The Malacca Conspiracy

Chapter 5

The White House

3:20 a.m.

Mack Williams, the president of the United States, was not in the best of moods.

In the last year of his second administration, Mack faced a lameduck Congress full of howling Democrats who wanted to crow about everything from legalizing homosexual marriage to unconditional amnesty for every illegal alien to socialized medicine for all. Add to that the constant series of international crises rooted in the global problem of radical Islam, and Mack was feeling the heavy weight of office upon his shoulders.

Like his predecessors, Clinton, Bush, and Obama, his hair had morphed from mainly brown, to salt-and-pepper, and finally, by this last year of his administration, to mostly salt. His forehead, as smooth as a baby’s bottom when he had raised his hand and taken the oath of office that cold January morning on the West Front of the US Capitol, had grown crisscrossed with lines, carved by the burden of his position.

The international crises and foreign threats had carved the deepest grooves.

His presidency had seen radical Islam attempt to infiltrate the US military, an attack on the Dome of the Rock in Israel, a daring military operation which he had ordered into Mongolia’s Gobi Desert to rescue an American naval officer, and a secret naval operation into the Black Sea to attack a Russian freighter suspected of transporting stolen nuclear fuel.

More than once, his administration had found America on the brink of nuclear war. The responsibility was astronomical. As a devout Christian, Mack had gotten through much of it by quoting the verse in Philippians that told him to be “anxious about nothing, but in all things bring your petitions and requests to God…and the peace of God that passes all understanding will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.”

He needed God’s supernatural peace. Otherwise, the pressure of the job, especially in these trying times of being at war with radical Islam, could kill a man.

Last night, he had hoped for a respite from it all. He had looked forward to watching his beloved Kansas Jayhawks host the hated Missouri Tigers in a Big 12 game at the historic Allen Fieldhouse. The Jayhawks were ranked number one and looking to pick some flesh off the Tigers.

But the team in crimson and blue never showed up, losing 101-100 in double overtime. Mack had flipped off the television and crawled into bed beside the First Lady at 11:00 P.M.

He shouldn’t get so wrapped up in college basketball or the basketball fortunes of his alma mater. He should have been praying or reading the Bible or doing something to advance democracy around the world.

But everybody, including the president, deserved a diversion. Didn’t he? He wrapped his arms around his wife and dozed off.

The phone rang. Mack looked over at the digital clock. 3:30 A.M.

Mack reached for the receiver. “Yeah.”

“Sorry to wake you, Mr. President,” his chief of staff, Arnie Brubaker, said. “But the national security advisor wants an emergency meeting of the NSC.”

“What for?”

“Suicide attacks on oil tankers, sir. The Malaccan Straits. And a terrorist attack in Singapore.”

“All right, Arnie. I’ll be down in ten minutes.”

“What now, Mack?” Caroline Williams mumbled.

“Shhhh.” The president reached over and kissed her. He swung his legs over the side of the bed and tiptoed across the presidential bedroom, stepping into a walk-in closet. He closed the door, flipped the light on, and put on a pair of khakis and a blue, button-down Oxford shirt, then slipped into a pair of brown penny loafers.

He flipped off the light, opened the doors, and walked through the dark bedroom toward the light shining under the bedroom door to the hallway.

“Morning, Mr. President.” Two Secret Service agents, posted in the hallway just outside the presidential bedroom, stood as the president stepped into the second-floor hallway.

“Gentlemen.” Mack nodded.

“Jayhawk on the move,” one of the Secret Service agents announced into his sleeve mike. Jayhawk was the code name that the Secret Service used when referring to the president. Mack liked the code name, except at the moment it reminded him of the results of last night’s game. He dismissed that thought.

Arnie Brubaker, in a brown suit and brown tie, and shadowed by two other Secret Service agents, approached down the hallway. “Good morning, Mr. President,” Arnie said.

“You’re bright-eyed and bushy-tailed for three-forty in the morning, Arnie.”

“That’s why you pay me the big bucks, sir.”

