by David Poyer
Henrickson. The little guy was fast up the ladder, but went wide when he came off it. Oberg hauled him back and pointed him the right way. He wondered if he wanted Henrickson behind him with a weapon. The guy was fine at a computer, but Oberg could see him turning tail if the going got tough. But they only had so many bodies. Just enough to secure a ship, if they all did their jobs. Carpenter was hopeless on the ladder. He’d been looking more and more bushed since they got to the camp; said he was having trouble sleeping. The submariner seemed to be able to handle the wheel, though. He’d have felt better with two guys in the boat. The old SEAL saying: “Two is one, one is none.” But if he didn’t have them, they’d still have to do the job.
“Okay, heads together here. Let’s go over who goes where again.”
The wreck wasn’t much like the ship they were going to board, plus, there was a big hole forward; anybody who wasn’t paying attention would go down twenty feet onto jagged steel. So he’d laid out rocks and boards on the beach and run them through it a dozen times.
He put the red spot of his Pelikan on the photo. A shot of Fengshun No. 5, taken from directly above. Labels identified the deck house, forecastle, walkways, and where they’d find the one piece of cargo they wanted. RUS U 8789032 would be a forty-eight-foot container, painted green. It would be double locked and isolated by empty containers on either side, above, and below, to protect the Shkval in the event of collision or fire. Unfortunately, 8789032 would not be the top stack, but one layer down. Before he’d left for Singapore, Lenson had pointed out this was probably a precaution against it being washed overboard in a storm, not to make it more difficult to steal, but the effect was the same. Since Fengshun No. 5 had no cranes, they’d have to move the containers above it to get at the one with the weapon.
“Any ideas on how to get those containers off?” Oberg asked them.
“Like I said, blow ’em off,” Kaulukukui said.
“I don’t think so,” Henrickson said. “From what they told Mister Lenson at NUWC, the guidance system may be pretty sensitive. We don’t know how it’s packed. We don’t know if there are live explosives in the warhead. Given all that, I don’t think we want to set off explosives that close to it.”
Teddy didn’t like how the little guy said this. Henrickson seemed to think he was number two to the commander’s number one. The guy might be a GS-13, but he was still just a fucking civilian. Nobody else said anything and Henrickson added, “If nobody has a better idea, why don’t we just use the boat? Grapnel on to the containers above it and use the boat’s engines to drag them off.”
“This T-AGS Mister Lenson’s getting us. Won’t it have cranes?” Wenck put in.
They looked at him. Henrickson said, “Sure, Donnie, it’ll have cranes, but the less time we spend alongside the better. It’d be smarter to have everything ready to go by the time we rendezvous. The more containers we can clear away before we go alongside, the better. Right, Obie?”
“I guess,” Oberg said reluctantly. “We’re gonna burn the fucker anyway. We can dump all the cargo we want, far as I can see.” He gave it a moment’s more thought—there was something there that didn’t sit right yet—then shrugged. “Okay, ready to play firebug?”
“Me first,” Wenck said, hands out.
They’d brought the thermite grenades and the night-vision goggles in separately from the rifles, and kept them out of their hosts’ sight, just so nobody got sticky fingers. He went over the procedure again—setting one off inadvertently could wreck the mission—and at last backed off. Took a final look around. Far off and low on the horizon a quarter moon was rising. No other lights; nothing but the stars, and the reddish, faintly shimmering moon. “Okay, Donnie, have at it. Just go slow. And, where do we plant these?”
“Right on top of the fuel tanks,” Wenck said breathlessly, fondling the grenades. Fuck me, Teddy thought. Got to keep an eye on this idiot.
“And where are the fuel tanks?”
“Lower deck, forward, level with the aft end of the forecastle.”
“Okay, just go forward and set it just a little behind that gap in the deck. Here, use the flashlight! And don’t fall in!”
Wenck came running back, panting. His grin was a green leer in the emerald gaze of the night-vision goggles. “Fire in the hole. Fire in the hole!”
