by David Poyer
USS SHAMAL
Dan leaned over the lifeline, coughing in the brownish white smog as the diesels warmed. It was so thick he could see for only a few feet around him; the lifelines leading fore and aft, the uneasy, sand-scummed chop below; a gutted fish, floating as if more exhausted than dead. So opaque it darkened the day, the smoke streamed up from the waterline exhausts, filling the basin as Geller, in the pilothouse, argued with the Ashaaran pilot.
They were headed out. Down the length of the Red Sea into the Gulf of Aden, around the barren coasts of Yemen and Oman, then into the Strait of Hormuz. A week of maintenance in Bahrain, then she’d head for a new assignment: antipirate patrol off Somalia. The chaos of that failed, unfortunate state was metastasizing across East Africa.
But not to Ashaara. At any rate, not yet.
“Take in lines two through four,” Geller yelled. Dan backed against the superstructure as the line handlers hustled past. The smoke thinned. Cranes and trucks emerged from the murk, and the towering cliff of a cargo ship unloading in the next berth. A whistle blast. “Under way. Shift colors.”
No one was on the apron to see him off. Henrickson and McCall were gone, flown back to TAG. Ahearn had said good-bye with a three-fingered handshake at Camp Rowley, which would be handed over to the Pakistanis, Bangladeshis, and Indians, the hired hands of most UN peace missions. Still, on some obscure impulse, Dan lifted a hand in farewell as the gap widened, the engines thunked into gear, and the staring fish circled in a lazy eddy as the jetty began moving aft.
A day or two in Bahrain, then he’d fly home to brief Admiral Contardi on the results of his study. And also, testify before an investigating subcommittee looking into how the insurgent attack had taken the JTF by surprise. The Pentagon was still negotiating what questions he’d answer.
The surviving leadership of the Waleeli had signed a cease-fire. The Governing Council, now accepted as the de facto government, had asked the United Nations for a peacekeeping force to oversee militia disarmament and aid distribution. But there were disquieting rumors about General Olowe. Hints that the former sergeant major was only biding his time. Building up security apparatus and army for the final showdown with the clans still hostile to his rule. People who’d angered the new strongman, or become too close to the Americans, were quietly disappearing.
They’d tried hard in Ashaara. Had they succeeded? Or failed? They’d hoped to restore democracy, but turned the country over to another budding dictator. Tamped down violence, but only by imposing a terror of their own.
He listened to the roar as giant machines sucked grain from the cargo ship’s holds. They’d averted mass starvation, at least. Maybe that was the important thing.
The new, extended jetty slipped past, and he thought: No, that’s too pessimistic. We’re leaving some good things. Buntine’s legacy, what the gruff constructor had died building: a functioning, expanded terminal, capable of handling cargo for all upper Africa. For the airport, a lengthened runway, dozens of new buildings, radars and generators. Scores of new wells, generators, water and septic systems, clinics, and schools throughout the country.
Whether they’d still be standing stone on stone ten years from now depended more on Olowe and his successors, and Ashaarans at the local level, than on America or the UN.
The outside world could help, but only Ashaarans could build Ashaara. As had been true of every country on earth.
He strolled forward, stepping over the ground tackle, and looked out as the city slipped past. The baking rocks of the jetty. Behind them, the citadel and pullulating slums of the Old Town.
What would he report to Contardi, whose bidding had precipitated him into this maelstrom of drought and famine, war and anarchy? What did the admiral’s vision of transformation mean?
He couldn’t say technology didn’t have a place. He’d been impressed by the neural network’s success in teasing Al-Maahdi’s subterranean den out of a welter of background noise. CIRCE was a powerful tool, nearly as all-seeing as the witch for whom it had been named.
But its knowledge wasn’t perfect. And could never be.
The engines’ mutter lessened.
The little pilot clambered down, a bundle clasped in one hand. Food, most likely, though wine and cash were acceptable tips too. “Left twenty degrees rudder,” Geller said in the pilothouse.
Dan turned and walked aft. He pulled himself up a ladder, past the bridge, to the open cockpit atop it. Up here the warm air was clean, the exhaust streaming aft as they accelerated. Signal flags fluttered. The Stars and Stripes snapped on their halyard. He looked down on Geller’s shaved skull as the skipper shaded his gaze shoreward. Dan swung the Big Eyes that way too. Taking a long last look at the city; the embassy, windows flashing in the sun; the white beaches and rolling dunes as Africa fell astern. Sunlight flashed from the blue sea.
Maybe that would be his final report to Contardi. The admiral’s premise had been that a decision maker could achieve perfect knowledge. Predict the trajectory of every bullet. Identify every target that moved in the darkness. Penetrate the intentions of every tyrant.
But no matter now fine the digital net, chance would slip through. The wind changed. The human heart defied logic.
Which left human beings with . . . what? The conclusion that, since no result could be guaranteed, no effort should be undertaken?
No. Turning away would be a greater evil. When starvation and war threatened, those who could had to act. Or abandon any pretense of humanity.
To act at all was to accept that the outcome would be mixed. Proceed with caution and faith, doing the best they could, without selfishness and without fear—that was all mortal men could do.
Shading his eyes, he saw they were passing the sea buoy. Shoals to starboard, between them and the coast. Shoals to port, between the channel and Jazirat Shâkir. Shoals all around, and to guide them, only the marks human judgment had anchored here and there amid the boundless sea.
He hoped it would be enough for a safe voyage.
