Cruisin' for a SEAL

by Sharon Hamilton

  Way too soon to start thinking about casualties.

  Rapid gun bursts were making staccato appearances on most levels, most of them seeming to come from the upper decks. The security officer’s quarters were at zero deck at the backside of the medical bay. Mark was glad they weren’t carrying anything but sidearms. No duty bags to draw attention. Not that the extra firepower wouldn’t have been nice.

  A tray had been knocked to the floor and broken dishes and silverware scattered about. They could hear heavy boots coming around the corner, so the three SEALs deflected toward the medical officer’s station. On the way they noticed the cargo doors wide open, the night sea breeze refreshing the stale air of the zero deck. Laced in the salty sea smell was diesel engine fuel. The SEALs could see several smaller ships bobbing alongside, their lights flickering like stars. They were about to be boarded.

  Luckily the doors to the medical office were unlocked, so they ducked inside the reception area, keeping the lights out, and hid behind the counter. They saw a trio of combat troops in dark camo run past the glass window of the sick bay door, headed toward the open cargo bay or the elevators beyond. A crowd of confused crew in their nightclothes converged. Multiple languages were being shouted angrily.

  Mark remembered studying the footprint of the zero deck when he considered searching for Sophia before they’d begun their trysts in the lifeboat. He scampered to one of the treatment rooms and pulled a lower cabinet off the rear wall. Listening to be sure he hadn’t generated any attention on the other side, he kicked the wall once, his boot coming out the other side. With another two kicks and the help of Kyle and Armando to pull back the flimsy wall, they managed to make a hole large enough to crawl through. Armando was the last one through, and he pulled the cabinet behind him to cover up their passageway.

  Inside Moshe’s office they found the desk and drawers had been tossed. Kyle quietly closed the private door and heard a satisfying click as the built-in security kicked in. Broken pictures of the Israeli’s wife and family lay at the floor. Mark noted the door had been ripped off the safe, rendering it useless.

  “They get anything?” Mark asked.

  “Nah, I got his Jericho and three clips earlier, thank God,” Kyle said as he crouched near the door and peered out the tiny glass window slit above the key lock on the reinforced door.

  “Armani, see if you can find some master passkeys. Moshe always had a handful of them somewhere in his office.”

  “Roger that.” Armando and Mark searched through the mess on his desk, and then rummaged through the contents of the spilled drawers.

  “Got ‘me.” Armando said as he held up a fistful of plastic key cards for Mark and Kyle to see.

  “Think they were looking for weapons, but they’ll figure it out sooner or later, after they get tired breaking down their twentieth door,” Kyle said. “They’ll be back for sure.

  Just then they heard the unmistakable sound of the engines grinding to a complete stop. Lights flickered in the hallway as the power was rerouted.

  “Shit. They’ve stopped the ship. Now what the fuck?”

  They didn’t have to wait long. A blast hit the side of the ship, knocking them to the floor and sending a couple of metal file cabinets crashing down on them.

  “That can’t be our bomb,” said Mark.

  “Sounded more like percussive flash bombs intended to scare anyone who thought they should stay put in their cabins. My guess is they’re boarding us big time,” Armando said.

  As soon as he’d said it, shouts and single pistol shots were heard as the crew was rounded up and herded down the hallway. Women screamed and occasionally something was said in Arabic.

  But then all of them heard the unmistakable command of a Russian officer. Someone tried to open the office door, then kicked it so hard Mark thought the hinges might burst. The butt of a rifle broke the glass window and a hand reached through to grab the lever on the inside of the compartment. Broken glass scraped against someone’s arm and the trio heard swearing in Russian when the scrape caused more than surface injury. Wrapping his arm and hand in a rag, the man tried again to reach his hand through the jagged opening. His fingers could barely grip the handle as he pulled and frantically moved it back and forth without luck. Mark was grateful the door had that extra security feature.

  The three of them breathed a sigh of relief, although only temporary as sounds emerged from their passageway on the other side, in the medical clinic, as bottles and glass cabinets were smashed.