“Can’t argue with that,” Mack said. “Ready to go?”

“Yes, sir,” Arnie said. “The National Security Council is already assembling.”

“Let’s go,” Mack said.

US Navy SH-60B Seahawk (“Rover 1”)

Near the Malacca Strait

2:30 p.m.

With orange flames and black smoke billowing high into the late afternoon sky, the location of the Altair Voyager was easily visible as the choppers approached. The scene reminded Lieutenant Carraway of pictures he had seen from the Persian Gulf War, when Saddam Hussein had intentionally set oil fields on fire in Kuwait. Altair Voyager was a burning oil well, surrounded not by sand, but by water.

“Rover 2. Rover 1. Go to one hundred feet. Stay on my wing and stay out of that smoke.”

“Rover 2. Roger that.”

Carraway brought Rover 1 down to one hundred feet and slowed his airspeed to thirty knots.

The ship was burning on her starboard side and was listing in that direction. Flames from the ship and from the sea were leaping perhaps a hundred feet into the sky. A massive slick of burning oil oozed into the sea from the ship’s starboard. But the problem wasn’t so much the flames or the oil.

The problem was the smoke.

Black plumes billowed from the right side of the sinking ship. The wind, blowing from right to left over the top of the ship, was spreading it like a black blanket above the water.

The ship’s crew was in the water opposite the flames, but under the black smoke. The choppers were designed to fly through air, but smoke was another matter. Carraway and his crew had to breathe. Plus, even if he were to descend into the smoke he would be operating blindly and blowing the deadly stuff into the lungs of those poor souls who were floating in the sea below.

Carraway picked up his microphone. “Ingraham. Rover 1. Altair Voyager is on fire and sinking. Survivors believed to be in the water, but thick smoke cover makes air recovery impossible. We need surface vessel support. The situation is critical down there.”

Static on the radio. “Rover 1. Ingraham control. Copy that. Maintain your position until further notice. We’re preparing to broadcast on universal frequencies.”

“Roger that, Ingraham.”

Static over the speakers. “To all ships and aircraft in the area. This is the USS Ingraham. Be advised that the tanker Altair Voyager is on fire and sinking in the Andaman Sea. Approximately one hundred miles east of the Nicobar Islands. Coordinates at zero-niner-four degrees, thirty minutes, fifteen seconds east longitude; zero-six degrees, twenty-five minutes, ten seconds north longitude. Request any surface vessels or aircraft in the area respond accordingly. Repeat. Request any surface vessels or aircraft in the area respond accordingly. This is the USS Ingraham.”

The White House

3:45 a.m.

Ladies and gentlemen, the president.” Arnie stepped into the Situation Room just ahead of Mack.

The group of six men and women, which included the vice president, the defense secretary, the secretary of state, the national security advisor, the director of national intelligence, and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, all rose to their feet.

“Sit down,” Mack said. “It’s not like Judge Judy stepped onto the bench or something.”

That brought a few chuckles, as US Navy stewards in black dress pants and white chef’s shirts pushed silver trays with steaming coffee and fresh blueberry muffins about the room.

“Cyndi.” Mack looked at his fifty-year-old, red-haired national security advisor, Cynthia Hewitt, who was seated just to his left. “You called this meeting. What’s up?”

“Terrorist strike in Singapore, Mr. President,” Hewitt said. “Multiple strikes on oil tankers in the Straits of Malacca and Singapore. Oil futures prices rocketing out the roof. The markets are teetering on the brink.”

“Spell it out.” Mack sipped a cup of the hot coffee that had just been poured by a navy steward. “What’s been hit in Singapore?”

“A bomb in the lobby of the resort hotel Rasa Sentosa. Preliminary count showing dozens dead and injured.”

“Any of our people?”

A wince crossed Cyndi’s face. “Sir, Commander Zack Brewer had just arrived as our naval attaché reached the rendezvous point wi to Singapore. He was at the hotel when the bomb went off.”

