The depth indicator unwound. The speed increase, taking the down angle and flooding depth control to make the ship heavier had all combined to take the ship from periscope depth to deep at 200 feet in a few seconds, the maneuver intended to save the ship in the event the conning officer saw a close surface ship bearing down on them when they were at periscope depth.

“All ahead full,” White ordered. “Dive, make your depth six hundred fifty feet. Helm, right two degrees rudder, steady course zero three zero.”

Soon Porter came back to the conn, looking shaken.

In Kane’s stateroom Wadsworth had been talking so fast his mouth was a blur on the screen when the sound of the circuit one rang throughout the ship sounding EMERGENCY DEEP and Wadsworth’s eyes grew large just before his image winked out for good. They had left the surface, where their periscope and radio antenna had them plugged into the world of the Pentagon and the Oval Office, and now Barracuda was deep, the radio waves gone, on her own. For the moment, anyway.

“Maybe we should call President Warner,” Kane said as Paully White came back in.

“You can bet that Wadsworth has already taken care of that,” White said.

“So we can assume we’re on our own now,” Kane said.

“I think that’s safe to say,” Pacino muttered.

“So what now. Admiral?”

“Now we put Barracuda on the case. We’ll go north into the Oparea here and see what luck we have against the Destiny class, using a Seawolf class and some Mark 50 torpedoes.”

“Admiral, those were the same weapons used by the 688s we lost.”

“We don’t know if they bagged any Destinys though.”

“What about Piranha? She could be a big help to us.”

“She’ll be coming in from the northern tip of the Oparea. We’re here just to the east of Tokyo Bay. I say we sweep north until we link up with Piranha. She’ll come south and shoot her way toward us.”

“Maybe we should radio the Piranha so Brucey Phillips knows what to do,” Paully put in.

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” Kane said. “After the collision with that fishing boat at periscope depth the antennae are out of commission.”

“What collision?” Paully was mystified until Pacino spoke up.

“The one that made you do the emergency deep, of course. Paully here has had so little sleep that he forgets colliding with that fishing boat…”

Paully smiled, catching on.

“So how will Piranha know what the deal is?”

“Bruce Phillips will know,” Pacino said. “Believe me, he’ll know.” “Sir,” Kane said, doubt in his voice, “I’m not so sure I’m okay with disobeying an order, even one from the Wadsworthless.”

“Kane, listen to me. Wadsworth knows me. He knows I’ll disregard that order. If we can put some Japanese subs on the bottom, between us and Bruce Phillips, two Seawolfclass ships, Wadsworth will forget about this order.” Kane said nothing. What the hell could you say to an admiral willing to cut his own throat?

“Okay,” Pacino said, clapping his hands. “Now, let’s get this bucket of bolts positioned in the Oparea and go to work.” m m BARRACUDA wm northwest pacific japanese oparea, twenty miles east OF point nojimazaki USS Barracuda

“Any activity?” Pacino asked Kane in the control room.

Kane was looking up at the sonar display above the postwo console.

“Nothing.”

“They’ll turn up.”

“Hope so.”

“How are the weapons?”

“I’ve got all eight loaded with Mark 50s. All eight tubes have outer doors open, and the upper four have torpedo power applied. I can get four out within thirty seconds of contact.”

“I’d think about warming up at least two more,” Pacino said. “If the gyro temps get too high you can always shut them down, but—” He realized he was interfering, doing what he swore to Paully he wouldn’t do. “I’ll be in my stateroom,” he said. Kane watched him leave, then looked over at the officer of the deck, Lt. David Voorheese.