by Bob Finley
"All in all, not a bad first day," he decided, setting the security sensors against the coming night.
Chapter 67
With the General Assembly of the United Nations already halfway through its annual session, and international outrage strongly favoring its ravaged South African member, it was almost inevitable that the tearful, impassioned plea from her delegates for intervention by the Security Council would assume an overriding priority. Neither was the implication of what had already happened to one of that country's largest cities lost on those members whose own countries were also targeted in this nuclear extortion plot.
The swiftly-rendered recommendation from the Council's 15 members surprised no one. In fact, had there been any recommendation other than the one they delivered, there would have been strong reaction from the general body. The recommendation brought to the floor to be voted on by the 180-plus members was passed by an astounding 87%. Requiring a two-thirds majority for approval, it was almost unheard of for any issue to garner such support. Of the twelve remaining UN members, eight abstained from voting, including the Central African Republic, which clandestinely hoped to realize an economic edge from its southern neighbor's bad fortune. Iran and Libya voted against the proposal in support of "their revolutionary brother in the Holy War against the infidel." Two other minor nations, economically dependent on the two terrorist cauldrons, voted with them but were resoundingly rebuffed. The Security Council of the United Nations was "directed by virtue of the authority of the Charter of its voting representatives to take corrective and appropriate peacekeeping action and the use of sanctions against aggressors who threaten the common interests and safety of the world body up to and including collective military force." It was implicitly understood by those who empowered the Security Council to take action on their behalf that "collective military force" in this case could have only one interpretation. The order was given to activate the TRAP team.
Chapter 68
"Where'd you disappear to?" Marc asked Janese Cramerton. "I looked for you after I found out what had happened to Bill, but I didn't see you anywhere."
She'd just come from a shower that wasn't long enough to remove the patina of disgust she'd felt when she'd left the penthouse, and her hair was still damp.
"I had to...take a quick shower. It was...one of those...female things, you know?" She hated the lie, even as she told it. But she somehow couldn't bring herself to admit to the despicable proposal Jambou had made, and certainly didn't want to discuss it with anyone else.
"What were you doing up there, anyway? I was surprised to find you there when they let me out of that...prison they had me locked in after that...that...animal did what he did!" His eyes blazed and she could feel the heat of his anger rising again. She couldn't tell whether the look he was giving her was one of concern or suspicion.
"Breton came and got me after that horrible thing on television. He said I was supposed to go with him...that Jambou wanted to see me."
"Well, what did he want?"
She shivered and hoped Marc was too distraught to notice. "He wanted to...brag. He showed me the diamonds. You know, the ones you told me about. Said how he's going to conquer the world."
"That's all?"
"What do you mean?" she responded, alarmed. Had he noticed, after all?
"What do you think I mean? You're the only woman in this motley bunch. Did he make a pass at you?"
She dropped her eyes.
"Well? Did he?"
She turned away, one hand grasping the other for control. Finally, she nodded and said, "Yes," in a small, quiet voice.
"I thought so! That blasted...was that all?"
She looked at him, fearfully, wide-eyed.
He stepped closer, concern on his face. "Did he...try anything?"
She quickly shook her head. "No. I told him I wanted to leave, and he let me."
He cupped her chin in his hand and drew her eyes up to his. "Don't go up there again, okay? I don't care who says so, don't go up there. Promise?" She tried to look away but he held her firmly. "Promise?" he insisted.
She nodded. "Yes. I shouldn't have gone at all. I just didn't know any better."
"Well, you do now."
And then, unexpectedly but in a way that somehow seemed right, he was holding her. Gently enfolded in his arms, she slid her own slowly around him and clung, if only for a moment, to the warm reassurance that his presence and concern brought.
Reluctantly, she pushed him tenderly away and said, "What was it like up there? It must have been terrible to stand by and watch him kill those people!" The moment vanished. He ducked into his protective shell.
"Yeah," he grunted. "But I wasn't exactly ‘standing by’. He had me locked in a soundproofed, glass room. When I realized what was coming, it was too late. I'd already been on the air and done what he wanted. I realize now that he didn't really care whether I said anything or not. Just the fact that my face is well-known enough to easily be identified on television would have been good enough. I could have been clawing at the glass like a caged animal and it would have been just as effective for his purposes. But I didn't know...I mean, I just had no idea he was going to..." His clenched jaws and the fury on his face said it all.
She laid her hand on his arm. "You couldn't know, couldn't have known, what he was going to do. Nobody could." She reached up and, with one hand, turned his face to hers. "It wasn't your fault. There's nothing you could have done. We're dealing with an insane man, here, and logic and reason have nothing at all to do with this situation. He can act. We can only react."
"For now. But, sooner or later..."
"I know," she said. "But we have to be careful until then. We're all going to get through this, one way or another. We just have to stick together and watch out for each other."
"Speaking of ‘watching out for each other’," Justin said, "I need to go see how Bill is doing. Apparently that ape Banner almost killed him." His face had darkened again.
