The Devil's Waters (31 page)

Yusuf crept through a cloud, the steel deck beneath his sandals the only solid thing. Suleiman stayed close at his rear, Kalashnikov up. Yusuf slung his own rifle across his back to reach under his
khameez
for the knife.

A body appeared at Yusuf’s feet. In the coiling mist he knelt and knew it to be Jama only because the man’s loose tunic had again slipped off his shoulder, showing one bullet hole through the heart. Yusuf’s next quiet strides revealed two more dead pirates, shot in the chest, too, and spreading black.

Along the port rail ahead, voices shouted in English. They sounded not like spirits but Americans.

Behind Yusuf, Suleiman muttered, “
Allahu Akbar
.” He raised his rifle to fire blindly at the voices. Yusuf pressed the barrel down, shaking his head.

“Your
shaitann
,” he whispered close to his cousin’s ear, “can see through the fog. Stay here.”

Quietly, Yusuf kicked out of his sandals. He rose to his bare toes and crouched, leading with the talon of the knife. His first steps gained him speed, silent on the pads of his feet as he charged through the cloud, low in the thickest part of the draining mist.

A shadow stood at the port rail. Yusuf ran at it, rising in the last moment to deliver the hardest blow. He struck first with his shoulder, slamming the soldier against the rail, trapping his hands there and his weapon. Yusuf drove the blade into the soldier’s back, up to the onyx handle. The soldier wore only a rubber wetsuit. Staying away from the muzzle of the man’s gun, Yusuf gripped the wetsuit at the collar to slam his face against the wall, the knife still in him like a windup key. Yusuf yanked out the blade, buried it again into the upper back to strike at a lung or the heart. He pulled back his knife.

Another shout entered the mist from the direction of the bow. Yusuf whirled, gripping the slumping body between him and the onrushing voice. A short gray silhouette ran down the port rail, shouting, jangling under a raised gun.

With full fury, not faith, Yusuf lifted the soldier over the rail. He did not just release but flung the body out over the water. The American fell, dying too fast even to scream as he plummeted. Let the running soldier see the first death on this ship in payment for Darood blood.

Yusuf slipped away into the blowing mist.

Before he could shout a warning or lower the NVGs, the stain in the smoke struck Robey with incredible speed. LB bolted into the haze.

He ran full tilt with no clear shot, no infrared sight on the Zastava. LB got within twenty yards, close enough to see the hazy outline of the young CRO being bashed against the wall. LB screamed. The big Somali turned his way, holding the limp Robey as a shield between them. LB could not shoot.

With seeming ease, the pirate heaved Robey over the rail. The young lieutenant didn’t yelp, only flopped in the air, unconscious or dead. Robey plunged out of sight. LB ran, firing the Zastava from the waist as the pirate darted away into the smoke. LB loosed another burst, the rounds hitting steel. LB bolted through the cloud to the other side, into the clear. He found no trace of the pirate.

Sandoval, with NVGs down, ran out of the mist. Together with LB they swept their rifles into the darkness, at the blowing fog.

Sandoval asked, “What the hell was that?”

“A big fucking pirate threw LT off the ship.”

Through the confusion, the pain in his calf, his worry and sudden sorrow over Robey, LB recalled that he’d seen that large Somali before, by flashlight with Drozdov, looking at the railgun. Iris had been right—LB should have shot the son of a bitch in the back.

“Can you spot Robey?”

Sandoval turned his night goggles overboard and behind the steaming ship.

“Yeah, yeah. He’s still floating.”

“Take the point. Get us back to the bridge.”

“Roger that.”

LB toggled his team radio. “Fitz, Fitz. LB. You copy?”

“LB, Fitz. Go.”

“Robey’s overboard, on port. He’s unconscious. His wetsuit’s keeping him on the surface. Find him.”

From the bridge, Quincy broke in. “What, again?”

LB dismissed this. Fitz in the RAMZ replied that he was trailing the
Valnea
by two hundred yards. He’d try to get a fix on the young CRO in the wake.

“On it, LB.” Fitz hailed Robey but got no answer. Fitz wouldn’t quit until he found him.

LB waited in the corridor for Wally and Jamie to catch up. Wally wasn’t lagging behind to help Jamie walk; he looked as if he needed a supporting hand himself, hobbling along the rail through the dissipating smoke.

