Joint Task Force #2: America (31 page)

“Don’t, Senior Chief!” Early shouted from where she sat on the deck.

The pressure of the barrel moved away from his neck. He was going to live.
It wouldn’t be pleasant for a while, but once they saw his value, life would become good again. Plus, there was that bank account in Liechtenstein. Of course
—Pain surged through his head for a moment, and the thought that the man had shot him accompanied Alrajool into darkness.

The speaker mounted near the merchant radio blared with ships’ conversation as various vessels tried to contact harbor control. Early listened to the radio chatter as she and the Senior Chief gently dragged Kelly to the forward bulkhead of the bridge.

“How you feel?” she asked softly. Above her head from the radio came a Coast Guard broadcast about opening the channel in a few hours to traffic into Hampton Roads. Hampton Roads was the generic name for the ports of Norfolk, Little Creek, and Hampton. Communications traffic increased in both volume and garbles as ship after ship demanded priority in entering.

“I feel like shit—but, then, I’ve been feeling like shit since we’ve been captured. Only this time, it really hurts.” He coughed a couple of times.

Early noticed no blood emerged with the coughs.
That’s good news,
she said silently.

“Senior Chief,” she said. “What did you do to him?” she asked, nodding toward Alrajool’s body.

“I cold cocked him with this here little gun,” he said, smiling. “He probably thinks he’s dead, and,” the man nodded toward Alrajool, “if he makes one move when he wakes up, he’s gonna be that way.”

She looked at Kelly. “Scott, you picked an awkward time to get yourself shot. You’re the only one of us with Surface Warfare experience and who has driven a ship, not counting those little things at Boat U.” Boat U was the euphemism for the Navy Academy.

The Senior Chief leaned down and gave Lieutenant Kelly the Uru he had taken from the dead hands of the
Chief Mate. “Here, sir. Lieutenant Early, we need to make contact and drive this big piece of shit,” he said, referring to the merchant vessel.

“Anyone can fly an aircraft, Senior Chief,” Kelly added. “But—” Coughing broke up the sentence for a few moments before Kelly continued. “It takes a real man to drive a ship.”

“If I can help you young’uns drive a P-3, sir, I can drive a ship.”

“Remember, Senior Chief, there are more aircraft in the ocean than there are ships in the sky.”

“Damn, Lieutenant. Just stay shot. You’re a better wounded than a comedian.”

Early grabbed the radio handset, turning it over in her hands as she tried to determine how to operate it. “It has a lot of numbers on it,” she said aloud, her voice betraying her nervousness.

“Does it say sixteen?” Kelly asked from the deck.

“Yeah.”

“Then, you’re on harbor common. Everyone’s on that, including the Coast Guard and the United States Navy. Broadcast away, Lieutenant, and get the cavalry out here. They—” Kelly broke into coughing. Early could hear liquid behind the cough. That wasn’t good.

“Shit, ma’am!” Senior Chief added as he shoved the dead helmsman off the seat, his finger running over the console as he concentrated on the displays. “They can even bring the Air Force as long as we don’t have to wait for them to take crews’ rest. But push the button and talk to them, please!”

“We’ve got to move him, Senior Chief. And, we got to do it now.” Early jammed the handset back in its holder, bent down, and with both hands under Kelly’s armpits, lifted him to a sitting position. “Here, I’m going to slide you against the helm in the center of the bridge,” she said.

The coughing stopped. A thin line of blood appeared out of the left corner of his mouth. “That would be nice,” he said weakly.

“Got it!” the Senior Chief said, looking over the helm at Early. “Which way you wanna—Here, let me give you a hand.” He came around the console and quickly helped Early move the wounded lieutenant the last couple of yards.

They propped Kelly with his back against the console. The ship took a slight roll and the wounded man tilted with the roll. Early grabbed him before he tumbled onto the deck.

Leary touched her on the shoulder. “We got problems, Lieutenant,” he said, pointing to the small monitors above the forward bridge windows.

She looked at where the Senior Chief was pointing.

“See the center one?”

Several armed men were scrambling up a ladder. Behind them more poured out of a nearby compartment. A couple of them in the passageway fell and stayed where they fell. Then they split into two groups, with the smaller group of terrorists heading forward while the others, unbeknownst to Early, headed aft, in the direction that Tamursheki and others had taken earlier.

