Dark Ocean

by Nick Elliott

  People with abdominal gunshot wounds bleed internally and die slowly. Chest wounds, even low ones which can get the liver, are what kill you fast. The kind of wound Ah Sun had suffered might not kill him for two or three hours. If that was how Ah Sun was going to go I didn’t want to see him suffer – and he was suffering now. He’d also begun to shake, his great body convulsing as he lay there. There was no-one here who could operate on him. I felt his pulse. It was jumping around. All I could do now was ease his pain.

  I knew that I had to give him the morphine intravenously. Given intramuscularly to a patient in shock it would take too long to work. A normal dose would be five to a maximum of ten milligrams. Although I knew ten would be a huge dose, that’s what I gave Ah Sun. I fixed the needle to the syringe, drew the liquid up from the ampoule and jabbed it into what I hoped was his median cubital vein.

  I stayed kneeling beside him. He gripped my hand but as the drug took effect his grip weakened until finally he let go. I stayed there as he bled out onto the carpet. At least he was out of pain now. All I felt was a slow, burning anger.

  ‘Right. Give me the coordinates and we will see,’ said Nakamura. ‘Now.’

  I stood up slowly. ‘Give me paper and pen and you can have them,’ I said, ‘but tell me, Nakamura, what do you hope to get out of this? Are you hoping to find some vast treasure trove down there to fulfil your crazy dreams? I don’t think there’s enough gold on that wreck to satisfy them if that’s what you’re thinking.’

  My words sparked an angry response. ‘You think we don’t have plans. Our nation has been humiliated. We, Genyosha, are the means by which Japan will regain its pride and its dignity. We are our nation’s destiny. I will not share our dreams as you call them. They are not dreams. They are clear objectives which will soon become reality. No, of course the financing needed cannot be met from what we find down there. The wreck and its cargo are only a small part. But it is the symbolism that counts. How would you know the influence Buddhism has had on the development of our society and our culture to this day. The Buddha beneath the sea here is the biggest such statue in the world. It will be taken to Japan and become the symbol of our cause.’

  He’d regained his composure but still spoke with passion. ‘Our followers expect us to bring to Japan the fruits of Golden Lily, denied us in our war against the Western imperialists. This wreck is the final site. Number 176. There are many more sites to be searched, but the cargo salvaged from this site will truly be proof of our commitment, of our achievement, our triumph!’

  ‘Enough. Here,’ he said walking over to a desk in the corner of the saloon and handing me pen and paper. ‘Write them down. Where does it lie?’

  I wrote them down then knelt down beside Ah Sun again. He lay still now and I could feel no pulse. If I was to avenge Ah Sun’s murder, then I must help retrieve his temple’s lost Buddha. Seizing it from Dark Ocean’s grasp was something else but right now I had traded the coordinates for a peaceful death for Ah Sun. Now I had to fulfil my side of the bargain.

  Nakamura took the paper I’d written on and made a call on the ship’s sound-powered phone. We stared at each other until the ship’s captain arrived with the Approaches to Hong Kong chart and his parallel rules. They pored over it together. Finally, Nakamura turned to me. ‘The coordinates match, but until the wreck is located you will remain aboard, as our guest.’

  ‘And after that?’ I asked unnecessarily. He didn’t bother answering.

  Chapter 28

  Out on deck there was no sign of the man I’d left unconscious by the hatch coaming earlier. I was taken to the Bosun’s store in the ship’s forepeak, a place familiar to me from my seagoing days. It was where everything from ropes and chains to paints, grease, luboils and all manner of tools were kept. As a ship’s Bosun, the store had once been part of my domain. Now it was to be my prison.

  There was little light in there but I explored my surroundings in what was available. It was an orderly place. Ropes coiled neatly on the deck and shelving with drums of oil, tins of grease, tools and assorted weather-proof clothing and footwear. But what I saw next took a moment to register. Lined up on the starboard side shelving were a dozen crates. In the dim light I could make out a series of letters and numbers stencilled onto their sides. There were only two letters that made any sense to me: VX.

