The Somali Deception Episode I (A Cameron Kincaid Serial) (9 page)

Cameron and Pepe shared an
intent glance with Alastair and then shifted their concerned gaze to
Isaac.
 
Isaac looked blankly back.

“You know we are messing with
you,” said Isaac.
 
He, Eazy,
Alastair and Dakarai all began to laugh, Ari merely grinned.

Cameron and Pepe collectively
sighed.

Cameron glanced at
Alastair.
 
“They do this often?”

“Any chance they get,” said
Alastair.
 
“Isaac and Easy are also
former Mossad.
 
Their expertise is
demolition.”

“I get that,” said Pepe.
 
“They have what we
need?
”

“We will hook you up,” said
Eazy.

“We are more than happy to do
so,” said Isaac.

“I would love to have some of
that coffee you offered,” said Cameron.

“Me as well,” said Pepe.
 
“Though now I am feeling quite awake.”

* * *
* *

Laikipia Plateau

The group had moved into a large
canvas tent in another section of the tunnel.
 
The tent created a sense that they could
be anywhere other than below the earth in the abandoned mine turned
bunker.
 
They sat along one side of
a table that held current weather charts and a paper model of a seaside
compound.
 
Before them, a large
physical map of the Somali and Kenyan coast hung on the wall draped with a
plastic overlay.
 
The southern
Somali coast was heavily marked with coordinates, circles, and crosses in red
and black colored pen.
 
The Indian
Ocean portion of the map along the right side was plated with several satellite
images of the target area terrain and close-ups of the buildings from the
compound modeled on the table.
 
On
the left side of the map were photographs of the Kalinihta, her crew, Nikos,
and Christine.

Cameron recognized the photo of
Christine.
 
The image was from a
magazine advertisement she had appeared in a few years before for Estee
Lauder.
 
Her face had been cropped
and enlarged to fill the photo.
 
There were eight pairs of eyes on the wall next to Christine’s yet
Cameron was drawn to hers alone.

“They call this the Tactical
Center,” said Alastair.

“I can see why,” said Cameron.

Isaac raised himself from the
table and approached the map.
 
“I
have to tell you that when Alastair rang us, we were happy to jump onboard even
before we knew the meat of the situation.
 
We want to see those pirates, and this is of course whom we are talking
about, gone in general.”
 
Isaac
placed his hands on his hips and peered directly into the map of the Somali
coast, witnessing something that the others in the room could not see.
 
“There have been far too many rumors
that Israel is funding the pirates.
 
Rumors that say Israel
is
attempting to secure
a presence in the Gulf of Aden.”
 
Isaac’s voice softened, “Ridiculous, the CIA knows a lot of the ransom
money has changed hands in Lebanon.”

“We’re not here for the
politics,” said Cameron, his voice elevated.

“Fair enough,” said Isaac, and
he spun back toward the table.
 
“Let
us tell you how we can help you.
 
As
I was saying, we were happy to jump on board right away.
 
As you are aware the Kalinihta,” Isaac
gestured to the photograph of the yacht, “is owned by billionaire Demetrius
Stratos and as Alastair told you, he has already secured substantial funding
for our operation.”

“Is that how we were able to get
the satellite imagery so fast?” asked Cameron.

Eazy spoke up, “There are many
international satellites directed at the Middle East region and I have a direct
feed into several of them.”

Cameron glanced at Alastair and
raised his brow.
 
Alastair raised
one brow in return.
 
They had
utilized satellite imagery like the photographs on the wall on nearly every
mission while in the Legion and after and Cameron
were
aware that to gain access to the level of detail displayed in these pictures
was near impossible.
 
Anyone could
pay to task a satellite down to one meter and big money could easily get half
of that.
 
These super sharp pictures
were down to a quarter of a meter easy.

Eazy anticipated Cameron’s next
question.
 
“The hacks are old and
unnoticeable,” he shrugged his shoulders, “maybe tolerated.
 
You know they seldom risk upgrading the
firmware.
 
If the upgrade knocks out
a satellite, well...” he raised his hands in the air.

“I am glad we have them,” said
Pepe.
 
“How recent are they?”

“All from within the last twelve
hours,” said Isaac, “most an hour before sunset, and the infrareds after.
 
We pulled from the birds right after we
heard from Alistair.
 
As you can see
the Kalinihta is anchored here as reported.”
 
Isaac referenced an aerial picture of
the small harbor at the edge of the building compound.
 
The photograph displayed the buildings
closest to the water, a small beach, a dock, and man-made break walls hugging
around them.
 
At the mouth of the
tiny port was a yacht flanked by buoyed skiffs.
 
The detail of the image was
pristine.
 
The chaise lounge pillows
on the deck of the Kalinihta were clear, as were the side tables.

“The Kalinihta does not take
much water.
 
Why not use the dock?”
asked Ari.

“Same reason the skiffs don’t,”
said Cameron.

“You’re right,” said Eazy.
 
“Good eyes.”

“We have done this before,” said
Alastair.

Isaac ran his finger through the
center of the picture, “The road is guarded by a tower and from movement we
think that building number four, adjacent to the main building number one here
on the courtyard, is a barracks.
 
The clearest point of entry is directly through the harbor, up the
beach, and right up the steps to the compound.”
 
He gestured to an image of the entire
complex, “You see here, and by the model on the table.
 
The walls are three meters high
surrounding the compound.”

“Ah,” said Ari, “There is
something in the water.”

