Nearing the Edge

by Eagle

The Art of Breaking Rules (TNB)

August 13th, 2005
2100 Hours
Near Onda Cálida, Shadow Empire

This was going to be another one he couldn’t talk about, thought Commander Mike Osario. As captain of USS Parche, he knew a thing or two about covert operations.

He stood with his arms crossed, leaning with his hip against the handrail that surrounded the periscope stand in the control room as the submarine cautiously nosed into Shadow territorial waters. They were now trespassing, as the United Nations saw it.

Of course, as the Arcaian Defense Bloc saw it, they had been trespassing ten miles ago. But this wasn’t their world, and the UN looked poorly on countries who tried to impose their own laws of the sea. Still, Parche was trespassing anyway. Spying was the art of breaking the rules, and also getting away with it.

Spying was a grey area, where accountability and legality were swept under the table. The mission came first, and thinking about how it was accomplished got pushed to the back burner. If they were caught, the consequences could be enormous.

The stakes were high, but so were Parche’s capabilities. It wasn’t Osario’s first tour on board and he knew the boat like the back of his hand. She was specialized for the mission and was the only one of her kind that had ever been built.

Parche had once been a Sturgeon-class nuclear-powered attack submarine, laid down in the ‘70s. Nearly from day one, she had been involved in clandestine operations. However, it was only after a refit added an additional 100 feet of length to her bow and installed a number of other renovations that she truly came into her own. She was oddly proportioned and had strange bulges and lumps all over her hull, but it all served a purpose. She had been scheduled for decommissioning the previous year, but the appearance of Arcaia had turned a lot of things on their head, including the US defense budget. Despite being the oldest and perhaps also the ugliest submarine in the US Navy, Parche had nine Presidential Unit Citations under her belt as the most decorated American vessel of all time.

Earning decorations like that - during peacetime no less - still entailed secret and dangerous missions. It was a legacy to live up to. And in her age, Parche still had things left to prove.

Osario watched the approach on the plotting table as they drew closer to the coast. Reports from the Office of Naval Intelligence indicated that the Shadow Empire might be trialing new units in the coastal city of Onda Cálida. Due to the Bloc’s control of weather to foil satellites and the fact that they hadn’t quite embraced modern technology yet which foiled electronic eavesdropping, spying had become very difficult indeed.

Enter Parche. Spying was simply what she did. Once upon a time, it had been the Soviet Union. Now, at thirty two years old, she was still up to her old tricks.

She slipped quietly towards shore as the bottom started to come up. Ten miles out of the harbor, the passive sonar operators began to resolve some of the clutter. There were the usual waves and industrial sounds, strange splashes, and engines of all kinds. That would help mask Parche, but being so close to shore also reduce the margin of error to near zero.

Parche had never fired a shot in anger, nor had most American submarines, but still had her torpedoes. Sinking a foreign ship in self defense in its own territorial waters would be an international incident, but the alternative would be worse.

“Come left, three five zero,” Osario ordered. The helm acknowledged.

He cut the submarine back and forth in a slow zigzag. This would help with range bearings via sonar, and perhaps make their path less predictable. Parche was no rookie to this game.

“Reel in the tail and bring us to periscope depth,” Osario ordered.

The sensitive towed-array sonar carried on a long cable out behind the submarine was her best microphone to the ocean. However, there was a risk in snagging it in shallow water.

Parche approached the surface. Osario wasn’t expecting to see much at night, but one last check would be prudent. It would also provide an opportunity to get a read on any electronic emissions in the area.

He hit the controls and the attack periscope slid up. One of the crewmen threw a switch and an ESM mast also went up, testing the airwaves.

The clouds were low, Osario saw. He could make out city lights in the distance. A slow check did not reveal any ship traffic nearby. Sonar hadn’t heard any, either.

Satisfied, he lowered the periscope and committed to the final approach.

There was always a danger that they would be detected. The Shadows would be stupid not to have some kind of harbor surveillance set up. But would they be looking for a submarine? Did they have barriers, or worse, mines? Osario ordered the speed cut back again. He was mentally prepared for the mission to take all night. And on that note, he excused himself to get a cup of coffee.

