Black Sea Affair (33 page)

Other than strands of wispy cirrus clouds miles above, the skies were a clear, pristine blue. The first ten minutes of the flight were refreshingly clear of turbulence. Pavel settled into the cockpit for what looked like a routine, velvety-smooth flight over to Romania. And then, the peaceful hum in the cockpit was suddenly punctuated by distressed calls of "Mayday!"

Pavel sat up, listening intently to the words crackling over the speakers. As soon as he understood the situation, he contacted the control tower. "Sevastopol Control, Crimean 18."

"Go ahead, Crimean 18."

"Sevastopol, I've got a mayday on VLF from the freighter
Alexander
Popovich.
The mayday claims the ship is sinking. Repeat, the mayday claims the ship is sinking. Request permission to go to one thousand for a visual."

"Crimean 18, Sevastopol. Permission granted. Go to one thousand. Monitor for as long as fuel permits. Advise."

"Sevastopol. Crimean. Descending to one thousand now."

The
Al Alamein

Mediterranean Sea

Course and position?" Captain Hosni Sadir was asking.

"Twenty miles north of Crete, sir, " the Egyptian helmsman replied. "We must make a course correction soon, or we will run into the island."

"Very well." Captain Sadir sipped a cup of hot tea and glanced at the navigational charts spread out on the table. "Upon my mark, make your course ninety degrees. Chart new course for Gibraltar."

"Yes,
Kapitan
."

Sadir checked his watch. Salman Dudayev stepped onto the bridge. "Ah, Salman, " Sadir said. "How is the world's most brilliant physicist?"

A sly grin came from the Chechen. "Thank you for the compliment,
Kapitan
. If our plan works, perhaps I will allow you to call me that on the other side of paradise."

"Care for tea?"

"No, thank you. There is still much work to do."

Another sip of tea. "And how is your work coming?"

"The plutonium was stored in two large, radioactive-proof barrels, " Salman said. "It took a while to open it, but now my assistants are molding it into special metal bowls that we have on board. After that, we will start on the explosives and detonators."

Hearing Salman describe his work brought a tranquil peace over the captain's body. Surely this peace was from Allah the munificent. "Perhaps you can soon give me a tour of this hydrogen bomb facility you have constructed in my ship."

"With pleasure,
Kapitan
. But remember that you must wear a radioactive suit. I am sure we have some your size."

Sadir chuckled. "Perhaps when we leave the Mediterranean I will accept your offer to go on that tour."

"Of course, sir."

Sadir checked his watch again. "Helmsman, make your course zero-nine-zero degrees. Plot new course for the Rock of Gibraltar."

Lifeboat

The Black Sea

Sasha!" Masha was standing in the boat, screaming. Sasha had not come up from the spot that he had fallen into the water. The children leaned over the side of the boat, staring into the water and screaming his name. "Sasha! Sasha!"

"Get back, children!" she yelled. Sasha could not swim. Neither could she.

A huge splash threw a wave of water into the boat. Masha glanced up, realizing that Aleksey had jumped in the sea.

All the children were wailing now.

"Jesus, help us!" she blurted.

There was a stirring in the water. Aleksey popped up, blowing air out of his mouth. Sasha was cradled under his arm.

"Help me get him into the boat, " he called up at Masha.

She reached over and yanked the little boy under his arms. He slid into the boat, his face pale and his body limp.

"Sasha! Sasha, wake up!" Masha shook him. "Please wake up!"

Aleksey swam around to the back of the boat and pulled himself into the boat. He took Sasha into his arms, locked arms around the boy's waist, and then squeezed his abdomen.

"Sasha!" Aleksey slapped his face.

The boy coughed and spat water from his mouth and nose.

"Sasha!" Masha pleaded. Sasha's blue eyes blue opened, then rolled towards her. He was coughing, but a weak smile crossed his face. "Oh, thank God!"

Aleksey ripped a knife from his pocket. He sliced one of the ropes tying the lifeboat to the ship. "We must go!"

"No!" Masha grabbed Aleksey's hand. "Not without Dima!"

"Move!" He shoved her away. "Dima is fine. He is in one of the other lifeboats."

"What other lifeboats? I do not see any other lifeboats!"

"There are lifeboats on the other side of the ship. Now we must get away or we will all be sucked down when she sinks." He pushed her away, then shoved a paddle against the ship. The boat drifted away from the sinking freighter.

"Look! It is sinking! It is sinking!" The children screamed and pointed over the back of the lifeboat.

Masha looked over her shoulder and saw the floating hulk slipping down into the sea.

"Don't look!" Aleksey was screaming. "Keep paddling. We must get away or we will be sucked under with her!"

Masha turned her head, attacking the sea with her paddle with all her might. Aleksey sat beside her, paddling off the right side. The boat slipped forward through the Black Sea.

"It is gone!" The children were yelling and pointing.

"Do not stop, Masha! We must get far away! There will be a great suction!"

Masha kept paddling. The bow of the boat began turning. "Why are we turning?" In a moment they had spun all the way around the sinking ship. The boat kept turning, bringing them around another full rotation. This time the ship had disappeared.

A rushing current pulled them back, back toward the spot in the water where the ship had gone under.

"Paddle!" Aleksey yelled. Masha tried, but to no avail. The boat was now spinning in a whirlpool. Other whirlpools spun all around them. The current grew faster. The sea sucked floating debris into the vacuum left by the sinking ship.

"Jesus, save my children!"

The USS
Honolulu
The Black Sea

Boat's on the surface, Skipper!"

"Very well. Deploy SEAL team for rescue ops."

