by Tony Bulmer
Sprawling forwards on the floor, Kellerman looked up, saw that she was surrounded by men with guns and raised her hands very slightly. What would Buchanan do under such circumstances? He would probably spit on the floor, offer up some gruff, expletive ridden witticism then charge the enemy, like a rampaging gorilla. That guy was a force of nature, at least he had been. But who was going to take over the baton now? There was no one else. She was the only one left. Everything was down to her. Everything.
Kellerman rose slowly to her feet, keeping her eyes on Kim the whole time. When at last she had risen to her full height, she turned slightly and spat on the floor. “I want to see the crew. I want to see they are alive and well, and they better be, or you and your buddies will be sailing this tub to hell on your own.”
A thin, derisive sneer edged across Kim’s face, “Your friends put up quite a fight. They killed my engineer. You will take his place. If you complete the tasks I set for you, you will join your friends, if not, I will kill them one by one, until your obedience is unquestioning.”
“You wont kill anyone Kim,” said Kellerman flatly. She looked around at Kim’s men, half a dozen thin little guys, all of them nervous all of them holding Chinese style AK assault rifles. “So where is the crew, what have you done with them?”
“They are contained. Gathered together in the mess hall.”
“So you say. For all I know you killed everyone, dumped them in the ocean.”
Kim’s eyes grew wide with irritation. “You doubt my word?”
“Hell, yes, I doubt your word. Take me to see my people, or you can kiss your big ideas goodbye Kim, I won’t raise a damn finger to help you. You understand me?”
Kim scowled, threw her a sick recalcitrant look then made eye contact with one of the gun-‐ wielding guards. He gestured with his head in the direction of the mess hall. The guard took a step back and made a jerking motion with the barrel of his gun that seemed to indicate that he wanted Kellerman to move towards the door.
“Any tricks and I will not hesitate to shoot
you Officer Kellerman,” snapped Kim brusquely. Kellerman gave him a look of displeasure.
The comment was so stupid and contemptible, that
she wouldn’t bother to dignify it with an answer. Kim’s men marched Kellerman towards the
mess hall, as they wound their way through the
ship, there were signs of the vicious battle that had
raged out of control. The floor was littered with
cartridge cases and the bullet-‐strafed walls
resembled something out of a vintage war film, the
kind you saw on TCM. The thought of old movies
sucked her mind away from the moment and
delivered her home, to her walk up apartment in
sunny Long Beach. What she wouldn’t give to be
sitting there right now, relaxing back on the couch
in front of her wide screen TV, eating popcorn and
sipping Chardonnay, listening to the clipped
annunciation of the black and white past. All her
things were there, the pictures of her family, the
shooting and the swimming trophies from school;
the soft toys her mom had bought her many years
ago, so worn and floppy now, as they sat collecting
dust on their safe little shelves, knowing they could
never be thrown away. Kellerman paused. Felt a
rush of emotion. The walls of her apartment were
pastel yellow—she hated pastel colors. Why in the
hell would she paint her home that way? When she
got back, she would make changes, big changes. The gun barrel prodded her hard between
the shoulder blades. The guard screeched at her,
high pitched and insistent, but Kellerman had no
idea what he was saying. Absently she said,
“Alright, alright. Just relax would you?” As they
reached the end of the corridor they were greeted
by another guard, a thin mean faced specimen, who looked her over with restless eyes. The screeching guard began rattling off some kind of long winded explanation as to why they had come to visit but the guy with the restless eyes said nothing, just stared at them, his big wet lips parting to show a collection of squalid teeth.
Kellerman raised her hand to open the mess hall door, but restless eyes, covered her hand with his own and barred her way. His fingers were cold and clammy. He stroked the back of her hand and showed her his teeth close up, “Americans I like,” he said with a heavy accent. “I like many times to come to your country,” he added, his eyes lingering over her breasts. “I like very much to make you acquaintance.” He flashed his squalid teeth once again.
Kellerman squeezed a saccharine smile, and said, “You best let go of my hand now bucko, or the only thing you’ll be getting acquainted with is broken fingers.”
The guy with the restless eyes nodded slowly, without comprehension. His wet little mouth drifted open once again, as though preparing to deliver further words of wisdom. But the guy with the screechy voice interjected. From the tone of his voice he was getting impatient. He underlined his impatience by jabbing the hard barrel of his rifle into the joints at the top of her spine. Kellerman hoped he had the safety on. One slip and the AK would blast her head clean off.
