Syren's Song (14 page)

Syren
was thirty miles from the shoreline with no other boats in sight. Most of the commercial traffic had changed shipping routes to avoid the conflict in Sri Lanka. Stark ordered the helmsman to change course. Instead of running parallel to the coast in a northerly direction, they would make a heading of 270 degrees—directly for the coast—for the next thirty minutes at forty knots.

The sun had set over Sri Lanka and the moon was rising astern of the ship as she made her way in. The ship's crew had conducted four boardings that day. In each case the operating procedures were the same. Olivia Harrison remained in command of
Syren
while Stark, Warren, and Ranasinghe joined a security team on one of the small boats and boarded the target ship.

Three of the ships were fishing boats. The team thoroughly checked them for signs of weapons or components—one of the security team even put on a snorkel and fins to dive under the hull. Stark never overlooked that part of the inspection. Years before, as commanding officer of a PC—a small Navy ship—in the Gulf, then-lieutenant Stark had intercepted and boarded a ship the Office of Naval Intelligence was certain was carrying weapons. The inspection turned up nothing in any of the compartments, but Stark and a sailor looking around belowdecks noticed three large bolts in the hull that were out of place, and all were leaking water. Stark ordered his most experienced swimmer to check under the hull, and the man found a large canister bolted to the ship. When the boat was escorted into port, the canister was removed and opened, revealing weapons and ammunition bound from Iran to Gaza for Palestinian terrorists.

The fourth ship they searched was a five-thousand-ton Panamanian-flagged freighter named
Asity
. The captain and crew were largely Pakistani, although the steward was a Filipino. The inspection team found no canister mounted beneath the hull, but two of the searchers found a cache of weapons and ammunition in one of the holds. Stark, Warren, and Ranasinghe questioned the captain closely. The compliant captain presented a logbook that showed monthly transits between Myanmar and Pakistan and listed a variety of cargoes including corrugated steel, shovels, copper wire, lights, power sluices, picks, and sieves. When asked, the captain explained that he had a contract to provide construction supplies for the expansion of the port of Gwadar—a big project on which China and Pakistan were cooperating.

“And you always have a direct route from Rangoon to Gwadar? No stops?”

“Yes,” the captain said nervously. “No stops.”

“Why are you carrying weapons?” Stark asked.

“They are for the Pakistani military.”

“Hmm, I see,” Stark responded.

Stark motioned to Ranasinghe to join him on the bridge while the security team monitored the captain and crew. The two walked to the chart table, and Stark called Olivia on
Syren
asking for
Asity
's exact coordinates and heading when she was first spotted. He picked up a ruler, then checked the fuel level and estimated usage. The estimate matched what might be expended if the ship originated in Rangoon. The problem was the heading. The ship had not been on a southwesterly course that would take her well south of Sri Lanka and India. She was on a heading that would take her to northeastern Sri Lanka.

Stark paced the bridge as he thought. He looked out onto the deck where the captain and crew stood in a group, all watched by the Highland Maritime security team. But someone was missing—the steward. Stark called on the walkie-talkie to his team and was told that the steward had been allowed to remain in the galley because he was busy preparing the evening meal.

“Follow me,” Stark said to Ranasinghe as he went below.

The steward was indeed busy in the kitchen, chopping vegetables, boiling water, and moving plates about. He stopped abruptly when he saw the uniformed Sri Lankan commander and Stark standing in the doorway and took a step back when he saw the pistols at their sides.

Stark held up his hand. “You speak English?”

“Yes, some English,” the steward replied.

“You have a logbook?”

The steward motioned to the small office across from the galley. “I show you?”

Stark and Ranasinghe broke apart to let him through as he went directly to the desk. Amid a stack of notebooks he found one with a green cover and handed it to Stark.

The steward's logbook was different from the ship's log. The latter noted ship positions, ports visited, and key events. The steward's log listed all the food purchased for the ship as well as receipts for all services, including garbage taken off the ship by port contractors. Stark scanned the past year. Rangoon was clearly listed, but Gwadar was nowhere to be seen. Instead, the other main port visited was Mullaitivu in northeastern Sri Lanka. Stark took the logbook with him and returned to the deck, where he and Ranasinghe presented the inconsistency to the captain. The captain looked from Stark to Ranasinghe but said nothing.

