Operation Sea Ghost (39 page)

This vibe was so intense, Nolan leaned over to Batman, told him his fear about Twitch, and then said: “Please keep an eye on him. Don’t let him do anything rash.”

Batman replied, “OK—but who’s going to keep an eye on me?”

*   *   *

NIGHT HAD FALLEN by this time. As was always the case at sea, one moment it was dusk, the next it was the dead of night and the stars were out in all their brilliance.

Still sitting in the back of the cockpit, Nolan saw an airliner going over their heads. Way up there, all lights and contrails, he thought:
You lucky bastards
.

Emma was right up next to him as always, her head pressed against his shoulder. He couldn’t imagine what she was feeling about all this. It was embarrassing that after all they’d gone through he’d fucked up so royally with such an unworkable plan. As everything had more or less gone their way in the past few days, he’d never considered the string of good luck would so suddenly run out. And that had been a big mistake.

But all she said to him was: “Who will tell our story if we all die?”

*   *   *

NO ONE SLEPT. No one spoke.

The racing yacht roared on, bouncing constantly by riding atop the ocean waves.

Nolan watched Savoldi, as if he was waiting for a miracle to occur. The pilot was continuously checking his computer readouts, checking the weight sensor, checking the GPS screen and tracking the little red dot that represented the
Smoke-Lar
. But he could tell every time Savoldi went through this procedure, it was not good news. They just could not get close enough to the terrorist boat, and if even the slightest thing went wrong with
Numero Two,
they would probably be lost for good.

Who will tell our story if we all die?

Those words were now stuck in Nolan’s head.

Through it all, Murphy sat off by himself, staring into space. He looked so out of place, like an old man lost at the supermarket. He’d said nothing for the longest time, so Nolan started to worry about him as well.

At one point Savoldi pulled a notebook from underneath his control board. It was the operating manual for
Numero Two
and probably weighed a quarter of a pound if that. Yet the pilot considered throwing it overboard as all the information within was duplicated on his computer.

But Murphy stopped him.

“May I?” he asked the boat pilot.

Savoldi shrugged and said, “Be my guest.”

Murphy took the book and sat back down.

*   *   *

THEY PLOWED ON into the night.

The roar of the turbine first became physically tiring, and then painful. Again, the team was huddled at the very rear of the semi-enclosed cockpit, definitely not a space designed to carry people. A lot of spray made its way onto their heads and the temperature was plummeting. Their hopeless condition made them more miserable by the minute.

But suddenly, Murphy came alive.

He sprang to his feet, operating manual still in hand, and made his way up to Savoldi at the control board.

“Turbine engines have a tendency to leak fuel, am I right?” Murphy asked him.

Savoldi thought a moment, then nodded. “More so than other types of engines,
si
.”

Listening in, Nolan also knew this to be true, especially on some jet aircraft or turbine-powered helicopters. When turbines were first started, they were flooded with fuel, and some of that fuel inevitably leaked out. It was the nature of the beast.

“What do you do with that leaking fuel?” Murphy asked him.

Savoldi had to think a moment. “It’s found and used again,” he said in the best way he could find to explain it.

Murphy’s eyes lit up. “So, your engine has an attachment that captures and then recycles this leaking fuel?”

Savoldi called for Giuseppe. His cousin crawled out of the engine compartment having just changed out a fuel container.

Savoldi explained Murphy’s question to him and Giuseppe nodded. “When the turbine stops, we take extra fuel back,” he said.

“So, your engine has a fuel recycle and recovery tank?” Murphy pressed Giuseppe directly.

Giuseppe nodded. “
Si…”
he said. “A big one.”

Nolan was up beside them now. Murphy explained to him that the turbine’s recycling attachment and recovery tank must weigh at least four hundred pounds. Yet according to
Numero Two
’s manual, they really didn’t need it, as the amount of fuel it would save in a couple days was negligible. If they were able to take it off, along with the recovery tank, it would be a huge weight savings.