"May I go with you?" she asked, glad for the diversion.
They found William Clayton in his bunk. Frank had talked a guard out of some bandages and wrapped the older man's head. It was primitive but at least held a lump of gauze over the laceration Banner had opened on the back of his head.
Kim rose from his squatting position by the bed and nodded reassuringly at his boss, moving over to make room for Justin. Marc knelt on one knee and looked at his friend with obvious concern.
"How you feeling, old man?" he asked lightly. Clayton opened his eyes and squinted at him.
"When this headache goes away, I'm thinking of asking Mr. Banner to switch to a smaller caliber weapon. That hog leg he carries weighs entirely too much."
Marc smiled. It was obvious the other man was in a lot of pain. He looked up at Kim, who was standing close by.
"I checked his pupils," Kim answered the unasked question. "No sign of concussion. Just a really bad headache. His other vital signs seem reasonable, too."
"He means for a man my age," Bill interjected. "Fortunately, the men in my family are known for being hard-headed." They all chuckled.
"What can we do for you?" Marc asked.
"Take me to the airport?" More laughter.
"Well, I'm afraid the shuttle sub has been impounded. But I do promise to have you a front seat on the first taxi out of here."
"What time do you think it'll be leaving?"
"I wish I knew," Marc Justin confided to his friend. "In the meantime, you stay here and get some rest. Sleep's probably the best cure for that headache. We'll bring you some supper after while."
"Thanks," Bill Clayton murmured, forgetting not to nod his head and instantly regretting his oversight.
Marc stood and looked around the group. Making sure Bill couldn't see him, he motioned with his head for the others to follow him outside. When they'd quietly closed the door and moved a short distance away, Marc gathered the uneasy group around him.
"What do you think?" Kim asked him.
"I think Bill will be alright, once most of the pain goes away."
"He's lucky," Frank said. "We're all lucky," he added. "That Banner's a dangerous man, especially when he's mad." They all nodded agreement.
"What are we going to do now?" Janese wondered aloud.
"Well, I really don't think there's much of anything we can do just now," Marc observed. "If my watch is right, it shouldn't be long before sundown...not that we'd know it down here, but up there..." several eyes followed his toward the surface "...I have a feeling that war clouds 'll be gathering soon."
"What do you mean?" Janese asked, alarm furrowing her forehead.
"He means somebody's going to be on their way here soon, maybe right now, to teach that nut upstairs some hard lessons!" Frank said, heatedly. Distracted, the others quickly looked back to Marc for confirmation.
"Yeah, and it had better be wearin' Navy blue when it gets here, too," Cy Wojecki chimed in. "Whadda you think, Mr. Justin?"
Marc Justin smiled at the young sailor, both for his gung-ho attitude and for the fact that he'd been called ‘Mister’ not so much from military discipline he suspected, as from their too-obvious age difference. He considered the question before he answered.
"I think you could be right, Cy. With the British only a hundred miles from here, at Gibraltar, and the U.S. Navy base just inside the Med, I'd be surprised if they weren't racing each other to see who gets here first."
"Well, if they're only a hundred miles away, why don't they just fly out here?"
"They could," Kim cut in, "but all they'd be able to do is just look around, which wouldn't help a whole lot. They're going to need ships on the scene to do any good."
"Why not ships and planes?" Frank joined in. "An aircraft carrier?"
Marc looked at Kim. "That's a thought. Do you remember from our briefing whether there was any heavy stuff in the Med?"
Kim slowly shook his head, thinking. "No, I don't...remember anything, one way or the other."
"That would be nice, Frank, but without the VIKING's communications I don't have any idea what the fleet dispersal is."
"But I don't understand," Janese interrupted, exasperated. "What's all this going to mean, anyway, when somebody, whoever, finally does get here? I mean, what are they going to do? As far as that goes, what are we going to do? They're up there, and we're down here!"
No one said anything for a moment. Then, again, they all looked at Justin. Frustrated at their apparent dependence on him, when he didn't have any answers either, he shrugged and looked at Janese.
"That's true," he admitted. "And the truth is, I don't have any magic answers any more than you do." Their faces fell and it would have been comical under other circumstances. "The way I see it is this: there are too many unknowns for us to do any planning. We can only assume there'll be a military response. We can guess that military forces from several countries, especially the ones that've been threatened, will be a part of that response. We don't know, and can't know, what they'll do once they get here...if they do anything. And if they do, we don't know what Jambou's response to them will be. There 're just too many variables."
"We've gotta do something!" Cy groaned in an aggrieved voice.
"We will, Cy, when the time comes," Justin tried to bolster the young man's spirit.
"When will that be?" Janese retorted.
Marc and Kim exchanged a knowing look. "What we have to do...each one of us..." Justin said in measured tones, "...is to very carefully fight small wars of opportunity."
Frank and Janese and Cy all looked at him blankly.
