The Devil's Waters (33 page)

Wally spoke straight into LB’s face, without broadcasting to the team or the pirate.

“No.”

Wally gave the next order over the radio. “Team, lights out.”

The hovering heads on both wings extinguished. Dow and Quincy lowered their NVGs over their eyes. Quincy crept to the window to help Dow keep an eye inside the bridge, weapons ready.

LB checked the time. Twelve minutes left.

Wally, again off the team freq, said, “You got two minutes.”

LB lifted the M4 strap over his head. Before he could lay the gun on the deck, Wally thrust his bandaged arm to stop him.

“I said no.”

“I got to go in there. I can talk them out.”

“Do it from here. Use the radio, like we said.”

“For Christ’s sake, he wants me inside. I can do it; I know I can.”

“Listen to me. We’re not hostage negotiators. We’ve got a mission. You have two minutes to talk them out of the bridge. Then we go in and get them. If you lack the stomach for that, stay out here. Start talking now, or I give the go.”

LB slipped his rifle back across his shoulders. Wally joined Quincy and Doc kneeling at the port window.

LB peered through his NVGs for one more look inside the dark bridge. Five frantic pirates and five guns menaced the huddled hostages. Big Yusuf Raage stood in the center of the bridge behind the captain’s chair, holding the spare walkie-talkie Doc had slid inside.

Doc was right. A single wrong move, and this would turn into a bloodbath.

LB lifted the goggles. He flicked on his flashlight again, training it under his chin, upward over his face as before, to talk to the pirate in plain view. He thumbed the PTT.

“Yusuf.”

“Yes.”

“I can’t come inside.”

“I understand. It would not have been good for you.”

“I’ve got two minutes to convince you that you’re all going to die.”

“I don’t believe you, Sergeant. You would not sacrifice the hostages.”

“We would. I know you’ve seen what’s on this ship. Down in the cargo hold, I was there. I saw you and Drozdov.”

“Very good. That is a lot of machines.”

“About five billion dollars’ worth, all of it state-of-the-art.”

“All going to Iran. Yes, I know this.”

“Then you know it’s an illegal shipment. Four different countries, mine included, do not want you to keep this boat. Hostages or not.”

“Those are harsh orders, Sergeant.”

“For everybody. So come out. Let’s call it a night.”

“What if I fight you?”

“Listen to me. Even if you win, you lose. In ten minutes, the United States government’s going to blow this ship to the bottom if we don’t have control of it. There’s a drone over our heads right now with weapons locked.”

“Again, I don’t believe you.”

“Look behind me, Yusuf. You see the American warship?”

“Yes.”

“It’s turned around.”

“Yes. It has.”

“They’ve got orders, too. No witnesses. I’m not lying. We’re all dead, the hostages, you, me, if we don’t settle this fast. If we have to come in for you, I swear, you and your men will not survive. You’ve seen what we can do.”

“Yes.”

“So end it. Give your men and the hostages their lives back. You and me, too. I’ll be honest, I don’t want to come in there to get you.”

Off the radio, Wally said, “Time.”

“Yusuf, what’s your answer?”

Inside the bridge, the pirate lowered the radio. Wally stepped beside LB. He drew his hand under his chin—out of time.

LB shut off the flashlight.

Wally circled a finger in the air for Quincy and Dow. Ready.

Dow snuck his arm up to the portal handle. Quincy readied a flashbang.

LB dropped his NVGs in place. In the starboard window, Mouse and Dow watched from their dark wing. LB took a knee, Wally knelt beside him. Wally held up a fist, as per the plan, marking thirty seconds.

The team freq hissed.

“Sergeant?”

“Yeah, Yusuf.”

“Can you see me in the dark?”

“We all can.”

“Then watch.”

Yusuf approached the seated hostages. A few shied from him, shinnying away. In the center, Drozdov held firm.

Yusuf knelt before Drozdov. “Captain. I need one of your men. You pick. Or I will.”

Drozdov’s gray sockets and sunken cheeks might have branded him a ghost to Suleiman.

“No,” the captain said. “This is not the way.”

Yusuf stood to look across the seamen. The Filipinos in dungarees and T-shirts lowered their eyes from him, wanting nothing to do with sacrifice. The Russian officers in slacks and buttoned shirts crowded about Drozdov as if closeness to his courage might save them from Yusuf’s choosing. The two guards in their black sweaters sat separate, distancing themselves from these sailors and their concerns.

Yusuf considered the fat first mate, Grisha. This one looked like he would blubber. Already Yusuf knew him to be a traitor. He needed a more sympathetic figure.

The Filipinos were small and too many.