Mack felt his stomach drop. Over the past five years, Zack Brewer had become something of a national hero and the navy’s most famous officer for his prosecution of three Islamic US Navy chaplains accused of treason.

“Please don’t tell me we’ve lost Commander Brewer.”

“He’s in a hospital in Singapore. That’s all we know right now.”

Mack passed a hand over his face. “Tell me about these strikes on oil tankers.”

Hewitt adjusted her reading glasses. “Four attacks in the last four hours. One was foiled by the navy, sir. USS Reuben James intercepted and destroyed a suicide boat full of explosives trying to ram the tanker SeaRiver Baytown.

“Two other tankers guarded by the Royal Navy in the Singapore Straits weren’t so lucky. Both were hit by suicide boats and are aflame even as I speak.”

“How bad?” Mack nervously sipped coffee.

“Bad, sir. South Singapore is in chaos. They’re dousing water on the burning tankers, but it’s hard to get burning oil under control. Meanwhile, the oil that hasn’t caught fire is slicking all over the Singapore Strait, and it’s lapping on the beaches around Singapore and Sentosa Islands. Dead birds and fish are washing onto the beaches. Smoke clouds from the oil are already rising over the city.”

Cyndi Hewitt whipped off her reading glasses and paused. “We’ve got an environmental disaster on our hands, Mr. President. Think the Prince William Sound in a major metropolitan area.” She was referring to the 1989 mammoth oil spill in Alaska, when the tanker Exxon Valdez ran into a reef, spilling millions of gallons of crude in one of the most devastating environmental disasters in human history.

“And the fourth tanker? Where’d they hit it and how bad?”

Hewitt readjusted her reading glasses. “Mr. President, the Chevron tanker Altair Voyager was just attacked a few minutes ago in the Andaman Sea, right outside the entrance to the Malaccan Strait. She was to be escorted through the strait by USS Ingraham, but she was hit before she reached the rendezvous point with the Ingraham. She’s on fire and sinking. Oil is leaking into the sea, but they’re over a hundred miles from shore. Nearest city is Banda Aceh, Indonesia.”

“Banda Aceh. Why’s that familiar?”

“Mr. President,” Secretary of State Robert Mauney spoke up, “Banda Aceh is the city that took the biggest loss from the 2004 Boxer Day tsunami that devastated the region. Over one hundred sixty-five thousand died there.”

“Those poor people,” Mack said. “Wiped out by a tsunami. Now they’re at risk of a mammoth oil slick reaching their beaches.”

“That’s correct, Mr. President,” Hewitt said, “and all the environmental hazards that go with it, unless we can stop it.”

“We’ve gotta try,” Mack said. “Any Americans on board that tanker?”

The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Roscoe Jones, responded. “Mr. President, the Chevron tanker is flying under a Panamanian flag. But the captain is American, along with several members of the crew. We’ve got two Seahawks from Ingraham out there right now, sir, but they can’t do much.”

Mack rubbed his temples. “Why not, Admiral?”

“Thick smoke clouds from the burning oil. Choppers can’t fly through ’em.”

“Do we have any ships in the area that can help?”

Admiral Jones ran his hand through his hair. “USS Ingraham is steaming that way and should be on site within a couple of hours. One of our fast attack subs, USS Boise, is in the area. Also, the president of Singapore has requested that we dispatch a carrier task force to the area immediately.”

“What’s our closest carrier operating in the area?”

“USS George Bush is operating in the South China Sea, sir.”

“Then that request is approved. Get the Bush as close to Singapore as you can. Plus, I want all available military resources dispatched to help that burning tanker. Save lives.”

“Aye, Mr. President.”

“Cyndi, what’s going on in the international markets?”

“Mr. President, someone’s making tons of money off this. I’ll defer that question to Admiral Jones.”

Mack raised his eyebrow. “I didn’t realize the admiral was an economist.”

“I’m not, Mr. President,” Jones said. “But we may have correlation between skyrocketing crude oil futures prices and these attacks.”

Mack rubbed his chin. “Explain, Admiral.”

