Dark Transit

It had taken two years for the relationship to fall apart, and when it did, it came apart as suddenly and strangely as it started. If Redhead had a fatal flaw, it was jealousy, and somehow she’d gotten it into her head that Lewinsky had something going on with Rachel Romanov — which he most certainly did not — but his working closely with the ship’s navigator had made Redhead stew in boiling anger, particularly when Vermont would disappear on an op for weeks on end. Redhead finally revealed that Rachel had a crush on Lewinsky, and had put Redhead up to sleeping with him as an odd way of, as Redhead put it, “Rachel fucking you by proxy,” saying, “she used me, she made me into a sex torpedo that she fired at you.” Redhead was convinced that the Vermont navigator had sent Redhead his way in order to obtain juicy details about what sex with him was like, because Romanov lusted for him. The reality of this crazy situation was that Redhead couldn’t live in a world where she thought another woman wanted her man, or one where she thought her man wanted another woman.

Redhead eventually left him, slamming the door after her. She’d taken an ice pick to the Testarossa and in white epoxy paint had written the word ASSHOLE on every surface. It had taken a twenty-thousand-dollar repair and a new paint job to fix that, but there would be no fixing Mario Lewinsky’s heart. He was still deeply, profoundly in love with Redhead, and he imagined he always would be, their terrible ending notwithstanding.

It was then that his reverie was interrupted by Sonarman First Class Jay “Snowman” Mercer, the midwatch sonarman of the watch. “Officer of the Deck, we’ve got some strange transients coming from the Panther.”

“Transients? Like what?” Transients could be bad news. A mechanical malfunction? Something rupturing and breaking? A fire breaking out with the crew making noise trying to battle the flames?

“I’ve got a pump startup. Not just any pump. A big pump.”

“A pump? Why would a diesel-electric submarine be starting a pump?”

“Maybe because it’s about to become a nuclear submarine.”

“Oh, holy hell, no.”

“I’ve got flow noise, Eng. There’s definitely steam flowing in pipes, a fuck-ton of it.”

“Exactly how much is the quantity ‘fuck-ton,’ Petty Officer Mercer?”

“A buttload, in technical terms, Eng. Now I’ve got a turbine starting up. No, two turbines, a small one and a big one. Definitely a big-ass turbine. Do you want that quantified also?”

“Is this for real?”

“I’ve got transient clicks or booms, Eng. Could be breakers shutting. The turbine noise is getting louder. Wait, what the hell?”

“What?”

“Possible zig, Panther, sir. She’s speeding up. Jesus, she’s speeding up. Can you get a TMA leg? With speed across the line-of-sight of at least fifteen knots?”

“Pilot! Left full rudder, all ahead standard! Steady course east.”

“Left full rudder, steady course east, Pilot aye, and all ahead standard,” Torpedoman Senior Chief Nygard said. “Maneuvering answers, all ahead standard. Present course one six zero, seventy degrees from ordered course.”

“FT of the Watch, once we steady on course east, get a curve.”

“Get a curve, aye.”

Lewinsky was already dialing the XO’s stateroom.

“Command Duty Officer.”

“Sir, we have a zig on Panther. Looks like they lit off that fast reactor and they’re speeding up like a bat outta hell, sir. I’m getting a perpendicular leg to get a fix on his speed.”

“I’ll be right there,” Quinnivan said.

Ten minutes later, after Vermont had taken data on the first leg, then turned to the reciprocal course, west, and gathered data on the other perpendicular leg, the answer was in. Panther was doing thirty-one knots.

“Thirty-one goddamned knots, XO,” Lewinsky said.

“That reactor seems to be working quite nicely,” Quinnivan said. “And good news. It didn’t explode.”

“Yet,” Lewinsky said, old worries from the past deciding to visit.

“Your optimism is noted, Eng,” Quinnivan said. “I’ll inform the captain.”