Warshot (The Hunter Killer Series Book 6) by Don Keith (dark books to read TXT) 📕

launch some rubber boats. At least not without some kind of perfunctory challenge. Now Allison had a front-row seat to this little stare-down that appeared to be on the verge of taking place.

The skipper swung the scope back to see what was happening with the SSNs. He was just in time to see the men topside scurrying toward hatches. It was either time for them to go, or they, too, were aware of the Taiwanese destroyer heading their way.

The small boats the subs had put into the water were lost in the darkness. Seconds later, both SSNs slid smoothly below the surface with barely a ripple.

“Conn, ESM, detecting SPG-Sixty gun-control radar. Equates to a Kee Lung-class destroyer. It’s in target acquisition mode.”

The destroyer was in the process of homing in on the proposed targets, the final step before shooting. Or at least trying to convince the PLAN vessels that they were about to do just that if they did not go away.

Allison spun the scope back toward the destroyer in time to see it charging boldly out into the open water. Just then, a brilliant orange-red flame shot from the barrel of the vessel’s forward five-inch gun. Three more shots followed in rapid succession.

This was no bluff. They were trying to sink the two interlopers!

The AN/WLY-1 Acoustic Threat Intercept System on Boise began ominously chiming. Simultaneously, Sonar reported, “Receiving three-point-five kilo-hertz active sonar. SQS-Fifty-Three. Signal strength forty-five. Probability of detection eighty percent.”

Allison nodded. The situation was getting very serious very quickly. The destroyer had stormed out of its anchorage looking for submarines and was already shooting. The Fifty-Three sonar system they were employing was a really good high-power active sonar. There was a damn good chance it would be able to detect all three of the submarines swimming around in Taiwanese waters, the two Chinese boats and the Boise. But great as it was, it could not sort out the good guys from the bad.

“Captain,” the XO, Henrietta Foster, jumped in. “Recommend we go active to tell the destroyer who we are.”

Allison did not hesitate. He was already thinking the same thing.

“Sonar, go active on the BQQ-Ten. Max power omni mode.”

The BQQ-10 sonar transmitted on the same frequency as the SQS-53. They were very similar systems, actually designed and built by the same people. The sonar operators on the destroyer should easily be able to identify that one contact they were seeing was a US submarine.

Of course, the two Chinese SSNs would also know now that Boise was an uninvited guest at their little party. Allison would have loved to see the looks on the Chinese skippers’ faces when Boise’s BQQ-10 popped up.

There was, of course, a chance their reaction might be drastic. Time to get the gun cocked, just in case.

“Make tubes one and two ready in all respects. Assign tube one to Master One, tube two to Master Two.” Now it would only take a few seconds to put two torpedoes in the water if they needed to, one aimed at each of the Chinese submarines.

“Conn, Sonar. Three active returns. Master One, bearing three-four-four, range three-five-hundred yards. Master Two, bearing three-five-one, range four-two-hundred yards. Sierra One-Seven, the Taiwan DDG, bearing zero-one-six, range six-five-hundred yards.”

It was a regular South China Sea regatta!

Allison spun the scope around again. Time for one final look and then they would get out of town. He did not want to be in the middle of an Old West gunfight.

The skipper was just in time to see two ASROC missiles leap from the forward launch rails of the destroyer. Brilliant white flames arched across the night sky.

“Torpedo in the water!” The pitch of Vincent’s voice had gone up a notch or two. “Hold two...wait...hold four torpedoes in the water.”

“Snapshot tube one Master One. Tube two Master Two,” Allison called out. He reached up and spun the red ring to lower the scope.

The captain hardly had time to consider what had just happened. Torpedoes had been launched at them with the intent of blowing them up and sending them to the bottom. He was about to launch weapons at the two submarines attacking him, occupied by fellow living, breathing submariners.

Foster checked the fire control solutions and calmly said, “Solution ready, both weapons.”

“Ship ready,” Esteban confirmed.

“Two torpedoes bearing three-four-five. No bearing drift.” Chief Vincent’s voice was tight with tension over the 21MC. “The other two have a right bearing drift. They are heading for the destroyer.”

The Chinese SSNs were shooting at everything they could see or hear.

Allison looked over at the weapons control panel just as the weapons officer yelled, “Weapons ready.”

“Shoot tubes one and two,” Allison ordered. He felt a sudden shudder as the impulse ram forced high-pressure water around the stern of each two-ton ADCAP torpedo and flushed them out of the tubes into the sea.

“Normal launch, both tubes,” the weapons officer reported, as calmly as if this were just another drill and they had launched water slugs or exercise torpedoes.

Turning to the chief of the watch, Allison ordered, “Launch the EMATT, launch a pair of evasion devices. Wait fifteen seconds and launch two more evasion devices.”

The EMATT, or Expendable Mobile ASW Training Target, was designed to simulate a submarine while training operators. However, since the device sounded and behaved just like a real submarine, it made a good decoy. Hopefully good enough to fool the two oncoming weapons zooming toward Boise.

“Hold both weapons running normally,” Chief Vincent reported. “Inbound weapons still bear three-four-five and three-four-three.”

With the counterattack launched, it was time to get out of town. Allison ordered, “Ahead flank. Make your depth three hundred feet. Steady course zero-eight-zero.”

Foster had moved back to the ECDIS display. “Skipper, recommend stay on this course for thirty seconds, then come left to zero-six-five. And depth four hundred feet.”

Boise jumped ahead and angled downward.

“Incoming weapons still bear three-four-three and three-four-five. Loud splashes bearing three-four-zero. Sounds like multiple Mark Forty-Six torpedoes on that bearing.”

The Taiwanese destroyer had added to the fusillade aimed at the two Chinese boats. Allison