by Peter Nealen
Hancock watched him with narrowed eyes for a moment, then looked back at Brannigan. The Colonel met his gaze, and nodded fractionally. Brannigan was out of the fight for the moment, but Hancock still wanted his okay.
Turning, he followed Huerta into the frigate’s superstructure.
***
Huerta clearly knew the ship well enough; he moved quickly through the narrow passageways and hatches, dodging sailors and ducking under pipes, making his way quickly toward the wardroom.
The frigate’s wardroom was not large. Hancock had seen smaller, but there was just enough room around the table for one man to walk behind the chairs. The bulkheads were half-paneled with light wood, the rest painted white.
Huerta moved to the end of the table and leaned on the back of a chair. “The Capitàn is on his way here,” he said. “But you and I need to speak, first.”
“You have us at something of a disadvantage, Admiral,” Hancock pointed out. He was standing across the table from Huerta, his rifle slung in front of him, one hand on the buttstock.
“As do you,” Huerta pointed out. “You are still armed, and I am quite sure that, should I order your arrest, at least one of you will probably fight.”
Not just one of us, buddy.
“You also know that I hired you,” Huerta continued, lowering his voice. “I could try to have you all killed—it has been done before—but that has its own problems. And if you go before a Mexican judge, you can ruin me.”
Which was also true. If he was being honest, Hancock hadn’t even quite thought of that. He hadn’t quite shifted gears from combat to legalities.
“Here is what I want to discuss,” Huerta said, in the same tone. “I lost nearly a squad of Naval Infantrymen when that bomb exploded. Time is pressing; I am sure that the Hermenegildo Galeana can track the enemy’s submarine, but we have limited assets that I can call upon. I will make a deal with you; help me to hunt these men down, and I guarantee that I will get you out of Mexico and back to the Estados Unidos quietly and without incident.”
Hancock eyed him for a moment. “I hope that guarantee is worth more than your family company’s logistical support, Admiral,” he said.
Huerta stiffened. “That was not my fault,” he said, “and I promise you that it will not happen again.”
Hancock thought about it, uncomfortable that he was having to make this call himself, on the fly. At the very least, he wanted to consult with Brannigan before committing the team to another mission, especially after how badly the platform boarding had gone.
“I’m going to have to talk to the rest of the boys,” he temporized. “We’re contractors, not soldiers. They’re going to have to agree.”
Huerta looked impatient. “There isn’t time,” he insisted. “El Capitàn will be here any moment, and if he suspects that you are anything but a team of American Special Forces commandos, operating under a silent agreement between Washington and Mexico City, then we are dead. A commando leader would not consult with his men before taking on a mission.”
“But he would have to consult with his higher headquarters,” Hancock pointed out. “Even SOF has oversight. Tell him that that’s what I’m doing.”
Huerta was starting to look angry, but a rap on the hatch behind Hancock interrupted them. “Entrar,” Huerta called. The hatch swung open, and the Hermenegildo Galeana’s captain stepped inside. He was a small, balding man, with a blatant comb-over. He looked like a clerk.
Huerta fired questions at the captain, as the little man closed the hatch behind him. The frigate’s commander responded in a soft voice.
“He says that they have had intermittent sonar contact with what he believes is the submarine,” Huerta told Hancock. “It is very quiet, but they have been using the frigate’s active sonar to maintain contact. If he is not mistaken, the submarine is currently ten nautical miles ahead, moving to the southeast, into the deeper waters of the Gulf of Mexico.”
Hancock nodded, watching Huerta even as he was all too aware of the Mexican captain’s eyes on him. “I’ll have an answer for you within the next few minutes, Admiral,” he said.
It was clearly not the response that Huerta had been hoping for. But he simply inclined his head in agreement, and motioned toward the hatch.
Feeling both Mexican officers’ eyes on his back, Hancock headed back toward the stern.
***
“I’m all for it,” Santelli said. “But the price is gonna have to go up.”
