18
Captain Prestwick found his shoes and led Murdock and Bradford down to the engine room. They met no Chinese on the walk.
“How many Chinese onboard?” Murdock asked.
“About thirty. Most of them are sleeping in vacant rooms. I don’t even know which ones. The purser should know. I’ll call him and he will give me the room numbers.”
At the engine compartment Murdock was surprised at the size of the place. In the far end was a closed off space where the controls and instruments were situated. Lam materialized from behind some huge pipes.
“Skipper, not sure how to dig these guys out. The door is locked but we could go through it. Trouble is, I don’t know what a fire fight with live rounds might do to these tubes and pipes.”
“Good thinking,” Captain Prestwick said. “I have a key to open the door, but what then?”
“An EAR round,” Bradford said.
“What if we get a bounce back here and it puts all of us down as well for four hours?” Murdock asked.
“Yeah, the quarters are a bit close.”
“Flash bang?” Lam asked.
“Could do it,” Murdock said. “Three of them. I have one.”
They found three, the captain took out a master key and three men pulled flash-bang grenade pins and held down the arming handles.
“Open the door only six inches,” Murdock said. “We pitch the flash bangs in to the middle of the area.” He nodded at the captain.
“Unlock it and pull it open.”
He did. The men threw in the grenades, felt one rifle round hit the metal door, then the captain pushed the door shut and latched it as the strobes went off inside and the six loud explosive sounds came though the walls.
The moment the sounds died, Murdock jerked open the door and the SEALs charged into the room. There were no shots fired. The six Chinese were all on the floor moaning and holding their ears. All had their eyes shut. The SEALs bound them with riot cuffs and found the two crewmen in a locked side room. They came out, and the captain told them that they might get under way in a few hours. The men began to check controls and instruments.
“Commander, you said there were some problems at engineering?” Captain Prestwick asked.
“Yes, can you take us there?”
Five minutes later they came to the engineering section where Fernandez watched a door.
“In there, Skipper. Two of them, they saw me and holed up. That room important?”
“If we want to run the ship,” Murdock said. “Captain, any ideas? A back door, flood the thing with teargas?”
“No back door, no tear gas. It’s a small room. One of those flash bangs should do it.”
Fernandez had one. The captain unlocked the door, Fernandez threw in the non-lethal grenade and two minutes later engineering was back in friendly hands.
The captain smiled. “I think I own my ship again. No, those other Chinese with their submachine guns could still kill some of my passengers. Let’s wake up the purser and find out which rooms the Chinese are using.
“The thirty men you mentioned, did that include the guards out front?”
The captain shook his head. “No, thirty onboard. You’ve accounted for some already, four on the bridge, six in engineering, maybe three or four more. That should leave twelve or fourteen sleeping. We need to surprise them before they can get to their guns.”
The purser was not pleased to be rousted out of bed at 0245, but when he saw the SEALs he became absolutely chipper and ecstatic.
“Damn right I know where they are, the fourteen rooms they demanded. All in the crew quarters. I put them in the four to a room area. I call it our dormitory rooms. They have four of them side by side. I’ll show you exactly where they are.”
Murdock called in reserves on the Motorola. He had eight men marching down the corridors to the crew deck. The purser opened the first door and four SEALs charged in, binding hands and feet on two Chinese before they knew what happened. One soldier put up a fight but was promptly knocked out with a slash of an MP5. They went to the end of the four rooms and opened that one.
In the last of the four rooms there were only three men, and one was awake and got off a shot with a pistol. The round missed and Howie Anderson charged him and broke his arm taking the weapon away from him.
“Little shit, I should break your neck,” Howie brayed. He was the closest to the fired round.
Captain Prestwick couldn’t keep a delighted smile off his face. It was 0323 when the last Chinese was bound. All were walked to the Promenade deck and their ankles retied. They would be put off the ship as soon as it was ready to pull away. The ship’s engines fired up, and the crew alerted, bailing out of warm beds ready for action.
The captain said it would take at least an hour to get the ship ready to move. There were no other large ships docked near the Queen of the Seas. The SEALs counted twenty-eight Chinese ready to be kicked off the ship.
“The other two were the ones at the gangplank,” Lam said. “That makes the thirty we need. No stowaways.”
By 0430, Captain Prestwick said they were ready. The SEALs cut the plastic cuffs on the Chinese men’s feet and led them down the gangplank. Once on the dock their feet were bound with another riot cuff and they were added to the tethered Chinese on the dock.
Murdock was the last SEAL up the gangplank before it was released by the ship. It would be stowed on the dock later.
Murdock hurried to the bridge. He wanted to see the captain maneuver the big ship out into the channel. At the same time, he called on Howie Anderson to bring up the SATCOM. Time to alert the fly boys that they might be needed. It wouldn’t take them long to get to Hong Kong, and if they were in the area it would be even better.
“Queen here, CAG,” Murdock said on the SATCOM. “We’ve cast off our lines and are starting to maneuver into the bay. So far no Chinese other than those unconscious or tied up, know what’s going on. There could be an alarm sounded at any time. Quicker here the better.”
“We’ve had cover on you for about an hour,” the CAG on the aircraft carrier Stennis said. “You can talk to them on channel two on your dial. I’ll turn you over to them.”
Murdock made contact on the first transmission.
“Skyhigh, this is the Queen, glad you’re nearby. We’re pushing away from the dock now. No alarm yet. Will let you know what’s happening.”
“Good, Queen. We’re flying CAP about ten miles off shore. Can be in your area in three or four minutes. Good luck.”
Murdock watched the huge ship edge away from the pier. She used some kind of side thrusters that blew water to the side of the ship to ease her into or away from a dock. At last they were twenty feet away, but not anywhere near far enough to start a turn. The engines purred and they moved like a snail with an outhouse on its back.
Murdock scowled. Damn, what about those destroyers he heard were based in Hong Kong? They could do thirty to thirty-two knots. The Queen could make twenty if she were at top speed. No contest if one of the Chinese destroyers was sent on a chase. He had no idea where the nearest Chinese military air base might be. The Tomcats could take care of the fighters, and the F18s could handle patrol boats, but would they sink a destroyer?
They were forty yards away from the pier when the nose of the big ship began to come around so she could head out of the harbor, and to the northwest at the same time. A siren wailed from the pier and Murdock could see the flashing lights of a police vehicle.