Murph hadn’t served in the Navy but had worked with Eric on a top secret missile project as a civilian contractor, and he was the only member of the crew without a military or intelligence entry on his résumé. An arms development genius with a Ph.D. from MIT earned in his early twenties, Murph was a natural fit in his role as the Oregon’s weapons officer.
Disdaining any semblance of conformity, Murph let his dark hair sprout like a wild bramble, which was now further mussed by the wind. His chin sported the patchy stubble of a beard that refused to grow, and his lanky torso was covered by a T-shirt that read “Gorilla Biscuits,” which Juan assumed was the name of one of the punk rock bands that Murph blasted from his cabin stereo loud enough to wake Davy Jones.
The young crew members ceded their stations and Eric took his place at the helm while Murph sat at the weapons control console.
“From those smug looks on your faces,” Juan said, “I’d guess everything went as planned.”
“Affirmative, Chairman,” Eric replied. “We have everything in place.”
“What he means,” Murph said, “is that we’ve outdone ourselves this time. Wait ’til you see it.”
Before Juan could respond, Hali said, “Radar contact. We have an aircraft ten miles out, bearing one-eight-nine, approaching at a hundred and fifty knots.”
“That must be the Mariscal Sucre’s ASW chopper,” Juan said. “Threat assessment?”
Murph, a virtual database of weapons information, piped up. “Lupo-class frigates carry a single Agusta-Bell AB-212. In its role as an antisubmarine warfare helicopter, it can be equipped with two Mark 46 torpedoes and four AS.12 antiship missiles.”
“What’s their missiles’ range?”
“Max range is four and a half miles, but they could drop a torpedo at seven miles.”
“It’s unlikely they’d fire torpedoes in an active shipping lane, but let’s keep them at a respectful distance. Wepps, paint the target.”
Murph activated the targeting radar, which immediately locked onto the approaching helicopter. The chopper pilot would hear a high-pitched whine, indicating that a missile could be headed his way at any moment from the ship.
Juan didn’t want to engage, but blowing the helicopter out of the sky would be easy if it came to that. The Oregon concealed a formidable array of weaponry behind retractable plates in the hull. A 120mm tank cannon was hidden in the bow, while three radar-controlled 20mm Gatling guns could be activated for aerial self-defense and small-ship attacks. In addition to the water cannons, remote-controlled .50 caliber machine guns mounted inside fake oil barrels on the deck could be deployed to repel boarders.
The ship also featured hatches that could be blown away to fire Exocet antiship missiles and cruise missiles for land targets, and Russian-made torpedoes could be launched from tubes below the waterline. Surface-to-air missiles were at the ready in case the chopper pilot didn’t take the hint.
They hadn’t battle-tested their newest weapon system yet, a one-hundred-barrel multi-cannon based on a design by a company called Metal Storm. Unlike the Gatling gun’s six rotating barrels that fired a stream of rounds fed by a belt, the Metal Storm firing system was completely electronic, so there were no moving parts, making jams impossible. Rounds were loaded into the grid of barrels so that the projectiles lined up nose to tail. The electronic control allowed for a precise firing sequence that made the Gatling gun’s rate of three thousand rounds per minute seem pokey. With each barrel of the Metal Storm gun firing simultaneously at forty-five thousand rounds per minute, the entire weapon could pump out tungsten slugs at a staggering rate of four and a half million rounds per minute.
“The helicopter is turning around,” Hali said.
Juan wasn’t surprised. The latest shoulder-fired surface-to-air missile would seem like just the kind of weapon to be used by a spy ship with small arms and RPGs, so the pilot was wise to keep his distance. He would have no way of knowing that the Oregon’s missiles were orders of magnitude more potent.
“Let us know if he changes his mind, Mr. Kasim.”
The next twenty minutes passed without incident. The three islets they were heading toward curled around one another in two-mile-long angular ridges jutting from the sea. They lay directly across from a pair of uninhabited peninsulas. The islets were so close together that the spans of water between them were barely longer than the Oregon.
