Within an hour they were coming up toward Laasgoray, a tiny hamlet on the coast.
“Colonel, we have a couple of surface contacts moving at pretty high speed here,” said Dish Mallack from his radar station upstairs. “Uh, two, hold—three patrol boats. They’re being ID’d by the computer as members of the Super Dvora Mk II class. That’s an Israeli ship, patrol boat, so the computer is just making a match to the closest type.”
“Flighthawk leader, see if you can get a close-up view,”
said Dog. He checked the sitrep map. The Abner Read—just barely visible on the radar—was about fifty miles farther east and just to the north, next to a much larger ship. Here was his chance to say hello to the task group’s commander, and maybe give him an assist at the same time.
“I think these may be the pirates Xray Pop has been hunting,” Dog told Zen. “Track them while we make contact.”
“I’m on it,” said Zen.
Near Laasgoray, Somalia,
on the Gulf of Aden
6 November 1997
2220
ALI STRAINED IN THE DIRECTION THE HELMSMAN WAS POINTing, but he saw nothing in the sky.
“It came from that direction,” insisted the man. “It flew toward us, then banked in the gulf.”
SATAN’S TAIL
99
A figment of the man’s imagination? Or an aircraft hunting for them?
“Stop the boats. Lie dead in the water,” said Ali. He took the signal lamp and flashed the message to the other boats personally as their speed slackened and the boat’s prow lowered into the water. “Man the forward gun and the SA-7,” he told the crew.
Two of the crewmen went to the stern and opened a water-proof locker where the antiaircraft missile was kept. The SA-7 was an old weapon dating to the Cold War, but properly handled, it could be effective against low flying aircraft, helicopters especially.
“Any word on the Adak?” he asked Bari, inquiring about the merchant ship they had left behind when Satan’s Tail approached.
“No sir. The timer has another five minutes to run.”
“There!” shouted one of the men at the bow. They swung the cannon in the direction of a shadow looming out of the dusky coast to their south.
“Hold your fire!” ordered Ali. “No one is to fire until I give the order. Bari, signal the others.”
Ali watched as the black triangle approached. It was low, no higher than fifteen hundred feet above. At first it seemed to be a great distance away; then Ali realized it was close but smaller than he had thought. For a moment he feared it was a missile, homing in on them. Despair fluttered in his stomach—he thought of the moment he realized his son was gone—then he realized that the craft was passing overhead.
“A radar is tracking us, Captain,” said Bari. “It may be an aircraft. It seems to be at long range, but it may be the way the signal is sent, a mechanism designed to be difficult to detect.”
“The docks at Laasgoray, quickly!” said Ali, spinning around and taking the wheel of the boat himself.
100
DALE BROWN’S DREAMLAND
Aboard the Abner Read , Gulf of Aden
6 November 1997
2223
“WE’VE FOUND THREE BODIES SO FAR,” SAID GORDIE, WHO WAS
heading the boarding team. “The bridge is a mess. Auxiliary controls look OK, though. We probably could get her into port with a skeleton crew. We’ll know better in the morning.”
“Storm, we have a report coming in from an Air Force unit,” said Eyes, who was standing next to him in the Tactical Center. “I assume it’s the Dreamland group you mentioned, though they won’t specifically identify themselves.
They have a location on three fast patrol boats about fifty miles from here. They’re on Com Line External Two.”
“Hold on, Gordie. Let me deal with this.” Storm went to his station in the Tactical Center. He punched the communications panel at the left. “Is this Colonel Bastian?”
“This is Technical Sergeant Mallack,” said the man on the other line.
“This is Captain Gale. Give me your boss.”
“Uh—”
“Now, mister.”
There was a slight pause, but no click or discernible static on the line.
“This is Colonel Bastian.”
“Colonel, you have surface contacts?”
“We have three fast patrol boats that are similar to Israeli Dvora II class. My radar operator has the specific locations.
They’re about fifty miles from your location, about seven-teen miles offshore but heading toward coastal waters. I haven’t had a chance—”
“Sink the bastards.”
“Excuse me?”
“You’re ordered to sink them.”
There was a pause. “You’re giving me an order?”
“Colonel, I’m sitting in the water next to a mer-
SATAN’S TAIL
101
chant whose crew they slaughtered. Sink them.”
“You know these are the ships?”
“What do you want? Pictures? If I’d been close enough to see them, I would have sunk them.”
“Sorry, Captain, but my orders don’t allow me to sink unidentified boats, or any boat for that matter,” said Dog. “I can track them for you; that’s the best I can offer.”
“That’s not good enough,” said Storm. “They’ll be in for-bidden territory in a second. Sink them.”
“Thanks for the advice.” The line snapped dead.
Aboard the Wisconsin , over the Gulf of Aden
6 November 1997
2223
DOG SHOOK HIS HEAD, WONDERING WHY EVERY NAVY OFFICER
he ever dealt with had an ego larger than an aircraft carrier.
“Patrol craft are starting to move again,” said Sergeant Mallack. He’d gotten his nickname, “Dish,” not because he worked a radar, but because he always went back for seconds, and sometimes thirds and fourths, in the mess hall.
“Any hostile action?” Dog asked Zen.
“Negative. They manned their guns and got a missile ready, but didn’t attack.”
“Follow them at a distance.”
“Flighthawk leader.”
Aboard Baker-Baker Two , over the Gulf of Aden
2224
“SO WHAT DO YOU FIGURE THE SUDANESE F-7MS WERE UP
to?” asked Spiderman as they got ready to drop their second control buoy.
102
DALE BROWN’S DREAMLAND
“Just a macho thing to show us that they’re here,” replied Breanna. “And to see what we were.”
“They didn’t go slow enough to see anything.”
“Maybe they were too scared to slow down,” said Breanna. “Piranha, how are we doing?”
“Probe’s just humming along,” said Commander Delaford. “We have control from the second buoy. Proceeding on course as planned.”
“All right. We’re going to swing south and drop our next control buoy, then climb and take a look around.”
“Roger that,” acknowledged Delaford.
“You sleeping yet?” Breanna asked Starship.
“No ma’am,” said the lieutenant. “Just wishing I’d had a Flighthawk to kick those two ragheads in the rear.”
“All right, let’s all just relax,” said Breanna. “We’re going to be out here for quite a while tonight. No sense using up all our adrenaline in one shot.”