“Thanks,” Randy called back as the Keldara clambered over the side.
“They yours?”
“My boss’s,” Randy said. “We’re delivering them to him in the Bahamas.”
“Can we go for a ride?” the driver of the boat asked. She was a cute little blonde, the other two being nearly as cute brunettes.
“You’re way too young to be accepting rides from strange men in boats,” Randy said. “I’d love to, but we’ve got to hit the cut and then head for Bimini. And I don’t think your folks want you riding over to Bimini.”
“Damn,” the girl said. “Okay. Maybe another time.”
“You got any questions?” Randy said as Vil pulled the boat forward. Genrich was up front, pulling in the anchor line and securing it. The one thing Randy hadn’t had to teach these guys, thank God, were knots. Those they knew. Probably from climbing.
“A million,” Vil admitted in Russian. “Not all of them about boats. Was that young lady serious?”
“Yeah,” Randy said. “Stupid but serious.”
“Very stupid,” Vil said. “I will not speak to her morals, I know that the cultures are different. But… where I came from, until the coming of the Kildar, girls such as her were always escorted by men. Because of moral issues, yes, but also because they were often kidnapped and turned into whores.”
“Plenty of girls get snatched in the U.S. every year,” Randy said. “Boys too, but more girls. And they usually either disappear or end up as a rape/murder case. But… generally not by guys driving quarter-of-a-million-dollar boats. Oh, there are exceptions. A guy like that, identity unknown, is still the top suspect in a multiple rape murder over in Tampa. But mostly they’re safe; they’ve got too much to lose to screw some fourteen-year-old. So she figured she’d get a ride in a fast boat, which is always fun, get dropped off and motor on her way. Hell, she’s probably done it before. The waters around here are still safer on that score than about anywhere else in the world.”
“Very confusing,” Vil said. “I wish that the Kildar had assigned Sawn’s team to this. I love the boats, don’t get me wrong. I think we will do well. But it is all very confusing. Sawn is… was better at confusing.”
“Was?” Randy asked.
“He… bought the farm you say,” Vil replied. “In a battle about a month ago. And much of his team bought the farm or are recovering. Was very bad battle.”
“Wait,” Randy said, his eyes wide. “That sniper shot on TV?”
“Yes,” Vil said, nodding. “Lasko. He is magic. Black magic. Nearly three kilometers. Impossible shot. Right through the X ring.”
“Damn, that was your guys?” Randy said. “Bet you’re glad you weren’t there.”
“I lost two men,” Vil said. “More in hospital. Tuul is still home recovering. Clarn probably should be; he took a chest shot at nearly point-blank range. Two units of whole blood are the only reason he’s here.”
“Oh,” Randy said. He’d kept up with the discussion of the battle on the boards. The questions about it were still raging. Nobody could believe that the group had survived the reported correlation of forces. Or that the sniper shot had been made at the range that it looked like on TV. That was damned near two miles. But here he was sitting next to one of the guys who had been in the battle. If Vil had questions, Randy had as many.
“Well, you’re doing fine with the electronics,” Randy said. Vil had figured out the complicated navigational system for a treat. He was still learning to read the markings, but the controls he had cold.
“These are not complicated,” Vil said, sighing and gesturing at the console. “We work with satellite communications, battlefield computers, GPS, all of that very much. Water. These boats? The society? Father of All, they are complicated.”
“Father of All?” Randy asked.
“Is our way of saying God,” Vil replied. “The boats are starting to move.”
“Yeah,” Randy said, standing up. “Okay!” he yelled. “Weigh anchor!”
“How are we to weigh it?” Clarn yelled. “Where is the scale?”
“Oh, Jesus,” Randy said, grabbing his hair.
“I’m getting a base,” Mike said. “Not just the yacht. For one thing, the Keldara are hot bunking.”
The run from the cut to Nassau had been fast. The passage had lower waves than the Florida Straits so he’d cranked the boat up to the maximum he felt he could run given fuel usage, which went way up at max speed. At ninety miles an hour, the run had gone quickly.
“We need some sort of confirmation on what’s going on,” Britney said. “If you get a base near Nassau and it’s all happening down around Andros…”
“I’m not going near Andros,” Mike said, chuckling. “My pilots won’t go near Andros. Not on a bet. They, through a remarkable coincidence, are the pilots who were flying the FAST in when the nuke went up. Kacey still bitches about that. Only bird she’s ever dumped.”
“She’s very… cocky,” Britney said.
“Pilots usually are,” Mike replied. “Good ones. But in her case it’s justified. None of the Keldara saw her take out the bunkers that got — Well, anyway, there were some Rangers watching. Words like ‘unbelievable’ and ‘awesome’ were the minimum they used. Apparently she just went insane. You can… do incredible things when you’re out of your mind.”
“Seen it,” Britney said, grinning.
“That wasn’t as far as I’ve gone,” Mike said. “The Keldara are still whispering about the Charge of the Kildar in the last battle. I don’t really remember it. But even Adams was impressed and he’s hard to impress. And then…”
“You collapsed,” Britney said. “It happens. Post-combat reaction can be as bad as postpartum depression. As I said, lots of counseling. And, hell, that’s why I got my bachelors in psych.”
“Great,” Mike said, shaking his head. “Just what I need. A shrink.”
“Frankly, you probably do,” Britney replied. “But I’m not going to analyze you. We’ll talk, when you feel up to it.”
“Nassau,” Mike said, pointing at the island on the horizon. Boat traffic had definitely picked up and the Cigarette jumped over a series of waves from the wake of a freighter. “And that freighter could be the very one we’re looking for.”
“No,” Britney said. “If they’re already moving things in, it’s not. The one we’re looking for is somewhere up there,” she added, pointing north.
“Sir, got a strange track,” the radar tech said.
The deck officer for the CIC of the aircraft carrier Ronald Reagan walked over and looked at the screen.
“Whatcha got?”
“Freighter,” the tech said. “Sierra forty-two. I only bring it up cause I saw it yesterday. And the day before. It’s just cruising back and forth.” She highlighted the track, then brought up a previous day’s track. “Same general position. It’s doing a long figure eight, just running back and forth.”
The CIC officer didn’t know why the carrier battle group, which normally was doing “power projection” somewhere in the Middle East, was stuck patrolling up and down the Florida coast. But he did know that they were told to report anything “suspicious” to higher.
“Could be a Lloyds Looper,” the tech said, shrugging.
And that was the problem with it being “suspicious.” It really wasn’t. Freighters were a business, which meant that most of the time they should be going from point A to point B, preferably filled with cargo. But under certain circumstances, related to obscure insurance rules, circling around in the middle of nowhere made more financial sense. Six ships had been detected, shortly after the Iraq war kicked off, circling in the Indian Ocean. After debating it for a while, spec ops teams descended on them in the middle of the night. No illicit cargo was found in them. In fact no cargo was found in them. It turned out that for insurance reasons, it was more profitable for them to stay at sea, waiting for their next load, than to tie up along shore. Even burning as much diesel as they did.