The Gray Ship Read online

  The Gray Ship

  Russell F. Moran

  Captain Ashley Patterson is a 36 year old black woman, the Commanding Officer of a nuclear guided missile cruiser. While steaming toward Charleston, South Carolina in April 2013, the ship encounters a time warp or wormhole. Suddenly, Captain Patterson and her 930 crew members find themselves in the year 1861, two days before the start of the Civil War. They were to participate in a ceremony to commemorate the 152nd anniversary of the Battle of Fort Sumter.

  Abraham Lincoln wants to win the war, and he sees this ship as a key to victory.

  But Captain Patterson and her crew want to return home to the 21st Century.

  For them, the Civil War was history. Now, they find that it has only just begun.

  Does she risk mutiny, or commit treason.

  Russell F. Moran

  THE GRAY SHIP

  Preface

  A story begins with an idea, which then develops into a concept that eventually becomes the story. Like most of my work, this book began with conversations with my wife, Lynda. I have always been a Civil War buff, fascinated by its grandeur and its horror. The idea of a modern warship in the Civil War popped into my mind during one of those conversations. To pull that off, of course, I knew that the book would be based on the science fiction sub-genre of time travel. That’s the only way I could get a nuclear powered cruiser to 1861. I enjoyed The Final Countdown by Martin Caidan, the 1980 novel about the USS Nimitz getting caught in a time portal during a freak electric storm and time travelling to Pearl Harbor on the eve of the attack. Lynda and I talked for hours about the captain and his (or her) character. Ashley Patterson became part of the concept.

  This is a work of fiction, and any similarity between a character and a living person is a coincidence. There are, however, historical figures in the book, including Abraham Lincoln, Jefferson Davis and President Barack Obama. Although these are real people, the scenes in which they appear came out of my head.

  Acknowledgments

  An author can’t be his own editor. You’re too close to the subject. You skip over the grammar and punctuation because you’re concentrating on The Story. No matter how many revisions you go through, you are bound to miss a lot of errors. An editor looks for grammatical and punctuation errors, but he also brings a fresh eye to the story itself and spots inconsistencies. I thank my friends Bill Holland from Olympia, Washington and Nick Wartella from Sayville, New York for their bi-coastal efforts. I also thank my wife Lynda for her countless hours of input into this novel.

  I also thank my friend Lloyd (Hoss) Miller, Rear Admiral, Retired, United States Navy. Admiral Miller was the first commanding officer of the USS California, the ship that plays the pivotal role in the story. His technical input was invaluable, but I must emphasize something here. This is a work of fiction, and because it’s a novel, I changed some facts to serve the story. For one thing, I had to bring the California out of mothballs for The Gray Ship because the ship had been decommissioned in 1999. I also added Tomahawk cruise missiles to the ship’s arsenal, although the historic California didn’t carry them.

  Admiral Miller makes a cameo appearance in the book, but obviously the scene is fictional. I won’t tell you why it’s obvious. You’ll find out. In the scene, Admiral Miller is a strong leader, a gentleman, and a very likeable person. That’s not fiction. That’s the truth.

  I hope you have as much fun reading this book as I had writing it.

  Chapter 1

  “Captain, we have a problem.”

  Captain Patterson hit the reply button on the intercom next to her bed.

  “What is it, Lieutenant?”

  “It feels like we’re going aground, Ma’am.”

  Because the Captain’s sea cabin is only 10 feet away, she’s on the bridge in seconds. She always wore fresh fatigues to bed so she can respond to an emergency in uniform, not a bathrobe. It is 0307 (3:07 A.M.).

  The ship went through a strange turbulence, an underwater commotion the likes of which no one on the ship had ever experienced, a soft bumping sensation, not like waves, but more like the ship was riding over a herd of whales. In 30 seconds, the bumping stopped.

  “What’s our depth, Lieutenant?”

  “Sonar shows 200 feet, Captain.”

  “Any sign of marine life?”

