Authors: Steven Becker
The sound of a helicopter landing startled him and he realized he had lost track of time and thought he might have fallen asleep. The rotors shut down and the ship was quiet again. Although he was in the dark cabin, he could sense men were moving quickly around the boat, and he figured from the changed attitudes that whoever had just landed had something to do with their urgency and his fate. He started to get fidgety. The restraints cut into his wrists with each movement and he was at the point of breaking when the blindfold was ripped from his head. A pock-marked face stared at him.
“You are?” the man asked.
Mac looked at the scarred face, the army uniform displaying enough hardware to suggest his rank. There was no reason to lie to the man. “Mac Travis,” he said.
“Ah, Mac Travis. And how did you come to be in the water?”
Mac needed to stall and see where this man’s loyalties were. He had figured out enough in the last few days to understand the two factions vying for power. Their means were the same, but their aims were different. “Where is my friend?”
The man laughed, “Your friend? Is that what he is. We know Armando Cruz, the baseball player and my grandson.”
“Is he OK?”
“Mac Travis, yes; he is safe and comfortable and thank you for taking care of him, although dragging him into the harbor with you served no purpose. He speaks highly of you and requested that you not be hurt.”
His suspicions were confirmed and Mac tried to figure a way out. “What do you intend to do with me then?”
The man rubbed his chin. “You are also a prize,” he turned, giving an order in Spanish to one of the men behind him.
***
Alicia was frantically typing lines of code, alternately pinging Mac and Norm’s phones. Neither responded and she suspected the batteries were removed or totally dead. Since the men had been captured, the chatter on the radio had become more organized and less urgent. Hoping this meant that they haven’t been found yet, she continued working.
She had been fighting her conscience as well. The ‘do the right thing’ part of her brain told her to call this in to the Agency, but the ‘it’s your first assignment – don’t screw it up’ part convinced her to wait a little longer. Her sympathetic qualities were intentionally dimmed to make herself analytical, but in this case she was right and taking emotion out of the situation was the best course. She decided that informing the Agency was not going to diffuse a bomb planted on the ferry; it would only muddy the water, especially with Norm missing. Although her trust for him was gone, she still recognized and respected his skill. She was well aware of the assets the Agency had in the area, and knew they were scarce, and none on the island itself. She was the closest and most aware of the situation. Her mother had said to be careful what you wish for, and this was the perfect example.
Frustrated with her efforts, she left the table and made her way to the flybridge. Trufante and TJ sat side by side on the bench, drinking beer like they were out for a pleasure cruise. She climbed the stainless steel ladder and found it was even rougher on the platform, the little bit of elevation making a huge difference in the sway of the boat. With both hands clinging to the rail, she looked ahead. The view was better than the cabin window and she could see the thin line of land ahead.
“Is that Cuba?” she asked.
TJ turned to her. “It is. Time to decide; we’re sitting just outside their waters.”
***
Choy had not shown any willingness to negotiate earlier and Norm paced the room trying to figure a way out. He had picked at the plate of picadillo that sat on the table, pulling the peas out before eating, and wishing the bottled water was rum. He knew the general was trying to appear to be patient, but he suspected he was anxious for a resolution. Having lost control over Choy’s grandson, though, things were different. The door opened and the general entered.
“It seems my grandson has been found,” he said with a smile.
“Then I am done here. Tell me where the bomb is and let’s end this before it turns into an international incident.”
“Not so fast, Mr. CIA. Maybe we should take a walk,” Choy said and extended his arm toward the door.
Norm didn’t have to be asked twice. ‘Take a walk’ in the intel business meant the general wanted to talk without anyone hearing. He had to suspect, or know firsthand, that the building was monitored. Norm walked out the door and past the guard, the general behind him. They exited the building from a back door and entered a small park-like area surrounded by a high concrete wall.
The general started to walk and as they reached the far corner of the property, he stopped. “I can trust your discretion?”
