“He stuck himself, I think,” Emma said. “He must have liked the initial dopamine surge and wanted to try it again.” She went over to the porthole and closed the covering. The room descended into gloom.
Janklow shook his head. “This is creepy. Let’s get out of here. I’ll tell Wainwright.”
Emma bent down to pick up one of the boxes. “We’ll bring these with us. You never know when we may need them.”
Janklow took the second. “I hope not. I don’t want to get close enough to those guys to be able to use these.”
They closed the door and left Clutch there. Emma hoped he was happier in the next life. She also hoped she wouldn’t be joining him anytime soon.
MUNGABE SAT IN THE LEAD SKIFF ROARING TOWARD THE
KAISER
Franz.
He wanted to show his crew that he was determined to take the ship. While the other attempts had proved futile, this one would succeed. Talek rode with him. He held an RPG that contained a loaded grenade and had a red scarf attached to the tube. He thought the scarf, given to him by a woman three years before, was good luck, and so he carried it everywhere. Abdul and the American Somali made up the rest of the boat.
The tiny craft bounced along the ocean in a constant banging rhythm. Mungabe jumped along with it, keeping his eyes forward. He determined not to show any weakness before his men. He hefted an AK-47 onto his right shoulder, his intention being to kill the sniper who was causing them trouble. Mungabe thought himself a very good shot. No Westerner would beat him. Not when he had a Kalashnikov in his hand.
As they neared the boat, he gazed at it with the pride of someone who already believed he owned it. It was magnificent. Small by oil-tanker standards, but still large enough to be imposing, sleek enough to be elegant. Mungabe could now understand why the Vulture wanted the vessel. But Mungabe had already decided to take it for himself. The Vulture hadn’t fulfilled their deal, and so neither would Mungabe. This much he knew.
The ship floated in the ocean, still. Mungabe’s men had managed to disable it. It was like the large bulls he had seen on his one visit to
India. They were considered sacred and so had lost any instinct to fight. No longer smart enough to move when something bigger, more ferocious was approaching them, and too stupid to care.
Mungabe gave an order to stop when his men came within four hundred meters of the boat. He wouldn’t risk an RPG attack until everything was prepared. He leaned toward Talek.
“Tell the rest to surround it.” He watched as his crews separated, forming a circle with the cruise liner in the middle as the target. The satellite phone rang. Mungabe waved an aggravated hand at the device. A crew member grabbed the receiver and handed it to him.
“It’s me,” the Vulture said. “Do you have control of the ship?”
“Have you destroyed Darkview?”
“Yes.”
Mungabe felt his anger erupt. “You lie! I’m taking the ship, the passengers,
and
the poison. If you value your life, you won’t come to this part of the world again.”
Mungabe heard fast breathing over the line, as if the Vulture were running a race.
“You cross me and you won’t live to see the next month,” the Vulture warned.
Mungabe laughed. “Come and get me, Vulture. But don’t wear those fancy suits when you do, because you had better be prepared to fight.” He hung up the phone. He’d deal with the Vulture later.
He waited while his men gained their positions. The large craft hadn’t moved.
“Hand me some binoculars,” Mungabe said. A crew member dropped a set into his hand. Mungabe peered at the
Kaiser Franz.
There was no movement on any decks. The satellite dish and the spinning dish that operated the radar were gone. They were off the grid, then. He skimmed the glasses over the boat’s windows, looking for passengers, crew, anyone. He saw nothing. Talek moved up next to him.
“Where’s the crew?” Talek said.
“It’s a trick. They’re on that boat, you can be sure.”
Talek lowered his own binoculars to look at Mungabe. “It’s a foolish decision. Better to fight us off with grenades.” Talek eyed the ship. “Perhaps they don’t have any? It’s against the law for such a ship to carry heavy arms.”
Mungabe doubted that the ship had no weapons. Darkview fought without honor, ignoring the laws of its country in favor of winning. “Darkview ignores international law whenever they decide to. They have grenades, you can be sure.”
“They have never shot them before.”
Mungabe pondered that. It was true. In all the prior skirmishes, the cruise liner had yet to fire a grenade. Only the sniper had shot at them. Mungabe shook his head. No, that was wrong. Darkview had grenades. He wouldn’t allow them to lure him in with such a trick.
“Are the men in place?”
Talek nodded.
“Then let’s move. Tell them we fire the first grenades in unison. After that may the best boat win. The first crew over the side gets a bonus.”
Talek grinned. He put his RPG on his shoulder, its red scarf hanging down his back. “That will be me. I could use a bonus.”
Mungabe laughed. He picked up the walkie-talkie, depressed the button, and said, “Go!”