A lanky officer shifted to his knees to stand, muttering, “
Sparcai-m-ash in ciorba lu ma-ta
.”

Drozdov reached to stop him. “Razvan, no.” The officer shoved his captain’s hand away and straightened.

Yusuf moved close to this tall officer. “What did you say to me, Russian?”

“I will shit in your mother’s soup.” He spat. “And I am Romanian, pirate.”

Before Yusuf could take this one by the arm, Drozdov struggled to his feet to confront his tall crewman.

“Sit, Chief. That is order.”

The Romanian curled his lips and winced, holding back another spit. He took his seat.

Drozdov walked away from Yusuf, again without instructions. He rounded the long dashboard to stand in the glow of his dials and screens, lit by his ship.

Dramatically, Drozdov spread his hands. Yusuf pushed talk on the radio and held it up to Drozdov so the Americans could hear him.

“Three years I have been dying slow death from pirates. Drinking, stupid, angry. Day after day. So let’s go, Yusuf Raage. Kill me all at once instead of these little bits.
Po hooy
. I don’t fucking care.”

Yusuf raised the Kalashnikov to his shoulder. At the same time he brought the radio close to his lips.

“You are listening?”

“Yes.”

“Take your men off the wings. Now. Or I will shoot the captain. I will kill another every minute until you leave or you kill me.”

“Yusuf, I’m not bluffing. I can’t.”

“Take a moment, Sergeant. Be sure.”

“I haven’t got a moment. Neither do you. Put the gun down.”

On both dark ends of the bridge, the doors unsealed. The wind whistled again.

At the end of the Kalashnikov, Drozdov dropped his arms.

Yusuf had run through the blood of his clansmen, sworn to walk through Robow’s in revenge. In the next seconds, there would be more blood at his feet, the hostages’, Guleed’s, his own, perhaps the Americans’. Air gushed into the bridge from the doors cracking open; the soldiers would be next to rush in. They would spill all to take this ship and their machines back. Suleiman had not slowed them. Yusuf could not stop them.

The American had said it. If Yusuf did not surrender, he was a dead man. If he did give up, if he betrayed his clan, his vows, Qandala, his kin, he would surely be a living dead man.

There was only one choice. Spill one man’s blood. It may stop more. It had worked before.

The radio said, “One last time. Put all your guns down. Come out.”

Guleed shook his head in fast, frightened trembles. “They’ll kill us.”

The port door opened wide enough for a big soldier, eyes hidden behind goggles, to fill the frame. The soldier did not enter but pointed his weapon at Guleed’s back.

Yusuf screamed at the soldier, “No!”

His Kalashnikov flamed inside the dark bridge.

Drozdov shuddered, every round of the long blast tearing him until he buckled at the foot of the captain’s chair.

LB yanked Quincy out of the doorway and down. Doc slammed the door just before a burst from an AK shattered the window-pane. Bullets blistered over their heads, banging the rail. Glass shards showered the ducking PJs.

“Now!” Wally’s radio voice cut across the gunfire. “Throw!”

From his back, Quincy pulled the pin to toss a flashbang through the busted window. LB shut his eyes behind the goggles and clapped hands over his ears.

The first detonation thumped deep in the steel. A second followed instantly.

Quincy scrambled off the deck, quick as a tiger. LB opened his eyes, gathering himself to move fast. Doc pulled the door wide open. Coils of smoke spilled out. Wally bulled into the cloud first, his M4 immediately sparking. Quincy moved in his wake, angling toward the windshield and hostages. LB jumped to his feet to rush into the bridge.

His goggles pierced the mist, every detail left hazy but identifiable. Emerald beams slashed back and forth, searching. The last traces of the grenades’ roars rang in the metal surfaces. Near the windshield, a Somali staggered, stunned and blind. From ten feet away Quincy pinned his chest with the IR beam, put a fast pop on the dot, then plugged him again as he fell. Another Somali lurched near the hostages, hunched and holding his head. Before LB could target this one, the pirate pulled his trigger to loose a wild arc of bullets, intending to die firing into the hostages. All of the sailors pressed chests to the floor, flattened by the grenades and gunfire. The pirate had no bearings in the smoke, deaf to the hostages shrieking at his feet. His first volley dented the wall behind them and blasted out a windshield pane, spattering glass on the crew. LB whipped his IR beam to the pirate’s chest and fired. The Somali wobbled from two speed rounds to the breast but did not go down. Fading, the pirate lowered the gun’s muzzle as his last act and raked the gun blazing into the hostages. From the chart table, Doc finished him with two more rounds to the rib cage. The Kalashnikov fell silent with the pirate. With more Somalis alive on the bridge, LB tore his attention from the wailing, injured hostages.

