The Chimera Sanction

by André K. Baby

  ‘What?’

  ‘Our source says he was registered in Sion, Switzerland, as a practicing Cathar.’

  ‘Unbelievable.’ Now sitting on the edge of the bed, Dulac absorbed the impact of the news. For the Vatican to allow the Swiss Guards, staunch Roman Catholics to a man, to be headed by a Cathar, was embarrassing, inexcusable. Someone would have to answer for the laxity. Perhaps a cardinal or two.

  ‘I know. As incredible as it may seem, he was in regular contact with the Cathar bishop of Switzerland, a monsignor Pierre Comtesse. Romer being head of the Swiss Guards, nobody bothered to check.’

  ‘Nor had anyone reason to. Up till now. Who checked his credentials when he applied for the post?’

  ‘That’s going to take a lot more digging.’

  ‘That explains why Aguar had no difficulty in getting hired, why the kidnappers knew about the ambulance being out of service, had access to the helicopter landing pad. Christ, the kidnappers had inside info on everything. Just pissing great.’

  ‘It all falls into place.’

  ‘So Aguar, dead, Romer, a Cathar, dead. De Ségur, a Cathar, very much alive. He and his bunch of hoods have killed the Pope, and we have their lat-long fix in Sicily. What the Christ are you waiting for? De Ségur’s personal invitation?’

  ‘Your sarcasm I don’t need, Dulac. You didn’t let me finish. Yesterday, the Palermo police raided the villa corresponding to the latitude-longitude fix.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘It’s empty.’

  Chapter 18

  Somewhere in the Mediterranean, 4.42 a.m.

  The wind was now shearing plumes of phosphorescent foam off the mountainous wave tops. The captain glanced at the fine-featured Tunisian helmsman standing slightly ahead of him, not getting any reassurance from the worried look on the helmsman’s usually jovial face.

  ‘Everything OK?’ said the captain coolly, as the Tunisian swung the wheel to starboard, to counter the force of an oncoming wave.

  ‘OK. I’m OK,’ said the Tunisian nervously, overcorrecting to port.

  Spews of spray were exploding off the Bellerophon’s bow, hitting the bridge’s windows with increasing regularity and force. The wipers weren’t keeping up. Instead, a greasy film of sand and saltwater was forming on the glass, reducing the Tunisian’s visibility. Now and again, he would emit a muffled curse in Arabic, leaning over to the side window to get a better view of the oncoming waves.

  The captain looked at the anemometer’s dimly-lit dial directly above him. Its needle was oscillating between forty-five and fifty knots. The occasional gust would bring the needle perilously close to sixty knots.

  ‘It’s veering south-east,’ said the Tunisian. ‘It’s already 20 degrees off the port bow.’

  ‘Take her down to ten knots,’ ordered the captain.

  The pounding of the waves on the vessel’s hull had awakened Vespoli in his cabin. Hearing the motors slowing, he’d dressed and rushed up the companionway. At the top, he opened the door leading to the deck only to meet a wave hitting the side of the Bellerophon and drenching him from head to foot. He clambered up the open staircase and made his way to the bridge.

  ‘What’s the situation?’ he asked the captain.

  ‘We have a gale. And the wind is increasing.’

  Vespoli looked at the current position of the Bellerophon on the illuminated GPS chart plotter next to the helmsman, then looked at his watch. ‘We’re over an hour behind schedule. Can’t you get more speed out of her?’ The sight of an irate de Ségur waiting for him near Suluq darkened Vespoli’s mind briefly.

  ‘Forget it,’ said the captain. ‘Does the yacht “Estée Lauder” mean anything to you?’

  ‘No. Should it?’

  ‘She was caught by a Force Ten storm in the Straights of Messina. She tried to go head-on through it, got hit by a wave that sheared off half the bridge.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘She went down like a rock.’

  Vespoli didn’t react, looking straight ahead. With the slowing of the engines, the Bellerophon was now hobby-horseing, its bow lifting high above the water before plunging down the face of the next wave. Just then, a wave slammed into the half-inch thick window with the force of a wrecking ball. The whole bridge shook violently.

  The captain grabbed the wheel from the helmsman and pulled back the throttle.

  ‘Get the crew up here. Check the panes for cracks,’ said the captain to the helmsman. Suddenly, a voice crackled on the intercom.