Jones, wearing his service dress-blue uniform with the massive gold sleeve bands of a four-star navy admiral, steepled his fingers together. “Sir, one of our reservists, an intelligence officer assigned to J-2, works as a commodities analyst at the New York Mercantile Exchange. This officer alerted the chairman that huge limit moves in the price of crude oil took place at roughly the same time as the attacks. The verdict is still out, but someone could be making billions from these terrorist actions. Perhaps someone with advance knowledge.”

“Hmm.” Mack stood up, crossed his arms, and paced back and forth. “Who’s making billions? And what are they doing with the money?”

“Good question, Mr. President,” Hewitt said.

“I need an answer to that question…and fast.” The president turned back to Admiral Jones. “Admiral, if I catch your drift, you’re suggesting…possibly…that there is a correlation between huge limit moves in oil futures and these attacks?”

“Quite possibly, sir,” the admiral said, “at least that’s what the reservist I mentioned to you believes. He thinks he detected a correlation in the overnight limit moves and the attacks around the Malaccan Strait. This is certainly worth monitoring.”

“This reserve officer. What’s his name?”

“One moment, Mr. President.” Admiral Jones checked some notes in his file. “Molster. Lieutenant Robert Molster.”

“Robert Molster.” The president instinctively repeated the name. “Well, Admiral, I want you to call this Lieutenant Robert Molster, send him greetings on behalf of his commander in chief, and inform him that as of”-the president looked at his watch and calculated-“nine o’clock this morning, he is officially called up to active duty in the United States Navy, to serve at the pleasure of the president and the Joint Chiefs of Staff until further notice.”

The Altair Voyager

Near the Strait of Malacca

3:00 p.m.

The aft of his ship was rising into the air like the back end of a seesaw. The bow section, which was flooding rapidly, was aflame and sinking into the sea.

Captain Eichenbrenner grabbed the steel cable surrounding the perimeter of the deck and looked down over the port side into the water below, which was growing darker under the black cloud of oily soot spreading overhead.

All of his men had jumped into the water, somewhere below.

He looked, one last time, at the flames leaping from the forward section of the Altair Voyager.

The thought crossed his mind that as captain, he should go down with his ship. There was a certain chivalrous lore about this time-honored maritime notion.

To go down with a ship was one thing. Being burned alive on it was quite another. Heat rolled in oppressive, hundred-plus-degree waves from the front of his ship. His body and clothes were drenched in perspiration from scorching flames.

The helicopters were out there, somewhere, and by the roar of their engines, they had to be nearby.

But where?

And how would they possibly rescue his crew?

The late afternoon sun was shining on the horizon, but the sky over the ship was black, as if a solar eclipse had darkened the sea.

“Attention! This is the US Navy!” Loudspeakers blared from helicopters somewhere above the smoke. “If you are in the water below, swim away from the ship in the direction of the ship’s aft!”

Eichenbrenner looked off the stern. The smoke cover extended a couple of hundred yards behind the ship, and perhaps five hundred yards to the left. The navy was urging his crew to swim out from under the smoke cloud so they could start rescue operations. Aft of the ship was their best chance. But that was a long shot. The smoke cloud was spreading in every direction, probably faster than his men could swim. They needed a miracle from the wind.

“Swim away from the ship in the direction of the ship’s aft! Repeat, this is the US Navy!”

“Skipper! Jump in the water!” a voice called from below.

Despite the heat, he felt frozen, alone on the great vessel that was under his command. A captain must never abandon his ship, even at the moment of death.

“Jump, Skipper!”

He looked back toward the flames.

And then, he saw them.

Dana and Laura.

Their red hair was blowing in the wind. Teardrops beaded in their blue eyes. Was it a hallucination? He heard that people had hallucinations before death. Or maybe they were angels. Maybe angels were real.

“We love you, Daddy,” Dana said.

“Daddy, please come home,” said Laura.

The smoke was affecting his breathing. His mind was playing tricks on him.

“Jump!”

