by Sean Blaise
However, the Ivana also had a unique ace up her sleeve. Hidden in the recesses of her transom, the Ivana had three additional ports behind the conventional propellers. The size of a ten-person hot tub each, these ports were coupled to Rolls Royce, water jet drives. Each water jet was powered by a 5,000 hp gas turbine, usually used in small passenger jets. When extra power was required, the captain would open massive water inlets in the bow of the ship and open the turbine air intakes on the stack. Each jet filled up an Olympic-sized swimming pool in under 30 seconds. With all three turbines at full power, the Ivana had a military destroyer speed in excess of 50 knots.
John guided the Ivana out the breakwater as quickly as possible. This was a critical choke point where an attack was most likely to occur. Alexi sat quietly on the bridge as John maneuvered the vessel with great dexterity through the tight pass.
Aden, Yemen, was as dangerous a place as a vessel could be. Made famous by the bombing of the U.S.S. Cole, the Gulf of Aden was known for piracy, terrorism, and a host of other ill pursuits. Sweeney appeared on the bridge after he finished directing his deckhands in stowing the massive dock lines.
"All clear boss,” he said smiling looking at John. He suddenly noticed Alexi seated in the dark behind John.
"All clear boss," he said again to Alexi who smiled. Alexi liked Sweeney. Although not as serious as John, Sweeney had a natural grace with people that made him invaluable. He was highly skilled as a deck boss. In fact, Alexi mused, this crew was the best he had ever had; and he had had many crews before.
"Light up the FLIR camera, Sweeney, I want a clean sweep in all directions until we're clear of the harbor and at max speed. Anything small, unidentified, or unlit, I want to know about it."
"Roger.” Sweeney knew the concerns John was having. He turned the knob on the FLIR camera and began sweeping the harbor.
The FLIR camera was a thirty-thousand-dollar piece of military grade machinery. It was a thermal- and light-imaging camera that could basically spot a seagull in pitch darkness at a distance of over three miles. It was especially useful on the water, because the constant temperature of the sea made any and all objects that were a different temperature on the water stand out in bright detail. Human shapes, with body temperatures of 98 degrees, stood out from the darkness like spotlights.
"All clear, John," Sweeney said as he moved the camera back and forth across the bow of the ship in long slow sweeps.
John cleared the breakwater with the Ivana and nosed the tiny throttles forward. Watching the digital readout, he continued to nudge the throttles ahead until his engine load meter read eighty percent power. That was the Ivana’s ideal cruising speed of 22 knots. An engine load any lower than that would cause unburned fuel to begin to cloud the cylinder linings, seriously hampering fuel efficiency and engine performance. Not to mention that Jean Michelle, the engineer, would give John yet another earful on proper diesel engine performance. Jean Michelle treated the main engines like his children, and a doting father he was.
Chapter 10
Chung-Ho's phone chimed once in the early morning. He opened the phone with shaky hands and clicked the blinking text message icon. It only contained one word in Arabic.
"Khalas," it said from his newest recruit Malik.
Chung-Ho moved to his laptop and clicked open the tracking program. A long nervous moment elapsed before the little blip on the screen appeared. Chung-Ho let out a long sigh of relief. Crisis averted so far, he thought. He had wondered about the reliability of the young Arab, Malik, and knew if he failed at his task, Chung-Ho's future would have taken a sudden swing towards the less than positive. It was hard to contain his enthusiasm when he dialed his bosses’ number.
"Confirmed," he said in Korean. All he heard in response was a grunt of affirmation. His boss was not one for small talk. Chung-Ho quickly hung up the phone and bent over to pick up his already packed grey duffel bag. Less than five minutes later he was speeding towards the airport in his hired car. His work in Yemen was complete; and, for the next few weeks, he had nothing to do but wait. The beacon would send position reports on the yacht twice a day to his boss in Pyongyang as well as to the Tsung Tao shadowing the Ivana.
