Ryan cringed each time the sonar lash echoed through the double hull. "Can't you jam that or something?" he demanded.

"Patience, Ryan," Ramius said. He had never faced live warheads before but had exercised this problem a hundred times in his career. "Let him know he has us first."

"Do you carry decoys?" Mancuso asked.

"Four of them, in the torpedo room, forward—but we have no torpedomen."

Both captains were playing the cool game, Ryan noted bitterly from inside his terrified little world. Neither was willing to show fright before his peer. But they were both trained for this.

"Skipper," Jones called, "two fish, bearing constant at three-two-zero—they just went active. I say again, the fish are now active—shit! they sound just like 48s. Skipper, they sound like Mark 48 fish."

Ramius had been waiting for this. "Yes, we stole the torpedo sonar from you five years ago, but not your torpedo engines. Bugayev!"

In the sonar room, Bugayev had powered up the acoustical jamming gear as soon as the fish were launched. Now he carefully timed his jamming pulses to coincide with those from the approaching torpedoes. The pulses were dialed into the same carrier frequency and pulse repetition rate. The timing had to be precise. By sending out slightly distorted return echoes, he could create ghost targets. Not too many, nor too far away. Just a few, close by, and he might be able to confuse the fire control operators on the attacking Alfa. He thumbed the trigger switch carefully, chewing on an American cigarette.

The V. K. Konovalov

"Damn! He's jamming us." The michman, noting a pair of new pips, showed his first trace of emotion. The fading pip from the true contact was now bordered with two new ones, one north and closer, the other south and farther away. "Captain, the target is using Soviet jamming equipment."

"You see?" Tupolev said to the zampolit. "Use caution now," he ordered his starpom.

The Red October

"Ryan, all up on planes!" Ramius shouted.

"All the way up." Ryan yanked back, pulling the yoke hard against his belly and hoping that Ramius knew what the hell he was doing.

"Jones, give us time and range."

"Aye." The jamming gave them a sonar picture plotted on the main scopes. "Two fish, bearing three-two-zero. Range to number one is 2,000 yards, to number two is 2,300—I got a depression angle on number one! Number one fish is heading down a little, sir." Maybe Bugayev wasn't so dumb after all, Jones thought. But they had two fish to sweat . . .

The Pogy

The Pogy's skipper was enraged. The goddamned rules of engagement prevented him from doing a goddamned thing, except, maybe—

"Sonar, ping the sonuvabitch! Max power, blast the sucker!"

The Pogy's BQQ-5 sent timed wave fronts of energy lashing at the Alfa. The Pogy couldn't shoot, but maybe the Russian didn't know that, and maybe this lashing would interfere with their targeting sonar.

The Red October