Jump to new as of November 26, 1999
Prologue
Author's Note: This is mainly for people who enjoy Tom Clancy, or have read(or seen.) The Hunt for Red October. This is just a prologue, so I won't torture you poor, defenseless (I'm raving...) readers with a full chapter, and if you don't like it, any of it. Now, I'll outline the story (kind of) and list the characters. (Some of the names have been changed to protect the potential victims of this story.)
Our story begins with Charles Ramius beginning out of the Soviet Navy's secret military installation at Polyarnyy aboard the Soviet missile submarine, Red October. He was dressed in five layers of wool and oilskin, but the chill from the early morning and cold air coming off the inlet from the cold ocean five nautical miles north was strong. He could feel the worn out tugboat obliging them out to sea in the Soviet fashion-- Strong and surely. "Engines slow, Kamarov," he ordered. The tug slid away from behind them and their own engine power coming online, the first time in its two-year lifetime, and pushing them out to sea to begin a journey that would begin a new chapter in Ramius' sailing career. Ramius sat thinking about the ice-breaker sailing in front of them and how it's engine must have been at full to break the ice so efficiently.....
Now the names;
Charles Ramius--Captain of the nuclear missile submarine Red October,
Jack Darcy--Consultant to the CIA and father of one adopted daughter
Elizabeth Bennet--One of the only female 'higher-ups' in the Submarine Intel program
Bart Mancuso--Driver of the American Missile boat(sub)(Los Angeles Class) Dallas
Ivan Yurievich--Annoying Political Officer to Charles Ramius
Doctor Petrov--Medical doctor on board Red October
Posted on Friday, 23 April 1999
The Red October It was not until late morning Red October submerged into the icy water that filled the Kola Fjord, which eventually entered the frigid Barents Sea in the Arctic Ocean. Ramius had given the order to submerge over an hour ago, but problems with the Purga, the ice-breaker, had stopped them for a quarter of an hour. Ramius had just settled in the massive sub's wardroom, when there came a knock at the door, the person on the other side did not wait for Ramius to open the door, but came right in. It was Political Officer Ivan Yurievich Putin. "Captain! We go to sea once again to protect and serve the Rodina!" he said without any enticement from Captain Ramius.
"Indeed, Ivan," Ramius replied with more good cheer than he felt. "Two weeks at sea. It is good to leave the dock. A seaman belongs at sea, not tied alongside, overrun with bureaucrats and workmen with dirty boots. And we will be warm."
"You find this cold?" Putin asked incredulously.
Putin was the perfect political officer. His voice was too loud, and his humor too affected. He never allowed a person to forget who he was. The perfect political officer, Putin was an easy man to fear.
Morrow, England
"Halsey's greatest popular success was his greatest error. In establishing himself as a popular hero with legendary aggressiveness, the admiral would blind later generations to his impressive intellectual abilities and a shrewd gamblers instinct to--" Jack Darcy frowned at his computer. It sounded too much like a doctoral dissertation, and he had already done one of those. Why was it, he wondered, the introductions were the hardest part of history books? He was doing an authorized biography of Fleet Admiral William Halsey. Nearly all of it was sitting next to him in half a dozen floppy disks on top of his printer joined by a cable to his Apple laptop.
"Daddy, daddy?" Darcy's daughter was staring up at him.
"And how's my little Sally today?"
"Fine."
Darcy picked her up and set her on his lap, careful to slide his chair away from the keyboard. Sally was all checked out for games and educational programs, and occasionally thought that this meant she could handle WordStar also. Once that had resulted in the loss of twenty-thousand words of electronically-recorded manuscript. And a spanking.
She leaned her head against her father's shoulder.
"You don't look fine. What's bothering my little girl?"
"Well, daddy, y'see it's almost Chris'mas, an...I'm not sure that Santa knows where we are. We're not where we were last year."
"Oh, I see. And you're afraid he doesn't come here?"
"Uh huh."
"Why didn't you ask me before? Of course he comes here. Promise.
"Promise?"
"Promise."
