Stabenow, Dana - Blindfold Game (v1

by Blindfold Game(lit)

  The cutter was shuddering, as if with disbelief at this outrage perpetrated against her. Sara rested her hands lightly on the railing. It was folly to anthropomorphize wood and steel, but she heard herself whispering anyway, “Im sorry. Im so sorry.

  She was facing aft, in the direction the ship was traveling. The northeastern point of the island began to curve around the ship in a granite embrace. The beach was rapidly approaching. “Tommy?

  Tommys voice came over the loudspeaker. “All hands, brace for impact, I say again, brace for

  Sara grabbed the railing, braced her feet, and held on.

  The propellers hit first. Sara was knocked off her feet by the vibration. The keel hit next in a grinding, shrieking protest of steel over rock.

  In her minds eye Sara followed the action in the engine room as the EO pulled all the stops and ordered his crew out in case of fire or flood or both. She pulled herself upright. “Tommy, let go the anchors!

  There was no corresponding reply. “Tommy! Let go the anchors!

  Tommys head poked out of the hatch. “Uh, we can try, Captain. But

  Sara met Tommys apologetic expression and realized that when she ordered the Sojourner Truth to ram the Star of Bali the anchors had probably been pushed into the emergency bulkhead along with the bow. She staggered forward and looked out over the bow to see the deck crew clinging to cleats and stanchions. The Sojourner Truths hull settled.

  And then there was silence.

  The chief picked himself up off the deck, looking white and shaken. “I dont ever want to have to do that again, Captain.

  “Me, either, Sara said, trying to smile, and then turned away quickly, before he could see the tears in her eyes.

  MUSTANG SUIT OR NOT, Hugh was already numb with cold when the life raft exploded out of the water not a foot from his head. Floating on his back, he watched it shoot into the sky, where it seemed to hover for a moment or two. It fell back into the water with a mighty smack.

  It took a moment to realize that salvation was at hand. When that moment came, he paddled clumsily over to the raft and began a laborious ascent over its side. Every muscle screamed as he hoisted himself up with the aid of the rope threaded around the rafts gunnel. As he was somersaulting inside he saw with mild surprise that another man was climbing over the opposite side of the raft.

  They tumbled in together and lay on their backs, staring at the sky and gasping like stranded fish. Hugh raised his head and looked at the other man. He looked familiar. It took a whileeverything seemed to be moving in slow motionbut eventually he figured out why. “Why, hello there, Mr. Fang, he said, and then had to repeat it in Mandarin.

  Fangs face twisted. Hugh tensed instinctively. If Fang had had a weapon, he would have killed Hugh on the spot. Instead, he doubled over and began coughing up seawater.

  Hugh relaxed again and lay where he was, wondering somewhat dreamily if perhaps he should search the raft for some way to restrain the pirate. He didnt want to move, though. He was just starting to warm up.

  A shadow came up beside them and belatedly he became aware of the sound of an engine. Something hit the side of the raft.

  “Hey, someone shouted, “grab the line!

  He looked up to see a row of faces peering down at him from the side of a small cruise ship.

  He blinked at one of them. “Lilah?

  A FISHING BOAT SKIPPERED by a crusty old fart was the first to arrive off the Sojourner Truths bow. Hed never seen anything like it in all his born days, nosireebob. Oh, it was a woman commander? That went a long way toward explaining things. Our tax dollars at work. Sure, hed let someone board to use the radio. The deck crew jury-rigged a bosuns chair and Ops slid down in it to the fishing boat and disappeared into the old farts cabin.

  After the first flurry of orders, Sara subsided into her chair on the bridge and watched numbly as the crew went about the tasks of making the ship as secure as possible and to alert command to their present location. Any minute now she expected to see a fleet of aircraft coming over the horizon like the leading edge of an invading army. She ought to go below, inspect the damage, check on the injured.

  Hugh was gone. No matter how many times she repeated the words she could not quite believe them. Hugh was gone, and she was alone. No more shared suffering through required parental visits home to Seldovia. No more fights over who had to move where when one of them got transferred. No more quickies in hotel rooms.

