The Storm (26 page)

“Don’t want to do that,” she said.

“Neither do I,” he replied. “If we’re going to take over the plane without a struggle, we need to upgrade our weapon status.”

With Leilani trailing him, he walked toward the cargo pallets, hoping to find something more lethal.

As he dug into the first pallet, the high-pitched whine of the engines slowed and dropped an octave or two. The odd, slightly weightless feeling of an aircraft nosing over from cruise to descent came next. It was far more pronounced than on your average airliner.

“We’re descending,” Leilani said.

“Must be getting close,” Kurt said. “We’d better hurry.”

CHAPTER 34

THE FLOATING ISLAND OF AQUA-TERRA WAS UNDER NEW management. As Zarrina gave orders on the bridge, even Otero and Matson were feeling the heat.

Many decks below, Paul Trout walked the confines of Marchetti’s five-star brig, taking inventory of the surroundings. It came with floor-to-ceiling windows, soft recessed lighting and comfortable pillow-top mattresses. It even had a massage chair and a juice dispenser.

“A juice dispenser,” Paul said incredulously.

“Good idea,” Marchetti said, calling to him from the massage chair. “I’ll take a guava-pineapple while you’re up.”

Paul looked over at their host. He was arching his back like a cat rubbing on the furniture as the chair’s shiatsu tumblers moved up and down his spine.

“Oh, that feels good,” he mumbled. “Yeah, right there.”

On the one hand, it struck Paul as the height of absurdity; on the other hand, he couldn’t wait for Marchetti to get done so he could have a turn. Fighting the fire had knotted up his back something fierce.

He poured three cups of the guava-pineapple mixture and brought them back to the other side of the room. He placed them down between Marchetti, who was still making strange sounds of pleasure, and Gamay, who was scowling like an assistant principal ready to put everyone in detention.

Paul offered her one of the cups. She shook her head in disgust.

“When you two are done enjoying your spa day, maybe we could try and figure out a way to escape?”

“I tried the windows,” Paul said.

“Oh, you’ll never get through those,” Marchetti promised. “They’re designed to withstand a Force 10 gale.”

“What about doors?”

“Key-coded from the outside,” he said, shifting his position in the chair. “No way to access the control box from in here. If you notice, we don’t even have a handle.”

“I noticed,” Gamay said.

Marchetti pushed back into the seat a little farther, and the tumblers began to vibrate, shaking him and giving his voice a strange staccato sound like someone pounding on his own chest as he spoke. “I … think … we … should … just … sit … tight …” he said. “Conserve … our … energy …”

Paul saw the fires of fury rise up in Gamay’s eyes. He got out of the way quickly as she lunged toward Marchetti and his chair. She grabbed the plug and yanked it out of the wall. The massage ended abruptly.

Marchetti looked stunned. Paul guessed his own session was now on permanent hold.

“You’d better get serious,” she growled. “These people aren’t playing a game. That wench Zarrina killed one of your crewmen, and who knows how many others in her time. And if we don’t get ourselves out of here, they’re going to kill us before this is over.”

Marchetti looked to Paul for help, got none and turned back to Gamay.

“Sorry,” he said finally. “Denial is my favorite coping mechanism. When you have a billion dollars, problems have a way of disappearing if you ignore them long enough.”

“This one isn’t going away,” Gamay said.

Marchetti nodded.

“Do you have any security protocols?” Paul asked. “Any emergency codes or scheduled check-ins that will cause you to be missed?”

Marchetti scratched his head. “Not really,” he said, sounding as if he hated to disappoint them. “Being too accessible kind of messes up the whole reclusive billionaire persona I’ve been trying to cultivate.”

“How do you run your companies?” Paul asked.

“They kind of run themselves.”

“What if you need to give an order?” Gamay said. “What if one of them has to make a big purchase or close a deal or a merger that only you can sign off on?”

“I’d have Matson do it.”

That was a problem.

“So,” Paul said, summing things up, “as long as Matson keeps communicating with the outside world, no one will ever know you’re missing.”

Marchetti nodded. “I’m afraid so.”

Gamay looked as glum as Paul felt. “At least until they come up with a nice story about your disappearance during some expedition or other stunt.”

