Operation Sea Ghost

12

Indian Ocean

“ANY IDEA WHAT’S going on here, Snake?”

Nolan nervously checked his ammo clip and then looked out on the hot and hazy sea.

“I wish I did,” he replied, “but I don’t have a clue.”

He and Gunner were sitting atop the bridge of the Taiwan Song. They were both armed, sweaty and anxious. Gunner had binoculars and was scanning the sea in all directions. Nolan was doing the same with his specially adapted one-eye night-vision telescope, set for daylight.

Down on the bow, two of the Senegals had set up gun slots for their M4 assault rifles. Two more Senegals were covering the stern. The fifth Senegal was on the bridge with the freighter’s crew helping them steer the purloined bucket of bolts. The weather was brutally hot.

It was now late morning. They were sailing about thirty miles off the coast of India, barely making five knots. This part of the Indian Ocean was regarded by mariners as particularly treacherous waters. The area had a propensity for freak storms, waterspouts, whirlpools and tsunami-sized rogue waves. Even worse, it was a haven for pirates. Lots of them. Next to the Gulf of Aden and certain places in the Java Sea, this area had the highest concentration of pirates of anywhere in the world.

This was not a very good place to be at the moment and Nolan knew it. Twenty-four hours ago he’d been a guest on one of the most luxurious vessels on the planet, dealing only with snobs and ghosts. Now he was here, in this devil’s lake, on a ship that was moving so sluggishly, the slowest fish in the sea could pass it with ease.

And for what? That was the biggest mystery.

Nolan looked out on the vast expanse of water again and thought: How the hell did we get here?

* * *

ESCAPING FROM GOTTABANG had been the easy part.

Once they’d stolen aboard the Taiwan Song using a rowboat found on the dirty beach, Nolan and Gunner had no problem getting the drunken Korean crew to do what they wanted. And what they wanted at that moment was to make Emma Simms happy and load the poor souls from the Black Hole onto the soon-to-be-broken ship.

The squad had been able to get the Untouchables onto the beach in the first place only because the Senegals had realigned themselves atop the sand dune and brought massive firepower down on the Gottabang security troops who’d been firing at them from the edge of the workers’ shantytown.

But once on the beach, it was soon clear that there was no way to get the escapees onto the Taiwan Song, anchored 500 feet offshore. The ship didn’t have any lifeboats remaining on board, and the team’s RIB had been left way down near the breaking beach and thus was irretrievable.

Just about the time Nolan and Gunner were realizing all this, the ship’s radio crackled to life. It was the Gottabang beachmaster, confirming the Taiwan Song would be the first ship broken that day and that the crew should start making preparations for it now. He ended by saying he’d be calling back in twenty minutes with further instructions on how the crew should run the old ship up onto the beach.

Of course, this was crazy. There had just been a gun battle less than a mile from the breaking operation. Tracer fire was still streaking through the sky occasionally, a few small explosions still going off. Was the beachmaster simply unaware of what was happening?

At the time, Alpha Squad didn’t want to find out. They told the ship’s senior crewman to reply that he was awaiting the beachmaster’s further instructions. Then Nolan came up with the only way possible to get the Untouchables aboard the creaky Taiwan Song quickly.

The Shin-1 had landed about halfway between the ship and the beach, thinking they would be retrieving the squad. Nolan radioed the Stormos with his change in plans. Moving in the fading darkness and using the pervasive smoke as cover, the pilots maneuvered their airplane right up to the beach and took on all of the Untouchables, as well as Emma and the smartly retreating Senegals. Though too overloaded to fly, the plane was still able to taxi its human cargo over to the stern of the Taiwan Song, where Nolan and Gunner were stationed with an access ladder. They hastily pulled everyone onto the ship.

Just as the last Untouchable was brought aboard, the ship’s radio came to life again. It was the beachmaster, with his further orders. The sun was just coming up, and even though there were some small fires still burning from the gunfight, it was apparently business as usual with the breaking operation.

The beachmaster’s instructions were direct. The crew was told to raise anchor, start its engine and—oddly—head out to sea. But that was only to build up speed. Once the ship was three miles off the beach, they would then turn around and head for the shore at full throttle, building the momentum needed to properly run the 30,000-ton ship aground. After hearing the instructions, Nolan told the ship’s crew to follow the beachmaster’s orders.