  No more Hugh. How could she still be breathing? How could she still be here, when he was not?

  She became aware of the tears running down her face and of Mark Edelen standing nearby, looking helpless and not a little frightened. “XO

  “Let her alone. Tommys voice was almost unrecognizable, rough and loud. “Just let her alone, Chief.

  So they did, leaving her bent over in the captains chair, tears dripping off her chin and into her lap. After a while she stopped seeing them as they moved around her, stopped hearing their voices when they spoke.

  Sometime later she felt a tap on her shoulder. She looked up to see Ops standing in front of her with a concerned look on his face. His mouth moved, but she couldnt make out the words. She shook her head tiredly and put up her palm to fend him off.

  He wouldnt go. She knew a tiny spark of anger, immediately quenched by grief.

  “Come with me, maam, he said, and put a hand beneath her elbow to assist her out of the chair.

  “What she started to say.

  “Please come with me, maam, he said with unaccustomed firmness, and such was her state of mind that it was easier to follow him off the bridge and down the outside stairs to the main deck.

  He led her to the bow. There were a half dozen small boats clustered around them by now, fishing boats and a couple of skiffs. A small cruise ship had a line to what was left of the cutters bow, its foredeck all but obscured by a crowd of paying passengers gaping at a sight that for sure hadnt been on the itinerary.

  Ops said something.

  Sara could not make it out. “What?

  Ops took her firmly by the shoulders and turned her in the direction of the cruise ship. He pointed over her shoulder so that she had no choice but to follow the direction of his finger.

  She couldnt see what Ops thought was so important. There must have been fifty people on board the little cruise ship. Who went for a boat ride for fun in January?

  And then she saw his face staring up at her, wet hair matted on his brow, eyes intent on hers, a smile of such joy breaking across his face.

  The next thing she knew she was balanced on the gunnel and reaching for the rope mooring the cruise ship to the Sojourner Truth. She grabbed the line with both hands without a thought to seeing if it was on belay and launched herself from the cutter, swinging into space over the water.

  There were alarmed shouts from both ships. She ignored them, wrapping her ankles around the line and going down hand over hand so fast that later she found rope burns on her palms.

  She hit the deck of the little cruise ship and before she had regained her balance she was in his arms.

  EPILOGUE

  MARCH

  WASHINGTON, D.C.

  EVERYONE WAS THERE, FROM the secretary of state to all of the Joint Chiefs, even though no one was ever going to be allowed to admit to attending.

  “How many killed? said the representative from the Senate Armed Services Committee.

  They looked at the Coast Guard captain, a nondescript man of middle age with a carefully cultivated air of dullness. “Seven killed. Thirteen wounded. Those are just our own casualties, you understand. There are ninety-seven crew members on the Agafia and eighteen on the Star of Bali yet to be accounted for.

  “Who is handling the interrogation of the surviving terrorists?

  The FBI agent said, “Thats us, sir. Its slow going but were getting some good stuff from the hired hands. I think well have a pretty solid report for you soon.

  “What about the missile?

  “The wreck
age has been recovered.

  “And the payload?

  “The payload was dispersed upon impact and detonation.

  “Dispersed where? This question came a little more sharply.

  The FBI agent looked at the Coast Guard captain, who looked at the mad scientist on his right. His hair looked more Donald Trump than Albert Einstein and he wasnt really mad, but when your job was primarily providing worst-case scenarios it helped if the people to whom you were delivering them thought so. “Impact was about twelve miles south of Seward, in Spoon Glacier, at an elevation of about twelve hundred feet. There was a steady onshore wind of fifteen to twenty knots. The cesium-137 was dispersed across the northern half of Resurrection Bay. We estimate that the fallout would disperse most heavily on the maximum security prison on the east side of the bay, but that the wind was blowing strongly enough that some of it would have reached the town. However, not in such quantities as to prove an immediate hazard to the health of anyone living there.