“Yes,” Marchetti said. “I’m starting to realize there are drawbacks to being a recluse.”

“All kinds,” Gamay insisted. “There were rumors that Howard Hughes died years before his official date of death. Probably false, but the thing is he became so isolated no one knew for sure. You’re in the same boat. And if you call it an island, I’ll slap you.”

“Boat,” he agreed. “And assuming we survive, I promise to be far more public from here on out.”

That’s great, Paul thought, but it wasn’t going to help them now. “What do you think they’ve done with the rest of the crew?”

“A couple of them seemed to be on Zarrina’s side,” Gamay said.

“The others are probably locked up like we are,” Marchetti added. “There are five cells down here.”

“Keeping us spread out,” Paul said, “prevents us from plotting against them.”

“What about your people?” Marchetti asked. “The ones back in Washington. You’re expected to report and check in. Surely you’ll be missed.”

Paul exchanged a knowing glance with his wife, after years together their minds melding in some way. “Not quickly enough.”

“What do you mean?”

Paul explained. “We send them data every twenty-four hours. But it won’t be too hard for Zarrina and Otero to fake it. She knows what we’ve been sending and what we’re after. I imagine it’ll be quite some time before anyone becomes suspicious.”

“Maybe Dirk will call us,” Gamay said hopefully. “They can’t fake a video linkup.”

“No,” Paul said. “But they can threaten all kinds of dire consequences should we try to broadcast the truth. Which we shall of course attempt to do regardless of their threats.”

Gamay looked at him. “How do we tell Dirk, or anyone else who calls in, that we’re in trouble without our captors knowing about it?”

“We’re hostages,” Paul said. “Dirk has been in this situation a few times. Maybe we slip in the name of one of those places or one of the thugs who held him. That ought to get his wheels turning.”

“That’s brilliant, Mr. Trout,” Marchetti said. “A secret code.”

“The
Lady Flamborough
,” Gamay said.

“The what?”

“The
Lady Flamborough
,” she repeated. “It was a cruise ship. Dirk’s father, the Senator, was held hostage on it in Antarctica. Dirk had to rescue him. If any of us get a chance to talk to Dirk, we play our part and keep up appearances for Zarrina and her thugs. We say what they want us to say. At some point Dirk will fire off a general question about our well-being or what the weather’s like or something along those lines. We just have to smile nonchalantly and say things are going great, like taking a cruise on the
Lady Flamborough
.”

“That’s a bit vague,” Marchetti said. “What if he doesn’t get it?”

“You don’t know Dirk Pitt,” Paul insisted. “He’ll get it.”

“Okay, that’s good,” Marchetti said excitedly. “So we have a plan, assuming they cooperate and ask you to speak with him. What if they don’t?”

Marchetti looked Paul’s way. All Paul could offer in return was a blank stare. He flicked his eyes toward Gamay and got nothing from her either. It seemed none of them had a plan B yet.

With frowns settling deeper on their faces, Gamay reached over and plugged the chair back in. The massage began anew.

Marchetti looked surprised.

Gamay threw up her hands. “Maybe it’ll help you think.”

CHAPTER 35

KURT AUSTIN HAD SPENT SEVERAL MINUTES RUMMAGING around in the cargo bay of the plane. He’d bypassed guns and ammunition and the rockets he’d spotted earlier, much to Leilani Tanner’s bewilderment.

“What are you doing?” she asked.

“A wise general forages from his enemy,” Kurt said.

“Again,” she said. “I really have trouble following you.”

“Sun Tzu,” Kurt explained.
“The Art of War.”

“Oh,” she said. “Him, I’ve heard of.”

He pulled a set of zip ties from one crate, the kind used to bind the hands of prisoners.

Leilani stared at the thick plastic loops. “Seen those before.”

“Our friends are planning on taking more hostages,” he said, wondering once again where they were headed.

He slid a handful of the ties into his pocket and dug into the next crates.

“So what else are we looking for?”

“There are probably two or three guys on the flight deck. Two pilots and an engineer, if they have one. Maybe even a fourth in the bunk up top.”

“But we can’t shoot them,” she said. “So how do we fight them?”

“We don’t,” he said.

She pointed. “See, that’s what I mean, the confusion thing. I was with you and then … poof.”

