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"Maybe he can hear us," Ricks growled. "I'm taking us up through the layer. Make your depth one hundred feet."

"One hundred feet, aye," the diving officer responded immediately. "Helm, five degrees up on the fairwater planes."

"Five degrees up on the fairwater planes, aye. Sir, the fairwater planes are up five degrees, coming to one hundred feet."

"Conn, maneuvering, the rattle has stopped. It stopped when we took the slight up-angle."

The XO grunted next to the captain. "What the hell does that mean ?"

"It probably means that some dumbass dockyard worker left his toolbox in the ballast tank. That happened to a friend of mine once." Ricks was truly angry now, but if you had to have such incidents, here was the place for them. "When we get above the layer, I want to go north and clear datum."

"Sir, I'd wait. We know where the CZ is. Let him slide out of it, then we can maneuver clear while he can't hear us. Let him think he's got us scoped before we start playing tricks. He probably thinks we don't have him. By maneuvering radically, we're tipping our hand."

Ricks considered that. "No, we've cancelled the noise aft, we've probably dropped off his scopes already, and when we get above the layer, we can get lost in the surface noise and maneuver clear. His sonar isn't all that good. He doesn't even know what we are yet. He's just sniffing for something. This way we can put more distance between us."

"Aye aye," the XO responded neutrally.

Maine leveled off at one hundred feet, well above the thermocline layer, the boundary between relatively warm surface water and the cold deep water. It changed acoustical conditions drastically and, Ricks judged, should eliminate any chance that the Akula had him.

"Conn, sonar, contact lost in Sierra-5."

"Very well. I have the conn." Ricks announced.

"Captain has the conn." the officer of the deck acknowledged.

"Left ten degrees rudder, come to new course three-five-zero."

"Left ten degrees rudder, aye, coming to new course three-five-zero. Sir, my rudder is left ten degrees."

"Very well. Engine room, conn, make turns for ten knots."

"Engine room, aye, turns for ten knots. Building up slowly."

Maine steadied up on a northerly course and increased speed. It took several minutes for her towed-array sonar to straighten out and be useful again. During this time, the American submarine was somewhat blinded.

"Conn, maneuvering, we got that noise again!" the speaker announced.

"Slow to five - all ahead one-third!"

"All ahead one-third, aye. Sir, engine room answers all ahead one-third."

"Very well. Maneuvering, conn, what about that noise?"

"Still there, sir."

"We'll give it a minute." Ricks judged. "Sonar, conn, got anything on Sierra-5?"

"Negative, sir, holding no contacts at this time."

Ricks sipped at his coffee and watched the clock on the bulkhead for three minutes. "Maneuvering, conn, what about the noise?"

"Has not changed, sir. It's still there."

"Damn! X, bring her down a knot." Claggett did as he was told. The skipper was losing it, he realized. Not good. Another ten minutes passed. The worrisome noise aft attenuated, but did not go away.

"Conn, sonar! Contact bearing zero-one-five, just appeared real sudden, like, it's Sierra-5, sir. Definite Akula-class, Admiral Lunin. Evaluate as direct-path contact, bow-on aspect. Probably just came up through the layer, sir."

"Does he have us?" Ricks asked.

"Probably yes, sir," the sonarman reported.

"Stop!" another voice announced. Commodore Mancuso walked into the room. "Okay, we conclude the exercise at this point. Will the officers please come with me?"

Everyone let out a collective breath as the lights went up. The room was set in a large square building shaped not at all like a submarine, though its various other rooms duplicated most of the important parts of an Ohio-class boomer. Mancuso led the attack-center crew into a conference room and closed the door.

"Bad tactical