He stepped onto the ship’s ledge. “God, let me see my girls again.” He leapt into the air, his stomach in his throat, as he flew down, down, toward the dark waters below.

USS Boise

The Andaman Sea

3:02 p.m.

Wearing his wash khaki uniform and a navy blue ball cap with the emblem of his submarine and the initials “CO” stitched in gold on the front, Commander Graham Hardison walked across the control room and put his hand on the shoulder of the enlisted man who was seated at a control panel just in front of the skipper’s seat.

“Got any more of that black stuff, Mr. COB?” Mr. COB was the acronym that submariners often used to refer to the chief of the boat, usually the senior enlisted man on board a US Navy submarine. In this case, the COB was Radioman Senior Chief Fred Gimler, a tall, balding South Dakotan who was approaching thirty years in the submarine service.

“Yessir, Captain,” the COB said. “Just brought a pot up from the galley.” Gimler turned around with a knowing grin.

“I thought I saw you tiptoeing onto my bridge with steaming contraband in hand,” Hardison joked.

“Guilty as charged, Captain.” The COB twisted the plastic top off the insulated thermos. The scent of fresh coffee permeated the control room, and Commander Hardison felt a jolt to his senses just from the scent of it. “Your mug, sir?”

Hardison held his white, porcelain coffee mug, with coffee acid rings circling the bottom-a badge of honor among submariners-out to the chief. “Mug looks a little clean, sir.” The COB grinned as steaming, black, battery-acid strength coffee oozed into the skipper’s mug.

“Maybe in my next life, I’ll come back as a navy chief, Mr. COB,” Hardison joked. “That way, I’ll always make sure there’s something growing in the bottom of my mug.”

“Trust me, Skipper, the pay’s better in your seat,” the COB chuckled.

Hardison laughed. “Thanks for reminding me, Chief.” He took a refreshing sip of the strong stuff. The kick was immediate. “Ahh. Good stuff.”

Hardison returned to the captain’s chair. “XO, report our updated position, please.”

“Aye, Captain,” the executive officer said. “Currently eighty-three miles east of Nicobar Island. Speed ten knots,” the XO said. “Course zero-nine-zero degrees.”

“Very well,” Hardison said. “Steady as she goes.”

“Steady as she goes. Aye, Captain.”

“Conn. Radio.” The radio officer’s voice blared over the intercom.

“Radio. Conn. Whatcha got?”

“Sir, we’ve got an all-frequency distress call from USS Ingraham.”

“The Ingraham?” Dear Lord. The Ingraham was one of the US Navy frigates assigned to tanker escort duty in the Malaccan Strait. “Don’t tell me another terrorist attack.”

“That’s correct, sir.”

Hardison sloshed his coffee. “What is the position of the Ingraham?”

“The Ingraham is not under attack. She’s relaying a distress call for the tanker Altair Voyager. The tanker’s on fire in the Andaman Sea, near the western entrance to the Strait of Malacca. She’s taking on water. They’ve abandoned ship. Two choppers from the Ingraham are in the area, but rescue efforts are being hampered by a smoke cloud. They need assistance on the surface, sir.”

Hardison stood. Adrenaline was starting to kick in.

“Navigator. Plot a course to Altair Voyager. Advise on ETA at full power.”

“Aye, Captain.” The navigator punched the coordinates into the sub’s navigational computer. “Estimated time of arrival at full power…twenty-two minutes, Captain.”

“Very well. Radio. Contact Seventh Fleet. Mark it. USS Boise requests permission to surface to assist USS Ingraham in rescue efforts of tanker Altair Voyager.”

The Andaman Sea

3:14 p.m.

Captain Eichenbrenner lay back in the warm sea water, trying to stay afloat.

Where was his crew? Perhaps they were swimming aft, trying to get out from under the thickening black smoke.

“Skipper! Over here!”

Eichenbrenner pulled his arms through the salt water and saw two of his men clinging to a single donut flotation device.

