Imagine (Black Raven Book 4)

by Stella Barcelona

  The sound of footsteps ascending the metal stairs snapped his mind back to reality. Hard-soled shoes. One person. Relatively light. In good shape. Surefooted. Fast.

  Raising his rifle, and holding his breath, he pressed his index finger within a hair of firing. The man reached the landing, with an immediate turn to face Ace. His eyes widened with surprise as he saw Ace and Marks. In the millisecond before Ace fired at the man on the stairwell, his brain absorbed who the guy was, and more importantly, who he wasn’t.

  Black hair, graying at the temples. Asian. No camo. Tuxedo. Shirt unbuttoned. No tie.

  Kill?

  No!

  Not a Quan Security operative.

  Ling Wen.

  As Ace realized he was within a hair of killing a guest who happened to be one of HUG’s most prized clients, Ling Wen assumed a squared firing stance and lifted a QBZ-95 to point it at Ace.

  “Don’t fire!” Ace raised his arms, and his rifle, overhead, while Marks, eased forward to stand on the same step as Ace, rifle lifted and aimed at Wen.

  “We’re friendly,” Ace said. “Put down your weapon.”

  “Prove it.”

  Fair enough.

  With a sideways glance at Marks, Ace said, “Stand down.”

  As Marks raised his arms and his weapon, matching Ace’s conciliatory stance, Ace locked eyes with Wen. “It took one hell of a lot of skill for me not to blow your brains out. You’re handling that weapon well enough to know that. Don’t make me regret my decision. Put the rifle down.”

  Wen kept the butt of his rifle at his shoulder. If the man was nervous, he did a damn good job of hiding it. Arms lifted, with no tremble. Steady focus through the sights. His right cheek was firmly planted against the smooth cheek surface on the stock, as he slowly shifted his aim from Ace’s face, to Marks, and back again. He had a solid stance, as though he knew what he was doing and wouldn’t flinch when he did it. Digging a fact on Wen from his memory bank, Ace remembered that the man owned weapons manufacturing facilities. Shit. Wen built the QBZ-95, for God’s sake.

  “I’m worth more alive than dead to you. Or your boss.” Wen spoke perfect English, without a trace of an accent. His tone was calm and cool. “For a while, at least.”

  “I’m not a hijacker, goddammit. I’m a guest. Zack Abrams,” Ace kept his voice low, mindful that even small sounds carried in the stairwell and, at any moment, the enemy could approach from above or below. “At six fifteen this evening my fiancée was playing craps two tables down from you. Golden skin. Metal halter top. Your wife kissed you before you rolled. You spotted me looking at the two of you. Right after we made eye contact, you rolled a ten.”

  Wen, studying Ace, kept the assault rifle aimed. “I recognize you. Explain why you packed combat gear for a gambling cruise.”

  Great question.

  “I’m a security contractor. I was undercover as a guest. Actually, I’m Adam Evans. You’re one of HUG’s clients. Your K & R coverage, and your wife’s, tops out at two billion Hong Kong dollars. Apiece. HUG hired my company to cover their ass in the event a kidnapping involves a ransom demand. So please, put down the goddamn rifle. I’ve got work to do.”

  “Name of your company?”

  “Black Raven.”

  As Wen eased the weapon down, Ace asked, “Where’s your wife?”

  “Where she won’t be found.”

  Ace sure hoped the man was right, but on his next breath, he had a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach. “Please don’t say in a crawl space.”

  Wen visibly flinched. “She is.”

  Aw. Hell. “They know other guests have hidden in crawl spaces, so they’re already searching them.

  He watched the man grow pale. His shoulders dropped, before his moment of weakness passed. “She’s not anywhere near our cabin.”

  “That might buy her some time, but I wouldn’t count on much.”

  “How many of you are there?”

  “Not enough,” Ace said, “yet. We’re working on making the odds better.”

  “We need to end this. We should go to the radio room.” Wen slung the rifle behind his shoulder.

  We? Great. A billionaire boy scout.

