From Russia Without Love

23

Chris pulled up to the port side of the fantail before slowing to match the ship’s speed. Then he signaled Mikhail to take the wheel. Sonny trained his weapon on the ship, ready to wax the first boogeyman who appeared. Chris picked up the caving ladder and extension pole and carried them to the bow. Hannah was right behind. Both the Binagadi and the go-fast rose and fell with the sea as they sailed forward.

While Sonny trained his weapon on the ship and Hannah steadied Chris, he attached the caving ladder and its hook to the pole. In the Teams, it was usually another guy’s responsibility to hook the ship, but Chris had done it before. Normally, he did the deed with four boatloads of SEALs, two boats on each side of the ship. If one boat failed to hook on, the boat behind would move in and complete the task. Even if three boats failed and one succeeded, all the SEALs could climb up the one ladder that hooked on. Chris double-checked to make sure the hook was securely attached to the ladder. If he attached the hook to the ship and the ladder fell away, they’d be in a shit state, or worse; if he climbed the ladder and it separated from the hook and he fell thirty feet and landed on the go-fast, the fall would likely kill him.

“Just hold on to my belt from behind and steady me,” he said quietly to Hannah. Normally, two SEALs would do the job of steadying him, but one Hannah would have to do.

He extended the hook above the edge of the hull, and he tried to hook it on to metal, but with both boats moving with the waves, it was tough to keep his balance. Hannah did a good job of preventing him from landing on his ass, though. His first attempt to hook on to the ship failed. His second attempt lined up perfectly, but Mikhail veered too close to the ship and bumped it, causing both Chris and Hannah to lose their balance. He silently cursed the man, hoping the noise of hull against hull didn’t alert Xander and his gang.

On the third attempt, Chris successfully hooked on to a rail. Then he pulled down on the pole, causing the caving ladder to unroll like toilet paper until it reached his feet with ladder to spare. He collapsed the telescopic pole.

“Wait ’til I signal that it’s clear to climb,” Chris said. “I’ll go up first, followed by Hannah, and then Sonny. Mikhail, once we’re on board, you can back off and follow from a distance. After we get the ship stopped, we’ll radio you in.”

They nodded.

Chris mounted the ladder and climbed. With the wind and the movement of the ship, each step he took felt like a blessing. While at sea, he’d seen more than one Teammate thrown from a caving ladder. He climbed with his legs and used his arms for balance, rather than climbing with his arms and burning his muscles out quickly. Because it was daytime, it was much easier to see the steps of the ladder, but because it was daytime, it would also be much easier to be seen by Xander and his men.

When Chris reached the deck of the ship, he scanned the area for trouble. He saw none, so he went to work on the ladder. Once it was securely fastened, he looked around again for enemy signs. No one was on the main deck, but a man stood up on the superstructure. He was looking down at something in his hands, but it wasn’t immediately clear what. As he lifted the object to his shoulder, it became apparent. He had a rocket-propelled grenade.

“RPG,” Chris whisper-shouted into his comm.

There was nothing to hide behind to avoid the inevitable blast. My only chance is to take him out before he takes me out.

Chris aimed his rifle and squeezed the trigger, cutting down the enemy — but not before he could fire his RPG.

Swoosh. After the rocket took flight, it hit the deck next to Chris with a loud crack and knocked off the caving ladder. The time it took for the resulting explosion was interminable.

The RPG didn’t explode, and his human instinct was Don’t pick up an unexploded bomb, but the longer he waited, the higher the likelihood it would blow up in his face. He picked it up and threw it over the stern, away from Hannah, Sonny, and Mikhail. It vanished from view without a sound.

Thank you, Lord.

He looked over the port side. Hannah, Sonny, and Mikhail were fine. Hannah and Mikhail fished the caving ladder out of the water, but one of the hooks had snapped off. Sonny held up the ladder with the missing piece and asked over the comm, “Now what?”

There was strength in numbers, and Chris didn’t want to go the mission alone. “I’ll figure something out.”

Up on the ship’s superstructure, the RPG man was laid out on the deck, but now he rose to his knees. Before he could cause more trouble, Chris shot him again, flattening him.

Chris checked the port side for a boatswain’s locker with some rope in it to secure the broken caving ladder. He found a hatch, and as a matter of routine, he aimed his weapon at it before opening it. Expecting to find rope inside, it startled him to see a man with long sideburns armed with an AK.

This is a passageway, not a boatswain’s locker.