“You think—”

“I don’t get paid to think, Lieutenant. That’s your job. But since you asked, I would say that in a few seconds we’re going to have a lot of company up here on the bridge with us. You really need to get on that radio, ma’am.”

Kelly tumbled onto the deck with the return roll, then slowly pushed himself upright. Breathing heavily, he said, “I’m okay.”

Early grabbed the handset.

“Don’t try to figure it out, Gotta-Be!” Senior Chief shouted. “Just push the button.”

She pushed the transmit button just as the hatch to the bridge opened. The ship took a steep roll to port. The roll caught the terrorists off-balance, causing three of them to fall into each other and onto the deck. Guns blazed from behind the three as others fought to enter the bridge. Shots rippled in a line across the overhead.

Early flipped her gun to the right, still holding the handset in her left hand, pulled the trigger, discovering herself surprised that bullets came out of the thing when you did that. Senior Chief Leary fired from the end of the helm console.

The terrorists inside the bridge dove back through the hatch into the passageway. One lay lifeless on the deck. The open hatch moved back and forth to the roll of the ship, bouncing off the head of the dead terrorist blocking the hatchway.

Whoever was following stopped. How were they going to shut the hatch? They should have secured it as soon as they took the bridge. She mentally kicked herself for failing to think of it. Between the starvation and dehydrating diet they’d been on for a week, finding her crew massacred, and fighting for the bridge, it was a wonder they were still alive. Still, she should have been thinking ahead.

She lifted the handset to her lips. “Mayday, mayday, mayday . . .”

CHAPTER 11

THE GRAY OF DAY RODE ACROSS THE SHEETS OF RAIN
dancing along the shoreline toward the tower. A hot breakfast had given Tucker his second wind after a restless night. He watched through the window as Pete MacOlson and the First Class continued their work along the piers. A new person was with them. The anchor of a chief petty officer was embroidered on the front of the new one’s ball cap.

When Tucker had gone to bed the night before, MacOlson and his men had been setting and resetting the mooring lines on the special operations crafts; when he had risen early at around three in the morning, they had still been out there; and here it was approaching eight o’clock and they were still at it. At least with the SEALs you got a change of scenery every now and again. Granted, a lot of those scenes had bullets in them.

No wonder few remained Surface Warfare officers. Plus, Navy SEALs do get a few hours in a row for a good sleep. Most SWOs were lucky to get four hours in a row, especially when they were at sea. Must drive their wives
mad. On the other hand, there could be many happy nights when the sailor came home from the sea.

Footsteps behind him drew Tucker’s attention. Commodore West appeared at the head of the stairs, holding papers in his right hand. He waved them at Tucker. “Looks as if we’re finally getting some good news,” he said, walking toward the Navy SEAL.

“Yes, sir?”

“Our esteemed weather-guessers have met in secret counsel and decided that by noon the malevolent Being driving this storm will be far enough away in its sharp right-hand turn toward the northeast that we should see the rain and seas diminish. The storm is heading toward our brothers and sisters on the British Isles, who, as we all know, are much better qualified to handle weather such as this.” He handed the top paper to Tucker. “Personally, I would much rather have it visit the French.”

A schematic of the East Coast filled the sheets covered with the myriad of wavy lines that, with the exception of the Cray computers hidden beneath the bowels of NSA, only trained meteorologists could interpret. Little arrows bulging along the lines pointed the directions various fronts were moving, and in the upper right-hand corner, a small block identified the date and time of the data.

West laughed. “I know,” he said, taking the paper back and shoving it on the bottom of the stack. “I always feel like a pig looking at a clock when I’m trying to read these printouts, but they surely do get their feelings hurt if I tell them I don’t want them.” Then, with a humorous, conspiratorial tone, he continued, “But, we must never let the small corps of Navy weathermen figure out we can’t read this crap—their spirit of superiority will soar to such heights that we’ll never be able to live with them. They’re kinda like wives, you know, Commander—can’t live with them and can’t live without them.”

The crackle of the radio at the front of the tower interrupted their conversation as early-morning chatter from the merchant ships riding out the storm off the Virginia Capes focused on the Harbormaster asking permission to
enter. Anything was better than riding out a storm this close to shore. This time it was a Japanese roll-on roll-off carrier with a load of new automobiles that had the better volume. Everyday loitering off shore cost money to both operators of ships and the companies whose merchandise lay stagnant on board. This time the Harbormaster gave them a time.