"What I mean is, until we get the one big chance we're waiting for, we've all got to stay alert and constantly be looking for opportunities to better our situation in any way we can, so that, at the right moment, we'll be ready."
"Watch the enemy for weaknesses, without him knowing he's being watched," Frank said.
"Exactly," Marc agreed.
"Work together, as a team," Janese added.
"Yes," Justin encouraged.
"Be alert," Cy offered.
"Perfect," their reluctant leader supported the effort.
They began to drift away toward the mess hall. Marc and Kim looked at each other, reading the other's mind.
"Be alert," Marc said under his breath, as the two of them fell in behind the others.
"Right," Kim added. "The world needs more lerts."
Marcus Justin smiled grimly to himself at their old joke. He sure hoped something came their way 'cause he was fresh out of ideas. That was when he heard shouts and saw two of the guards running toward the mess hall.
Chapter 69
There was a tight cluster of guards around the 60-inch flat screen on the far wall of the mess hall. They were clearly excited by what they were looking at and as the group of hostages spilled into the room, it was easy to see why.
A woman, blood running down one side of her face, was struggling to her feet in what must have been the cabin of an aircraft. The next scene was a close-up of an engine on fire and a wing...no, half a wing of the aircraft. Then there was a confused blur as the cameraman apparently stumbled across the cabin and, as the camera was thrust through the window, a view of the ocean below. It was when the camera steadied that it really got interesting. They all collectively gaped, then gasped, as they realized they were looking at the twin contrails of a pair of missiles that had obviously been fired from the tower that was rapidly diminishing in the distance as the aircraft jinked evasively away from the scene. Marc was sure he must have been as wide-eyed as Kim was when they looked at each other across the group. That had to be...
Shouts from the screen. Angry replies. Somebody's name. "That was a missile!...We've been shot...tower..."
And then the woman...she must have been some kind of reporter...was back, explaining to the camera that somebody had fired on them with missiles from a tower. More talk. And then first the pilot, and then the woman, was on the radio calling for help from...from an aircraft carrier?! And getting it! The footage was spellbinding and, as one, captors and captives watched the dramatic crash landing, apparently successful, of the little plane on a U. S. Navy aircraft carrier...one that was undeniably just moments by air from the tower...their tower. The one above their heads.
Cy let out a whoop, exulting in the news that the troops had arrived, his troops. The guards looked around, realizing for the first time that the other group was behind them. They were, themselves, confused. They didn't know whether to be glad that things were finally happening that would lead to their being paid off and rotated out when a fresh security crew arrived, or to be alarmed that their wacko boss had just tried to shoot down a civilian airplane full of newsies who were then rescued by a military force that was practically breathing down their necks. One that they hadn't even known was there at all until now. The first seeds of a possible betrayal were watered by the fevered acknowledgment that something was finally shaking that would get them some relief from almost two months of tedious boredom. As it suddenly occurred to several of the guards that maybe these prisoners shouldn't be allowed to see what was going on topside, the scene on the screen changed.
Jambou's face filled the screen, the bald head chillingly grotesque on a screen so large.
"As you can see," he said smugly, "the first shots of this confrontation have been fired, and they were ours." Justin was surprised, then impressed, by the man's use of the word ‘ours’, knowing full well that including the flunkies in the proceedings was just a ploy to string them along and control them until he no longer needed them.
"The tower up above was raised today just before our now-famous television show and has proved itself to be very valuable. Not only did the television equipment work very well, but the missiles on the tower, as you've just seen in a re-broadcast CNN television newscast, also did their job. The missiles are set to automatically shoot down anyone foolish enough to invade our country, as the airplane you just saw found out. I doubt if anyone wil
l try that again anytime soon."
"As you also noticed, there is now a group of United States warships on the surface. They arrived just before the news plane, about two hours ago. You have no reason for alarm. In fact, you should be glad that they're up there, because that means that some very important people are now taking us very seriously. And that means that it's just a matter of time now before they agree to our demands. And, of course, that means that you all get big bonuses and a well-earned vacation on the Riviera! I'm sure you're all looking forward to that after being cooped up here for all these weeks." The motley group laughed raucously and elbowed each other.
"Now that things are starting to really happen, it will be even more important for you to stay alert and do whatever it takes to bring this operation to a successful conclusion. I'm depending on you now more than ever. Each of you was hired for two reasons: you're good with weapons and, for the right price, you'd spit in the devil's eye. Well, the price is right. I personally guarantee it!" There was an enthusiastic chorus of appreciation.
"Keep an especially close eye on our guests," Jambou warned them. "We already know we can't trust them, especially the short, slant-eyed one who calls himself Kim. He's already cost one of our people his life, and we don't want a repeat of that, do we?" Heads turned, eyes hostile and wary, toward Kim. There were muttered comments, scattered snatches of which were enough to cause Marc to begin quietly rounding up his bunch and herding them toward the door and their quarters.