When Wally came past, LB fell in behind him. The man bled out of the gash in his biceps and at least a dozen shrapnel cuts from the back of his neck to his ankles. LB took stock of the carnage they passed. One Somali lay crumpled in the corridor, cleanly killed through the heart by Robey. Three more corpses jammed the narrow alley leading to the forward crane.

He asked Wally, “How many is that?”

Wally toted up: fourteen dead targets around the deck. Two more were still alive down here somewhere, the big one and another. LB had seen just how dangerous those two intended to make themselves. Another five remained inside the bridge with the hostages.

LB checked his watch: 0145.

“Twenty-five minutes left.”

Wally hailed Doc. “On our way.”

Doc answered. “The pirates are freaked. They saw the flash-bangs. Still haven’t come out on the wings.”

“We’ll be there in five minutes.”

“What happened to Robey?”

LB chewed his lip; his own limp grew more pronounced as they made their way along the corridor. Since he’d seen it happen, he answered, knowing the whole team was listening.

“One of the pirates threw him overboard. I think he’s dead.”

No responses came over the frequency. All the cursing was done in whispers, off the radio.

Wally added, “Stay focused.” Finger off the PTT, he turned to LB. “Tell me something.”

“Yeah.”

“You know what’s on this ship?”

“I do. But it wasn’t my fault.”

“I don’t care. Tell me.”

“What about the order not to be curious?”

“That went overboard with Robey. I’ve lost a man, and now I want to know why. I want to know what you know.”

LB opened his mouth to answer but paused. He ought to tell the entire team. All their lives, already in danger, were even more at risk because of the cargo on this ship. One of their own had just paid the price for the secrets under their feet. The clock was ticking down on a drone locked and loaded to blow them all out of the water if they didn’t retake this ship on time.

Five miles off, the US warship kept pace. They couldn’t call the frigate for backup.
Valnea
was massively top secret. There needed to be as few witnesses as possible to everything that happened on board.

They had their orders: this mission wasn’t a hostage rescue. The Somalis could never be allowed to keep this ship. And the pirates had made it clear they weren’t leaving unless it was feet first.

This was the PJs’ job to finish. Do or, really, die.

The team had a right to know everything.

LB set his thumb over the PTT on his team radio. Wally nodded, okay. He pressed his own talk button.

“Listen up, team. LB’s going to give us a fast brief. Eyes on your job while he talks. Go, LB.”

Wally dropped behind Jamie to keep an eye on their six while LB spoke on the team freq.

“All right. You guys remember Iran-Contra, back in the eighties. The US and Israel gave Iran a bunch of missiles under the table so they’d release some hostages. Well, it’s happening again; we got the twenty-first-century version. This ship is carrying state-of-the-art battlefield radar and weaponry to Iran, a swap for their nuclear weapons program. This shipment is so fucking illegal, it’s off the chart. Israel, Russia, and the US are behind it. The Somalis cannot, repeat, cannot, be allowed to keep this ship. You lucky bastards were the only unit sitting alert close enough to do the job. That’s the nutshell.”

Doc said only, “What a world.”

Quiet moments passed. Sandoval led LB and Jamie forward along the port rail; Wally backpedaled with his M4 facing backward. The missing member was Robey. His return broke the silence.

The team freq clicked. “Juggler. Fitz.”

Wally answered. “Fitz, go.”

“I found Robey.”

“How bad?”

“He’s dead. Someone cut him up pretty good.”

The kid never had a chance—he was overwhelmed in the first second. Robey was likely dead when he hit the water.

They continued to move toward the bridge, all of them with watchful eyes on the moon-shadowed corners of the freighter. Inside the bridge, the pirates paced in front of Drozdov and his hostage crew. The clock to the Predator continued to tick down: twenty-three minutes left. None of this stopped because of Robey’s death. The opposite happened; things sped up. LB hadn’t expected the PJs would take this ship and get away without paying for it.

Wally responded to Fitz. “Roger that. Stay close. I’ll let you know if we need you.”

“Roger. Good luck, guys.”

Like that, Robey was put aside. This was combat, and though the dead asked for a role, they had none.

Suleiman galloped in front, holding Yusuf’s abandoned sandals. They left the cloud behind, gunfire rattling and fading at their backs.

They rounded a corner into the starboard rail corridor. The guns on the far side of the ship stopped snapping. Yusuf and Suleiman swept the muzzles of their Kalashnikovs left and right to be certain they were not being trailed. The moon had ridden high enough to show the corridor empty, but that meant little. The Americans could appear out of darkness and smoke anywhere on the ship. Yes, Yusuf thought, like demons. But the one he’d killed had died like any other man.

