He had drifted off for a couple hours, only to be awakened by a sharp knock on the cabin door. This was getting to be a habit. He would finally start to get some sleep when something would happen and he’d be back in action again.
This time the person at the door was one of Giuseppe’s men. “Message,” he kept saying, as if it were the only English he knew. “Message … ”
Hunter was in the CIC inside of two minutes. Heath and Yaz were there, along with Giuseppe.
“What have you got?” Hunter asked, reaching for a mug of coffee.
“An intercepted radio message from the western Med,” Heath said.
Hunter stopped in mid-sip. “The Modern Knights?” he asked.
“Could be,” Yaz said. “Listen for yourself … ”
He reached over to the large radio set and turned on the built-in tape recorder. There was a burst of static, then an indecipherable chatter. Then, gradually, individual voices could be heard. They had definite British accents.
“Lancelot, Lancelot … ” one voice repeated. “Fueling time for you is 0830.”
“I copy you, Galahad,” another voice said.
More static went by, then another moment of clarity.
“Godfrey, Godfrey,” a distinctly French-accented voice said. “Repondez. Repondez.”
“Oui, Norman,” the reply came back. “Nuit blanche. Repete. Nuit blanche.”
The tape ended with a final burst of static.
“Nuit blanche,” Hunter repeated. “I think that means ‘a white night,’ like in ‘a sleepless night.’”
“It’s got to be some kind of code,” Yaz said.
“Could be,” Hunter said, rewinding the tape and listening to it again.
“Maybe it means they’re working overtime,” Heath offered.
“Any idea where they are?” Hunter asked.
Giuseppe nodded and pointed to a map of the Mediterranean. “Near Majorca,” he said in his best English.
“Really?” Hunter was surprised.
“I felt the same way,” Heath said. “I thought, ‘My God, at least they’ve pushed off.’ Maybe Stanley’s return got them into gear. But then I realized they are still some distance away. That is, if they manage to avoid all the problems we encountered.”
“Christ,” Yaz said. “We did our best to clear the way for them.”
Hunter looked at the map. Majorca. Where it all started. It seemed like a year ago, when it was only a matter of a couple of weeks. How things had changed in this New Order World. At one time, crossing the Med was a lark on a cruise ship, or a flash in a jet airliner. Now, the other side of the Med — and those ships — might as well be a million miles away.
They listened to the messages one more time, then walked out into the open air, Hunter looked out on the horizon and saw it first.
“Jezzuz,” he exclaimed. “Is that really it?”
Heath shielded his eyes against the glare of the rising sun. “I believe it is, old boy,” he said excitedly.
A voice above them confirmed what they were thinking.
“That’s it, lads,” O’Brien called down from the bridge railing. “That’s the entrance to the Suez Canal … ”
Chapter 38
Hunter watched the S-3A roar off the deck of the carrier, climb, and turn south. Inside, he knew, the pilot, E.J. Russell, would be flying the most dangerous mission of his life.
Fate had dictated that the carrier, several days behind schedule, would reach the northern entrance of the Canal just as the advanced elements of Lucifer’s fleet were entering the southern end. Now only about 100 miles separated the two opposing forces.
So, although the Italian communications team was working round the clock intercepting messages from the enemy fleet, Hunter and the others still lacked an accurate reading as to just how many and what type of ships Lucifer had under his command. That’s where the Aussie pilot Russell came in. The pilot’s mission was to overfly the southern end of the Canal in his S-3A, unescorted, and photograph the enemy with the plane’s sophisticated belly cameras. For good measure, the BBC cameraman volunteered to go along. Videotapes of the fleet would also be very helpful in the battle to come.
The two mine-laying frigates rejoined the Saratoga flotilla just as it was preparing to enter the Canal. Before the task force entered the waterway, all of the ships had spent time with the flotilla oiler. Watching the refueling operation, Hunter wondered when they would get a chance to fuel up again. If ever …
He spent the morning hours with O’Brien, Olson, Heath, and the Commodore determining the order of battle for the flotilla. They agreed that six of Olson’s frigates would enter the Canal first, followed by the carrier itself. The Moroccan troopship would come next, along with the oiler and the captured supertanker. The rest of Olson’s frigates would protect the rear. Twenty of the Commodore’s armed yachts, carrying members of the UDT, would sweep for mines beyond the area they had already cleared. The rest of the Freedom Navy would be scattered throughout the flotilla.
Hunter had already worked out the air operations. The eleven Tornados were the heart of his squadron. The versatile airplanes were very valuable to their cause, so he divided them into two units, Alpha and Beta, and instructed that only in the worst possible scenario would both units be off the carrier at the same time. The Tornados would comprise the main bombing force. They would go after the enemy ships with everything and anything they could carry.
The Viggens too would serve exclusively in the attack role. Hunter had the Swedish airplanes fitted with overstuffed “Greendog” bombs — so heavy that the airplanes would have to skim the surface of the water for their initial attacks.
The creaking Jaguars would be given the pinch-hitter role. They would be loaded up with aerial bombs, cannon ammo, and Sidewinders. They could either take the measure of the lead enemy ships via dive-bombing attacks and strafing, or protect the bombers from any enemy interference in the air.
The most difficult assignments fell to Hunter’s F-16 and the three Harrier jump-jets. They would have to free-lance for most of the air strikes. That is, be on station quickly, unleash whatever bomb loads they might have, then loiter over the battle area and apply force — whether it be Sidewinders, cannon fire, or air-to-surface missiles — as needed.
The S-3A would provide armed recon. Olson’s choppers would serve in the air-rescue role.
The flotilla sailed into the Canal quietly, without incident. Moving more or less in single file, the frigates and the Freedom Navy advance ships went in first, then the carrier, the troopship, the tankers, and the rest of the frigates. The only thing they encountered on the waterway was the still-smoldering wreckage of the gunboat that had made the mistake of stopping the Commodore twice.
Hunter had never sailed through the Canal. As he watched the passing shoreline, he knew that in peaceful times the channel would have been bustling with merchant ships big and small. Now it was quiet, eerie. The shores were lined with wreckage everywhere, all of it slowly disintegrating in the mercilessly hot Mideast sun. He saw downed airplanes of all sizes and types, bows of sunken ships, demolished tanks, jeeps, trucks, pontoon bridges. Rusting, sand-blasted reminders of Mideast wars too numerous to count. It was almost as if war were attracted to the area, like tornados to the American Midwest or hurricanes to its East Coast.
“What the hell is the big attraction?” Hunter asked himself. “Why have so many people died over a bunch of sand?”
There were human skeletons everywhere too. Some still dressed in uniforms, helmets still strapped onto bare jawbones. There were clutches of them, here and there, like the wreckage, victims of wars past and forgotten. Watching them, Hunter got the distinct and unnerving impression that he was floating through a graveyard.