All this time Nolan had been watching the breaking beach come alive with workers, arriving for another day of hellish labor. Though it seemed one hand didn’t know what the other was doing, he was half expecting some kind of armed boat to come out and challenge them at any moment. Or maybe the security troops would begin shelling them from the north beach. The emptied-out Shin-1 had taken off and was circling high overhead by this time, giving Alpha some eyes in the sky. But no one really knew what the flying boat could do if any unfriendlies did appear.

But … nothing happened. There was no opposition. No gunboats. No counterattack from shore. The only explanation was that the people who ran Gottabang simply believed the wretched souls taken from the Black Hole just weren’t worth fighting over.

With the Senegals looking over their shoulders, the ship’s crew got the Taiwan Song moving. Zigzagging through the heavily polluted harbor, it finally made it to the less congested bay beyond.

But when the ship reached the three-mile limit, and the point where they were supposed to turn around, Nolan ordered the crew to just keep on going.

The beachmaster went ballistic. Screaming in a variety of languages, he repeatedly ordered the ship to turn around and come into the beach as instructed. But the Taiwan Song just kept on going.

After a few minutes, the angry calls from shore suddenly stopped. The radio went silent for a minute and then they heard the beachmaster’s voice again, sending out instructions to the next ship in line to get ready to beach itself.

They never heard from Gottabang again.

* * *

FROM THERE, THE immediate plan was to get as far away from the ship-breaking beach as possible.

But it wasn’t just the power plant on the Taiwan Song that proved difficult. It was also the steering; it was like something found on an amusement ride. The Senegals were expert seamen, but they discovered the ship’s controls were so out of whack, it took all their strength just to move the wheel even a quarter way. Eventually, though, they got it heading southwest.

In the meantime, Gunner had walked through the ship, taking stock of their situation. He’d returned with nothing but gloomy things to report.

One of the ship’s engines was not working at all; in fact, its bearings had already been removed. The second engine was working, but only at half speed. They were diesel-powered, but the ship’s fuel tanks were less than one-quarter full. The electrical systems on board were down to running at ten percent; everything on the ship was dim. The bilge pumps weren’t working at all. They had very little drinkable water, and practically no food. Finally, there was so much seawater in the bottom hold, the ship was sailing at a ten-degree list.

Gunner’s conclusion: there was a good reason the Taiwan Song was about to be broken.

It was falling apart.

* * *

THE SHIN-1 STAYED with them for the first hour. Circling overhead, the pilots used their radio to call the bridge and report to Nolan what they could see from 5,000 feet up.

But soon enough, the flying boat had reached its bingo point. It had to leave and fly the 1,000 miles back to Oman before it ran out of gas.

As the whole affair had been woefully unplanned, all Nolan could do was ask the Stormos to refuel and come back and meet them near the Lakshadweep Islands. This isolated chain was about 200 miles off the southwest coast of India and roughly 150 miles south of the ship’s position at the time. It was just about the only landmass other than India itself for thousands of square miles.

Though they knew nothing about the place, at the time it seemed to be their only chance at safe haven.

* * *

ALL THIS HAD happened about thirty minutes ago.

Nolan and Gunner had taken up their stations atop the bridge soon after the Shin departed and had been looking out for trouble ever since.

They’d done a lot of talking in that time, but Gunner finally asked Nolan the question that was on everyone’s mind:

“What do you think happened to her back there, Snake?” he said. “She’s not the same person.”

It was just about the only topic they hadn’t discussed since leaving Gottabang. Emma Simms’s sudden transformation from Bitch Princess into … well, into what?

“I got no idea,” Nolan said. “I know I’ve never seen anything like it—that’s for sure.”

“Concussions can do weird things,” Gunner offered. “Or drug withdrawals. Meth, coke, do weird things when you don’t feed the need. Or maybe the Shakas gave her a Mickey like the Ekitas gave Batman? The change was just as radical. Even more so.”

Nolan just shook his head. They had ninety-nine Untouchables on board. Confused and frightened, they’d been led down to the ship’s mess. All of them were either sick or malnourished, and none of them spoke a word of English. Even worse, when they were first brought aboard, they were convinced they were going to be thrown overboard once the ship reached deep water. Apparently this had happened to others like them who’d lived and worked at Gottabang.