“I’m not sure it’s such a good idea,” Wade suggested. Jenkins nodded in agreement, apparently forgetting his earlier clash with Wade over the tattoos. “We’re way out in the cold here, and we’ve already lost two. Are they gonna rearm us, or would we be going in with just what we’ve got? And what’s to stop them from arresting us as soon as the bad guys are dealt with?”
Hancock glanced over his shoulder. None of the Mexican Marines or sailors appeared to be within earshot. “If he tries it, Huerta knows that his head is on the chopping block right next to ours,” he said. “He doesn’t want to stir that pot.”
“And we should just trust his word on that?” Childress asked. “Look what happened with his family business.”
“What’s the Colonel have to say?” Flanagan asked quietly. He hadn’t said a word so far, but only listened. Him and Gomez, both.
“He said it’s our call,” Hancock admitted. “He’s out of the fight for the moment, so he won’t say ‘yes’ or ‘no.’ We’re independent contractors, so he told me that we’ve got to figure it out.”
“I’m not comfortable going in there without the Colonel,” Curtis said. He was unusually solemn. It could be that being on a potentially hostile ship and steaming away from the US had put a damper on his usual high spirits. Or maybe being nearly blown sky-high by a detonating oil rig, which was still putting up a towering column of black smoke on the horizon behind them, had done it.
“Those bastards murdered the people we went in to rescue,” Santelli said bluntly. “I want my pound of flesh.”
“Let’s face it, gents,” Flanagan said, “we don’t actually have that much choice in the matter.”
“What do you mean?” Childress asked, frowning.
“Simple,” Flanagan said. “We’re technically illegal combatants, aboard a Mexican warship. Huerta might not try to arrest us, or even have us murdered, but if we don’t help him out, he’s under no particular obligation to help us get home, either. He could just drop us in some port in the middle of Mexico, gear and all, and say, ‘Good luck!’ Then we’d be just as screwed as if he’d decided to throw us into a deep, dark hole somewhere.”
None of the rest of them spoke, thinking over what he’d said. A few nodded. Hancock blew out a sigh.
“Fine,” he said. “I’ll go tell him we’re in.”
Chapter 20
The sun went down over the Gulf of Mexico, disappearing into the waters to the west, as the ARM Hermenegildo Galeana left the Mexican coast behind. The Blackhearts had found a place to settle in just forward of the aft quarterdeck, most of them sitting against the bulkheads, trying to stay out of the Mexican sailors’ way.
Two of the Mexican Marines were stationed at the hatch leading toward the bridge and the rest of the ship. They held their P90s across their bodies, watching the Blackhearts.
Most of the mercenaries were zonked out. It had been a long, brutal day, and Bianco, Jenkins, Curtis, and Childress were all asleep, sprawled in various uncomfortable and contorted positions on the deck. Curtis’ head was back against the bulkhead, his mouth open, snoring. Childress was bent forward, his chin on his chest, and looked like he was going to fall over any second.
Wade was sitting up, watching the Mexican Marines, his pale eyes almost unblinking.
“I don’t think a staring contest is going to accomplish much, John,” Flanagan said quietly. He was leaning back against the bulkhead in a corner, his rifle across his knees. He was placed so that he could casually watch the Marines without looki
ng like he was ready to get in a fight, like Wade was.
“They want our fucking help, but they’re gonna watch us like detainees?” Wade countered without turning his basilisk stare away from the two masked Naval Infantrymen. “I’m telling you, I think we’re being set up.”
“Could be,” Santelli said. He was flat on his back, his own M6 leaning against the bulkhead next to him, his eyes on the overhead. “It sure would be simple to wrap things up in a neat little bow, lay the whole thing on us.”
“Except that we’d be too likely to talk, point out who hired us in the first place,” Hancock said. “We’ve been over this. Huerta doesn’t want that.”
“Who says he’d let it go to trial?” Wade countered. “We’re on a damned ship in the middle of the Gulf, a ship where he’s the ranking officer. We could just disappear, and he’d tell his men what to say happened afterward. They’d probably believe it, too. They don’t know us.”