“Looks as if they intend to open the harbor in a few hours,” said the Commodore, pursing his lips at the transmission. He sighed and looked at the next paper before handing it to Tucker. “Message from Southern Command,” he explained. “They have resumed the search for survivors of Recce Mission 62.” West shook his head. “Very doubtful after all this time they’ll find anyone alive, but you’ve got to look. You’ve got to go through the routine, cross your fingers, and hope that some God out there has reached out and touched the survivors. The Admiral also attached the crew manifest to the message since next-of-kins have all been notified.”

Marc St. Cyr, the Frenchman, appeared at the top of the stairs along with Wing Commander Tibbles-Seagraves. St. Cyr had a couple of pastries soaking through some napkins wrapped around them. Tibbles-Seagraves held a hot cup of tea—a string with a small piece of paper fluttered from the lip of the cup—with his thumb and finger.

“Your American weather is great,” St. Cyr said. “Reminds me of Chad without the desert and rain.”

Tibbles-Seagraves’s thick eyebrows bunched. “And, along with my fine French ally, it reminds me of England without the temperature.”

“Ally?” St. Cyr said with a smile, placing his hand with spread fingers lightly on his chest. “
Moi
—the French? We are now your allies?”

“Well, for today you’re an ally of Britain. Doesn’t happen often, about three times last century, I seem to recall. I think two of those times were when we were in France, but I think you French forget sometimes. But, far be it for me to raise that issue. Every now and again, we British
believe that allowing the French to associate with us may bring some semblance of civilization and common sense to you.” He took a sip of the tea. “But, then again, it hasn’t worked so far.”

“C’est vrai,”
St. Cyr said, using the French for “this is true.” “But I doubt very much that anyone can bring common sense to any of our countries. Our three militaries are always burdened with the same yoke—politicians.”

“C’est vrai, c’est vrai, c’est vrai,”
Commodore West mumbled in a low but agitated voice to himself.

“Touché,” Tibbles-Seagraves replied, slurping from the slightly cooler top layer of tea.

“Glad you’ve joined us,” Commodore West finally said.

Tucker noticed that the friendly voice that had shared conversation with him during the night now seemed more stiff, more formal.

“I just returned from Commander, Special Warfare Group Two, after the morning intelligence brief. Seems with this storm turning northeast and away from us, the search for the rogue freighter continues to be haphazard at best. Admiral Holman has recommended to his French and British counterparts that they reorient their efforts and turn more attention to protecting the most likely target ports such as Rotterdam. Admiral Holman should be back in our area in the next couple of days. The Admiral believes a more layered defense in depth that combines the advantages of a proactive search backed up with a strong second-string defense is the best way to go. Your countries,” West said, nodding at St. Cyr and Tibbles-Seagraves, “agree. Britain and France will take the European side of the Atlantic. Admiral Holman will regroup off VACAPES,” West continued, using the acronym for the Navy’s Virginia Capes, “and start a complete search of the Atlantic behind the departing storm. If the rogue freighter had been heading to Europe or the Mediterranean, they feel it would have been sighted by now. The Spanish and Portuguese military placed an east-west
barrier over a thousand miles long running from the coast of Morocco to past the Azores, stopping hundreds of merchant vessels. No joy.”

“Have our Navy and our British ally redeployed their ships to protect Rotterdam and the other major ports?” St. Cyr asked, rolling the “r” in Rotterdam.

The radio crackled again. This time multiple calls filled the tower as ships that had been waiting days demanded entry times. The Chief Petty Officer Tucker had seen on the pier with MacOlson a few moments before entered the tower and turned the volume down on the harbor common radio to where it was barely audible.

Commodore West, his eyes narrowed, looked over his bifocals at the Chief, who nodded and turned the volume up slightly. The chatter was still there, but relegated to background noise.

“How about the crew of the missing airplane?” Tibbles-Seagraves asked, setting his cup on the table for a moment. He brushed his hands together.

How do they do it?
Tucker asked himself, looking at the blue SAS suit of Tibbles-Seagraves. He glanced down at his and then at St. Cyr’s. Theirs were wrinkled and showed the wear of three days, while the Brit’s blue outfit still had those knife-sharp creases along the legs and running through the blouse.

West nodded at Tucker. “As I was telling Commander Raleigh, Southern Command has recommenced the search. Expectations are high that if the crew successfully ditched or bailed out, they’ll find them.”