The flotation rings were designed to hold one man, not two. “I’m okay!” he shouted. “You men keep that ring. I’ll be fine.”

“Skipper. You better get over here!”

The men kept motioning for him to swim in their direction. “Hurry, Skipper!”

Instinct took over. If he didn’t get away from the ship, he’d be sucked under when it went down. He started swimming in the direction of their voices.

“Swim away from the ship in the direction of the ship’s aft! Repeat, this is the United States Navy!”

He pushed his arms through water and pulled down, beginning a backstroke. The sky blackened by the minute. If the cloud came much lower, it would cut off their oxygen.

“Hurry, Skipper!”

He pulled his hands through the water, then pushed water down from over his head to his sides.

“Over here, Skipper!”

A hand snatched his forearm, pulling him under. He popped up and found himself with two of his crew members, Seamen Tommy Grimes and Dennis Basnight. Each hung on the life ring.

“It won’t hold us all, Skipper,” Basnight said, blowing sea water from his nose, “but it helps. Just kick a little. Maybe we can hang on long enough to get out from under this smoke so the chopper can throw us a line.”

Eichenbrenner looked around. They were about fifty yards from the burning, smoking relic of the Altair Voyager. “Forget the smoke!” he said. “We’ve got to get away from the ship or we’ll get sucked down with it. Where are the men? Did they swim aft?”

Basnight bobbed under the water, then bobbed back up. “The situation isn’t good, Skipper.”

“No kidding!”

“No, Skipper. I mean with the men. It’s not good.”

“Skipper! Behind you! Watch out!” Grimes said.

Eichenbrenner looked over his left shoulder.

A dark gray triangular fin cut through the water in a flash. It disappeared. Eichenbrenner groaned.

“Another one!” Basnight said. “Opposite direction! Get your legs up!”

This one was swimming from their right. Eichenbrenner pulled his knees to his chest as the shark bore down on them.

Twenty feet…

Fifteen feet…

Ten feet…

The fin vanished.

“Where’d it go?” blurted Basnight.

“Maybe it’s gone,” Grimes said.

A moment passed.

Something slammed their legs. The jolt knocked the three men away from the life ring.

Eichenbrenner went under and came back up splashing, gasping for air. Grimes and Basnight flailed in the water nearby.

The life ring drifted off to the left, maybe ten feet away. Eichenbrenner started a breast stroke toward it.

“Watch out!”

The fin surfaced again, about fifteen feet to his right. It made quick, violent circles in the water, then disappeared.

Eichenbrenner swam and instinctively prayed that he would reach the ring without being bitten in half.

A few seconds later, his hand reached the flotation device.

The shark resurfaced, maybe twenty-five feet away. It set a course directly for him. Angry white teeth like glistening sharp razors bore straight at him. Its black eyes blazed fury. It swirled in the water, then slowly started a death swim in his direction.

“Dear Jesus!”

Suddenly, the shark jumped. It splashed down to his right, spraying sea water in his face. Eichenbrenner grasped the life ring and looked around.

Gone again. The shark was toying with him before the kill.

“Skipper!” Basnight yelled from about twenty feet away. He and Grimes were floating close to each other. Hooking the raft in one arm, the captain paddled toward them.

“You okay, Skipper?” Grimes asked.

“Fine,” Eichenbrenner lied. Panting and breathless, he pushed the donut toward the men.

“Sir, they got several of our crew members already,” Grimes said.

“They?”

“Skipper, four of our guys tried to swim aft. We saw the fins surface, and they disappeared under the water.”

“Who disappeared?”

“The men, Captain,” Basnight said. “The sharks got ’em!” Terror crossed the man’s face. Almost a delayed reaction.

The shark surfaced again.

This time, fifteen feet to their right.

Making a wide loop, the fin orbited their position in the water, its wet skin reflecting the leaping flames from the ship in the background.

“There’s another one!” Grimes shouted.

Eichenbrenner looked over his left shoulder. A second shark had joined the first.

Basnight swore and pointed. “Another.”