“Commander Ranasinghe,” Stark said, “am I to understand that as a designated ship representing Sri Lanka under a letter of marque I am authorized to seize and impound this ship?”

“The Sri Lankan government so authorizes you, Captain. When the ship and its contents are sold, the money will be transferred to you, in accordance with the terms of your letter of marque.”

“Very well.” Stark turned to the captain. “Sir, you and your crew are now my prisoners.” Stark turned to the security team leader. “Take them to the largest stateroom and keep them there.” As the prisoners were leaving the deck Stark called
Syren
and ordered Charlie team to join them on
Asity
. When they arrived, Stark took the team leaders and Commander Ranasinghe to the bridge and leaned over the chart.

“Commander Ranasinghe, I'd like you to take the ship here,” Stark said, pointing to coordinates seventy-five miles off the coast of Sri Lanka. “I request that you remain there until further notice.”

“Understood, Captain Stark.”

“You do understand that I have no authority over you, Commander, and that I can only request your help.”

“Captain, you have my trust,” Ranasinghe replied. “And I am pleased that I have yours. Let us resolve this issue together.”

“Then do you see any problem with my having seized a Pakistani-crewed ship?”

“I do not. The ship was searched and seized in Sri Lankan territorial waters and found to have contraband. And we need not notify the Pakistani government until this crisis is resolved.”

“Thank you, sir. I will be in contact as soon as possible.”

They shook hands and parted.

Stark returned to
Syren
and advised Olivia that they were now down two of their four six-man security teams, then gave the order to make for the coast at forty knots. The moon rising astern laid out a path for them.

DAY 12
DAY 12

Mount Iranamadu

M
elanie was now in full control of her senses, having slept, eaten well, and, more important, survived her interview with Vanni. She was busy formulating her next story, and it was not going to be the one the mysterious Tiger leader wanted her to tell. The only problem would be reporting it. She sensed that Vanni's group wasn't just a terrorist organization conducting a hit-or-miss insurgency. They were fighting a civil war far more aggressively and with far more focus than the Tamil Tigers had done in the past. Groundswells took time. Since arriving she had sensed their urgency. Prior to last week's events the Tigers had been invisible. No one anticipated that the Sea Tigers would reemerge unexpectedly and launch a major successful attack, or the attacks that followed. What she was seeing wasn't a groundswell, but it was effective silent groundwork.

Her ex-husband had attended English schools and was a rabid Sherlock Holmes fan. More than once in their very brief marriage he had referred to “the dog that didn't bark” from Conan Doyle's story “Silver Blaze.” The dog didn't bark because the murderer was not a stranger. For some reason the Buddhist monk's story of the silence from the monastery at Mount Iranamadu kept reminding her of that.

The silent monastery, the abandoned village she had come across in the valley, and the mass grave she had found and photographed had not been reported in the media. And the Sri Lankan government had mounted no investigations. She thought she understood why. Vanni had told her the region was under private control. An entire government ignoring vanishing villages was unlikely, but she had been to enough war-torn areas to know that it took very little to bribe minor public officials in seemingly innocuous
positions. Anything could be covered up for long enough to make a surreptitious purchase, cut communications, or close roads for something as mundane as “road work.”

Her guards had been reduced to a team of four. Vanni had disappeared as well after telling her she was being moved to another camp where she would be provided paper and pens to write the Tigers' story for release. If he approved of it, she would continue to live. If he did not, then he no longer had a use for her. She enjoyed her relative freedom. For the first time in a week her wrists were unbound. One wrist was raw and bleeding from rope burns, but she had no way to treat it. She hoped it wouldn't get infected in this humid environment.

Dusk was approaching when they moved her. She noticed something different about these guards. Their discipline was notably slacker since Vanni's departure. But that happened everywhere when the boss left. Employees, soldiers, and reporters alike—they were all on good behavior in the presence of their superiors. And when the bosses left, the employees became more casual, less disciplined, and less cautious.

The well-beaten path wound its way another few hundred yards up Mount Iranamadu, and Melanie realized where she was going. Beyond the ferns and trees she could make out voices and the shimmer of firelight reflecting off stone. The group stopped at the edge of a flat terrace built of stone. To one side all was dark save the faint light of the newly risen moon, three-quarters full. The evening was clear enough for her to see moonlight reflecting off the sea perhaps ten or fifteen miles away. Hundreds of miles to the southeast was Thailand, her point of origin. She had found—or rather been brought to—the ancient monastery the monk had asked her to investigate.