The Senegals took a long time using pantomime trying to explain to the unfortunates that they weren’t being transported to their deaths, but rather they were being liberated. Still the Untouchables were terrified. It was only when Emma rose to talk to them that they calmed down and came alive.

Nolan and the others wouldn’t have believed it if they hadn’t seen it, but Emma had thrown herself body and soul into helping the sickly ninety-nine. She’d helped get them settled in the mess. She’d scoured the ship for sleeping mats, blankets or anything that would make them more comfortable. She’d taken Alpha squad’s MREs, as in “Meals Ready to Eat,” divided their contents and distributed the meager result to the starving people. She gave away her own ration of precious water, so there would be just a little more for them.

It was baffling and it was weird. The actress had done a 180-degree turnabout from her former self and they really didn’t know why.

“Was it a ‘Road to Damascus’ moment?” Nolan wondered. “Or…”

“Or … what?”

“Or maybe people like her can change…” Nolan said.

Gunner just laughed.

“I’m just afraid if she whacks her head again, she’ll turn back,” he said. “Then what will we do?”

* * *

THEY SAILED ON for another hour.

The heat became even more vile. The sea was almost too calm.

They could see nothing on the horizon in any direction. The radio had fallen silent; the only noise was the constant chugging of the ship’s single balky engine.

Suddenly Gunner elbowed Nolan. He nodded toward the railing on their port side.

Nolan saw that Emma had come up on deck, taking a break from the overcrowded mess hall below.

“Maybe this is your chance to get the 411,” Gunner said.

Nolan had to agree.

“If I’m not back in ten minutes send a search party,” he told Gunner.

Then he climbed down to the deck.

She was sitting against the bulkhead, her head on her knees. Her clothes were dirty and damp. Her hair was a mess. She was either asleep or quietly crying.

He approached her slowly. This would be the first time they’d spoken since the bizarre incident back in the Black Hole.

Suddenly he was at a loss for what to say to her. Sitting there, crouched almost into a ball, she looked like a different person.

“I think we should check you for a concussion,” he finally said.

She looked up, surprised to see him. Her makeup was smeared, and yes, she’d been crying.

“Why?” she asked him simply.

“Sometimes concussions can change a person’s behavior,” he said, “And the condition could get worse.”

But as he was saying this, he knew he was making a big mistake.

She thought a long time, then put her head back down on her knees. “If that’s the case, I don’t want to know.”

He almost sat down next to her, but fought the temptation.

Instead, he told her their current position, speed and direction, and said that at their present course they would be near the Lakshadweep Islands sometime the next day.

Then as diplomatically as possible, he asked, “Unless there’s somewhere else you’d like us to go?”

She didn’t reply for a long time. And now he saw she was crying again. Finally, she wiped her eyes and looked back at him.

“I have plenty of rich friends around here,” she said with a sniffle. “And they owe me plenty of favors. If I could just get in touch with them, we’ll be OK. They’ll help us out.”

Nolan knew the ship’s radio was in bad shape. It was old, and like the rest of the ship, was about to be canned. Plus, the electrical power was at such a low point on the ship, the radio was barely emitting static anymore.

The only other communications device Alpha had was the sat-phone the CIA agent gave them.

The agent had warned them strenuously not to use the phones unless they’d found the Z-box or found out what happened to it. But their mission of locating the mysterious box seemed like a dream at the moment.

Nolan decided this was an emergency and, basically, screw the CIA.

He pulled out the sat-phone and handed it to her.

“Do you know their telephone numbers?” he asked.

She wiped her eyes again, a bit surprised, and then took it from him.

“I can call anyone in the world?” she asked with another sniff.

He nodded. “That’s the theory.”

She thought a moment, then tried a number—but nothing happened.

She tried again. Still nothing.

She looked up at him helplessly.

“Try another number,” he suggested.

She started dialing again.

But again, to no result.

“I’m not even getting a dial tone,” she said finally.

Nolan took the phone back and removed the rear panel. He was instantly pissed. The battery was corroded beyond belief.

He looked the phone over and saw it had been made in China.

