Medusa Rising

by Cindy Dees

  The Roosevelt wouldn’t arrive for an hour. And it would take more time after that for the Marines to board the Grand Adventure. Two hours before the Medusas would have real help.

  In two hours this thing would be long over. One way or another.

  No way around it. The Medusas were on their own.

  Aleesha paused casually inside the Safari Lounge, on the top step of the five shallow stairs that led down onto the floor of the restaurant. Quickly she glanced at the four terrorists standing in each of the four corners of the room. She was looking for someone she recognized and had struck a rapport with. Over there. To her right. One of the shortest, dark-haired Americans. He’d always been polite to her, if not particularly warm.

  “Hey. What’s up?” she asked him boldly. “The lights in my room went out. Why are all these women in here?”

  “Christ, Aleesha,” the guy snapped. “Get out of here. Go back to your room and lock the door.”

  “Why?” she demanded, striding toward him. Okay, Vanessa. Anytime now. If she didn’t have the full attention of the terrorists now, she wasn’t going to get it.

  Then she heard the sound she’d been waiting for. Quick bursts of MP-5s behind her. The guy she’d been talking to and his buddy swung their weapons up and appeared to commence firing in superslow motion. She dived for the floor. She shot up at the friendly American from underneath her sack of gear. He dropped, his chest exploding toward her in a mass of lung tissue, bone and blood.

  Whether it was her shot that killed him or a shot from one of her teammates, she had no idea. Either way, remorse speared through her. The accumulation of blood on her hands was starting to get inside her head. What was she doing? She was running around like some killing machine, knocking out everyone she saw. She was a healer, for God’s sake. Wasn’t there some other way? Could she drop these guys with nonlethal shots? Maybe just take them out of action and not kill them?

  But she knew they were soldiers. They’d go down fighting, just as she and the other Medusas would. All of them understood the rules of engagement here. This was a fight to the death. And if she needed a reason for why she was doing it, all she had to do was look around the room. Literally hundreds of women sobbed in relief or stared in shock. These were innocents. They hadn’t asked to be here.

  Vaguely she heard Vanessa giving her speech about the women hiding or arming themselves and joining the Medusas in the Deck 10 pool area if they wanted to help take back the ship. In a strangely detached frame of mind, Aleesha considered Vanessa’s choice of a rendezvous spot. It made sense. The terrorists would scatter throughout the passenger and crew areas of the ship, looking for the children, and the pool deck was nothing but a large open area with glass railings and deck chairs by the hundreds. Nowhere for anyone to hide. The hijackers would ignore it. And by now, all the Tangos who were planning to hunker down on the bridge would already be there. Best of all, the bridge took up the entire forward section of Deck 10. It was only a short walk from the pool area.

  The women in the restaurant surged one way and then back the other in riotous panic. Aleesha shouted at the women nearest to her, “Those two guys over there are still alive. We’ve got work to do elsewhere, so you’ll have to finish them off. Can you do that?”

  Aleesha reeled back from the bloodlust that lit up in the women’s eyes. Yikes! No wonder folks said what they did about not tangling with an angry woman. She backed away from the two badly wounded hijackers as a horde of at least two dozen women jumped on each of them, kicking and punching, swinging chairs and anything else heavy they could lay their hands on. It was a brutal sight. She wouldn’t wish that kind of death on anyone, not even these men. A few days ago she’d seen them as monsters in need of killing. But now she knew their names. Knew how they took their coffee. Fortunately, both men had already been nearly dead and hadn’t suffered much. But it wasn’t a sight she’d soon forget.

  The head count of eliminated stood at eleven Yankees and five Frenchmen. That left eight Tangos, assuming the woman had shown herself and joined her companions. But Michael was included in that number, so it was really seven against the Medusas’ six. She hoped. No, she prayed. Michael had to be one of the good guys. She knew it in her heart. Now she just needed him to confirm it in her head.

  “I think I just heard Viktor order all his remaining men to fall back to the bridge,” Vanessa said over the radio.

