Skeleton Coast

When Juan was sure no one was looking in his direction he rolled off the net and under the crawler treads of the mobile crane. He checked over his weapon and changed out the half-depleted magazine.

He didn’t have a good enough view of the battle to start sniping the rebels without risking another blast from an RPG. He scooted around and wriggled to the back of the crane, cautiously looking around for better cover.

An insurgent suddenly sprang up from behind a crate and was about to toss a grenade across the deck at where a wounded Zimbabwean cowered behind a huge valve. Juan drilled the terrorist with a single shot and a moment later the grenade went off, lifting his corpse and the mangled body of a comrade on a column of smoky flame.

Before anyone could pinpoint where the shot had originated, Juan rushed out from under the crane, ru

Juan thrust the barrel of his MP-5 into a pipe and triggered off a three-round burst. Two of the bullets struck the interior of the pipe and went wild, but one hit the terrorist low in the abdomen. He staggered back and was caught in the avalanche of oil. One second he seemed to be leaning against the surging mass and the next he’d been pulled in, like he’d been absorbed, and vanished in the cascade draining down to the ocean.

Cabrillo circled back around the pile of pipes when a half dozen rebels raked it with autofire, the impacts making the steel pipes sing. He was begi

With so many rebels still fighting he knew that the climb down to the minisub would be suicide. They’d be picked off before they were a quarter of the way down the ladder. Juan had to think of an alternative and considered taking the platform’s lifeboat, a reinforced fiberglass escape pod that could be automatically lowered. The only problem was the lifeboat’s davits were on an isolated spot on the far side of the deck, surrounded by open space—a killing field if Juan had ever seen one.

He tapped his radio to get Linda’s frequency as another fusillade slammed into the drill string. “Linda, its Cabrillo. Forget about the workers and get your butts up here double time.” When she didn’t respond Juan repeated her name. “Where in the hell is she?”

SHE’D spent five hours a week every week for two straight years. More than five hundred hours training on the mats Eddie Seng had brought into theOregon ’s fitness center dojo. He’d learned from a master who no longer bothered with rankings because there were few people on the planet capable enough to certify him.

Hearing Juan’s voice was enough to get Linda Ross over her moment of panic and into action. She stepped out and back so quickly that the killer didn’t realize the receiver of his gun was now against her hip. Slamming her elbow into his sternum sent a wave of rancid breath across her face. She then smashed her fist between his legs, recalling Eddie’s words at this point in the oft-practiced counterattack: “If you feel his weight on your back, toss him. If not, grab on until he goes down.”

But she felt the man deflate against her. She reached for his arm, cocked her hip, and threw him over her shoulder, holding on to him so their combined weight crushed him against the deck. Unable to get air into his deflated lungs the terrorist gasped like a fish. Linda chopped him at a pressure point on the side of his exposed throat and his eyes fluttered and rolled back into his head. He’d be out for hours.

She got to her feet to see the man she thought of as “the sniper” peering at her through the open counter to the dining hall. He was just lowering his AK for a shot he hadn’t dared to take. She gave him a little curtsy and was rewarded with a broad smile.

Linda threw a pair of flex cuffs around the nearby stove’s leg and secured the terrorist’s wrists as a precaution. Returning to the mess hall, she saw her other two men still guarding the door to make sure none of the workers left to face another slaughter on the deck.

Bodies littered the floor. A few of them were dead but most had just been wounded in the mindless melee. Some of their coworkers were already trying to help get them into more comfortable positions and pressing rags and wads of napkins into their wounds. One man in particular seemed to be leading the medical efforts. He was a white man with a fringe of sandy hair around his red scalp and the biggest hands she had ever seen. He was also one of the most ruggedly handsome men she’d ever seen. When he got up from examining a crewman leaning against an overturned table he noticed her and came across the room in five long strides.

“Little lady, I don’t know who you are or where in all get all you came from, but damn, darlin’, am I glad to see you.” He towered over her and his voice was pure west Texas. “I’m Jim Gibson, this here rig’s tool pusher.”

Linda knew that was the title given to the boss on an offshore platform. “Ross, my name is Linda Ross.

Hold on a second.” She resettled her radio earpiece, which had been dislodged during the fight. “Juan, it’s Linda.”

“Thank God. I need you and your men up herenow . We’re taking a pounding. Worry about the workers later.” The sound of a firefight raging in the background underscored his urgent words.

“They’re secure and I’m on my way.” She looked back up at the big Texan. “Mr. Gibson.”

“Jim.”

“Jim, I need you to keep your people here. There’s still terrorists topside. They’ve done something to the platform so oil’s pouring into the ocean. When we take care of the rebels, can you guys stop the crude?”

“Hell yeah we can. What’s going on?”

Linda put a fresh magazine into her machine pistol as she answered. “A group of rebels from the Congo were hired to take over several platforms and the main tanker terminal.”

“Is this some political thing?”

“Jim, I promise when this is over I’ll explain it all, but right now I’ve got to go.”

“You can tell me over di

“I know a better one in Lisbon,” Linda called over her shoulder, “But you’re still buying.”

MIKE kept theLiberty driving straight for the seawall before cranking the wheel and chopping the throttles at the very last second. Though already off her foils, the boat settled deeper in the water as her side kissed the concrete so lightly that it didn’t disturb any of the mussels clinging to its side.

The forward hatch was open and men began streaming out of the boat and onto the quay, seeking whatever cover they could find. A smattering of small-arms fire came from the direction of the terminal, but between Mark Murphy’s efforts and Trono’s deft abilities with a boat, only a few of the rebels were yet in range.

Mike gathered up his gear and jumped for the wall. There was nothing to tie off the boat to so he unholstered a special gun from behind his back. Actuated by a .22-caliber cartridge, the gun fired a six-inch steel rod into the cement. He jacked the gun to reset it and fired a second bolt, then tied off a line dangling over theLiberty ’s side.

The freedom fighters hadn’t forgotten their hard-won lessons in the years since their civil war. They were properly fa