John Birmingham: Final impact

The cabin was located all of fifteen meters from the sub’s Combat Center, allowing her to arrive in a shade under the promised two minutes.

“Captain on deck!”

“As you were. Mr. Grey, I hear we’ve got them by the short and curlies again.”

Lieutenant Commander Conrad Grey stepped aside from a bank of flat-panel screens, a quick nod inviting her to take his place. She could see that he was tense, like everyone present.

“The sea’s calmed down a fair bit up there, skipper. We’re getting clean capture on the sensors now, the best we’ve had in three days. Their cocks are on the chopping block, ma’am. Just waiting for the magic word.”

Willet took in the sensor feed with a glance. Once upon a time, they would have made this kill from a much safer distance, but in such foul weather, without satellite cover, they’d been forced to come within six thousand meters just to use the boat’s own sensor suite. Tracking something as dangerous as a Sartre-class stealth destroyer was like snuggling up to a nest of vipers.

At least it would have been under normal circumstances.

The Dessaix, however, wasn’t under the command of its normal crew. Mostly their fates were unknown, but it didn’t take much to imagine what had become of them. The Nazis had captured the ship while they were all still comatose from the Transition, so there wouldn’t have been a chance to resist. If any still lived, they were probably hanging by their thumbs in a Gestapo cell somewhere in Germany.

Willet leaned back into the gelform seat padding and peered intently into the multipanel display. There was no video feed to examine, only animations of the boat’s electronic intelligence haul. The Havoc had five small drones left, but they weren’t robust enough to cope with the extreme conditions above. Three days earlier two giant storm cells had merged to create a supercell within which the Dessaix was trapped. Sitting two hundred meters down, the submariners had enjoyed an easy time of it. Conditions top-side, on the other hand, would be evil.

They were bad enough that tracking the ship had been near impossible. They’d lost contact again and again. At last, when the weather showed signs of abating, they had her-and the chance of taking her down.

“You know, Mr. Grey,” Willet mused, “we may not have to bother with this after all. Mother Nature might just do our job for us. It looks to me like the Dessaix is struggling.”

“Better safe than sorry, ma’am,” her XO cautioned.

“Of course. It was just a girlish whim.” She smiled, then her features took on an altogether somber cast. “Weapons?” she said crisply. “Confirm target lock and torpedo status.”

“Aye, ma’am. Both confirmed. And we’ve reached firing depth.”

“Well, then, let’s not drag it out. Open tubes.”

Though she couldn’t actually hear or feel it, she knew instinctively when the giant submarine had bared its fangs.

“Tubes three and four open, ma’am.”

Willet did not hesitate. “Fire.”

“Firing three. Firing four, skipper. Clean shots. Tracking now.”

The Combat Center was normally a hushed environment, but when a warshot was loosed, a preternatural stillness came over the dozen men and women working there. In the bad old days a sub captain would have followed the torpedoes to their victim by watching through a periscope. Just two years ago Willet herself would have observed the killing stroke on the ship’s holobloc, where the action would play itself out as a ghostly, three-dimensional image. But now all she had was a crude computer-generated simulation as her last pair of Type 92 torpedoes accelerated toward the hijacked French vessel that was struggling through the waves.

“Countermeasures?” she asked quietly, although there was no need. The Havoc was fully stealthed.

“None deployed yet, ma’am. They haven’t made us.”

She nodded, but couldn’t help chewing her lip. She had just fired off the last of their offensive weapons. There were no more shots in the locker-the cruise missile bays and the torpedo room were empty. If they missed with this strike, and the pickup crew of the Dessaix were any good, she would have to dive deep and hide out down there for a very long time.

Two indicator bars, showing the distance to the target, crawled across the nearest screen. Five millimeters before they reached their goal, the chief defensive sysop cried out.

“They’re on to us! Threat boards red.”

Willet’s heart rate surged, but then her weapons officer spoke up.

“We got a double tap, skipper! Clean hits.” He added, “She’s gone.”

Willet’s crew were disciplined, and nobody cheered, but the commander of the HMAS Havoc spoke for them all. “Outstanding piece of work everyone,” she said quietly. “Congratulations.”

Lieutenant Commander Grey stayed bent over the schematic displays until he was entirely satisfied. Standing upright, he asked, “Shall we search for survivors, ma’am?”

It didn’t take long for her to consider the question. “No, I’m afraid not, Mr. Grey. The seas are still running at twelve meters up there. We can’t take the chance. Bring us around, and let’s get back to the lake. Prepare an encrypted burst for Pearl, San Diego, and Sydney, then send it when we get within range.

“And have Ms. Sparrow brew me a hot chocolate. I’m going back to bed.”

D-DAY. 3 MAY 1944.

0300 HOURS. IN TRANSIT.

The lead helicopter hammered across the English Channel at the edge of its performance envelope, close enough to the waves that Lieutenant Gil Amundson thought he could feel a fine mist of sea spray stirred up by their passage through the darkness.

The seven men in his chalk were quiet, each alone in his own cocoon of anticipation and fear. Amundson could hear Sergeant Nunez beside him, reciting rapid-fire Hail Marys, working through a set of rosary beads in what looked to the young cavalry officer like record time. Across the cabin Private Clarke was nervously tapping his heel on the steel plating of the floor, the tempo increasing until it sounded like one of those rock-and-roll drummers. Then he’d curse, punch himself on the leg, and go still for a moment before starting all over again.

On either side of him a couple of the boys were dozing fitfully. Or at least pretending to.

That’s how it went the whole way across. Each man playing out what might be his last hour as he saw fit. Some checked their equipment, before checking their buddy’s. Some leaned over to get a view of the invasion fleet as it headed for the coast. Corporal Gadsden craned his head skyward, the bulky lens of his Gen2 Starlite goggles tracking his gaze as he picked out Dakotas, gliders, Mustang night fighters, and, at one point, a squadron of Sabers miles overhead, all screaming toward France.

Amundson forced himself to go through the plan again. The rapid insertion, the assembly point for his platoon, the mental map of their objective.

He used what little space he had in the chopper to perform a set of isometric exercises, lest his butt fall asleep before they jumped into Hitler’s front garden. He stretched his arms and legs and craned his neck from side to side, a full extension in each direction, which gave him a clear view of the rest of the cav squadron as it thundered toward the enemy in 132 Hueys, with another forty Cobra gunships riding shotgun.

It seemed that the demonic roar of so many engines, the great thudding of all those rotors, could surely be heard in Berlin itself. But as quickly as the thought came to him, it was gone.

A quick glance forward through the armored glass canopy revealed the firestorm that was engulfing the Pas de Calais. So much high explosive had been dropped on that small region of France, it would be a wonder if anything bigger than a flea still lived down there. There’d even been talk back in England that Ike might bust a nuke over the krauts, although Amundson doubted that. They hadn’t been outfitted to fight in radioactive terrain.