  Wen continued, “I was headed there to make a Mayday call.”

  “Got that covered.” Ace reached into his pocket for his extra screwdriver. “Catch.”

  Wen caught it with his left hand, looked at it, and glanced at Ace with what Ace thought was a puzzled look.

  “Screwdriver,” Ace explained. “Pivoting, telescoping head. You can use it from outside and inside the crawl spaces.”

  “I know what this is.”

  “Use it at the next entry panel. Slip into the crawl space. One of my agents is in there. I wouldn’t surprise her if I were you. Hide there until the ship’s secure, or use that crawl space to get back to your wife. If you do that, be ready to use that rifle.”

  “I’m not hiding.”

  “You should, and be prepared, because if they find your wife, they’ll use her as leverage against you. I just watched them kill one of the guest’s fiancée to get him to comply with their demands.”

  Anger sparked in Wen’s eyes. “If you think I’m going to hide, you have severely underestimated my capabilities.”

  Wen’s insistence that he would not cower proved that the man hadn’t accumulated his vast wealth without more than the usual dose of tenacity, coupled with a pair of balls that would have made a goddamn bull elephant envious.

  “Hide. Or don’t. My advice is hide. Whatever you do, stay out of our way. And let me be clear. Aiming a weapon at any Black Raven agent is a mistake, one that may prove lethal if you do it again.” He paused, eyeing Wen. “One more thing. Where did you get that rifle?”

  “My security. My men weren’t in their room when I awakened. But I knew where they kept their weapons.”

  Somewhat satisfied, and disappointed that Wen hadn’t acquired the rifle after killing a member of Quan security, Ace nodded in the direction of the descending stairwell. “Marks. Move out.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  2:07 a.m.

  As Ace and Marks replaced the entry panel, Leo realized that the steel walls of the crawl space provided too much interference with the signal Skylar was using. The signal wasn’t totally blocked, like the walls did with the Black Raven comm system in their helmets. The signal strength indicator on her laptop showed that her position gave her one of four possible bars of strength. She shimmied forward, moving her laptop closer to the vent. There, the indicator light showed two bars of strength.

  Shit!

  As tempted as she was to try, she knew that half strength wouldn’t be enough. To piggyback effectively on Skylar’s signal, and do it undetected, she’d need maximum signal strength. The signal’s two bars flashed, then became one, confirming her decision.

  No choice but to proceed to the radio room.

  She reached into her backpack, feeling for one of the small remote cameras. Finding it, she attached the orb-like camera to the vent. Once she established connectivity, she’d be able to pick up the camera’s signal and see what was happening in the theater, almost as though she’d stayed in position above the vent. Assuming she was able to reestablish a connection.

  After repacking her laptop and tablet, she belly-crawled forward, then turned sideways to get around an HVAC duct. As she turned, a smaller passageway leading off the main crawl space caught her attention. Her pre-job study of Imagine’s schematics indicated that the passageway led directly above the backstage area and dead-ended there. If she could get to the end, she’d be able to drop through a vent into a booth that housed stage props.

  The props booth was behind the drapes that were now drawn across the stage, as well as behind the on-stage acting area. It was essentially part of the stage, but designed so that theatergoers wouldn’t notice it, even when the curtains weren’t drawn. Through design tricks of sliding walls, black paint, and dark mirrors, the booth functioned as a closet of
sorts for stage props. It was virtually invisible to theatergoers. Most important for Leo’s purpose, the walls of the booth were not reinforced with steel. The thin walls, designed for maneuverability, would provide virtually no interference with jumping on Skylar’s Wi-Fi signal. It would be as though she and Skylar were both on stage, in the same room. Because they would be. Most importantly, there would be minimal interference with the signal he was using.

  Eyes straining, she studied the narrow passageway, jam-packed with tubes, wiring, and shiny silver HVAC apparatus. It was too small for Evans or any of the others. She’d only fit through it if she stripped off most of her gear. Even then, it would be tight. Yet she could do it, with bare-bones equipment. The next hurdle she’d face would be a significant drop from the ceiling to the floor of the props booth. If she remembered the schematics correctly, the ceiling over the stage sloped. At the props booth, it could be anywhere from twenty feet to thirty feet. Fortunately, Ace had added climbing rope to her stash of gear, when her mind hadn’t been functioning properly in their suite.