Over his right shoulder, a third fin cut through the water in the circle.

Like bloodthirsty savages circling a defenseless wagon train, the sharks circled their prey slowly, in an inexplicable ritual of cruel, psychological torture.

“I wish they’d get it over with,” Basnight groaned.

“You boys believe in prayer?” Eichenbrenner asked.

“Never believed in it. Not gonna start now,” Basnight said. Cold fear filled his voice.

“If there was a God, why would he put us on a burning ship and then throw us out to the sharks?” Grimes muttered.

“There may or may not be a God,” Eichenbrenner said, “but I’m going to try it.”

“Try what?”

“Prayer. I suggest you do the same.”

USS Boise

The Andaman Sea

3:25 p.m.

Range to target one thousand yards,” the chief of the watch said. “All ahead one-third,” Captain Hardison said.

“All ahead one-third,” came the reply.

“Very well. Up scope!”

“Up scope. Aye, sir!”

The commanding officer moved over to the periscope station as mechanical motors inside the stainless-steel cylinder whined and clanked, raising the top of the scope to a position just a few feet above the level of the surface.

“Scope’s up, Captain,” the chief of the watch announced.

“Very well.” Captain Hardison stepped up to the eyepiece, grabbed the handle bars, and peered through the scope. Nothing but open water and late-afternoon horizon.

Rotating clockwise, he turned slightly to his right.

Still nothing.

He turned a bit more. Orange smoke and black flames billowed into the sky. Below the smoke, the silhouette of a ship lay low in the water. He hit the magnification button, bringing the ship in full view in the viewfinder.

Hardison squinted, meticulously searching for any signs of life still aboard the ship. His eyes quickly swept twice from the smoking bow to the stern area.

Nothing.

He’d seen enough.

“Down scope. Prepare to surface.”

The Andaman Sea

4:05 p.m.

They had drifted another fifty yards away from the burning ship, perhaps just far enough to avoid getting sucked down when the Altair Voyager went under.

But getting sucked down was the least of their worries at the moment.

Like a hangman tightening a noose, the gray fins continued to swirl angrily in a concentric ring about ten yards from the tiny flotation device. They were so close now that the men could see the shadows of the sharks’ bodies swimming by.

Against the chopping roar of helicopter motors, which remained invisible above the black smoke, Eichenbrenner silently prayed.

Basnight and Grimes cursed that they had no effective means of committing suicide.

“Look!” Basnight suddenly pointed outward. “One of them is leaving.”

One of the sharks had left the circle and seemed to be swimming away, toward the direction of the burning ship.

“It’s turning around!” Eichenbrenner warned.

“It’s headed back!” Basnight unleashed a string of profanities.

“It’s coming fast!” Grimes yelled.

“Lord, help us,” Eichenbrenner blurted. The shark slid through the circling perimeter of fins, then disappeared.

A moment passed.

“Aaahhhhh!” Basnight screamed. “My leg! Aaaaahhh!” Basnight’s face contorted. Blood bubbled and gushed up around his neck. He cocked his head to the heavens and released the raft, drifting in his own blood.

The shark surfaced a few feet to Grimes’ left, then submerged again.

A second later, with a violent jerk, Basnight was snatched under the water. More blood pooled on the surface.

Grimes swore. “We’re dead, Captain.”

“Pray.”

Basnight’s blood excited the circle of sharks. They swam faster now, splashing at the surface violently, as if in a war dance.

A second shark broke away and swam toward the burning ship. Like the one that got Basnight, he turned and started swimming toward Eichenbrenner and Grimes.

The fin disappeared. “God have mercy!” Eichenbrenner said.

A second passed.

Then another.

Nothing.

Five seconds.

Still nothing.

Maybe God had heard his prayer.

“No!”

The shark’s powerful jaws clamped around Grimes’ arm. Grimes screamed, flailed, splashed in the water, and tried punching the creature on the nose with his fist. The shark dragged him across the surface of the water, away from the life ring. “Help me! Help!” Grimes’ screams even drowned out the sound of the helicopters.