  ‘Captain, the lower deck has three broken ports and we’re shipping a ton of water.’

  The captain glanced at the ship’s anemometer. It was locked at the maximum, 70 knots. ‘Get me Tripoli Coast Guard,’ said the captain to the radio operator behind him.

  Vespoli pulled out his Glock 7 mm pistol from his jacket and put it to the radio operator’s temple. ‘Do that and those will be your last words.’

  The radio operator looked wild-eyed at Vespoli and froze.

  ‘Are you crazy? You’re risking all our lives,’ shouted the captain. ‘The next wave can take us out.’

  Vespoli had survived de Ségur’s wrath twice. De Ségur had made it very clear there would be no third time. To dock into Tripoli Harbor under Coast Guard escort would blow their cover, kill the mission and sign Vespoli’s death warrant. The risk of the Bellerophon being damaged by an out-of-phase wave paled in comparison.

  ‘Get your speed to 10 knots, or I will,’ said Vespoli, now aiming his Glock at the captain’s head.

  ‘This is madness, complete madness.’ The captain obeyed, slowly moving the throttle forward. The yacht lurched and plunged directly into the sea’s increasing fury.

  At that moment, the door of the bridge opened and two Cathars entered, disheveled, and soaked.

  ‘Captain, everyone below is sick. Can’t we go slower?’ said the man in the wet brown shirt.

  The captain looked at Vespoli and before he could answer, the crackling of the intercom interrupted again.

  ‘Captain, we’re flooding. The bilge pumps can’t handle the volume,’ said the now-desperate voice.

  ‘How far are we from Libya?’ said Vespoli to the captain.

  ‘About 30 nautical miles from Benghazi.’

  ‘So the waves should get smaller as we get nearer the coast.’

  ‘Shorter but steeper and more powerful. Like a herd of bull elephants.’

  The intercom crackled to life again: ‘Captain, the engine room is half flooded. We must slow down.’

  The bow was now rising clear of the water, and then submerging completely under tons of deadly water. The whole ship shuddered violently on every impact.

  ‘Slow her to 8 knots,’ Vespoli ordered.

  ‘That’s not enough! We must reduce to minimum steerage,’ said the captain. Between torrents of water lashing at the bridge’s windows, Vespoli would catch a glimpse of the Bellerophon’s bow rising up the steep cliffs of water, coming to a halt on the crests, then accelerating down the waves’ backsides. The intercom crackled again: ‘Captain, both generators have shorted out. We’re on battery power only.’

  Suddenly, a large cross-wave hit the Bellerophon on her port quarter and she started heeling in a continuous, sickening roll. Vespoli grabbed the handrail over his head with his free hand, still pointing his Glock at the captain. The yacht veered to starboard, exposing its port flank broadside to the waves’ fury. The captain flung the wheel hard to port and shoved the throttle full forward, in a desperate attempt to bring the bow back, perpendicular to the waves.

  ‘Come on. Come on, you can do it,’ coaxed the captain. The Bellerophon shuddered as she slowly righted herself and struggled back onto her course.

  There was a moment of relief, and the captain reduced speed again. Vespoli relaxed his grip on the overhead metal handhold.

  The Bellerophon‘s hobby-horseing had assumed a steady rhythm, when suddenly Vespoli sensed an eerie darkness invading the bridge. ‘What the…?’ said the captain.
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  Vespoli looked up and saw it: ‘Mother of God!’

  The enormous rogue wave, three times the size of any previous wave, started to engulf the ship’s bow, the mountain of falling water obliterating the morning light.

  The men on the bridge stood paralyzed, hypnotized by the onslaught of the incoming monster.

  ‘Hold on,’ yelled the captain.

  Those were the last words Vespoli ever heard.

  The wave hit the bridge with the force of a freight train, shattering windows and sending missiles of broken glass through wood and flesh. Men were sent flying onto the steel-paneled rear wall of the bridge, hitting its protruding beams with their arms, torsos and heads, their broken bodies collapsing onto the floor. Water gushed through the windowless ports, flooding the bridge. The few men who had survived the impact were trying to escape the torrent, their screams muffled by the inrush of water. Minutes later, the bridge lay half-submerged, filled with bloodied bodies and drowning men.