  “No, Ma’am. Sonar shows nothing between us and the bottom except water.”

  “Damage control report?”

  “Nothing so far Captain except for a few broken dishes in the mess hall.”

  What happened next was an event that would forever change the lives of the crew of the USS California. At 0309, the dark night changed to a bright noon. The sun was high in the sky, and the sweet smell of ozone, when the bright sun mingles with the ocean, was as pleasant as it was terrifying.

  All departments reported to the bridge in order of protocol.

  “Captain, we’ve received reports from almost every department,” said the Officer of the Deck. “Engine room, AOK; reactor room, AOK; after-steering station, AOK…”

  “Lieutenant, please tell me what’s wrong, not what’s right.”

  “Aye, Captain. We’ve lost all GPS navigation, ship-to-shore communications, and ship-to-ship communications. We have no Internet connections, email, or cell phone service.”

  * * *

  Petty Officer Third Class Andrea Dunne was exchanging text messages with her mother in Norfolk, Virginia. Her mother has liver cancer, and she is getting worse every day.

  “Mom, please tell me the truth. Don’t try to make me feel better, I want you to feel better.”

  “Well, honey, the doctor was just here and he said…” There was no more message. Dunne was frantic. Her mother was about to tell her something important and the message stopped. She tried to send email, but the send command didn’t work. The message on her IPhone said that there was no cellular network available. She tried to phone, but got the same message: no cellular network available.

  * * *

  Lieutenant Kevin Fitzpatrick stood watch in the Combat Information Center doing a routine check of satellite positions. The software displayed a computer simulation of satellites in range of the California. Suddenly, all satellite images disappeared from his screen. He tried to “ping” the code for each satellite. Not one responded. He assumed it was a software malfunction. Dozens of satellites can’t just disappear, Fitzpatrick thought.

  * * *

  At the Pentagon, Lieutenant Fran Talierco was on watch at the Office of Naval Operations, NavOps. Her job, as deputy watch officer, was to monitor the positions of all Navy ships in the Eastern Atlantic via Global Positioning System or GPS.

  “Oh my God,” yelled Talierco, “where’s the California?”

  Lt. Commander Frank Orzo, the Duty Officer, hurried to Talierco’s station. “What happened Fran?”

  “The California just disappeared,” said Talierco. Because every ship had multiple redundant GPS devices aboard, they both knew it was impossible for a ship’s position to disappear if one malfunctioned. That could only happen if a ship sank.

  “Call them by phone,” said Orzo. Talierco called the satellite number for Captain Ashley Patterson, the CO of the California. A recorded message said, “The number you are calling is not in service at this time.” She tried the number of the Executive Officer of the California. Same message.

  “I’ll try the Ticonderoga to see if they can get the California on radio,” Talierco said. The USS Ticonderoga steamed twenty miles east of the California’s last position. Talierco spoke to the Officer of the Deck (OOD) on the Ticonderoga who immediately radioed the California.

  “I get no response, Lieutenant,” said the OOD on the Ticonderoga.

  “Get Admiral Friese on the phone,
Fran,” Orzo said. Talierco hit the emergency line for the Deputy Chief of Naval Operations.

  * * *

  Lt. Commander Dominic Valente, the California’s Supply Officer, arose early so he could get some work done without interruption. He ordered supplies for the next two months using newly installed supply software. He went through the on-screen menu of items, which calculated the amount needed based on the size of the crew and the length of deployment. Valente loved that the software was “cloud based,” meaning that the data was on a distant server farm somewhere in the Midwest and could be updated instantly. His screen flashed the message that the network wasn’t responding. This is crazy, thought Valente. We must have a dozen different Internet connections on this ship. But his workstation could not pick up one of the ship’s networks. Wow, thought Valente. We’re totally off the Web. He called Lieutenant Jason Terhune, the ship’s IT officer.

  “Any idea what’s going on, Lieutenant?”

  “Beats the hell out of me, Commander. The whole ship seems to be out.”