When Isla Caraca del Oeste was off their port bow, Hali called out, “Surface contact! Bearing one-six-eight at ten miles out. It’s the Mariscal Sucre. She must have her engines running flat out.”
With the Oregon in full view, the frigate’s next action was predictable, but even so, Hali’s next words got Juan’s attention.
“I have a missile launch!”
Juan leaned forward in his chair, his eyes on the map displayed on the front screen that showed a red blip racing toward the symbol for the Oregon. A video feed next to the map showed the image from one of the deck cameras. The missile wasn’t yet visible, but it would be soon.
“Wepps, time to impact?”
“Fifty-two seconds,” Murph said. The missile’s cruising velocity was just below the speed of sound.
“Ready the Metal Storm battery. Let’s see what it can do. But spool up the aft Gatling gun just in case.”
The Metal Storm multi-cannon rose into firing position from its hiding place behind the stern-most hold. The plate covering the Gatling gun flew open and the barrels spun up to firing speed.
“Both weapons have a radar lock on the missile,” Murph announced.
“Remember,” Juan said, “don’t fire until it’s only six hundred yards out.” That would only be two seconds before impact.
“Ready and waiting,” came Murph’s confident reply. “The system is programmed to fire automatically at that distance.”
On the front screen, a dot of fire bloomed in the night sky, growing brighter with each passing second as it skimmed low over the water. When the missile reached the six-hundred-yard mark, the Metal Storm battery fired without Murph having to lift his finger from the Gatling gun safety.
The Gatling would have taken ten seconds to fire five hundred rounds. The Metal Storm unleashed that many rounds in less than the blink of an eye. In fact, it was so fast that on the video feed it seemed to emit a single flash, accompanied by a sound like a jackhammer echoing through the ship.
The missile didn’t stand a chance. Murph had programmed the Metal Storm to fire the rounds so that they formed an impenetrable wall of tungsten in midair. The Otomat met the rounds three hundred yards from the Oregon’s stern and exploded in a fireball that temporarily overloaded the deck camera’s imaging system and blanked out the screen.
Despite the missile’s destruction, the Oregon didn’t come out unscathed. When the image of the outside deck returned, it showed a massive fire raging.
Admiral Dayana Ruiz smiled at the ship blazing on the horizon. The missile had done its job and the Dolos slowed to a crawl.
“Shall we finish them off, Admiral?” Captain Escobar asked. His face was bathed in red from the battle lights on the bridge of the Mariscal Sucre.
Ruiz lowered her binoculars. “No. I want to capture the ship intact. Well, as intact as it will be if they are able to extinguish the fire.”
“At our present speed, we will intercept them in fifteen minutes.”
“Hail them.”
Captain Holland—or whatever his real name was—answered. “Calling to gloat?” She could hear coughing in the background, no doubt from the smoke pouring through the ship.
“You see now that you had no chance from the beginning,” Ruiz said. “Surrender and I’ll promise leniency for your crew.”
“We’re not done yet.”
“Captain, your ship is on fire. It will either sink or the fertilizer in your hold will detonate. Think of your men.”
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“It’s nothing that a new coat of paint won’t fix.”
“I admire your resilience, Captain, but you must realize that your position is hopeless.”
“We’ll see about that.” The line went dead.
“He’s a stubborn bastard,” Escobar said.
“If he were in this Navy, I’d either bust him for insubordination or give him command of an entire squadron.” Ruiz saw much of herself in her adversary. It would be interesting to see if his composure continued once he was in the brig at Puerto Cabello Naval Base.
The frigate carved through the swells for ten minutes until it was just three miles away from the target, which was lingering just south of the closest islet. It was apparent that the effort to fight the fire wasn’t going well. The fantail was still ablaze.
“We’ll wait here,” Ruiz said, and Escobar brought the frigate to a halt. Any closer and they’d risk being damaged if the Dolos exploded.
