Plague Ship

by Clive Cussler

  With her bow configured and reinforced to crash through sea ice, the Oregon slammed into the bridge, riding up on it in an earsplitting squeal of steel. Rather than crush the bridge, the tremendous weight of the hull snapped the locks that held it in place and it sank under the hull. The Oregon came back down with a tremendous splash that sloshed back and forth against the canal sides and dangerously slewed the ship.

  Max looked up. It was as if the canal’s featureless rock walls reached the heavens. They dwarfed the ship, and, up ahead, the automobile and railroad bridges looked as light and delicate as girders from his boyhood Erector set.

  The tramp freighter continued to charge through the canal, and, to Eric’s credit, he kept it dead center, using the Oregon’s athwartship thrusters with such delicacy that the flying bridges never once touched the side. Max chanced stepping out on one and walking all the way to the end. It was foolish and dangerous. If Eric made a mistake, a collision at this speed would tear the platform off the superstructure. But Max wanted to reach out and touch the stone. It was cool and rough. At this depth, the canal remained in shadow for most of the day, so the sun never had the chance to warm it.

  Satisfied, he hurried to the bridge just as the Oregon heaved slightly and the railing smacked the canal wall. Eric shifted their heading infinitesimally, so as not to overcorrect, and centered them once again.

  “Linda’s van is just about at the New National Road bridge,” Gomez called over the intercom. “I can see the Chairman, too. He’s still got a good lead on the jeep chasing him.”

  “On my way down,” Max said, and moved for the elevator.

  THE DAMAGED TIRE finally shredded a quarter mile from the bridge, and they covered the distance riding on the rim, sparks shooting from the back of the van like a Catherine wheel. The sound was like fingernails across a chalkboard, something Linda hated more than any other noise in the world. She wasn’t sure what made her happier when they reached the center of the span: that they were almost home free or that the unholy shriek had ended.

  Franklin Lincoln threw open the side door as soon as they stopped. He could see the Oregon fast approaching and heaved three thick nylon climbing ropes off the bridge. The ropes were secured around the van’s seats and through a frame member that was exposed in the cargo area. They uncoiled as they fell through space and came up just ten feet shy of the sea.

  Linda quickly jumped out of her seat and donned her rappelling gear—harness, helmet, and gloves—while, two hundred feet below them, water frothed at the Oregon’s stern as reverse thrust was applied to slow her. With the power of her massive engines, she lost headway almost immediately.

  Linc had already strapped himself into a harness used by tandem parachute jumpers, and, with Eddie’s help, they had clipped an unconscious Kyle Hanley to him. The three of them then secured themselves to the lines and waited for word from down below.

  On the Oregon, crewmen at the bow grabbed the dangling ropes and guided them aft as the vessel crept forward, making sure they didn’t become entangled with the superstructure, communications antenna, or any of the hundreds of things that could snag them. As soon as the men reached the aft deck, Max ordered his people to go.

  Never one to be bothered by heights, Linda stepped onto the guardrail and started lowering herself from the bridge. Eddie was on one side of her, and Linc, carrying Kyle, made his way down the other. They lowered themselves down the bridge’s underpinning girders, and then, suddenly, they were dangling two hundred feet over their ship, nothing holding them in place but the three-quarter-inch lines.

  With a whoop, Linda shot down her rope like a runaway elevator. Eddie and Linc quickly followed, almost free-falling through space before using their rappelling harnesses to slow their descent. They touched down at almost the same time, and stood still so that their crewmates could unhook them from the ropes. The lines’ trailing ends were quickly knotted around cast-iron bollards bolted to the ship’s deck.

  Breathless from the adrenaline rush, Linda said, “Now for the fun part.”

  Watching the action on deck from the closed-circuit television system, Eric Stone didn’t wait for orders. He eased the T-handle throttle forward slightly to edge the ship farther up the canal. The slack in the ropes vanished in an instant, and then they quivered for a second before the ship’s thrust rolled the rental van over the guardrail. It plummeted like a stone, smashing into the water just behind the Oregon’s fantail. The impact flattened its roof and blew out all its windows. The weight of its engine caused the van to upend, like a duck diving for food, and it bobbed in the ship’s wake for a moment before filling with water and sinking out of sight. They would tow the ruined vehicle well into the Aegean before cutting the ropes and allowing the van to sink to the bottom.