"SEAL teams already in the water, Skipper."

"XO, follow me! Mr. McCaffity, you have the conn!"

Pete donned his orange all-weather jacket, then stormed out of the control room, up the ladder, toward the bridge. Enlisted men had already opened the hatch, and sunlight streamed into the open space as Pete climbed quickly up the ladder.

Two lookouts were already posted in the open air bridge as Pete stepped under the blue skies and the late-afternoon sun.

"Your binoculars, Skipper."

"Thanks, Chief."

"The wreckage was off in that direction, sir."

The chief petty officer pointed in an easterly direction, and Pete brought his binoculars to his eyes. Pete swept the horizon. Black smoke billowed into the sky. At least one small lifeboat was in the water. And it was in serious trouble.

Lifeboat

The Black Sea

The lifeboat was spinning rapidly now, almost like one of those rides at the amusement park in Kiev. Masha had abandoned her paddling and was now wrapping her arms around as many orphans as she could reach.

The water was getting choppy and was splashing into the boat. Waves breaking over the side drenched their clothes. The orphans screamed and cried.

"Do not panic! Do not panic!" Aleksey was yelling, as he fought the current and the whirlpools with his paddle.

Masha closed her eyes. The words that the Allisons had written in her Bible came to mind.

If you are ever in doubt, ask him to show you the way!

"Jesus! Jesus! Save us! Please! Save us!"

The wooden lifeboat was half full of water now. The children huddled in the middle of the boat, shivering and crying. Masha spread her arms across their shoulders, like a mother hen protecting her flock. Aleksey sat in the back of the boat, his legs spread, his mouth agape.

She closed her eyes and prayed again. Something felt different. The motion. Or lack of it. She opened her eyes. The boat had stopped spinning! Debris floated on the top of the water, but nothing was being sucked down. In fact, pieces of wood, plastic, and Styrofoam that had been sucked under were now floating back to the surface.

She bowed her head, cried some more, and thanked God that they had not been swallowed by the sea. At least not yet.

The boat tilted to the left. A shrill scream pierced the air.

"Monster!"

Crimean Airlines Flight 18
Over the Black Sea

Captain Pavel Zalevskiy looked down over his right shoulder at the long, black, cigar-shaped object floating in the water.

Odd
, Zalevskiy thought. He had flown an old Tu-124 antisubmarine warfare aircraft for the Ukrainian Navy. He had experience spotting submarines in the Black Sea. But this did not look like anything put out by the Russians or any of the other littoral nations surrounding the sea.

He lowered his altitude to one thousand and banked around for another look. This boat almost had the shape of one of those
Los Angeles
- class boats used by the Americans. But that would be impossible. There was no way that even the Americans could get an
LA
- class boat through the Bosphorus submerged. Everyone in the world would know if they had sailed through on the surface.

Zalevskiy trained on the sub with his binoculars. Orange-jacketed men were on the bridge, looking out over open sea. With the movement of the plane, however, he could not keep his eyes trained on the sub for more than a couple of seconds.

He pushed the button opening up a line to Sevastopol.

"Sevastopol Tower. Crimean Eighteen. I have an unidentified submarine on the surface. Resembles United States
Los Angeles
- class design. Coordinates forty-five degrees north latitude; thirty degrees, thirty minutes east longitude."

"Crimean Eighteen. Sevastopol Tower. Did you say
Los Angeles
class?"

Pavel took another look over his shoulders. "Definitely not
Kilo
and not
Tango
either." He was referring to the two classes of Russian subs now in the naval base at Sevastopol, which the Russians now leased from Ukraine.

"Thank you for your work, Crimean Eighteen. We will notify the Ukrainian Navy. Crimean Eighteen, go to ten thousand and resume course for Constanta."

"Crimean Eighteen, roger that. Resuming ten thousand. Good luck to the Navy."

Lifeboat

The Black Sea

The scream and the tilting boat brought Masha's eyes off to the left. A black creature with goggles and a hose in his mouth was pulling up on the side of the boat.

"Lieutenant John L. Smith, United States Navy, " the creature said. Having studied some English at university, Masha realized that the man had just spoken to her in English.

The children stopped screaming, but most still cried. They huddled on the other side of the boat, staring at the strange man in the black rubber suit.

"Is everyone okay?" the man said.

"I Masha. This Aleksey, " Masha tried her broken English. She gestured at the children. "We okay."

"Great, great." The diver put the hose back into his mouth and disappeared under the water again.

In a second, others were swimming in the water around the lifeboat. An inflatable rubber raft appeared on the surface. Some of the divers climbed into the rubber boat. Some swam with a rope from the back of the raft to the lifeboat. Others attached some sort of small outboard motor to the rubber raft.

They pulled a cord, and the motor started. The others disappeared underwater. In a moment, the rope tightened, and the lifeboat was moving through the water. The men in black driving the rubber boat made a wide turn in the water, and Masha saw the long, sleek outline of a submarine off in the distance.

CHAPTER 21

Ilyushin I1-96 jetliner

150 miles northeast of Odessa, Ukraine

President Vitaly Evtimov looked out the window of the presidential cabin and saw the MiG-29 Fulcrums that accompanied all flights made by the president of the Republic.

If this summit were successful, perhaps he could pull President Butrin out of the American orbit.

The plan was to have the orphans step off the freighter, then climb Odessa's most famous landmark, the Potemkin Stairs, the long staircase of over two hundred steps that started at the waterside and went straight up the hill to Primorskaya Street, where they would be ceremoniously greeted by the two presidents.