Paradox Hour (36 page)

It was then that his Sonarman reported another contact, this time an undersea boat, confidence high. Processing soon had a fix on the demon, and it was exactly that.

“Got it, sir,” said Harland. “I’m pretty sure it’s that new Russian boat—
Kazan
, and I think its engaging a target.”

“
Kazan
? That boat was last reported in the bloody Pacific!” That sub should be sailing half a world away, he thought, in another ocean. Perhaps Harly botched the reading, and this is another boat in that class.

Things were really starting to stink, thought Vann. Ships were appearing and disappearing, moving about like chess pieces in a game where he was just a kibitzer. Yet one thing was certain—the Russians were here, on and below the sea he now prowled, and this was his beat. Yet how in the world did they break through the G.I.U.K. gap so easily? That thought, and the silence from Whale Island, were ample cause for alarm, and his instincts told him it was time for action.

“Battle stations, gentlemen,” he said quietly. “Get the heavyweights up, if you please, and stand to.”

Part XI

Twisted

“In all chaos there is a cosmos, in all disorder a secret order.”

―
Carl Jung

Chapter 31

They
appeared in a grey fog, heavy on the sea, so thick that they could not see three feet in front of them. The ship seemed to be suspended in infinity, but soon Fedorov could feel the telltale rise and swell of the sea beneath them. The lights and equipment fluttered on the bridge, and he felt a queasy sense of disorientation, his equilibrium off, and a sensation that he was too light, too insubstantial. Then weight and solidity returned, a heaviness of flesh and bone, yet he found himself stuck in place, looking down to see the soles of his boots seemed to be fused to the deck.

A wiggle of his toes confirmed that his feet were safe and sound, and now he looked to the others on the bridge, seeing the same looks of confused disorientation on their faces. Admiral Volsky seemed to take it the hardest, trying to steady himself with one hand gripping the Captain’s chair.

“Are you alright sir?”

Volsky looked at him, his eyes glazed over, and then finally focused. He shook his head, as if trying to revive his dulled senses, and then spoke.

“A bit dizzy, Fedorov. My sea legs are not what they used to be.”

“Please sir, take the Captain’s chair. Rodenko? Samsonov?”

The other men reported all was well, and Nikolin was secure at the comm station, though he did not look happy or content. The
Starpom
made a quick check of the remaining bridge crew, seeing that all were well, but then noted an odd buckling in the deck near the main hatch.

“Look here, Fedorov,” he said, pointing to the obvious depression. It extended two feet out from the hatch, and now they saw that the bulkhead to one side also seemed slightly warped.

“Try that hatch,” Rodenko ordered one of the men to check the operation, and they found it wedged tight, as if the ship itself had been greatly stressed, and the metal had simply warped. It was just enough of a distortion to wedge the hatch tightly shut.

Fedorov stooped, untying his boots, and he was soon standing in his heavy woolen socks, noting one small hole where the fabric seemed missing. He had been standing right at the edge of the small depression in the deck plating, and his boots were stuck in place, as if the soles had simply melted into the deck itself. All he could think of was Lenkov’s legs when they found them in that storage locker.

“All bridge stations—report!” said Volsky, easing into the Captain’s chair and still looking and sounding a bit woozy.

One by one the watch stations sounded off. Radar and sonar both reported all clear with no contacts. CIC and communications indicated no red or yellow lights on their equipment.

“No contacts?” That was a problem. “You cannot read
Invincible
off our stern?”

“No sir,” said Kalinichev, “my screen is completely clear on both Fregat and Phased Array systems.”

“Sonar?”

Velichko reported all clear again. He had no acoustic reading for the British battleship.

“Well,” said Volsky. “That settles it. “Velichko has the best ears in the fleet. If he hears nothing, then either his equipment has completely malfunctioned, or there is simply nothing there.”

Fedorov gave the Admiral an odd look when he said that about Velichko, as if something was out of place with the remark, like a shirt buttoned wrong.

“Fedorov, what just happened?” Volsky noted his Captain standing in his stocking feet for the first time.

