Voyage of the Devilfish

1. KREMLIN IS SUSPICIOUS.

2. TODAY I BRIEFED THE KREMLIN AND DEFENSE MINISTRY PERSONNEL, INCLUDING PACIFIC FLEET COMMANDER ADMIRAL MIKHAIL BARISOV.

3. ALL EXCEPT BARISOV SATISFIED FOR THE MOMENT THAT YOU ARE CONDUCTING AN EXERCISE. TIME OF THE ESSENCE. ADVISE YOU COMPLETE OPERATION SOON OR THEY WILL WONDER WHY PIERS STILL EMPTY.

4. BARISOV VERY INTERESTED IN FLEET DEPLOYMENT. ASKED QUESTIONS, WANTED SPECIFICS. MENTIONED POSSIBILITY OF EMULATING OPERATION TO SEE HOW WELL HIS SUBMARINES COULD SCRAMBLE TO SEA. I TOLD HIM IT HAD TAKEN MONTHS OF PREPARATIONS, GREAT COST. THAT MAY HAVE PUT HIM OFF OR MADE HIM MORE SUSPICIOUS OF YOUR MOTIVES. HE SAID NOTHING.

5. BARISOV REMAINS IN MOSCOW. MEANWHILE PACIFIC FLEET HEADQUARTERS IN VLADIVOSTOK BUSY. BARISOV MAY BE PLANNING SOMETHING. MORE REASON TO CONCLUDE OPERATION

6. NEW INTELLIGENCE — U.S. ATLANTIC FLEET ATTACK SUBMARINES SCRAMBLED TO WEST ATLANTIC. OVER 60 VESSELS. SUGGEST RETHINK OPERATION IF THEY ARE ABLE TO TRAIL OUR SUBMARINES. THEY MUST BE PRESUMED TO CARRY JAVELIN CRUISE MISSILES. PROVOCATION COULD BRING DANGEROUS CONSEQUENCES.

7. MORE INTELLIGENCE — A U.S. ATTACK SUBMARINE, PIRANHA CLASS, IS ENROUTE NORTH ATLANTIC, POSSIBLY TO ICECAP.

8. U.N. CREW WITNESSED DESTRUCTION OF 120 “WARSHOT” SSN-X-27 CRUISE MISSILES TODAY. WORLD BELIEVES WE NOW HAVE NONE.

9. FISHHOOK, AS ORDERED, TRYING TO CONVINCE U.S. LEADERSHIP THAT NORTHERN FLEET DEPLOYMENT IS EXERCISE.

10. RAPID REPEAT RAPID CONCLUSION OF THIS OPERATION VITAL. GOOD LUCK.

Novskoyy read the message again, then shredded it in Vlasenko’s shredding machine. He consulted his calendar. With a decent speed-of-advance, his fleet should be off the coast of the U.S. in two days — by the 20th of December. What remained was for Agent Fishhook, General Tyler, to hold off the U.S. submarine force long enough for his ships to get in position.

CHAPTER 14

SATURDAY, 18 DECEMBER

NORTH ATLANTIC

The periscope video-repeater showed the dark water, the ridge of ice ahead and the low arctic sun shining coldly in the local morning. This far north, in the marginal ice zone, where the sun lingered low on the horizon most of the days, the MIZ was a dangerous area of icebergs and drift-ice, the transition between open water and the cover of the polar icecap. Submarines usually avoided going to periscope depth in the MIZ. The risk of collision was great, and the hull could easily be torn open by an iceberg. But Pacino had insisted on one last look and for twenty minutes had trained the scope around in slow circles. What Pacino saw looked like snow-covered, mountainous terrain on the horizon. Cold, deserted, desolate, dead.

Still, at least it was the surface, complete with the sun and the sea and the ice. And fresh clean air not filtered by charcoal, not scrubbed of carbon dioxide by an amine bed, not fed through carbon-monoxide burners, not electrified by the precipitators. Not the dry coppery artificial air generated by the “Bomb,” the oxygen generator that split water into hydrogen and oxygen, storing the oxygen and discarding the hydrogen, the mixture of gases dangerous enough to breach the hull in a violent explosion should it fail, and giving the machine its nickname. Christman’s voice, edged with uncertainty, interrupted Pacino’s thoughts.