Phoenix Sub Zero

“Houser, get the chief radioman in here. I want the gear checked before we go above the layer. We took a hell of a beating. And find Sanderson and tell him I want to know sonar’s status. And the firecontrol chief, Gessup, get him up here too. And Jensen, to see how the nav electronics are doing. Once we get the electronic systems functional we’ll come up and send the brass the word on us and the Destiny.”

“Then what, sir?”

“What’s Doc think about the injured? A week make a big difference?”

“You’re not thinking about Norfolk, are you?” Houser asked. “I’ve been with Ives in the mess. Those guys need help fast. Your call, Cap’n, but if this bucket of bolts belonged to me I’d hightail it for someplace damned close. Scotland or Liverpool or Rota.”

“It will depend on the electronics, Houser,” Kane said. “If the ship is healthy enough to make it transatlantic I’ll take the injured off with a chopper and drive the boat home — this girl’s going to need a dry dock after what she’s been through. A pier at Faslane does her no good. And we’re out of the fight anyway with no torpedoes. But if we have no sonar and no firecontrol, I won’t risk the trip.”

Kane looked down at the dead computer screens of the attack centers, suddenly knowing that the vital but vulnerable electronics were probably total wrecks. It would seem a miracle that the reactor plant and steam plant were online, but three decades before, when Admiral Rickover himself designed most of the propulsion plant of the USS Nautilus, the propulsion systems had been absolutely bulletproof, forsaking the then electronic technology of vacuum tubes for magamps, giant iron cores being the state-of-the-art in the late 1930s. Since 1954, vacuum tubes had given way to transistors, then integrated circuits and finally microprocessors.

Still, the nuclear plants had stuck with magamps, the speed controller on a motor-generator the size of a refrigerator even though the same controller would take up the space of a fingernail if done with a microprocessor. The nukes had kept the old-fashioned bulletproof systems, forsaking most microelectronics except the reactor’s safety systems — which had triple redundancy anyway — even though the designers were pressing hard to save every cubic foot of volume aboard. Those decisions now seemed rational, since after a five-g crash against the bottom, the reactor systems had been restarted without a flaw while the ship’s more modern computer systems forward might never function again.

Sanderson arrived first, looking haggard. Senior Chief Radioman Binghamton limped in with a splint on his knee.

Binghamton was a shaved-headed muscular Mr. Clean, missing only the earrings and the height, barely five-foot-four in shoes. He was a man of many styles, able to shift from humorous and encouraging coach to tough authoritarian. Not. one enlisted man or officer called him “Bingy” to his face, not since his first week onboard when several radiomen and one chief had found themselves slammed into bulkheads with Binghamton’s large face in theirs. He was fond of giving advice, especially to those who didn’t want it, like Mcdonne. But it was a given that every man aboard loved Binghamton, with the exception of Edwin Sanderson. Kane had made Binghamton chief of the boat, the ranking enlisted man, a move that Mcdonne pretended to disagree with since both men believed they were the experts at leading the crew.

On this run Binghamton had been in an upbeat mood, the word coming down that he would soon make master chief or warrant officer. But now Binghamton’s face was full of anger.

He kept his silence until Kane was ready. Electronics Mate First Class Edwards arrived, a worried look on his bearded face.

“Where’s Gessup?” Kane asked, referring to the firecontrol chief, the man he wanted to tell him the status of the firecontrol system.

“He was getting a cup of bug juice in the crew’s mess,” Edwards said, “when he just keeled over. Doc says he’s got a concussion but he looked like my daddy did when he had his stroke—”

“Okay. Edwards, hang in there.” Kane looked at the assembled men. “The reactor is up and we’re on the way home, at least for now. I need to know if we can remain submerged and I want to send a message about the Destiny. Radio first. What’s the status, Senior?”

“It’s hosed, Captain. Every cabinet. I’m cannibalizing components from every system trying to get one up. I think I can get one UHF transceiver going through the bigmouth antenna, but the crypto gear has shit the bed. Anything you say, you better count on the enemy hearing.”

“What about a slot buoy?”

“All broken to hell. Not one working, and they can’t be repaired —no spares.”

“How long till you’ll be ready to send a message?”

“Ten minutes, but that doesn’t mean the bigmouth will work. All I can do is wait till we’re ready to transmit.”