“Mines would be my guess,” said
Cameron.

“And you would be right.
 
We also have intelligence that the beach
is
mined
,” said Isaac.
 
He gestured toward another two
photographs, “We have images of individuals crossing so there must be a safe
line...
 
Still.”

Eazy continued Isaac’s thought,
“We believe the safe line would be monitored electronically, or at least as
guarded.
 
You can see the guards
there.”
 
He shot the bead of a laser
pointer onto three shadows near the waters edge of the compound, two at the ends
of the wide steps, and one obvious sentry on the dock.

“Electronically?
 
That’s far more high tech than I
imagined for these fellas,” said Cameron.

“Well that is the meat of it,”
said Isaac.

“How’s that?” asked
Cameron.

“One of the reasons our friend
Dada was so glad to help,” said Alastair.
 
“This is not only a stronghold of the National Volunteer Coast
Guard.
 
According to Dada this is
the home of their leader Abbo Mohammed.”

“Their leader?” asked Ari.

“And all that implies,” said
Isaac.
 
“A lot of men, a lot of
guns, and I expect an RPG or two.”

“The man that wanted us out of
the way,” said Cameron.

“The bald man in London Alastair
was telling us about,” said Isaac.

Cameron nodded his head, “I
think this is pretty straight forward then, we do a helodrop a kilometer out
then take the yacht from the water.”

“I thought you would see it that
way.
 
Our helicopter is a modified
Sikorsky Black Hawk.
 
She’s already
fueled and loaded in the launch bay.”

“In the launch bay?
 
This place is full of surprises,” said
Cameron.

Isaac nodded at Cameron.
 
“I think you will find we have all of
the gear you require in the armory,” said Isaac.
 
“We leave in three hours.”

“And if they are not all on the
boat?” asked Ari.

“Need be, I can clear the way to
the compound,” said Eazy.
 
“There
will be a lot of noise which means the team going ashore will have to be fast
and surgical.”

“If anyone has been taken to the
main house it will have been my sister,” said Pepe.
 
“Cameron and I will go.”

“Not without me,” said
Alastair.
 
He placed a hand upon
Pepe’s shoulder, “Viva Legionne.”
 
Pepe’s
eyes matched Alastair’s, “The Legion is our strength.”

* * *
* *

Somali Coast North of Kismayu

Cameron slipped another clip
into a pocket of his wetsuit, then for a
third
time,
in the dim light of the cabin, inspected the MP-5 submachine gun he had
selected from Isaac and Eazy’s armory.
 
The bewildering variety of weapons amassed in their munitions store
amused Cameron.
 
A matter of
tactical operation protocol was that all of the munitions were
interchangeable.
 
Perhaps confidence
in experience was high or maybe the years between field and undercover ops had
forgiven rigor and set them in their ways, because each armed by personal
preference.
 
In the cockpit were
Isaac and Dakarai, the towering Afrikaan.
 
Isaac and Dakarai were to stay on the helo after the drop.
 
Across the cabin of the Black Hawk, Eazy
was inspecting his CTAR-21, an Israeli commando submachine gun.
 
Alastair sat next to Eazy, with his
hands on his lap, his back arrow straight.
 
Pepe was sitting in the back leaning against the corner inspecting the
MP-5 he had selected.
 
Cameron
watched Pepe maneuver the safety toggle from single fire to rapid then back to
single.
 
Pepe’s gaze was not on his
weapon.
 
He stared vacuously into
the interior of the cabin sliding the toggle to different hot actions.
 
Cameron recognized that Pepe was running
a combat simulation.
 
Though the
small team was well equipped, no one else wanted to see battle this
morning.
 
The plan was a direct
action infiltration exfiltration, a commando specialization.
 
The four of them were to shadow the
yacht with the zodiacs and then rescue the crew.
 
If anyone was missing, Eazy was to
evacuate with whatever hostages were onboard while the other three went ashore,
and they were only going ashore if necessary.
 
Their team was too small to take any
great risks.
 
Somewhere outside of
the Black Hawk was Ari in the Dark Star.
 
Ari had not hesitated in his role of the mission.
 
If everything went well on the yacht,
they would not see Ari again until the mission was complete.
 
If they had to get to the main house on
the beach, what they referred to as building number one, then Ari was going to
come in like the cavalry, strafing with the guns newly fitted at the bunker, and
lift them out, or at least provide cover for the Black Hawk if all of the
hostages had been moved to shore.

That was a major kink in the
plan.

The team was counting on the
hostages being left on the yacht and even with the satellite images that Eazy
was able to retrieve there was no way of knowing if that was the case.
 
The team had debated as to whether the
zodiacs should be brought to shore or the Black Hawk brought in.
 
In the end, Pepe made the call.
 
If the compound was still too hot to
evacuate with the Black Hack there was no way the three of them were going the
get all of the hostages onto the beach and out.
 
“If we fail, we fail big,” said
Pepe.
 
So that was Plan A, the
yacht, Plan B, the compound with Ari, Plan C, the compound with the Black Hawk,
and if Plan C went awry their last resort Plan D would be the zodiacs on the
beach with strafing fire from Ari.
 
No one wanted Plan D.
 
They
all agreed the Kalinihta was to be utilized if the yacht had fuel and the
captain was in shape to pilot the ship yet they had no time to discover if the
hull was rigged with explosives and they certainly could not outrun the skiffs
that would have GPS locks on the yacht.