In the distance ahead, some fifty yards away, she could see light coming from the side of the mountain and people pushing wheelbarrows out of a large opening. They dumped the contents on a pile where other people—children and a few older bald men in tattered robes and sandals—sifted through the soil with small rock hammers and their hands as a dozen soldiers stood close watch. This was clearly some sort of mining operation, and based on the size of the pile and the number of people it had been going on for a while. But what were they mining?

She had found the silent monks. She had also uncovered the mystery of the mass graves that contained only adults. The children were here, working with the monks as slave laborers. All of them were dirty and gaunt.
This
was the story she had come to report. If only she had her camera. More important than the story, she had to find a way to help them, to free them.

Three of her four guards left her and approached the men guarding the mine, who greeted them with backslapping and laughter. Melanie was appalled. These men—who were not only ignoring the plight of the bedraggled miners but were causing it—were laughing!

Melanie noticed that one of the monks kneeling by the stone pile had stopped working and was looking directly at her. He straightened slightly, and his dull face took on animation. Even at this distance she could see that his eyes had brightened. What was it that he saw when he looked at her? What was different from her as a new prisoner? It was hope, she realized; hope that the end of their work was near. He slowly nodded to her. She inclined her head just enough to acknowledge him. The complacent soldiers paid no attention.

The monk turned to another monk at his side and they too exchanged nods. The second monk summoned all his strength, jumped up, and ran into the jungle. The startled guards turned in his direction and away from the mine entrance. The first monk looked at Melanie again briefly, then rose and darted into the cave entrance followed by another monk. The guards meanwhile began shooting into the jungle. They fired haphazardly, but it seemed likely that one of the dozen men firing in the fleeing monk's direction managed to hit him.

Then someone realized that two other monks had gone inside the cave, and all of the guards except two began to chase after him. Melanie realized the event had been staged to give her a chance to escape. The monks were giving their lives so that she would have a chance to tell the world what was happening here.

She and her guard were still far from the entrance and the work area when she seized the opportunity. Her
muay thai
combat skills kicked in as she dropped and swung her left leg around behind her guard's knees, forcing him to fall backward. His AK-47 flew from his hands into some brush. As the man lay on his back, still stunned from the series of events, she jammed her elbow into his solar plexus. She rose to her feet and took a quick look at the children standing at the cave entrance. This was her chance, yes, but it was not for her freedom that she ran. She ran to find help for the children and the monks.

She sped back down the path. No one was chasing her yet, but she heard intermittent gunfire. Suddenly the ground beneath her began to shake. The rumbling increased in intensity. Struggling to keep her footing, Melanie turned and ran back toward the monastery, which seemed to be the locus of the sound, and the helpless children. She had almost reached the monastery
when a blinding flash of light shot out of the entrance. The fireworks continued for nearly thirty seconds, then diminished into wisps of smoke. The shaking stopped and the ground settled.

She saw that the guards were holding the children down. There was nothing she could do for them other than get help. Melanie made her second break for freedom and succeeded. She had eluded the Tigers—for now.

M/V
Syren

The ship settled back into the water as the helmsman reduced her speed a few miles from the coast. With the sun well down now, those on the ship could see little on the water except for reflected moonlight. Stark had ordered all ship's lights, including running lights, turned off. Running dark risked a collision with another ship, but the radar showed nothing except the ships anchored offshore at the Breakers waiting for demolition.
Syren
had another advantage—her camouflage paint scheme. In the daylight it made her more difficult for other ships to see; at night, even in the moonlight, she was nearly invisible.

Asity
, under Ranasinghe's command, was forty miles away by now, along with twelve of
Syren
's twenty-four security personnel. They would eventually take up station and maintain radio silence until Stark and
Syren
returned for them.

Connor sat back in the captain's chair, the navigator seated diagonally to his left and the helmsman forward and to the right, as he sent an email to Commander Johnson on
LeFon
. Olivia Harrison stood behind him. The helmsman wore night-vision goggles—NVGs—as the ship turned slowly to starboard to regain a parallel track along the coast. Stark and Harrison both raised their NVGs in the direction of the horizon to confirm what the radar showed; there were no other boats here.