Both men jumped with surprise at the same time. Sideburns pulled the trigger first, but he hadn’t aimed yet. Clank clank, the bullet ricocheted in the narrow passageway, hitting Sideburns in his own thigh. Chris was slower to pull the trigger, but his weapon was already aimed. He pumped two rounds into the man.

Sideburns dropped his weapon and clutched his chest. Frothy crimson spilled between his fingertips his lung was punctured and he was having trouble breathing. Sideburns dropped to his knees, and a smile appeared on his face.

“What’s so damn funny?” Chris asked.

“You can’t stop Mr. Metaxas,” Sideburns wheezed.

Chris aimed his weapon at Sideburns’s head. “Stop him from what?”

“Eat shit.” Sideburns’s smile broadened, and he closed his eyes.

Chris ended the conversation with a bullet. “Boring conversation, anyway.”

Then he frisked Sideburns for intel and confiscated a cell phone, keys, and a wallet. He used the cell phone to call the automated number that Young ran 24-7. After the call went through, Young or one of his assistants would hack the phone and download its data and Young would begin analysis.

Chris maneuvered around to the starboard side to look for rope. With the disappearance of two men, Xander might be sending out a search party, and Chris wanted his crew at his side before the party started.

While looking for a boatswain’s locker, he located a Jacob’s ladder, bound by a strap and a metal latch. Chris spoke via his throat mic and used Mikhail’s call sign. “Jirtdan, bring the go-fast around to the starboard side. I’m going to drop a Jacob’s ladder for Infidel and Sunshine to climb aboard.”

“Roger, wilco,” Mikhail answered.

After scanning for possible threats and spotting none, Chris took a knee on the deck and undid the latch. Then he unrolled the Jacob’s ladder over the starboard side. “Infidel and Sunshine, the starboard ladder is ready for boarding. I’ll cover you from here.”

“Roger,” Hannah said, “Starboard ladder ready for boarding. You’re covering.”

“About damn time,” Sonny said.

From Chris’s current position, he had to look three ways to cover all possible approaches from Xander and his men: forward, aft, and up. “I’m moving aft for a better tactical view.”

After shifting locations, he had most of the ship in front of him without having to bend his neck back and forth, up and down and risk missing something.

“Infidel boarding,” Hannah said.

Chris hoped Hannah made it on board before Xander and his men appeared. Suddenly, there was movement. Whiteface, carrying an AK, appeared on the port side of the bridge. Chris covered him. It was the same guy who was with Animus in London.

Whiteface looked down at the port side of the ship and the sea and then returned back inside the bridge. Soon, Whiteface stepped outside on the starboard side. Chris placed the red dot of his scope on the profile of Whiteface’s upper body while simultaneously placing his finger snugly on the trigger. As Whiteface walked toward the edge of the ship, Chris followed with his red dot, tracking the side of his upper body. Chris held his breath to stop his lungs from moving, reducing the wobble of the red dot. Whiteface bent over the rails and looked down at the water, near where Hannah and Sonny were.

Chris squeezed the trigger slowly. He tried not to anticipate the quiet pop from the sound-suppressed barrel or the recoil of the butt into his shoulder. He tried not to think about when the shot would fire. It was best to be surprised. Pop. The sound was no louder than a kid’s BB gun. Whiteface jerked, and he twisted toward the bow as if to see who hit him, but he was facing the opposite direction of where the shot had come from, and he seemed confused. Pop. Chris shot him in the back.

Whiteface’s back arched before he dropped to the deck, crying out in Russian for help. “Po-masch!” He dropped his weapon and crawled for the bridge, but Chris covered him with the red dot and fired again, this time hitting him on his uninjured side. He stopped crawling.

“Ivan!” Animus’s voice called out.

Ivan is no more.

Chris had focused so tightly on the bridge that he had to open his field of view again to possible enemy combatants on the rest of the starboard side. Hannah’s head rose above the Jacob’s ladder, and he assumed Sonny was directly below her.

An armed man hopped out of the starboard hatch of the bridge, stoking Chris’s pulse and breathing rates. “Armed man, bridge, starboard wing,” Chris reported over his radio.

Chris aimed at him, but he ducked before Chris could pull the trigger or Hannah could acquire him. Chris’s heart and breathing sped up. Then more appeared.

“More armed men, same location. No Xander yet,” Chris said into his mic.

He tried to figure who was the most senior of the men present in order to take him out first and weaken the remaining members, but it wasn’t clear who was senior. Adrenaline dumped into Chris’s system as he decided to take out the greatest threat first. But they all seemed equally threatening. While his mind raced trying to pick out the best target, the armed men spotted Chris.