  For those who were listening for it, the stress on the word “immediate was readily apparent. No one commented on it, though.

  “So thats good news, then, the presidents man said. “Nothing that cant be explained as a conventional missile. No reason to tell anyone otherwise. He looked around the table for opposition to this eminently sensible viewpoint and of course found none.

  The mad scientist made a noncommital noise. His report had gone in days before, and the presidents man knew full well that it would be years before the effects of the fallout would be known. The cesium had dispersed over a wide area covered with snow and ice that would melt into streams and rivers and flow eventually to the bay and the sound. In the meantime, the Centers for Disease Control would maintain a quiet watch through local clinics to monitor the health of the community, in particular the incidence of cancer.

  “Very well, the presidents man said with satisfaction, “our line will be that a terrorist attempt to attack the homeland was unsuccessful due to the diligence of our own counterterrorism forces, who had the operation under continuous surveillance from the moment of its inception. When the terrorists were discovered, they fired off the missile prematurely in the hope of doing random damage. Due to the vigilance and skill of the United States Coast Guardhe inclined his head toward the Coast Guard captain“no such damage was suffered. He shrugged. “There was no serious threat to the public at any time. He cocked an eyebrow. No one contradicted him, but the air force general was displaying less enthusiasm than he liked to see. “General? Something you wanted to share with the rest of the group?

  The air force general raised his head. “Why Anchorage? There are half a dozen ports on the West Coast with military bases to target and far more people to kill, and therefore that much bigger a message to send. Why Anchorage?

  “We werent looking for them to attack Anchorage for precisely those reasons, the man from the CIA said. “I think its fair to say they took that into account in their planning of the attack. He shrugged. “And besides. Its Anchorage. Whats more, its Alaska. Most Americans think Alaska floats off the southwest coast of California, right next to Hawaii, with occasional appearances on the Discovery Channel.

  There was a rich chuckle all around at this witticism. When it died down, the man from the White House looked at the man from the CIA. “And the motivation behind this attack?

  The agent shook his head. “Not what you would have expected, sir, not at all. For one thing, the Ja brothers seem to have acted independently.

  There was instant and vocal skepticism, and the CIA agent had to raise his voice to be heard. “Thats what la Bae-ho is claiming, sir, and so far his story hangs together.

  “They were al-Qaida trained, said the army general. “Bin Ladens got his own fleet of ships. Didnt you say you couldnt trace the owner of this freighter?

  The CIA man met the generals contemptuous look with a bland expression. “Ja Bae-ho makes a very convincing case that this was a personal mission, General.

  “Then where did they get the money to finance this operation?

  “We dont know yet, sir. We have some leads, which we are tracing now, and

  The general glared. “Yeah, well, I know, and I dont need to trace any so-called leads and neither does anyone else in this room with half a brain. His tone made it clear that he was excluding the CIAs man from that number.

  “Ladies, gentlemen, the representative from the White House said, and everyone shut up. “This was too close. We must take steps to see that it never happens again.

  “Sir the Coast Guard representative said.

  “Stir up your service, Captain. Come up with some recommendations for the defense of the coastline and our ports that we can put into effect immediately. What almost happened here is deeply disturbing to every thinking member of this committee. Thank you all for coming.

  The audience was at an end. The crowd dispersed. The representative from the White House lingered to talk to the Coast Guard captain who had given the briefing. The captain concentrated on gathering up the handouts, perhaps two of which had been looked at by the attendees.

  “Imagine, the man from the White House said, chewing reflectively on the earpiece of his reading glasses, “they almost pulled it off, they almost sailed that puppy right into an American port and set off a dirty bomb that if detonated would have taken out nearly three hundred thousand people and rendered a strategic air force base and an entire city uninhabitable for years to come.

  The captain closed his briefcase.

  “This is going to happen again, isnt it, Captain.

  It wasnt really a question, but the Coast Guard captain answered it anyway. “Yes, sir, it is.

