Seawolf Mask of Command (58 page)

“What the fuck?” COB asked, he was the only one who’d never heard her speak Mandarin, and thus he was the last to realize what was going on. “Of course she isn’t going in there!”

Kristen was still struggling with her growing fear about what she was getting herself into. But COB’s comment caused a sudden surge of anger within her. She didn’t want to go. She had no desire to play commando. She certainly had seen enough action in the last month to last her a lifetime, and she was not looking for glory or fame. She was scared, and she was willing to admit it. But she was also becoming mad. These men wouldn’t have hesitated to send her in if she’d been a man. Both Graves and COB had been looking after her since she’d come on board.

Only Brodie had treated her like everyone else.

But, could he still do that?

She recalled the incident in his cabin.

Could he send her ashore to die with the SEALs on this suicide mission?

He hadn’t ordered her to go.

Could he?

He clearly had the backbone to order the four SEALs to their deaths.

Kristen sat up, slowly straightening her spine against the back of her chair as she chose her words carefully. He couldn’t bring himself to say it, and she thought she knew why, and the reason wasn’t because she was a woman. Kristen cleared her throat and caught everyone’s attention. She looked toward Brodie whose eyes hadn’t moved from her since she’d asked who spoke Mandarin. “As luck would have it, I speak Mandarin,” she told them all with as steady a voice as she could manage.

The SEALs all looked equally uncertain. They glanced back and forth at one another as if this was all some sort of cruel joke. Grogan however looked at her, and his face turned brutal as he waved a finger in her direction. “Well bully for you, Lieutenant,” he told her bluntly. “This isn’t some yachting cruise we’re going on. Have you ever locked-out of a submarine before at sixty feet below the surface in the dead of night?”

Kristen shook her head. Her stomach was twisting into knots and she felt nauseous all the sudden. But she hid her fears behind her carefully crafted, calm exterior, a veneer she’d spent years practicing and perfecting. She would hide what she was feeling from these men. They had to let her go. It was the only chance for mission success. All of them may not have accepted it, but she had. More importantly, she knew Brodie had. He didn’t like it, but he accepted it.

“No?” Grogan asked in mock surprise and then added with cold seriousness, “I didn’t think so.” He then glanced at Brodie as if it were the stupidest thing he had ever heard. “Hell, I bet she’s never even been on SCUBA before.”

Kristen could have said nothing else, and it might have ended there. The SEALs could have gone ahead on shore and snatched the doctor. He might or might not die from sheer terror, not knowing what was going on, or because they were unable to explain how to properly use the diving equipment, and he drowned on the way back to the sub. But she’d already formed her argument, and she knew they would have to accept her cold, simple logic. “Dar-Hyun has never used a submarine’s lockout system before, either,” she reminded them. “Yet you and your men are planning to try and get him through it safely. Even though you won’t be able to explain to him how to do it,” she pointed out. “And I’m sure Dar-Hyun has never been in a SDV before either, but you’re expecting him to figure it out fast, aren’t you?”

Grogan watched her with an uncomfortable sense of disbelief over what was being proposed. “Lieutenant,” he said without any hint of over exaggerated concern, “this is no place for a woman,” he concluded. Although hardly a new argument, it was at least refreshing to have someone say it to her face for a change. The others were thinking it. Except for perhaps Brodie. Kristen was fairly certain the fact she was a woman was not what was causing the anguish he was fighting to hide behind his stony stare. “This is the real deal here,” Grogan continued. “If something goes wrong, then it is going to be a knife fight just to get our asses off the beach.”

“Skipper,” Graves asked, “what do you want to do?”

Brodie hesitated, something she’d never seen him do when dealing with an operational situation. When the torpedo had been boring in on the
Seawolf
a few days earlier, he’d appeared as comfortable as if he’d been riding his motorcycle. His orders had been clear, concise, and rapid. But now, he groped for the right words. Kristen was certain Graves and COB could see him struggling as well. “Lieutenant,” he finally began. “No one is asking, let alone ordering you to go.”