Kurt couldn’t help but smile. He held up a single finger, the way he remembered the master doing it on old reruns of the show
Kung Fu
.

“To fight and conquer is not excellence,” he said. “But breaking the enemy’s resistance without fighting is supreme.”

“Sun Tzu again?”

He nodded.

“Can you translate for me?”

“Make them too afraid to move and they won’t do anything stupid,” he said. “But to do that, we need something more deadly than a knife and more lethal than a gun, something so scary the pilots will do what we tell them to do and not even think about resisting.”

He pulled the lid off another crate and smiled. A look of fear came across Leilani’s face.

“I don’t know about this,” she said.

“Trust me,” he said, “this is exactly what we’re looking for.”

They heard the flaps extending, and the turbulent air began to buffet the plane.

“We’re coming in for a landing,” Leilani said.

Kurt looked out the window. The horizon was beginning to glow, the sky changing hue. He saw no sign of land. “Depends on your definition of landing.”

“What do you mean?”

“This is a seaplane,” he said, “more accurately called a flying boat. It lands on the water.”

Kurt was torn. One part of him was anxious to make his move before they got too close to whatever rendezvous they were heading for, the rest of him was curious as to where they were headed.

He remembered Jinn saying he needed to move to a more secure location. It would be grand if Kurt could report back and give that location to the powers that be.

But then he thought about the water tanks in the belly of the plane and the load of microbots he suspected they were carrying. He decided it would be better to move sooner rather than later.

He went to the seating area, pulled out his knife and began working on the item he’d liberated from the crate.

“I’m not even going to ask,” Leilani said, looking away.

When he was finished, he slid the knife back into his boot and covered it with the leg of his pants. Next he took one of the 9mm Lugers and popped the clip out. He quickly unloaded all the shells, including the one in the chamber, and then jammed the clip back in.

He handed it to Leilani with the safety off.

“I don’t like guns,” she said.

“Don’t think of it as a gun.”

“But it
is
a gun,” she insisted.

He was already moving toward the front of the plane. “Not without the bullets, it’s not. It’s just a big, crazy bluff, and you better wield it like Dirty Harry”—he saw the blank look appearing on her young face and changed references—“like Angelina Jolie, if you want them to believe you’re going to shoot it.”

“But I’m not going to shoot,” she said.

As he approached the ladder that led up to the flight deck, Kurt hoped his own bluff would be sufficient because he didn’t think Leilani quite had the concept down.

“Just stay behind me and to my right, and point the gun at them,” he said.

“Anything else?”

“Yeah. Try to look mean.”

Kurt climbed the ladder, which was canted sideways to the flight deck.

The pilots snapped their heads around at the commotion and saw Kurt. The captain shouted. The copilot reached for his seat belt release. And Kurt showed them what he was carrying.

They stopped in their tracks, staring at a pineapple grenade in Kurt’s hand. He pulled the pin in an exaggerated manner and held the safety lever, or spoon, down tight.

Leilani came up beside him, aiming the empty gun nicely. “Everybody freeze!” she growled.

The pilots had already frozen, but he appreciated the effort.

“That’s right,” he said. “Let’s just assume that the seat belt sign is on and you’re
not
free to move about the cabin.”

The captain turned back to the controls, the copilot stared. “What are you talking about?”

“Hands on the yoke,” Kurt ordered. “Eyes forward.”

The copilot complied, but also mumbled something in Arabic to the captain.

“Are you trying to take her?” the captain asked. “To rescue her? You’re a fool to throw your life away for this puny woman.”

“Shut up, jerk!” Leilani growled. “Or, so help me, I’ll fill you full of lead!”

She looked at Kurt, smiling proudly. “How’s that?”

“We need to work on your dialogue a bit, but not bad.”

Kurt glanced out the window. The horizon to the east was starting to sharpen, but the sky was still inky purple, and for the most part it was hard to tell where it ended and the sea began.

He could see the other two jets ahead of them, but only because of their navigation lights. The closest plane looked to be a mile away and maybe a thousand feet lower. The lead plane might have been three miles out and a thousand feet below the other one. The whole squadron was descending. He heard no transmissions and assumed they were operating under radio silence.