Seeking Safe Harbor: Suddenly Everything Changed (The Seeking Series)

by Albert Correia

  Stacey pulled her daughter close and hugged her, squeezing tightly for a moment.

  “Look, we’re not sure yet that there’s any danger,” Zach told the women. “Let’s put the weapons down but keep them close, just in case. We’ll know soon enough if we’re going to need them.”

  He looked at the other boat again, sweeping the whole of it. When he got to one spot, he stopped and studied it for a few moments.

  “What is it?” asked Stacey.

  “The writing on the side. It looks like it’s in Chinese or some other Asian language.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “No idea. The carrier is U.S. for sure, but that small boat is… I have no idea what it is.”

  They all watched for several minutes as the boat from the carrier moved toward them. There was no longer any question. It was heading directly at their boat. Then, Glen jumped up and began running back to the cockpit, yelling, “Two guys went to that little cannon or whatever it is up front. They’re loading it.”

  Zach leveled his binoculars on the boat’s bow. “Geez, he’s right, and they’re aiming at us. Get down, everyone.”

  Before they could move toward cover, they heard the frightening sound of a shell being launched. It blazed right at them.

  Chapter 4

  ZACH pushed Stacey and Denise down while Glen leaped toward the cockpit. They weren’t yet under cover when they heard the frightening sound of something whizzing by overhead. They looked at one another in amazement as they heard an explosion.

  Looking back, they saw a fifty-foot powerboat less than a mile behind them, its bow on fire. They’d been so focused on the aircraft carrier and its launch, they hadn’t bothered to look at the area behind them or check their radar for over half an hour. In the past, that might not have made a difference, but things had suddenly changed.

  As they started to get up, they heard another boom and were rocked a moment later by the wake of the boat that had come from the carrier as it rushed past, heading for the burning boat. As it passed, they could clearly see that the lettering on its side was Asian. Everyone aboard, though, looked American. The second shell destroyed the wheelhouse of the crippled vessel, and as the armed boat approached, five armed men opened fire with assault weapons. For a few seconds, there was return fire, but that ended quickly. When they were alongside, four men jumped aboard where there was another short volley of small arms fire, and then silence.

  The family watched as the navy crew brought two men out from below. Even though they were wounded, the prisoner’s hands were bound behind their backs. The crew took the prisoners aboard the navy boat, and then returned to the burning craft, transferring things from the burning boat to their own. Zach and his family couldn’t see what they were loading. The men worked quickly, obviously in a hurry to get away. When they had what they wanted, they motored thirty yards out, then turned back and launched one more shell at the boat’s hull. The final shot hit right at the waterline, ripping the bottom to shreds. No longer having anything to hold it up, the boat was gone in minutes, leaving only a small oil slick and a little flotsam to mark the spot.

  The vessel from the carrier headed back toward the sailboat. When they saw it coming, Glen grabbed the carbine and Denise started for the automatic.

  “Keep them ready,” Zach told the youngsters, who were growing up quickly. “But don’t shoot unless you have to.”

  As he walked over to the rail to watch the boat approach, a loudspeaker came on. “Ahoy, there, you aboard the ketch, La Sirena,” came a booming voice. “I am Commander Joseph A. Kotchel of the United States Navy. With your permission, we would like to come alongside your vessel. We have things to discuss.”

  By that time, the other boat was thirty yards away. Zach leaned out and yelled, “What things?”

  “What just transpired this morning, for one.”

  “We saw what happened.”

  “But, you don’t know why it happened.”

  “We don’t care why.”

  “Oh, but you will when you hear the story. What’s more, it is essential that we discuss what the immediate future holds for you.”

  “Our future is none of your business!”

  By now, the other boat was within twenty feet and the two men were talking directly to one another.