  CAPTAIN LOWE WAS BURIED with full military honors in his hometown of Valentine, Nebraska, his wife, son, and two daughters present. His wife was presented with the flag that had draped his coffin and she accepted it, dry-eyed, as her daughters wept quietly and her son stared straight ahead with a stony face.

  HELMSMAN EUGENE RAZO WAS buried with much more fanfare and ten times the family members present in his hometown of Kodiak. His fiancees family hosted a memorial potlatch that is still remembered for its cornucopia of food and the amount and quality of the gifts given those who attended. His parents started a scholarship fund in his name at the held indefinitely without bail or representation. His uncle died later that year, but he never knew it.

  THE BODIES OF TERRORISTS, mercenaries, and ships crew floated ashore in Resurrection Bay for months following the incident. Ja Yong-Baes body was not among them.

  The younger Noortmans leg healed, although he would walk with a slight limp for the rest of his life. He remained in Hong Kong doing contract work for various organizations, some legal, some not. A year after the events recorded here he was recruited by a Russian mafia don who wanted to expand his empire into maritime shipping. He never did track down the true owners of the Agafia.

  PETER WOLF NEVER RETURNED to Odessa. There was a Pedro Lobo who surfaced in Rio de Janeiro a year later. He was joined by a ravishing young Russian woman who lavished affection on him and then disappeared with a substantial portion of his more liquid assets, including a handful of uncut diamonds from the wall safe, the combination of which he had been so unwise as to give her. He took it well. “At least she left me enough to live on, he said, and was soon seen in the clubs with another, even more ravishing girl from the Philippines.

  No evidence was ever found to connect the Ja brothers to the bombing of his office.

  WHEN LAST HEARD FROM, Arlene Harte was in Anaktuvuk Pass, Alaska, writing a column about the annual migration of the Western Arctic caribou herd. Knight-Ridder has made an offer for a syndicated column, and she is considering it.

  IN MAY ENSIGN HANK Ryan was promoted to lieutenant and given command of a one-hundred-ten-footer out of Pensacola, Florida. Ensign Robert Ostlund took early retirement with a medical disability. Ensign Reese was promoted to lieutenant, junior grade. Seamen Delgado and Lewis were promoted to petty offi
cers. Chief Mark Edelen put in for retirement and invested in a marina in Corpus Christi.

  FIVE YEARS LATER, LILAH Chase was diagnosed with a virulent case of pancreatic cancer. She died two weeks later, in great pain. Shortly thereafter Eli Chase was diagnosed with leukemia. He survived.

  JULY

  WASHINGTON, D.C.

  “IT REALLY IS OVAl, Sara said, looking around her.

  “Ye-ees, the flunky said. “The president will be right with you, Commander, Admiral.

  “Thank you, Sara said politely. She seemed incapable of being anything but these days. She limped forward with the aid of a cane. It turned out she had cracked her right fibula when the Sojourner Truth went aground on Fox Island, and in the press of business hadnt noticed. It was taking a tiresomely long time to heal.

  Admiral Elwood “Woodie Long, commandant of the U.S. Coast Guard and no fool, gave her a penetrating look, and held his peace.

  Sure enough, a few minutes later the president walked in and exchanged handshakes and backslaps with Admiral Long, who then introduced Sara. Sara accepted the presidents hand and stared at the face usually seen at the top of the hour on CNN and pretended to listen to his words of praise with a pleasant, attentive expression.

  She became aware of silence and realized that the president had stopped speaking. “Thank you very much, sir, she said gravely, and looked at the admiral, waiting for the signal to go.

  “I mean it, Commander, the president said, who seemed like a nice man, only very insistent on getting and keeping her attention. He smiled. “I heard you backed your cutter onto the beach. Is that true?

  “Yes, sir, she said, still polite. “We lost the bow when we rammed the freighter. It was the only way.

  His smile widened. “An inspired solution. He sighed, his smile fading. “I wish we could acknowledge your heroism, Commander, and that of your crew, but we feel at the present time that it would be most unwise to allow this story to be told. Later, perhaps, when the country is less unsettled