“I read somewhere that Kazakhstan is becoming the world’s main opium and heroin producer,” Costas said.
“That’s right,” said Howe. “And this man controls most of it. By all accounts he’s a charming host to journalists invited to meet him, a scholar who collects art and antiquities on a prodigious scale.” Howe paused and looked round the table. “He’s also a murderous psychopath.”
“How long has he been eyeballing us?” Jack asked.
“They hove into visual range twenty-four hours ago, immediately before Costas called you in Alexandria,” York responded. “SATSURV had already warned us of a potentially hostile intrusion, a vessel of warship configuration which answered no international call signs.”
“That’s when you shifted position.” Seaquest now lay off the far side of the atoll two nautical miles from the wreck.
“Not before we bubble-mined the site,” York replied.
Katya looked questioningly at Jack.
“An IMU innovation,” he explained. “Miniature contact mines the size of Ping-Pong balls joined together by monofilaments like a screen of bubbles. They’re triggered by photoelectric sensors which can distinguish the movement of divers and submersibles.”
Costas shifted his gaze to York. “What are our options?”
“Whatever we do now may be pointless.” York’s voice was bleak and emotionless. “We’ve been issued an ultimatum.” He handed Jack a sheet of paper which had just come through by email. Jack quickly scanned the text, his face betraying nothing of the turmoil he felt inside.
“Seaquest, this is Vultura. Depart by eighteen hundred hours or be annihilated.”
Costas peered over at the paper. “Doesn’t mess around, does he?”
As if on cue, there was an immense rushing sound like a low-flying jet followed by a thunderous crash off the starboard bow. Tom York spun round to the nearest porthole just as a towering column of white water lashed the windowpane with spray. The shell had only narrowly missed them.
“You bastards.” York spoke through clenched teeth with the rage of a professional naval officer who was powerless to respond in kind.
At that moment the two-way radio began to crackle, and York angrily punched the intercom so they all could hear.
“This is Seaquest.” York’s voice was barely controlled, almost a snarl. “Make your intentions clear. Over.”
After a few moments a voice came over the intercom, its drawling, guttural tones unmistakably Russian.
“Good afternoon, Captain York. Major Howe. And Dr. Howard, I presume? Our felicitations. This is Vultura.” There was a pause. “You have been warned.”
York switched off the receiver in disgust and flipped open a lid beside him. Before he pulled down the lever inside, he looked up at Jack, his voice now coldly composed.
“We’re going to battle stations.”
Within minutes of the klaxon sounding, Seaquest had transformed from a research vessel into a ship of war. The diving equipment which usually cluttered the deck had been stowed as soon as Vultura appeared on the scene. Now, in the hold forward of the deckhouse, a group of technicians in white anti-flash overalls were arming Seaquest’s weapons pod, a Breda twin 40 mm L70 modified to IMU specifications. The successor of the renowned Bofors anti-aircraft gun of the Second World War, the “Fast Forty” had a dual-feed mechanism which fired high-explosive and armour-piercing shells at a rate of 900 rounds per minute. The pod was concealed in a retracted shaft which was elevated moments before use.
In the hold all non-essential personnel were assembling beside Seaquest’s escape submersible Neptune II. The submersible would quickly reach Greek territorial waters and rendezvous with a Hellenic Navy frigate which would set sail from Crete within the hour. It would also take away the bull’s head rhyton and other artefacts which had come up too late for the final helicopter shuttle to Carthage.
York quickly led the group down a lift to a point well below the waterline, the door opening to reveal a curved metal bulkhead that looked as if a flying saucer was wedged inside the hull.
York looked at Katya. “The command module.” He tapped the shiny surface. “Twenty-centimetre-thick titanium-reinforced steel. The entire pod can blow itself away from Seaquest and make off undetected, thanks to the same stealth technology we used for the escape sub.”
“I think of it as a giant ejection seat.” Costas beamed. “Like the command module on the old Saturn moon rockets.”
“Just as long as it doesn’t send us into space,” Katya said.
York spoke into an intercom and the circular hatch swung open. A subdued red light from the battery of control panels on the far side cast an eerie glow over the interior. They ducked through and he pulled the hatch shut behind them, spinning the central wheel until the locking arms were fully engaged.
Immediately in front, several crew were busily preparing small-arms ammunition, pressing rounds into magazines and assembling weapons. Katya walked over and picked up a rifle and magazine, expertly loading it and cocking the bolt.
“Enfield SA80 Mark 2,” she announced. “British Army personal weapon. Thirty-round magazine, 5.56 millimetre. Bullpup design, handle in front of the magazine, versatile for confined spaces.” She peered over the sights. “The infrared four-times scope is a nice feature, but give me the new Kalashnikov AK102 any day.” She removed the clip and checked the chamber was clear before replacing the weapon in the rack.
She looked rather incongruous still in the elegant black dress she wore to the conference, Jack mused, but clearly she had more than adequate skills to hold her own in a fight.
“You’re some lady,” he said. “First a world expert on ancient Greek scripts, now a military small-arms instructor.”
“Where I come from,” Katya responded, “it’s the second qualification that counts.”
As they made their way past the armoury, York glanced at Jack. “We must decide our course of action now.”
Jack nodded.
York led them up a short flight of steps to a platform about five metres across. He motioned towards a semicircle of swivel chairs which faced a battery of workstations along one side.
“The bridge console,” he said to Katya. “It serves as command centre and a virtual-reality bridge, allowing us to navigate Seaquest using the surveillance and imaging systems topside.”
Above them a concave screen displayed a panoramic digital reproduction of the view from Seaquest’s bridge. The cameras were equipped with infrared and thermal imaging sensors, so even though it was dusk they could still make out the low shape of Vultura and the fading heat signature of its forward gun turret.
“Peter will review our security options.” York turned to Howe.
Peter Howe looked at the others ruefully. “I won’t beat about the bush. It’s bad, really bad. We’re up against a purpose-built warship armed to the teeth with the latest weaponry, able to outgun and outrun virtually any naval or coastguard vessel assigned to deal with this kind of menace.”
Jack turned to Katya. “IMU policy is to rely on friendly nations in this kind of situation. The presence of warships and aircraft is often sufficiently intimidating even if they are outside territorial waters and legally unable to intervene.”
Howe tapped a key and the screen above them showed the Admiralty Chart of the Aegean.