  The van was rented by a disguised crew member using false identification, and there would be no link back to the Corporation. And only one more person needed to rejoin the ship for the mission to be considered a success, even if they had to go so deep into their playbook that they had to use plan C.

  CABRILLO RACED TOWARD the Corinth Canal, flashing by villages and small farms in a blur. In the moonlight, stands of conical cypress trees looked like army sentries guarding the fields.

  No matter how recklessly he took corners or how brutally he punished the jeep’s transmission, he couldn’t shake his tail. Denied returning their kidnapped member, the men chasing him wanted blood. They drove just as hard, using both lanes of the road and often skidding into the gravel verge in their pursuit. They had managed a few potshots at Cabrillo, but at the speeds they were traveling there was no chance to fire accurately, and they’d stopped, presumably to conserve ammunition.

  Juan regretted not raising the windscreen as he squinted against eighty-mile-an-hour wind. It didn’t help that a breeze had picked up, and grit as nebulous as smoke drifted across the road and scoured his eyes. He flashed past the site of ancient Isthmia. Unlike other ruins dotting Greece, there was nothing to see on the low hillock, no temples or columns, just a sign and a tiny museum. What he noticed most, however, was a sign stating the modern town of Isthmia was two kilometers ahead. If the Oregon didn’t get into position soon, he was going to be in trouble. The jeep’s gas gauge was staying above EMPTY on the sheer force of his will.

  He heard his name in his earbud and had to adjust the volume on his radio. “Juan here.”

  “Chairman, it’s Gomez. Linda and the others are safely aboard. I’ve got you on the drone, and Eric’s making his calculations now, but you might want to slow down a touch.”

  “You do see that other jeep behind me, right?”

  “I do,” the chopper pilot drawled. “But if we don’t get this just right, you’re going to end up like a fly on the wrong side of a swatter, if you know what I mean.”

  The simile was more than apt. “Thanks for the mental picture.”

  The road started to descend down to the coast. In order to save fuel, Juan mashed the clutch and let momentum and gravity take over for a few seconds. He drove with one eye on the side mirror, and a few seconds after spotting the Responsivists’ headlights he eased off the clutch to let the engine engage again.

  The motor sputtered. It caught instantly, but gave another weak cough. Cabrillo used an old stock-car driver’s trick, weaving the jeep to slosh the gasoline in the tank. It seemed to work because the engine purred.

  “Juan, Eric’s finished with his number crunching,” Adams said. “You’re eight hundred and seventy meters from the bridge, meaning you’re too close. You need to slow down to fifty miles an hour if we’re to make this happen.”

  The pursuing jeep was eighty yards back and closing. The road was too straight for Juan to do much maneuvering, and, when he tried to swerve again so they would waste a shot, the motor wheezed. He cursed.

  “I’m coming in hot. Tell Eric to goose the old girl and meet me.”

  He entered the town of Isthmia, a typical Greek seaside village. He could smell the sea and the io
dine taint of drying fishing nets. The buildings were mostly whitewashed, with the ubiquitous red-tiled roofs. Satellite dishes grew from many of them like high-tech mushrooms. The main drag opened on a small village square, and Cabrillo could see the stanchions that raised and lowered the narrow bridge to cross the canal beyond.

  “Okay, Chairman.” This time, it was Eric in the earbud. “You need to slow down now. Exactly fifty-two kilometers per hour or you’re going to hit us.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “It’s simple vectors. High school physics,” Eric replied as if he’d been insulted. “Trust me.”

  The crack of a rifle sounded behind Cabrillo. He had no idea where the bullet went but had no choice but to ignore it and comply with Eric’s directions. As he slowed, the AK-47 chattered on automatic. He could hear the bullets striking the jeep. One passed over his shoulder close enough to ruffle the cloth of his uniform shirt.