  Then, the Bellerophon began a slow, inexorable roll to starboard. Her fate seemed sealed when suddenly, as if by held by a giant hand, her rolling stopped. The yacht lay on its side, wallowing in the waves like a mortally wounded whale. Below, suffocating men were fighting to get out from the rapidly flooding entrails of the ship. Then, an out-of-sync wave hit without mercy, submerging the bow under tons of water. The doomed ship began its inescapable descent, sinking slowly at first, then quickly, as the bow dove steeper, deeper into the abyss.

  Below in his cabin, Bruscetti was thrown across the room onto the small commode of the stateroom. He tried to regain his balance, only to fall down on the lopsided floor. The water was gushing in under the doorsill. He clambered towards the door, fighting the inrush of water. He grabbed the door handle and pulled himself up, working the door handle frantically until finally it broke off. He grabbed the bottom of the door and tried pulling. It was no use. ‘Help! Help me,’ he yelled. He pounded desperately on the door, to no avail. Finally, the water pressure burst the wooden door off its hinges and Bruscetti was thrown clear across the cabin, the door crushing his chest and pinning him against the wall. As he tried in vain to free himself, the water level quickly reached neck-level. He tried to breathe but choked, again and again, his body’s autonomous reflex attempting in vain to expulse the deadly liquid. As his lungs filled with water, he began to feel dizzy. Now he could barely see the cabin lights, flickering in the increasing obscurity. The cabin was almost fully submerged, when the door finally released its deadly grip and fell slowly to the floor. By now, Bruscetti’s world had swung ninety degrees: he was standing nearly fully submerged on one of the cabin’s walls, the doorway was now horizontal and completely submerged, and the edge of the water was lapping at his chin. I must try now! For Maria. He took a last gulp of air, ducked underwater and began swimming towards the cabin’s doorway. He was halfway out the doorway and trying to resurface when he felt his clothing catch on something. He looked down: he’d caught a loop of his fatigue around the leg of an overturned chair. He pulled hard to free himself, only to tighten the loop around the chair’s leg. He panicked, letting out the precious air from his searing lungs. He choked and swallowed more water. There was no more air. He pulled desperately one more time, as his lungs burst with pain. Nothing. It was useless. He was caught. He swallowed again.

  Slowly, inexorably Bruscetti felt a feeling of abandon overtake his will to survive, giving way to a sense of resignation and peace. As the lights flickered erratically underwater in the corridor, the last thing Bruscetti saw was a white blur, being carried away by the water. The blur was struggling in slow-motion, trying to surface. It looked like an angel.

  Then, darkness fell.

  Suluq, 20 km south of Benghazi, 6.05 a.m.

  In the Libyan Desert, the earliest warning of a sirocco comes invariably too late. Awakened in the middle of the night by the eerie whistling sound of the wind, de Ségur had ordered the Berbers to barricade the doors of the house, and secure the Alouette helicopter by tying it down with sisal ropes anchored to small stones. When the 150 km-an-hour wind hit the helicopter, it ripped the ropes free in minutes. Flogging wildly about like sails in a storm, the loose ropes eventually flipped the helicopter onto its side like a toy in a sandbox.

  Two hours later the wind finally abated, and one of the Berbers had to crawl through a window to remove the pile of sand blocking the front door. De Ségur stepped outside, looking forlornly at the remnants of the Alouette: the helicopter lay half-buried in sand, two of its blades badly bent. The force of the wind had blown off the jet motor’s intake cover, letting in large amounts of sand. De Ségur was looking at the useless piece of wreckage when his satellite phone rang.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Sir, there’s still no sign of the Bellerophon.’ De Ségur recognized Antoine’s voice. ‘She should have been here an hour and a half ago.’

  ‘Any radio contact?’ said de Ségur.

  ‘Nothing. We tried hailing them on channel 76 and emergency channel 16. They must have been hit by the sirocco. It went through here about two hours ago. There’s big damage to the docks. Three fishing trawlers were sunk here in Quaminis Bay.’

  ‘Give them another hour, and then get back here,’ said de Ségur to Antoine, the van’s driver. ‘We’ve got to make other plans.’

  De Ségur returned inside to face the eight Cathars seated in the small, stuffy room: ‘They’re almost two hours late. The sirocco must have hit them.’

  ‘Mr de Ségur, we looked outside,’ said a young Cathar. ‘Is the helicopter…?’