  On the plus side, she could get there faster than she could get to the radio room, and Skylar’s signal, if she could access it, was potentially a surer shot for a Mayday call. With Kamin already attempting a Mayday from the radio room, there was no down side

  Except that Ace wouldn’t like the idea of one agent advancing into the theater alone.

  Unfortunately, until she restored comms, there was no way to run the idea by him. Besides, when Ace deemed that the number of Quan operatives was sufficiently reduced, he and the other Black Raven agents would be entering the theater. It would help if she was already inside, at a point where she’d have full firing range of the room.

  Decision made, Leo quickly stripped down to the essentials. She kept her Glock and Sig Sauer, but left her rifle behind. She stripped off her backpack. Her laptop was encased with a material that was similar to the flexible body armor that she wore. She could use it in place of either her chest plate or back plate. She removed her back plate and shoved her laptop into the pocket where it had been. She tucked her other comm gear into the front of her shirt, along with her handgun clips. She slid climbing rope into the waistband of her pants and shoved carabiners into her pockets.

  As she contorted her body forward, moving as fast as she could, she breathed easier with each inch of forward progress. She focused on the tasks that she’d accomplish once in the props booth, which had to be performed quickly. Mayday. Restoration of agent-to-agent comms.

  Upon which many lives damn well depended.

  Chapter Fifteen

  2:14 a.m.

  Ace and Marks ran down the stairs, leaving Wen behind. On line sixteen, Skylar was silent, presumably preoccupied with the demands he was putting upon the hostages. Ace wondered how far Skylar had gotten in his wealth accumulation. How many hostages had been killed for incentive. Whether the brutal murder of Howell’s fiancée had been enough incentive for all of the hostages to comply with Skylar’s demands. And, what the hell Skylar was going to do with the hostages when he met his financial quota.

  Would he kill them anyway?

  Two Quan operatives talked as they climbed the stairs and rounded the landing. Focused more on each other than their surroundings, Ace realized that their lack of attention meant that the other agents hadn’t yet done anything to sound alarms.

  Could be a good or a bad sign.

  It did mean that Ace and Marks had surprise working in their favor. Ace fired at the one on the left, between the eyebrows. Marks killed the one on the right.

  Eight Quan operatives down. Maybe more, depending on Omega team’s success. As many as fifty-two remaining. Still too many.

  Sprinting over them, Ace and Marks continued down the stairs until they reached the bottom floor. They didn’t encounter any more Quan operatives on their way to the control area, which was a self-contained room. To get into the engine room, he and Marks had to go through the control room. Normal operation of the ship required two engineers monitoring systems that ran everything from toilet flushing to engine oil pressure.

  The control room door was open. Ace and Marks approached, slowly. Two camo-wearing Quan operatives were seated on either side of the closed engine room door, their backs to Ace and Marks. They weren’t paying attention to what was happening behind them.

  The one on the left said, in English, “Fuck. Cameras are on the blink.”

  “Again?” The one on the right said, without glancing at his co-worker.

  Over the Quan operative’s shoulder, Ace saw monitors that should’ve shown video feeds from internal engine room cams and elsewhere around the ship. Rather than showing live video, the monitors were dark. Good—Kamin had succeeded.

  As if sensing that they had company, the Quan operatives lurched to their feet, fumbling for their assault rifles. Ace and Marks fired while the Quan operatives were dicking around. One fell on the still-blank surveillance monitors. The other hit the workstation before sliding to the floor, leaving streaks of blood over blinking green numbers that revealed engine output data.

  Ten Quan operatives down. Maybe more, depending on Omega’s success. Fifty remaining. Still too many.