  Just great. They could barricade themselves in there for a good long time. It was practically a fortress. And the Medusas would have to go in and take it by brute force, the way they’d dreaded doing. This time they didn’t get to cheat like they had in the Norfolk scenario. Seven on six. Not bad odds at all. They’d trained against much worse. Hopefully, Viktor hadn’t crammed too many hostages on the bridge with him. Depending on how crowded the room was, they could have a hard time getting clear shots at anyone.

  And Michael…saints preserve him! He would surely be on the bridge. How was he going to get out of this alive? There wasn’t a damned thing she could do to stop her teammates from taking him out along with all the other terrorists when the shit hit the fan. The SEALs had been set up. Attacked. And Michael had said nothing that could’ve saved them. If he’d known about it, then he’d broken faith with the Medusas. And now they probably thought of him as just another terrorist. They’d kill him like one, too.

  Chapter 19

  Getting to Deck 10 proved to be very easy. The remaining terrorists had apparently already made their way to the bridge, and the coast was clear for the Medusas as they headed up to the swimming pool. They still used a threat formation and leapfrogged positions as they moved forward, though.

  Aleesha was on point, just peering out of the aft stairwell onto Deck 9 when two people came into sight. She swung her MP-5 at them, but jerked it up and away as she realized it was a pair of middle-aged women.

  “Over here,” Aleesha called out quietly.

  The two women jumped, frightened out of their skins. They turned toward her, and she saw they were both brandishing butcher knives. “Are you those girl soldiers who are going to save us?” one of them asked.

  Aleesha replied, “Yes. Come over here. We’re headed up to the pool now. You can come with us.”

  The women’s shoulders sagged in relief. She had to give them credit. They were scared spitless, but they were out here anyway, obviously willing to help take back the ship. Aleesha directed the two civilians into the middle of their formation beside Isabella and Kat. With a quick hand signal to her teammates, Aleesha moved out once more. One more flight of stairs. She raced up the steps and paused inside the Deck 10 stairwell. The rest of the Medusas and the two civilians joined her. Vanessa twirled a finger beside her head and pointed out the door. The signal to go.

  Aleesha burst outside low and fast, spinning to the right side. Misty spun out to the left, and Karen and Vanessa moved straight ahead. There was a collective gasp from in front of them, and Aleesha gaped in surprise. There had to be close to a thousand women up here! The entire pool deck was crammed with women holding all manner of improvised weapons, from fire axes to mops and everything in between. The Medusas straightened, looking at each other in disbelief. Practically every woman on the ship had shown up to help them!

  A murmur from the women swelled around them. Crap. They had to keep the women quiet! Aleesha jumped up on the nearest chaise longue and raised her hands, palms down, signaling urgently for silence. Thankfully, the noise subsided rapidly.

  She announced clearly enough so her voice would carry, but not in a shout that would ring throughout the ship, “Give us a minute, ladies. We weren’t expecting this kind of turnout. And please, keep as quiet as you can.”

  She stepped down and huddled with the other Medusas. Vanessa was just saying, “What are we going to do with all of them? They’ll get in the way if we take this many.”

  Aleesha shrugged. “Yeah, but you have to give them all a role to play. They’re jonesing to get revenge on the SOBs who’v
e terrorized them for the last several days.”

  “Ideas?” Vanessa asked.

  Aleesha remarked, “You know, I’ve been thinking about that take-the-bridge scenario back at Norfolk ever since we did it. It always bothered me that we went around the real test. And I was wondering. What if we take a couple of fire hoses with us when we break onto the bridge? If we shoot a full-pressure stream of water at the terrorists, I think it might knock them off their feet, maybe disarm them. It would also obscure their vision. And I expect it would change the trajectory of any bullets passing through it enough to throw off the their aim a little.”

  Vanessa nodded slowly. “We could use a couple dozen of the strongest women to hold the hoses for us. That would leave us free to fire our own weapons around the wall of water. But what about the other thousand women up here? We’ve got to get them away from the firefight.”