“We must have shifted just now—phased out of the time we were occupying a moment ago.”

“Phased? Where? We had clear skies and dawn just a moment ago, and now this fog is thick as good borscht… And where are your service boots?”

Fedorov pointed, and the Admiral saw the boots stuck in the deck, noting the strange warp there and the odd distortion near the main hatch.

“What is going on? Time is getting sloppy again, Fedorov. If we moved just now as you suggest, the boat seems to have suffered a few bruises.”

“I suggest we get on the P.A., sir. There may be trouble elsewhere. My boots are melded to the deck. Look where I was standing, very near that warped segment near the hatch. Remember Lenkov?”

“Only too well.” Said Fedorov. He made a general announcement on the P.A. system, asking all sections to check the status of all ship’s bulkheads, cable runs, pipes and equipment. When he finished he looked to Volsky.

“If that happened to my boots, then what if a key cooling pipe in the reactors became misaligned? We need to do a complete sweep of the ship, top to bottom.”

“Correct,” said Volsky. “You may wish to go below, Fedorov, and check on things yourself. Don’t worry about me,” he said when he saw his Captain hesitate. “I am quite myself now. It was just a passing dizziness, something I am prone to from time to time. Besides… I think you will want to fetch another pair of boots, yes?”

“Very good, sir.” Fedorov found the main hatch could simply not be opened, and so he had to use the hatch off the weather bridge, taking the long ladder down the superstructure, his feet cold on the metal with each step, and a strange, icy chill in the air that was very discomfiting. He felt as though he was descending through a cloud, the fog thick about him, and with each downward step he began to probe with his foot, hoping the ladder rung would still be there. Thankfully, he made it to the deck below, his eyes staring up the ladder, which looked oddly distorted.

He was soon looking for the nearest hatch into the main conning tower, intent on finding Damage Control Chief Byko to see if anything else had been reported amiss. Along the way he stumbled into clumps of crew members in the interior passages, and assured them all was well, setting them to work inspecting cable runs, deck structure and anything else in their sections. By the time he found Byko, initial reports were coming in from Chief Warrant Officers, Midshipmen and Petty Officers, and a list of several odd instances of what the Chief called “metal fatigue” were reported.

Another hatch on a deck serving one of the fire control radar stations seemed slightly off plum, and the gunwale there bulged, as if it had been forced out of alignment by a collision—except the bulge was outward, which eliminated that as the reason for the distortion.

Amazingly, there were absolutely no reports of any equipment malfunction, which impressed Fedorov when he gave that some thought. The ship was packed with electronics and precision machined equipment, yet nothing seemed to have sustained any damage at all. Every wire and cable run was checked, the crew running along the thick bundles with gloved hands to look for any breaks or distortions, but nothing was found amiss. If something as simple as a single microchip had not manifested intact, they would surely notice an immediate system failure, but none were reported. It was as if something about the energy, or perhaps the magnetic field surrounding the equipment, served to shield it from the odd effects being reported elsewhere. The only damage was confined to dead metal—bulkheads, deck plating, and the two hatches that seemed frozen shut.

Fedorov was several hours below decks, getting a feel for the entire ship, and grateful that no further incidents along the lines of Lenkov had been discovered. Every man seemed safe and sound of body, though he could not ascertain how they were holding up mentally. He went past the sick bay to check on Doctor Zolkin and the condition of Chief Dobrynin, and there he did find another line of eight or ten men, all wanting something to offset the same queasy nausea and disorientation that had affected the Bridge crew momentarily.

“He’s recovering slowly,” said Zolkin. “The rest has done him some good, and he is asking to get back to the reactor room. I think it best to keep him here another eight hours, and get some good food into him.”

“Does he report hearing that sound as before?”

“Yes, he can hear it, but the brain compensates for these things, and comes to ignore a disturbance like that in time. Live next to a waterfall, and you don’t hear it after a while. I think it was just the early days of the disturbance that he found so intrusive.”

“Any other men reporting this?”

