Compass numbers swung upward, ticking to a southeasterly heading while his speed gauge walked to five knots. Patiently watching for minutes, he noticed the giant ship maintain its depth and stability while the submarine dragged it.
Accepting his passenger role, the colonel descended the stairs and entered the control room, where he offered his commander a gruff greeting in passing.
He then continued his sternward trek, passing multiple watertight boundaries, until he reached his bulldog and the starboard hull’s third commando. The younger warrior helped strap the sergeant into his rebreather, and a stuffed canvas bag of welding gear lay beside spare oxygen sources.
“Good timing, sir. I was just getting ready to call you.”
“What’s the status, sergeant?”
“All that’s left is to pressurize this compartment and come as shallow as we can to minimize the pressure difference across the door. The water’s going to push it open hard, but we can give ourselves good odds of closing it again.”
“Hold on.”
“What’s wrong?”
“If the three of us can’t close this door, we’ll all drown.”
“Do you want more hands back here?”
“No. There’s only enough space here for two of us to have good footing on the outside, and you’ll have to pull from the inside.”
“I can block the water flow a bit with my body.”
The colonel drove himself crazy trying to quantify the odds of killing himself if he opened the door. Then a new idea struck him. “What if we all just swam out?”
The bulldog stared blankly.
“You’re looking at me like I’m mad. I mean if we open a hatch and swim out of this ship.”
“We’d fail in our mission.”
The truth stung, but the colonel wanted to assess the option. “I know that. Just humor me.”
“We don’t have enough rebreathers for everyone.”
“We have enough for everyone on this side of the ship. We’d need only to flood a compartment with a hatch and open it when we’re ready to swim out.”
“You would abandon the others?”
“Never. Those on the other side could breathe forced air from the submarine while they flood a compartment that has a hatch. Then they could make for the surface while holding their breath.”
“Those with proper training could do that. But it’s doubtful for our technicians, and our unconscious man would die.”
As another truthful statement stung him, he updated his plan. “I’ll carry a rebreather to that side.”
“Just one?”
“For the unconscious man only, meaning I’ll give him mine when I get there. The rest can show some courage and survivability and follow me out the hatch while holding their breath.”
“How will you get in?”
“Through the hole in the starboard engine room.”
“You’d flood MESMA plant six on your way in.”
“MESMA plant four and forward would be fine. That would leave us enough time to escape from the forward hatch.”
The bulldog frowned while reflecting. “It could work, but it sounds like a last option. I’d rather enter this engine room now and regain propulsion.”
Like an epiphany rising from the confluence of seemingly random factors, a scintillating idea sprung into the colonel’s mind. He inhaled deeply while processing it. “Would you be willing to wait if I told you the Specter’s taking us somewhere favorable for our chances of survival, no matter which plan we follow?”
“Sure. I guess that depends where we’re going.”
Hungry after avoiding eating all night, the colonel decided to allow his team food. “Let’s make breakfast and have the port side eat as well. We need our strength, and I’m in the mood for eggs and bacon.”
“I’m always willing to eat. Just as long as I know I’m not letting myself get killed for lack of doing something else more important.”
“I need to verify my assumptions over the next several hours, but if I’m correct, time’s now working in our favor.”
“How so? What changed?”
“I just figured out Renard’s next move. He isn’t taking us back to Muscat. That arrogant bastard doesn’t know it yet, but he’s taking us straight home.”
CHAPTER 20
Terry Cahill required a conscious effort to walk without wincing.
As he slid closer to Jake, the Australian hid the pain behind his face. His abdomen and loins ablaze with acid from his combat swim, he’d hate himself if he missed his second chance.
The American’s question was a fair one. “You up for this again?”
“Bloody well right, I am.”
Having expected the anchor grab to end the flight, the Australian recovered from the disappointment of the hijackers’ resolve to continue resisting. Though the move had averted the Iranian threat, it had failed to surface the Goliath, compelling him and his colleagues to endure a furious debate about their next move.
The consensus — a final, unstoppable plan in which they’d continue dragging the Goliath to shallow waters to prevent its irrecoverable sinking. Settled on eight knots at snorkel depth as the optimum towing parameters, Jake had the Specter pulling the transport vessel towards the closest non-Persian shore.
Beyond that, the debate continued about how to force the hijackers from the ship, but sending swimmers played into all the top options, and Cahill vowed to be ready.
“I figured you’d want to get back to your ship. But let’s finalize the plan before you even think about suiting up. We’re talking ourselves in circles. We need to pick an idea and run with it.”
“I know. But we’ve got eight hours before we’re in shallow enough water to act. This is our first chance to plan something without having to race a clock.”
“We already have a good plan. If we place small explosives on every compartment, we can selectively set them off and drive them around like rats until they figure out they need to either give up or drown.”
The American’s default destruction mode chafed Cahill. “There’s no reason to risk more damage to me ship.”
“It’s just water damage. Half the equipment is waterproof, and there’s a French shipbuilder pumping out spare parts for anything we’d need to replace.”
Cahill welcomed his boss’ retort from the loudspeaker. “I appreciate your desire to end this Jake, but I am concerned with your enthusiasm to spend my money so liberally.”
“It’s spending pennies to save dollars when you consider the risk of anything worse happening to the Goliath.”
Across the table, the eldest legionnaire opened his mouth to speak, and Cahill braced himself. The lone English-speaking member of the Specter’s security team had been pushing an agenda of violence comparable to Jake’s opinions. “My plan to enter the engine room is best. I don’t have to flood things. No more damage. Not much anyway.”
Cahill saw a flaw. “Except bullets and grenades, and I don’t see how you’ll stop the flooding. My plan’s the only one that guarantees no further damage. We block the seawater intakes for each MESMA plant, and they become unusable. No more electricity, and eventually the air becomes unbreathable.”
Jake scowled. “That’ll take days to force them out.”
“We’ve got days, mate. What’s the hurry now?”
“Common sense. You give them days to think about how to escape, and they’ll find a way to escape.”
The legionnaire sounded frustrated. “No, you don’t understand. Nobody lets me explain.” The security leader then rattled off phrases in French.