  * * *

  At 0309 Petty Officer Third Class James Randolph sat on a gun turret looking at the sky, playing with a new IPad app to learn astronomy. The screen was darkened, a great idea because if it were backlit it would be no good for viewing at night. A tiny point of light represented each star, with the star’s name appearing at the bottom of the screen when he tapped on the image. He committed himself to learn astronomy, something he could share with his seven year-old son. He looked at the sky, trying to match the star to what he saw on the IPad screen. Suddenly, the sun appeared where his eyes were focused. With a shout he covered his eyes, shaking his head from the sudden pain.

  * * *

  “When was our last good fix, Lieutenant?” Captain Patterson asked.

  “At 0250, about 30 minutes before the event, Captain. The quartermaster of the watch tried to get a position right after the event, but that’s when he learned that our navigation systems are out.”

  “Well let’s get a land fix now, Lieutenant. I can see the shore lights from here.”

  “It gets worse, Captain. The navigator tried to get a fix using the charted landmarks, but the landmarks and buoys aren’t where they should be. We got a position line from the flagpole at Fort Sumter, but that’s it. Our charted buoys and towers just aren’t visible.”

  Piloting, or what some call close-in navigation, is a simple matter. You look through a telescope on an instrument called an alidade. You line up your “target,” say a lighthouse, and read the bearing from the ring at the base of the alidade. You then take a parallel ruler, line it up to the bearing on a compass rose on the chart, which is a circle with all points of the compass. Next, you take the parallel ruler and “walk” it over to the dot you’ve made, and then draw a line on the chart on that bearing. One line is not a fix, because your position can be anywhere along the line. With a second line from another known target, you have a fix, but not a great one. Once you have a third line from yet another target, and all three lines intersect, you now have a good fix, or navigational position. All you need are updated charts and a good alidade. If your charts don’t conform to the targets you’re looking at, you can’t get a fix. And that was the California’s problem.

  “How’s radar and sonar?” asked Captain Patterson.

  “They appear to be working, Captain, but what we see on the scopes isn’t what we expect to see when we look at our charts. Based on the harbor chart, there should be eight buoys in sight or visible from radar, but we can only see three, and they aren’t where should be. We know our approximate position based on our last fix, but another thing looks weird. Our depth readings from sonar are way off. We should be in 200 feet of water according to our charts, but sonar thinks we have only 160 feet under us.”

  “Sound General Quarters, Lieutenant.”

  “Aye aye, Captain.”

  The ear splitting clang of the general quarters alarm sounded in every space on the ship, followed by the announcement, “General Quarters, General Quarters, All Hands Man Your Battle Stations. This is not a drill. Repeat, this is not a drill.”

  “Order right full rudder and come to course 090, Lieutenant. Until we can figure out what the hell is going on, I want some sea between me and the land.”

  “Aye aye, Captain. Right full rudder, steer course zero niner zero.”

  * * *

  At the Pentagon, Duty Officer Frank Orzo was on the phone with Rear Admiral Robert Friese, the Deputy Chief of Naval operations. “Admiral this is Lieutenant Commander Orzo, Duty Officer at NavOps. We’ve lost all contact with one of our ships, the California, off the coast of South Carolina.”

  Friese had been celebrating his wife’s birthday all evening and was quite drunk.

  “Lizzen up, Luzzenum Cabana Orbo, you’re just not (hiccup) lookin’ hard enough.” Orzo tapped the phone and said, “I’m sorry sir, but we seem to have a bad connection. I’ll call you later.” He heard a loud snore just before he hit the end button. Orzo then called Admiral Gary Roughead, Chief of Naval Operations.

  “I tried to call Admiral Friese, Sir, but we were unable to communicate.” (A very true statement, thought Orzo). Roughead asked, “Did any nearby ships report an explosion?”

  “Negative, sir. We’ve contacted all ships within 20 miles of the California, and no one saw or heard an explosion.”

