Gideon's War / Hard Target

“Eighteen hours, twenty-five minutes.”

“What’s the President doing about it?”

“He’s deployed Deltas from Hawaii to take back the rig, but they may not be able to get in under the weather.”

“What weather?”

Simpson told Gideon about the typhoon, which had changed course and was limiting the possibility of an aerial assault.

“The president must be doing something.”

Gideon's War and Hard Target

Simpson nodded. “He’s ordered a SEAL team to take back the...

Gideon climbed into the chopper, which rose into the air over the ruined village of Kampung Naga. Through one of the roofless buildings, Gideon could see Chadeev sitting cross-legged on the ground, still watching Dallas, surrounded by a litter of beer bottles.

CHAPTER TWENTY

THE TROUBLE STARTED BEFORE the boat had even launched.

On paper the boat that the Sultan had loaned to Captain Taylor’s SEAL platoon was an ideal fit for the mission. At 41 feet it was large enough to accommodate the platoon and powerful enough to fight through the massive seas—driven by a pair of intercooled, supercharged MerCruiser V-8s that put out over 750 horsepower apiece.

The problem was that it was a poser—a rich guy’s pleasure craft masquerading as a high performance boat. The decks and superstructure were heavy teak. Every cleat and hitch and light fixture was fashioned from brass. To make matters worse, the i

As long as they were blasting straight into a wave, they were fine. They powered up the face of one wave, throttled back at the top, surfed down the face of the next wave, and submarined into the next wave. Each trough brought a momentary heart-stopping thud as the wave broke over the bow and engulfed the craft, which shuddered before bursting up from the water like a breaching submarine.

The Obelisk was due northeast from their launching point, but the waves were rolling in from the east. For a while Taylor was able to head directly into the waves. Once he adjusted to a true north course, though, the waves began hitting the hull broadside. And that’s where the weakness of the Sultan’s boat began to show.

Every time the craft crested a wave, it heeled over to port, then rolled rapidly starboard as the wave passed underneath. The momentum of the wave and the weight of the armored hull made the boat just want to keep rolling.

Taylor stood in the wheelhouse at the shoulder of Petty Officer Derrick Winters, who concentrated as he silently piloted the craft. He faced a computerized helm rivaling the cockpit of a jet aircraft. Manifold pressure, oil pressure, boost, coolant temperature, bearing, depth, wind speed and direction, radar, sonar. But the one digital readout that kept drawing the captain’s attention was the pitch indicator, which showed how much the craft was rolling.

They crested a wave and the boat rolled to starboard. Eleven degrees. Twelve degrees. Fifteen. Sixteen. Finally the boat settled and began to roll back.

“Can she handle it?” Taylor asked.

“Yes, sir.”

But Taylor heard the uncertainty in Winters’s voice. “As much as I appreciate your optimism, I’d rather have your honesty.”

Winters didn’t answer right away. “We’ll find out soon enough, sir.”

A tle D‡voice suddenly interrupted. “She’s taking on water, sir.”

An inch or two of water had been sloshing from one side of the wheel-house to the other for at least ten minutes.

The boat’s wheelhouse was enclosed, but water was getting in from somewhere. “Mr. Ke

“Gaylord’s on it already, sir,” Ke

“Very well,” Taylor said.

The water was washing over his boots now. He didn’t have to tell the men what they knew already: the more water they took on, the worse they’d roll. Enough water, or a big enough wave, and they would capsize.

“What’s our ETA to the rig?” Taylor said.

“Five minutes,” Winters said. “Seven tops.”

Taylor nodded.

They crested the next wave. The boat rolled again. Nine degrees. Twelve. Fifteen. Eighteen. Something fell over and crashed behind Taylor. The boat was still rolling. Nineteen degrees.

“Come on, baby. Come on.” Winters was riding the throttle and carving to starboard, making micro adjustments to keep the boat from rolling any farther.

Finally the boat began to settle. Taylor exhaled, but his relief was short-lived.

“Oh, Jesus!” someone said.

Taylor didn’t see it at first. In the dim light it was hard to make out exactly what was going on outside the craft. But then he saw what his men were pointing at. A gathering blackness was swelling, rising up before them. Suddenly, Taylor felt himself falling, as if he were on an elevator that had its cables cut. The boat let out a horrible, rending groan.

And then it was upon them.

The news that Gideon Davis was alive had boosted the president’s mood, but it didn’t diminish the helplessness or the anxiety he felt as he sat in the Situation Room, monitoring the SEAL operation. Because the cloud cover was so thick, the satellite could only send thermal images onto the wall-mounted monitor. The Sultan’s boat appeared as an orange triangle as it sliced through the blue-black space of the sea toward the Obelisk. Periodically a wave would crash over the boat and much of the orange triangle would disappear for a while. But it always came back.

“How close are they?” President Diggs said softly.

“Four kilometers.” The man from the National Reco

The president realized he’d been sitting there with his fist clenched in front of his mouth for five or ten minutes. It wasn’t a very presidential posture, he thought. His hand was getting sore, he’d been squeezing so hard. He looked at his hand, flexing his fingers a couple of times. When he looked back up at the monitor, there was nothing on the screen but a field of blue. The NRO man kept stabbing at his keyboard.

“BrinackÑ€†g them back,” the president said. “Where are they?”

The NRO man shook his head like a boxer shaking off a hard right hook.

“Find them!” General Ferry echoed the president. “Find my boat!”

The NRO man shook his head a second time.

“Don’t shake your head at me, young man!” General Ferry shouted. “Find my boat.”

The NRO man didn’t look up from the screen. “I can’t, sir.”

“Why not?” President Diggs said.

“Because it’s gone, sir,” a voice said from the back of the room. It was an admiral Diggs didn’t recognize, although he was clearly the oldest man in the room. His was the creased and rugged face of a man who’d spent most of his life at sea, and now it wore a somber expression.

President Diggs stared at the admiral for a moment. “I’m sorry, Admiral, what did you say?”

“They’re gone, Mr. President,” the admiral said. “Captain Taylor knew the specs on that boat were far from ideal in this weather, but he and his men believed it was worth the risk. Waves were just too high for that boat.”

Diggs looked over at Elliot Hammershaw. The chief of staff’s face had gone white. Neither of them needed to say anything because they both understood the math. The terrorists’ deadline was in fewer than twelve hours, and the storm wouldn’t pass for seventy-two hours. Their last chance to take back the rig depended on the Delta team threading the eye of needle.

Gideon glanced at Simpson every time he heard the sound. They were flying so low that the limbs of the tallest trees occasionally whacked against the undercarriage of the helicopter. Suddenly, the chopper pitched forward and went into a dive. Gideon’s stomach went up into his throat.