"Okay." She kissed her father on the fore-head, and ran into the living room to watch the telly, as they called it in England. Darcy was glad he was interrupted. He didn't want to forget to pick up a few things when he flew over to Washington. Where was--Oh yea. He pulled a floppy-disk from his desk drawer and inserted it in the spare disk drive. After clearing the screen, he scrolled up to the Christmas list, things he still had to get. With a single command, Darcy began printing the list, he tore it off and quickly put it into his pocket. Work didn't appeal to him this Saturday morning, and he decided to play with his daughter. After all, he planned on being in Washington the whole week.
Chapter Two
USS Bremerton
Colonel William Clark was on the bridge watching the main workings of a submarine he'd never been on before. He had been debriefed by three Generals about the operation that he had successfully carried out with four other men. He had sustained only cuts and bruises, and that was from the rough landing from the helicopter landing on the submarine's bow, but one other man was shot through the arm with a pistol fired from one of the scared natives. The four of them had jetted through the water on special boards equipped with engines and steering capabilities. They had landed a tiny bit off course, but were undaunted, and headed into the rain forest. Their mission was to rescue twenty-one POWs and bring them back safely. This was accomplished in less than four days, the amount of time the SEAL team had allotted to get them all out. Clark was the leader appointed not only by the government of the United States, but by the team he would be leading also. His men had confidence and trust in him and it would not do to let them down. The camp where the POWs were being held was like most of the secret camps in North Vietnam; cold, damp, and frightful. The rescue party staked out the camp twenty-four hours a day for any signs of a change in the norm. After two painstakingly long days, Clark called in on his radio, 'CRICKET this is SNAKE, we're moving in to get the 'Ws.'
Cricket grumbled a reply and they went in. Everyone had silencers on their old CAR-16s, but after a few seconds, everyone knew there was something wrong. Only a few rounds were traded between the N.V.A.(North Vietnam Army)and the SecOps team. They were in, grabbed the captive soldiers, and got out. All the former POWs were now in comfortable quarters until they could be debriefed properly by someone from the Marines. Clark was in the mess-hall relaxing and having a beer, something that had to be kept strictly away from the ears of any higher-ups, and retelling what he was allowed to, to some of the other sailors. "I'll tell you one thing," Clark said after finishing his bottle and dinner, "After this, I've got even more reason to take a long visit to the Keys."
The Red October
Ramius had listened to Putin rave about the Motherland and the politics of Moscow yesterday, and prepared himself for it again. Today was to be the day they discovered their orders. Putin arrived exactly on time and sat down, there was a book on the table the captain had been reading, Putin flipped through it and grunted something about not being able to read English and what a waste of time it was for a loyal Soviet officer, a submarine commander no less, to learn a language he would scarcely speak. "Oh, Comrade Political Officer, you are not excited about learning our orders?" Ramius asked hearing Putin's tone. He did not reply, but when Ramius rose to unlock the safe holding the highly sensitive orders, gave him his key. Ramius dialed in the combination, unlocked it with the keys, and gave Putin back his. "Hmm, hmm, hmm," Ramius mumbled flipping through the pages, "We are to proceed to grid-square 54-90 and rendezvous with our attack submarine V.K. Konovalov--That's captain Tupolev's new command. You know Viktor Tupolev. No? Viktor will guard us from imperialist intruders, and we will conduct a four-day acquisition and tracking drill, with him hunting us--if he can." Ramius chuckled. "He has not yet learned to track us with our new drive. Well, our operations will be limited to square 54-90 and the surrounding ones. Might as well make it somewhat easy for him."
"You will not let him catch us?" Putin asked in surprise.
"Of course not! Viktor was once my pupil, you do not let the student surpass the teacher." Ramius shot back.
Putin finished his cigarette and tea before standing. "So again I am permitted to watch the master captain at work--befuddling a poor boy." He turned towards the door. "I think--"
Ramius kicked Putin's feet out from under him just as he was stepping away from the table. Putin fell backwards while Ramius sprang to his feet and grasped the political officer's head in his strong fisherman hands. The captain drove his neck downward to the sharp, metal-edged corner of the wardroom table. It struck the point. In the same instant, Ramius drove his elbow sharply into Putin's chest, he heard the sickening sound of bones being crushed and checked Putin's pulse. It took nearly two minutes for it to stop. When he was sure the man was dead, he dumped two cups worth of tea on the floor and was careful to dribble some on his shoes then immedietly yelled for the doctor, "Dr. Petrov to the wardroom at once!" The doctor's office was just a few steps aft the wardroom. After completing a once-over of the body, Petrov concluded he was dead. "It was my fault! He slipped on my spilled tea. He is dead because of me." Ramius said with emotion he did not feel looking down at the body.