“And I’m sure he’s considered it,” Hancock said. “In fact, I’m ninety-nine percent certain that he’s been real, real tempted. But I talked to him. I don’t think he’s going to.”
Wade finally turned his eyes away from the Mexican Marines. “What makes you so sure?” he asked.
Hancock just shrugged. “Gut call,” was all he said.
Wade didn’t look impressed, but then he thought for a moment and shrugged back. “I guess I can’t really talk shit,” he said. “I’ve done some objectively stupid shit that worked out, based on gut calls.”
“We don’t really have an option besides rolling with the punches anyway,” Santelli said. “We’re stuck on a ship, outnumbered and outgunned. Maybe Huerta will try having us killed. Maybe he’ll be true to his word. Ain’t shit we can do about it right now.”
Conversation subsided. Wade went back to mean-mugging the Mexican Marines. Flanagan put his head back against the steel of the bulkhead, his eyes hooded, watching while he rested.
Outside, night descended on the Gulf of Mexico as they cruised southeast, the Hermenegildo Galeana’s wake almost luminous in the dark.
***
Huerta’s eyes stung with fatigue, but he couldn’t sleep. He wouldn’t sleep. Not until he had exacted vengeance on the terrorists who had almost slipped through his fingers. Instead, he lurked around the Hermengildo Galeana’s bridge, a constant, brooding presence that had the sailors and watchstanders looking over their shoulders constantly.
He was rotating between the plotting table and the ASW station, where a rating was monitoring the AN/SQS-26 bow-mounted sonar. The display was a waterfall of multi-colored noise, indecipherable to Huerta, who had come up through the Naval Infantry. But it meant something to the rating, who was staring intently at it, his head buried in his headphones.
It was entirely likely that some of the sailor’s intense concentration was an effort to ignore the looming presence of his superior officer looking over his shoulder. He was doing a good job of feigning absolute focus, if that was the case.
The presence of the gringo mercenaries on the aft deck was nagging at Huerta almost as much as the hunt for the terrorist submarine. They will be the death of you, Diego. But as much as he knew that he should simply dispose of them, hoping that none of the sailors or Marines said anything about it, he could not bring himself to do so. He knew at least one of them had been killed, and their commander severely wounded. They’d incurred those losses and wounds doing what he’d been otherwise unable to do.
You cannot afford to be soft. They are mercenaries, they knew what they were getting into in the first place.
Your honor is all you have, Diego. He could have sworn he still heard his mother saying that.
The rating pointed at a bright red point in the waterfall of the sonar display. “There, Contralmirante,” he said. “That has to be the target.”
“Are you sure?” he asked.
The rating hesitated. Admitting that he was guessing to a Contralmirante, especially under such circumstances, was rarely a good idea.
“It isn’t sea floor noise,” he said hesitantly, “and it is moving, along the same line that the submarine was the last time we had contact with it.”
“But we’ve lost contact four times in as many hours,” Huerta pointed out.
“Which is why we switched to the active sonar, Señor,” the captain said, appearing at Huerta’s elbow. “The submarine is simply too quiet to track using only the passive sonar.” He nodded at the display. “It is not quite on the same track, though. It’s turned due east, which has opened up the distance between us. It will take several hours to close that distance.”
“Close in as fast as you can,” Huerta said. “As much as I wish to kill these men in person, sinking the submarine will accomplish the same thing.”
***
But it didn’t turn out to be that simple. The submarine captain had heard the Hermenegildo Galeana’s sonar pings, and had taken steps to evade. Since they were well out into the Gulf, where the sea bottom was more than twelve thousand feet deep—well below crush depth for any operational sub—simply heading for the bottom wasn’t an option. But after a couple more hours, the sonar couldn’t pick the submarine out anymore.
“They may have gone below the thermocline,” the sonar operator said. “The different density of the colder water is like a wall to sonar.”
“Start a search pattern,” Huerta demanded. “Find that submarine.”