Nolan and Savoldi both understood, but then Savoldi said, “Such a thing can’t be done while turbine is running—everything in the engine is too hot to touch. And we can’t stop to do it or we’ll be way too far behind. Plus, fuel usually caught by the recycler would wind up on the floor of the compartment.”

“But the engine
can
run without this attachment?” Nolan asked Giuseppe.

He nodded again, but confirmed the fuel would collect on the bottom of the engine compartment.

He said, “Kerosene. One spark—
boom!
All over…”

Nolan turned back to Savoldi. “If we were able to lose all that equipment, would we catch up to the
Smoke-Lar
?”

Savoldi checked the Dutch boat’s position and then nodded. “It’s a better possibility,” is how he replied.

Now Nolan had a million thoughts shoot through his head. If they could somehow get rid of this nonessential engine part, then they might still be able to make this all work.

But how could they detach it? Giuseppe was indicating that he knew how to do it, but how could they work on a piece of equipment that would be red hot?

“I can do it,” Batman suddenly said from the corner of the cockpit.

Nolan turned to him. “You? Why you?”

Batman held up his twisted prosthetic hand and said, “Because I got nothing to burn.”

*   *   *

SIX HOURS.

That’s how long it took for Batman to disconnect the fuel recycler and its recovery tank from the boat’s massive gas turbine engine.

All the work had to be done inside the extremely tight confines of the engine compartment, a hot, smelly greasy place that had no headroom, no legroom, and only a dull fifty-watt-equivalent bulb to light it.

Add in the constant bouncing of the boat, and the thunderous roar of the engine itself, it equaled a little piece of hell traveling at 80 mph.

Batman stuck with it, though. The attachment was located at the front and on the underside of the turbine, the most inconvenient spot imaginable when attacking it from the rear. It was held on by a flange of countersunk bolts, designed to be removed by a universal wrench, which was one of the tools Giuseppe had retained. The problem was, there were three-dozen of them, and each bolt took many minutes to slowly come undone.

Batman worked the wrench with his good hand, using his mechanical hand to hold the loosening flange in place and to collect the bolts each time one needed to be removed. Nolan sat just outside the engine compartment hatch throughout, passing in a t-shirt soaked with seawater for Batman to cool himself off, however minimally. Giuseppe sat just inside the cramped room, providing encouragement and collecting the bolts each time one was removed.

Nolan found himself thinking more than once the engine room was so small, even Crash’s ghost would have a hard time fitting inside.

The attachment was finally separated from the turbine five hours into the operation. The sixth hour was spent trying to position the heavy, four-by-five boxlike recycler so they could work it out of the engine room. This proved to be the hardest part of all, and for a few scary minutes it seemed that after detaching it, the recycler was just too big to take out though the engine compartment’s hatchway.

But with a lot of pushing, pulling and even some kicking, they managed to squeeze the 400-pound attachment out the engine hatch, where Nolan, Twitch, Savoldi, Murphy and Giuseppe triumphantly pushed it over the side. The recovery tank was also given the heave-ho. Then Savoldi checked his weight sensor again.

The
Numero Two
was lighter by a whopping 422 pounds.

They could feel the boat moving faster already.

*   *   *

BUT THEN THEY extracted Batman from the engine compartment, and one look at his other hand—the one without the prosthesis—told just how painful the procedure had been. All of his fingers and his palm down to his wrist were horribly burned.

Emma immediately wanted to take care of him, but all their first-aid supplies had gone overboard. The only thing she could treat it with was salt water from the spray coming into the boat. She gathered it up on the t-shirt and gently rubbed the burns.

It must have been hugely painful, yet Batman just sat there and took it.

“How do we get ourselves into these situations?” he asked Nolan darkly through gritted teeth. “I had more fun when the IRS was chasing me.”

28

WITHIN TEN MINUTES of Savoldi telling them that
Numero Two
could now catch up to the
Smoke-Lar,
the Whiskey contingent were all asleep.

It was strange. Whether the situation had become a little more hopeful, or a little less stressful, or that exhaustion finally set in, everyone found a place at the rear of the cockpit and just drifted off.

