“What can I do for you, sir?” he asked.
“We have a situation developing with the Chinese, courtesy of Alex Langley.”
Gibbs felt a pang of anger hit him at the mention of that name. Raine’s former C.O. had ended up taking a leaf out of his student’s book and resorting to treason. Gibbs had been made aware of the situation while the team was in Germany but had kept the information to himself. Despite his irritation at Langley going directly to Raine to inform him of a possible traitor in the team, Gibbs was the point-man on this mission and there hadn’t been any further reason for another team member to speak to him.
“We’re not waiting ‘til morning. I’m escalating the time-line,” the president explained. “You have a go to proceed with Phoenix as soon as possible.”
Gibbs absorbed this information and his revised orders with his usual detached professionalism. “I understand, Mister President.”
There was a pause, then; “Godspeed.”
The finality of the president’s farewell as the line clicked dead sent a shiver down Gibbs’ spine but his concerns were cut through by the voice of the navy pilot at the helicopter controls.
“I have a visual on our destination, sir.”
Gibbs pushed out of his seat and staggered up behind the cockpit, staring between the shoulders of the two pilots.
The sun was setting, its dying rays bursting through the gathering storm clouds to the west and turning the choppy waters of the Pacific to molten gold. But, silhouetted against it, tiny from this altitude and spread out in a two-mile wide defensive pattern around their destination, were the six ships of the task force. One, the furthest out, was by far the largest. The USS George Washington.
In the centre of the defensive net another gun-metal grey ship bobbed on the swell. Gibbs gripped the back of the pilots’ chair as the chopper dropped in altitude and raced down towards that lonesome vessel, slowing into a hover as they prepared to touch down on the helipad on the ship’s stern.
In bold letters etched into the gun-metal grey aft bulkhead, the ship’s name was emblazoned: USS Eldridge.
54:
Blood in the Sky
Raine and King broke the surface and heaved in a great lung full of air. Unfortunately, the air was anything but the sweet tasting nectar they had both anticipated. Instead, it was cloying and laced with the acid taste of burning diesel. All around them fires crackled and popped as they consumed the slicks of oil which shone metallic on the heavy swell. All that remained of the boat.
All that remained of Sid.
Almost immediately upon surfacing, Benjamin King broke into sobs of tears, his breathing laboured. He choked on the burning fumes and coughed on sea water as he sank beneath the surface again. Raine held him afloat, giving him a moment. He could feel his body tremble as he held him beneath the arms. To have him drown now would have been a crying shame considering all that Rudy O’Rourke had done to save them.
The main tip-off had been his reference to the Sri Lanka mission, but Raine had been picking up on subtle hints as far back as the mission to the mine in Cornwall. In reality, Raine had known all along that the presidential pardon he had been given wasn’t worth the paper it was written on. Sooner or later he knew that someone would come for him. He hadn’t, however, truly thought that Gibbs would murder three innocent scientists in cold blood, not to mention the U.S. marines.
But, while suiting up on the deck of the boat, Raine had been puzzled to find O’Rourke secretly placing bullet-proof vests on them. “Kinda reminds you of that time in Sri Lanka, ay, Boss?”
Almost five years ago, on O’Rourke’s first mission on Raine’s team, they had infiltrated a group of pirates who had been holding an American diplomat hostage. But O’Rourke’s cover had been blown and Raine had been ordered to kill him. If he didn’t, his cover would have been blown too and the diplomat executed. During a mock confrontation with the soldier, Raine had managed to sneak a slab of metal under his shirt and then proceeded to shoot him. He’d fallen overboard and, despite being dazed and in pain, the young recruit had had the good sense to sink.
Now, just like Sri Lanka, knowing he had been ordered to execute Raine and the scientists, the now more experienced soldier had perfected Raine’s own deception, using bullet proof vests and sachets of fake blood. When the time came, Raine, King, Sid and Nadia would be shot and go overboard. Still in their diving equipment, they’d stay underwater until the boat left then swim for the island.
But it hadn’t gone quite according to plan.
“You knew.” King came to the conclusion just as the thoughts were running through Raine’s head. “You knew they were going to betray us yet you did nothing!” He thrashed out of Raine’s grip and began to go under.
Once they had been shot off the back of the boat, Raine had dragged King down to the seafloor as quickly as possible. The pain was excruciating. While the bullet proof vests had prevented the bullets from entering their bodies, the impact was still enough to knock a man unconscious from the pain. Both men now felt the bruises swelling on their chests from at least half a dozen impacts.
Above them, the two marines, not wearing bullet-proof vests, were torn apart by the sharks that zeroed in on their blood. But King was also covered in blood — Sid’s blood — and so Raine had quickly stripped the dazed man of any equipment with blood on it, including his buoyancy vest and rebreather system, as well as Raine’s own gloves.
Then they had sat in silence in the shelter of the Yonaguni Monument, sharing the single rebreather, passing it from one to the other. At first it was clumsy and King had been close to panic whenever Raine took the mask from him to get his own gulp of air. But, eventually, they’d found a rhythm, and that was how they remained for almost half an hour, until the boat had been obliterated and the sharks had finished their gruesome feast and moved on.
“Benny, calm down,” he told him now.
“No! I won’t calm down!” He splashed, his head going beneath the waves despite his kicking.
“Ben, you’re exhausted.” Raine grasped the other man’s arms and held him tight. With his own vest inflated he wouldn’t sink.
“You knew!” King cried, his face a mask of agony. “You just let them—”
“Rudy saved us,” Raine explained.
“Us but not Sid!”
“He tried. I tried.”
“How?! How did you—”
“I tried to get out of the water with them. So long as the four of us stayed together and kept our bullet-proof vests on I knew we’d be safe. I didn’t know Nadia was going to—” He cut himself off, overcome by anger. Betrayal. But now wasn’t the time. “Benny, we’ve got to swim to land. It’s not far—”
“Leave me!” King broke from his grip again. The hollowness in his eyes, in his voice, was painful to witness. “I don’t want to go to land,” he sobbed, fresh tears falling. He trod water slowly and began to sink. “I can’t leave her, Nate.”
“Ben, I—”
“Just go!” he spat. “Go! Leave me!”
“I’m not leaving you!” Raine snapped determinedly. “I know what you’re going through—”
“You don’t have a clue what I going through!” He dropped below the water then kicked up again, coughing and choking. Raine grasped him and held him steady as he gagged.