***
Brannigan opened his eyes blearily. He’d been drifting in and out for a while. He didn’t think that was a good sign, with his head wound, but the Mexican orderly hadn’t seemed too concerned. Of course, the man also hadn’t seemed too solicitous of Brannigan’s life at all, so he didn’t think that was a good measuring stick to go by concerning the severity of his wounds.
He turned his aching head, and made out Hart, leaning against the wall, still armed to the teeth, his shoulder looking slightly misshapen from the pressure bandage around it. Looking around, he saw that he had been stripped of his gear, but it was piled next to the bed, with his FN-45 pistol sitting on the bed next to his hand. That had to be his boys’ doing; he was sure the orderly never would have gone for it without some pressure.
“Where are we?” he croaked.
Hart looked over at him. “Somewhere in the Gulf, Colonel,” he answered. “Couldn’t tell you more than that. This Admiral Huerta guy is dead-set on catching the bad guys who got off the platform, and Hancock’s decided we’re going to help him.”
Brannigan nodded slowly, the pain almost bringing tears to his eyes. He didn’t know the whole situation, of course, but he suspected that he knew Hancock’s reasons for going along with Huerta’s vendetta. He couldn’t say that he disagreed, though the circumstances were rather less than ideal.
“We lose anyone else on the way off?” he asked. He didn’t think they had, but he’d been a little foggy since getting smacked in the side of the head with a bullet.
“No,” Hart replied. “We couldn’t get Aziz’ body off, though. It went up with the platform.”
Brannigan closed his eyes as he nodded fractionally. The fire and explosions were little more than snapshot impressions in his memory.
Damn, I must have gotten hit harder than I thought. I’ve definitely got a concussion.
“Can you go get Roger or Carlo?” he asked.
“Sorry, Colonel,” Hart answered. “Hancock doesn’t want you left alone. I don’t think he entirely trusts our hosts.”
I wouldn’t, either.
“Well, if he comes up while I’m out of it again,” Brannigan said, “wake me up.” We’ve got to figure out our exit plan. He wasn’t going to trust Huerta any more than Hancock apparently did, and while he might be out of action, the Blackhearts were still his boys, and he’d be damned if he left their fate to the whims of a Mexican military officer.
Hart just nodded, watching Brannigan for a moment before turning back to the door.
Brannigan felt himself start to drift
again.
***
The night passed slowly, as the Hermenegildo Galeana cut back and forth, lashing the water with her bow sonar, searching for the mysterious submarine. Three times she picked up the sub’s trail, only to lose it again. The sub’s skipper was being canny, but he could only go so fast underwater without making enough noise to give his position away.
Huerta was up on the weather deck, smoking a cigarette. He’d lost track of exactly what time it was, but the eastern horizon was starting to lighten.
“Contralmirante!” the watch officer shouted from below.
Huerta didn’t bother to respond; he just flung the lit cigarette out to sea and pounded down the ladderwell.
“We think they have surfaced, Contralmirante,” the captain said. “We got a sonar hit near a radar contact, about twenty kilometers away.”
“Show me,” Huerta demanded.
The captain pointed to the plot, which was crisscrossed with paths of freighters, tankers, cruise liners, fishing boats, and yachts. There was still a lot of sea traffic in the Gulf of Mexico, despite the wars raging on the mainland.
The mark for the possible surfaced submarine was next to another track, that of a large yacht named the Carla Espinoza.
“They are making rendezvous,” Huerta said. He didn’t know that for certain, but it seemed like the most likely course of action. Why else would the submarine surface out there? If it was a diesel sub, it still wouldn’t need to surface to run its engines; all modern diesels had snorkels. It had to be meeting the Carla Espinoza for some reason.
“Full speed ahead,” he ordered. “Close in on that submarine.” He turned to leave the bridge. “Let me know when we are within visual range.”
He had to get the assaulters ready. All of them.
He left the bridge and headed below, to where Teniente Medina’s Marines had set up, not far from the aft compartment where the gringo mercenaries were waiting. He stuck his head in the hatch, managing not to recoil from the stench of sweat, saltwater, and smoke. He’d smelled far worse.
