“Perhaps you and I should begin brainstorming options while Jake and Dmitry take their trailing positions.”
Taking the hint, the Australian excused himself and walked away. He headed aft and felt the cramping confines of a normal-sized submarine. The crew’s mess seemed small, and he realized how accustomed he’d become to his huge ship.
He stepped into the tight space and saw a moving body. “Excuse me.”
“Yes?”
The man’s thick French accent and hesitance caught Cahill off guard. The Australian then realized that aboard the Specter he was a misplaced reminder of the fleet’s victimhood. “I’m Terry Cahill, commanding officer of the Goliath.”
“Of course. I’m Jean-Claude. What just happened is terrible. But don’t worry. Jake is the best. He’ll get it back for you.”
“I’m sure.”
“Can I get you something to eat or drink?”
“No, thanks. I was hoping you could help me get a tablet or a laptop with a communications link.”
“Sure. You can use mine. I’ll set you up at the dinner table. There’s a LAN connection there.”
Minutes later, Renard offered the Australian qualified privacy. “Jake and Dmitry can see my face, but they can’t hear me since I’ve muted their audio.”
“You’re mastering your fleet admiral’s technology.”
“It’s an art.”
“Where are you?”
“I’ve turned my hotel room into tonight’s command center. I’m using my phone’s hotspot as our communications channel. I’ll wager that it’s the most secure device in the Arabian Peninsula.”
“It might just be.”
“Unless the others can read lips, we have our privacy.”
He tested his boss. “I appreciate you ordering Jake and Dmitry to shut down the slow-kills.”
“Since we’re alone, I’ll share with you that the decision was a difficult one.”
“But the right one.”
“For now. Jake’s correct, though. This will end with a slow-kill if we can’t create a better option.”
“There’s got to be a way. You and Jake invented an entire industry based upon stealing or disabling submarines.”
“This is no mere submarine. It’s my flagship, and I want it back as much as you do, perhaps even more.”
“Sorry, I forget it’s your ship. I keep calling it mine.”
“That’s acceptable. Though I own it, you command it. I applaud your pride in ownership.”
Cahill embraced the sentiment. “Well, then. I want me damned ship back.”
“Understood. Shall we compare notes?”
“I haven’t really sorted through my ideas yet.”
“Stream of consciousness is fine.”
The Australian recalled his first foray with the Frenchman’s fleet. They’d stolen a Malaysian submarine by landing divers on its snorkel mast and injecting the ship with poison. “What if we did what we did when we took the Wraith?”
“Possibly. But I don’t know how long it would take to get canisters of poison ready or if there’s any predictability on the Goliath using its air intakes.”
“I know. There’s enough MESMA fuel for it to run hundreds of miles submerged, unfortunately.”
“That’s a good idea, though. We need to come at this with several ideas in parallel.”
Cahill prioritized his backlog of ideas and revealed the next one on his list. “We could alter a slow-kill to deploy only one or two bomblets.”
“That might work, but it’s tedious. Imagine if we were to place one hole in the control room. Then one in the crew’s mess. Then one in a MESMA plant. And so on and so forth until we’d sink it by a death of a thousand cuts.”
“I see. If we never hit the port engine room, those mongrels may keep pressing their luck and running.”
“I lament that the Lynx helicopter couldn’t finish the job, but the hijackers submerged too quickly.”
“I’m sure it took several hits for twenty-millimeter rounds to make a sizeable hole in me ship.”
The Frenchman frowned and looked to his arm. “I must take this call. Excuse me.”
As his boss stepped away, Cahill pondered the identity of the culprits. He reckoned the Wraith’s original Malaysian owners might be settling a score — with interest — by grabbing the more expensive combat cargo ship.
After joining the Frenchman’s fleet and taking command of the Goliath, he’d helped rescue a South Korean submarine from its northern adversaries. He questioned if the North Koreans sought vengeance through the theft.
Next, he’d challenged the conquerors of Crimea by vandalizing its connecting infrastructure, and he wondered if the hijacking represented Russian revenge.
Then, his attack on Greece had created a NATO enemy with reason to seek the Goliath.
Finally, Cahill’s interference in an Israeli civil war had left a failing prime minister who’d enjoy a public relations coup by stealing the ship that had ruined him.
The Australian then recalled what he knew of his boss’ history prior to his employment. The Chinese, Pakistanis, Syrians, Iranians, and Argentines could claim scores worth settling. Then his mind flitted over a mental map of random nations and rogue actors that could benefit from the Goliath’s stealth, speed, and firepower.
He accepted that the hijacker could be anyone as the Frenchman’s face returned on the screen. “I wish I had better news. I need you to keep a secret.”
“Of course.”
Cahill’s boss leaned forward and lowered his voice. “I mean from our team, especially Jake.”
“From Jake? What’s wrong.”
“His state of mind is too bellicose. I shouldn’t be surprised, since he’s wrestled with a deep anger since his childhood, and it still underpins his personality.”
“Okay, mate. I’ll keep the secret.”
“I stretched the truth earlier when I implied I was hesitant to call Miss McDonald. In fact, I called her immediately when I had the chance, and I shared everything.”
“That was risky.”
“And she just called me back. She’s threatened to share our predicament with the Fifth Fleet.”
“Bloody hell. Is she trying to kill us?”
The Frenchman shook his head. “I released her from any confidentiality.”
“Dear God. Why?”
“Because, if I’m honest with myself, I’d rather destroy the Goliath than let it become an instrument of wanton destruction in hostile hands. If we fall short of stopping it, I want the Americans to sink it before it could damage their assets.”
Cahill considered the Goliath part of his identity. He credited it with attracting his lover, the Israeli intelligence officer who’d become enamored with his deeds before meeting him. He equated losing his command to losing his manhood. “Well, shit. What’s that mean for us?”
“I know her well, and most of the implications were expressed in the words she didn’t say.”
“Okay, what didn’t tell you?”
“She understands the concept of a choke point, and I expect she’ll formally inform the Fifth Fleet before the Goliath reaches the Strait of Hormuz. Nothing gets through the straits unheard by the U.S. Navy, and it’s a proper point for them to engage. It would be irresponsible to let the Goliath pass into the Persian Gulf.”
Cahill’s mental map placed the American naval base more than one hundred miles outside his ship’s railgun range from the Strait of Hormuz. “That’s harshly conservative. But I understand.”
“Even if she’s not planning to draw the line, I will. I’m declaring the line of longitude running through Bandar Abbas as our terminus for having assets from the Fifth Fleet sink it.”