  The bridge was fifty yards away and the Responsivists maybe fifty yards behind him. Traveling at the required speed took every ounce of self-control Cabrillo possessed. The primitive part of his brain was screaming for him to floor it, to get out of there as fast as he could.

  Appearing like a colossus, the bow of the Oregon suddenly emerged from behind a four-story building that was blocking Juan’s view of the canal. She never looked so beautiful.

  And, suddenly, she was rearing up, her plates scraping against the bridge, as she had done when she’d first entered the canal. She rose higher and higher, climbing up the bridge as if she were cutting an ice pack. With a shearing clang, the mechanical systems that operated the bridge gave out under her titanic weight, and the ship crashed back into the canal with barely a check in her speed.

  Juan kept driving at her, seemingly bent on crashing into her armored flank. The men chasing him must have thought he was bent on suicide.

  Fifteen yards to go and panic began to hit him. They’d timed it wrong. He was going to slam into the ship as she glided out of the canal. He could feel it. More gunfire erupted from behind him. It was answered by someone firing from the Oregon’s railing. He saw the muzzle flash against the darkened hull.

  Seconds now. Speed, vectors, timing. He’d gambled and lost and was about to crank the wheel over when he spotted the yawning opening of the boat garage bathed in red battle lights. The Oregon was ballasted perfectly to the bottom lip of the ramp they used to launch Zodiacs and their assault boat was just slightly lower than the roadway.

  Keeping it at exactly fifty-two kilometers per hour, he hit the end of the road, jumping the one-foot gap separating the damaged bridge from the Oregon and landing inside his ship. He hit the brakes and caromed into reinforced netting set up to stop boats during high-speed maneuvers. The jeep’s air bag deployed, further cushioning Juan from the brutal deceleration.

  From outside, he heard the squeal of brakes. Tires dug in hard but not hard enough. Spinning sideways, the pursuing jeep slammed into the hull with a dull ring and teetered against the plates as the ship passed by. Metal tore against metal, as the Oregon ground the jeep against the side of the canal, flattening the vehicle and its occupants, until Eric Stone gave a little lateral thrust and the jeep fell into the water.

  Max materialized at Cabrillo’s side and helped him dig out from under the deflated air bag. "Plan C, huh?”

  “It worked, didn’t it?” They exited the boat garage, Juan moving a little stiffly. “How’s Kyle?”

  “He’s sedated down in medical with Hux.”

  “We’ll get him straightened out.”

  “I know.” Max stopped and looked into Juan’s eyes. “Thank you.”

  “No thanks necessary.” They started walking toward the infirmary.

  "If plan C was this nuts, you’ve got to tell me about plan D.”

  “Oh sure.” Juan grinned. “Only problem with that one was, we couldn’t find enough Spartans to re-create the battle of Thermopylae.”

  CHAPTER 15

  A PATROL CRAFT FROM THE HELLENIC COAST GUARD approached the Oregon just as the dawn sun crested the horizon. After a mad sixty-mile dash from the Corinth Canal, they were cruising at a steady fourteen knots, an appropriate speed for such a dilapidated ship. The sooty smoke pouring from her funnel made it appear as though the engine was burning as much oil as bunker fuel. Over the radio, the captain of the forty-foot patrol boat didn’t sound too concerned about a rust-bucket freighter, so far from the scene of the crime, being the culprit.

  “No, Captain,” Juan bluffed smoothly. “We’ve been nowhere near Corinth. We were on our way to Piraeus when our agent radioed that our contract to haul olive oil to Egypt had been cancelled. We are continuing on to Istanbul. Besides, I don’t even think this old girl could fit in the canal. Too wide in the hips.” Cabrillo gave a lewd chuckle. “And if we had hit a bridge, our bows would have been crushed. As you can see, that is not the case. You are welcome to board and inspect them, if you wish.”

  “That won’t be necessary,” the Coast Guard captain replied. “The incident occurred a hundred kilometers from here. By the looks of your vessel, it would take you eight hours to travel that far.”

  “And only with the wind at our backs,” Juan quipped.

  “If you see any ships acting erratically or have damage to their bows, please contact the authorities immediately.”