  The SEALs had nowhere to hide when at last all sounds from both sides of the corridors stopped. Muffled bursts of gunfire from far away and the gurgling of diesel engines from the flotilla outside the open hatches of the cargo bay gave them the impression it was raining bullets and destruction on everyone in the intruders’ path. It was a full-on, well-planned assault on a defenseless ship, and they were getting up to speed fast. Mark’s heart was in his throat, thinking about the women, hoping Sophia and the others, especially the ailing Libby, were safe, or left relatively alone.

  The captain’s voice began to crackle again over the intercom system.

  “Ladies and gentlemen, we are asking that all the women and children come to Deck Nine immediately.”

  “That’s the cafeteria level and outside on deck by the pool, on top of the ship. They want all the women on the top? It’s freezing up there,” Mark said.

  “They’re bait,” Armando whispered sadly.

  Kyle felt the buzz of his sat phone.

  “Lansdowne,” he whispered.

  “This Special Operator Kyle Lansdowne?”

  “Yessir.”

  “Hold on for Commander Vinson, sir,” the voice on the other end of the phone spoke.

  Kyle put his hand over the mouthpiece and whispered, “Do we know a Commander Vinson?”

  Mark shook his head. Armando shrugged, “Nada.”

  The phone crackled to life. “I’m Commander Vinson of the joint task force at SOCOM substation in Miami working with the U.S. Coast Guard.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I understand you are running an operation on a commercial cruise liner and are in the process of being compromised, is my assumption correct, sir?”

  “Hijacked would be more like it. That is correct, Commander. At approximately zero one hundred hours we got invasion units landing by boat, taking over the bridge and forcing the captain to request cooperation from the passengers. Then roughly thirty minutes ago we got a full hull breech, someone opened the cargo doors, and we believe many enemy insurgents came aboard, sir.”

  “How many men is your security force, son?”

  “Security force?”

  “We understand a Navy SEAL Platoon was dispatched to accompany a high level target on that cruise ship. How many men in your force, exactly?”

  “Commander, there’s no fuckin high level target here. We’re on a fuckin’ cruise ship. On vacation with our wives.”

  “Excuse me, would you repeat that?” The crackling of the phone was loud. Mark hoped the noise wouldn’t give their position away. Mark took several of the security pass cards Armando handed him, sticking them into his vest pocket.

  “We’re on vacation. This wasn’t a SEAL operation at all. We’ve just found ourselves in the middle of this shit, Commander.”

  They heard talking on the other end of the line. “This is not a U.S. Naval Special Forces operation, then, son, is that what you’re saying?”

  “Well, no. Hey, I called my Commander in Coronado, how did it get to you in Miami? And where are the SOCs?”

  “We monitor all calls coming from international waters, and intercepted. After we heard the content of your call, thought we should do more than just listen. Have already placed a call into SOCOM.”

  Thank God someone got through.

  “Fuckin’ A. When am I going to get some backup?” Kyle asked.

  “Believe it’s in the works, son.”

  “Look, I’m in the fuckin’ medical offi
ce of a cruise ship off the fuckin’ coast of Africa. We’re dead in the water. There’s a bomb on board and they’re taking hostages.”

  Both Armando and Mark’s phones began to vibrate. Something was going on.

  “Coop.” they said in unison and showed their phones to each other.

  “Look, I’ve got one of my guys down looking for the bomb right now. You better get some frogmen here, and we’re in sore need of firepower. All we have is our sidearm.”

  “Roger that.” Kyle gave him Commander Ramsey’s personal numbers, the ones he had left messages for.

  “Tell Commander Ramsey they’re probably going to use deadly force with the hostages, and ARE threatening to blow up this boat, sir. We have thirty-four hundred souls on board, sir, nearly all of them civilians. Innocents.”

  The long pause was painful.

  “I gotta take Coop’s call,” Armando said as he hoisted his cell to his ear. “Coop, I’m here,” he whispered.

  “What kinds of precautions does the cruise ship have? Is there an emergency plan?” the Commander asked Kyle.