  ‘Finished.’

  The young man was silent, waiting for de Ségur to continue.

  ‘We still have the vans,’ said de Ségur as he sat down, absorbing the air of disquiet on the Cathars’ faces. For the first time, he felt their confidence in him wavering.

  ‘Sir, the Bellerophon. Could it have altered course to another port?’ asked the burly Frenchman in the brown desert shirt.

  ‘Vespoli would’ve contacted us,’ said de Ségur.

  ‘Their radios could be temporarily out of order,’ said a bespectacled, bald man.

  ‘Not all of them,’ said de Ségur.

  Jean Gaspard, treading water, half dazed and coughing out a lungful of salt water, looked desperately for floating debris from the Bellerophon. Waiting for a wave to pass, he pivoted on himself and searched the horizon. Nothing. Another wave caught him off guard and he swallowed more water. He knew that every time he did, he was getting a little closer to drowning. He turned again slowly, careful to keep his timing and to inhale only when on top of a wave. Again, nothing. Desperation was setting in. He had to find something, anything that could help him float. He pivoted one more half turn, and saw it: a couple of hundred yards away. First an orange blur between each passing wave. He focused and waited for the next wave. He rose with it. Yes. A life raft! He suddenly felt a surge of elation. He started swimming vigorously towards the raft. After a dozen strokes, he realized he wasn’t closing the distance. It seemed the wind and waves were pushing it at a slight angle away from him. He realized he had to aim not at the raft but in front of it. If he swam quickly, he could still intercept it. He knew he had but one try before the raft would sail away. He swam forcefully towards the raft, marshaling every bit of energy, when suddenly a wave flipped the raft onto its side. The raft began to sail away more quickly. Gaspard swam furiously, fear and adrenaline his only fuel. He was catching it. His arms and lungs seared with pain but he kept hitting the water with rapid, purposeful strokes. A few more yards. He was there. With a last, desperate lunge, he grabbed the rubber tubing of the raft’s side. As he tried to right the raft, his hand slipped, and a wave pushed the raft out of reach. Exhausted, his arms heavy with lactic acid, he swam after it, but another wave pushed the raft further away. In a matter of seconds, it was twenty feet away. He’d used up his last bit of strength. He had nothing left. It was no use. The raft was gone.

  Desperation and panic started floo
ding his brain. Stay calm, I must stay calm. He started to tread water again when suddenly he felt something brush his left hand. A bit of yellow rope. Jesus. It’s … it must be the end of the raft’s painter. He grabbed the yellow, floating polypropylene rope and pulled. Dear God, make that it’s still connected to the raft. He pulled frantically, and felt the tug of the raft at the other end of the raft’s painter. Nothing had ever felt so good. Slowly, one hand at a time, he pulled in the raft, careful not to entangle himself in the painter, treading water between pulls. With the raft finally alongside, he hung there for a moment, his right hand wrapped around the painter, too tired to climb in. After a moment, gathering his strength, he struggled up the two rubber steps and tumbled into the raft. He lay on the bottom exhausted, taking short breaths, and eventually fell into a semi-conscious sleep.

  A while later, a barely perceptible tapping sound tore insistently at Gaspard’s dazed somnolence, finally awakening him. He leaned on the raft’s side and looked about. The fury of the sirocco had passed, replaced by a cool westerly breeze. The seas, although diminished, were still chaotic, a confused maelstrom of large, crisscrossing swells. Gaspard could hear a faint thump, thump, thump coming from somewhere in the distance. Squinting into the sunlight, he saw a human form, waving, or … no, someone was striking what looked like a large, wooden box.

  Gaspard searched for a paddle inside the raft, but there was none. Only an emergency ration kit and a portable VHF radio transmitter under the life raft’s torn cover. He cupped his hands and yelled to the man: ‘Hang on!’

  Gaspard couldn’t make out his faint reply, but noticed that the wind was pushing the life raft closer. ‘I’m coming. Hang on!’ he shouted. Gaspard leaned over the edge of the raft and started to paddle with his hands. The raft barely moved. Gaspard looked at the desperate man and saw he couldn’t hold onto the wooden object much longer. The man’s arm went up in the air and fell limp into the water one more time, and didn’t move. The top of his head was now barely visible over the box. He was going under.