He rotated around, looking for any ships. Even though Vipr’s sonar was tracking multitudes of ships, he visually confirmed that there were none located in the patch of ocean he saw. Just to make sure, he looked around again, rotating more slowly this time, searching every wave top. Still no ships.

“Captain,” Dmolysti said, his voice little more than a whisper. “Do you want to search with radar?”

“No, not this time. There is no one up there right now. Using the radar would attract attention from anyone searching over the horizon.”

“Very well, Captain,” the first officer answered. “We are ready to commence launch. One minute to scheduled launch time.”

Vivilav stepped back from the periscope. He was not certain of all the reasons for what was about to happen. He was not even certain how it could possibly be the best thing for his country. But his commander had ordered it done. Admiral Durov was a god to him. He recalled the day he first heard Durov lecture at the Soviet Naval School at Stalingrad. If Admiral Durov ordered it done, Anatol Vivilav was bound to do it.

“First Officer, commence launch sequence,” he ordered without wavering.

The outer doors on four torpedo tubes clanged open. Four deadly missiles were made ready to leap into the night sky on fiery trails.

*   *   *

Jon Ward sat in the command seat in the CIC on board the Anzio. The large flat-panel display mounted on the bulkhead in front of him was littered with tracks from the dozens of surface ships that Anzio’s advanced Aegis radar was following. Most were shown as white rectangles, telling him at a glance that those ships were positively identified as noncombatants. He could ignore them. Some of the rectangles were yellow. That signified that they had not been positively ID’d yet. Those didn’t interest Ward, either.

His eyes were locked on a green triangle with the notation AA275 written beside it. Just to the east of the green triangle was a red box with an open side facing down. Beside it was written AS124. AA275 was the Aegis track number for Anzio’s SH-60 helicopter. Its radio call sign was Foxtrot Three Two. AS124 was the track number for the Russian submarine they had been tailing all the way from the north of Norway, through the Baltic Sea, and into the Gulf of Finland.

“Commodore, Foxtrot Three Two reports ceiling at one thousand.” Bob Norquest sat right beside Ward, listening to the helicopter pilot on the tactical radio. “One Two Four is at the edge of the sonobuoy field. Three Two is going to drop down to two hundred feet and deploy a new line.”