The Emperor's Revenge

FIFTY-NINE

“Flank speed!” Golov shouted, when the radar operator announced that an Exocet was on the way, and hung up on Cabrillo. “Evasive maneuvers!”

The Achilles shot forward like a drag racer. But with no way to focus its deadly beam, the laser was a total loss. And Golov couldn’t use the railgun if he didn’t know where to aim it.

He ran over to the radar station and yelled into the operator’s ear, “Find me a target!”

“I can’t see them!”

“Where did the missile come from?”

“Over the top of Falster Island. Impact in ten seconds.”

Golov spun on the XO. “Kravchuk, fire the railgun back along the missile’s trajectory.”

“Captain, we can’t know where it was launched from or—”

“I said do it!” Golov screamed.

Kravchuk nodded grimly. “Aye, Captain.” He gave the order to aim the weapon along the missile’s flight path.

The railgun spun on its turret, compensating for the Achilles’s movements.

“Target locked.”

“Fire!”

A hypersonic round shot from the railgun, but Golov had his eye fixed on the flaming tail of the missile coming toward them.

The radar operator yelled, “Brace for impact!”

For a moment, Golov was certain the Exocet would blow apart the yacht’s bridge, but the missile hit the Achilles dead amidships in a fiery blast. The entire bridge crew was thrown to the deck, but the polycarbonate windows deflected the shrapnel from the explosion.

As Golov scrambled back to his feet, he shouted for a damage report.

Kravchuk peered at a monitor that was flashing red. “Fire suppression systems have activated. The fire is out, but the railgun turret was damaged. We have elevation control of the weapon, but the turntable is off-line. We can’t rotate it to aim it anymore.”

“Can it still fire?”

Kravchuk frantically typed into the computer. “Yes, but we’ve got a fault in the capacitor system. We might blow the whole ship apart if we continue firing.”

“We’ll have to risk it.”

“But shooting at them is futile!”

“That’s for me to decide!”

Golov’s phone, which he finally realized was still in his hand, rang with a jingle that was completely discordant with the chaos on the bridge.

The Oregon was calling back.

“Is there another missile coming?” Golov asked the radar operator.

“No, sir.”

“Get the helicopter in the air now.” He had ordered the Ka-226 fully fueled and armed with Russian Switchblade anti-ship missiles just in case he ran into a coast guard vessel that got too curious.

The phone rang insistently. He gritted his teeth and answered the call, if only to buy some time.

“What?” he growled.

“Why’d you hang up on me, Golov?” Cabrillo asked in a mocking tone. “You guys busy over there or something? By the way, you missed us. It wasn’t even close.”

“Calling to gloat over your victory?”

“I’m calling to see if you want to surrender. Personally, I’m hoping the answer is no, but I have someone from Interpol here who wants to take you into custody and deliver you to any number of countries that would love to interrogate you and your crew about your activities over the last few weeks.”

Golov slammed his hand on the chair. He wasn’t going to give up when he was so close to completing the operation. Not when Ivana was about to fulfill her part.

But he couldn’t fire on the transformer station until she had deactivated the circuit breakers. If he destroyed it early, the cascade effect on the electrical grid wouldn’t work. It had to happen after she had uploaded her software.

While Golov was contemplating his options, the helicopter took off. As he watched it swoop away toward the island, he locked his gaze on the cruise ship behind it in the distance.

“Since you launched an attack chopper,” Cabrillo said, “I’m going to interpret your stunned silence as a big fat no to surrendering. Linda, fire two. Bye, Golov.”

“Wait,” Golov said into the phone.

“Too late. Missile’s away.”

“Don’t you want to hear my counterproposal?” As he was talking, he pointed at the immense white cruise ship ten miles off their port bow and motioned for the helmsman to bring the Achilles around. Maybe the railgun couldn’t turn, but the yacht could.

Cabrillo laughed. “Counterproposal? You’re joking, right?”

“Missile incoming!” the panicked radar operator shouted. “Twenty seconds to impact!”

“In ten seconds, I’m going to start firing on that cruise ship,” Golov said to Cabrillo with no bluff in his caustic delivery of the line. “And if you don’t kill me with this next missile, I’m going to keep firing until all five thousand people on that ship are dead.”

Juan and the rest of the crew inside the op center watched as the Achilles slewed around until the barrel of the railgun was pointed at the cruise ship. He knew Golov would fire. He could only imagine the devastation that the railgun’s round would cause if it struck a crowded part of the passenger decks.

He didn’t have time to think about it further. The missile was too close to the Achilles.

“Abort the missile,” he told Linda.

“Aborting, aye,” she replied, and the Exocet detonated halfway to the target.

“All right, Golov. Looks like we’ve got ourselves a Mexican standoff.”

“That’s just the way it seems,” Golov said. “Don’t bother trying to warn the cruise ship. We’re monitoring the same radio frequencies they are.”

“We’ll pull back,” Juan said.

“Not good enough. As soon as that ship is out of range, I’ll be at your mercy again.”

“Then what’s your counterproposal?”

“Bring your ship out of hiding. I want it right next to the Achilles.”

“Why?”

“Because you’re the one who’s going to surrender. I estimate the cruise ship will be in range for another fifteen minutes. You have ten minutes to bring the Oregon to me.”

Juan signaled Hali with the finger-across-the-throat gesture so that he’d mute the call. Hali nodded that they were clear.

Max erupted. “We can’t surrender to that madman!”

“Golov won’t hesitate to blow that ship apart,” Gretchen said. “Since he thinks he can still win, prison isn’t an option for him, or anyone else on the Achilles. He has nothing to lose.”

“I’m not inclined to give up any more easily than he is,” Juan said. “Is there any other way to take his railgun out?”

Max shook his head. “Not before he could get off three or four shots. Even a ship as big as that one might not be able to survive that kind of barrage.”

“Anyone else have an idea of how to take the gun out?”

Silence was his only reply.

“Then I don’t see any alternative,” Juan said. “We have to do what he says. Hali, put us back on.”

Hali nodded again.

Juan sighed for effect. “I’ve considered your tempting proposal. We’re on our way.”

“Wise choice,” Golov said. “If you launch a single missile, or if there are any weapons visible on that wonder ship of yours, I will fire.”

“I don’t doubt you’re a man of your word. But if you fire, I will destroy you.”

“Two men of our word, then. I expect to see you out on deck with the rest of your crew when you get here.”

“I understand.”

“I can’t wait to see you again,” Golov said, and hung up.

“Stoney,” Juan said. “Set a course for the Achilles.”

“Aye, Chairman,” Eric said. The Oregon began to move.

A deathly quiet filled the op center.

“He’ll kill us all, you know,” Linda finally said. “You’ve seen what he’s capable of.”

“I know,” Juan said as he set the timer on his watch. “So we’ve got ten minutes to come up with a way to keep Golov from sinking that cruise ship while also stopping him from causing a continent-wide disaster. Any ideas?”

More silence, excruciating in its totality. It was broken when Eric cleared his throat.

“You’ve got something, Stoney?” Juan asked.

“Remember those Jetlev-Flyers Murph and I were playing around with a few weeks ago before we started that job in Algeria?”

“Murph liked those more than his beloved skateboard,” Max said. “He even convinced me to buy four for the ship to use for R and R.”

Eric nodded. “Well, Golov said he wanted to see you on deck.”

Juan sat forward, intrigued. “Where are you going with this?”

Eric had just the hint of a smile, and Juan knew he was onto something. “He didn’t say whose deck.”