Norm knew what this meant as well; he was about to be asked an off-the-books favor. “Of course,” he replied.
“We don’t need to go into the inner politics of the island. I trust you know what is going on here,” Choy said.
“Yes,” Norm said, showing more patience than he felt.
“But things are not often as they appear.” He started walking. “I am an old man. You see, I came here with my countrymen over fifty years ago, full of dogma, a desire to support the revolution, and thwart the evil United States. Over the years I have become more and more Cuban and less Chinese. I intermarried, out of necessity, and raised my children and grandchildren under the name Cruz, rather than Choy.”
Norm knew where this was going.
Choy continued. “The younger generations of my family have blended and assimilated well, to the point where my grandson is a well known Cuban baseball player. But you already know that.” He paused and looked at the ground. “I have seen three brands of communism fail, all in different fashions: the Russians first, with their power-hungry greed; my home country with their nepotism and hatred of the peasants; and my adopted country. I care for these people and call them my own.”
He stopped and looked at Norm. “I am powerless in this. The Special Forces men that captured your Mac Travis and rescued my grandson were there to plant the bomb on the ferry. I have no reason to believe they did not succeed.”
Norm saw the opening. “And how can I help you, General?”
“I am going to release you. Since there is no US embassy here, you are on your own.”
“You want me to find and diffuse the bomb?” He needed an answer to a question that had been bothering him now that he held the higher ground. “So this was always a bluff.”
The look on the general’s face said it all.
“Where are you holding the American?” Norm asked, playing his advantage. He needed to find Travis and close the loop on this.
“Fair enough. I don’t want any more blood on my hands,” Choy said.
***
Mac felt someone grab him by the shirt, pull him to his feet and push him towards a passageway. He was guided along the narrow corridor and stopped at a cabin close to what he thought, by the increasing engine noise, was the stern. The man pushed him. He tripped on a threshold and was thrown against a steel wall. Something slammed behind him and his hopes sunk another notch when he heard the sound of the hatch being sealed. It took a few minutes for his eyes to acclimate to the dimly lit cabin. It was a plain storage closet barely big enough for him to move. The walls were lined with shelves containing what looked like cleaning supplies, some with Russian labels.
He sat down and leaned against the steel bulkhead, trying to figure out a plan, but soon realized how futile his situation was. Stuck in the hold of a foreign Navy ship somewhere in Cuba was not anywhere close to a scenario he could salvage, and he started to feel powerless to help Mel. His leg cramped, probably from dehydration, and he twisted to the side to relieve the pain. He heard the sound of something hit the steel deck and worked his hand around to find the objet that must have fallen from his pocket. He thought back to his capture or rescue, not sure if he needed to make the distinction, and could not recall being searched. Dragged dripping wet from the water in only shorts and a T-shirt, it was evident he was weaponless. His hand found the plastic case of the cell phone and he groaned. After being in the water, there was little chance it would work.
He flipped the screen open and nothing happened, although that didn’t surprise him. With nothing else to do, he crawled to the door and searched the bulkhead for a light. His hand found a toggle switch that turned on a single overhead bulb in a metal cage and he surveyed his surroundings. The shelves were lined with cleaning supplies and paper goods. He looked down at the dead phone and cleared a workspace on a shelf, pulled the cover off the back compartment and removed the battery. With a roll of toilet paper, he wiped the terminals clean and placed it to the side. Slowly he scanned the supplies stored on the shelves until he found what looked like glass cleaner. He squirted a small amount on his finger, smelled it and felt it evaporate.
