Seven Veils of Wisdom – Bloc One – by P J Searle

Walden had reached the rocket silo and was now feverishly working on the controls of a missile. He stopped, suddenly frozen with fear. An audio countdown sequence had started and could be heard over the ship’s Tannoy. A hundred-second timer began to tick away – 99 – 98 – 97. In frenzy Walden, yanked all the wire connections away from the unit. The countdown stopped for a brief moment… then continued – 93 – 92. Walden dashed from the silo to the next compartment. There he stopped and pinched his eyes shut. ‘Captain!’ he shouted desperately into his hand. A low-resolution picture of Falstaff appeared to Walden’s closed eyes.

‘Walden, where the hell have you been?’ demanded an angry looking Falstaff. ‘You have a stupid goddamn gismo screwed inside your head and you don’t keep THE THING SWITCHED ON!’

‘No time, Captain,’ said Walden. ‘This missile is gonna fly. So I’m gonna smash the fucker’s compressed air tank.’

‘No! You’ll blow the lot. No! That’s an order! – NO!!’

‘Sorry, Captain, I’m on my own on this one. Thank God I never volunteered, aye?’ He opened his eyes. ‘I reckon next we meet, Sir, it’ll be either heaven or hell. Maybe this is my ticket out of purgatory an’ into heaven. – Out.’

‘Don’t do it, Walden! Get out! GET OUT NOW!’

The countdown continued – 51 – 50 – 49 – Walden picked up the sub-machine gun and replaced its magazine – 30 – 29 – 28 – He fired. The first shot hit the compressed air tank and ricocheted off with no effect, and then the gun jammed. He fiddled and re-cocked but it still wouldn’t fire. In blind anger he hit out at the compressed-air tank with the butt, again to no effect –15 – 14 – 13. He threw the weapon aside and made for the next compartment, grabbing at the hatch. It came free. He closed and sealed it off – 5 – 4 – 3 – 2 – 1 – zero! The submarine shuddered.

In the icy depths, the black water burst with a convulsion of compressed air as the Pegasus belched out a missile. At the surface, it punched through the ice a mile from the base-camp and hurtled into the air. After fifty feet the main rocket flamed-up. It was a perfect launch.

Inside the Pegasus, Walden closed his eyes. A low-resolution picture of Falstaff appeared. ‘She’s gone, Captain,’ he said, defeated. ‘Nothing I could do to stop it.’

‘God forgive us – I think that meeting, Walden, will be in hell.’

On the surface, high in the clear cold air, the missile levelled out and flew straight.

President Caxton sat with hand over eyes as he received the appalling news. He gave a face of dread, then stood and addressed all.

‘Ladies and gentlemen, a missile has been inadvertently fired from the United States A-class submarine, Pegasus. It is rogue and seems to be on an undetermined TOA. The trajectory predict it would appear is the Persian Gulf, but that’s not confirmed. It is a LAR-type, Lethal Autonomous Robotic, it has no recall or destruct facility.’ His words were met with gasps of horror… then silence. Caxton fixed his eyes on the painted ceiling above the crowded sanctum and continued. ‘I have just been informed that when the missile is over the Urals the Russians intend to shoot it down, hopefully over the Caspian Sea. I/ we made the offer to assist. This has been unequivocally refused.’

A bluff military-looking woman, Field Marshal Ravenhill stood and looked to Caxton. He nodded for her to speak.

‘There is no dictate protocol for this scenario, Mr. President. What are you going to do?’ She waited a few moments… Caxton didn’t answer. She continued, forcefully. ‘We have to burn that warhead, Mister President; we can’t leave it to the Russians. We burn it now!’

‘You gutless mother!’ yelled Shatner, still held in restraint by the troopers, ‘You’re just going to leave it to the Russians!’

‘You can’t talk to me like that,’ growled Caxton. ‘You’ve crossed the line, Senator. I told you to leave this war-room. Will you leave, Sir? – Now!’

‘Yeah, I’ll go. The people need to know what the fuck’s going on here.’ Shatner forced himself from the hands of the troopers and started to walk to the door.

The President looked around the room then turned to one of the attendant guard. ‘Draw your weapon, soldier, and escort Senator Shatner to the annex room and guard him, and if he tries to leave, shoot him!’ The guard hesitated, Caxton yelled into his face, ‘That, is, an, order, Soldier.’ The guard jumped to action, pointed his pistol at Shatner and escorted him out through uproar. Caxton expelled a breath and continued. ‘Now, contrary to Senator Shatner’s belief, we have sent a force... three long-range Fusion scramjet fighters… live pilots… with the communication situation we can’t send drones. These will intercept and destroy that missile before it gets out of Russian territory, we dare not risk it falling on Kuwait!’ He paused and took a sharp intake of breath, then continued, ‘And let there be no doubt, the Russians will try to stop us.’

As he spoke, from the United States Air Base in Crete, three US Fusion scramjet fighters took off under rocket boost. They climbed with incredible velocity to great altitude, all aircraft simultaneously breaking the sound barrier. Exhausted rocket boosters dropped away and parachuted to earth. The three scramjets linked up into formation and flew south.