He wiped the knife on his
khameez
, a bloody man. He slid it into the sheath in his waistband.

A hundred meters toward the stern, at the top of the super-structure, the broad windshield of the bridge stayed dark. The freighter surged toward Qandala as if nothing were wrong.

“We’ve got to get to Guleed,” Yusuf said. “As long as we hold the controls, we can make it. The sun will be up in a few hours.”

Suleiman did not face him. He focused on the last wisps of smoke behind them, as though the puffs were more ghosts. Yusuf spoke to his cousin’s narrow back.

“We need to get to the bridge.”

“I agree.”

“Let’s go.”

“You must go, cousin.” Suleiman turned. “My brother.”

“We go together.”

Suleiman’s gold teeth sparkled. “We have traveled beside each other a long time. We go separate ways now.”

Yusuf set a palm to Suleiman’s thin chest. “It doesn’t have to be like that. You said we would fight together. Please, no more signs.”

“This is not a sign. It is a choice.” Suleiman covered Yusuf’s hand with his. “There is no
jihad
in piracy. There never was. I’m done with it. I won’t fight for this ship anymore.”

“You said to have faith. We’ll get through this. We’ll get home.”

Suleiman laughed. “I have absolute faith, cousin. If I am to live or die, I submit myself to Allah for a better cause than ransom.”

“Those are men.” Yusuf held out a stained and tacky hand. “Just men.”

“They may be men and still be sent by Allah.”

Suleiman scanned the stars. His words seemed intended as much for them as for Yusuf.

“I do not believe we will both survive this night.”

“How can you be sure?”

“I did not say I was sure. I said I believe.”

Yusuf bunched Suleiman’s tunic into his fist. “This is madness.”

“No. I have not gone mad. I am still a fighter, like you. And if Allah decides I must die by his hand, it will need to be a strong hand.”

“What about Qandala?”

“Qandala, the ransom, Robow—those are for you, cousin. Not for me.”

“What will you do?”

Suleiman squeezed Yusuf’s bloodied wrist.

“I will attack. I will slow them, perhaps kill a few more, enough to give you a better chance. You go to the bridge. Save Guleed and yourself, get this ship home. If I am alive at sunup, I will pay for your wedding. But if I am to die tonight, it will be to save my two kinsmen.”

Suleiman wrapped Yusuf in both arms. The Kalashnikovs bulged between them.

Yusuf whispered, “Our paths have always been side by side.”

Suleiman’s head shook gently. “This is not a new path for us. It’s the one we’ve always been on. Now mine stays here. Yours leads to the bridge. Run, Yusuf. Allah rewards those who run to their destiny.”

Suleiman kissed both Yusuf’s cheeks, then released him. Suleiman was the elder, but Yusuf remained clan chief. Suleiman turned away but did not walk off. He faced the bow and rising moon. This let Yusuf depart first, as was proper. At his back, Yusuf heard his cousin climb a ladder, up to the cargo deck.

Yusuf sprinted sternward, brandishing his Kalashnikov in case he surprised an enemy in the corridor. The narrow passage stayed empty, the wake’s hiss the only sound. Yusuf swung his shoulders to dodge the pillars, jumped across the bodies of clansmen.

The soldiers had gone quiet. Jama and the last three pirates on deck had died in explosions and smoke. No one was left to oppose them but Suleiman.

Yusuf ran as his cousin said. With every stride he felt the severing of their fates.

Bolting down the dark passage, he fingered the trigger of his rifle. Should he have allowed Suleiman to talk him into letting him stay behind? Yusuf was tempted to turn around and go kill the rest of the soldiers alongside his cousin. He’d throw their carcasses off this ship and shout to him, “See this! Allah has chosen for you to live!”

Yusuf reached the superstructure. He stopped to catch his wind. He pointed the Kalashnikov in every direction until all the shadows proved themselves motionless.

The six stairwells to the bridge loomed very high. Yusuf, alone and breathing hard, was tempted not to go up them. He might stand his ground and deal with whatever came out of the dark for him, like Suleiman.

He could not stay here. He was not Suleiman, did not share his destiny. Guleed, Drozdov, the hostages, the American soldiers, Qandala—all those fates waited on Yusuf to move.

He spit over the rail. He picked one star to breathe in.

Yusuf entered the superstructure to take the elevator.