  Mark couldn’t believe his ears.

  “I’m not aware that the cruise ship has the ability to do anything but wait for some ransom demands,” Kyle informed him. “The head security officer has been taken at gunpoint by masked men. I’d say he’s in grave danger, sir.”

  “Son, you’ve definitely got our attention, but I’m going to be honest. It will take an hour or two to assemble a team unless we get some kind of miracle.”

  “That’s exactly what we need, Commander. A fuckin’ miracle.”

  “Roger that. Stand by.” The phone went dead.

  Kyle sat back. “Un-fuckin-believable.”

  Armando was getting information from Cooper. “Holy fuckin’ Christ. Snakes?” Armando asked.

  Kyle ripped the phone from Armando’s hands.

  “Report, Coop.”

  “We got a problem, Kyle,” Coop said.

  “Okay. Lay it out for me.”

  “We got a bomb. We got engines shut down, but appear to not be compromised, but we got a dead chief engineer and we got snakes loose.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “When we got here they’d just finished shutting everything down, sending the crew upstairs somewhere, and murdering the engineer, who’d tried to be a hero. When they left, we found the bomb, uncrated. Seems as though someone had the bright idea to load the package with cobras and one of the commandos got bit in the leg and died within minutes. There are about twenty snakes, as best I can see, crawling all over the engine room floor. We’re up on the catwalk.”

  “Holy fuckin’ hell. So I guess you aren’t going to have a good look at that bomb, then.”

  Cooper cleared his throat. “Does anybody know, do cobras climb trees? ’Cause I think I see one havin’ that sort of an idea.”

  Chapter 28

  ‡

  SOPHIA HAD BEEN forced to go upstairs with the other women of the crew and staff. She found Christy, Gina, Devon, Mia, Jasmine and a very ill looking Libby, who had brought a blanket with her and was lying on one of the bench seats in the Deck 9 dining area. Christy had gotten a glass of hot water and was trying to help Libby sip a bit of it.

  She approached them. “Anything I can get for her?”

  “She shouldn’t be here. She should be in bed, in a warm cabin,” Christy said.

  “At least you got a spot inside. Some aren’t so lucky,” she pointed to the glass sliding doors which were sliding back and forth as people were lined up several deep, attempting to file into the dining area from the outside. A guard at the doorway blocked their entrance. He waved an automatic in their faces and several in the front screamed and fell, but were helped back up by the passengers behind them. A cold wind swiftly cut through the room every time the door swung open.

  Sophia thought most of the commandos, and there appeared to be about ten of them on the deck, were Russian. She’d heard one speaking Arabic, but several spoke a Russian-like dialect she’d heard only a couple of times before.

  She’d passed the Moroccan dancers, headed downstairs with a large contingent of elderly men. Their skinny bodies seemed out of place with the tall, muscular black-camo warriors surrounding them. They kept to themselves, whispering, with eyes darting back and forth. That’s when she realized they’d been pawns in a very dangerous game, perhaps more deadly than they realized.

  She wondered how the SEAL Team men were faring, since she’d not seen one of them. Sanouk had been allowed to accompany Libby, since she was too weak to walk on her own and needed someone to carry her.

  Sanouk walked up to her and whispered in her ear. “She is very sick, mum. I am afraid for her.”

  “Me too, Sanouk. Let me see if I can get her something to chew on.”

  “No, mum. She can’t keep anything down. Just seems to make her sicker. My mother would brew her some chrysanthemum tea, which would be good for her stomach.”

  “Well, I see they have warm water. Let me see if I can get some herbal—”

  A heavy arm grabbed Sophia by the waist and pulled her back and away from the other women. She struggled a bit before she saw Maksym’s face, which looked confused and hostile. He was unaccompanied.

  “You will come with me and get one other who is strong.” His grip on her arm hurt, reminding her of Roberto.

  “Where are you taking us?”

  “I’m allowed to keep a special eye out for troublemakers. I may have need of your services.”