Oberg turned off the goggles and hit the deck as night turned to noon. The column of smoke and flame roared upward, pumpkin-colored fire blended into black smoke like some enormous scoop of mandarin-chocolate ice cream. Rusty steel shuddered under his hands. A horrendous chemical stink caught in his throat. “Shit, Wenck! Where in the fuck did you put that thing?”
“Next to some old oil drums up there.”
“Oil drums?” Kaulukukui coughed. “That wasn’t no fucking oil. That’s gonna bring everybody here in for twenty miles around.”
Choking, brushing off greasy flakes that fell from the night and stuck to their clothes, they piled aft and down the ladder into the waiting boat. “You fucking awake, Carpenter? Haul ass out of here,” he grated.
“The fuck was that, man?”
“Just drive!” Fucking blackshoes, fucking retirees, fucking civilians. He was supposed to take these guys on mission? “Just fucking drive, all right?”
Much later, the moon stood above huts and trees. Firelight swayed. Figures lay sprawled, snoring, some wrapped in blankets, others in mosquito nets stencilled USAID. Broken glass sparkled where Kaulukukui had given an unasked-for demonstration of terminating bottles one-handed with an AK.
Rit sat up very quietly. When no one stirred he crawled away from the flickering circle of ruddy light. He fingered the hard long lumps in his trousers. The flashlight in one pocket, the bottle of the local rum in the other. He slung his blanket over his shoulder. Umali liked something to lie on. He did, too, considering what was probably crawling around on the jungle floor by the well. Their regular meeting place, now. He was both eager and getting fucked out. Whichever of these assholes she belonged to, she wasn’t getting enough at home, that was for sure.
Well, never let it be said Rit Carpenter let down the honor of the sub force. He oriented by Polaris and headed between the huts. Past another fire, lighting Lenson’s face as he sat with Captain Abu. The commander had just gotten back to camp when the team had come back from drilling out at the wreck. Abu was shaking his hands up and down, talking rapidly; the American was listening intently. Rit faded past, and neither looked his way.
Sighing as he left the last hut behind, he headed down the path that led to the sea, looking not directly in front of him but using the edges of his sight to stay between the dark towerings of jungle on either side. As the firelight faded he gradually made out the white glow of the foot-smoothed path. His mouth began to water. He fingered another lump in his trousers.
There were always women. And some were always open to suggestion. You just had to be tuned in. When you were, it was all around you. When you weren’t, you’d bop on past and never even notice. Like fucking Donnie. The kid was so nervous around women, even girls his own age, he wasn’t going to ever get any. He wondered if he should ask Umali if she had any friends.
The path turned this way and that, perfectly visible now under the moonlight. He hummed under his breath. “Rolling home,” he sang softly. “Rolling home, by the light of the silvery moo-oo-oo-oon; happy is the day, when a sailor gets his pay. . . .”
“Reet?”
The half-whisper came from the darkness to his right. He stopped short, peering. Was he there already? He’d thought it was another hundred yards.
“Umali? That you?”
Was that a whispered yes? A moving shadow; was that her, beckoning? Maybe this was it. He swung the blanket off his shoulder. Touched the bottle in his pocket, then the hardness next to it. This wouldn’t take long.
“Here I am, baby,” he murmured, stepping into the dark.
13
Abu looked up from the fire when the shouting started. Dan
had been sounding him out on his plans, but the Sayyaf chief had been evasive. He tilted his head, listening to the distant yelling. Then suddenly rose.
“What is it?” Dan said, getting up, too.
“You come with me.”
When they reached where the path left the hamlet to head down to the well and then the beach, four men were headed toward them, shining flashlights and carrying torches. Dan grinned at the torches. They looked like the villagers from Young Frankenstein. He quit grinning when he saw who they were dragging.
“Carpenter, you didn’t,” he breathed. “Not again.”
The submariner’s eye was swelling closed and blood was running down his temple, dripping onto his bare chest. He didn’t meet Dan’s eyes. He started to speak, but was kicked into silence. Behind him, not beaten but plainly terrified, was a slight woman who hugged a head wrap, though she was naked from the waist up.