Several sharp pops interrupted the chatter from the speaker.

“And the other good news—”

St. Cyr held his hand up. “Wait!” He cocked his ear toward the speaker where three ships were arguing about who had arrived first and should be granted first-entry rights.

“What is it?” Tucker asked.

“Turn the volume up, please,” St. Cyr asked the Chief Petty Officer while pointing toward the radio.

“Did you hear that?” St. Cyr said to the other officers.

“Hear what?” West asked.

“That! I heard ‘m’aider’ ” St. Cyr insisted, pushing past the Commodore to the harbor radio at the front. He bent down, looking at the controls. “There’s nothing here,” he said.

“It’s an old radio, sir,” the Chief Petty Officer offered. “What do you want to do?”

“I want to turn it up. I want to hear what I heard a few seconds ago.”

“M’aider?”
Commodore West said softly to Raleigh, his right lip curling upward. “What the shit does that mean?”

The Chief reached down and twisted the volume knob. The sound of the chatter rose within the tower.

“Not too loud, Chief,” West said. “You get it too loud, you won’t be able to hear what they’re saying because it’ll distort the transmissions.”

“Mayday, mayday, mayday. Anyone on this station,” shouted a female voice over the speaker.

“See!” St. Cyr said, pointing at the speaker. “M’aider!”

“We need—” The popping sound came again.

“There! You hear that?” St. Cyr looked at Tucker and Tibbles-Seagraves. “Tell me
oui!
”

“Yeah, we heard that.” West replied as he moved toward the radio.

“That’s gunfire!” Tucker and Tibbles-Seagraves responded in unison.

Tucker hurried over to where St. Cyr stood. Tibbles-Seagraves lifted his cup and walked to where the two men and the Commodore now stood.

“You sure that’s gunfire?” the Commodore asked.

“Heard it before. Heard it in Afghanistan. Yemen. And Somalia. Doesn’t sound the same when it’s—”

“We’re on a ship somewhere out here in VACAPES!” the female voice screamed. “We’re United States Navy. There are terrorists on board here. We have the bridge—” More pops drowned out the voice. “Mayday, mayday,
mayday! For Christ’s sake! Someone’s gotta be out there! We need help!”

“You don’t think?” Tibbles-Seagraves asked Tucker and St. Cyr, his voice low.

“I don’t get paid to think,” West interrupted. He rushed over to the red telephone mounted on the far bulkhead and picked it up.

From the top of the stairs, Sam Bradley walked into the main tower. “Well, seems everyone is up and active this morning,” she said.

Tucker looked at her. She must have seen something in his look, for the smile left her lips and her eyes widened.

He turned his attention to the radio as they watched the Commodore on the secure telephone. Sam hurried over to Tucker and hugged his arm for a moment. She was dressed in khaki, her hair tugged into a bun. No one spoke.

Sam asked softly, “What’s the matter?”

A wave of rain hit the front windows.

Commodore put the telephone down. “I just called NetWars Command. They’re turning the local Security Group direction-finding units onto harbor-common to see if they can triangulate the source.”

“Could be a hoax,” Tucker offered.

“What could be a hoax?” Sam asked, cocking her head to the side. “Something’s going on, and I should know about it.”

The voice emerged again from the speaker. “We have the bridge, but I don’t know how long we can hold it. We have one wounded. The rest of my crew are dead—”

The scrabble of three ships arguing about entry times overrode the faint transmission of the woman. Several minutes passed. The red telephone rang and the Commodore picked it up. He listened for a couple of minutes before hanging it up. Tucker used that time to bring Sam up to date on what they had heard. Unspoken was the thought that the rogue freighter everyone thought was heading toward Europe may be instead off the coast of
Virginia. If so, then who was the American woman calling for help on harbor common and to what “crew” was she referring?

The secure telephone rang from its position on the small desk beneath the red telephone. Commodore West picked it up. He listed for a few minutes, said “sir” into it several times. The “sir” told Tucker and the others that whomever the Commodore was talking with was senior to the older Navy Captain.

The officer hung up, looked down at the handset for a moment before raising his head. “Chief, go get Lieutenant MacOlson and have him and his team report to the briefing room immediately.”

“Team?”

“Yes, team,” West said, emphasizing the latter word. When the term team was used, it meant special operations. If he had said crew, then he would have been referring to a nautical-maritime function.