  “Perhaps not,” said the commander, “but it is a conversation we must have.” The naval officer was a man of average height, not more than thirty-five. His manner was polite, but firm. “I can understand that you are wary of having us board your vessel after what you witnessed here, but I assure you that you and your family are safe. If it will make you feel more at ease, I will come alone, and will leave my weapons aboard the vessel here. I see you have weapons. I will not object if you want to keep me covered while we talk. My men will not fire upon you.”

  “Very well,” Zach said. “Come alone and unarmed. Once you are aboard, though, have your men move your vessel at least fifty yards away.” He had seen what they could do; they were trained, well armed and outnumbered his family, but it was not in his nature to give in easily. The mariners were willing to talk, so they might do it his way.

  “Agreed,” the commander said. He removed his holster and laid down his assault rifle. As soon as the boats were adjacent, only rubber fenders keeping them from rubbing against one another, he stepped easily aboard the ketch. Zach took his arm to be sure he was steady and then cautiously shook the officer’s hand. Zach was slightly taller than the navy man. Both were muscular and obviously athletic.

  “My name is Zach Arthur, and this is my wife, Stacey,” the civilian boat captain told the navy officer. “The two people holding guns on you are my son, Glen, and my daughter, Denise. They are both excellent shots.”

  The naval officer took them in at a glance, seeing four trim, well-proportioned people. Stacey was a runner, and at age thirty-eight still had the waist of a fit twenty-year-old. Glen was already over five-foot-ten and Denise was tall for thirteen. He shook hands with each of them.

  “Now,” Zach said, “since you feel it is so important that we know; tell us what the devil is going on here.”

  “We got word yesterday that a terrorist group, the most vicious kind imaginable, had captured a boat and was pirating boats in this area, killing everyone aboard.” The commander nodded toward the spot where the boat had gone down. “We were looking for them.”

  “Looking for them? Are you aware that it was us you almost ran over this morning?”

  “Yes, of course. My captain and I offer our apologies. We thought you were them,” and he, again, nodded toward the spot in the ocean. “When we saw you were flying an American flag, we altered our course to miss you.”

  “Altered your course?” Zach seethed. “You kept coming straight at us. The only reason we’re alive is because I was able to get out of your way at the last second.”

  “It takes a little distance for an aircraft carrier to change directions, “and it happens slowly. Again, my apologies, but even if it didn’t appear to you that way, we were trying to avoid hitting your boat in those final seconds. And, we did miss you.”

  “Okay, I’ll grant that what you’re saying is plausible. But, why did you stop here?”

  “We thought the terrorists might be after your boat, but wouldn’t try if we were visible.”

  Zach was aghast. “Are you telling me you used us as bait?”

  “I wouldn’t put it quite that way. But, we did think that if they thought they were alone with you, they would try to kill you. As it turned out, we were right. Fortunately, they didn’t have radar and we were far enough away that they didn’t see us until it was too late.”

  “I’ve never been in the navy,” Zach said through clinched teeth, “but I was an Army Ranger for five years. Never would we have even considered using civilians to lure the enemy. I’m sorry, Commander, but none of what you’ve said makes any sense to me. What you’ve done in the last five or six hours is unconscionable. All of that aside,
why would I believe that a multi-billion dollar United States Navy Aircraft Carrier is out hunting for a few penny ante terrorists instead of doing something, you know, a bit more important?”

  Kotchel didn’t respond immediately. When he did, he asked, “Do you mind telling me where you’ve been for the last week?”

  “We were on one of the Marshall Islands for five days. A little atoll, actually. The last three days, we’ve been at sea.”

  “Have you read a newspaper, or listened to the news at any time in that period?”

  “There aren’t any newsstands in the middle of the Pacific. And we lost any kind of radio signal while we were on the island. But, what could happen that is so earth shattering that it causes these kinds of things?”

  “Earth shattering,” Kotchel said thoughtfully. “That’s a more apt description of what has taken place this past week than you could possibly realize, being as you haven’t heard the news. Come, Mr. Arthur, I think you and your family had better take seats in the cockpit. You don’t want to be standing when I tell you what has gone on this past week.”

