Operation Sea Ghost

26

Monte Carlo

IT WAS 8:00 A.M. when Murphy’s phone finally rang.

The three of them were still holed up in the support shack for Smoke-Lar. Twitch was presiding over the late support crew’s Power-Mac suite; it contained a Kestrel 4500 weather-tracking station and a GPS-slaved Earthworks program that allowed him to uncover the predetermined course of the two racing yachts. Batman, meanwhile, had been watching the door, on the lookout for any unexpected visitors.

Murphy had spent all this time on the phone. Outside, the preliminaries for the Grand Prix had begun, and between the sound of the Formula One cars and the noise made by the thousands of spectators awaiting the race, it didn’t seem like Monte Carlo would ever be quiet again.

But this did not deter him. He was constantly checking in with his network of operatives, especially the ones who were keeping an eye on Audette’s PSOs, who in turn were watching all the local transportation points where the terrorists or the other participants in the gagnant could leave the area. He spoke with other operatives who were watching for any suspicious activity around the Pakistani consulate.

Murphy was also in touch with his base of operations, which was a nondescript container ship anchored about fifteen miles to the west, off of Nice. While using cargo vessels as cover for special operations had been around since the Q-ships of World War Two, Murphy’s ship, built with funds he’d managed to weasel out of the U.S. government after 9/11, was not just for transport; it was a self-contained floating headquarters complete with advanced communications and eavesdropping equipment for his small army of spies and special ops experts. It was also part aircraft carrier: It was from here, still shrouded by the morning darkness and fog, that his unit’s jump jet had taken off.

Murphy had not been entirely successful getting all his people on the phone, though: at least one was not answering his calls. At one point, he blamed the growing commotion in town for screwing up his phone reception. “Monte Carlo is one big EID,” he said.

What Murphy was really doing, however, was waiting for someone to call him—namely the pilot of his jump jet. That was the one phone call that could change everything, the call that would tell them the key and the terrorists were sleeping with the fishes somewhere off the coast of Majorca. Only good things could come from that. The calamity that could be caused by the Z-box would be lessened tremendously. The box could then be tracked down in a much more rational manner. And the CIA could write a big fat check and reward those who’d pulled its collective ass from the fire.

So when Murphy’s phone finally rang—someone was calling him, and not the other way around—he hit the TALK button with much anticipation; Batman and Twitch were listening in close by.

But not five seconds into the conversation the little man literally slumped to the greasy floor, his face turning white, his eyes tearing up.

The call did not bring good news.

To Murphy’s credit, he pulled himself together just as quickly as he’d collapsed, getting back to his feet and brushing himself off even before Batman and Twitch could reach him to help.

“My fly guy found the yacht,” he told them after hanging up. “And he was ready to take it out, but then he realized the mooks had a hostage with them. One of my people.”

Batman and Twitch couldn’t believe it. “One of your people?” Batman said. “Who?”

“The woman you met twice,” Murphy said, his eyes red. “The woman who showed you the penthouse. The woman who sat in for me at the gagnant. Her name is Li—and no wonder she wasn’t answering my calls. They got her and they made it clear they’d kill her if we interfered.”

Batman’s mind flashed on the face of the gorgeous Asian woman, clearly one of the most attractive females he’d ever met, and that included Her Bitchiness, Emma Simms. She made the perfect special ops operative because just about anyone with an ounce of testosterone in his body would be charmed into submission just by meeting her.

“But how could they have kidnapped her,” Batman finally asked him. “Her, of all people?”

Murphy could barely speak now. In a halting voice, he revealed that after she’d reported in to tell him that Batman and Twitch had won the gagnant, he’d told her to tail them. He could only guess that’s what she’d been doing on Palace Road when the shootout took place. The terrorists must have captured her in the process, and seeing her value as a hostage, didn’t kill her when they whacked the four PSO guys and the racing yacht’s support crew.

“So she’s the ‘hooker’ on the videotape?” Twitch asked.

“She’s hardly a hooker,” Murphy shot back. “And I know it sounds corny, but she’s like a daughter to me.”

But she was now a huge complication, this beautiful Asian woman who, up until then, had been haunting the edges of this very strange adventure.

Batman and Twitch eyed each other—they were thinking the same thing.

“I know it’s difficult to accept,” Twitch tried to explain to Murphy. “But this isn’t a time for sentimentality. We could have an enormous catastrophe in a major U.S. city if that boat isn’t dealt with.”

Murphy knew what he was proposing—and was immediately incensed.

“No way,” he said sternly. “Not in a million years.”

“But you’re talking about one life as compared to millions of permanently injured people in the United States,” Twitch said. “These things aren’t easy, but look at the big picture. Someone has to take the hit.”

Murphy just waved him off. “Well, it’s not going to be her. The least of the reasons being the guy flying the jump jet happens to be her significant other. So, you can just forget about that option, because it’s not an option at all.”

A tense silence came over the three of them. Meanwhile the racket of the race cars outside provided the perfect sound track for what was happening inside the shack.

Finally, Batman broke the silence.

“OK, then,” he said to Murphy. “Will you at least admit now that it’s over? That this thing is too big for us? None of us is going to get what we want, so what’s the f*cking point? We’ve got to call in the military … someone’s military. We’ve got to come clean about this whole thing to someone who can do something about it.”

“And say bye-bye to one hundred million,” Twitch mumbled. “But I guess that’s better than blinding everyone in Washington, Boston or New York.”

But Murphy was still shaking his head.

“If we call in the military now, especially the U.S. military, what do you think they’re going to do?” he asked harshly. “If they’re made aware of the magnitude of this threat, they’ll hit that yacht with a couple Harpoon missiles and then tell everyone it was lost at sea. End of story. But I’m not going to allow that, not with Li on board.”

“What else can we possibly do then?” Twitch pleaded. “We can’t swim after that f*cking boat. We can’t just snap our fingers like ghosts and suddenly be there to stop these a*sholes.”

That’s when Batman held up his hand—asking for silence.

“Wait a minute,” he said. “Do you hear that?”

Twitch and Murphy had no idea what he was talking about.

“Hear it?” he asked them again.

“How can you hear anything over all those race cars?” Murphy replied.

Batman looked out the shack’s only window, and then ran out to the dock.

That’s when he saw it.

High in the sky, but getting closer.

The answer to their prayers—maybe.

It was the Shin-1 flying boat.