"No captain. It was no ones fault, it was, how do the American's say? bad luck."
Ramius continued in his false guilt for ten minutes after to convince the doctor he thought it was his fault and gave the doctor permission to take the body away. His plan was underway.
Chapter
V. K. Konovalov
The V. K. Konovalov crept just above the hard sand bottom of the Barents Sea at three knots. She was at the southwest corner of grid square 54-90 and for the past ten hours had been drifting back and forth on a north-south line, waiting for the Red October to arrive for the beginning of exercise OCTOBER FROST. Captain Second Rank Viktor Alexievich Tupolev paced slowly around the periscope pedestal in the control room of his small, fast attack sub. He was waiting for his old mentor to show up, hoping to play a few tricks on him. He had served with the Schoolmaster for two years. They had been good years, and while he found his former commander somewhat of a cynic, especially about the Party, be would unhesitatingly testify to Ramius' skill and craftiness.
And his own. Tupolev, now in his third year of command, had been one of the Schoolmaster's star pupils. His current vessel was a brand-new Alfa, the fastest submarine ever made. A month earlier, while Ramius had been fitting out the Red October after her initial shakedown, Tupolev and three of his officers had flown down to the model sub that had been the test-bed for the prototype drive system. Thirty-two meters long and diesel-electric powered, it was based in the Caspian Sea, far from the eyes of imperialist spies, and kept in a covered dock, safe from their photographic satellites. Ramius had had a hand in the development of the caterpillar, and Tupolev recognized the mark of the master. He would have a heck of a time detecting it. Not quite impossible, though. After a week of following the model around the Caspian Sea in an electrically powered launch, trailing the best passive sonar array his country had yet made, he thought he had found a flaw. Not a big one, just big enough to exploit.
Of course there was no guarantee of success. He was not only in competition with a machine, but also with the captain commanding her. Tupolev knew this area intimately. The water was almost perfectly isothermal; there was no thermal layer for a submarine to hide under. They were far enough from the freshwater rivers on the north coast of Russia not to have to worry about pools and walls of variable salinity interfering with their sonar searches. The Konovalov had been built with the best sonar systems the Soviet Union had yet produced, copied closley from the French DUUV-23 and a bit improved, the factory technitions said.
Tupolev planned to mimic the American tactic of drifting slowly, just enough to maintian steerage, perfectly quiet and waiting for the Red October to cross his path. He would then trail his course closely and log each change in course and speed, so that when compared with the logs in a few weeks, the Schoolmaster would see that his erstwhile student had played his own winning game. It was about time someone did.
"Anything new on sonar?" Tupolev was getting tense. Patience did not come easily to him.
"Nothing new, Comrade Captain." The starpom tapped the X on the chart that marked the position of the Rokossovskiy, a Delta-class missile sub they had been tracking for several hours in the same exercise area. "Our friend is still cruising in a slow circle. Do you think Captain Ramius would have arranged for the Rokossovskiy to complicate our task?"
The thought had occurred to Tupolev. "Perhaps, but probably not. This exercise was arranged by Korov himself. Our orders were sealed, and Charles'," Tupolev did not like the fact Ramius had an American first name, but he tolerated it. "Should have been also. But then again, Admiral Korov his an old friend of Charles'." Tupolev paused for a moment and shook his head. "No, Korov is an honorable man. I think Ramius is proceeding this way as slowly as he can. To make us nervous, to make us question ourselves. He will know we are to hunt him, and he will change his plans accordingly. He might enter the square from and unexpected direction--or make us think he is. You have never served under Captain Ramius, Comrade Lieutenant. He is a fox, and old gray-whiskered fox. I think we will continue to patrol this square as we are for another four hours. If we have not yet acquired him, we will cross over to the south-east corner, then to the center. Yes." Tupolev never expected it would be this easy. No submarine captain had ever embarrassed Ramius. He was determined to be the first, this would be an important victory in his career as a Soviet submarine commander, but would only confirm his own prowess. In one, maybe two more years, Tupolev planned to be the new Schoolmaster.