  Chapter 5

  ZACH and Stacey sat on one side of the cockpit, Glen, and Denise on the other. The weapons had been set aside, but were handy, just in case. Commander Kotchel took a seat in the middle, behind the wheel.

  “Before I start, I want to make something clear. What I’m about to tell you is going to be a shock, so prepare yourselves for the worst. The very worst you can possibly imagine.”

  “We’re at war, aren’t we?” Glen asked.

  Kotchel glanced sympathetically at the boy, then turned to the parents. “You could say that, but it goes beyond being ‘at war.’ Far beyond.”

  “What could go beyond being at war?” Stacey wanted to know.

  “It’s North Korea, isn’t it?” Glen added.

  “Again, it’s more than that. The easiest explanation is simply to say that the world, as you know it, is gone. It’s been obliterated!”

  “What?” Zach and Stacey cried in unison. Glen and Denise leaned forward and stared in disbelief at the navy officer.

  “You’d all better sit back and listen while I give you an overview,” the commander said, his voice becoming stern. “Hold your questions until you have a picture of what has happened.” He looked at each until they nodded their assent. He took a breath, and his eyes revealed the pain he felt as he began to tell them what happened.

  “Yes, to the best of our knowledge, North Korea was the first to fire at its major adversary, South Korea. The first missile was conventional. South Korea responded in full force and, without warning, North Korea sent a nuclear missile into the heart of Seoul, destroying much of the city. China warned the United States to stay out of it, and for the first few hours, we did. But when North Korea used a nuclear weapon, we took action against them. When we did, China attacked our naval forces in the region with such ferocity it shocked everyone. That by itself might have led to what followed, but there was more. Much more.”

  Kotchel sat back and shook his head. “At the same time that was going on, Israel and Iran attacked one another. No one knows what the final straw was that caused it, or who fired first. It all happened so fast. Within twenty-four hours, both gave up on conventional weapons. Again, it’s muddled who did it first, but they both began firing off missiles with nuclear warheads, ending any debate about whether either of them had them. It was clear that they both did, and they had enough to destroy whole countries. However, Israel has – had – the most efficient anti-missile system ever invented, and blasted Iran’s weapons out of the sky. Their own hit with such devastating force, they completely destroyed Iran. That brought Russia in. They immediately fired nuclear missiles at Israel, overwhelming their anti-missile system, and the ones that made it through wiped the country off the map. That action brought a nuclear response from NATO.

  “In the meantime, the United States retaliated against China. We’d been strengthening our forces in the area, so the response was not only fast, it was devastating. It had only been two days since North Korea attacked South Korea, and the U.S. and China were still using conventional weapons. Then, I suppose because others were already using them, and they had little hope of defeating the United States in a conventional war, China decided to take us by surprise and attacked with nuclear weapons. And it wasn’t our forces in Asia they went after. They attempted to destroy our mainland, sending nuclear missiles to every major city in the United States. The U.S. was indeed taken by surprise, but as soon as we saw what was happening, we retaliated in kind.”

  “The Northern Lights,” Denise whispered.

  “What was that?” Kotchel was caught off guard by the remark.

  “We thought we saw lights in the sky to the north a few nights ago,” Stacey said. “We wondered if it was the Aurora Borealis.”

  “If only it were,” said the navy man. “But, it’s too late for the spring showing, and too early for the autumn.”

  “I told yo…” Glen started to say, but his voice trailed off when he realized how unimportant his being right was now that they knew what it must have been.