Malik found the money outside his apartment, just like the Asian businessman had promised. He tore open the manila envelope nervously, fearful that he might have been cheated. Nope. It was all there. One thousand U.S., to the dollar. Malik smiled.
He hopped on his motor bike excited about spending his newfound riches on two of his favorite pastimes, women and hashish. Hashish was easy to find; but women were an entirely different story in Yemen, unless you knew where to go.
The dirt bike thankfully started up on the first kick, which was a rarity for this antique. Malik had never been happier, the bike worked, he had money, life was good. He looked quickly down the street in both directions, looking out for crazy Arab drivers. Seeing none, he accelerated quickly down the darkened street. His excitement at his pending evening caused him to push the throttle down a little further than he normally would have, and the powerful motor kicked the bike ahead.
As he approached the end of the street, he began to close his hand on the brake lever, to make the left turn. In a split second, he realized his mortal danger. Someone had cut his brakes. The thought of fear had barely left his brain, on its way to his limbs for reaction, before the bike crashed violently into the building at the end of the street. Malik's head was smashed like a pumpkin on the brick wall. He never even blinked. The bikes tires kept turning by his shattered body, as the dollar bills scattered in the street.
Chapter 11
John sipped the overly hot tea carefully to avoid burning his mouth. He never understood why Ingrid had to prepare his tea at such excessive temperatures. Must be a Russian thing, he thought.
Despite his best efforts, the scalding liquid scorched the tip of this tongue and he cursed loudly. He kicked his feet off the helm station and placed the boiling mug in a cup holder. He figured if he waited a half hour it'd be palatable again.
John stood up idly and stretched his legs. Night watches could be incredibly boring. Of course, as the chief officer, he usually handed off the truly mind-numbing midnight to four am watch to his underling, and second officer, Sweeney. John himself usually took the 4-8am watches, allowing him a modicum of normal sleeping habits, and always letting him see the sunrise.
The night was pitch black except for a setting moon that cast an eerie glow across the waves. The only sound was the crashing of the ocean waves as they hit the blade-like bow of the Ivana, moving at nearly twenty-five knots. The engine noise was barely perceptible, which, in and of itself, was miraculous considering the amount of power being transferred to the sea through the stainless-steel propeller shafts. The Ivana was flying, by maritime standards. The irony was most cars did this speed in city traffic.
The Ivana was operating on radio silence; and had also turned off all her running and cabin lights. Although running without lights was against the international rules of the road, in this part of the world, and running at night, a mere 80 miles off the coast of Yemen, it was common practice.
John had taken further precautions as well. He had Jean Michelle prepare the auxiliary gas turbines for immediate starting, should the Ivana be at risk, John wanted the ability to take off at an almost untouchable speed of 50 knots. He had also turned off the vessel's AIS, or automatic identification system receiver, which usually broadcast the vessels position to all vessel's in the immediate area. Although AIS was required by law, and necessary as an aid to navigation in most parts of the world, here, in the Gulf of Aden, it was like having a bull's-eye attached to your back. He had also had the helicopter prepared for immediate flight: by unhitching most of her fastenings to the deck and keeping her uncovered.
John had no illusions as to how valuable a target the Ivana was to a bold pirate. Not only was the vessel worth a cool eighty million by herself, onboard was a man richer than most of the countries in the
area. Alexi kept over one hundred million on hand at all times for emergencies and quick purchases of companies he felt were ripe for the picking. Getting hands on him would be a boon to any pirate’s retirement plan.
John wandered aimlessly over to the bridge door on the port wing station and opened it. The air was unnaturally warm, considering how cold the dark ocean looked. The hot air hit him in the face, and he quickly closed the door behind him and stepped out on the bridge wing. Looking over the side of the ship, John could see the bright green glow of phosphorescence in the water below.