Ruiz ordered a boarding party to be organized. If the captain changed his mind and decided to surrender, she wanted to be ready. That is, if he could save his ship.
“Are there any rafts in the water?” The blaze should have made it easy to spot them despite the darkness.
“None that we can see, Admiral,” Escobar said. “Their crew must still be attempting to put out the fire.”
“They’re fooling themselves. It looks to me as if the flames have spread. It’s only a matter of time before it reaches the cargo.”
“Admiral!” the radar operator cried out. “The enemy ship is moving.”
“What?” Ruiz rushed over to his console. Sure enough, the Dolos was moving away.
“Speed?”
“Fifteen knots and accelerating. She’s rounding the southern point of the island and heading into the channel between Isla Caraca del Oeste and Ilsa Caraca del Este.”
“Their engines seemed to be out of commission,” Escobar said. “How did the crew get them fixed so fast?”
“It doesn’t matter. Prepare to fire the main gun.”
“But she’s hidden behind the nearest island.”
She felt like she was talking to a child. “Use their trajectory and speed to anticipate their position and fire over the island. Impress me.”
“Should we follow?”
She paused as she considered the proper pursuit course. Following them through the tiny strait was hazardous. And if the gun didn’t find its target, she wanted to be between them and the open sea.
“No,” she said. “Plot an intercept course around the island. We’ll head them off in the event that I’m not impressed.”
The Mariscal Sucre accelerated to flank speed in its dash north. The forward turret slewed around to starboard, its gears whining as the 127mm gun rose to aim in a high arc.
“We have the trajectory locked in,” Escobar said.
“Fire,” she said calmly as her heart pounded.
Escobar relayed the command. The frigate was shaken by the thunderous blast of the cannon firing its seventy-pound shell. The first round was followed by three more in quick succession.
Their view of the freighter was blocked by the islet’s rugged terrain, so they would only be able to see the effect of the shots. Rounds that splashed into the ocean wouldn’t be visible. Only if the target were hit would they see the flash of a fireball.
The frigate’s weapons officer counted down the time to impact. The opening shot landed without effect. The second round likewise missed. When the third round fell with no apparent impact, Ruiz could see perspiration dripping from Escobar’s brow.
The last round, however, made up for the misses: a bright flare briefly illuminated the clouds from beneath. The bridge erupted in cheers.
“Excellent shooting, Captain,” Ruiz said. “I will be adding a commendation to your report.”
“Thank you, Admiral.”
“Now get us around the island. I want to see if there’s anything left for us to salvage. Examining the wreckage may reveal who is behind their mission. And I still want to question any survivors. At dawn we’ll get the helicopter into the air to see if anyone made it onto one of the islands.”
In five minutes, the frigate came around the northwest point of Isla Caraca del Oeste, revealing the Dolos motionless in the channel between the neighboring islands.
The spy freighter would be going nowhere. Fire had extended to the entire back half of the ship, making it easy to see that the bridge superstructure had been destroyed by the frigate’s shell.
Ruiz was disappointed. She couldn’t imagine that the captain who had given her so much trouble had abandoned his post. He must have died on the bridge. They’d be lucky to find anything left of him.
“Your orders, Admiral?” Escobar asked.
“There’s nothing to do but wait,” she replied. “It’s only a matter of time now.”
Ruiz knew very well the sight of a vessel in its death throes.
Juan felt a stab of regret at seeing the ship aflame. The familiar outline made the sight even more poignant, but she had served her purpose and now they had to leave her behind.
“Be sure to keep the islets between us and the frigate until we’re out of radar range, Mr. Stone,” Juan said.
“Aye, Chairman,” Eric replied. “Shouldn’t be too hard. The Mariscal Sucre doesn’t appear to be moving.”
“I don’t think she’s going anywhere,” Max said. “Ruiz is like an arsonist watching her handiwork burn.”
“Then let’s show her the grand finale. Mr. Murphy, ready the fireworks.”