  Kotchel continued, but thought it best to veer away from the main subject for a minute. “By the way, if you’re wondering why our carrier isn’t on the bottom of the sea, we were on our way from San Diego to Hawaii at that time. We were ordered to change course for the South China Sea. By the time we got there, it was pretty much over. Most of our navy was already on the bottom of the ocean, as were almost all the North Korean and Chinese ships. We were involved in a few skirmishes with smaller ships and won them all. We’ve had some damage, but nothing major. He looked out at the boat he’d just come from. You probably noticed that the craft we’re using isn’t U.S. A carrier isn’t equipped to do some of the things we’ve had to do this past week, so we captured that vessel from the North Koreans three days ago. As you saw, it’s been really handy.

  “But, back to what has happened in the world. While all I’ve told you so far was going on, Pakistan decided to take advantage of the confusion and nuked India, their archenemy. India retaliated with their own nukes. By then, it was as if everyone in the world had gone mad. No one dared wait to be attacked. It seemed that attacking first was the only way they could survive. Countries were emptying their arsenals. When NATO forces responded to Russia, Russia launched missiles at every NATO country and all their allies, which pretty much includes every democracy in the world. China followed suit. All the major economic centers in the United States, Canada, and Europe were being annihilated, but everyone got off just about every one of their own nukes before the sites were wiped out. At any given moment, there were hundreds of nuclear missiles flying in every direction imaginable. Some anti-missile missiles were up there, and they knocked many enemy missiles out, but there weren’t enough of them to ward off the deluge.”

  He stopped to draw a breath. As he’d known would happen, the Arthur family was sitting in total shock. Their eyes were wide and their minds were racing. Zach and Stacey were holding hands; she was gripping him so hard, Kotchel could see the muscles bulging in her hand.

  He went on. “While we still had some form of mass communications, we learned that an estimate of at least four billion people were killed in the first…”

  “Four billion?” gasped Stacey. “Did you say four billion?”

  “Yes. Well over half the population of the world was annihilated in the first four days. It’s been the most devastating time in human history, worse than even the most pessimistic dooms-dayers predicted. Every major city was wiped out. New York, Tokyo, Beijing, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Mexico City, Sao Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Paris, Rome, Moscow, Berlin, Toronto, Los Angeles, Manila, Mumbai, and any other metropolitan area you can think of, no longer exists, except for some suburbs. Even those are mostly uninhabited. What the bombs didn’t kill, the radioactivity did or soon will. Europe and the Middle East are gone. So, too are Russia and China, although some people are still alive in small parts of eas
tern Russia and western China. Every military base in the world of any consequence, big or small, was destroyed. Our carrier is only one of maybe a hundred military ships still in existence. Except for our carrier, and I think two cruisers, the rest are all small. One of the cruisers is ours, the other Chinese. You see, I’m not talking about a hundred American ships. That’s all that’s left in the whole world.

  “You already know about Pakistan and India, but it didn’t stop there. Country after country, most of whom no longer have the core of their elected leadership, began attacking whoever they perceived to be their enemies. Venezuela attacked Colombia, Guatemala attacked Mexico, and Cambodia attacked Vietnam. Heck, even Argentina attacked Brazil, and they had been friends the week before. Nicaragua attacked Costa Rica, who didn’t have an army, only their police to defend them, but then Honduras attacked Nicaragua. And on, and on, and on. The nuclear holocaust is over, but only because about every nuclear weapon that had ever been made was either used or destroyed. The country squabbles continue, however, and they are vicious. Violent fighting continues, even within countries, including some of those that in the past resolved their differences peacefully at the ballot box.

  “The parties that have been out of power for years, if not forever, are attacking what is left of the existing power structure. The only places in the world that have any semblance of order are the bottom two-thirds of Africa and the Australian Outback – well, all of Australia, except for the coastal areas. Not that Africa is all that peaceful, but all they have going on is their usual in-house conflicts. Terrorists, or gangs, or whatever you want to call them, are openly killing anyone in their way. That’s happening everywhere.”

  He involuntarily looked back at the spot where the boat had been sunk and paused to let all that he had told them sink in.

  “Now,” he said, inhaling deeply, “I suspect you have some questions you’ll be wanting to ask me.”