Millions of tiny little bioluminescent plankton exploded in anger at the passing of the ship. John remembered what one of his teachers at Maine Maritime Academy had told him. The professor said it took over 24 hours for the microbes to store up enough energy to explode in a single burst of light, lasting a hundredth of a second. John almost felt guilty for making the creatures expend their hard-earned energy on the Ivana.
A puff of air exploded less than twenty feet from John, and he smiled. Bottle-nosed dolphins. They had an innate sense for a free ride. John could see the dolphins vicariously through the massive green, comet-like tail of phosphorescence, as they exploded forward trying to catch the bow wave of the Ivana. Although the Ivana had a narrow and sleek bow, her passage through the water created an underwater wave that dolphins loved to surf.
John watched in awe as the dolphins caught up to the Ivana with ease and began gliding effortlessly down wave at the bow of the Ivana. Pops of raspy breaths exploded all around in the warm night air as the rest of the first dolphin’s pod caught up to him; and began converging on the Ivana. Like so many glowing torpedoes, long trails of green followed the silvery grey wraiths as they joined their friend on the bow.
The dolphins weren't just thrill seekers. Although the creatures did seem to have a zest for life that few humans could claim to match, they were also infinitely clever. Not only did the bow of the Ivana upset the glowing plankton, it also scared the flying fish. Like mammoth dragon flies the flying fish would explode out of the ocean, in front of the Ivana, and fly dangerously close to the tips of the waves as they tried to escape the imaginary attack of the bow of the ship. The dolphins would watch and wait for the little fighter pilots to take flight, and then with an explosion of green light at their powerful tails they would take off after the fish.
Like an elegant dog fight, the little pilots would pump their fine, wing-like fins furiously trying to gain distance from the pursuing submarines, hoping to touch down in the water before the gaping grins of the dolphins caught them. Sometimes the flying fish succeeded in evading their pursuers; but, more often than not, the highly intelligent dolphins would anticipate the evasive maneuvers of their quarry and would place themselves directly underneath the drained pilots. After catching the flying fish, the dolphins would quietly steam back towards the bow of the ship to rejoin their pod until, yet another piece of breakfast broke from the water to escape.
John never got tired of watching this show; and he had seen it many times in his numerous ocean crossings. He marveled at how the dolphins had learned this trick: utilizing vehicles that they had never experienced before to their infinite advantage. How they learned it over and over again, tens of thousands of miles apart in different oceans was a mystery. John recalled a time when a pod of over forty dolphins had been operating like this for over five hours. So many dolphins were riding the wave that the ship itself had lost over a knot of sea speed, just from the drag of pushing the pod forward through the water.
John looked up from the play beneath the waves and glanced around the vast expanse of moonlit water. Nothing. Not a boat in sight. He felt relieved, the Ivana was nearly out of the danger zone. The moon was just beginning to set in the night sky, and full darkness would be soon enveloping the entire area, until the darkness would be shattered by the by the rising sun less than two hours away. The night is darkest before the dawn, he thought. John opened the bridge door and reentered the bridge of the ship. He was startled by the voluptuous figure of the Australian stewardess, Claire, standing there.
Chapter 12
Alexi Popovich sat in his plush bed three decks below John. The soft, orange, glow of his bed stand light shone on his open book. He was reading yet another economic theory book by one of the leading thinkers of the day. Business. He lived and breathed it.
Alexi had not always been interested in intellectual pursuits. He was born in a ghetto of Lobnya, Russia, not too far north of Moscow. His mother had thrown his newborn body in front of the local church and gone back to her life as a local prostitute. Feeding an infant made feeding her heroin addiction impossible. She made the obvious choice. Alexi was raised in an over-crowded orphanage where food was always scarce, and violence was all too common. The violence came not only from the other orphans, but also from the adult caretakers only interested in the government check.
Luckily for Alexi, he was a larger kid. He was handsome, with Slavic bones and blue eyes. But he learned early that violence, and strength, were the only attributes that one needed to succeed. He would often bully the smaller children and take what little they had to reluctantly give.