  “Roger that, and good hunting. Atlantis out.” Juan waved at the small cutter from the wing bridge and ambled back inside, blowing out a long breath. He hung the radio hand mike back on its hook. The coiled cord trailed onto the floor.

  “Did you have to invite them over for an inspection?” Eddie Seng asked from where he stood at the ship’s wheel, pretending to steer.

  “They never would have taken me up on it. The Greeks want to nail someone’s hide to the outhouse door for what happened back in Corinth. They’re not going to bother with a ship that couldn’t possibly be involved.”

  “What happens when they correlate all of their eyewitness accounts of what happened and come to the conclusion that we are the only vessel that fits the description?”

  Juan slapped him on the shoulder. “We’ll be deep into international waters and they’ll be looking for a ship called the Atlantis. As soon as there’s no other boat traffic around, I want the name plates on the fantail and fairleads changed back to Oregon.” He paused for a moment before adding, “Just in case someone has an eye for detail and a long memory, we’ll be avoiding Greece for a while.”

  “Prudent precaution.”

  “First watch should be up any second. Why don’t you head below and get some well-earned rest. I’ll want your after-action report on my desk by four this afternoon.”

  “Should make for some interesting reading,” Eddie remarked. “In my worst nightmares, I never expected that hornet’s nest we walked in on.”

  “Me neither,” Juan admitted. “There’s a lot more to these people than what we saw on their website and what the deprogrammer told Linda. That level of paranoia means they’re hiding something.”

  “The obvious question is, what?”

  “Maybe we’ll get lucky and no one will notice the bug I planted.”

  Eddie shot him a dubious look. “The first thing their head of security’s going to do is sweep every square inch of that place looking for listening devices.”

  “You’re right. I know. So if an electronic spy doesn’t work, we send in a human one.”

  “I’ll go.”

  “You don’t exactly have the look of a lost soul searching for meaning in life who’s willing to blindly follow some wacko’s rants.”

  “Mark Murphy?” Eddie suggested.

  “He fits the bill to a tee, but he doesn’t have the skill sets to pull off an undercover job like this. Eric Stone would be another candidate, but the same problem crops up. No. I was thinking of Linda. As a woman, she would draw less suspicion automatically. She’s got a background in intelligence work, and, as we have both seen a dozen times over, she knows how to keep h
er head.”

  “How would you make it work?”

  Juan smiled tiredly. “Give me a break, will ya? I’m making this up as I go along. The three of us will meet before dinner and brainstorm a strategy.”

  “Just so long as it doesn’t turn into a plan C,” Eddie teased.

  Cabrillo threw up his hands in mock exasperation. “Why is everyone giving me a hard time about that? The plan worked.”

  “So do most Rube Goldberg contraptions.”

  “Bah!” Juan dismissed him with a wave.

  Before heading for his cabin for what he hoped to be about ten hours of uninterrupted sleep, Juan took the elevator down to the Op Center. Hali Kasim was bent over his workstation, papers strewn about his desk as though a hurricane had just passed through. A pair of headphones flattened his otherwise-curly hair. Unlike others whose faces turn to stone when deep in thought, Hali’s Semitic features were serene, a sure sign his brain was churning.

  He startled when he felt Cabrillo standing over him. He stripped off his headphones and massaged his ears.

  “How’s it coming?” Juan asked. Moments after checking in on Dr. Huxley and Kyle Hanley when he’d returned to the Oregon, Juan had asked Hali to monitor the bug he’d placed in Gil Martell’s office.

  “Reminds me of that urban legend about hearing voices in the white noise of a television tuned to a station that’s off the air.” He handed the headphones to Juan.

  They were warm and a little damp when he slipped them on. Kasim hit a button on his computer. Static filled Juan’s ears, but in it he could hear something. To call them words would be an overstatement. They were more like low tones underlying the crackle of electronics.

  He pulled off the headphones. “Have you tried scrubbing the tape?”

  “This is scrubbed. Twice.”

  “Put it on speaker and play it from the beginning,” Juan told him.

  A few keystrokes later, the recording began. Because the bug was sound activated, it had remained dormant until someone entered the office.