EMMA WATCHED THE PIRATES
mass around them from her hidden position behind a deck door. There were almost thirty boats, each with a crew of four. She couldn’t see the men’s faces that clearly through the small crack she allowed herself to peer through, but she didn’t have to. That they were vastly outnumbered was apparent. Emma’s tiny gun, Sumner’s Dragunov, Hassim’s RPG and few grenades—these were not going to be enough to win this battle. Emma patted the leg pocket of her cargo pants. She held ten EpiPens. Stark
had made it clear that although someone would die from two sticks, it would take too long for death to occur for the pens to be of any help. In fact, Stark thought that using the pens would work against them, due to their tendency to heighten the fight-or-flight response.
“We’ll be adding to their rage, not diminishing it” was how Stark put it. Nevertheless, Emma had handed out all the pens from the boxes they found in Clutch’s room, with instructions to stick the pirates twice if they could. Likewise, everyone was given a squeeze bottle of fresh water spiked with rubbing alcohol to shoot at the pans of jellyfish or into the eyes of the boarding pirates. Emma’s sat on the floor at her feet. Sumner sidled up next to her.
“You okay?” he asked.
“Good as I’ll ever be,” she said. “I wish I had an RPG instead of a small gun and some pens.”
“You think the pens will work?”
Emma nodded. “I do, despite what Stark said.”
Sumner nodded. “I’m with you. It’s all we’ve got going for us at the moment.”
There was a roar as the assembled boats began their charge.
“Here they come,” Sumner said.
EMMA WATCHED THE SKIFFS SHOOT TOWARD THEM. SUMNER
held the Dragunov, and he stepped out onto the deck as they approached. He waited in the shadow of a small overhang along the wall for the moment that they were close enough to hit. The pirates began their own volleys at three hundred meters away. They fired in unison, launching grenades at the
Kaiser Franz,
aiming high. The luxury boat shook with the force that hammered into it. Explosions rocked the ship, blowing out windows, sending shards of glass catapulting twenty feet into the air, and raining bits of metal and splinters of wood everywhere. Two grenades shot past Emma’s hiding place, too high to hit anything. She could smell the sulfuric chemical burning at the rockets’ tails as they whizzed by.
Sumner stepped out of the shadow and returned fire. Emma watched the driver in the lead boat drop. From twenty feet to Emma’s right came the burst of their own RPG being fired. Hassim held the weapon. Emma could see him standing at the very edge of the deck rail. His back blast nearly scorched a life ring hanging on the wall ten feet behind him. Hassim’s grenade traveled straight toward his target like a heat-seeking missile. The first skiff’s hull shattered at the prow, sending planks flying upward. The pirates screamed, jumping out of the craft into the water. Emma heard more shouts as the men landed in the jellyfish-infused ocean.
Sumner fired again, but it did little to slow the pirates’ progress. They unleashed grenades at the ship in sporadic bursts, and as they
neared, their aim sharpened. Most of the ordnance met its target. They were close now. Sumner picked off pirate after pirate, but the sheer number of them ensured that they would succeed in boarding the ship. Emma saw the flash of steel as the first grappling hooks flew over the railing thirty feet to the left of them.
The hooks cued Cindy and Marina, who emerged from their hiding places behind a door. They crouched over as they slid four flat dishpans across the deck. Marina shoved one under the first hook, which had been thrown next to a ladder built into the
Kaiser Franz
’s side. Cindy pushed hers beside it, in line with the first. Three more grappling hooks flew into the air, clattering onto the deck. Cindy yelped when one grazed her shoulder before it fell onto the planking. The metal prongs rattled as they were drawn back. Two fell harmlessly into the water when their hooks failed to grab on to anything. The third caught the base pole of the railing and stuck there. Cindy rammed another pan under the last. Both women scuttled back to the metal door.
The
Kaiser Franz
emitted a huge metallic sound, belched a cloud of oily smoke, and groaned to a start. They were moving. Emma heard muffled cheers from the passengers hiding in the lower decks. The ropes attached to the grappling hooks pulled tight while the boat hauled them along. Sumner moved closer to the railing, firing shot after shot into the attached skiffs. Emma sidled up next to him, removed the safety on her gun, and glanced over the side.
Four skiffs dragged in the cruise liner’s wake, each one filled with Somalis. Two aimed assault rifles upward. One fired off a volley at Sumner and Emma. Sumner dove to the deck, but Emma was already as flat as she could get, so she concentrated her attention on the shooter. She responded with her own series of shots, catching the man in the shoulder and causing the others to dive for cover. Empty bullet casings ejected from the pistol’s side, flying to the right and landing on the wooden planks with plinking sounds. She held the gun with two hands, as Hassim had taught her, but she still had a difficult time controlling the weapon’s recoil.