“Holy shit!” COB responded forcefully as he rose up out of his chair. He looked like an angry father protecting his only daughter. “Of course she isn’t going!”

“COB!” Graves snapped and shot the old seadog a sharp glance. “Don’t make this any harder than it already is.”

But COB turned to Brodie and continued to fight to keep her from going, “Skipper, you cannot be seriously considering this.”

“If I were a man,” Kristen said with a calm, steady voice that hid her fear, “we wouldn’t still be talking about this.”

All of them were again looking at her, including COB whose face had turned red with anger. His hands were literally trembling with rage. She gave him a warm smile, briefly wondering if he had any children of his own. She then turned and looked at Grogan. He was staring at her with the same look of shock as he had when he’d first realized she might be going with them. “And yes, I’ve been on SCUBA before,” she told him. “And I’m willing to bet I can out swim any of your men under any conditions,” she added to him with a hint of pride. “And unless you have someone else around who speaks Mandarin and is better qualified, then I think you’re stuck with me, Chief.”

“Captain,” Grogan argued as he turned back toward Brodie. “My men have trained for years together. The last thing we need is some goddamn Jayne Wayne fumbling around out there. This mission is hairy enough without a friggin’ cheerleader along.”

Kristen was about to respond, but Graves rose to her defense as Brodie continued to sit motionless. “She’s no goddamn cheerleader, Chief!” Graves snapped. “She’s an officer in the United States Navy and don’t forget it!” Graves was angry, and Kristen guessed part of his anger was due to his not liking the fact she had to go. But Graves wasn’t finished. He’d been a SEAL and had some understanding of just what she was getting into. “And as for your men training together, no one is doubting it. But you’re also trained to have specialists inserted into your team for special missions, and I don’t imagine Dr. Dar-Hyun has half the training of Lieutenant Whitaker. Now, every minute we sit here talking about it is one less minute we have to get her ready.”

Grogan looked back at her. He didn’t want to accept it. His men certainly weren’t in her corner, and she understood they feared she would simply be excess baggage they would have to carry. She tried to reason with him. “Listen, Chief, this isn’t some case of penis envy on steroids,” she told him bluntly. “Trust me, I’ve no desire to go sightseeing in North Korea any more than any of you. But unless you can find someone more qualified, then I don’t think either of us have a choice.”

Silence reigned supreme for what felt like minutes. Beside her, Martin hadn’t moved a muscle during the entire conversation, but he was sweating profusely. The SEALs didn’t like it, but they saw that she was indeed their best chance to get Dar-Hyun back to the
Seawolf
alive. COB had sat back down, but looked angry enough to chew barbed wire. If it were up to him, Kristen would never leave. The XO didn’t like it either. But he also had his hand on the nuclear trigger, and he was desperate for the mission to succeed. Then she looked at Brodie.

Her captain was staring across the table with a resolute expression. He hadn’t blinked when he’d ordered Grogan and his team to go. But she could see him struggling to keep a modicum of calm. She found this last detail particular unsettling.

“Jesus,” Grogan said in simple acceptance.

“Kristen, are you sure about this?” Graves asked, giving her a final chance to call it all off.

“No, sir,” she said honestly. “But I doubt anyone in their right mind would be sure about this.” She looked over at the four SEALs. “Am I right?”

The SEALs seemed to understand this, and with the exception of Hamilton, they nodded their heads. Hamilton just continued to lean back and eye her with the warmth of a snake looking at his next meal.

“Well, Lieutenant,” Grogan said with a hint of foreboding in his voice. “I guess you’re going to have a chance to see if the minefield data you collected is accurate after all.”

Torpedo Handling Room, USS Seawolf

“D
o you have a swimsuit?” Grogan asked her as his men began unpacking their equipment bags and weapons cases.

“I’ve got an old comp suit,” she replied as they laid out their gear. She recognized almost none of it.