The Pentagon
Elizabeth Bennet sat at her desk in the outer-most ring of the Pentagon. She preferred her office over-looking the parking lot, it was more than anyone in the other rings had. All they had were their pictures on the wall, it was only a parking lot, but it was real. She could have had an office in one of the inner-rings--and could still at the drop of a hat--because of her high position in the United States Military's Submarine Intelligence Program. This was something the American citizens knew very little about. The government kept a tight lock on pretty much everything about this. She didn't mind, but it was very tiresome leaving work and not being able to vent to anyone about it. She enjoyed every aspect of her job, except the stress that came along with the Soviet's growing interest in 'exploring the ocean.' as their classified talks with the Soviet diplomat last year had produced. Things over there, it seemed to Elizabeth, were growing unstable by the day. After finishing up a late meeting, and doing some paperwork given to her by her secretary, she went home to her apartment. She found a message on her voice mail; "Hello, Liz, how are you doing? I'm in town for a conference, by the way, will you delete this message after you've listened to it please, I shouldn't have told you about the conference, and I was wondering if we could meet for dinner? Thanks. I'm staying at the Washington Hilton, room 314. 'Bye." She recognized the voice of an old friend; Jack Darcy.
Chapter 4
Elizabeth Bennet's Apartment
"Ha, like that'll happen." she said as she deleted Jack's message on her Voice-Mail. She and Jack went back a long time and she preferred not to remember. He'd been a hot-shot CIA agent, and she'd been an aide to a congressman. They met at a fancy restaurant where his date hadn't shown up, and her's wasn't to be seen anywhere. Elizabeth had been waiting on the sidewalk for the taxi she'd called inside, and Jack was going the same way. They went out once, and Jack thought that gave him the license to propose marriage. She would have been able to let him down easily, if not for his cocky proposal. She still remembered the words he used; 'You know, I think we should get married. I know you are kind of, oh, unpopular with most people 'cause you're so stiff. But we can change that when we're married. Now, what'da say? I think Tuesday is good for me.' She objected to the way he phrased it and he responded, 'No offence, but you're lucky, you're just an aide.'
'Just an aide?! I'll tell you something mister, you may be a hot-shot agent for the CIA, but with me, you have just become extremely intolerable, and I do not wish to see you again.' she yelled at him and she'd only talked to him once after that; when he'd apologized. She'd taken it, and they parted ways. Well, maybe if it's a short dinner. Maybe he's gotten a little smarter since then. she thought to herself. She felt lucky she'd written down the number and hotel where Jack was staying and called him. A few rings and he picked up, "Hello?"
"Um, hi Jack. It's Liz. I got your message."
"Oh! Hi. How is everything? I heard you got a big promotion from the Hill. Working with sub-stuff?"
"Yeah. I'm full time or better at the Pentagon. Listen Jack, if it's good with you, you want to meet for dinner in about," Elizabeth looked down at her watch, 7:30 p.m., "Forty-five minutes?"
"Sure, I'll pick you up at your house. Still live at 4309 Longbourne Rd.?" he thought the name of her street was silly.
"Yes, still do. See you around eight. 'Bye." With that, the conversation was over. "What have I gotten myself into?" she murmured as she went to her closet to find a dress.
The Red October
As Ramius tidied up after Putin's 'accident' he quickly grabbed the orders he'd prepared prior to sailing. After killing Putin, Ramius burned their real orders and replaced them with the document now tucked safely inside his jacket pocket. When everything was clean to Ramius' satisfaction, he left the wardroom, and made his way to the bridge of the Red October.
"Mr. Kamarov," Ramius said to the sonar man, "Anything new on sonar?"
"No comrade captain. The waters are clear."
"Are the engines functioning correctly?"
"Yes, Captain, to the very best of my knowledge." the sonar man asked puzzled at why the captain would ask him that question.