Six more hooks flew over the railings at various points. Sumner crawled next to her, lay on his belly, and aimed at the men. He started picking them off as they grabbed on to the ladder to haul themselves upward. The vessel’s movement served to slow the pirates’ momentum, but even so they were climbing fast. The ones using makeshift ladders fell off them when they hitched sideways from the combination of ocean waves and moving target. Emma reloaded with the last of her ammunition. Each shot was going to have to count.
The first group was at the top of the railing, and four swung a leg over to board. Their weapons were slung across their backs, and a quick glance at the first two showed that they wore heavy work boots with thick steel-reinforced soles and long pants. Emma wanted to groan. Although they stepped directly into the dishpans, they didn’t react. Even if the tentacles had fired, the men weren’t feeling the sting. The first on board managed to stumble over the lip of the pan. He catapulted forward, arms flailing. Emma darted toward him, a pen in her hand. She plunged it into the back of his arm as he fell to the deck.
Emma swung back to watch the other two. One crumpled to the planks from a shot fired by Sumner, while the fourth wasn’t quite over the railing. He wore sandals and slammed one foot into a pan. He didn’t react but seemed intent on swinging his second leg across the railing. Marina darted from behind a lifeboat. She skidded to a stop four feet from the man, pointed a squeeze bottle at him, and emptied the water into the pan. The man howled, stumbling over the pan’s lip and dropping to his knees. Marina spun back to run for cover. There was the sound of a crack, and her body flew forward with the force of the bullet entering it. She slammed face-first onto the deck, and a blooming red stain formed on her shoulder. She lay flat, unmoving.
Emma felt an arm wrap around her throat from behind. The man she’d hit with the pen was choking her. She fought for air as he tightened his sinewy arm on her neck. She could smell his sweat and feel his bicep bulge with his effort. She still held the spent pen in her hand.
She dropped it and scrabbled in her pants pocket to grab another. Her fingers closed on the slim plastic piece and she pulled it out, held it low, and plunged it backward, into the man’s thigh, which was the only part of his body she could reach. Seconds later she felt him begin to jerk in a spasm. He kept his arm locked around her throat as his body twitched.
Sumner was up and running toward her, his weapon held in both hands. He swung the butt of the gun high, above Emma’s head, aiming for her attacker. She felt a puff of air as the steel whiffed past her hair. The gun hit the pirate with a thudding sound. He collapsed, taking Emma down with him. She untangled herself from his arm and rolled to the edge of the railing to get away.
Her heart plunged as she looked downward. The pirates were swarming over the side of the boat, slamming makeshift ladders against the side to crawl up. One man, still inside a skiff, yelled orders, his face contorted with rage. He held an assault weapon at the ready while his eyes raked the ship—looking for what, Emma didn’t know. Sumner moved to stand above her, a foot on either side of her body. He continued to fire at the pirates, but it was only going to be a matter of minutes before they were overwhelmed. The raging man’s eyes locked on Sumner. He raised his gun to shoot.
From that moment forward, Emma felt her world switch into slow motion. She hauled the arm that held the pistol out from next to her body, preparing to shoot the raging man. Sumner, too, shouldered his weapon to aim, and the pirates continued to crawl upward. The raging man, Emma, and Sumner fired at the same moment. The raging man went down, a bullet in his heart, and Sumner dropped, landing on Emma.
The weight of his landing on her squeezed all the air out of her lungs. She felt the warm flow of blood ooze onto her cheek. Sumner groaned and stayed still, his body heavy on hers. Emma wanted to scream, but her shock at seeing his blood seemed to freeze her lungs. She twisted to slither out from under him. He moaned again,
twitched, and slid off her. She watched him reach for the Dragunov with his left hand. Blood poured from his right arm. A pirate loomed over them both, holding his gun like a baseball bat. Emma rolled onto her back, aimed her revolver, and pulled the trigger.
The gun gave a hollow click, barely audible. Nothing happened. The pirate’s eyes, which had widened at the sight of her pistol, narrowed. He flipped his own rifle back into firing position. Emma pulled a pen from her pocket and jammed it into the pirate’s foot at the arch. She left it hanging there, grabbed another, and jabbed him again. When she glanced up, she saw that the man was shaking, trembling, his mouth jerking. He still held the gun, but it hung down at his side while his muscles spasmed. His finger was curled over the trigger, and the gun erupted. Bullets hammered into the deck in a crazy pattern all around her. She found her voice and started yelling, pushing herself backward, bumping into Sumner, who still lay behind her, while she used her feet to scuttle across the planks.
Several more pirates appeared at the railing, grasping the horizontal slats and climbing hand over hand.
“Sumner, can you shoot?” Emma threw the question behind her. She felt him move in response.