“What the fuck’s that?” Alvarez asked as he unpacked a camouflaged drysuit.

“It’s a competition swimsuit,” she answered. “I used to swim competitively.”

“Oh, yeah?” Hoover asked as he began inventorying a waterproof rucksack filled with medical supplies. He’d stripped down to a pair of swim trunks, and she saw that her initial assessment of his physique was accurate. He was tall, lean, and all muscle. She noticed a handful of tattoos on his body plus a number of scars. “What kind of competition?”

Graves, who was watching them, answered for her, “She was a finalist for the US Olympic team.” Ending the useless chit chat, the XO said, “Now let’s cut the shit and get her ready.” Graves had followed her to the torpedo room, and Kristen suspected it was to make certain they didn’t waste any time with stupid games that would do none of them any good.

Kristen raced back to her cabin and found her old Speedo fly back in the bottom of her sea bag. She stripped down in a hurry, not worrying about where her clothes ended up as she stepped into her lucky swimsuit and then glanced at herself in the small mirror.

Are you out of your mind?

“Probably,” she answered herself and then raced back to the torpedo room, ignoring the army of shocked expressions as she ran past men in the passageways. Besides the fact she was a woman and wearing a skintight swimsuit that hid none of her curves like her coveralls had, word of what was happening had—of course—already spread throughout the
Seawolf.
Kristen vaguely wondered if there was already a betting pool going on whether or not she would make it.

Back in the torpedo room, all of the SEALs were wearing their camouflaged drysuits rolled down around their waists. Hoover was seated on his gear and pulling on a pair of strange looking boots. She noticed all of the SEALs were wearing similar boots on their feet. “What now?” she asked Grogan. The Chief was checking a wicked looking assault rifle.

“Get dressed,” Grogan said as he tossed her a wetsuit and a pair of boots that would never fit her feet. The wetsuit had come from the
Seawolf’s
dive locker. It wasn’t a perfect fit, but would have to do. The boots, on the other hand, were huge on her slender feet.

“Uh… Chief?” she asked referring to the oversized boots.

“Wear five pair of socks if you have to,” he replied.

“What kinda boot is this anyway?” she asked as Hoover tossed her three pairs of rolled up socks.

“Standard issue SEAL ‘workboot,’” Hoover answered. “Best things for moving in and out of the water.”

Kristen sat on a crate of ammunition and pulled on the extra socks. As she did, she noticed Hoover watching her. “What?” she asked him.

“You’re pretty thick, Miss,” he replied admiringly.

“Is that supposed to be a compliment?” she asked, assuming he was referring to the fact that swimming several miles a day had given her more muscle mass than the average woman.

“Just an observation,” he replied and began helping her with the rest of her gear.

Kristen knew she wasn’t built like most women. She had long arms, longer legs, and a broad back from years of swimming, with hardly an ounce of fat. Her swimsuit clung to her, and her clearly defined abdominal muscles were evident through the thin fabric. In high school her ungainly proportions had made her an excellent swimmer, but had hardly caught the eye of any boys.

“Nice tat, Ell-Tee,” Hoover said as he held her wetsuit top. “What’s it stand for?”

Kristen had forgotten about the tattoo on her right shoulder blade. It was a blue capital letter “N” with four small stars along the right side of the “N.”

“It means I was stupid enough to go out with some girlfriends one night after Nationals,” Kristen explained as she squirmed her hips into the wetsuit trousers. “I fell asleep after too many cosmos and woke up with this memento.”

“Cool,” Hoover said approvingly.

Once the clothing problem was solved, they began explaining the complex LAR-7 self-contained breathing apparatus. Hoover showed her everything, moving fast because they had no time to spare. After a quick class on the rebreather, the four of them started pummeling her with questions about the breathing gear, giving her no time to think, and forcing her to demonstrate her proficiency immediately, without any practice. She didn’t complain, understanding why they were being hard on her. If she screwed up, she would be dead before anyone could come to her aid.