‘Bullshit. I’m surprised you didn’t go down and load the damn gun yourself.’
‘Computer does all the hard work.’ Storm smiled. He might be a micromanager and a pain in the butt and all that – but he also knew that he took care of his people when the shit hit the fan. And they knew it too.
‘They’re mighty pleased back at the Pentagon. Everybody’s lining up to buy you some champagne.’
‘Everybody except your boss.’
‘Ah, don’t worry about Tex. He’s just pissed that you’re getting most of the credit. He’ll come around. By tomorrow he’ll be reminding people Xray Pop was his idea.’
Red meant that as a joke – Tex had opposed the idea as premature, and Storm had only prevailed by calling in favors owed to him at the Pentagon. It didn’t hurt that he’d had several assignments under the present Chief of Staff, Admiral Balboa, when Balboa headed CentCom. Balboa was a bit too pansy-assed for Storm, but connections were connections.
‘I’m telling you, Tex is warming up to you,’ added Red. ‘He has the commendation all written out.’
‘The only reason that might be true is if you wrote it.’
Red smiled. ‘So how many of the little suckers are left?’
‘No idea,’ said Storm. ‘There were at least three other boats last night, all of them patrol-boat-sized. And we’ve seen others. It’s a motley assortment.’
‘One of your little Shark Boats couldn’t take care of them?’
‘I have to tell you, Red, not having over-the-horizon systems is hurting us quite a bit. If we had those Orions we’d be doing much better. Listen – give me the Belleau Wood and I guarantee we’ll wipe these guys off the face of the earth.’
Red laughed, but Storm wasn’t joking. The Belleau Wood – LHA-3 – was an assault ship capable of carrying Harriers and AH-1W SuperCobras as well as nearly two thousand Marines. The ship looked like a downsized aircraft carrier, which she essentially was. When Storm had originally drawn up the proposal for Xray Pop and the mission here, he had wanted Belleau Wood or one of her sister ships involved, intending to use the airpower to provide reconnaissance and air cover. He also would have used the Marines to strike the pirate bases.
‘What happened to your Sea Sprite helicopters?’ asked Red when he noticed Storm wasn’t laughing.
‘Still back at Pearl. It’s a sore subject, Red. Those helos weren’t designed to operate from the Abner Read, let alone the Shark Boats. I need the UAVs.’
‘Not going to happen.’ Red shrugged; weapons development wasn’t his area. ‘Any other news? You find that lost Libyan submarine?’
‘Give me a break, huh? The Libyans can’t even get out of port, for cryin’ out loud. They’re not going to sail around Africa.’
‘National Security Council thinks it’s real. Rumor has it Phil Freeman is sending a detachment out of Dreamland to look for it.’
‘Dreamland? Out here?’
‘Strictly to find the submarine.’
‘As long as they stay out of my way,’ said Storm. He’d heard of Lieutenant Colonel Tecumseh ‘Dog’ Bastian: He’d gotten his nickname because it was ‘God’ spelled backward. Bastian was so full of himself he could have been in the Army, Storm thought. ‘That Yemen missile boat we sunk – does that mean we can go into Yemen waters now?’
‘You heard that the Yemen government claims it was stolen, I assume.’
Storm snorted in derision. ‘Sounds like the story we told the night we stole the Army’s mule for the game.’
Red smiled. As students at Annapolis, Red, Storm, and four other midshipmen had conducted an elaborate operation to procure the Army mascot prior to the Army-Navy game. The operation had involved considerable daring, skulduggery, and not a little deceit – but its success had guaranteed that the six would live forever in Academy lore. It also hadn’t hurt their careers.
‘Untie my hands, Red. Let me go after these bastards where they live. They don’t respect the law. Why should we? Let my ships go into territorial waters.’
‘Talk to the politicians,’ said Red. ‘Even Tex’ll back you on that.’
‘Untie my hands. That’s all I ask.’
‘That and an assault ship and half of the Navy’s Marines.’
‘I’ll take two platoons of Marines. With or without the ship.’
‘Where will you put them?’
‘Marines? I’ll give ’em a rubber raft and tell them that’s all they get until they take over one of the patrol boats. I’ll have the whole damn pirate fleet by nightfall.’
Near Karin, Somalia, on the Gulf of Aden 4 November 1997 1731
Fatigue stung Ali’s eyes as he walked up the gangplank to the large ship. He had not slept since the battle. It was not simply a matter of restlessness, or even the demands of his position. He feared that he would dream of his son the same way he had dreamed of his wife after her death. The dreams had been vivid and heart-wrenching; he could not face such an ordeal now.
The ship was nearly twice as long as his boats. Once part of the Russian navy, it had fallen into great disrepair after being delivered to Somalia as part of a deal the communists used to sway the corrupt government years before. The ship had fallen under the control of a warlord in Mogadishu, who had agreed to donate it to the Islamic cause in exchange for weapons and cash.
Rust stained the hull and the odor of rot hung heavy over the ship. Netting and fake spars had been strategically placed ahead of the forecastle to make the vessel look more like a merchant trawler from the air. Ali had no illusion that this would fool a discerning eye intent on discovering the ship; he merely wanted to make it easier to overlook.
‘Admiral Ali,’ said the ship’s captain, greeting him as he came aboard. ‘It is a pleasure, sir.’
‘I am not an admiral,’ Ali told him.
‘Yes, sir,’ said the captain. He led the way around the deck of the ship, showing Ali to the bridge.
‘I wish to see the engines,’ said Ali.
‘The engine room,’ said the captain doubtfully. When Ali did not respond, the captain dutifully led him to a ladder and they descended into the bowels of the ship. The stench of rot increased as they went down; the way was dark and the passages narrow. Ali noticed several sets of pipes and wires that were broken, and there were bits of the decking that seemed as if a shark had bitten through.
In truth, the engine room was not as bad as he expected when he saw the captain’s frown. Water slopped along the floor, but it was less than an inch. The massive 40 DM diesels seemed clean enough, and while the space smelled of diesel oil, Ali had been on several ships in the Egyptian navy that were much worse. There were two men on duty, one of whom did not speak Arabic – a Polish engineer familiar with the engines whom the captain had somehow found and managed to hire.
‘He is, unfortunately, a drinker,’ said the captain as they went back topside. ‘But he knows the engines.’
‘You have done very well getting the ship here,’ said Ali. ‘But you have much more work to do.’
‘I understand, Captain.’
‘We will obtain the missiles in a few days. How long will it take you to install them?’
Ali listened as the ship’s commander told him that he had two men trained by the Russians to work with the systems, and several