“Freaking spooks,” he said under his breath. “How to wave the flag…”

He yelled up to Gunner. He was soon on the deck with them and Nolan showed him the phone. It was so frustratingly stupid Gunner couldn’t help but laugh.

“This Z-box could have fallen out of the sky and hit us on the head,” he roared. “And there wouldn’t have been any way for us to tell them. If that ain’t typical.”

Nolan threw the phone into the ocean. “This cheap crap has totally screwed us, though,” he said soberly.

Gunner got serious again, too. “Now what are we going to do?” he asked.

Before Nolan could answer, one of the Senegals came running down the deck. He interrupted the conversation by saying in French, “You must come to the stern, right now.”

Nolan and Gunner hurried to the back of the ship, Emma trailing behind. The other Senegals were already there. They directed Nolan’s attention to the northeast horizon.

“Brigands—beaucoup d’entre eux,” one said.

Translation: Pirates—lots of them.

Nolan saw a dozen motorboats heading in their direction. Each boat was brightly colored; each had a flag billowing from its back. Nolan knew who these people were right away: the Bombay-Katum-Velay pirate gang. Better known as the Bom-Kats, they took their name from a small chain of islands located about twenty miles off Bombay.

Recruiting small-time criminals from India’s ports, the Bom-Kats had an almost unlimited supply of manpower to draw from. They preyed mostly on coastal freighters along the west Indian coastline and luxury vessels sailing between India and the Maldives Islands. Just like pirates of old, the Bom-Kats usually killed the crew of any ship they attacked and rarely showed mercy to any passengers. Of all the Indian pirate gangs in the area, they were the most ruthless.

“Maybe this is why no one chased us out of Gottabang,” Gunner said, looking at the pirate fleet through his binoculars. “Those cutters might have tipped off these guys to get their ship back.”

“Either that or they’re just bored,” Nolan said.

To her credit, Emma wasn’t scared. She was angry.

“What would they want with us?” she asked hoarsely. “The people on this ship are in rags.”

Nolan just shrugged. “I guess they want the rags…”

He motioned to one of the Senegals to take Emma and the ship’s crew below.

“Hide them and stay with them,” Nolan said. “No matter what happens.”

When they departed, he gathered the remaining Senegals and Gunner together. Each man checked his ammo supply. Nolan and the Senegals had half-full magazines in their M4s, with three magazines each in reserve. Gunner’s Streetsweeper was about 80 percent full, plus he had a belt of C-80 ammunition, small incendiary shells that exploded like mini hand grenades.

It was a lot of firepower.

So, Nolan told them simply: “OK—you guys know what to do.”

* * *

THE FIRST BOM-KAT boat came alongside the freighter five minutes later.

Those pirates on board it were sure the Taiwan Song would be easy pickings. It was moving at barely five knots, its engine was smoking and it was sailing with a noticeable list. It was obviously wounded and in trouble.

The Bom-Kats weren’t expecting to find a mother lode aboard the rusty old ship. Rather, at the moment, it was the ship itself they were after. Their allies among the Gottabang security force had asked them to be on the lookout for the crippled vessel. If they found it, they could do whatever they wanted with whomever and whatever they found on board. The important thing was they’d get a payment for returning the vessel to the notorious ship-cracking beach.

It wasn’t typical pirate work. But it was a payday, so why not take it?

The first pirate boat had reached the ship with no problem. They’d seen people scrambling about on deck as they drew closer, but that was routine. Whenever they seized a ship, the resulting panic and confusion always worked to the Bom-Kats’ advantage.

The first boat tied up to the freighter’s port-side access ladder. Here it lingered until a second boat arrived. Each boat had four pirates in it. Two more boats were waiting off the ship’s starboard side, being held in reserve. The remainder of the pirate fleet stayed about a quarter mile away, simply to watch.

Once everyone was in position, two pirates from the first boat started to climb the steep access ladder. Ten feet from gaining the railing, the pirate first in line looked up to see an African man looking down at him from the railing.

The pirate thought the man was part of the crew and wanted to surrender. But an instant later, he saw the barrel of a huge weapon pointing down at him. He actually saw a bright flash from this weapon—but then he saw no more.

The pirate behind him took almost the full blast from this same shot after it had nearly decapitated the man in front of him. Both dead men fell back down the ladder, hitting the water with a sickening splash.

