The Command

She was out of air. Time to go up. But there was no air up there to breathe. And she had her hands on the wheel now. So she drew her knees up under her and bent over the valve and said in her mind Left to loose, right to tight, and put her shoulders into it hard and broke it free. Shifted her grip and got it over another quarter turn and then another. Closing it. Closing off the ruthless inflooding sea. Thinking: Kait-lyn. Remember me. Your mom did what she had to do.

Stars shooting away from the edge of her vision. She couldn’t see anything, only those stars. But she kept turning the wheel, until all her strength would turn it no more.

34

Dan was still at the damage control board hours later, when word came up at last that flooding was under control in Main One. The water level was dropping around the submersible pumps that had been lowered down the escape scuttle.

“What about the people?” he asked harshly.

“Nothing yet, sir. We searched down to the internal waterline.” Another voice on the far end of the line; then the first one, the repair party talker, came back on. “Sir, just got the word we have firemain pressure back. Rigging the portable eductors.”

“Dewater fast as you can. Check for any air pockets.” But he knew as he took the phones off there probably wouldn’t be any.

He slumped, rubbing his eyes with utter weariness and near despair even though that last news was good. They’d fought flooding and fire all this time and for many hours it had looked like they’d lose. If any of the bulkheads had ruptured, it would have been over. With Main One starting to dewater maybe they’d turned the corner at last. But he couldn’t stop thinking of the helo crew, the Gold Team, the guys who’d been topside when the blast hit. The investigators and repair party people he’d sent down into the spaces, who’d never made it back up.

Porter came off the phones. “Starting from forward going aft: Flooding in Main One under control, commencing dewater. Dewatering complete in Aux One and Two, starting cleanup. Main Two, water cleared, smoke cleared. Shaft alley, three feet of water left, but lube oil restored to main shaft bearings. Port shaft seal checked and cleared for one-third power. Permission to light off main propulsion engines one-alfa and one-bravo. Permission to restart gas turbine generator number two.”

“Granted.”

“And test the engines?”

“Check with Commander Hotchkiss first, in Combat. Then come ahead slow with the port shaft and check the stern tube seal for leaks.”

She passed that word and he watched her profile for a few seconds. Then called Combat himself.

“XO here. Are we gonna float, sir?”

“I think so. So far anyway. Anything yet from Bill Brinegar?”

“We just got him. Get this: on a secure compartmented-intelligence net. The Evinrude guys tinkered it up and got a message out. I passed our position. He was already on his way; his sonar guys reported the explosion and he wondered why we dropped off the net and didn’t answer his calls. He passed our status to Sixth Fleet. Orders are to head for Crete if we can, Port Said if we can’t.”

“Copy that.”

“The chief corpsman says you have to get off your feet and on your back. Are you gonna do that? Or do I have to relieve you of command?”

“Lin says we might have steerageway in a couple of minutes. I’m going to tell after steering to put us into the wind and start the washdown system, start decontaminating from the bullnose aft. Pass that to Bill. When he gets here, we’re gonna want to borrow his decon guys, damage control teams, and some of his hose and patching kits. We’ll have to use his boats, ours are gone.”

He signed off and went over to the propulsion control panel and stood watching as the engineers started the main propulsion engines. One-bravo lit off. One-alfa wouldn’t start. But even one engine would give them steerageway and they already had enough generators to run the vital load. When the second engine lit off, he told them good job. Then undogged the door and went forward.

But after a few steps he had to stop. His neck felt warm. The tingling in his legs was worse. He had to lie down. Sick bay. No. His at-sea cabin. Just a couple of ladders.

He leaned against a fire station, alone in the passageway, and closed his eyes.

It had been very close. A lot of his people had died, been hurt, taken doses of radiation. But they’d come through. The guys, the girls, every one of them. He was so fucking proud of them. It looked like they’d saved her.

And having that bomb go off out here at sea, not where it had been intended, had probably saved a lot of other lives.

The trawler had been headed for Tel Aviv With a tremendously fallout-enhanced nuclear device of some sort. Probably enough, if the wind was right, to contaminate most of Israel. Where had it come from? Who’d been behind it?

He didn’t know. But he looked forward to finding out.

A sailor came from aft, bedraggled and wet. Their eyes met. “Gonna make it, Captain?”

“I’ll make it.”