Abu shouted at them, and the men shouted and shook their fists back. Izmin, the squat, ugly little man who’d sat with the Americans in the headquarters hut, kept shaking the woman and spitting on her. She looked fixedly before her, gaze unfocused.
“Okay, okay, what’s going on,” Dan said, but no one paid any attention.
Oberg burst out of the hut area, Kalashnikov muzzle-down along his leg. Kaulukukui followed, also armed. Without a word each went to a knee, flanking Dan. Behind them the Abu Sayyaf were boiling out, rattling the bolts on their new weapons. Whatever the guys dragging Carpenter were shouting was heating the others to ignition point. Amin grabbed one of the torches and started beating the woman with it, scattering sparks over her hair and clothes. One of the others got the torch away from him, and someone else beat the sparks out. But they didn’t act eager to do it, and there was a lot of muttering.
Abu and Ibrahim were pushing the crowd back, shouting questions. They shoved the woman forward, gesturing angrily at her.
“Teddy? Can you understand what they’re saying?”
“Not a lot, sir. That’s Tausug they’re spouting. Looks like they caught Izmin’s wife, I guess maybe his senior wife, with Carpenter here.”
“Anything we can do about it?”
“Christ.” For the first time since Dan had known him, Oberg looked uncertain. He rubbed his mouth with the back of the hand that wasn’t holding the AK. “Well . . . she’s dead meat, that’s for sure. My take, him, too. The rest of us, we’re gonna be golden if we can get out of here with our heads still attached.”
By now Abu and Ibrahim, Ibrahim especially, had brought some order to the uproar. At least no one was being flailed with lit torches. But Dan didn’t like the way the team was surrounded. There were at least forty Abu Sayyaf bunched close around them, each with some type of rifle and almost all with machetes in their belts as well. The women stayed to the fringes, faces veiled, keeping well back from the firelight. Their eyes shimmered in the torch glare, but they said absolutely nothing. There were kids, too, big-eyed, hanging on their skirts, and a dozen mangy dogs plunged about, tripling the din with frenzied barking. Abu was still speaking at length, questioning the original four who’d brought in the couple. Then he turned to Izmin, who’d gone berserker. He kept trying to burst out of the armlocks two of his buddies held him in. He howled at his wife, spittle-spray gleaming in the firelight.
“This might be our only chance to break out,” Oberg murmured.
“Break out?” Dan glanced around. “Where to?”
“Hit ’em hard and bust through. Lay down covering fire and head for the road.”
Dan doubted a fighting retreat through rough terrain, in the dark, outnumbered six to one by men who knew every tree, would have much chance. His anger boiled up again. “We might have been able to do that before you fucking armed them all, Obie. Couldn’t you have waited to weapon them up, till after we left?”
“No way to keep ’em locked up, Commander.” The SEAL shook himself. “Sumo! Monty! Breakout to the north. Stand by—”
“No. Belay that,” Dan snapped. “We’re not going there, Oberg! Ground your weapon!” The SEAL had it aimed at a villager who’d shoved him. “Ground that weapon! And stand fast. I’m going to talk to Abu.”
“Standing down, boss,” Oberg said unwillingly.
Dan pushed his way through the throng, getting furious glances and punches to his back. He ignored them and got to the little chieftain. Abu looked different without his beret. Less artistic, more like a thug. “Captain. What’s going on? I am this man’s leader. I must be involved in the discussion.”
To his surprise, this seemed to go down perfectly. “Yes. You his leader. So. You speak for him?”
“I’m not certain—you mean, like a lawyer?”
“No. Like the head of his family.”
“Uh, yeah. Sure. The head of his family.” He hissed to Carpenter, “You stupid son of a bitch, don’t you ever learn? You did this in Korea, too!”
“Sorry, Commander. She hit on me first—”
“Goddamn it, who gives a shit about who hit on who first! I’ve seen you operate! This time I hope they cut it off!”