Fortunately, the guy with the restless eyes decided that the bidding of superiors took precedence over further chat and he swung back the heavy latch on the mess hall door. He hung the
snub nosed rifle across his chest and swung the door wide. Mr. Screechy barked a command and pushed Kellerman into the room, she staggered forwards her brow creasing with annoyance. Turning, she snapped, “You better watch what you are doing with that thing, or I will have you wear it like a suppository. Regaining her composure, Kellerman brushed off her filthy tunic and turned to see a room full of glum faces staring back at her. No one said anything.
Kellerman sniffed, nodded and said, “I thought I would drop in, see how you were doing— not good is what I am guessing.”
“Did you get the weapons?” Captain Pedro Álvares looked ashen faced. Laying on the floor, half covered in a dirty bloodstained blanket, with ENS Mooney crouched faithfully by his side. Álvares looked like he wasn’t going to make it.
Kellerman gave a quick nod.
“What was all the shooting about?” asked Mooney
“Buchanan and me—we had a plan—it
didn’t work out.”
Deck hand Rosco Collins was unimpressed.
“No shit, you and that idiot Buchanan you riled
these bastards up didn’t you? What are they going
to do now shoot us?”
“If they were going to do that, they would
have done it already don’t you think Rosco?” “What the hell do I know,” snapped Collins.
“Caught in here, like a rat in a box? These tricky
>
little bastards are probably going to make some
kind of crazy ransom demand to the government
and when the government don’t pay up, they will
probably send the ship to the bottom, with every one of us on board.”
“Ransom is not the motive. They want to patch in to the computer system.”
“What the hell would you know Kellerman? They shot Jennings and Scotty Gehringer, gunned them down like they were animals. Scotty had three kids and another on the way and Jennings, that big happy kid never hurt anyone; those scumbags didn’t even have the decency to let us take care of them, they just tossed the bodies overboard. Now I ask you, does that sound like a bunch of computer hackers to you?
“They are after the network, they want to disable the DART Buoys” said Captain Pedro Álvares, quietly. “That’s why they want our ship. If they hack into the network from our system they will be able to knock out the Tsunami warning network. It will leave the entire Pacific coast vulnerable.”
Rosco Collins stared slack jawed. Kellerman frowned, as worrying questions began rolling through her mind. Predicting earthquakes and ocean tsunami waves was a difficult operation that involved millions of dollars of highly complex equipment. Why would a bunch of rag-‐tag pirates from North Korea want to interfere with that? What the hell were they up to? Even if they took the network down for a matter of hours what advantage would that offer? Seismic events were by their very nature highly unpredictable. So why would they try and take out the early warning network—unless they wanted to cover up some kind of man made phenomenon—like a nuclear weapon exploding. Kellerman’s blood ran cold—A
high yield nuke could create a wall of radioactive water two hundred feet high. Without the DART system the Pacific coast would be destroyed, millions of Americans would die and the ocean would be polluted for centuries to come.
48
Oahu, Hawaii Karyn banged on the door of the black van and stood back. When the door opened, she reached in with a quick movement and caught the guy by the neck. He was young, kind of cute looking with a mop of unkempt hair moussed across the top of his head, like he was some kind of fashion magazine model. Problem was, he smelled bad, a covert-‐ops stink that said he had been lurking inside the van for a double shift at least. Karyn pulled him clear of the van and cracked him hard across the back of his head with the pistol. He went down like he’d been hit with pipe wrench. His face impacted the hood of the car parked directly behind the van and his unconscious body rolled into the gutter. Karyn gave him a three count with her weapon held ready to pop him if he made a move—he didn’t, so she spun to her right to cover the inside of the van. There was no one else inside, just a covert
communications rig, complete with video screens and a satellite uplink system—standard Fed kit. The engine of the van suddenly burst into life—the driver must have seen her in his rearview and gotten spooked—probably figuring that he could blow the scene and motor out of trouble.
That wasn’t going to happen.
Karyn moved around to the driver’s side door and popped it open. The driver, a thickset guy with a red topped buzz-‐cut swiveled fast in his seat and tried to kick her in the head. It was a clumsy move, telegraphed so far in advance he might as
well have sent her a text message to tell her it was coming. Karyn feinted out of the way and pointed her weapon at the driver. “Get out the passenger side and make it fast. You mess me around and I will blow you a new one.”