At the same time, at the Russian air-force base, Rostov, a squadron of six, Vlad pulsejet long-range fighters took off and also flew south.

Again, angry protests echoed around the Pentagon war-room, again Caxton had to shout to be heard. ‘Order! Order!!’ Finally they calmed and he was able to speak. ’I agree… this is ‘a very dangerous ethic’, but it’s a great deal safer than leaving it to the Russians. Our planes are far superior. That rogue missile is carrying blanket-bombs; to miss one would be unthinkable’

Field Marshal Ravenhill stood and, after getting a nod from Caxton, hurled her words. ‘How the hell are our boys going to fly without computer-guidance, Sir?’

‘A goddam sight better than the Russians, I can tell you that, Madam,’ came Caxton’s equally forceful reply. ‘We have the best machines, and more to the point, the best-trained men. This is old-time warfare; hand-to-hand, bayonets fixed!’

‘But I understand the Russians have no computer shutdown,’ said Ravenhill, still pushing her point.

‘We only have their word for that; we don’t expect them to be as candid as ourselves.’

‘And what about EMP, Mister President?’ said Ravenhill as she sat down. She folded her arms and waited; satisfied she’d won some ground over the many voices drowning her out. ‘I said, what about E, M, P?’ She shouted it defiantly into the direction of the voices. Uproar again.

Caxton slammed his hand down on the desk for order. ‘We are all aware of the electro-magnetic storm that a nuclear strike could create. Our aircraft are highly adaptable in such a scenario, and since they have no computer-link it would seem purely academic.’

Ravenhill stood again. ‘And if they fire on and destroy a Russian aircraft?’

‘That, Field Marshal, would be a disaster,’ said Caxton, offering a face of unyielding resolve, ‘But a disaster that we are prepared to live with…’ he paused while he scanned the room, then continued, ‘Just weigh that up against the disaster a missile-strike would cause if it happened over a major city! It’s a nuclear blanket bomb, like the other. We must catch it high… before it can disperse to the surface. The Caspian Sea is out; it would be at the end of its predicted parabola. It would be too low by then.’

There was now an unearthly silence as they contemplated such a disaster. Caxton put his hand to his face and expelled another long-held breath.

Walden had made his way back to the rocket silo and was again working feverishly on one of the missiles. He stopped abruptly as if summoned by some unspoken command. He pinched his eyes closed and spoke. ‘Holy Mother of Christ, Captain,’ Falstaff’s face constructed in his QuickVision mind’s eye, ‘they’re all hot, every last one of the mothers, and they’re working to battery-launch, set at ten-second intervals. They’ve even compensated for the salvo-ratio.’

‘Hold on, Sailor, just hold on,’ Falstaff’s voice rang out in his head, ‘I’m coming to you. It’ll take a while; I have to breach two compartments.’

‘You’ll never make it Captain. It’s suicide.’

‘I’ve got to try.’

’How ‘bout Rees, is he okay?’

‘Rees is fine; I’m leaving him here to repair the docking bay.’

‘What the hell for?’

In the control-room, Falstaff spoke forcefully into the neck chip in his hand. ‘Because, Walden, we are getting out of here! I intend to get to that little hovel in Glamorganshire even if it goddam kills me. I told you, I don’t do suicide missions, nor do any of my men. I’ll be with you directly… soon as I can. – Out.’ Falstaff put his chip inside his shirt then turned to Rees, his raised eyebrow invited input.

‘We could take the suits, Captain; we ain’t too deep for that?’

’No, we couldn’t, Rees. We would need eight minutes to surface with a suit... in this water we’d be dead in four. We need a submersible. So you stay and ‘de-fuck’ the hatch. You got a problem with that?’

‘Nooo, Boss, you’s da white man.’

Falstaff considered Rees’ statement, ’Yeah! Yeah, you’re right, I am ‘da white man,’ so I’ll stay here and play with the hatch while you do the hero bit.’

‘Fuck you, Captain,’ said Rees giving a look of horror, ‘No offence.’ Falstaff laughed… they both laughed together as they donned their breathing apparatus. ‘One thing, Captain,’ continued Rees.

‘What’s that, Rees? … We got some few minutes to squander while the pressure equalizes… we have to do it slowly, don’t want to rattle the Mare.’

‘Why Wales? What’s wrong with good ol’ US of A?’

‘Nothing! I just thought we’d change our luck. We had five good years, then…’

‘Word has it you lost a kid… I’m sorry. That’s what they say.’

’You heard wrongly, Rees. We lost two kids, one at birth and one at two years old – ‘to lose one is sad, to lose two is downright careless’. I forget what that’s from.’

’Sounds like, ‘Importance of being Ernest’ – Wilde.’

‘Wild! I should say I was wild.’ Falstaff gave Rees a wry, censuring look.

‘Sorry, Sir. No offence meant.’

‘None taken, none taken. How come you’re so well-read, Rees?’