  “Call the Coast Guard command in Charleston,” Roughead said to Orzo. “Give them the last known position of the California. Tell them to launch helicopters and begin a sea rescue operation immediately.”

  “Aye aye, Sir” said Orzo.

  Admiral Roughead worked up the chain of command and called the Secretary of the Navy, who then called the called the Secretary of Defense, who placed a call to the White House.

  As the phone rang, Roughead wondered how the hell a cruiser could just disappear?

  The California has been missing for seven minutes.

  Chapter 2

  The nuclear guided missile cruiser USS California (CGN 36) had been taken out of mothballs and recommissioned as the Navy’s only nuclear powered surface ship except for aircraft carriers. The ship launched in 1971 and was commissioned in 1974.

  On the morning of April 10, 2013, under the command of Captain Ashley Patterson, the ship left its homeport in Norfolk, Virginia and steamed toward Charleston, South Carolina. The ship would anchor near Fort Sumter for a ceremony commemorating the first battle of the Civil War on April 12, 1861, the bombardment of Fort Sumter. Civil War reenactors from around the country would be on hand for the ceremonies. The California was scheduled to deploy to the Persian Gulf after the ceremony at Charleston.

  The ship has enough fire power to unleash Biblical hell on an enemy. Her armaments include: Harpoon anti-ship missiles; five inch, forty-five caliber Mark 45 guns; the Phalanx anti-ship missile defense system; an ASROC anti-submarine missile system; two Mark 13 guided missile launch systems; Mark 46 anti-submarine torpedoes, and 12 Tomahawk Cruise Missiles. She is also equipped with an Apache attack helicopter and two unmanned drone helicopters, both for surveillance and attack. The USS California was designed to instill fear in an enemy, and if fear didn’t work, to destroy it.

  Besides a platoon of 16 SEALs, there is also a platoon of 16 marines scheduled to disembark the California when they arrived in the Gulf. Counting the SEAL and Marine platoons, the ship has a complement of 630 crew members, including 31 officers.

  With its nuclear power plant, the USS California can stay at sea for years. The only tether to the world beyond the ship is its need for supplies. The USS California is a key in projecting American power in the world.

  On the morning of April 10, 2013, the California was on its own.

  Chapter 3

  Ashley Patterson was scared. Her years in the Navy exposed her to countless challenges, all of which she handled. She had graduated fifth in her class from the United States Naval Academy in 1995. At age 36, as Captain of the USS California, she is the youngest com
manding officer in the fleet, and the first African American woman to command a nuclear combat ship. She is six feet tall and strikingly beautiful. During a CBS 60 Minutes segment on women in the military, Ashley was featured. Captain Patterson is a rising star in the Navy, and she’s on a lot of short lists to make admiral.

  But on the morning of April 10, Ashley didn’t feel like a rising star. She always had a concern, although she never let it show, that she was not up to the task, that she was in over her head, that her station in life had gotten ahead of her. Why couldn’t she be a math professor at a small college in the Midwest, her original career goal? There is a petulant little girl inside of her who wants to be coddled, who wants someone else to make decisions, who just wants to be left alone. She calls this little girl “Splashy,” a nickname given to her when she was eight years old by a little friend missing her front teeth, who found it impossible to pronounce Ashley.

  * * *

  When the ship was 10 miles offshore, Captain Patterson ordered a change in course to head north along the coast and dropped the speed to a modest 10 knots. This was the nautical equivalent of taking a walk around the block to clear one’s head. Take it slow, sort things out.

  “Lieutenant Bellamy, take the con,” Captain Patterson said to the Officer of the Deck. “Steer the current course and maintain speed until further orders.”

  “Aye aye, Captain.”

  She also told him to cancel the General Quarters status, thinking it unnecessary to add to everyone’s stress by keeping them at battle stations.

  She turned to Commander Philip Bradley, the Executive Officer.

  “Phil, gather all department heads in the wardroom right now, please. We’re going to look for answers.”