The driver threw Karyn a sleazy look, “You won’t get away with this lady. No one messes with the FBI and gets away with it.”
Karyn stared at him, her eyes flat and deadly, “One more word out of you and I will hurt you bad—you up for that Red?”
The driver licked his lips, his pale freckled hands tightening for a brief moment on the steering wheel. Then, he lunged out of his seat, his thick ham-‐hock arms flailing like he was trying to fly. He realized he had misjudged just as soon as he had committed himself, but by the time that realization came, it was already too late. His soft, over-‐ nourished body hit the roadway like a side of ham falling onto a butcher’s block, and there he lay, his eyes fluttering, like he’d just walked into a wrecking ball.
Karyn stepped over the driver. She climbed into the cab of the van and threw it into gear. In the rearview she could see what remained of the takedown team chasing out of the alleyway. Instinctively, she profiled downwards, below the dashboard and hammered her foot on the gas. The first bullets came in short bust increments. Karyn stayed down. The van cut out onto the boulevard with a squeal of tires. Horns blared, onlookers hollered and screamed and the bullets came fast and hard, a full-‐auto firestorm, tearing into the back of the van. Karyn popped her head clear of the dash and jammed the gas pedal into the floor. The
van lurched and veered, as every over-‐torqued cylinder in the engine powered up in unison. The rear end fishtailed out, rebounding off parked cars. Karyn accelerated away, making distance. The bullets had stopped now, no more pitter-‐pat-‐pat of metal on metal, but the ominous throb of traffic noise that moved into the vacuum told her the night wasn’t over, not by a long shot.
There was no going back to the Hawaiian Gardens hotel, the location was compromised—it had to be given the level of Federal involvement. Jack Senegar had been right, there was something very bad going down on the island of Oahu, something Deng Tao and his megalomaniacal friends wanted to stay hidden from public view— some dark secret they would go to any lengths to protect.
Karyn thought back to her meeting with Honolulu Police Chief Donald Mālama and FBI Station head Ted Congo. That half-‐pint punk Congo was involved deep, that much was now certain. No doubt his own personal murder team had been front and centre in the Tex Johnston slaying, probably the very same creeps she had seen off tonight. If so, Special Agent Congo was about to find out what it was like to be hunted. He would be on his guard certainly, but he had a fiefdom to protect and that made him vulnerable. Operators like Congo always had a point of weakness, no matter how tough they thought they were, Congo had introduced that weakness on their very first meeting—his name was Donald Mālama head of the HPD. Karyn smiled. She turned the block, got off the main drag then pulled up in a darkened alleyway. There would be an APB out on the van for
sure, every cop and Federal Agent on the entire Island looking for her. But they weren’t dealing with just another criminal on the run. They were dealing with a deep cover assassin from the CIA. Karyn pulled out her on her iPhone and ran the PDF of the Mālama file Senegar had given her. Dawn was fast approaching and by then she would know everything there was to know about Police Chief Donald Mālama.
49
Langley, Virginia In the packed CIA situation room, Jack Senegar regarded his laptop closely and frowned. “We got ourselves a development Admiral, and
an ugly one at that.”
Admiral William Arthur Kane looked unimpressed. “So spit it out then Laddie. Let us know the nature of this development, so we might assess its relevance to the task in hand.”
“According to the National Oceanographic Data Centre in Silver Spring, Maryland, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration ship Nautilus has just dropped off the grid and the entire DART network has gone black.”
“Ocean research? What in the wild-‐ tarnation are you talking about?” fumed the Admiral. “This is no time to be worrying about those dolphin loving pseudo civilians and their petty little problems. We have an operation in hand Laddie and I would thank you to remember that.”
“This is an escalation,” said Senegar, his face grim. “First we get the communications outage over on the Islands, followed by surge interference, then a knock on to the telecoms hub and now satcom outages over the entire region. What is more, every NOAA station between Hawaii and San Francisco is off line. Someone is playing a dirty game with us Admiral and I want to know why.”
“We will find out, have no fear of that Jack, I have birds in the air.” The Admiral gave the nod to his assistant, a sandy haired Lieutenant named
Parker, who began pounding away at his keyboard and barking commands into his communications head set. Parker detailed longitude and latitude coordinates, followed by a series of coded commands. Then, with his work completed, he looked to the Admiral for further instruction.