  Signaling Marks to shut the control room door, Ace crossed the narrow room to the engine room door, which was centered in the wall, between the two workstations. A round window in the door provided a view of the vast area containing Imagine’s four diesel engines, generators, HVAC units, fuel and bilge tanks, hydraulic systems, spare parts, and more. Composed of three platforms that stretched across the beam of the ship and spanned its length, the cavernous room was as large as the casino and twice the height.

  While his Black Raven comm remained dead silent, the Quan Security earbud crackled to life with the voice of an operative, speaking hurriedly in Mandarin.

  Skylar replied, in English, with a terse, “Repeat that.”

  As he listened, Ace peered through the window, into the engine room. At first glance, he didn’t see any Quan operatives. Only a wide expanse of a room, gleaming with white industrial paint and pristine equipment, silver-gridded pathways that provided access around the equipment, and yellow, red, and green safety lights. He refocused, then spotted a flash of camo. Port side. Second platform. Side walkway. Three Quan operatives were moving cautiously towards the engine room door, weapons lifted, as though they were expecting someone to come charging through, guns blazing.

  On line sixteen, the Quan operative whose excitement was getting in the way of effective communication, repeated his statements, this time in a mix of Mandarin and heavily accented English.

  Ace understood only a bit. Something about “controls,” “forward stairwell,” “dead,” and “two.” He heard enough to know why the Quan operatives in the engine room had raised their weapons and were more on guard than any he’d seen thus far. Evidently, the bodies of the two men that he and Marks had killed only moments earlier, in the forward stairwell, had been discovered.

  Skylar replied, “Ling. Tam. Go investigate. Bottom deck.”

  There was no reply to Skylar’s directive. The silence lasted long enough to make Ace pretty certain that the now-dead operatives who’d been working in the control room were Ling and Tam. Skylar confirmed Ace’s hunch by yelling for all available operatives to proceed to the control room and the forward service stairwell.

  Ace tuned out the replies, except to be aware that the number of different voices meant that he and his agents damn well had work to do before they had a prayer of overtaking Skylar in the theater and freeing the hostages. As Ace flipped the latches on the engine room door, Marks fired off a volley of shots that killed an Asian man who burst through the door of the control room.

  Marks once again shut the door. “Eleven Quans down. Maybe more, depending on Omega.”

  “Getting better,” Ace said. “We have three Quans in the engine room, ready to fire at us as soon as we go through the door, which opens on the middle platform. The two hydraulic pumps are
on the bottom platform.”

  Marks nodded. “Positioned twenty feet from the KVMB12s.”

  The younger agent’s technical reference to the Bergen-type main engines gave Ace a measure of comfort that Marks, who’d been undercover in the ship’s jewelry store, knew exactly where to go, what to do, and that he’d accomplish his task no matter the stress. “Once we get through the door, you’ll take port side. I’ll go to starboard. We’ll disable at the power take-off clutch.” Ace explained how he wanted connections severed. “We have to be able to put it back together, just in case we need to get the hostages off Imagine via life boats later.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Ace glanced again in the engine room through the circular window and found what he was looking for. “Three Quan operatives. Partially concealed. Port side, at a water expansion tank and hot well. Poised for firing.”

  “There’s access to the engine room on the stern,” Marks observed.

  “Correct. So the fact that there are only three is good news.” Ace thought about the agents that he’d sent to the stern of the ship, with the open-ended directive to whittle down Quan’s numbers. “Let’s take it as a sign that Omega team’s doing good work.”

  Three Quan operatives were enough of a problem to be a speed bump for getting through the engine room door. Ace intended to comply with what he considered to be a primary rule of close quarter combat; when entering a room, damn well live through the perilous act of crossing the threshold.

  Cons were that he and Marks faced three men with powerful weapons, superior tactical position, who were already in kill position, expecting someone to enter. I’ve faced worse. One pro for him and Marks was that both the expansion tank and hot well where the Quan operatives were hiding were designed to collect and release steam. Stupid hiding place. Also, the wall between the engine room and the control room was reinforced steel, designed to protect the ship in the event of catastrophic, explosive engine failure. Which meant he and Marks had some protection.