Red Star on the Sail is a riveting pair of stories cleverly spun together by the author; packed with page-turning romance, thrills, spine-tingling adventure and espionage. Follow the path of a young California couple in search the sailboat of their dreams, and feel the problems arising in their marriage as plans to cruise the South Pacific become complicated and confused. Shiver in the midst of a bitter winter with an unruly Russian admiral, given command of his country's newest and most lethal nuclear submarine. Outbound with orders of ominous potential, America's CIA intervenes, throwing chaos at the commander, his wife and trusted executive officer. Become part of the characters' lives as they develop concurrently on opposite sides of the globe and take similar turns - while plotting and planning futures - laden with inevitable yet unexpected obstacles. What might occur, should their courses converge on the high seas?

Red Star On The Sail

By Douglas E. Templin

AuthorHouse

Copyright © 2010 Douglas E. Templin
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4490-5657-5

Chapter One

SEVERODVINSK, RUSSIA

What in the ...?

Lightning fast, a scythe from nowhere, the resounding slap smothered Captain Mikhail Cosmonov in a galaxy of grinning stars. So stunned he was from the sudden and unexpected impact, his mind whirled into momentary, balance-teetering blackness.

Dizzy ... can't focus. Knees ... crumpling ... may be finished. Thoughts stammered, halting an instinctive vocal response. Cosmonov's eyes cracked open in time to see the back of Admiral Ivanovitch Darkotov's right hand hissing past his face.

There was no time for analysis; he had no options. The Captain had to recover and recover fast. Flooded in disbelief, he wavered for an instant, resumed his motionless stance, and boldly faced his new commander with no further change in countenance, save the faint but perceptible twitch in his left eye.

Darkotov leered downward at Captain Cosmonov's stumpy but powerful two-hundred-pound hulk. The Admiral stiffened, clicked his boots, and with a fiery glare, demanded composure from his humiliated counterpart. "Attention, Mister Cosmonov ... as you were," he bellowed

Chest out and eyes drilled forward again, Cosmonov's entire body reacted reflexively, but words crying to be heard stayed deep within.

Darkotov detested the bitter Arctic wind and its prying fingers that drove snow flurries almost horizontally that day. Gritting teeth, he shivered from the cold. The shallow cleft in the center of his boxed chin was almost flattened. His lips had turned a waxy white. Leathery, sea-wrinkled skin draping loosely around his throat, shook as he breathed. His heavy mane of black hair, laced with dirty yellow-gray, hung dampened and shaggy below the margin of his fur cap, betraying fifty-six years of hard living and the stresses induced by a life of military toil.

Cosmonov couldn't help but exact every detail as he worked to recover.

Mystified by his surprisingly impulsive action, Darkotov looked inward for answers. What came over me? Surely I detected signs of fleeting distraction in my comrade's gaze. Were there facial expressions suggesting contemptuous wanderings? Did Cosmonov utter something only I could hear? He did! He slurred something beneath his breath. He must have. Was it just the fury of this infernal storm?

Horror-struck and likewise chilled almost beyond redemption, Darkotov's select crew watched from four long columns overlooking the Admiral Antonov Vitchidock, a slate-gray nuclear submarine of gargantuan proportions, soon to be their new home. Its oversized Russian ensign crackled nosily on the stern staff, adding drama to the aftermath of the Admiral's strange assault.

Young officers-chests puffed, almost bursting with pride despite the cold-filled most of the front line closest to the tattered wharf. Stone-still for the most part, occasional involuntary shaking broke their petrified poses. Heavy coats and upturned collars offered little respite from the swirls of wet snow which had begun to whiten shoulders. Medals dangling from their outer garments clinked like ice in crystal goblets at a formal dinner party.

Few of the enlisted seamen in the ranks behind the officers had ever served with the Admiral, but all were apprehensive from the ceremony's beginning. There was no paucity of rumors touting Darkotov's toughness around the training base, so they'd come prepared for the worst. Intimidated, yet acting as if they had ignored the slap, the men appeared almost frozen in their wool watch caps and bulky but inadequate midnight black dress uniforms. Not daring to break the spell with notable movement, the one hundred forty fear-filled statues stayed at full attention, enduring speech after speech as best they could.

Sevmash Shipyard's newest launch, the Antonov Vitchidock signaled a roaring triumph for the remote, far-north waterfront city of Severodvinsk. Russia Federation's largest and most lethal ballistic missile launcher was soon to be operational. This was the long-awaited day-a time for tributes, despite the delayed and arduous construction effort-the final commissioning ceremony preceding its entry into naval operations.

Christened almost a year before, the 565' Borey class nuclear sub, hull number one in this highly advanced series, was to have seen active duty in June. But completion dragged to early November and the first serious freeze grinned with a vengeance. Across the bay to the south of the shipyard, the white-blanketed landscape looked bleak; buckled icy fringes trimmed the water's edge. Sailing orders were long overdue, and, to the frustration of all, winter had slipped in the shoes of Indian summer with little warning.

Still churning with workers inside her mammoth carcass, the Vitchidock lay gracefully and low in the smelly, brackish backwater of the inner harbor, a crowded estuary all but clogged with old tires, wood scraps, undulating waves of plastic, and other carelessly discarded detritus. Standing proudly above it-a huge floating cigar with dorsal fin-the submarine dwarfed rotting and rusted hulks of many smaller, duty-torn sister submarines awaiting major overhaul or demolition, afloat at various angles nearby. It seemed to all in attendance that the new hatchling was being readied just to spite its older counterparts.

Shadows had grown long at the Sevmash facility, Russia's secreted but cluttered and terribly outdated nuclear submarine construction center. Distracted after the blow to Cosmonov, and concerned to complete the program while the short daylight lasted, Darkotov looked over the Captain's shoulders toward the cavernous, two-tone gray plant building beyond the assembled crowd. It embarrassed him; could have been the faade of a deserted ghost town business district in an American western movie, he thought. He gagged from the pale cocoa smoke spewing from its crumbling, charcoal stained brick stacks, and felt ashamed at myriad signs of budgetary woes: Scores of broken windows, smelly pools of black oil, peeling paint, and limitless piles of undiscarded waste. The sprawling, decrepit structure, filled with antiquated machinery, barely hinted such a high-tech weapon could have been born there.

For a few moments after the Admiral's indiscretion, an eerie and timeless still prevailed. Watches could have stopped. The two officers4 -equally shocked-said not a word for too long, each glaring at the other as though something physical might occur. But Cosmonov, who was to serve as the Vitchidock's Executive Officer, knew better, and kept himself in strict, disciplined control.

He'd seen his new commander do this before to enlisted men, even an officer or two-sometimes deserved, mostly undeserved-never imagining himself the subject of such untagged abuse. The strike at his face was unforgivable, yet such a move was Darkotov's prerogative. The Admiral was notorious for it and he'd never been seriously disciplined for such antics. Retaliation under the circumstances would have been career-ending, prompting the chagrined man to remain steadfast as he sought rationale for the incident, and strained for composure.

The Admiral leaned close to the Captain, breaching the safe margin of space top-level officers did not normally cross, certainly before the public. Darkotov's broad nose flared; his breath reeked of the pungent Cuban cigars he smoked. The whites of his eyes were still streaked...