"Good. I will now address the crew." Ramius picked up the microphone which would trigger the P.A. system, depressed the button, and began to speak;
"Gentlemen, this is your captain speaking, it is a pleasure to serve with you aboard our country's latest achievement. Now, we set out to sea to play this dangerous game of chess once again. Your brothers and fathers before you played this game well, but now it is time you tried your hand at this vastly strategic game. I will now share with you our orders to sail into the United States, where we will listen to their Rock 'n' Roll while we lay many missiles off their largest cities, including Washington D.C. and New York City. We will slip in undetected, pass through their 'sonar nets' in the Atlantic Ocean, and after we have done this, we may sail up to the Cuban shores, where the weather is warm, as is the Comradeship." Ramius heard hoots and hollers he guessed came from the men in the lunch room. He continued, "The order is to engage the silent drive!" He heard, and saw, men rushing around the bridge, "Engage the caterpillar, aye captain!" he heard one of the men say. Ramius felt a small surge as the main engines stopped and the silent drive engaged. Ramius started to speak again but was drowned out by a sound sacred to all the men on board; the Soviet National Anthem. "Captain, the silent drive is fully operational, and no sonar will pick us up, but what about the singing?" Ramius' first officer asked. By now the singing had become quite loud, and a smile had developed on Ramius' face. "Let them sing." he replied.
Chapter 5
As Jack finished getting ready for dinner with Elizabeth, he caught his reflection in the mirror. At 32, he still looked good, his six foot frame was muscular from his days as a Marine, but no so that it looked bulky under his suit. His black suit made him look more the James Bond super-spy type than a CIA analyst. He walked out the door of his hotel room and got in his rented black BMW convertible and started it up, it purred, waiting to be set free on the highway. He would not, however, be going on the freeway, but on busy thoroughfares and main streets. Once through the clogged intersections of Washington D.C., he turned down a small street named Longbourn Drive, where Elizabeth lived. He took a final look in the rear-view mirror, and picked the single red rose off of the passenger's seat. He walked up to the door and rang the bell once. Elizabeth appeared in the doorway at once dressed in a black dress Jack thought was a bit old-fashioned; it was cut off just below the knee. In short, she looked stunning. "For you, Elizabeth Bennet." Jack said as he handed her the rose.
"Thank you, Jack Darcy." she said as she gave him a quick hug and walked out to his car. Something wasn't right though, she could feel the bulge of a shoulder holster.
"Is it ready?" the man dressed all in black asked Wickham in thickly Russian accented English.
"Yeah, no problem. The reactor will start melt-down in two hours. Where's my cash?" George Wickham said, quite proud of himself.
"Not so fast. You'll get your money when meltdown starts."
They moved from the busy street corner in Moscow to a small coffee shop. The two had a cup of imported Colombian coffee and left. Wickham pulled a small cellular phone from his pocket and dialed a series of numbers, when he was finally connected he started speaking. "It's George, yeah, two hours and I want him dead." he ended the call quickly. He wouldn't be doing jobs for this egomaniac any longer. The man Wickham had just spoke to in the coffee shop wanted a Russian nuclear submarine down and he thought he was God on top of it. As Wickham boarded the tugboat that was to take him to the point where he would meet up with the submarine, he wondered how long it would really take him to set the small bomb in place. "And all right under the captain's nose." Wickham mused out loud. Actually it would not be right under his nose, he would be asleep when it all happened.
Chapter 6
Aboard Red October, 2200 hours Moscow Time
"Hurry, we have only two hours until the captain returns," the nervous lieutenant on watch ordered. He was below rank of most of the men on the bridge, but the captain had left explicit orders to obey him, or face punishment. "Surface the ship at coordinates 35-94 at 2205 local." the junior officer had unknowingly just attracted the looks of some hardened anti-American sailors by using the States' military time. The dive-officer gave the order back mechanically, "Thirty-five ninety-four, sir." What the heck are we doing surfacing without the captain's orders? the dive officer asked himself, but obeyed the orders given to him to avoid punishment. The captain had to know, or why else would they be risking their cover surfacing in a Russian controlled port--and guarded surely--while also risking their very ranks. Two minutes. The acting C.O. drifted back to his thoughts as he sat in the middle of the dimly-lit room. Oh, how proud his family would be when this mission was de-classified and he was allowed to tell them. A lieutenant was certainly an accomplishment in the Navy, but even more considering he had grown up close to 200 miles from Moscow in Firovo which is in the Valdia Hills.
"Surfacing now." someone behind him said.
"Open the hatch and let our friend aboard."
"Aye, sir." reported a private.
A moment later a tall, American-looking man walked onto the bridge. It was clear a moment later, when he spoke, he was not American man, "You are the captain? They are young these days, eh?" He spoke Russian well, but clearly was not of the nationality he was speaking, judging by his accent.
