Yet a third detail worked within the recovery ship, this one not made up of Bugis alone. A group of outsiders, a small mixed bag of Asian and Caucasian technicians, labored with the pirates. Pale-featured and nauseated at the sight of the sprawled bodies and scarlet-streaked bulkheads, yet decisive in their actions as they selected and removed hard-copy manuals, computer files, and key components from the Starcatcher’s systems bays.
Astern, the third of the schooners drew alongside of INDASAT 06 itself. Loincloth-clad swimmers went over the rail and set to work around the satellite, deactivating its marker strobes and hacking away the antenna of its radio transponders, working to the diagrams shown to them by their foreign advisers.
The flotation bladders were carefully vented until the spacecraft floated just awash beneath the waves. Then a camouflage shroud was wrestled up and out of the schooner’s hold and lowered over the side. A huge bag of lightweight parachute-grade nylon, colored in mottled sea tone blues and greens, it slipped smoothly over the INDASAT, concealing its stark white thermal shell.
The recovery tether to the Starcatcher was cast off and a short towing harness rigged to the stern of the Bugis schooner. The swimmers came back aboard, and diesel engines far more powerful than would be needed for a craft of the schooner’s displacement rumbled to life. The heavy wake streaming back from the hard-driving propellers would wash back over the towed satellite, helping to conceal its shadowy outline from all but the closest arial observation pass.
All tasks were done. It was time to depart.
Casting off from the lifeless Starcatcher, the two boarding ships pulled away, following the craft towing the satellite. All deck hatches on the recovery vessel were tightly dogged down. Belowdecks, however, all water tight doors and hatches gaped wide. Sledgehammer blows had smashed open the intakes and outlets of the powerplant cooling system and half a dozen six-inch streams of water geysered into the rapidly filling engine room.
Half an hour after the departure of the pirate force, the first broken porthole dipped beneath the ocean’s surface. Seven minutes later, the INDASAT Starcatcher capsized and sank, disappearing from the ken of man.
Palau Piri Island, Indonesia
Off the Northwestern Tip of Bali
0131 Hours, Zone Time: July 9, 2008
A classic Indonesian rijsttafel had been held at House Harconan for the new U.S. ambassador to Indonesia, honoring his first visit to Bali. Ambassador Randolph Goodyard and his wife had been introduced to the savory and exotic pleasures of the Indonesian “rice table” and to a select cadre of Indonesian movers and shakers, both courtesy of Makara Harconan.
Several hours of good conversation and excellent brandy had followed on the broad beachfront lanai of the sprawling single-story mansion. Eventually, however, group by small group, the guests had departed, borne back through the night to the Bali mainland. The majority was transported by a small flotilla of expensive motor yachts standing by at the estate pier, a select handful by the helicopters spotted on the commodious private helipad. Finally only the guests of honor and the host lingered.
Ambassador Goodyard lifted his glass in a final salute. “Mr. Harconan, my wife and I would like to thank you for a most entertaining evening, If this is the kind of hospitality l can look forward to, my tour here in the Far East will be most pleasantly memorable.”
Harconan tilted his head in mild self-effacement. “It was my pleasure having you honor my home, Mr. Ambassador. I hope your time with us will be both enjoyable for you and productive for your nation and mine.”
Although an Indonesian citizen, Makara Harconan was a man of many worlds. The multimillionaire trader and commodities broker was tall, with the tapering broad-shouldered solidity of his Dutch father. Yet, his dark and angular handsome features held the exotic kiss of his Asian mother’s blood as well. Born in Jakarta, he had chosen the island of Bali as a suitable base of operations for the growing business empire of a twenty-first-century taipan.
Harconan was a formidable individual and potentially both a valuable ally and a resource worth cultivating. Goodyard, a canny yet internationally inexperienced former governor from Nebraska, recognized this fact full well and had taken the opportunity to pump the trader on the local political and economic environment. Harconan in turn had been both forthcoming and helpful with his replies.
Now, at the tag end of the evening, there was one final question.
“Mr. Harconan, in your opinion, if one word could be used to sum up what I could expect from this part of the world, what would it be?”
Harconan frowned and lightly stroked his pencil-line moustache, a long-standing habit when he was in thought. For a long moment he considered the answer.
“Contrasts, Mr. Ambassador,” he replied finally. “In dealing with Indonesia, one must expect remarkable contrasts at all times.”
Rising from his rattan chair, he gestured westward toward the looming mountains and scattered coastal lights beyond the Bali strait. “There you have Java, the island with the highest population density on the planet. Yet, a comparatively few sea or air miles from here, you will find other islands where not a soul dwells and where one can still find ground that no other human foot has ever rested upon.
“Jakarta, the city where you have your embassy, is one of the most modern and sophisticated cosmopolitan areas in the world. Yet at the other end of the archipelago, you have lrian Jaya — New Guinea, as you would know it — where the Stone Age is still very much a going concern.
“To the northeast you have the oil sultanate of Brunei, possibly the richest nation on the face of the earth. Yet crushing poverty is also common. There are more followers of Islam in Indonesia than there are in all of the Mideast. Yet here also dwells the largest body of Hindus outside of India, while other islands have almost entirely been converted to the Christian faith. And over all, ancient tribal sorcery and animist beliefs linger on.
“Indonesia has the world’s fourth-largest population. Yet it is a population broken down into over three hundred separate and distinct cultures, speaking over two hundred and fifty different languages, rendering any kind of true single national identity a dream held only in Jakarta.
“You will find piercing beauty everywhere, yet also great ugliness. Kindness and joy abound, as do anger and hatred. Here is diversity beyond anything you have ever imagined, Mr. Ambassador, and always in vivid contrasts.”
Goodyard frowned, his expression indicating his sudden surge of homesickness for the simplicity of Lincoln. “It’s going to be a challenge,” he said, setting down his glass.
Harconan gave a minute nod to the Nung Chinese security man standing unobtrusively back in the shadows of the lanai. In turn, the guard whispered a few words into the lip mike of his radiolink. The cranking wail of a turbine engine came from the direction of the seaplane ramp as the pilots of Harconan’s corporate aircraft readied it for departure.
Harconan bowed over the hand of the ambassador’s wife, then extended his own to the ambassador. “Mr. Goodyard, I am at your disposal at any time. If I may be of assistance to you or your government, you need but call.”
“I’ll remember that, Mr. Harconan. And I thank you again. In a world where anti-Americanism sometimes seems rampant, your offer of friend ship is a comfort.”