At 18 he was kicked out of the state-run orphan house. Alone, and without an education, he had few options. He worked off and on for a few drug dealers; but he found the work scarce and payment usually had to be beaten out of his clients. Looking for a steadier paycheck, he had joined the Russian army. He had reveled in the instant structure and stability of the lifestyle. For the first time in his life, his belly was almost always full, and his paycheck was on time. Killing for these simple pleasures seemed like a small price to pay.
Alexi had first been deployed to Chechnya. There Muslim separatists were constantly at war with Russia. Violence, on both sides, was constant and severe. He didn't understand what the separatists wanted _ and he didn't really care. He loved the mindlessness of the job. The brotherhood, and camaraderie he felt for his fellow soldiers, was the closest he had ever come to having a family and feeling like he "belonged". That was until he met Slava.
He remembered the first time he had met Slava. While on patrol, in Grozny, Chechnya, he was looking for local militants when they came across a Mercedes sitting in the middle of a square. Riddled with bullet holes, there were four men lying on the ground in front of the car. The lights were on, and the shooters, were standing looking at the bodies.
That's when Alexi had noticed a man still crouched behind the trunk of the car. He was clearly scared. Alexi wondered what it must be like, to be so close to death, to face your very existence like that man was down there. Alexi had no desire to intervene, in fact he felt no moral quandary at all when faced with the clear death of this man in front of him. The man probably deserved it, as he was obviously some sort of mobster. Then again, everyone in Russia was at that time. Everyone, from the local priest to the judge, had some kind of back-hand deal going on, or some far-fetched get rich quick scheme. Black market trading was as Russian as vodka.
"I know him," said Dmitry, Alexi's second in command.
"So?" Alexi asked.
"He is someone we could use on our side. It would be a shame to let him die," Dmitry prodded carefully. He knew better than to push Alexi and incite his, sometimes considerable, wrath.
"Who is he to you? Why do you want to save him?" Alexi asked with hostility.
"He deals in weapons, drugs, everything. He has a lot of money, and he can get us good weapons. I think that if we save him, he will owe us some very nice weapons for free, don't you?"
Alexi shrugged disinterested; but the glimmer of greed began to form in his eye. Alexi was always out to make a quick buck or get something for nothing. Dmitry might have a point. To have a weapons dealer on their side might come in handy.
"Besides if we let these Chechnyan dogs kill every good Russian businessman, we are letting them win," Dmitry said pushing to close the deal.
"That is true," Alexi said. He looked down and surveyed the ki
ll zone. An ambush would be easy; and probably over in minutes. Alexi really had nothing better to do.
"Dmitry you take the men down the left; I will start from here."
Dmitry smiled and handed the rifle to Alexi, wordlessly. Alexi always liked to shoot from afar. Dmitry never knew whether it was because he didn't want to see the end results of the damage up close and personal, or whether it was because he loved to challenge himself with longer and longer shots of skill. Either way, sniper fire was always a brutally effective way to break up a small group of enemy combatants and scatter them aimlessly, usually right into the devastating fire of Dmitry's nearby AKs.
Alexi lay down in the dirt, resting the rifle on his stretched out left arm. The ground was rock hard and freezing cold. It wouldn't take long for him to start shivering, which would kill his accuracy. Alexi looked to see the last of his squad making their way down the hill, with Dmitry in the lead. Dmitry was a good man and like a brother to Alexi. Alexi trusted his skill implicitly and he knew that the attack would be successful with him in the lead. More importantly Dmitry was loyal _ like a dog. Saving someone’s life would do that.
Alexi's breath, while he'd looked at his group, had fogged up the scopes glass. He wiped it quickly and began to breathe through his mouth, so he could blow the hot air away from his eye and scope. The simple steam vapors from his breath could throw off a shot and ruin the element of surprise putting his team and Dmitry in danger.