She started walking toward him. Something was odd about her walk. She seemed to be scratching her back.

She approached to within a few feet of him. "I was watching the children play the American game called volleyball."

"Yes, I can see." He nodded toward Akelsey, who still had the rats occupied. "Listen, Masha, something important has come up."

"Dah?" She kept scratching her back.

"We have received a radio transmission from Sebastopol about the children."

"About the children?"

"Dah. Walk with me, please." He led her back onto the small deck-way surrounding the superstructure in the rear of the ship. They kept walking. They were almost near the stern now.

Batsakov looked around.

They were out of sight of anyone else on board.

He reached inside his coat and felt for the pistol.

The USS Honolulu The Black Sea

Torpedo tubes one and four are flooded, sir, " the OOD said. "Awaiting your orders!"

"Range?"

"Range to target – twelve hundred yards, sir."

"Easy, " Pete said. "Just a little closer."

"Are you going to fire both torps, Captain?" the XO asked.

"One torpedo should do the job, don't you think, XO?"

"On a Russian freighter, I should think so, Skipper."

"I say we save torp four." He glanced at Frank. "We may need it."

Frank did not respond for a couple of seconds. "You got that right, Skipper."

"Range to target?"

"Range now eleven hundred yards."

Pete raised his finger. "On my mark, prepare to fire torpedo one."

"Range now one thousand yards."

"Fire torp one!"

"Fire torp one!"

A powerful swoosh rocked the Honolulu.

"Torp's in the water!"

Tension filled the control room. There was no turning back now.

"Range to target?"

"Torpedo is at eight hundred yards and closing, Captain."

Pete checked his watch.

"Now seven hundred yards."

"Six hundred yards to target and still closing."

"Time to impact?"

"Time to impact fifty seconds, Captain. Now five hundred yards."

Pete checked his watch again.

"Range four hundred yards. Time to impact forty seconds."

The Alexander Popovich The Black Sea

The wind whipped hard around the stern of the ship. A sudden surge of cool air in her face and hair emboldened her to the task at hand.

She knew this was the time.

It was either him or her.

She held her hand in place behind her back to avoid revealing the knife until the last second.

"Something wrong with your back, Miss Katovich?"

"I think I pulled a muscle, that is all. What did you want to see me about?"

"It is about the children." He pulled a black pistol from his jacket. "I am sorry to have to do this to such a beautiful woman."

"Emergency! Emergency!" A voice boomed over the ship's loudspeakers. "Torpedo in the water! Torpedo in the water! Brace for impact!"

The captain looked up. She dived at his midsection, lunging at him with the knife. A deafening explosion rocked the ship, spraying columns of seawater high into the air. The explosion knocked Masha off her feet. The ship rolled and listed in the water.

Masha pushed herself up and saw the captain writhing on the back deck, just in front of the Russian flag that flew off the stern. The knife was plunged deep into his midsection just below his sternum. Blood gushed around the knife. The captain moaned. "My ship! Oh, my ship!"

The gun had fallen on the deck near his outstretched hand. Adrenaline shot Masha's hand toward the gun. When she grabbed it, the thought hit her.

Dima!

The USS Honolulu The Black Sea

Contact! Contact! We got 'em, Captain!" Cheers erupted in the Honolulu's control room. Officers and enlisted men high-fived each other.

"Quiet! Quiet in the conn!" Pete held his palms down. His men responded to his call for silence. "I understand your exuberance, gentlemen, but we've still got work to do."

"Conn. Sonar."

"Go ahead, Sonar!"

"Captain, we're picking up sounds of explosions coming through the water."

"Any other contacts in the area?"

"That's a negative, Captain. Not yet, anyway!"

"Notify me when we make first sonar contact." Pete looked at his OOD. "Lieutenant McCaffity. Up scope."

"Up scope, aye, sir." McCaffity pushed the button to raise the Type 2 attack periscope. A few seconds later, Pete brought his eyes to the scope again. The powerful blast of the Mark 48 torpedo had broken the freighter into two sections. The torp had exploded under the keel, just as it was designed to do, essentially breaking the ship's back.

Thick black smoke billowed from the forward section, which was listing badly, and had floated about one hundred yards from the aft section. As bad as it was listing, the bow section might have another five minutes before slipping under the surface.

Pete hit the magnification button. This brought the whole wreckage into a close-up view.

The back section was also floating, but listing. Pete could see people scrambling around on the deck of the back section. They looked like… Children?

No. His eyes were playing tricks on him. Pete squinted and looked again. Whoever he saw running on the deck of the sinking freighter was gone.

It was time to get out of here.

"Down scope."

"Down scope, aye, Captain."

"Five degrees down bubble, make depth one-five-zero feet."

The submarine dropped another ninety feet in the water from a depth of sixty feet to a depth of one hundred fifty feet.

"Float VLF buoy, " Pete said. "I want to monitor any low frequency radio waves for a while."

The submarine released its very low frequency buoy, designed to float to the surface to monitor for radio signals emanating from sources on the surface.

"Chief of the Boat, how far to our rendezvous point with the Volga River?"

"Approximately two hundred miles, south-southeast, Captain."

"Set course for one-seven-zero degrees. All ahead one-half. Let's get out of here."

The Alexander Popovich The Black Sea

We need the captain! We must find the captain!" the helmsman shouted in a panic.

"I am in charge on the bridge!" First Officer Joseph Radin snapped. "The captain may be dead! We have no time. Get our radio up and running or we will all go down and never be found."

"I have a connection, Mr. Radin!" the communications officer announced. "We have a broadcast frequency!"

"Give me that microphone!" Radin took the microphone in hand. "Mayday! Mayday! This is the Russian freighter Alexander Popovich. We have been struck by torpedo! Location: Black Sea. Ninety miles west of Sevastopol. We have children on board. We are sinking!

"Mayday! Mayday! This is the Alexander Popovich. We have children on board and we are sinking!"

"Mr. Radin!" the helmsman screamed. "We must leave now! We are sinking!"

Masha pulled herself up off the deck, trying to keep her balance. The ship was tilting to the left, forcing her to toss the gun back down to the deck and hang onto a rope that was strung between the walkway. She grasped the rope tightly as she walked back around the deck toward the ship's midsection.

The smoke and flames resembled the special effects in an American science fiction movie. The bow section of the ship had broken off and was standing on its end in the sea, perhaps a hundred yards away from the rest of the ship.

Masha froze in her tracks, paralyzed by the sight of it all. A great creaking sound, then twising metal, then almost a moaning came from the bow section.

The bow section stood up higher in the water, then higher. Now about a hundred feet off the surface of the water, the tip of the bow pointed up toward the sun, like a skyscraper standing erect in the water.

For a few seconds more twisting sounds followed. The sea grew strangely calm, and then the bow of the ship began slipping down into the water, disappearing into a huge whirlpool.