“But I did some checking,” added Junior. “I hope you don’t mind.”
“Tell me.”
“It’s been back and forth between a dozen South and North Korean ports over the last eighteen months. And before that it was in Russia,” he said, a note of triumph in his voice. “Kamenka. Same place you just raided.”
“Good work, Junior,” I told him.
“Ask him about the computer,” hissed Trace. “Tell him the files are erased. Isn’t there a way to get them back?”
There was. Junior talked her through the procedure and came up with some interesting e-mails—interesting largely because they were encrypted and couldn’t be read. There were also some Web porn sites he didn’t know about.
“I can take the e-mail addresses and see if they mean anything to the No Suchers,” said Junior.
“Good. Do it. And get yourself a milkshake. Call me if you find anything.”
“Ike’s on board that ship,” said Trace as I disconnected. “What are we going to do?”
“Just follow for a while.”
“What’s the plan for going on board?”
“Who says we’re going on board?”
“We can’t just let him get away.”
“We’re not. We’re following him.”
“We have to stop him. We can sneak on and grab him.”
“Polorski?”
“Yes.”
“He’s not necessarily on the ship, Trace. And it’s Yong Shin Jong we’re interested in.”
“You know he is, Dick. He wasn’t at the base, and he wasn’t on the other ship—he took Yong Shin Jong with him. The real Yong Shin Jong. These were imposters—I’ll bet backups that he was going to use if he couldn’t get the real one. He’s going to deliver him now.”
“Or one of them was the real Yong Shin Jong and your love toy was told to kill him,” I said.
“Why bring him all the way here if you’re going to kill him?”
“Why bring the imposters?”
“In case someone on the ship’s crew tried to get nasty. No one would know who was the genuine bastard.”
“Maybe.”
“We have to get him, Dick. Whether Yong Shin Jong is with him or not. Let’s do it.”
“Someday I’m going to sit down with you and give you a long lecture on not getting your emotions involved in an operation.”
“I’m not letting my emotions get involved.”
“You don’t want to kill the son of a bitch?”
“I do want to kill the son of a bitch. With my bare hands. After I’ve dragged him under the hull of his ship a few times and fed his balls to the sharks.”
“And you’re not emotionally involved?”
“Of course not.”
Apache logic. Hard to argue with.
I turned the wheel hard to port, setting my course parallel to hers. I took out the sat phone to call Doc—then noticed that Trace was rummaging through her gear.
“What are you doing?”
“I’m look for the pancakes.”
“Pancakes” was her quaint term for the suction cup devices we’d packed as backups to get aboard the trawler. While Navy SEALs do use the devices, they’re really a last-ditch choice—they’re literally suction cups, used to pull yourself up the side, arm length by sagging, cramping arm length. You press a button to release the grip, then smack it on the hull a little higher, moving up perhaps a few excruciating feet at a time.
“You’re not thinking of boarding the ship, are you?” I asked her.
“Aren’t you?”
I was in fact, but not without help. I called Doc back, but my timing was off—he’d just gotten aboard the submarine and for the moment couldn’t receive the signal from the satellite.
Trace gave the vessel a good look-over with the night goggles from her pack, staring intently at the ship.
“This will be easier than I thought,” she said suddenly. She handed the glasses to me. “Look.”
The vessel was trailing a line near midship, possibly inadvertently left earlier when they had hooked up with the motorboat and made the exchange. Poor seamanship—but very common.
“We can use the line to get aboard,” said Trace. “Easy as one, two, three.”
Using the line to get aboard the ship was easier than using the pancakes, but ease was a relative concept. It was also easier than hiking up Mount Everest in my underwear while carrying a polar bear on my back.
“If we’re going to get Yong Shin Jong, we’re going to have to get aboard before daybreak,” said Trace. “They’re only a few hours outside of Korean waters.”
“That’s just it—we’re going after Yong Shin Jong, not Tall, Dark, and Polack,” I told her. “You have to keep your emotions in check. This isn’t a lovers’ quarrel we’re involved in.”
“Fuck you.”
