“Yes, sir. All engines, ahead full. Making turns for twenty-six knots.”
“Chief Haldiman, inform the task group to form up on us. Right echelon at two-thousand-meter intervals”
“Aye, aye, sir. Right echelon at two thousand.”
MacIntyre slapped the phone to its cradle. By God, it felt good to be commanding a ship again instead of a political entity. Tugging his ratty commander’s cap lower over his eyes, he leaned back against the bulk head, savoring the growing vibration of the Sutanto’s propellers.
“Admiral, can I ask you a question?” Nichols asked from the helm station.
“Of course, Miss Nichols. What about?”
“Our flag, sir. We’re running this tub, so she shouldn’t be operating under Indonesian colors anymore. But she’s not a commissioned vessel of the United States Navy, so we can’t officially fly the stars and stripes either. But shouldn’t we have some kind of battle flag if we’re going into a fight tomorrow?”
“Valid points, I suppose, Lieutenant,” MacIntyre replied, wondering where this conversation was heading. “Do you have any suggestions?”
“Uh, yes, sir, the subject did come up within the Special Boat Detachment and we’d like to put forward a proposal. Higbee, show the admiral.”
An SB hand dug a mass of dark cloth out of a flag bag and passed it to MacIntyre. The admiral unfolded it, trying to make out the design in the dimness. When he did, his bellow of laughter made the wheel house ring.
“Excellent choice, Lieutenant. My compliments to you and to the detachment: It suits our purposes perfectly. Have it run up to the main truck immediately.”
Three warships raced on, closing the range with the coast of New Guinea, the light of the Southern Cross and a million more tropic stars caught and reflected in the spray of the bow waves. Aboard the lead vessel, the smallest yet at the moment the most critical of the trio, a bundle of black fabric rose jerkily to the head of the latticework mainmast. A lanyard was yanked and the banner streamed in the trade wind, the stark white skull and crossbones grinning into the night.
MV Harconan Flores, Crab’s Claw Cape
0614 Hours, Zone Time: August 25, 2008
Amanda Garrett’s eyes snapped open and she found herself instantly awake and poised for… what? The master’s cabin was dark; the dim, silvery glow of the cavern work lights leaked through the slatted blinds of the portholes, sketching shapes, shadows, and outline, including that of the masculine form lying still on the other side of the bed.
Experimentally she held her breath, listening. There was nothing save the purr of the cabin air conditioner and the more distant mumble of the ship’s auxiliary power plant. That and the occasional muffled voice and metallic transitory of a crewed ship at a moorage.
Nothing was different. Nothing had changed. Yet, Amanda was totally alert and aware, stimulated by the ringing of some subliminal alarm. She recognized the state as a personal call to battle stations, never to be disregarded.
She closed her eyes against the dark and sought for the central node of the warning.
How long had it been since her kidnapping? Five nights. How long since she had painted her message on the surface of the sea? Three nights. Granted that it had worked, how long might it take to be noticed and deciphered? How long would it take the task force to follow it up and pinpoint this base? How long to plan and position for an attack?
She added the hours up in her mind and opened her eyes once more. Today. They would be coming today — soon.
Amanda brushed aside the single sheet covering her nude form. Flowing to her feet, she silently padded the two steps to the porthole. Peering out, she saw only the shadow-streaked cavern wall and wooden pier side with the gun emplacement at its end. A pair of sentries, one Bugis the other Melanesian, paced listlessly in and out of the work-light pools. All was as it had been for her last two days’ imprisonment here.
She was the only one with the warning. When the time came, Amanda knew she must be ready to act. Exactly what she was going to do would depend on circumstances and luck. She had certain ideas, but she would have to see how things broke.
The porthole was located near the foot of Harconan’s bed. As she turned away from the port, her eyes fell naturally on him. She paused, then reached back to the blind, silently parting the lattice with her finger tips. A band of illumination fell across Harconan’s decisive, angular features, softened slightly in sleep.
He was beautiful, a beautiful, wild, and dangerous animal and a deadly risk to the peaceful flocks she had sworn to protect. Thus, she must destroy him.
Yet, they were alike, as the ancestors of the wolf and sheepdog must have once hunted side by side. Amanda knew it, sensed it in the hunger and recklessness he had inspired in her. So different from any other man she had known. Different from the joyful comradeship she’d shared with her last youthful lover. Different from what she would share with that half-visualized ideal she sought for. Different.
And Makara — had he fallen sway to that impossible dangerous draw as well? He must have. Why else was she here? Why else would he keep her at his side this way unless he genuinely believed that the sheepdog could be called out to run with the pack again?
And it could not be, not in any way or manner, save for maybe one.
Amanda slipped under the sheet beside that powerful, long-muscled form. Covering Makara’s body with her own, she brought him fully awake with her mouth on his, her body aching. This time she was the aggressor, urgently demanding her fill, savoring this one last moment of madness.
USS Cunningham, CLA-79, on Buccaneer Station
30 Miles West of Crab’s Claw Cape
0721 Hours, Zone Time: August 25, 2008
“Navicom reports we are on station, sir,” the helmsman said, looking up from his station at the central bridge console. “CIC verifies we have matching coordinates for Firing Station Buccaneer as per the action plan.”
“Very good, Helm,” Commander Ken Hiro replied. “Stop all engines. Initiate active station-keeping. Quartermaster, sound general quarters, bombardment stations!”
Throughout the superstructure and hull, the bawling Klaxons sounded the call to arms. In drill and in reality Hiro had heard them sound many times before aboard the Duke. There was a different tone to them now, though. Before, he had been serving as Amanda Garrett’s executive officer. Now he was Captain, under God, and they were sounding the call to battle under his command.
I wonder if your throat was dry that first time in Drake’s Passage, ma’am, Hiro thought to a presence not at his side. It sure didn’t sound or look like it.
It was that way every time, Ken, every time. Trust your ship. Trust your crew. You’ve got them both ready.
But you’re going to be the one under our guns out there, ma’am.
Ken visualized the ironic lift of a pair of brows. Why do you think I’m glad it’s the Duke doing the job? Carry on, Mr. Hiro.
“Aye, aye, ma’am.” He smiled and whispered the acknowledgment aloud. Turning to the racked combat gear on the rear bridge bulkhead, he took down and donned the combination flak vest and lifejacket and the gray Kevlar helmet with the white-stenciled CAPTAIN on its brow.
Down the long open sweep of the Cunninham’s foredeck, in the forward-most Vertical Launch System array, half a dozen missile silo lurches swung open, big silo hatches, taking up four of the standard bunch cells.
Aft of VLS Array One, in the space taken up by what at one time had been the second of the Duke’s three Vertical Launch Systems, another pair of rectangular hatches retracted, revealing a pair of guide tracks set in slots in the deck. A pair of massive gun barrels slid up the tracks, fixed to fire forward at a shallow angle off the bow, they locked into train with only a couple of feet of muzzle protruding.