“Don’t just stand there gawking, big brother, give me a hand.”
Tuff and Ricky helped him stand, and Vince wasted no time greeting his brother with a warm hug. “I always knew that you wanted to go along on this crossing, but I never thought you’d stoop to being a stowaway.”
Thomas laughed. “Stowaway? No, let’s just say I dropped in without a proper ticket.”
“Gentlemen,” interrupted Kristin, her voice heavy with concern. “I hate to interrupt what seems to be a family reunion. But unless we get down to the Engine Room and stop my father, this ship’s going right to the bottom of the Atlantic, with us in it!”
“We’ve lost Collins. sir!”
This somber radio report arrived via Laycob’s cranial headset, and the Royal Marine commando took it upon himself to shoulder the blame.
“It’s all my bloody fault,” he admitted, from the cover of the anteroom outside the vacant Print Shop.
The platoon’s senior SEAL was huddled at his side, and both of them were forced to hit the deck when a submachine-gun round ricocheted overhead.
“It was Collins’s impatience that got him killed,” managed the SEAL while reloading his sidearm. “As point man, he should have waited for the rest of the assault train to catch up, before continuing up the passageway.”
The deep, booming report of a 45 caliber pistol sounded in the background, and Laycob flinched when a concussion grenade detonated nearby.
“It’s ironic that they picked the Hospital’s anteroom in which to set up their ambush,” remarked the Englishman. “By positioning an armed sentry on each side of the working alleyway there, they’ve pretty well blocked our access to points forward.”
“We can always try to storm them,” offered the SEAL.
“That would be too costly,” Laycob cautioned.
“We can’t just sit here,” the SEAL returned. “Ammo’s getting low and we’re losing our momentum.”
Yet another bullet whined overhead. Laycob offered the only tactical advice that made any sense: “We can bypass this passageway by returning aft, and then work our way forward through the Engine Room. The only problem is getting back down this corridor in one piece.”
“It’s nothing that a protective curtain of tear gas, smoke canisters, and stun grenades can’t take care of,” said the SEAL, who addressed the miniature transmitter of his cranial headset to implement this strategic retreat.
“This is as far as we’re going, comrades!” shouted Sunny at the top of his voice. Even then, it was hard for his nine, tuxedo-clad prisoners to hear him over the roaring whine of the engines.
Together with Ping, the QE2’s former head laundryman, Sunny had herded the heads of state through the adjoining compartment, where the massive diesel engines were incessantly grinding away. Their prisoners looked strangely out of place in this unglamorous, grease-stained environment.
This was the working-man’s world, a place of raw machinery, twisting pipe, and snaking insulated conduit. The scent that permeated the steamy air here wasn’t that of fancy cologne or French perfume. It was rather that of diesel fuel and sweat. It filled Sunny’s nostrils with memories of his early childhood in the oil fields of Hunan.
If his hard-working, peasant family could only see him now, thought Sunny, as he signaled his prisoners to halt beside the grimy bulkhead.
He merely had to wave the stubby barrel of his MP-5K submachine gun, to get the chancellor of Germany to tighten his ranks with the rest of this group. Sunny Chu, the son of a Hunanese peasant, currently herding the nine most powerful men in the world as if they were a bunch of frightened sheep! Who would have thought that such an incredible day would ever come?
Proud of his achievements like never before, Sunny took up a position against the opposite bulkhead. Beside him were a collection of oddly shaped, sealed vats, with thick, grease-stained pipes snaking in and out of them. He knew this was the place where the fuel oil was heated.
And on the far side of the vat nearest to him was where they had planted the explosive device.
It was a simple mechanism, formed out of a fist-sized lump of plastic explosives, a blasting cap, a nine-volt battery, and a digital timer. A small amount of colored wire connected the components that their leader had placed here on the night of the takeover the heavy scent of oil masking it from bomb-sniffing dogs.
Dennis Liu had called it their insurance policy, and Sunny assumed that he was preparing to make good his threat to use it. This meant that the submarine they were supposed to rendezvous with was close by.
They’d be surely transferring into the hold of this vessel any minute now, with a submerged trip back to the motherland to follow.
Such heroes they’d be, thought Sunny, who knew he’d soon have his pick of China’s most beautiful women. The trick now was to stay healthy, so that he could enjoy each and every one of them!
Sunny licked his dry lips in anticipation when Dennis Liu and Monica Chang stepped over the edge of the watertight door leading from the compartment where the engines were noisily grinding away. Their leader looked pale, and there could be no missing the bright red blood that stained the upper half of his coveralls.
“Whatever happened?” asked Sunny. “Are you hurt?”
“It’s nothing but a scratch,” replied Liu, who was more concerned with the nine men standing before him. “Any problems getting them down here?”
“We were forced to shoot several of the security agents when we began escorting them out of the Dining Room,” revealed Sunny. “But other than that, they were as docile as lambs.”
“Good,” replied Liu while continuing to the vat on which their bomb was placed.
Sunny followed him, watching as Liu bent over and manipulated the bomb’s digital timer. After a minor adjustment, he clicked the timer’s stem and the electronic display briefly registered seven minutes before beginning a rapid second-by-second countdown.
“Comrade Liu, I believe that you’ve made a mistake here,” remarked Sunny. “We’ll never get aboard that submarine in a mere seven minutes.”
“Sunny,” said Liu with a disgusted shake of his head. “Get over there by Ping and keep your mouth shut. I’ve got the situation under control as always.”
As he crossed over the deck, Sunny realized what Liu must be attempting.
It was a scare tactic, designed to put fear into the hearts of the cowardly statesmen. Renewed confidence guided Sunny’s steps as he took up a position alongside Ping and directed the barrel of his weapon at the pathetic group of men standing in front of them.
Dennis Liu also approached this group, and he made it a point to isolate the lanky politician standing on the far right. President Li Chen acknowledged Liu’s glance with a defiant smirk. Liu reacted to this insulting sneer by reaching forward and grabbing the Chinese leader by the scruff of his neck. He then positioned himself behind Li, all the while planting the barrel of his Sterling firmly against the president’s sweating temple.
“This is the spineless coward who’s responsible for my presence amongst you!” shouted Liu to the other leaders. “Fifty years ago, it was Li Chen’s grandfather who executed my own beloved parent, and left his body to be devoured by dogs. And now Li Chen with his murderous blood has stolen away the leadership of the People’s Republic. I know what he was doing here. He was selling out our nation, in the tradition of the weak-willed Russians. China shall not take the Soviet Union’s path, and go overnight from a superpower to a nation of beggars. All of you share in the blame. Your greed is limitless, and now you shall pay the ultimate price for your despicable crimes!”