Isn’t that just like a woman? Always trying to sweet talk you into something.
The sat phone buzzed; Jimmy Zim was returning my call.
“You’ve lived up to your reputation,” said the CIA officer. “Washington is very pleased.”
“Sorry to hear that.”
“Excuse me? Our connection must be bad.”
I’m not in the business of pleasing Washington, but I dropped the matter without further comment and explained our situation. Zim’s tone changed abruptly.
“There’s no way we’re going to get any kind of okay to use the SEALs against that ship, Dick. Just zero. Less than zero.”
“What if Yong Shin Jong is aboard?”
“Is he?”
“I don’t know.”
“Even if he is, it’ll be a hard sell. A very, very hard sell. How close is the ship to Korean waters?”
Close enough that the Greenville would never reach it before it crossed over the line. It was no use arguing with Jimmy Zim; he was just the messenger.
But I argued with him anyway.
“You get on the line with Washington and tell them we have to stop that ship. Tell them Yong Shin Jong is aboard. Tell them the nuke is there. Tell the State Department to drop dead.”
“Dick—”
“Just tell them. Call your boss, and tell him, too.”
“Who?”
“Admiral Jones.”
“I don’t think the director—”
“Call him. And get our submarine moving. I’ll be on the ship.”
[ II ]
THE TRUTH IS, I didn’t think Jimmy Zim would pass along my “request” that the USS Greenville stop the ship, much less believe that he would actually win official permission to do so. But I did think the sub would respond to a distress call if the ship was floundering.
The merchant ship was doing just under twenty knots, much faster than a cargo vessel typically travels, especially in these fuel conscious days, but not so fast that we couldn’t catch up in the cabin cruiser. As we approached, Trace locked her GPS unit on transmit and left it on the cruiser’s bench so we’d be able to find it later. Then she grabbed her gear and walked out onto the bow. The closer we got, the more she leaned forward, until at last I thought she was going to fall in the drink. The line she’d spotted dangled off the side, slapping against the water, barely visible in the shadows as we pulled up.
Matching course and speed to another craft can be difficult at night, especially if you’re trying to do it by mental telepathy. Despite the fact that I’d tied the wheel with my belt, the cabin cruiser veered starboard as soon as I reached for the rope to follow Trace upward. I bent back over the windscreen and corrected the rudder. Then I juiced the throttle for a moment before killing it completely.
The line stayed just out of reach. The cabin cruiser once more started to veer away from the ship. I started leaning back to get the wheel, then saw the rope shoot toward me.
It nearly knocked me over with a teasing love tap. I grabbed it backhanded as I fell, then hung on as the cabin cruiser veered off again. The screws driving the ship were making a sound like KER-chunk,
ker-gonnagetya-chunk, gonnachunkya, gonnachunkya. They were meat grinders with suction, waiting to welcome me if I lost my grip. The sound chased away my fatigue and I pulled myself tight to the ship, scraping against the barnacles at the waterline.
By the time I neared the deck, I was more than a little wet. I was also pissed off enough that I didn’t care. I grabbed one of the rail stanchions and hoisted myself up, reaching for my gun’s waterproof cocoon at the same time.
“Trace?” I whispered.
No answer. I adjusted my radio—the clip-on microphone on my shirt had slipped down—then asked for her again without getting an answer.
The bridge superstructure sat over the stern; the rest of the ship was given over to cargo bays and a pair of booms for cranes. The ship may have been a few years younger than I was—but not many. It looked as if it hadn’t been painted for at least a decade. A mossy smell mixed with the stench of oil and exhaust whenever the breeze died.
I got my bearings, sorting the shadows from the lines and machinery. Hearing voices, I moved in their direction, toward the bow. A pair of seamen were sharing a cigarette and a bottle near the anchor chain, complaining about something in Russian.
I’m guessing they were complaining because they were sailors, and because of the tones of their voices; I didn’t understand most of the words. Under other circumstances, I might have been inclined to live and let live: not because I’m filled with the Christian spirit, but because eliminating two watchmen might indirectly raise an alarm when someone came looking for them. But I’d just taken a god-awful beating on the way up the side of the ship, and I was feeling even more ornery than normal. I stowed the submachine gun and took out my Strider.