  They kept the stuff on board! The implications crowded my mind. If these were the canisters taken all those years ago from Okinawa during Operation Red Hat, what condition were they in after nearly fifty years? Was it stable? Was it still potent? I found myself involuntarily backing away.

  Then, as I stood next to the door I felt the throb of the ship’s engines and shortly after, the nearby sound of her anchors being hauled up through the hawse pipes. We were on the move. But were we heading for the wreck site in the teeth of a typhoon or shifting to another in-port anchorage? After a while the question was answered. We were entering open waters and the ship began to pitch and roll, gently at first but then with greater force as her speed picked up and in open water, the sea became rougher.

  The storm had passed over Luzon and headed northwest. The Philippines gets the brunt of the tropical cyclones that develop out in the Pacific, but they have a nasty habit of barrelling straight across the Philippine archipelago and on into the South China Sea. And that’s what this one had done. A mature tropical cyclone becomes a typhoon when wind speeds reach between seventy and ninety miles an hour; a severe typhoon has winds of at least ninety-two and to qualify as a super typhoon winds must reach a hundred and twenty, at least. This one was brewing into a severe typhoon but before I’d left the hotel the weathermen had been predicting it would reach landfall south of Hong Kong down towards Hainan as was often the case. But they’d added that this one was a straight track storm with a particularly wide radius of maximum wind, meaning Hong Kong and its surrounding waters could expect winds in excess of eighty miles an hour with accompanying storm surges and likely damage to fixed structures and floating craft.

  I began groping around searching for something I might be able to force open the weathertight door with. It had hatch dogs on both sides but a locking device had been fitted on the outside preventing it being opened from within.

  I gave up after a while and sat there nursing my arm which was aching and seeping blood, trying to think the situation through. Eventually I started searching again and this time got lucky in the form of a two-foot long Stillson pipe wrench which must have weighed close to twenty pounds. I moved across to the door with the idea of using the wrench to force the lock on the other side by levering the dog hatch handle of the door open. I was getting it into position when I heard a noise. The door was being opened from the outside. Standing back I waited, holding the wrench with both hands. A man entered carrying a torch in one hand and a gun in the other. It was the Korean I’d fought with earlier. I guessed he'd been sent to check on me, but considering our previous encounter he might have had other ideas. He certainly wasn’t carrying a dinner tray. He shone the torch around the store, then, when he didn’t see me, moved further in, searching. I came up behind him and caught him on his left ear with the wrench. He went down without a sound.

  I dragged him inside and bent down to feel his pulse. It was faint but his breathing was even. I took his waterproof jacket and found a bunch of keys in one pocket and ammunition in the other.

  I looked at the VX crates again and memorised the lettering on the first crate. Then I left locking the door behind me, armed with his gun, half a dozen ammunition clips and the pipe wrench.

  The weather had worsened. Waves were washing over the forecastle. Rain and spray blended into a white vortex coming from all directions at once. I stood for a moment in the shelter of the forepeak gripping the door and getting my bearings. I was pretty sure we were heading southeast away from Hong Kong’s Pun Shan Shek anchorage. Typhoons spin anti-clockwise and the wind was now on our port beam. We were in open waters but looking aft through the spray I caugh
t glimpses of the dark silhouette of an island with a cluster of lights along its shoreline. From its position I guessed it was Lamma island.

  The Toyama Maru had begun to slam as her bow heaved out of one trough and ploughed into the next mountainous wave, vibrating with the impact. Normally in these conditions the ship would have been slowed or her heading changed to reduce the risk of damage to her bottom plates and her cargo. I’d seen forty-foot containers virtually flattened by the effect of slamming. What worried me most now were the crates of the lethal nerve agent stowed just a few feet away and vulnerable to the pounding the ship was taking.

  My choices were limited. I wasn’t about to stroll into the wheelhouse and tell them to head back to Hong Kong. I needed to get off the ship. Zoe, I hoped, was safely ashore. Ah Sun was dead, and I wasn’t keen to be anywhere nearby if the VX started leaking – or worse, was detonated. I had no idea whether those crates contained canisters, or whether the VX had been weaponised in the form of missiles or mines.