There were no ingredients listed on the generic looking products, but he suspected the cleaner contained a high volume of isopropyl alcohol. He took the bottle back to the shelf and pried the phone case apart. The toilet paper had a harsh industrial feel to it and though he wouldn’t want to use it for its intended purpose, it was better than its softer counterpart for his use. Working carefully he dried the board inside the phone by dabbing it with a wad of the paper. When he had gotten all the moisture the paper could reach, he picked up the cleaner and sprayed down the phone. It seemed incongruent to his purpose, but he knew rubbing alcohol was a drying agent and would leach the remaining moisture from the circuit board when it evaporated. The unknown was time. There was no telling what other ingredients were in the solution and they would all dry at different rates. It looked dry so he replaced the battery and turned the unit on. It was either going to work or not and he might as well find out now.
He pressed the power button, but heard activity in the hallway and quickly pushed back his work, set several boxes in front of it and lunged for the light switch. The door opened and he assumed the position on the floor.
Squinting at the light, he tried to make it appear to his captors that he had been in the dark the whole time. He clenched his jaw when one of the men started sniffing the chemicals still in the air, but the soldier moved out of the way when the pock-faced man came towards him and slammed his head with a leather sap.
TWENTY SEVEN
“I got a signal!” Alicia called up to the flybridge. She went back into the cabin and started typing. The further they had traveled from the US coast, the fewer and further apart the repeaters were. Reception was poor, but she had just gotten a notification that Mac’s phone had just turned on and she raced to pinpoint the location before she lost the signal.
TJ hovered over her as she worked. “Can we call him?”
“If I had more time, I could hack into the Cuban cell network, but it’s notoriously unreliable. Here is the position.” She handed him a piece of paper with the GPS coordinates.
“We can plug them in the unit on the bridge,” he said and shot out of the cabin.
Before she followed, she tried Norm’s phone again, but the screen remained blank. She left the cabin, glanced at the seas, gripped the narrow stainless steel ladder tightly and followed TJ to the bridge. Both men had their heads together entering the numbers in the chart plotter. He looked up at Alicia and pointed to the dot on the screen.
“In the middle of Havana Harbor.” He said the words as if the name held some evil menace.
“We have to assume he’s in trouble. There would be no other reason for him to be there,” she said, trying to figure out a scenario that explained his position on what must be a ship. “Why there?”
“We gotta save him,” Trufante said.
Alicia looked at the dot on the screen. She could feel her heart beat in her chest as she stared at the electronic connection like a frail umbilical cord. She knew policy and the danger of entering Cuban waters, but there was the bomb, and that should have been enough, with the lives of hundreds of people at stake. She also felt she owed something to Mac after he had saved her from the meth heads in the backwaters of Florida Bay.
“I have to go research international maritime law,” she said and started to walk away.
“The law ain’t going to save him,” Trufante said.
She knew he was right, but procedure was her crutch. There had to be another way. “I have an idea. How far are we from Cuban waters?”
“The line’s right there.” Trufante traced his finger on the screen. “Twelve miles offshore.”
An idea was blooming in her head. “TJ, have you heard about the Cuban government giving permission to US-based dive charters to enter their waters?” They had the perfect cover with the dive boat.
“Sure. I know a few guys running six-pack trips, overnighters from Key West.”
She could see the concern in his face when he realized what she was up to. “Let’s go,” she told Trufante, who wasted no time in changing course.
“Wait!” TJ pushed Trufante’s hand from the joystick and twisted it back towards Florida. “You can’t take my boat in there. They’ll blow us out of the water.”
“Do we have to go through this again?” she asked in her most authoritative voice.
“Damn, buddy, this shit’ll make you famous. Them gamers you chat up won’t believe it.” Trufante turned the wheel to the south. “Best listen to the lady.”
TJ stood back, a deep frown on his face.
“This is not just about Mac; there are hundreds of lives at stake, never mind the political fallout if that bomb goes off.” She hoped to guilt him into submission with the moral obligation argument. She could see him thinking. “And, I can show you a back door to dominate World of Warcraft.”
His expression changed and she knew they had won him over.
“Anything happens to the boat, the CIA takes care of it - right?”
“Add it to your bill,” she said, gaining confidence. “Now here’s our story when they question us.”