“No, but there is a general sense of anxiety among the crew, and I have had to apply first aid to more than the usual number of black eyes and bruised cheeks. There have been a few quarrels below decks. I suggest food, Fedorov. If we have anything the cooks were saving for holidays, roll it out in the galley. There’s nothing like a good meal to make a man feel fit and comfortable.”

“Thank you, Doctor. That’s a very good idea. I’ll speak to the galley cooks on my way back to the bridge.”

“I do note the Captain is out of uniform,” said Zolkin with a smile, looking down at Fedorov’s grey wool socks.

“It’s a long story, Doctor. Yes, I’m off to fetch a new pair of service boots.”

Along the way, Fedorov met one
mishman
who seemed to be bent over a clipboard, pencil in hand, a puzzled expression on his face. He recognized the man, Sub-Lieutenant Gagarin, a workshop and repair technician.

“Something wrong, Mister Gagarin?”

“Sir? I was just checking my shift assignments… very strange.”

“Explain please.”

“Well sir, I always assign eight men per shift—always. But today, for some reason, I only see seven names on my list. I know them all, because I often pair crewmen who I know work well together. It’s this last name, sir, Mister Konalev. He’s an OR-4 senior seamen from workshop B, but for some reason I assigned him to the A-shift, and he’s not with…” The man’s expression deepened, and he scratched his head.

“Not with who?”

“That’s just it, Captain. I don’t remember. This man, Kornalev… Yes, I always posted him to B shift with a partner, but I simply cannot remember the other man’s name now. So here he is, odd man out, and posted over to the A-shift.”

“Did you experience any disorientation recently, Mister Gagarin?”

“Me sir? Just a flutter in the belly. Thought we hit a big wave or something, but I have good sea legs. I’m fine, sir.”

“Well, we’ve all been through quite a lot in recent months. Make sure you stay well rested, and spread the word, there is going to be a special meal served in the mess hall tonight. Holiday fare.”

After another spooky climb up the long outer ladder, Fedorov was soon back on the bridge, and in shiny new boots, reporting to Admiral Volsky.

“This fog,” said Volsky when his Captain was announced, coming in through the side hatch to the weather bridge. “It is very disconcerting. Radar shows nothing around us, not the
Invincible
, nor any of those German ships we were just shooting at a few hours ago. At least they may be having a better day now that the ship has gone and pulled another disappearing act. How are we doing, Fedorov?”

We have another stuck hatch aft, and I’ll have engineers on this one in ten minutes. There were two other instances of deck warpage, but both in non-essential areas. Three bulkheads seemed out of alignment, and a gunwale was bulged outward near one of the fire control service decks. Other than that, the ship and crew are fine. We’ve had no equipment failures. I had the men check every wire and pipe on the ship, particularly in the reactor section.”

He related his discussion with Doctor Zolkin, and the decision to get some good food into the men. Volsky was glad to hear that Dobrynin was recovering. “What happened here, Fedorov? Is this just another instance of this pulsing business you have spoken of?”

“Something different, I think,” said Fedorov. “When we pulsed before it was a rapid event, and we manifested very close to the moment we occupied when the effect was first noticed. This time we seem to be…”

“Elsewhere?”

“We have no GPS or satellite data, so I do not think we have reached any time in the future when that technology was active. Yet we also have no contact with any of the ships we were able to clearly track on our systems before this happened.”

“Admiral Tovey must be wondering what has happened to us,” said Volsky.

“I would say so, sir.”

“But
how
did this happen, Mister Fedorov? We have not used either of those two spare control rods, and I do not think we were firing any special warheads at the German fleet. The last time this pulsing occurred, it was a result of Dobrynin’s attempt to deliberately remove us from that situation in the Coral Sea. Am I correct?”

“That is so, sir, but after Lenkov, it is clear that the ship itself is… unstable.”

“That may become a bit of an understatement considering what happened to Lenkov,” said Volsky. “What if this continues? We could end up twisted like a pretzel the next time we pulse. And will we stay in this place, or turn up somewhere where the weather is a little better?”