Further along from the fighting Pirate had climbed unseen onto the vessel. He fired his RPG at the ambushers, killing several, wounding others, and setting the ship alight. Those who could fell back into the superstructure. Pirate led the charge but this was no longer an attack for profit. It became a battle for revenge. He went through the vessel room by room, killing anyone he found. He shot the captain and officers on the bridge. He walked calmly into the communications shack to kill the radio operator.
Pirate never knew what happened to the ship, neither did he care, after abandoning it ablaze. The attack had been a waste of time and manpower. A resulting argument with his commander left the leader dead, a knife buried in his neck, the hilt firmly in Pirate’s hands. And for his efforts the others made him commander.
From that day on his pirate philosophy had been to kill first, capture later. But his command turned out to be short-lived. His methods were shunned by other pirate commanders as counterproductive and he was soon forced out of his position under threat of execution.
Such was the way of his world. One’s power rose and fell like the tide. Surviving was the only important thing. And so here he was again, forced to obey orders that he believed to be wrong. He had watched this man step past him carrying a gun and knew he was a threat not to be ignored. And so he decided to act. ‘Move one more step and I kill you,’ the African warned.
Stratton’s mind raced. The fact that he had not been shot already told him the man was not quite prepared to kill him yet, for whatever reason. That gave him a narrow margin in which to negotiate. ‘I’m not alone,’ he said, hoping to unnerve the man.
‘You will be when I shoot you,’ Pirate replied.
Stratton sensed the murderous confidence in the foreign voice immediately.
‘Put your gun down on the floor now or I put a bullet into the back of your head.’
‘Okay,’ Stratton said, trying to sound nervous. ‘Don’t shoot.’
As he leaned forward he used his thumb to click the selector catch on the weapon from single-shot to fully automatic and moved the barrel round so that it angled across his body instead of facing his front. With nothing to go by but the voice he estimated the man to be three or four metres behind him. The barrel of the weapon was now pointing at a head-height container forming a wall to his side. He angled the gun a little further back as he bent at the waist and lowered it to the floor. Before it touched the ground he pulled the trigger. The only sound that resulted was the click, click, clatter of the moving parts as the weapon shuddered in his grip and the bang of the bullets hitting the metal container. The silenced SMG fired low-velocity rounds: bigger bullets than the average high-powered rifle but slower and less penetrating. They couldn’t pierce the skin of the container, for instance. Stratton held on to the trigger and emptied the entire magazine, the rounds striking and then ricocheting off the metal wall like billiard balls. He turned to see the figure of a man, juddering as he fell, a gun slipping from his grip.
Stratton moved to the man to look down on him. He was alive but breathing in short, rasping breaths. Stratton checked around to ensure they were alone. He couldn’t leave the Somali in case he was discovered. There was too much more to be done. Under normal circumstances a follow-up team would take care of him, the details of such cases depending on the nature of the operation and its ability to absorb enemy prisoners. In most cases this would be zero. That certainly applied to Stratton’s current situation.
Stratton couldn’t get the man to the platform’s outer edge because of the deck configuration: he’d have to drag him around the container and machinery to do that and risk exposure. The only choice he had was a gap between the narrow gangway he had climbed and the edge of the deck. A more or less unobstructed line of sight straight down to the water.
He slung the SMG over his back and dragged the man to the gangway. He heaved him up, leaned him over the top rail, picked up his heels and let the weight take him the rest of the way over. The man fell silently into the blackness. At first. But instead of a distant plop as he hit the water, a couple of dull thuds followed by a single deeper one came back up, as though the body had struck something very solid.
Stratton had no time to worry about the man’s fate. He was dead either way. The good news was that there was now one fewer enemy to fight. The bad news was that the clock had started ticking, for it would only be a matter of time before the man was declared missing and the reason for it became obvious.
He hid the Somali’s weapon and moved across to the door that led into the accommodation block.
Rowena and Jason were waiting on the spider deck for Binning when Pirate’s body struck the span across the gap from them and jammed awkwardly in a joint. Rowena lost her balance at the shock of it and might have fallen off the spar had Jason not been close enough to grab her.
As she steadied herself the thought hit her. Binning!
Mansfield jolted as if he’d had the same thought. ‘Stay here,’ he said. He shuffled to the end of the girder and climbed through an angled junction to the span where the body lay.
After a brief examination he made his way back. ‘It’s not Binning, or Stratton.’
‘Is he dead?’
‘For his sake I sincerely hope so. There’s little that anyone can do for him if he isn’t.’
‘Then where’s Binning?’ Rowena asked. They peered up into the complex web of light beams and shadows.
There was nothing more for it. She had to see for herself and so she clambered up the ladder. Jason wanted to stop her but instead climbed up behind her.
‘He’s gone with Stratton,’ she decided as Jason stepped onto the next spider deck.
‘He wouldn’t allow that,’ Jason said.
‘What other explanation could there be? Binning was supposed to set up the G43 here. Where the hell is he?’
‘Maybe he had to go further up,’ Jason suggested, craning to look for his colleague.
‘I’m surprised you didn’t go with him too. You and Binning are so keen to prove you’re better than Stratton.’
‘One minute you hate him, the next you’re a fan.’
Rowena ignored the comment. ‘What are we going to do?’
‘He may be having trouble securing the device. Be patient. He’ll be back soon.’
‘Then what about him down there? I suppose he was just taking a stroll in the storm and slipped. Are you going to tell me you can’t sense that something is really wrong here? Binning is not setting up the device anywhere here. He’s gone, Jason.’
Mansfield could not ignore her or the situation any longer. She was right.
‘I’m not going to wait for him,’ Rowena said, taking hold of the ladder. ‘I want to know where he is and that he’s placing the device. You stay if you want to.’ He grabbed her hand. ‘Don’t try to stop me, Jason, or so help me . . .’ Her expression was one of pure anger.
‘I’m not trying to stop you,’ he replied in a deliberate, calm voice. ‘We’ll both go but if we simply bimble around we could end up on the news ourselves. There’s no point in that, right?’
Rowena could see the sense of this.
Mansfield took out his pistol and held it firmly pointing upwards. ‘Let me take the lead, please.’
She hesitated, a long-time critic of the gender-weakness thing.
‘Consider it a condition of me letting you go up there at all.’
She gave in and let him go ahead of her up the ladder.
They reached the level below the machinery deck as the rain and wind whipped at them.
‘He’s not here,’ Rowena said loudly above the noise of the weather.
‘Perhaps he set up the G43 and then went off to help Stratton.’
She considered the possibility. ‘How can he do this without telling us?’ she said in frustration.