With a jerk and a splash, Grimes vanished with the shark under the surface. Blood bubbled up from the spot where he had disappeared.

Eichenbrenner grasped the life ring hard. Coiling into a human ball, he tucked his knees tightly against his chest, as if that would somehow give the monsters less of a target to sniff.

Two fins circled his position now, in equidistant spots, each about ten yards from the life ring.

“If anyone is in the water, please swim aft of the ship! We need you to clear that smoke cover! This is the US Navy!”

Eichenbrenner cocked his head back, gazing at the spreading smoke cloud.

If God would part that cloud…

Still scrunched in a ball, he felt cramping set into his calves. He instinctively kicked his feet down into the water to relieve the pain. The sharks were circling faster now.

One of the sharks broke away, and just as before, began swimming away, toward the ship. Then the second also broke away. Both swam away from him.

They were now at least twenty yards away.

Then, as if choreographed by a trainer at Sea World, both sharks pivoted, one a time. Their vicious snouts took aim at him.

Swirling and splashing their tail fins, they started swimming back toward the life ring.

Fifteen yards. Ten yards.

His life flashed in front of him. His marriage. His divorce. His girls.

This was it.

Fred closed his eyes and remembered words his grandmother once taught him: “Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come…Thy will be done…”

Chut-ah-chut-ah-chut-ah-chut-ah-chut-ah-chut-ah-chut-ah-chut-ah!

The wall of water sprayed from left to right in a line right in front of the sharks.

The sharks went limp on the surface. They floated on their stomachs for a second, then rolled over, belly-up, limp and bleeding.

Eichenbrenner looked over his shoulder.

The rubber boat was bobbing in the water, perhaps twenty feet behind him.

Crouched in the front of the boat in a black wet suit, holding a black submachine gun with white smoke billowing from the barrel, the man with the rugged chin sported a triumphant grin.

Rambo had risen from the sea!

“I can nail the suckers if they’re close to the surface,” the man said. “But no guarantees if they’re under the water. Now we’ve got to get you out of there.”

“Dear Jesus!”

“Nope. I’m not him. But you can thank him if you want. Lieutenant McKinley Kennedy, US Navy SEALs, at your service, sir,” the man said. “This is Senior Chief Comstock.” Eichenbrenner had not noticed the other man in the back of the boat. “Give me your hand, sir.”

Eichenbrenner reached up. The SEAL’s grip was an iron vise. The SEAL heaved, and instantly, Eichenbrenner was lying on his back in the bottom of the rubber boat.

“Any other survivors?” Kennedy asked.

“I don’t know. The sharks got several of my crew. Some tried swimming out from under the smoke. I was the last off the ship.”

“You the captain?”

“Yes.”

“Don’t worry, sir. We’ve got three other squads out on the water looking. If anybody’s out here, my men will find ’em. You sound American, Captain.”

“Born and raised in Southern California.”

“Well, sir, I want you to look back there.” The SEAL pointed across the stern of the raft.

It was long, black, and sleek, floating just above the surface of the water.

Toward the front of it, a black, square-shaped superstructure rose into the air. Off the back, lit by the orange glow of the sun setting on the horizon beyond the edge of the cloud cover, the flag of the United States of America flapped in the late afternoon breeze.

“That, Captain, is the USS Boise. We’re going to take you there now, and then we’re going to take you home. Chief, let’s do it.”

“Aye, sir.” The chief revved the electric motor. The boat turned in the water and cut a course directly for the submarine.

Eichenbrenner took one last glance over his shoulder at his sinking ship. The stern was rising off the water like the high end of a seesaw. It would not be long now until she slipped under the sea. He looked away, never to look back.

The sight of the Boise, of the flag draped in the afternoon sunlight, of his ship burning and sinking, then the realization that he would see his girls again, that his desperate prayer had been answered…Tears began rolling.

“It’s okay, Captain.” Kennedy put his hand on Eichenbrenner’s back. “We’re going home.”