"All right, Combat, captain out."
"Combat out."
Myers's voice echoed over the ship. "Set starboard side boat launch detail, set starboard side boat launch detail."
There was a wave of protest from the deck. "What?" "What'd they say?" "Are they kidding?" "Is this a joke?"
The XO had followed Cal inside. "I've got this, Captain."
"Nonsense, XO, I'll take it. You go keep our guests happy."
Good thing it was dark on the bridge so Cal couldn't see Taffy's expression.
Not that Boat Deck Captain Smith needed any help from Cal to get Mun 1 launched. He did not turn on the spotlight mounted on the edge of the starboard wing because it would have ruined everyone's night vision. Smith and Seaman Orozco had the davit engaged and the orange, rigid-hulled inflatable out of the cradle and snugged up against the boat deck a couple of minutes later. They were manned and ready to go in five minutes. Cal 's radio crackled into life. "Captain, boat deck."
"Boat deck, captain, go ahead."
"Permission to launch the starboard side boat, Captain?"
"Stand by one. Coxswain, captain."
"Captain, coxswain."
Two decks below the coxswain looked up but in the dark Cal couldn't see who it was. "Who's talking?"
"BM2 Hendricks, sir."
"Did you run a GAR?" This was an assessment by which crew readiness was calculated, run prior to an operation, especially one this unexpected.
"We're in the green, sir, total fourteen. High in crew fitness because we're all in tourist mode instead of being focused on the job, and another high in environment because we're fumbling around in the dark. The rest are all twos and threes. We know how to do this. We're ready."
"Who's on the crew?"
"Myself, Garon, Velasquez, Garza, and Clark."
Velasquez was one of their Spanish-speaking interpreters, breaking in Garza on the job. Good move, there was a strong chance that whatever this boat was, it would have no English speakers on board. "Thanks, Coxswain. Boat deck, Captain."
"Captain, boat deck."
"Permission to load, lower, and launch the starboard side boat, aye."
"Aye aye. Load, lower, and launch!" Smith's bellow was audible to everyone on the starboard bridge wing. "Boat moving!"
"Where are they going?"
Cal looked around to see the Munros leaning over the rail next to him to peer interestedly into the dark. "We have a contact on the radar where it shouldn't be, inside the area closed during launch."
"My goodness," Doreen said. They heard the smack of the small boat's hull on the water. "Who is it?"
"We don't know yet. Probably the usual idiot joyrider." He bent his head back. "Lookout?"
A head poked over the side of the deck over the bridge. "Yes, Captain?"
"Do you have a pair of those night-vision binoculars?"
"Sure thing, Captain." The head vanished and Cal went over the ladder up to the lookout. A moment later Seaman Critchfield handed the binoculars down to him.
"Thanks, Seaman."
"You're welcome, Captain. Uh, what's going on?"
"There's a contact bearing 090 relative, and heading west."
"That would be into the area closed during launch, sir?"
"It would. Keep an eye out."
"Keeping an eye out, aye sir."
22
TWO MILES OFFSHORE, ON BOARD FREIGHTER MOKAME
"I can hear their engine," Yussuf said.
"Yes," AMI said. "Captain?"
The blood had flowed freely from the scalp wound where Akil had struck him, and it had dried to his face in a half-mask that made him look like the Phantom of the Opera. The little finger on his left hand stuck out at an unnatural angle, and he was careful to hold it out of the way. He sounded resigned. "I say nothing. I do not respond to calls. I do not slow down."
"Correct," Akil said. "Yussuf, get our men up on deck."
"Yes, Isa," Yussuf said, and left. Shortly they heard footsteps coming aft and climbing the stairs to the deck.
The migrants said and did nothing, watching them pass with fear or apathy on their faces. Most of them spoke little English, and they'd probably spent everything they had on passage to the United States. They would do nothing, take no action that might delay or deny that goal.
The engine of the small boat neared. Akil could barely discern the outline of the hull against the sea. It was so dark he couldn't see where the sea ended and the sky began, but for the stars, which were many and beautiful. He thought of Adara. He thought of Zahirah.
The small boat hailed them on the marine band. "Unknown freight, unknown freighter, this is the United States Coast Guard. You are inside a closed area, I say again you are inside a closed area. You must turn around, I say again you must turn around immediately. Please respond."
"Don't answer," Akil said.
He remembered very clearly the story Adam Bayzani had told him about what it was like on a small boat at night. They were in constant communication with their ship, both the bridge and the combat center, and they were equipped with their own surface radar unit. The ship had infrared radar that Bayzani had spoken of admiringly, but not on the small boat. The cutter had night-vision goggles, which the small boat might or might not have on board as well.
These last two items of information were why Akil's men had jackets on over their weapons. If the Coast Guard did manage to get a close look at who was on deck of the little Haitian freighter in the dark, he didn't want his people to stand out any more than absolutely necessary. Or not immediately. It was also why he had instructed Yussuf and Yaqub to select recruits who looked more African than Asian. They would appear like every other Haitian migrant on board, at least at first.
The small boat came nearer and nearer. When Akil judged it near enough, he said, "Cut off the engines."
"They'll know we-"
Akil shot the captain in the back of the head. He had a silencer fitted to the muzzle of his pistol and the shot made a muted burping sound. The captain's forehead burst and splattered blood and brains all over the steering wheel and the control console. Akil wiped away some of the mess to take the boat out of gear. He had watched the captain very carefully for the last part of the journey.
He left the engine idling and went to join his men on deck. "Did you immobilize the rest of the crew?"
"Yes," Yussuf said. "They're tied up in our stateroom. There are only six of them, and I think four of them were only guards. None of them protested when they saw the guns." A trace of self-satisfaction colored the words. Yussuf was discovering the power that came with a weapon.
Akil nodded. "Good work." He was watching the shadow that was the small boat. It made a wide circle around the Mokame and took up position off their port side. A powerful spotlight came on and flooded the stern of the freighter with light. Akil's men put on a good show, putting up their hands to shade their faces and blinking in the bright light. They were lost in the sea of migrants surrounding them, all doing the same thing as they muttered incomprehensibly among themselves.
The loud hail came a moment later. "Unknown freighter, unknown freighter, this is the United States Coast Guard. You are inside a security zone closed to all unauthorized vessel traffic, I say again, you are inside a security zone closed to all unauthorized vessel traffic. You must depart this area at once. Please reply."
"Remember," Akil said, "we need the uniforms."
HAITI
They had crawled slowly and painstakingly through every waterfront dive and backwoods bar in the greater Port-au-Prince area. In the past week Patrick had drunk more alcohol-most of it, he was certain, distilled in someone's backyard from whatever fruit they had hanging from the handiest trees-than during the rest of his life combined. His liver was protesting, he was experiencing shortness of breath, and he fancied that his heart had picked up an irregular beat somewhere between the harbor saloon where a massive black man had offered him his sister and he had been almost too terrified to refuse, and the one-room juke joint where a three-piece band was sawing away at some of the best blues he'd ever heard in his life.