All this happened in a heartbeat. The pirates in the second boat immediately pulled out their AK-47s. They hadn’t expected any resistance from this ship’s crew. They’d been told four drunken, unarmed Koreans had stolen the ship. Besides, in situations like this, the imperiled crew usually fled to the engine room and locked themselves inside, letting the pirates do their dirty work unchallenged.

But now shots had been fired and two of their comrades had been killed. The Bom-Kats were forced to fight back.

As soon as the first two pirates had been shot down, three more gunmen, two Africans and a white man, appeared at the midship railing and fired at the second boat. This fusillade was so powerful it punched a hole in the brightly painted vessel, sinking it in an instant. Its four occupants were tossed into the sea and quickly caught up in the ship’s wake, drowning them.

Two pirates were left in the first boat; they tried frantically to rev their engine and get away, but a fourth African gunman appeared on the railing directly above them. He fired straight down onto their heads, killing them and blowing the speedboat to bits.

The pirates on the third and fourth speedboats, waiting not far away from the ship, were stunned by what was happening. It wasn’t supposed to be this way. They turned to escape.

That’s when another figure appeared at the railing. He was a large white man holding a huge weapon. He started firing at the two speedboats, expertly spitting out small incendiary projectiles on high arc trajectories. Both boats were hit in seconds, exploding into flames.

And that was enough for the Bom-Kats.

The remainder of the fleet, watching this from a quarter mile away, turned south and quickly fled.

* * *

FIVE MINUTES AFTER the battle ended, Emma was back up at the railing. The other Senegal and the ship’s crewmen were close behind.

Even though none of the pirates had made it aboard the ship, Emma was greeted by a grisly scene. The freighter was moving so slowly, and the sea was so calm, a couple of the dead pirates had been caught in the current and were ghoulishly keeping pace with the ship. Also some of the water around the vessel was faintly pink with blood.

“Was this all necessary?” she asked, looking over the side and shuddering.

“They weren’t coming for milk and cookies,” Gunner replied. “They just didn’t expect a tub like this to be armed.”

Emma was close to tears.

She grabbed Nolan by his arm. “We have to get that radio working somehow,” she said. “I have to contact my friends and get us out of this.”

At the same time, the ship’s original crewmen were also surveying the post-battle scene, especially noting the bodies still floating around the slow-moving ship.

They were incredulous. They knew well how pirate-infested these waters were. They also knew how brutal the Bom-Kats could be. Yet the brigands had been dispatched in a matter of seconds.

The crewmen looked at Nolan, Gunner and the Senegals.

Then one asked in broken English: “Who are you people?”

* * *

ABOUT A MILE away, the lead boat of the Bom-Kats gang lingered behind as the rest of the fleet retired.

Aboard was Bompat Kalish, the commander of the pirate group. He was a large man with many tattoos and body piercings. At the moment, he was furious—and baffled. He’d just watched a number of his men being killed in the unsuccessful attack. Why was such an old wreck of a ship so heavily defended? According to his contacts at Gottabang, it was supposed to be barely crewed and not worth fighting for.

Kalish had been pirating for thirty years. He knew whoever killed his men were professionals, not just tramp seamen with rifles.

His conclusion: There was something different about this ship.

He held a pair of very powerful binoculars to his eyes, studying the freighter as it chugged its way southwest. He focused in on the railing near the bridge—and couldn’t believe his eyes.

There was a blond woman up on the bow, talking to one of the gunmen. But this was not just any blond woman. Kalish thought he recognized her.

His binoculars had a small camera built in. He could take a photograph of anything he saw through the eyepieces. He zoomed all the way in on the blonde and then snapped a couple pictures.

Then, he showed the photos to his second-in-command.

This man couldn’t believe it.

“Do you believe in God?” Kalish asked him.

“No—not until now,” the man replied.

They went below to the captain’s cabin. Its walls were covered with photos of a young blond girl.

Kalish held the photo in his binocular screen next to one of the wall photos.

“It is her,” Kalish said. “I’m sure of it.”

“I am, too,” the second-in-command said. “But what would the world’s most famous actress be doing on that old tub?”

Kalish shook his head and licked his lips.

“God be praised, I don’t know,” he said. “But this changes everything.”