Murph rubbed his hands together in glee. “With pleasure, Chairman.”
Just as they had planned, Ruiz thought she was looking at the Oregon burning and adrift when it was really dashing northeast across the Caribbean at more than forty-five knots. The video feed on the front view screen proved their success in fooling Ruiz. The image being sent from a tiny drone circling the warship at a safe distance confirmed that it was stationary. If she hadn’t been deceived, it would have shown the frigate in hot pursuit.
Although the mission commissioned by the CIA was to sabotage the tanker diesel fuel bound for North Korea and to recover evidence of the Venezuelan arms smuggling operation, Juan saw it as a good opportunity to add a third objective: regain their anonymity.
For the last few years, they’d gotten into scrapes around the world with various Third World countries and battled the occasional naval vessel, sinking a few of them along the way. No incident in isolation was enough to reveal the Oregon’s hidden purpose and identity, but the rumors had started to make the rounds that there was some kind of spy ship cruising the seas of the world, although the stories conflicted radically on what the ship was called and what she looked like. But Juan and his officers agreed that it was only a matter of time before someone would make the connection and blow their cover. Which meant they needed to take action that would not only convince everyone this mythical spy ship was crewed by nothing more potent than a ragtag bunch of mercenaries but also that it was no longer a threat because it was at the bottom of the ocean.
Juan had gotten the brainstorm for how to do it when he learned that the Oregon’s only surviving sister ship was scheduled to be scrapped. Before being rebuilt as a technological marvel, the Oregon had been a sturdy lumber hauler, carrying loads between the Pacific Northwest and Asia. Four other ships of the same design were constructed, but service lives had ended for all but the Washington, which continued to ply the waters around her namesake state, ferrying supplies to Alaska.
When the Washington was headed for the scrapyard, the Corporation bought her for a pittance, setting Juan’s plan in motion. His crew had spent the past week altering her appearance so that the Washington and the Oregon would appear identical. They also filled her hold with the ammonium nitrate fertilizer that was supposed to be inside the Oregon. Then they’d m
oved the Washington to her anchorage nestled among the isolated Islas Caracas and left Eric Stone and Mark Murphy behind so that they could make the final preparations.
The part of the mission to regain anonymity had all been meticulously planned to lure one of the Venezuelan frigates into battle. Eddie Seng’s trickery had ensured that harbormaster Manuel Lozada would report the Oregon’s arrival to his superiors in the Navy, and Eddie stayed glued to Lozada so that he could apprise Max of the Venezuelans’ activities. Langston Overholt, their CIA connection, kept them informed about the location of Venezuelan warships via satellite observation. The Mariscal Sucre was the closest frigate on patrol, so they knew their target would be coming from the west.
After getting the intel about the smuggling operation, it was just a matter of baiting the frigate to the desolate islands where the Washington was hidden.
Like the squibs Kevin Nixon had designed for Eddie’s staged shooting, Murph had created his own giant squibs for the Oregon. At the moment the Metal Storm battery had neutralized the incoming missile, close enough to the ship to make Ruiz think it had hit, Murph simultaneously activated explosives on the deck of the Oregon as well as preset gas jets that simulated the look of a raging fire while posing no actual danger to the ship. He assured Juan that the paint wouldn’t even be charred.
The Washington, however, wouldn’t be as fortunate. With Eric’s help, Murph had covered her deck with canisters that would spew jellied gasoline when they were detonated, mimicking the fake fire on the Oregon. Additional explosives were rigged throughout the ship including the bridge superstructure.
Juan had idled the Oregon’s engines until the frigate was close enough to use her gun, floating at a spot that would quickly put them in the lee of Isla Caraca del Oeste after she got under way again. Once the island shielded them, Juan ramped her up to full throttle, knowing that the Mariscal Sucre would target Oregon’s presumed position based on the slower speed they’d been sustaining. The shells fell harmlessly in their wake. When the last one plunged into the water, Murph activated the explosives on the deck of the Washington.
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