At that moment Block burst out of a nearby door. He stopped, then aimed and shot a stun gun. Emma watched darts attached to trailing wires zip out of the front and connect with a pirate’s chest and shoulder. He yelled and dropped to the deck, writhing. Behind Block came Herr Schullmann and Stark, who wielded a long steel pipe. He stepped up to the men at the railing, pulled back the pipe, and slammed it into the nearest pirate’s skull. The man let go, falling backward into the sea. Block fired again, hitting a second pirate who had succeeded in getting one foot over the railing. His eyes rolled up in his head when the electricity entered his body.
Schullmann gazed down the deck, and Emma heard him give an anguished cry when he saw Marina lying on the boards. He ran toward her, ignoring the chaos all around him. A pirate aimed at her
from the railing, preparing to shoot her again. Schullmann threw himself toward her as the man fired, and his body jerked when the bullet entered his chest. Block was reloading when more pirates reached the railing. Emma stood up and turned to help Sumner rise. His right arm was slick with blood.
“Go to the bridge deck!” Stark yelled. He kept swinging the pipe, slamming it onto the hands of the pirates as they grabbed at the slats to climb upward. A grenade, fired by Hassim, flew past the railing and exploded when it hit a skiff floating below them. Emma figured he had one warhead left. Hassim disappeared around a corner, heading to the other side of the ship. She could only pray that he didn’t meet a new pirate force on that side.
Sumner was up, but he seemed to sway on his feet. Block reached out to grab his elbow and steady him.
“We’ve got to retreat up the stairs. Emma, you out?” Sumner’s voice was strained with pain.
Emma nodded. “Only the pens.”
“Then go!”
Sumner placed the Dragunov strap over his head and jogged to Herr Schullmann and Marina. He checked for Schullmann’s pulse, then shook his head at Block. Together the men lifted Marina, Block carrying her body while Sumner held her legs. She hung from their grasp, her hair flowing downward.
Emma reached the stairwell door at the same time as Block. Stark was next. She stepped back to allow Sumner and Block to maneuver Marina’s body through the doorway. The young woman’s face was parchment white and immobile.
Cindy darted in next. “Here.” She shoved some pens into Emma’s hands.
Emma stepped in the stairway last, swinging the door shut as she did. A pirate’s fingers wrapped around the edge. She grabbed the interior handle with both hands, and the two of them engaged in a tug of war, with Emma trying to keep the panel shut and the pirate at
tempting to yank it open. She let one hand go long enough to slam a pen into his index finger so deep that she felt it rattle against bone. He let go. She closed the door.
The stairwell felt cool and dark after the heat from the decks, and the sounds were muted. She scurried to the top of the stairs, where their first two buckets sat on the landing. She took a deep breath and held it as she dumped the first bucket’s contents into the second. The door opened, and sunlight flooded into the stairwell. The Somalis flowed into the narrow passageway. Emma hurled the empty pail at the men charging up the stairs. She didn’t stay to watch but ducked through the door leading to the bridge, closing and locking it behind her.
Every window in the bridge was shattered, but only two had actual holes in them. The remaining sections were cracked in a crazy splintered pattern, like the windshield of a car. The panels with the holes were opposite each other, as if a grenade had passed straight through. Block and the others were already across the room and out the other side. A long smear of blood left a trail on the floor. Emma wondered if Sumner had taken a bullet in a major vessel and was bleeding out.
She jogged across to the second set of buckets. At five feet away, a wave of toxic air washed over her. The others must have already mixed the gas. The door behind her burst open, and several men staggered into the room, bringing with them a second wave of noxious fumes. One dropped to his knees and started vomiting. His gun skittered across the floor toward Emma. The others gasped in huge gulps.
Emma reached for the door, but before she got there, the fumes overwhelmed her. Her eyes burned, and each time she inhaled, it felt as though she were pulling fire through her throat. Her vision distorted and her ears rang. The door appeared to undulate, making it difficult for her to locate the handle to open it. She dropped to one knee, doing her best to concentrate on the doorknob. She held her breath and grabbed it. The cold metal seemed to be the only stable
object in the room. She turned it and threw herself past the opening. She lay there, half in and half out, and gasped in another breath of the gas, which seared her throat. She felt her stomach start to dry-heave, and she closed her eyes. Suddenly a hand wrapped around her wrist and someone dragged her on her back across the floor. She opened her eyes. Sumner’s face ebbed and flowed in front of her as he pulled her the rest of the way out of the bridge. Blood covered his torso, and she saw that his arm still bled. His face was sheet white, but his eyes shone with determination.
He hauled her to a landing and started upward, pulling her with him. Her spine bumped over each stair, and she was relieved when he reached the highest level. He pulled her into the sunlight and let go. Her arm flopped onto the boards, and she lay there gasping, with her head turned to avoid the sunlight. Spent ordnance was scattered all around her. She watched Sumner crouch down and crab-walk to the edge of the deck. He flattened onto his stomach beside a steel upright, which was all that remained of the railing. Emma crawled next to him and looked down.