Bathed in the lights of the dashboard, another stumbling pirate went down to Wally’s M4. Folding to his knees, the pirate let off a quick burst. Across the room Quincy whirled, stung. LB put two more rounds in the dropping pirate from close range. This last Somali collapsed in a heap beside the first pirate killed when Wally charged the room.

The bridge echoed like a spent bell. The PJs stabbed their targeting beams into every corner of the room. A dark ooze spread into the Somalis’ blouses, drizzling onto the deck. The hostages moaned or shouted urgently through the chemical haze, unable to hear or see. Doc hustled to them, skidding on his kneepads to assess casualties. “Quincy,” he yelled, “med rucks!” Big Quincy, shaking blood off his left hand, bolted for the port wing’s shot-up door.

LB and Wally stepped over corpses, on crunching glass and slick blood, hunting out the last smoky hiding places on the bridge. Six Somalis had held the room when the assault started. Four were down.

“LB.” Wally did not turn from his sweeping IR beam.

“Yeah.”

“Hail that warship. Tell them we’re secure. Have them contact AFRICOM. Stat.”

LB hurried to the dash. Drozdov lay dead at the foot of his captain’s chair. The digital clock on the dash read 0204. Six minutes left.

LB pressed talk on the ship’s VHF.

“USS
Nicholas
,
Nicholas
. This is Air Force Guardian Angel team on board
Valnea
. Over.”

The warship answered immediately. LB interrupted the sailor’s response.

“
Valnea
is secure. Repeat,
Valnea
is secure. Request you contact AFRICOM immediately to relay this. Repeat, immediately.”

Over the loudspeaker the frigate’s radioman said he’d take care of it. He asked if any other assistance was needed.

From around the bridge, Wally, Quincy, and Doc yelled, “No!”

LB sped his words. “Not now. Just call AFRICOM. Urgent. Confirm when done.”

“Roger.
Nicholas
out.”

Mouse and Dow entered from the starboard wing, leaving the portal open. Mouse joined Doc and Quincy in tending to the hostages. Dow checked for a pulse on Drozdov, then the downed Somalis.

Wally finished searching in the departing mist. He moved beside the captain’s chair, ignoring Drozdov’s corpse. LB joined him. Both lifted their night goggles. The radioman on
Nicholas
called back to confirm. LB handled the contact. The one-word message from AFRICOM was “secure.”

Dow called out that all four Somalis were dead.

Wally answered. “Casualty report on the hostages.”

LB scanned the carnage of the bridge. Bits of impact glass and bullet casings glittered on the floor, lit by the ship’s gauges and the moon through missing windows. Blood would not color in the sparse light and stayed black on the pirates and Drozdov. Doc worked on hostages’ wounds, wrapping limbs and scalps. The hefty first mate, Grisha, lay with his head in another’s lap; Quincy was busy cutting away the shirt over the man’s bulbous belly. Dow knelt beside one downed Filipino, then moved to another. All the hostages’ senses remained clobbered. The ones who found their voices cried for help and answers. None tried to stand.

LB’s skin prickled after the ten seconds of combat. He unlatched his hands from the rifle for it to hang loose at his chest, his first step in letting the world restore.

Dow came close. “All four targets are dead. Plus the captain and two crew. One of the Russians has a sucking chest wound; we’ve got to evac him. Quincy took one through the wrist. He’s a bull. Says he’ll wrap himself.” Dow tapped a finger on the red coin seeping through the bandage around Wally’s biceps. “We ought to take a look at that too, Captain.”

Wally dismissed him with a nod. The PJ hesitated.

“What?” Wally asked.

“Weren’t there six targets in here?”

“Two got out.”

Dow surveyed the mess of the bridge. “Lucky.” He moved to station himself in the center of the room, standing guard should the two missing pirates take another turn at them.

LB said, “We got lucky, too.”

Wally pinched the bridge of his nose, showing strain. “No.”

“Three hostages. Quincy got winged. Could’ve been worse.”

“Robey makes it worse.”

“Yeah.”

“Where’s Yusuf Raage?”

LB had lied to the
Nicholas
when he reported that the freighter was secure. It wasn’t. Two pirates remained at large. And a female scientist.

Wally fingered his talk button. “Jamie? Sandoval? Respond.”

The last of the smoke slipped along the ceiling, seeping out the busted windows and open doors. Wally hailed again.

His answer blared through the wall at the back of the bridge, a long, emptying rip from a Kalashnikov in the stairwell.