  But to jump for it hoping to swim ashore in this weather wasn’t an option either. I presumed we were heading for the wreck site. That was just off the coast of Wenwei Zhou, the southwestern-most island of the Jiapeng Liedao group. If the wind continued to blow from the east then the wreck site would be in the lee of Wenwei Zhou, possibly a safe haven for her to wait out the storm.

  I was banking on something else too: that the ship had a functioning radio room, and that I could get into it undetected. I worked my way back along the main deck towards the accommodation block, clinging onto the starboard side ship’s rail. Twice I was knocked off my feet by the force of the waves sweeping across the whole length of the ship. The second time the wrench slipped from my grasp and slid across the deck before I could retrieve it.

  Eventually I made it to the weathertight door and into the relative calm of the ship’s accommodation. I stood still, dripping water and listening. The sound of the storm was muffled in here although the ship was still heaving about violently in an awkward corkscrewing motion.

  I made my way up to the bridge deck. I knew the officer of the watch and the helmsman would be in the wheelhouse, others too possibly. When I got up there, the door to the wheelhouse was closed. The door to the radio room, adjacent to the wheelhouse, was closed too but not locked. I went in, closing it behind me.

  The ship was old and so was most of the radio equipment arrayed around the operator’s table. This was from the days of Morse, when ships carried a specialist radio officer. Until satellite communication, the ship was a remote outstation, but to my relief, a laptop and satellite router sat on the table in front of me. I clicked the mouse and a password request came up. On a shelf above me were piles of books, mainly manuals of one kind or another, and beside them a stack of discs. I sifted through them and found what I was looking for: the installation disc for the computer’s operating system. I inserted it, rebooted the computer and entered the BOOT menu selecting the installation disc.

  It was all coming back to me from one day a couple of years ago when we’d had a computer meltdown in the office. It was Zoe who’d figured out how to repair it and I could see and hear her now as she tapped away, cursing softly as I stood watching over her shoulder. Now, expecting someone to burst into the radio room at any moment, I forced myself to think back. Suddenly it seemed intuitive and I could see how to reset the computer’s password.

  This led me into Inmarsat’s Fleet service, and another password request. I tried the ship’s call sign: 3LXY2. It worked. My message to Claire’s encrypted email address was short: “Eight containers of VX in Bosun’s store, forecastle. Unsure whether weaponised. Believe on course for wreck site. ETA imminent. Advise.”

  I sat and waited, and watched the door. She’d promised she’d be manning her station 24/7. I had her reply within two tense minutes: “Get off when you can. Believe Buchan on board. Have eyes on you. Standby pick up from portside. Signal to rescue team as you leave.”

  Did she mean the Special Boat Squadron she’d alluded to back in the hotel? Despite its lineage the IMTF rarely mentioned the resources at its disposal but I knew from my past encounter with them, that they could literally bring down shock and awe from the skies when necessary. It would make sense for them to call upon the Royal Navy’s resources to help me out. I deleted our messages which removed them permanently; no deleted items folder here.

  I was sitting there considering her reply when the door burst open. One of the ship’s officers stood there, frozen in surprise.

  He was wearing tropical whites with two-bar epaulettes on his shoulders. I turned and raised one hand in greeting. ‘Hello there, Second Mate. Just finishing off,’ I said standing up and pulling the gun from my pocket. ‘I'm going to kill you now unless you do what you're told. All clear?’

  ‘Okay, okay,’ he stammered, instinctively raising his arms.

  ‘Good. There’s a man on board called Buchan. Do you know him?

  ‘I know him. Locked in cabin.’

  ‘Right, we’ll go and see him.’ I prodded the gun into his chest and he backed out of the door. ‘One sound and you're dead,’ I whispered in case he hadn't got the message. The wheelhouse door was still closed. I guessed the Second Mate had been coming into the radio room to check for traffic. I’d got lucky.