Stark's major concern was running into one of the long lines with explosive buoys that had sunk two U.S. Navy warships. Minefields were also a possibility, but Stark figured two factors minimized the threat. First, it was unlikely the Sea Tigers had set up minefields because they had sunk the entire Sri Lankan navy on the first day of the war. Second, the explosive buoys that had sunk the LCSs were on lines towed by Tiger boats, and Warren had told him the lines probably had detonator cord and needed a boat to detonate them.

It was also possible that the Sea Tigers had stealthy ships. Since taking this assignment Stark had learned what he could about their previous civil war. The Sea Tigers had designed and built their own boats, including stealthy suicide boats with a low enough freeboard to evade most radar. Were they here? Stark made sure the remaining security teams were using their own NVGs.

The radio cackled. “Boss, need you down here in CIC now,” came Warren's staccato voice.

“You have the conn, Olivia,” Stark said on his way down the ladder.

The door to the CIC module was open. Jay and one of the technicians were hovering near a monitor. “What have you got?” Stark asked as he stepped up behind them.

“Our UAV. I've had it mowing the lawn along the coast,” Warren replied, referring to the flight pattern. “A few minutes ago the infrared camera caught this.” Warren pointed to the monitor. The UAV image showed a wavering line that reminded Stark of the mirage above a hot road in summer.

“Heat,” Stark said.

“Yup, but we're trying to—go back, go back. That's it,” Warren said to the flight tech.

“What are you looking for?”

“The FLIR camera is showing something interesting. I also mounted something like our NVGs and an ultraviolet camera on the UAV to give us better night vision,” he said. Warren typed on the keyboard as quickly as he spoke. The monitor changed. It cycled through various images until they merged into one grayscale as the bird circled the data point. “Boss, it's been thirty years since I worked in a mine in the Upper Peninsula, but that sure as shit looks like a mine fire to me.”

“Have you got the coordinates of that location?” Stark asked. Without saying a word Warren turned to a second station and typed in a few commands. A second monitor displayed
Syren
's location, a map of the coast, and the location of the site, which was about ten miles inland.

“Can you zoom in on the coastline?” Warren magnified the image, which showed mostly beach, and then zoomed out again and focused on the fire's location.

“What can you tell me about that spot, Jay?”

“Elevation is about 2,600 feet. It looks like it's on the side of a small mountain—Mount Iranamadu.”

“How high up is the bird?”

“Five thousand feet.”

“Can you fly her in closer?” he asked the tech.

As the UAV approached the site, the large fire separated into what looked like small campfires. The UAV's camera zoomed in on the site and showed bodies on the ground and a few people milling around nearby. Some appeared to be chasing another person running southward from the site. Small flashes appeared from some of the running bodies.

“Gunfire?” Stark asked Jay.

“Got to be.”

“Jay, print out some maps for me from the coast to the site.”

“You got it. You planning on going somewhere?”

Stark called for Olivia and the security team leader on watch. When they arrived in the CIC a few minutes later he explained what he had just seen and his conclusions. “Folks, it's been quiet here. This is the first sign of activity. If there's gunfire, I'm going to bet this isn't a simple mining operation. The Sri Lankan army isn't operating this far north, so I'm thinking all this must be connected to the Tigers. I want to see if that site will give us more information about their location.”

“Who are you planning on sending, Captain?” Harrison asked.

“We're not storming a castle. This is simply a reconnaissance mission, so we're going in light. The security team will be with me until we hit the beach, then I'll go inland alone.”

“Boss, what do you know about mines?” Warren asked, slowly for a change.

“Whatever you can tell me in the next couple of hours.”

“Uh, uh. No way. Mines are freaking dangerous places. You need me to go with you.”

“It's not that simple, Jay.”

“Uh, yeah it is, boss. I know mines. You don't. Sounds pretty fucking simple to me.”

“Sir, you should have some shooters with you,” Olivia added.

“I appreciate that, Olivia, but I
am
a shooter. I want a light footprint. Just to find out what's going on. I want the teams to stay on
Syren
to defend the ship. Get one of the small boats ready. They'll insert us on the coast at 0100 hours and then return to the ship. I want you to hightail it back over the horizon and return in forty-eight hours to extract us. That should give Jay and me time to get to the mountain and find out what we can.”

“Aye, Captain,” Harrison acknowledged. “We'll have the gear ready for you. Standard issue?”

“Yeah, XO. The ship is yours.”

“I'll take good care of her, sir.”

Sea Tiger Command Ship
Amba