‘I ain’t well-read, Boss… I read pretty slow, I’ve been struggling with two books for over a year, Frankenstein and Moby Dick, two nautical-related books. Them and my favourite, the Yale Book of Quotations – reading that makes it easy to impress gullible people, present company excluded. Again, no offence meant, Boss.’

‘None taken.’

Rees thought for a moment. ‘Captain, I’ve changed my mind. When I gets out of this I’m going home to my wife and kid.’ Falstaff smiled triumphantly. Rees continued, ‘Yeah, then we’s all going to the Keys. That’s if…’

‘Rees, I think this old planet of ours has been soiled, dirtied! We messed it up an’ now it’s going to mess us up.’

‘Yeah, hallelujah an’ amen.’

High in the heavens, the missile’s first stage dropped away and the second-stage fired. The missile continued its ascent.

‘You think I’m nuts, Rees?’ said Falstaff, giving a challenging stare.

’Yeah, I think you’re ‘nuts’… not as nuts as most, that’s why you’s the skipper. I think the whole fuckin’ world is nuts. As I said, take me back a couple o’ hundred years an’ stick a leg-iron on me an’ beat me; gimme something to fight for… to die for. All the bugs in the mud are hatching out, Captain; best-laid plans of mice and morons; them dickless suckers that build these goddam war-machines should be made to serve in them.’ He suddenly offered a face of deadly seriousness. ‘Hey Boss, we gotta get out of here while we still got a sperm-count between us, we still got some fancy breeding to do… right? Right?’

‘Right, Sailor. How’s the pressure?’

‘Nearly there Captain.’ Rees gave a look of compassion, ‘Third time lucky, Boss. It would be a shame to waste it. You got father potential… much more than me.’

‘You’ve got a pretty kid, Rees; you’re fortunate, and a beautiful wife.’

’How do you know that… I thought you said you didn’t know me? ‘I kept outta your way’, remember?’

‘When we came back onboard, I looked you up.’

‘How… the computer is down?’

‘I don’t like computers, I’ve got paper files on every man on board.’

‘That a fact? But that’s not regulation… no paper files… nothing on wax, sine sera to quote the Romans.’

Falstaff gave Rees another incredulous stare. ‘I don’t do regulation, Rees. I need to see my men’s families, their faces, need to hold the picture in my hand.’

‘Why’s that, Captain?’

‘I’ll tell you, Rees. A good captain needs to know the next-of-kin by sight.’

‘I get it, when you write to the grieving widow, mother, it makes it easier if you can see who you’re writing to, yeah?’

‘No. Not a letter; if I have to do that it will be in person.’ He turned away and gave a distant look. ‘I have this recurring nightmare, Rees. I wake up sweating from it. In the dream, I’ve given a mother the dreadful news that her son is dead, but I’ve made the cardinal mistake; I’ve given the wrong news to the wrong person. That happened to my mother in World War II. My father was reported killed in action… Omaha beach. I’m the living proof he wasn’t. But for two weeks my mother suffered, then he turned up, shell-shocked but alive. He got over it… but my mother never got over it… she never did.’

‘I think you’re going to make a marvellous father, Captain – know what I’m saying?’

‘Yeah, I know what you’re saying, Rees. How’s the pressure doing now?’

‘Another minute.’ He said it, slightly embarrassed at his attempted intimacy, and quickly hurried the conversation on. ‘Just one other thing, Captain. How we gonna get back in; we can’t blow this compartment, the controls don’t answer?’

‘I thought you’d never ask,’ said Falstaff with a wry smile, ‘I’m going to cut directly through the partition wall with a torch, make the way clear, and decrease the pressure. That will close it long enough for the submersible to dock and secure, and for us to get through and the hell out.’ He let the seemingly preposterous plan hang for a moment and waited for Rees’ expected, sarcastic comment.

‘O… kay.’ said Rees lazily.

Falstaff gave him a censuring frown. ‘You got any problem with that?’

‘Hey, I’m not a shareholder. As I said, you’s the skipper, Boss.’

‘O… kay.’ mimicked Falstaff.

‘Lieutenant Miro… report!’ Captain De Loock yelled into the bridge intercom. The voice echoed around the rocket-bay where a dozen men worked in frenzy, hosing and hammering. Lieutenant Miro waded through the foot-high water, picked up the handset and bellowed over the noise.

‘There is a link-reaction, Sir. I can’t break it. We’ve totally rewired the system bypassing the computer, but as soon as I deactivate one missile another comes alive.’

De Loock gave a dreadful sigh. ‘In your opinion, Lieutenant – hypothetical of course – what action would you suggest?’

‘There is only one action, Sir,’ answered Miro without hesitation, ‘Flood all port sections to make her list. When she’s on her side then flood all starboard sections except the keel and ballast sections, then let her sink so as she lays bottom-up on the sea bed, missiles intact. Then, if they do fire, they’ll be absorbed into the ocean floor. – Abandon ship and sink her, Captain.’

‘I’ve already tried. Negative! She won’t let us flood any section. Continue what you are doing. You are a good sailor, Lieutenant; you’ll make a good master one-day. – Out.’