  Chapter 29

  We headed down the stairway to the deck below and along the portside passageway.

  ‘Here. He’s in here,’ the officer said, stopping at the last cabin door. He turned to me nervously. ‘Don’t shoot, okay?’

  ‘Who’s in the next cabin?’

  ‘Nobody.’

  ‘Do you have a key?’

  ‘No key.’

  Here, try these,’ I said, handing him the keys I’d taken earlier. He gave me an enquiring look.

  ‘Just do it.’

  He found one that fitted and opened the cabin door. And there, lying on the bunk, was Monty Buchan looking dishevelled and forlorn, though when he saw me his expression brightened and he struggled to his feet. Monty Buchan was not cut out for this kind of thing.

  ‘Ye gods, Angus! Am I glad to see you,’ he said dabbing the sweat from his forehead with a paisley handkerchief. ‘And Watanabe too. He grabbed our hands in turn. Second Officer Watanabe was grinning now.

  ‘You two know each other then.’

  ‘Of course,’ said Monty. ’He used to sail for us when he was still a cadet. Imagine my surprise when I saw him here.’

  ‘Can he be trusted?’

  ‘You can trust me,’ Watanabe interrupted. ‘I didn’t know about these bad things when I joined this ship. I just want to leave.’

  ‘Are you off watch now?’

  ‘Yes. I came into the radio room to check for comms but off watch now.’

  ‘Okay, just sit down there,’ I said pointing with the gun to an office chair beside the desk. It was cramped in the cabin for the three of us. Monty had slumped back on the bunk with his back resting against the bulkhead. I sat myself on a small built-in sofa. In their day these officers’ cabins must have been immaculate. Now, like the rest of the ship, it was looking worn out and tawdry. Monty fitted in nicely.

  ‘Scotch,’ said Monty. It wasn't a question and I didn't need asking. He struggled up and poured three generous measures draining the bottle. They might have locked him up but at least they’d left that for him. We each drank. It burned its way into my stomach and for a moment I sat there feeling dazed and trying to gather my wits.

  ‘Angus, you look like death. What have you been up to?’

  I was dog tired, dangerously so. I got up, went into the tiny bathroom and splashed cold water onto my face. As I raised my head I caught sight of myself in the mirror. Monty hadn’t been exaggerating. And my arm ached like hell. I didn’t want to even look at it. I went back in and told them what had happened: how we’d got Zoe off, how they’d murdered Ah Sun. I didn’t mention what I’d found in the Bosun’s store.

  ‘You were shot?’ Watanabe asked. ‘You’re b
leeding through your shirt. Here, let me see.’ Second Officers commonly serve as the ship’s medical officer. I let him look. He bathed it with water from the sink, first easing off the fabric from my shirt which had stuck to my arm, then washing the wound which had swollen up around both the entry and exit holes. There was no antiseptic in the cabin so he poured some of his whisky into it and made an improvised bandage from Monty’s pillowcase.

  I winced as the alcohol burned down through the wound. I hoped he knew what he was doing.

  ‘So what's going on, Monty?’

  ‘We're in a fine pickle I can tell you.’ This much I already knew. ‘These bastards! I never thought it would come to this.’

  ‘Come to what, Monty?’ He had failed to impress me so far and as of this moment I wasn’t sure I could trust him. I needed to hear his side of the story.

  ‘I swear they're mad. They only want to take over the whole bloody world, you know.’

  ‘And how are they going to do that?’

  It was as if he hadn't heard me. ‘If I'd had any idea what they were planning I wouldn't have gone near this lot with a barge pole, believe me, Angus.’ He looked at me but I still couldn't be sure whether he was being genuine or not.

  ‘Tell me what they're planning, Monty. And make it quick.’

  He gave me a sly look. ‘You know plenty don't you. You're not just a P&I man are you, Angus. Otherwise you would never have come this far.’ He held up his hand. ‘Alright. I don't expect you to answer that.’

  ‘Monty, for God’s sake get to the point will you? We haven’t got all night. How come you're sitting here sounding remorseful? Is this all a charade?’