“Sea fighters?” Heath asked.
“I believe he means ‘pirates,’” Olson, the Norwegian commander, said.
“Good pirates,” the Commodore quickly injected. “We no raid women and babies. We raid the Sardinians. We raid no-good Sidra-Benghazi. We raid Russians—”
“What a minute.” Hunter stopped him. “You’ve seen Russian ships in these waters?”
“Si, signor,” the man answered excitedly. “Reds. Armed trawlers. Destroyers. Even some submarines and cruisers.”
“Heavy-duty stuff.” Yaz whistled.
“Between them and whatever the hell Lucifer’s allies have floating around,” Hunter said, “we’re going to have our hands full.”
“Si, si, signor!” the commodore said, bounding over to Hunter. “We help. We know the waters!”
Hunter, Yaz, Heath, and Olson all looked at each other. The Commodore’s enthusiasm was contagious. And Hunter could just tell by the nature of the man that he was trustworthy.
“But how could we feed them all?” Heath said. “You know what the food situation is on this ship.”
“Yeah,” Yaz said. “The bad news is the food is terrible. The good news is that no one can cook it and there’s not much to go around.”
The Commodore’s eyes lit up. “Food?” he said, a wide grin revealing a tooth-gaped smile. “We have plenty of food! Good food! And we can cook. My men and I are the best-fed sailors in the whole Mediterranean!”
Whether the little man knew it or not, his value had just gone up a few notches.
Once again the four principals exchanged looks and a round of “what the hell” shrugs.
“We’ll have to blow it by Sir Neil,” Hunter said. “Though I know he could stand a few good meals—”
“And he’s not averse to adding every fighting hand we can get,” Heath said.
Hunter turned to Olson. Really the final decision would be his. “Captain, you would have to coordinate the Commodore’s boats with yours. Can it be done?”
The craggy, proud-looking Olson rubbed his chin in a habit of thought. “They could provide a fine protection for our flanks and rear, of course.”
“Of course!” the Commodore yelled in glee, waving his hands.
“If it’s okay with Sir Neil,” Olson said, “it’s okay with me.”
A quick meeting was held in Sir Neil’s intensive care room. Heath slowly and deliberately whispered the situation into the British commander’s ear. Hunter could hear the key word “food” repeated several times. Finally they saw Sir Neil nodding his head, before falling back into semiconsciousness.
“The Commodore can throw in with us,” Heath told Hunter, Yaz, and Olson afterwards. “If Captain Olson can shepherd them for a while — who knows, they might bring us some luck.”
“Luck, hell,” Hunter said. “I’ll be glad to have one thousand sea pirates on my side any day.”
“Plus they can cook,” Heath said, raffishly twirling his huge red mustache.
The Commodore soon made good on his promise for edible food and decent cooking. That night he and 100 of his men fed the entire crew of the Saratoga a huge pasta meal. Similar feasts were prepared for the men on the other ships in the carrier’s entourage. But, privately, Hunter, Heath, and Olson agreed that the Norwegians would keep a close eye on the pirates — although, judging by the Commodore’s fervor, the likelihood of one of his men being a spy for Lucifer was remote.
In the meantime, the Italian communications team continued monitoring long-range radio transmissions emanating from Lucifer’s Arabian Empire. Hunter was constantly kept informed on critical messages. Most of the radio intercepts had to do with movements of Lucifer’s Legions and coordinating their transfers to troop ships anchored near his base at Jidda on the Red Sea.
But then, on the afternoon following the appearance of the Commodore’s fleet, Hunter and Heath were called up to the Saratoga’s CIC. The communications people had eavesdropped on a conversation between the pilot of Lucifer’s only airplane — a captured US-made P-3 Orion — and the captain a fleet of mercenary ships sailing in the Red Sea. The ships were discussing instructions to head toward the Suez Canal and “commence operations.”
“What kind of operations?” Hunter asked Giuseppe, the leader of the Italian communications team.
“It’s hard to say, major,” the man told him as he sat working over a sophisticated radio set. “But, judging by the strength of the mercenary’s radio signal, we can approximate the size and type of the ships they are using.”
“And?” Heath asked.
“And, if I had to guess,” Giuseppe said, “I’d say they were minelayers. Russian-built minelayers.”
“Blast!” Heath spat out. “Soviet mines! That’s all we need.”
“Mines in the canal could definitely crimp our style,” Hunter said.
Heath tugged at his mustache with worry. “Should we consider an air strike, major?” the Brit asked.
“I don’t think we can risk it,” Hunter replied. “We could lose some very valuable aircraft to SAMs, especially if they have a P-3 Orion flying around out there. With the AWACs gear on that airplane, they’d see us coming for miles.
“Plus we can sink the minelayers, but that wouldn’t take care of the mines themselves.”
“So what are our options?” Heath asked.
Hunter shook his head. “I’m afraid we don’t have any right now,” he said. “We’ll just have to deal with it as we go along.”
“Christ,” Heath said. “Just one more thing to worry about … ”
Another day passed. Slowly. Tension was building on the carrier, Hunter could feel it in his psyche. Even the Med seemed to be working against them. They were running into strong head winds. The resulting currents were making the towing operation more difficult.
Hunter spent most of his time this day supervising the rewiring of the Swedish Viggen fighters to carry heavy ordnance. The constant, more noticeable pull-push of the carrier in the rough seas made the precise work required twice as difficult.
After the long day finally ended, Hunter walked alone to the stern of the Saratoga. He stood close to the edge of the mighty carrier’s deck, watching O’Brien’s tugs churn up the Mediterranean in front of him, their thick towlines taut and vibrating like a too-tightly-strung violin.
As always, his mind was going in a million different directions. Life was so strange, he thought. He loved the USA. He missed his friends back home. Emma had filled a nice niche in his life, but he yearned for the sweet touch of Dominique. Yet here he was, out in the middle of the Mediterranean, on a disabled flattop, being towed into “the Gates of Hell,” as Sir Neil liked to describe it. Chasing the super-criminal who had so ruthlessly destroyed the fragility of America.
But was it worth it? Was it more like chasing a phantom? Punishing one man certainly wasn’t going to rebuild America from the ruins of The Circle War. Was the fact that Lucifer — then Viktor — had kidnapped Dominique and had used her in his devious plans the real reason why Hunter was so intent in tracking down the madman? Was this crazy adventure simply nothing more than a personal vendetta? Hunter shook his head — he just didn’t know.
The pilot heard someone behind him. He turned to see that it was the strange man Peter.
The prophetic looney-tune had been calmer than usual in the last few days; one of Yaz’s corpsman had injected him several times with a sedative, so Heath had told him. The drug was working; Peter spent most of his time lying in his wooden box-bed, placidly ranting. The Brits had even reduced the man’s four-man SAS guard to just two. Now, as these soldiers took a smoke break nearby, Peter walked to the edge of the deck and sat down, completely oblivious to Hunter, who was standing no more than ten feet away.