The radio on the belt of one of the sailors chirped. He acknowledged it, then started aft. I waited until he was just passing me, then leaped up from behind the boom’s winch machinery and gave him a boost off the side. He yelled all the way down.
His shout was enough to get the attention of the man who’d just shared his cigarette. The Russian came back cautiously, one hand on his radio. I came up behind him, and slipped one hand hard into his diaphragm while pulling the knife sharply across his neck. He made a gulping sound and dropped to the deck.
He followed his smoking buddy into the drink, after I grabbed the radio and keys from his pockets. I also relieved him of a Glock. There’s no such thing as having too many weapons when you’re crashing a party.
The radio crackled at me as I made my way back. Between the squelch and the noise of the ship, I’m not sure I would have understood what they were saying if they were speaking English. What I did understand was the movement of a pair of shadows over at the superstructure. I squeezed low to the deck, then slipped sideways to what looked like a metal gangplank secured nearby. One of the shadows disappeared back into the superstructure; the other went toward the stern. I started to rise, then saw something out of the corner of my eye—a figure jumped from halfway up the crane boom and trotted in my direction. Some sixth sense kept me from firing my gun.
“Trace,” I hissed.
“Dick. Where the hell have you been?”
“Lowering the head count. Why didn’t you answer the radio when I called you?”
“I didn’t hear you,” she said. “I was inside the ship.”
The downside of burst transmission radios—they don’t burst transmit too well through solid objects.
Trace had snuck inside and moved along a corridor to a metal stairway (or ladder, since we’re on a ship) before hearing voices and taking cover in a cabin used as a storeroom. When the crewmen passed, she’d gone up the ladder far enough to see a guard standing in front of a doorway about halfway down the corridor. Before she could do anything else, she heard a sailor coming up from behind her; she ducked below, crouching in the shadows. Had the sailor been very attentive, he’d have seen her, but most of us don’t look for things we don’t think are there, and so he passed by without noticing her.
“Yong Shin Jong has to be in that cabin,” she said.
“Maybe.”
“Who else would they be guarding?”
“Maybe Polorski.”
“I couldn’t be that lucky.”
Before checking it out, I decided to secure our escape route. Swimming back to the cabin cruiser was one option, but not an attractive one if we had to tow Yong Shin Jong, too. A better solution was to steal one of the lifeboats. Or rather the lifeboat—the merchant ship was equipped with only one, mounted on the starboard side near the stern.23 To get there, we’d have to go all the way around the fantail.
We moved aft cautiously to reconnoiter. Lights were on in the cabins that lined the stern portion of the deck; it took us two or three minutes to crawl beneath the portals and get to the other side without being seen. Just as I turned the corner, I heard a watchman cursing. I froze, then slid out far enough to see a boot sticking over the edge of the deck above. His radio was squawking—very possibly they were looking for the crewmen I’d sent overboard.
Pressing myself against the bulkhead, I inched my way forward until I was parallel with the lifeboat. Light flooded out onto the deck from the cabins above. I could reach the davits easily enough—two quick steps across the deck—but there was the question of swinging the boat out without being seen, either from the cabins or the man who was still cursing above.
According to the GPS unit, the cabin cruiser was still relatively close. If we weren’t seen aboard, it would make more sense to simply drop off into the water and swim for it.
I made my way back to the other side of the ship, where Trace was watching a pair of sailors barking orders at each other.
“They’re looking for the guys you sent overboard,” she said. “They were saying something about drinking. One’s going below.”
“Since when do you speak Russian?”
“I understand the words ‘vodka’ and ‘shit-faced.’ ”
The men split up. We waited until the first sailor went inside the ship, then snuck toward the second as he walked forward along the deck. Trace ducked behind the hatchway to the cargo hold. I positioned myself near the crane boom, leaned against it as if for support, and whistled.