  Aleesha shrugged. “Tell half of them to go guard the lifeboats and keep the terrorists from getting off the ship in case they make a run for it. Send the other half—preferably the mothers—down to act as human shields for the children.”

  The others nodded along with Vanessa. “They know you, Mamba. You tell them what to do and where to go.”

  She nodded, then jumped back up onto her chaise longue and announced, “I need about two dozen of the strongest of you to help us take over the bridge of the ship. It will be dangerous and you’ll potentially get caught in the middle of a gunfight. In a minute, I’ll need the rest of you to split into two groups. I want all the mothers to go to where we’ve hidden the children and guard them. The rest of you will need to go to Deck 5 and guard the lifeboats. It’ll be your job to keep the terrorists from getting off the ship if they make a run for it. Understood?”

  Nods all around.

  “Okay. Volunteers to help storm the bridge, step up here to my teammates. Moms to my left, everyone else to my right. Let’s move, ladies.”

  About forty women stepped forward to help them take the bridge. Vanessa quickly picked out the ones among them who looked the strongest and told them to go talk to Misty. The other sixteen or so women were sent down to take charge of the mothers guarding the children. Karen took them aside to give them some extra directions while Aleesha walked over to a group of some two hundred women and told the mothers exactly where the children where hiding.

  “What are we supposed to do?” one of them asked her. Many others nodded at the question.

  There wasn’t much she could teach the women in two or three hurried minutes, but she supposed anything was better than nothing. She told the women to post lookouts, to set up something to trip or slow down anyone who approached, to find positions where they could take cover if someone shot at them and, if they attacked a terrorist, to overwhelm him with a lot of women at once, striking him hard and fast en masse.

  Then it was time to go.

  Except a woman stepped forward, out of the crowd of mothers, and placed a restraining hand on her arm. The soft-looking woman grasped her with a surprising strength that would not be ignored.

  “We’ve got to go, ma’am,” Aleesha said as she unsuccessfully tried to disengage her arm.

  “There’s something you have to do for me.”

  Aleesha stared, arrested by the woman’s urgency. “What’s that?”

  “Kill my husband.”

  “Are you Susan Dupont?”

  The brunette nodded. “Promise me you’ll kill him. He’s a monster. My little boys will never feel safe until he’s dead.”

  Aleesha answered grimly, “I expect most of the people on this ship feel the same way. We’ll stop him for good. I promise.”

  The woman nodded and her hand fell away. “Godspeed.”

  Her jaw set, Aleesha gave the signal to move out.

  As they moved toward the bridge, she split the impromptu hose company into two groups of twelve women. “Ladies,” she told them, “you get to be two fire-hose crews. In a few minutes I’m going to unlock the door of the bridge, and you’re going to open fire with full pressure streams of water from both hoses. Have any of you ever had the opportunity to man a fire hose?”

  Negative head shakes all around.

  “Well, they’re like trying to hang on to a really mad python. They’re going to throw you all over the place if you don’t hang on to them really tight. You’ll need to work together. Follow the lead of the woman in front. She’ll aim the nozzle and the rest of you are there to provide muscle for her.”

  She looked around, picking out two muscular women who didn’t look completely terrified yet. “How would the two of you like to be the leaders?”

  Both women nodded resolutely. For a bunch of civilians, these ladies were stepping up to the plate big-time. She couldn’t help but be impressed. She peeled off her bulletproof vest and Isabella followed suit. They passed the garments to the two hose crew leaders.

  “What I need you two to do is point the water at everyone on the bridge. Don’t worry about hitting any hostages they might have up there. The water won’t kill them. It will probably knock everyone down, however. And that’s the idea. We need you to knock weapons out of bad guy hands, blind the terrorists and distract them so we can shoot them. Got it?”

  “Got it,” the two women replied in unison.

  She declined to tell them that they’d undoubtedly get shot at and maybe hit during the assault. Just as undoubtedly, they already knew it. It was funny how extraordinary courage showed up in the oddest places. Here were two women who’d expected nothing more than a nice vacation, and they’d just volunteered to risk their lives for the good of everyone else aboard this ship.

