Crescent Dawn

“I found this in the main cache of HMX,” Pitt said.

“It’s no good,” Lazlo replied with a stern shake of his head. “They’ve got multiple charges hidden throughout the hold. I inadvertently found this one tucked into a crate of the ANFO,” he said, holding up one of the timers. “I’m positive there are more.”

He looked at Pitt’s timer, then compared it to the two that he held.

“Fourteen minutes until she goes off,” he said, turning and winging the timers over the side rail. “There’s no way we can find them all.”

Pitt digested his words.

“Try to find the crew,” he ordered. “I’ll get us turned back into the strait.”

Pitt didn’t wait for a reply, taking off at a sprint for the bridge. The deck beneath his feet rumbled and vibrated, and he suddenly felt the whole ship shudder. Reaching a side stairwell, he took a quick glance aft, then wished he hadn’t.

Bearing down on the tanker from the east was the blue yacht of Ozden Celik.

71

Tailing off the stern of the tanker, Giordino had already spotted the hard-charging yacht bearing down in his direction. He flicked the marine radio to cha

Peering behind him, he was surprised to note the yacht had altered course and was suddenly closing fast on the Bullet . He realized they must not have seen him drop Pitt and Lazlo at the tanker. Despite the early-morning gloom, he could make out two figures climbing to the yacht’s forward rail. In their arms, he knew, were automatic weapons aimed at him.

Giordino immediately goosed the throttles to the submersible. The Bullet nearly leaped out of the water, surging quickly up to speed. Giordino tore past the bow of the tanker, then pulled close to the northern shoreline. A short distance ahead was the Galata Bridge, which he figured would provide some cover. But a quick glance behind revealed that the fast yacht was less than fifty yards behind, having closed the gap while the Bullet was accelerating. Giordino cursed aloud as he spotted a small flash of yellow light erupt from the yacht’s bow.

The burst of gunfire struck the water inches from the submersible’s hull, though Giordino could neither see nor hear the bullets striking. He nevertheless whipped the steering yoke hard left, followed by a sharp turn to the right. The nimble submersible responded immediately, zigzagging across the water. The action was enough to temporarily disrupt the accuracy of the yacht’s shooters.

The Galata Bridge suddenly loomed up, and in a flash Giordino passed under it. He banked hard once more, then he looked back to see the yacht burst from under the bridge and follow suit. The faster and more maneuverable Bullet was finally showing its legs, and the distance between the two vessels gradually began to increase. But that spurred only more shooting from the yacht.

Giordino kept up the zigzag pattern as he eyed another bridge, the Atatürk, less than a half mile ahead. A sudden banging above his head forced him to duck involuntarily, then he looked up to see that a trio of bullet holes had pierced the submersible’s acrylic bubble. Any thoughts of ducking behind an obstacle and trying to submerge suddenly vanished, so he set his sights on the bridge.

Several thick footings arose from the cha

Just over a mile behind, the Dayan was surely on its final death march. He had to be available to get both men off the tanker, and most likely soon. Right now, he had no way of knowing if Pitt and Lazlo had any hope at all.

Then he turned and looked behind him and saw that the pursuing yacht had suddenly vanished.

72

Lazlo only had to follow his ears to locate the tanker’s captive crewmen. Though in a weakened state from his gunshot wound, Captain Hammet had his men seeking an escape route the minute the guards left the mess room. The heavily wrapped chain locking the entry door was quickly deemed unbreakable, so the men turned their sights elsewhere. They were surrounded by steel bulkheads, and so there was in fact only one way to go and that was up.

Using butcher knives from the small galley, the crew began making their way through the ceiling panels and into an overhead duct, hoping to breach the deck above. Lazlo heard the clatter from a storeroom he was searching in an adjacent bay and immediately raced to the mess’s door. Quickly unraveling the chain, which was tied in a simple knot, he kicked open the door. Several crewmen, standing on tabletops with knives in their hands, stopped what they were doing and stared at him in surprise.

“Who’s in command here?” Lazlo barked.

“I’m captain of the Dayan ,” Hammet said. He was seated in a nearby chair with his leg resting on a stool.

“Captain, we have just minutes before the ship blows up. What is the quickest way to get you and your crew off?”

“The aft emergency lifeboat,” Hammet replied, rising to his feet with a grimace. “You can’t disable the explosives?”

Lazlo shook his head.

“Every man to the lifeboat,” Hammet ordered. “Let’s move.”

The crewmen quickly piled out the door, Lazlo and the executive officer helping Hammet out last. Stepping onto the deck, Hammet felt an unusual vibration beneath his feet, then looked over the rail. The Israeli captain was shocked to see the minarets of the Süleymaniye Mosque rising a short distance ahead of them.

“We’re in the middle of Istanbul?” he stammered.

“Yes,” Lazlo replied. “Come, we have little time.”

“But we must get the tanker turned around and out of here,” he protested.

“Someone is on the bridge attempting that.”

Hammet started to follow the others toward the stern, then hesitated as the deck shuddered again.

“Oh, no,” he groaned with a sullen frown. “I made her run dry of fuel.”

73

Pitt had only just discovered that same fact. Racing onto the bridge, he had ignored a pair of flashing red lights on the main console as he searched for and found the control that disabled the auto helm. The tanker was just approaching the Galata Bridge, steaming toward its center span, as Pitt regained control of the helm. Glaring at a bridge support off his port bow, he realized there was insufficient room to cut the big ship around. He would have to cross under the bridge first, then make a sweeping turn around and back under to exit the Golden Horn.

As the bow began to slip under the bridge, Pitt saw that the span ahead appeared to be at nearly eye level, and he wondered whether the tanker’s tall superstructure would fit beneath it. Waiting for it to approach, he finally looked down at the flashing red lights. With dismay, he saw they were low-fuel indicators for both the main and auxiliary fuel tanks. When Hammet had sneaked into the engine room, he had opened release valves on the bunkers that dumped fuel into the bilge, where it was then pumped over the side. The tanks were now dry, Pitt knew, as evidenced by the faltering engine that was drawing on the last remaining bit of fuel.

With a sudden certainty, Pitt knew he had no chance to guide the tanker back toward the Sea of Marmara, where it could explode without harm. Just sailing it safely away from the city was now a lost hope. Standing on the bridge of a ticking time bomb, one that was about to lose power, most men would have fallen prey to panic. They would have felt only the heart-pounding urge to flee, to get off the death ship and try to save their own skins.