Roger Ellis - AK-239

Bahadur goes down in pain ‘til Stone picks him up.

“And what the hell’s a Russian sub doin’ in my town?”

Peterson AFB

NORAD

Command Center, CO

An Airman walks to the general,

“General, the F35s are inbound. ETA zero two minutes ‘til target acquisition, sir.”

The general than says to Stone,

“Clear the area we have two fighters inbound. ETA zero two minutes. Hello?”

The general looks to an airman questioning the line.

The airman says, “The line is open sir. It sounds like there’s a fight going on.”

Another airman says, “They’re fuel is low, sir, and there are no tankers in the air within 200 miles.”

“Aw, hell!” says the general.

Fishing Trawler

Jen is looking through the binoculars again and reading Morse code.

“Permission … to… come… aboard?”

Stone is angry,

“No! No! I don’t want no damn Russians in Alaska!”

Jen staring at him asks,

“Does your wife wonder if you’re human?”

“All the time!” says his son, Tony.

“So what are we going to do?” I say looking through binoculars.

“Aw hell, invite ‘em to the party. They just saved our lives!” says Stone quickly changing his mind.

I look at Jennifer but neither of us can argue with Stone this time.

Stone pulls out a flashlight from his pocket.

“So who’s talkin’ to ‘em?”

“Toss it,” I say and Stone tosses me the flashlight.

I begin to flash Morris code to Vasili. I then walk to a cabinet and Jenn says, “What are you doing?”

“I’m looking for something to eat. Aren’t you hungry?”

Jennifer cannot believe us two Huns but she turns her attention to the Iranian,

“Can’t wait to see what your little friends will do with you.”

General Badakur looks up with a bleeding eye, a black eye, and a shoe imprint matching Stone’s boot on his forehead.

“Not so tough without your submarine now, are ya?” says Stone.

Jen is thinking, “Isn’t that a movie reference?”

“Are you for real? Were you in?” I ask.

“Nam. Vietnam. The big one! I was eighteen months in the bush and I can snap your neck in a heartbeat, sonny.”

“Really, really, you’re gonna do movie lines from Tom Hanks and the ‘The Burbs’?”[11] says Jen.

“Okay, you caught me,” says Stone.

“Blazing Saddles! Unbelievable!” I say.

Jen has been monitoring TK-20 with my binoculars,

“He’s coming in.”

She hands the binoculars back to me and I take another look.

TK-20

Captain Vasili’s Diary

This is the most difficult thing that I have ever done.

The easy part was torpedoing a submarine full of men who just helped kill our friends. A much more delicate task will be to convince my own Russian men to surrender our boat to the Americans. I have some key officers assembled on the conning tower and I’m worried mutiny may be next.

I don’t even have the words to speak to my men.

I speak very soberly,

“Gentlemen, I appreciate your hearing me out before you decide anything. I believe the Americans will not let us escape to Mother Russia. We might have gotten under the polar ice cap but it’s likely the USS Alaska or her replacement is still sitting there. They would be waiting for us. At this point the Americans think we just attacked the United States. There would be an order from the President of the United States to kill us.”

“We would all die and for what?

“Nothing.”

“Absolutely nothing.”

I think to myself as I’m speaking, it’s hard to tell what my officers are really thinking. I know most of them like family.

However, a few of them I don’t know at all.

Are they going to kill me right here?

Are they going to grab me and charge me with treason?

Like all good Russians, you play close to the vest and with your best poker face. I’m just putting all my cards on the table now. Am I doing the right thing? I continue to speak with the men:

“If the Americans don’t put me in jail, I intend to spend the rest of my natural days on this earth watching corn sway in the breeze of a hot Nebraska summer. I’m choosing that over a certain death in Russia. Any man who wants to return to Russia, I’m sure can eventually do so. I know most of you will want to return to your families so let’s get our story straight. If our president and state run media don’t buy your story, you will be beaten, tortured and maybe killed because you did something I ordered, which was in direct contravention of our president. I could never live with myself if any of you suffer because of me. So if you all wish, you can blame me and try and return me to Russia to stand trial. The decision is yours.”

“We’re now in America, a democracy, so this must be put to a vote.”

“Majority wins.”

“Do we surrender?”

“Or do we fight and die?”

“Moscow has been screaming to our radio man for at least five minutes so we better have our story straight, understand?”

“Are there any questions?

Captain Nikolai Alexi, President Mironovich’s hand-picked officer, stares at me without feeling or uttering a word.

Not a single sailor, including my officers, says a word.

“All right, we stay.”

“Here’s what we tell Moscow…”

Fishing Trawler

I’m flashing Morse code to TK-20 as I’m eating a can of Spaghetti-Os.

Jennifer disgustedly says, “What are you saying?”

“Nuclear detonation on Bokan. Area contaminated soon. Permission to come aboard?” I ask.

“Good idea,” says Jen.

I look into Jen’s eyes.

Weird, but I feel Jen understands my every unspoken word.

I throw away the can of Spaghetti-Os.

I feel like I’ve known her my entire life. Difficult to believe it’s only been two days!

I stop staring at her as Stone seems to notice this.

He just smiles.

I think the idiot understands our relationship too.

Stone walks over to me,

“What’d he say?”

My mind is somewhere else, “Who?” I ask.

Stone, “The sub. Who you think I’m talking about?”

Jen tries to help me out and asks Stone, “How do you know it’s a he?”

Stone is so confused by this he doesn’t know how to respond.

Meanwhile I’m looking through the binoculars reading Morris code,

“Permission granted. You can have my sub. She’s all yours!”

A cheer goes up from all of us: Jen, Stone and Tony and myself.

Jen hugs me.

Stone sees Badahur crawling for the door again and puts his boot on his back.

Stone looks around.

Sees an electrical cord nearby and uses it to tie Bahadur’s hands behind his back.

I say, “C’mon!”

All five of us exit the bridge to the starboard side of the boat as TK-20 pulls near.

F-35C Navy Fighter Jet

Two nautical miles south of Kendrick Bay

Altitude: 30,000 feet

A pilot sits in darkness. The only thing reflecting onto his visor and face mask are multiple green heads-up displays.

The pilot’s integrated night vision allows him to see for miles further than the human eye could see.

The pilot has a 360-degree view around him from a multitude of cameras on board, including the one on his helmet.[12]

An oxygen mask is required for all flights above 10,000 feet, as any person will start to not think straight above this altitude. In addition, if you have to pull serious Gs, a mask is necessary to feed enough oxygen to the pilot’s brain.

Also, if you need to eject, a mask is clearly needed as you could easily pass out or disfigure your face.