Hannah, who was on deck by now, took a shot and missed as Sonny crawled up onto the ship.

Chris’s panic rose. He had wasted precious time choosing a target, and now he wanted to shoot any and all threats. The darkness of warfare covered more and more of his light as a pastor. Gunfire erupted from the starboard wing of the bridge, and the heat of the rounds clapped the air near him. With his mind hazy and his vision blurred, it became a Herculean effort to focus on target. He knew his life and the lives of his teammates were in danger, so he jerked the trigger, hoping to hit one of the enemy combatants, but he missed.

“Take cover,” he warned the others. The SOG trio ran toward the bulkhead and took refuge from the shit storm that rained down.

“How many?” Sonny asked.

“Five or six,” Chris answered.

“Xander is still the prize,” Hannah reminded them. As if they could forget.

Chris took a slow breath. He had failed to take an effective shot so far, but he shook off the discouragement. It was history, and there was nothing he could accomplish now by dwelling on it. The only thing he had any control over was the here and now.

“Xander and his men have less room up there to maneuver than we do down here,” Chris said, getting his focus back. “We can whittle them down from where we are before making an assault.”

Sonny nodded. “Smoke ’em.”

“Let’s do it,” Hannah said.

“If Hannah can stay here and keep an eye on this hatch and the main deck,” Sonny said, “it’ll free up you and me to home in on the bastards near the bridge.”

Hannah grinned. “My pleasure

It was a wise move, and it could help Chris ensure he followed the advice of his veteran SEAL mentor, a shooting guru named Ron Hickok. Don’t show your face twice in the same spot unless you want to get it shot off. Because Chris had already been spotted aft, he moved forward. Sonny moved forward, too. Chris covered port and Sonny took starboard.

Thick black pipes ran along the length of the deck, and Chris lay down beside them, using them to provide partial cover and concealment. He slithered into a better position while watching the bridge and its starboard and port wings. More than anything, he hoped to spot Xander and take him out.

A spiky-haired man with an AK neared the rail and looked around. He seemed to have spotted Sonny, but Sonny’s rifle spit twice and Spike dropped.

Hannah’s rifle sounded. “Good night,” she said quietly, as if to herself, but her voice transmitted over the radio, and then a man yelped.

Chris settled into a stable position, an advantage of being prone, which would aid his accuracy. Several people were inside the pilothouse on the bridge, but the windows were tinted and it was difficult to see who was inside. Outside, on the starboard side, someone hung his AK out and sprayed below. None of the shots zipped anywhere close to Sonny — yet. Chris put his red dot on the man’s shoulder and squeezed. The shooter’s shirt quivered slightly, showing Chris where he’d struck his target. The shooter almost released his weapon as he pulled away, back into the bridge.

Sonny reached the port side and went aft.

An aggressive gunman came out the port side then, aiming his weapon toward the bow, looking for trouble but failing to notice Chris lying down between the pipes. Chris’s red dot aligned over the man’s chest, and his finger applied pressure to the trigger. The recoil of the rifle pushed his shoulder, signaling the deed was done. The aggressive shooter sank out of sight.

Sonny aimed at a target near the bridge. Chris couldn’t see who Sonny was shooting at, but he heard the pop.

Someone on the port side backed into Chris’s view. Chris plugged him between the shoulder blades, and the man dropped.

Then the shooting stopped. Everything became quiet — too quiet.

Chris slithered toward the superstructure, and a bullet punched through the glass of the pilothouse window. Tang! The projectile struck a metal pipe next to Chris, the surprise of the shot jolting him. He dispensed with the slithering, hopped to his feet, and sprinted out of the line of fire. His body tilted as he ran, and he realized the ship was turning. Tang! A second bullet just missed his foot.

Chris joined Sonny and Hannah next to the port hatch out of the line of fire. There was Sideburns in a puddle of blood. “He told me I was too late,” Chris said.

The ship straightened its course, and the deck leveled off. They were less than two klicks away from the Shah Deniz Alpha oil rig now. Chris had read that the rig’s legs had to stretch a hundred meters below the water to touch bottom, and on top of those legs, thirteen meters above water, rested the platform that carried the drilling and production facilities with housing for well over a hundred crewmembers.

“Xander is on a direct collision course with Shah Deniz Alpha,” Chris said.

“That’s how he plans to interrupt the flow of gas through the South Caucasus Pipeline,” Hannah said. “And he’ll kill all the crewmembers onboard the Shan Deniz Alpha in the process.”