The wardroom on a submarine was tiny. It was hard not to literally bump into people. There, Osario found one of the men from...well, it didn’t really matter which agency, or group, or activity they were from.

“About that time,” Osario commented.

“Yeah,” said the man.

Osario couldn’t remember if he was one of the ones that worked in the “bat cave” area installed in the 100 foot extension, or if he was in the other area near the stern. He wasn’t a permanent member of the crew, only brought on for this one mission. He wasn’t the first, and probably wouldn’t be the last, visitor Parche had ever seen.

Osario walked back to the control center, coffee in hand. Parche was starting to get pinched between the shallowing bottom and the surface. Osario had been in this position often enough to be familiar with it, but not enough to be comfortable. That would have been foolhardy. Nuclear submarines, as a rule, did not play in the shallows.

An hour passed, tension constant, but not dire. They had not run into anything. The chart carefully catalogued their route, taking information from the inertial navigation system and dead reckoning. It took precision, but that was what they did. Perfection was a way of life. The alternative could very well be death.

Osario reviewed what he knew of the mission. The Shadow Empire was in the process of constructing, well, a lot of things, but tonight Parche was after a hybrid battlecruiser with a platform for VTOL aircraft on its stern. Data said that it probably existed, but no one had ever seen it. Supposedly, the ship was called Miedo. It was just another piece in the growing arsenal the Bloc was preparing.

Onda Cálida was a small port in the southwestern part of the Shadow Empire. It wasn’t a major military installation, and probably wouldn’t merit heavy patrols. Still, where there was a shipbuilding facility, there was something to be learned. Parche had plenty of sophisticated sensors, cameras, underwater lights, and other gizmos. However, sneaking all the way up into a harbor would do them no good. The water would be too dirty to see through, and likely too shallow to completely hide the submarine.

That was where some of the mysterious visitors came in. Parche had already planned where she would stop and let the swimmers take over. She just had to get into position.

The submarine glided to a halt a mile south of the main harbor pier in two hundred feet of water. Small thrusters around the hull slowly spun her in place, pointed back out to sea. Hydraulics extended four ski-like feet from the bottom of the hull and Parche settled gently onto the seabed.

The divers going out were already in the airlocks. When the boat was secure, the hatches opened into the pressurized “moon pool” where they could simply slip into the water. The equally pressurized air in the small chamber kept the water from flooding in

The submarine’s permanent crew had nothing to do but wait. This close to shore, there was enough noise going on in the harbor to mask just about any noise they made. That didn’t mean anyone did, however.

Osario considered the Bloc’s capabilities. Improving rapidly, from what he had read. Technology from China and Russia, combined with a surprisingly acute homegrown sense had taken the Shadow Navy from nearly nothing to building battlecruisers in just years. That was to say nothing of the griffons or changelings.

The possibility that the Bloc possessed some new anti-submarine capability crossed his mind. What about trained dolphins, or pony swimmers, or something magical? They would never see it coming.

Sonar reported a close contact, bearing constant and cruising speed. A low hum slowly built in volume, even without hydraphones. Osario glanced up, as did a few others. Shallow as they were, one could hear ships go by overhead without even the sonar. The thought of a destroyer dropping depth charges came unpleasantly to mind.

Osario glanced at the clock. It was nearly time for the swimmers to come back. They’d agreed on a hard cutoff. Parche wouldn’t wait, if the divers had gotten into trouble. America’s best spy submarine could not afford to take unnecessary risks. More than they already had, anyway.

From the control room, he heard the hiss of changing pressure. That would be the airlock preparing to receive the divers back.

Suddenly, Parche shuddered, rocking to the side. Osario caught the handrail for balance. His ears popped with a pressure change. A grating noise combined with the sound of bending metal came from somewhere above.

Osario glanced at the integrity board, showing all green. The noises faded away and Parche settled back on her skids. A light for the diver chamber suddenly turned red.

“Get me a report,” he ordered to no one in particular. From forward, he heard pumps engage.

