Читать книгу Damage Control - Gordon Kent, Gordon Kent - Страница 15

“Admiral on the bridge!” The sailor braced.

“Stand easy.” Rafe came off the starboard ladder and waved at the bridge crew. “You guys have coffee for an old man?” He turned to Rick Madje, his flag lieutenant, who was holding a phone out to him. Rafe raised his eyebrows.

“Captain Fraser on the Picton.” HMCS Picton was a Canadian frigate attached to his battle group, the ship Alan had complained about because Rafe had put it way down south as a radar picket with orders to stay in Emissions Control, or EMCON—the regulation of outgoing EM transmissions across the spectrum—until she had a chance to shoot.

“Captain Fraser?”

“Sorry to break EMCON, Admiral, and I’m on satcom to make us harder to track.”

“Sure, Alex, sure.”

“Sir, I’m calling to protest two inbound ‘missiles.’ I’ve called Exercise Control four times to note them as intercepted and they don’t respond.” The “missiles” would really be aircraft imitating missiles as part of the exercise.

“Roger, Alex. I hear you. We haven’t been able to raise ExCon since a few seconds after startex ourselves. Something’s gone down at their end.”

Rafe could hear the relief in the Canadian’s voice. “That’s okay, then. But be aware that two Indian Air Force Jaguars went over my position about six minutes back and went into a missile profile.”

“Got it, Alex. I’ll pass that to Air Ops.”

“Out here, sir.”

“Stay alive, Alex. Keep up the good work.”

Rafe turned to Madje. “You get all that?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Get it through to Air Ops and Supplot.” Supplementary Plot was where electronic-warfare-intelligence information and various other sources were cross-indexed to update the carrier’s picture of the ocean around her. Rafe turned to the boat’s captain, a former F-18 pilot. His leather flight jacket’s patch said “Hank Rogers.” Only a score of old buddies like Rafe knew his name was really Reginald.

“Hank? Launch the alert five, okay? I have to put some teeth down there to cover the Canucks.”

“On the way,” Hank murmured, already on the phone to the air boss.