The larger contact remained near the platform's supports. Conrad watched it circle between two columns before turning back toward the deeper side.
Firing there was out of the question. A torpedo detonating beside one of the supports could damage the structure before they even knew what condition it was in.
"Keep the weapons off the platform."
Triton One carried another option.
An expendable noisemaker entered the water several hundred meters beyond the structure, well clear of the supports.
The device was smaller than a torpedo and carried no warhead. Once it reached its programmed depth, it began transmitting instead.
A series of low-frequency pulses spread through the surrounding water, followed by harsher mechanical noise meant to create an artificial acoustic target.
Normally, the decoy existed to give hostile sonar or an incoming torpedo something else to follow. Today, Triton needed it for the opposite reason.