"The captain is not available at this moment, but assures you he will give you a tour tomorrow, Mister Wickham." the C.O. said, puzzled by why they were picking up an American. But the everything about their mission, so far, was strange.
"Where's the kitchen?" Wickham asked in English.
The lieutenant touched his ear signaling him to say it again. He did, in Russian and was directed there. Wickham knew he had to wait a little while until they loaded the cargo he had brought aboard. When he felt them submerging, he set his plan into motion. He had memorized a set of blueprints given to him by a worker that had done the final walk-through on this ship. Wickham had paid a few Rubles for the plans, but it was a small price to pay, for he was getting one-million dollars for this. He had a small block of C-4 and a detonator in a sheet of wax paper in his pocket. He got to the engine room and took the clay-like substance and wire out and set it in the floor. He then removed the casing on the caterpillar drive, revealing an electronic panel, stuck the block of C-4 on the panel, and inserted the detonator. He left the room and went to the kitchen, looked around to make sure no one was watching and removed the remote control trigger for the detonator. He pressed a button waited five seconds and felt a slight rock indicating the explosives had gone off. He hoped no one was in the room when it went off, he wanted no reason to have to surface again.
Chapter
William "John" Clark sat in the briefing room at CIA headquarters in Quantico Virginia waiting for his counterpart Domingo Chavez, known to his friends as Ding. Clark had just been briefed on a particularly sensitive, and highly classified, mission known only to a select few at the Kremlin, and fewer in the White House. He listened as the briefing officer spoke the last few words of caution about safety and warnings about revealing the mission to anyone not cleared for it, and began. Clark had been briefed on the mission once but listened intently to the officer speaking from his chair opposite the table Ding was at.
The United States Army had reinstituted the idea of Infantry Division (Light) only a few years before. The units has not been all that hard to make. It was simply a matter of selecting an Infantry Division (Mechanized) and removing all of its (Mechanized) equipment . What then remained was an organization of roughly 10,500 people whose TOE (Table of Organization and Equipment) was even lighter than that of an airborne division, traditionally the lightest of them all, and therefore able to be air-transported by a mere five hundred flights of the Air Force Military Command. But the light infantry divisions, or "LIDs" as they came to be known, were not as useless as the casual observer might imagine, however. Far from it.
In creating "light fighters," the Army had decided to return to the timeless basics of history. Any thinking warrior will testify that there are two different kinds of fighters: the infantry and those who one way or another supported the infantry. In doing this the "LIDs" were given advanced training skills. The Army grew its sergeants the old fashioned way and placed its best instructors in a position to spot the promising young soldiers.
Domingo Chavez was given an ultimatum in his late teenage years; he could continue the gang life on the street or he could join the Army, the L.A. police officer told him during a booking. A recruiter was brought to his cell while he was doing time for a weapons violation. The jailer told the recruiter if Chavez would sign on to the Army, he could let the remaining three months of the sentence slide.
By the end of the day Domingo Chavez had the lowest rank, and amount of respect, the Army could give him. Domingo, or Ding as his teammates had taken to calling him, found he enjoyed the training and strenuous activity. He advanced quickly up the ranks to be noticed by a member of the elite Army Rangers. The next week Chavez was visited by a mister Shaw and was transported to Ranger School.
The rest, as Chavez liked to say, was history. He was sitting here now being briefed on a Special-Intelligence-codeword mission that would be labeled a 'black-op' by the bureaucrats, meaning that if asked by congress, or anyone else for that matter, never happened. That was the thing about SI-codeword, if you screwed up, there was no recognition of whatever it was you did.
The briefing ended with Chavez exchanging dialogue with Mr.. Clark.
"Heavy stuff, man. Russian subs, crazy captains. Messed up, Mister C."
"Welcome to the world, baby Domingo," Clark answered with a chuckle.
"What'da you think about this? They say we can reject this if we want,"
"I'm old, Ding, but I still know how to have fun. I'm goin' for it. I just need to know if you're in." Clark said with a knowing smile.
"Not old, Mister C, just seasoned." Chavez said as they walked out into the August evening. The mission would start the next week, if all went according to plan. Domingo was excited, Clark just wanted to get out there and get it done. He had several combat missions under his belt and knew what it would probably be like.