The Hunt for Red October - Tom Clancy [90]
"Admiral, since I'm not a nuc anymore, I have to do something on nights and weekends." Tyler arched his eyebrows lecherously. "I hear the Russkies are playing games."
Dodge was instantly serious. "They sure are. Fifty-eight attack boats—every nuclear boat in the Northern Fleet—heading this way with a big surface group, and most of their service forces tagging along."
"Doing what?"
"Maybe you can tell me. Come on back to my inner sanctum." Dodge led Tyler into a room where he saw another new gadget, a projection screen that displayed the North Atlantic from the Tropic of Cancer to the polar ice pack. Hundreds of ships were represented. The merchantmen were white, with flags to identify their nationality; the Soviet ships were red, and their shapes depicted their ship type; the American and allied ships were blue. The ocean was getting crowded.
"Christ."
"You got that one right, lad," Tyler nodded grimly. "How are you cleared?"
"Top secret and some special things, sir. I see everything we have on their hardware, and I do a lot of work with Sea Systems on the side."
"Johnnie said you did the evaluation of the new Kirov they just sent out to the Pacific—not bad, by the way."
"These two Alfas heading for Norfolk?"
"Looks like it. And they're burning a lot of neutrons doing it." Dodge pointed. "That one's heading to Long Island Sound as though to block the entrance to New London and that one's heading to Boston, I think. These Victors are not far behind. They already have most of the British ports staked out. By Monday they'll have two or more subs off every major port we have."
"I don't like the looks of this, sir."
"Neither do I. As you see, we're nearly a hundred percent at sea ourselves. The interesting thing, though—what they're doing just doesn't figure. I—" Captain Coleman came in.
"I see you let the prodigal son in, sir," Coleman said.
"Be nice to him, Johnnie. I seem to remember when he was a right fair sub driver. Anyway, at first it looked like they were going to block the SLOCs, but they went right past. What with these Alfas, they might be trying to blockade our coast."
"What about out west?"
"Nothing. Nothing at all, just routine activity."
"That doesn't make any sense," Tyler objected. "You don't ignore half the fleet. Of course, if you're going to war you don't announce it by kicking every boat to max power either."
"The Russians are a funny bunch, Skip," Coleman pointed out.
"Admiral, if we start shooting at them—"
"We hurt 'em," Dodge said. "With all the noise they're making we have good locations on near all of 'em. They have to know that, too. That's the one thing that makes me believe they're not up to anything really bad. They're smart enough not to be that obvious—unless that's what they want us to think."
"Have they said anything?" Tyler asked.
"Their ambassador says they've lost a boat, and since it has a bunch of big shots' kids aboard, they laid on an all-hands rescue mission. For what that's worth."
Tyler set his briefcase down and walked closer to the screen. "I can see the pattern for a search and rescue, but why blockade our ports?" He paused, thinking rapidly as his eyes scanned the top of the display. "Sir, I don't see any boomers up here."
"They're in port—all of 'em, on both oceans. The last Delta tied up a few hours ago. That's funny, too," Dodge said, looking at the screen again.
"All of them, sir?" Tyler asked as offhandedly as he could. Something had just occurred to him. The display screen showed the Bremerton in the Barents Sea but not her supposed quarry. He waited a few seconds for an answer. Getting none, he turned to see the two officers observing him closely.
"Why do you ask, son?" Dodge said quietly. In Sam Dodge, gentleness could be a real warning flag.
Tyler thought this one over for a few seconds. He'd given Ryan his word. Could he phrase his answer without compromising it and still find out what he wanted? Yes, he decided. There was an investigative