  “Who are you guys, anyway?” one of the women asked her.

  Aleesha shrugged. “Just a bunch of soldiers trying to help out.”

  They both looked skeptical, and one said aloud, “Yeah, right. I didn’t fall off the turnip truck yesterday.”

  Vanessa spoke from behind her. “We need to roll before the hijackers get any more time to organize. Are you ready, Mamba?”

  Aleesha nodded and gestured her teams to follow her. They reached the first fire-hose station just beyond the stairwell. Kat pulled out a glass cutter and sliced open the glass window covering the coiled hose. While Karen fed it out to them, the first team of women hauled it forward, getting a foretaste of what was to come in manhandling the hose. The good news was they’d only have to drag it a few yards once it was full of water, and then they’d only have to point it side to side.

  The second hose station came into view. It was mounted in a curving section of wall, barely out of sight of the bridge doors. Kat crept forward, cutting the glass again. She fed the hose back carefully, keeping it close to the wall. The second team of women got into position. The Medusas fanned out in a fighting formation in front of the two teams of women. Crouching low, they sidled forward along the wall.

  Aleesha took point, since she was the team’s lock-picking expert. Her surgeon’s fingers had a magical touch for opening just about any lock. The curve of the wall was so gradual that a periscope wouldn’t do any good. She just had to press forward and hope for the best. The outer edge of the porthole in the right-hand bridge door came into view. She took one last look over her shoulder at Karen and got a quick nod. Everyone behind her was ready to go.

  She dived forward, aiming for the floor just under the door. She rolled to a silent halt inches from the panel. According to the engineers from the Adventure Cruise Line, the bridge doors were bulletproof, ironically to keep the ship from being hijacked. So, down here, she ought to be safe from gunfire. She looked up at the lock above her. Oh, boy. It was a complicated double-action dead bolt augmented by an electronic keypad. This was going to be a bitch to get through. And the longer it took her, the more time the Tangos had to put a plan together.

  And then something tickled at the edges of her memory. She wondered…was it possible? She reached up, and very carefully gave a tug on the door. It cracked open, maybe a millimeter. Sonofagun. He’d
remembered. Michael said he’d leave the door unlocked and he actually had. God bless him.

  She flashed a hand signal over her shoulder, and the Medusas slid into place behind her, the fire hoses in their midst. The signal was passed back to turn on the water. A hissing sounded behind her. They waited just until the hoses were engorged and rock hard. The civilians got a solid hold on them and nodded grimly. The women who’d turned on the valves joined their teams, and they were ready to go. It typically took several strong firemen to manage a hose. These dozen women had their hands full, but they could manage the beasts.

  Vanessa gave the go signal.

  One of the radio techs called out from behind Jack, “We’re coming into range for the parabolic microphones.”

  The Roosevelt had deployed giant listening devices in an attempt to hear what was going on aboard the Grand Adventure.

  “What’s our range from the target?” he called out.

  A guy at the radar station answered, “Eighteen miles.”

  Close enough for the cruise ship to see them coming, and too far away to do a damned thing to help the Medusas. Especially since they’d had to slow down and employ anti-mine tactics. Frustration churned in his gut. Jack whirled and headed to the radio panel. He picked up one of the extra headsets and slapped one clamshell over his left ear. He was still monitoring the operating frequency the Medusas were using with his right ear, but they’d gone radio silent in the last several minutes. They should be setting up their run at the bridge right about now.

  A chatter of French voices erupted in his left ear. Someone was calling out the range of the vessels closing in on the cruise ship. That would be the Roosevelt task force the hijackers were seeing on radar. Someone else was shouting about none of the Americans answering the radios. A furious voice shouted over the din, barking out commands in French. Viktor.

  He was ordering men to shoot every woman on the ship. He was ranting and raving about it not mattering if the Americans were dead. They were pigs, anyway. He was demanding that Michael organize a team to kill every woman they could find. In one particularly manic moment, it sounded like he must be holding a gun to the head of one of the female ship’s officers, for he screamed about blowing her brains out this minute.