And when he’d reflected upon the final numbers during moments of brutal honesty, he’d admitted the perfection of his staff’s size. Anything larger would have implied a need for contingencies, which the speed and decisiveness of his strike would preclude.
The sergeant’s heavy steps thudded on the fantail. “They’re ready, sir.”
“The keys are in the ignition?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Take in the lines and head below to suit up.”
Alone on the weather deck, the colonel nudged the throttle into reverse and backed he yacht from its mooring. A few gentle rudder and engine movements placed the vessel in the marina’s exit channel.
He turned northeast and accelerated to the channel’s permissible limit. Turning, he saw Muscat’s graceful nighttime skyline, including his former vantage atop the hotel, which a backdrop of mountains humbled.
With satellite navigation guidance, he ignored landmarks and focused on his electronic display. The icon of the target’s anchor awaited him seven miles away. Angling the yacht out of the channel, he shoved the throttle forward until the speed gauge indicated fourteen knots. The gulf became choppy, and he steeled his grip on the boat’s wheel.
The bulldog’s voice overcame the wind. “How’s it going, sir?”
The colonel glanced behind him at a wetsuit’s hood poking from the cabin’s door. Wind whipping his cheeks, he screamed over his shoulder. “I want you in the water in twenty minutes.”
The bulldog sergeant nodded and disappeared.
His heart racing with anticipation, the colonel pushed the vessel toward the target. A white mast light signaled its forward orientation, and its silhouette began to form.
With his yacht’s lights illuminated to prevent suspicion, he knew the sentries saw him. He kept his radio silent and drove.
Two miles from the target, beacons of white light shot from the target, and the colonel turned to see his sergeant awaiting his order. “Get over the side!”
Like bullets, seven dark figures shot from the cabin and hurled themselves over the yacht’s far flank. The eighth fighter, the sergeant, hesitated until the colonel locked eyes with him. In a moment of understanding, the bulldog offered a thumbs-up before jumping overboard.
To appease the sentries and keep pace with his submerged swimmers, the colonel slowed the boat to a crawl. As the sentries’ forms became visible, one barked commands and waved him away.
The colonel kept his craft pointed at his target.
As a sentry raised a rifle, the colonel started his charade.
From the adjacent seat, he grabbed a bottle of premium vodka that he’d emptied and refilled with water. He waved it over his head and screamed a feigned crazed yelp while turning the vessel’s broadside to his audience.
Keeping his distance, he turned away while reversing course to reveal the yacht’s other side. He cut in front of his target to see the sentries on both sides. Feeling like an idiot, he continued his performance as a drunken buffoon, guzzling from the bottle and then spitting water into the wind.
He glanced at his phone hoping for readiness messages from his swimmers, who he expected had separated into two groups. The first team had broken the water’s surface and had sent him a note, but he awaited communication from the second.
He steered away again for another broadside pass, and the sentries appeared irked but tolerating of the yacht-driving fool. The tardiness of his second team’s signal undermined his theatrical performance, and he remained muted during his third run.
Twisting the wheel away again for a fourth broadside pass, he cursed the inactive phone. “Damn it. Where are you?”
With his first team expecting an order, he lifted his phone and dictated a text message for his first team to hold while he awaited his second team’s report. Then he verified and sent the message.
Realizing his charade had stalled, he turned, stopped the yacht, and sat in silence. Deciding his unanimated presence presented adequate distraction to the topside guards, he waited.
And he waited.
Five minutes later, his receipt of the second team’s report calmed him, and he dictated a request for verification, asking both teams to confirm their readiness.
They did, and he dictated his final text — a single word ordering them to ‘shoot’.
With his finger over his phone’s ‘send’ button, he nudged the throttle. As the yacht accelerated, he turned to the sentries and howled. When they looked to him, he lowered his finger and held his breath.
Silenced subsonic rounds ripped through the sentries, and their silhouettes collapsed.
Killing the guards allowed boarding, but it also started a race against a clock. Whether his victims had raised an alarm or not, the ship’s owner would react.
He turned the yacht towards the target to board it.
Wanting his swimmers to scout ahead before sending his technicians, he willed them forward. As if fate heard his quiet prayer, four forms climbed one side of the vessel, and two forms mounted the other.
Questioning the numerical disparity, he noticed a clue. A rebreather appeared on the water’s surface atop the protruding humps of a motionless body, and he tallied a rising death toll.
He stamped his heel on the floor three times to signal the team below, and a technician’s head emerged from the cabin. “Is it safe?”
“Yes. Get ready to throw the lines over.”
Recognizing the squat shape of his sergeant on the target’s deck, the colonel aimed the yacht at him. He then veered his vessel alongside the anchored ship and ordered his technician to toss a rope to the waiting weathered warrior.
As the ships became mated, the colonel yelled. “Where are—”
The bulldog interrupted him. “Gone, sir. We lost two guys.”
The colonel settled his eyes on the bulldog’s body in the weak lighting, and he noticed a foot-long cut down his wetsuit. From his vantage, the bleeding appeared nonfatal. “You’ve got a gash on your side.”
“Oh this? I may have picked up a scratch helping out our guys a bit. I think our guys surprised the sentries, but whatever happened it, it happened fast. By the time I could get involved, it was too late to save our men.”
“But the swimming sentries are taken care of?”
“Our guys got one. I took care of the other.”
“Then this is still a successful insertion, if we can get inside.”
The bulldog craned his neck to a nearby swimmer who had removed keys from a deceased sentry and stooped over a hatch. After swimmer rotated a latch back and forth, withdrew the key, and nodded, the sergeant affirmed the good news. “We’ll get in, sir. Should I bring a man over from the other team?”
“No. There’s no time. I’ll go with you.” He backed to the yacht’s far end and then broke into a sprint. After accelerating across the deck, he leapt off the edge and reached for the targeted ship. Landing on all fours, he regained his balance and gathered himself to his feet. “Give me your pistol.”
The bulldog obeyed.
“Now a concussion grenade.”
The sergeant extended the second object.
The nonlethal weapon weighed upon the colonel’s hand as he walked to the hatch and knelt. “Get ready.”
The sergeant squatted behind the hatch, took the key from the other swimmer, and jammed it into its latch. He twisted it, and a click signaled the unlocking. “I’m ready, sir. How about a countdown?”
“On three. One, two, three!”
The sergeant yanked open the portal, the colonel tossed in the grenade, and the two men slammed the steel circle shut. After the exploding thud, the bulldog opened the hatch, and the colonel jumped into the hole.
His feet smacked the deck, and he stepped forward with his pistol up. In the dim light, he felt isolated until the dense mass of his partner landed behind him. In tense moments of silence, the colonel scanned his surroundings. “We’re alone.”