The man turned, probably blinked, then came at me like a bull, aiming to give me a reaming I’d never forget. There was just enough light on the deck to see his eyes jump from their sockets in surprise and then shock—not so much at my ugly mug, but at the hard slap of Trace’s blackjack against the base of his skull. Her first shot sent him crumbling to the deck; her second and third were icing on the cake. She grabbed his sweater and cap—neither would have fit me—then we sent him overboard where he’d have a better chance of finding his companions.
The man who’d gone below emerged from a hatchway on the cargo deck just as we were disposing of his companion. Trace saw his head pop up about ten feet away from us. Before he could react, she double-tapped her MP5N, putting a large hole in the top of his skull.
The H&K MP5N noise suppressor sounds a bit like an overanxious pellet gun, easy to miss over the constant hum of a ship’s engines, especially if you’re inside the ship. So I might have taken our chances had the Russian not been on the radio when he saw us.
“Let’s get Yong,” I yelled to Trace, sprinting toward the door. “Come on.”24
I flew through the passageway and up the ladder. The guard Trace had seen earlier heard me coming and started to unholster his pistol, but before he could bring it to bear, it was bouncing on the deck. He’d dropped it as he ricocheted back against the bulkhead, propelled by the force of my bullets as they slammed against his bullet-resistant vest at close quarters.
That was the first pair of bullets, aimed at the center of his chest. My third bullet added a pretty red mark to his forehead.
I scrambled to the cabin, yelled, “Stand back,” and blasted the lock. Then I did a one-two dance step, snapping the door back hard enough to knock it off one of its hinges.
Yong Shin Jong blinked at me from a
chair at the far end of the room.
“Can you swim?” I asked.
“W-what?”
“Can you swim?” I grabbed his arm and pulled him to his feet.
“Yes.”
There was a life jacket on the wall nearby. I grabbed it and pushed it into his hands.
“Dick!” Trace yelled in the hall.
I pulled Yong Shin Jong with me as the passageway outside began echoing with gunfire. There was a loud bang—Trace had tossed a grenade—then silence.
“Go!” yelled Trace.
I pulled Yong Shin Jong from the cabin and half dragged him down the ladder with me. Trace took up the rear.
“What’s going on?” he asked as we ran.
“We’re rescuing you. But you’re going to have to swim for a bit.”
I pushed him up against the side of the passageway as more gunfire sounded above us. I fired a burst behind Trace as she scrambled down, dropped my empty mag, and reloaded. She ran toward the door we’d used to get in.
“I got point,” she said.
“Go!”
Yong Shin Jong had pulled the life jacket over his head, but was still moving in slow motion. I grabbed him and pushed him to follow Trace. Just as she reached the open door, there was a flash of light outside. Someone tried coming through the passageway and she cut them down. But bullets began swarming around us. I shoved Yong Shin Jong down, throwing myself on top of him as the gunfire continued. We were maybe ten yards from the railing, but the amount of lead pouring through the passageway made it clear that we weren’t going that way without the help of a tank, and maybe not even then.
“Back up topside,” I yelled to Trace. “Give us some smoke.”
She waved the grenade at me. I grabbed one of my flash-bang grenades and tossed it toward the door. By the time it exploded, Yong Shin Jong and I were halfway up the ladder. Four sailors lay in the passageway between us and the cabin Yong Shin Jong had been in.
“Try not to trip over the dead bodies,” I told the Korean, forging ahead.
The air inside the ship, not particularly fresh to begin with, turned sharply acrid as the smoke began furling from Trace’s grenade. Another ladder started to the starboard at the end of the corridor. We ran up it, spotting a passageway that looked as if it would run to the other side of the ship. As soon as I stuck my head around the corner a fresh round of gunfire beat me back. I waited for Trace to reach us, then rolled out onto the deck, hosing the corridor. But whoever had fired had vanished; there was no answering fire. I led the way down the passageway, then out the door onto a catwalk that ran around the exterior of the ship’s superstructure. The lifeboat I’d spotted earlier sat about ten yards to my right, and down two decks.
RW14 - Dictator's Ransom Page 20