  At first Sophia squinted at the insult she thought had been leveled at her. But a new plan began to form. Perhaps this officer, whom Mark had told her about, was beginning to sprout a conscience.

  She whirled around and surveyed the group of SEAL women before her. “I need a volunteer.” She didn’t have time to evaluate the group properly. Mia stepped forward but was soon pushed aside by Gina. “I’m your gal.” The two of them exchanged a look that informed Sophia that the other woman had some martial arts training and probably weaponry.

  “I’m a cop,” she whispered.

  “Maksym, we are ready,” Sophia said as she whirled around and found Maksym in an argument with a Russian nearly his size. The Russian had forced an armful of orange jumpsuits into Maksym’s arms and left. She’d heard the guttural Russian and multiple times the word, Amerikanskiy, which indicated to her they were being singled out for some reason.

  Maksym walked over to her with his arms full of jumpsuits.

  “I’m afraid you must all put these on. It is ordered by the commander.”

  This would make it impossible not to identify them as some kind of high-value asset. Sophia wondered what plan they were being forced to play.

  “No way I’m letting Libby put one of those jumpsuits on,” Christy said sternly. She huffed as she jammed her legs into the oversized opening of a filthy one-piece jumpsuit. It was clearly made for a man twice her size, with legs nearly a foot too long, despite Christy’s height. She rolled her cuffs up, as did several of the others.

  Sophia put on hers, which smelled of oil and days old sweat. Surveying the room, she saw that several other women were being asked to put on the orange jumpsuits, and Sophia realized they must have also been Americans.

  Maksym came up behind her and whispered, “Take it off, and get your friend to remove hers, too. Come with me.”

  Sophia and Gina did as instructed, waving fondly to the group before they followed the tall Ukrainian officer, who no longer wore anything that identified he was a member of the officer’s crew. His jeans, black knit top and black leather jacket made him look like a wealthy tourist. Holding the folded jumpsuits they had previously worn, he led them towards the center of the ship to a men’s restroom, closed the door behind them and locked it.

  Sophia saw Gina go on instant alert. Sophia had known Maksym only for a year, but she didn’t feel the same distrust she saw in Gina’s eyes and stance.

  “We have little time.” He threw the jumpsuits into the trash
bin under the sink. “Your friends have been chosen for execution. Public execution.”

  Gina’s eyes widened.

  “I cannot save all of you, but you two can pass for Italian, and you are Italian from now on, understood?”

  They nodded back at him.

  But Sophia could barely breathe. Her chest was heaving as she attempted to get air, yet she suffocated, her eyes stinging in pure pain. “You should not have let us go with you. We cannot abandon them.”

  “As I said, I cannot save all of you.”

  Sophia’s eyes filled with tears. Gina was right there, putting her arm around her waist, and smoothing her hair behind her ear. “Come on, Sophia. You can do this. We’ll figure out a way.”

  Maksym was staring at himself in the mirror. Closing his eyes, he allowed his forehead to drop to the glass surface, leaving a smudge from the sweat buildup there.

  “For the record, I did not know all this would happen. This wasn’t what I’d planned.”

  “This was your plan?” Sophia shot back at him. “You planned this?”

  “No. This was never the plan.” He turned and searched their faces.

  Was he daring to ask for absolution?

  Sophia hated him for his health, hated him for his greed, his good looks, the fact that he was alive and people her man loved were being targeted to extract a price for God knew what reason, hated his convoluted efforts to try to minimize his role in the terrible chain of events unfolding faster than any of them could have imagined. She hated her lack of power to do anything to stop it.

  What would her father have done? Would he have stood for this? She knew the answer almost before than the question had come to her. She took a deep breath, willing the tears back behind her eyes, willing her nerves of steel, her birthright, the only thing left of him she still had.

  “Maksym. What can we do to stop this?”

  Now it was Maksym’s turn to buck up. He seemed to take courage from her face. But then his eyes fell as he shrugged his shoulders and began to sob.

  Sophia slapped him. “Maksym. Maksym, stop it! Stop it right now. What can we do?”