Stratton hadn’t learned much about the Saudi during the operational briefing because little was known about him. There had been a comparison made with the background of Osama bin Laden because like bin Laden, Sabarak came from a wealthy Saudi family and at some stage during his education, he developed a keen interest in the Wahhabi way of life. Sabarak’s family made its wealth from retail as opposed to construction. Sabarak chose to hide his extreme beliefs no doubt because bin Laden had not and had been a hunted man even before 9/11. Sabarak enjoyed frequent trips to Europe and America, staying in fine hotels and spending serious money. What you could call the usual Western entrapments: fast cars, state-of-the-art electronics, generally appearing to fully embrace the secular way of life. The guy had clearly plotted to bide his time and wait for an opportunity to take part in the anti-Western cause. He’d made the move at some period in the previous two to three years. As soon as he did, it was always going to be only a matter of time before his head popped up into the sights of Western intelligence agencies. But Sabarak would have been aware of that and he would have prepared as much as he could before he stepped into the light. Stratton wondered how far the Saudi had got in his planning, if he had a clue before his kidnapping that he had actually made the wanted list.
As things stood, while the pirates didn’t know anything about any of them other than their nationalities, Hopper and Stratton stood a chance of being offered up to the British authorities for ransom. But Sabarak only had to find the connection to Al-Shabaab.
Stratton decided to tests the waters. ‘Well, Sabarak,’ he said. ‘It would seem as if fortune has indeed changed in your favour.’
Sabarak looked at him and in the dim light the operative could see the man grin. ‘I am well aware of that,’ the Saudi said.
‘You think you’ll be able to sell your story to these guys?’
‘I’m as confident as you are that I can.’
Hopper leaned close to Stratton to whisper in his ear.‘Remember the rules. Make escape attempts early.’
Stratton looked through the anchor cable eye in the side of the boat beside him and down at the dark, cold water. The half-dozen small boats were empty and being towed behind the mother craft. Could they cut them loose and take one back to the Yemen coast? He doubted it. They would have to overcome a myriad of obstacles before they could even attempt it.
‘Any ideas?’ Stratton muttered.
Hopper had gone through a similar thought process and come to the same conclusion. Hopper leaned his head back against the metal side of the tug.
Stratton lay back and made himself comfortable against a pile of nets. He was cold, his soaked clothes and the chilly night air a bad combination. He decided it was going to be one of those situations when all he could do was wait for the right opportunity to present itself. And when it came he needed to be decisive.
The rhythmic thud of the engines went on and the rolling motion of the boat had a calming effect. After a while he drifted off into an uneasy sleep. He was awoken by a sudden rush of activity on board as several men ran past him. The engines had been cranked up to what must have been full power. Pirates were hauling in the speedboats ready for crews to jump down into.
Stratton sat up and squinted at the sun that had appeared low above the water on the port side. It confirmed to him they were sailing south. And from Yemen that meant directly towards Somalia.
Another man ran past and went up into the superstructure, leaving the door open. They could hear the speedboats revving up and skimming away over the water.
The chief stepped out of the superstructure and went along the side of the vessel towards the front without a glance at his prisoners, talking energetically into a radio. Several more men ran past the group, one of them kicking Hopper’s legs out of the way.
Stratton got to his feet, feeling his muscles stiffen. He looked around the vast, uninterrupted ocean. And he saw what all the fuss was about. Half a mile or so up ahead was a large cargo vessel. The pirates were going to work. He stepped along the deckside to see better. The leader saw him standing part of the way along the deck and shouted at one of his men, who aimed his rifle at the operative, moving the tip of the barrel repeatedly, urging him back to the stern.
Stratton obeyed but remained standing. Hopper joined him to watch the small boats go after their prey. As the mother craft got closer, they watched the half-dozen speedboats, their former craft included, buzz the rear of the ship like a pack of hyenas. It was some kind of bulk cargo carrier nearly a hundred metres long, but it had a couple of significant disadvantages faced with the pirates: the bulker was slow, going little more than ten knots, and it had a low freeboard. The top of the stern itself looked to be only a couple of metres above the water. The bulker’s sides, up until midships, were little more than three metres out of the water. Not enough to prevent pirates climbing aboard. For that the free-board needed to be at least five metres clear of the water and the carrier would need to reach a speed in excess of fourteen knots. It hadn’t because it couldn’t.
The bulker began to swerve from side to side, as sharply as it could, creating large waves behind it, sending a churning wake towards the pirate boats. From what Stratton could see, the carrier had little or nothing else in the way of physical defences. No water cannon. No barbed wire or fencing. Short of any surprises, the boat looked like easy pickings.
The crack of gunfire could be heard above the thud of the mother craft’s engines. The pirates were in full attack mode.
Stratton, Hopper and Sabarak weren’t the only ones transfixed by the attack. So was their armed guard. Stratton looked at the back of the guy, calculating the possible phases after incapacitating him. He looked at the four or five Somalis on the prow. Guns in hand. The odds were not good enough.
He stood on a pile of fish boxes in order to get a better look at the action.
The bulker leaned steeply over with each desperate turn, its decks empty. No sign of any crew on board. Stratton could imagine them all inside, hatches battened down, locked inside the citadel, hoping desperately that it would be enough to defend against the pirates. No doubt they would also be wishng they had done more defensive preparation before entering the Gulf of Aden. But like wild dogs, the Somalis had a reputation for pressing the attack for as long as there was a chance of succeeding. Stratton had heard of Somali pirates boarding a boat and staying on its deck for more than a day while trying to gain entry to it.
The two longer attack boats each carried five or six men, the others three or four. As Stratton watched, one of the little boats accelerated along the length of the cargo carrier. A bang followed by a rocket with a smoking tail shot from the speedboat and curved over the top of the ship, narrowly missing the bridge and dropping into the sea the other side.
A second speedboat tore up the starboard side and released a rocket of its own. This one struck the bulker’s funnel and exploded like a hand grenade with a sharp crack, leaving a dramatic black scar and indent on the red-painted metal.