He was sorry the moment he’d said it. Especially since it looked like that was exactly what the men milling around them had in mind. Carpenter looked shocked, as if he’d never expected to hear an officer use that kind of language. Dan rubbed his face, feeling the beard prickle. How instantly a mission could go to shit.
“Excuse me,” said a quiet, nasal, but beautifully modulated voice next to him. It even had a Scottish burr.
Dan glanced up in surprise. He’d never heard Ibrahim speak before. “I didn’t know you spoke English.”
“Oh, yes. I studied at a madrasa in Scotland.”
“Is that so?”
“Yes, that is so. In Dundee. Now, Mr. Carpenter,” the imam said pleasantly. “Did you lie with this woman? These witnesses say you were found together.”
Carpenter mumbled something.
“Excuse me?” Ibrahim enquired gently.
“I said, yes.”
“Did you rape her?”
“More like the other way around.”
“Really,” said the imam, deadpan. “That is a joke, I take it.”
“Yeah. Sorry. A joke.”
He turned to Dan. “Your soldier here. He is married?”
“Uh, no. Divorced.”
“Did you knowingly have intercourse with her?” Ibrahim asked Carpenter, courteously. “With Amin’s wife?”
“I said I did. But I didn’t know whose wife she was.”
“I see. Did you know it was unlawful?”
“Unlawful? Fuck. I suppose so,” said Carpenter. He seemed to be trying to buck himself up, which was probably, Dan thought, not easy, surrounded as he was by heavily armed outlaws howling for his blood.
“So you laid with her, knowing it was unlawful, and that she was married?”
“Uh—affirmative.”
“And you had sexual intercourse with her? Was this the first time?”
“No.”
“How many times previous?”
Carpenter hesitated. Then squared his shoulders and said, louder than his previous answers, “Fifteen or twenty. Maybe more.”
“Oh, you fucking bullshitter,” Oberg muttered.
“We need to defuse this,” Dan told Abu and Ibrahim. “All three of us, or we’re going to have a bloodbath.”
“There is not other possible,” Abu said.
“Meaning what?”
Ibrahim said oh-so-sadly, “He means that unfortunately, this is what we call a hadd offense. The punishment is defined; we cannot alter it. He was caught with the woman by four men. Four witnesses—as the law prescribes. And unfortunately, he has just admitted his deed four times. Also as the law prescribes.”
So that was why the imam had kept asking the same question over and over. It sounded like entrapment, but Dan had the feeling “entrapment” wasn’t going to be a defense. “Okay, assuming he did it. What’s the punishment?”
“This t
hat they do, is hated by God. It gives bad example to other women. If she has child, it will be hated by all. Therefore what shariya prescribes is what is best for the community.” Ibrahim smiled fondly. “If she is found guilty, she must die.”
Dan looked at the woman. Her gaze was still on the ground. He honestly didn’t see anything he could do for her. “Uh . . . and for him?”
“For a non-Moslem? It, too, is death.”
“Death?”
“Correct.”
“Uh, right . . . but . . . there’s no trial?” He was groping now.
“Of course, there will be a trial,” Ibrahim said, sounding shocked. “Who do you think we are? We shall have it right now.”
Back in the hamlet, with fresh torches planted in a ring around the dusty chicken-scratched patch at its heart, and fresh wood stacked on the previous evening’s embers to stoke up the fire. Dan had asked for a few minutes to talk things over. He motioned Henrickson and Oberg in, too. “Guys, we’ve got a problem.”
“That’s an understatement.” Henrickson looked as worried as Dan had ever seen him.
“Teddy, we’re going to need a plan in case they actually condemn Carpenter.”
“Well, I say, fuck his ass,” Oberg said. “Screwing around with the host group’s women? A Moslem host group? Leave him, he’s that fucking stupid.”
“We’re not leaving anybody. You think we’d leave you?”
“If I ballocksed up like that, sure,” Obie told him. “If it means we lose the rest of the team, can’t accomplish the mission—fuck, yeah. Leave the silly fucker. Maybe if they cut his empty fucking head off, he won’t do it again.”