Nolan was the last to succumb; Emma was the first. She was pressed tightly against him and he could hear her breathing softly despite the roar of the turbine and the constant slamming of the boat’s hull against the ocean waves. Above it all, she felt warm when everything else felt cold.

No surprise that when he finally dozed off, she was in his dreams. They were back on the deserted island. They had built a house, and were living their lives in paradise, everything unfolding just like a movie. But then things started to go wrong. The weather over paradise grew nasty, dark and gray. A typhoon hit and he lost Emma in the jungle, and then he himself became lost. During all this, Nolan felt his head aching and his good eye burning up. There was a fire in his throat; his lungs seemed filled with hot water.

Then … suddenly he was awake. It was morning and the sun was pouring into the
Numero Two
’s cockpit. But the cockpit smelled horribly—of kerosene.

He knew why. The recycler and the recovery tank they’d removed. The fuel they were designed to catch was now dripping onto the hot engine-compartment floor. The fumes were seeping into the cockpit.

Nolan started shaking Emma, but she would not respond. He looked at the others. The way everyone was sprawled about, they seemed to be not sleeping but unconscious—or worse.

Then he looked up at the control board and saw Savoldi slumped over the steering column. At that moment, Nolan was convinced everyone but him was dead of carbon monoxide poisoning.

But then he felt Emma’s hand touch his face. She woke up—groggy but looking beautiful as always.

“I just had the strangest dream,” she whispered to him.

“Join the club,” he said.

He hugged her tight, thrilled that she was alive.

Then everyone started waking up—bleary-eyed, but all still breathing.

The fumes were real, though. Everyone was aware of them; they were thick in the early morning air.

“This ain’t good,” Twitch said with a cough. “Sniffing fumes can make people crazy.”

“You mean, ‘crazier’ don’t you?” Batman replied.

As for Savoldi, he’d just been leaning over his tracking computer, making sure what he was seeing was really true.

Finally he called out to Nolan, “Major—you should look at this…”

Nolan made his way up front. He looked down at the tracking screen, thinking this is what Savoldi wanted him to do. But instead the pilot directed his attention through the windshield to the sea beyond.

Nolan was astonished. There was a boat out there.

He saw the spray first and then the exhaust plume. Then they went up on a wave and he was able to see the whole vessel.

It was a racing yacht, moving just as quickly as they were.

Savoldi nodded and smiled. “It is no dream,” he said.

It was the
Smoke-Lar.

Not a mile in front of them.

A cheer went up. Everyone was quickly on their feet and looking out at the hijacked Dutch boat. Murphy was especially happy. He cried out: “Behold the white whale!”

But even as they were watching it, the boat seemed to be streaking away from them.

Savoldi turned serious.

“You never know what’s going to happen at sea,” he told them. “So if we want to shoot these people, it’s best to do it now.”

Whiskey didn’t have to be told twice.

They brought up the last weapon they had left on board—their M107 sniper rifle.

It was a monster. Nearly five feet long, and weighing a precious twenty-five pounds, it was all muzzle, metal and stock. It had a built-in collapsible bi-pod assembly for support, and a night-vision-equipped targeting scope that looked powerful enough to peer deep into the Milky Way.

Its .50-caliber bullet could seriously damage something like an armored car, a helicopter or even some tanks. As for a human body, one round in the right place could simply blow it apart.

They assembled the gun quickly and jammed in the ten-round magazine.

But then, another problem.

Where would they set up the gun?

Both racing yachts were traveling in a virtual straight line. Trying an angle shot would mean the
Numero Two
would have to deviate from its predetermined course, and reprogramming the computer to make that happen would take some doing. Plus, there were no guarantees if they did go off course that they’d be able to get back on track afterward.

So the sniper rifle had to be aimed straight out over the
Numero Two
’s bow. But the only way to do that was to take out a piece of the forward cockpit glass and stick the M107’s barrel through the hole.

But that brought up more issues.

The
Numero Two
was now moving at more than 85 mph—but this was not a smooth, clear pond they were traveling on. It was the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, with swells that ran at least six feet high, mixed with the occasional rogue wave that could go up to ten feet or more.