A long ten seconds passed before word came back. “The upset changed the water level in the moon pool and let some air out.”

That explained the pressure. “What happened? Can we get one of the divers to check topside?”

Something fouling the propeller would be their worst nightmare, though owing to the nature of her work, Parche was fitted with a guarded screw.

A few minutes passed, feeling like hours. Submarines were inherently slow-paced, but this was not the time nor place to be spending extra seconds.

The final diver was finally back within the submarine and going through the airlock. As the chamber equalized, he scribbled out the problem on his underwater slate and showed it to a sailor on the other side of the airlock window. The sailor, in turn, relayed it to the control room. “One fairwater plane slightly bent. Scratches all over the sail.”

Osario winced, but there was nothing that could be done now. To the helm, he ordered, “Get us up off the bottom and head out. Clear datum to the west.”

Sailors began adjusting ballast and preparing to retract the skids. Parche floated again, and began to slowly creep away.

The Chief of the Boat sidled over, already knowing what was on Osario’s mind. “I wonder if it’s related to the ship that had passed over earlier, sir.”

“That’s the only thing I can think of,” Osario agreed. “Were they dragging something? A net?”

“A fishing net wouldn’t have done that kind of damage,” COB pointed out. They both knew Sturgeon dive planes were designed strong enough to surface through ice.

“Yeah,” Osario said. “And last I checked, ponies don’t eat fish.”

Could they somehow have been detected? Or was it just dumb luck? Was it a device designed to net submarines, or simply something that had accidentally done so? Either way, the Shadows likely knew they were there now, though whether they realized exactly what they had caught was still unknown.

There were too many variables and not enough facts. Osario did at least know that Parche would require a refit when they got back to Bangor. Maintaining depth control would be more difficult without using the fairwater planes mounted on the submarine’s sail, but there was no way to know how extensive the damage was. With her modified hull, she was already ungainly. They would have to rely on just the stern planes and the fine maneuvering thrusters.

The minutes passed slowly. Even if they were to make flank speed, it would still take at least half an hour to get clear of Shadow waters, so there was no point in making noise by hurrying. Parche took the time to do things right. At low speed, the damaged planes probably wouldn’t change her sound signature.

It wouldn’t be the first time an American submarine returned to port with damage. It wouldn’t be the first time such a thing had happened inside another country’s territorial waters, either. While that didn’t make it acceptable, risks and regulations had to be considered if they wanted to get intelligence that was otherwise unobtainable. There was no other way but to pay the price and break the rules.

Sonar kept Osario constantly updated on the situation in the harbor. More ships were mobilizing. It was probably best to suspect they had been made. At least it seemed as if Parche’s maneuver off to the west put her out of the Shadow Navy’s expected search pattern.

Osario went over the approach in his head again and again. There was no way to know that ship had been dragging something. He might have been able to get Parche out of the way, but doing so might have compromised her, and before the divers returned. What could he have done differently?

The minutes and the miles slowly counted off. Osario didn’t relax, but after enough of both had passed, felt secure enough to leave his post in the control room for more coffee. He didn’t know how he was going to sleep after the caffeine, or especially after the mission.

As he finished pouring a cup, he met the divers just coming out of the airlock after decompressing.

“How did it go?” he asked.

“It was good,” said the man he’d spoken to earlier. “We got what we needed.”

Osario almost inquired about photos of the prototype Shadow ship, but asked a more important question first. “How does my boat look?”

The man shrugged and gestured to the bulkheads. “We’re alive, aren’t we?”

There was that, though it didn’t entirely alleviate Osario’s glum mood. This mission could have earned them another award citation. As it was, he wondered if he was in danger of losing his command for the damage of such an important national spy platform.

But that was still better than being dead, or worse, failing the mission.

Author's Note:

You all should thank TNB, he wanted to do submarine stuff.

Comments

[Earthpatriot117]

It's nice to see things from different perspectives. Xd
When is the next AWESOME update dude?

[totallynotabrony]

Hey Eagle, I noticed the image link on this chapter is dead. I think it can be fixed simply by replacing ".org" in the URL with ".cc"