Seaghost

by William H. Lovejoy

  Heusseini had learned about the mapping system available in the Sea Spectre’s computer but had also discovered some limitations. The maps of a few major harbors and bays were stored in the computer, but small waterways inland were not. The New River Bay in North Carolina was not. In fact, only the northern Atlantic and the Caribbean maps were accessible. Heusseini suspected that only the maps for the boat’s planned area of operations were input to the machine. The computer mapping function would have been useless to them in the Arabian Gulf without access to the appropriate software.

  It was also useless for most waterways inside the American continent. Badr had told them that the Americans had not planned on attacking their own installations with the boat. It brought a laugh.

  “How large is the contact?” Badr asked.

  “A medium-sized boat,” Kadar relied. “Two propellers.”

  “Range?”

  “Two thousand meters. Yards. This equipment thinks in yards. I do not.”

  Badr studied the night-vision screen. Soon, a set of running lights appeared, moving slowing toward them, but on the other side of the stream. They would clear each other by half a kilometer.

  Without permission, Heusseini went active on the radar, using only the forward antenna. He shut it off within seconds.

  “I see no other traffic,” he said.

  Badr thought it unwise to chastise the man about following orders at the moment. An argument would only disrupt the concentration of them all.

  Give me strength, Allah.

  “You must turn now,” Heusseini said.

  Badr could see for himself. The river took a ninety-degree turn to the right, past a point littered with trees. The shore on his right appeared swampy. The camera lens did not provide him with a decent view of the opposite shore. Through the windshield, the river’s edge was only a band of dense shadows against blackness.

  He made the turn, maintaining a steady speed of fifteen knots. Four kilometers later, he made a left turn, continuing inland. Ten minutes after that, the lights of the Camp Lejeune Marine Corps Base appeared.

  It was a large base located at the head of the bay. Geometric lines of streetlights defined it well, and a glow of more lights beyond would be the city of Jacksonville. As they closed with the base, the night-vision lens gave Badr a view of barracks, training fields, large maintenance-type buildings, and other unknown structures.

  He slowed the speed of the Sea Spectre three kilometers away from the base and glanced down at the armaments panel. It was active, its blue letters clear in the darkness of the cabin. Four green indicators at the top of the panel suggested that four missiles were in place on the launcher and that they were prepared for ignition.

  “Ahmed?”

  The confident voice responded at once. “Four missiles available, Colonel Badr. I have two more on the cranes, ready for reloading. I am clear of the missile bay.”

  “Omar?”

  “I am ready, Colonel. Targets?”

  “Choose large buildings. There is a truck park.”

  “Opening missile bay doors.” Heusseini touched a keypad.

  A green light.

  “Doors clear,” Rahman reported.

  Badr pulled the throttles all the way back. The boat slewed to the side a little as it slowed.

  Heusseini pressed another pad.

  “Launcher elevating. Locked in place,” Rahman said.

  “I am using electro-optical targeting,” Heusseini said.

  “You may fire when you are ready,” Badr told him.

  He switched his primary screen to the optical-tracking function. A green view of the Marine base appeared on the monitor, low on the screen, seen from the nose cone of the missile. A pair of automobile headlights snaked along one of the streets.

  WHOOSH!

  The missile launched directly ahead, the white-hot trail of its exhaust attacking his eyes through the windshield. He blinked his eyes, and when he opened them, the missile was a white dot dancing in the sky far ahead.

  He looked down at the screen. The view was jumping all about. Flashing lights sliding. Sky. Water. Lights again.

  Heusseini was having difficulty directing the missile with the directional keypads on the armaments panel. His fingers frolicked on the keys, pressing one, then another, as he sought to stabilize and direct the missile. He kept his eyes on his own screen.

  “You must relax, Omar,” Badr said.

  He heard the man take a deep breath.

  The picture steadied. An equipment park. Badr had a fleeting glimpse of large military trucks, personnel carriers, fuel tankers, and jeeps.

  The words “LOCK-ON” appeared in the upper right corner of the screen.

  The screen abruptly blinked to black, then to a new view from another missile as Heusseini abandoned his control of the first.

  WHOOSH!

  The second missile launched.

  Badr closed his eyes just in time.

  When he opened them, it took a half-second to locate the missile trail.

  The first missile drew his attention to it when it exploded. There was a brilliant yellow-red flash that was soundless in the night.

  The dull whump of the detonation followed a second later, very likely heard only because of the open missile bay doors. Most others sounds were filtered out by insulation and the headsets.

  He looked at his screen. A large building with a peaked roof.

  LOCK-ON.

  Blackness.

  WHOOSH!

  White-out through the windows.

  Another yellow-red flash on the shore as the second missile struck.

  At the truck park, orange-blue flames were starting to rise high. Smaller explosions peppered the view and the windshield as automotive gasoline tanks exploded.

  On the screen, another building. A barracks?

  LOCK-ON.

  Blank screen.

  New view.

  WHOOSH!

  “Retracting launcher,” Heusseini said. His voice was steady now, calm with the knowledge that he had met the challenge.

  “Launcher retracted,” Rahman reported. “I will reload with two missiles.”

  Badr felt the pride welling in himself. This was magnificent!

  The fourth missile slammed into a building and detonated. Four fires were raging around the base, spread across a three-kilometer arc. Heusseini’s accuracy was nothing he should boast about. He had merely locked his missiles onto whatever happened to be in view. Badr suspected that the first target, the truck park, was either a lucky fluke or had been under the guidance of Allah.

  He quickly switched his primary screen to the boat’s video camera view and eased the throttles forward to gain headway and control over the camera. Manipulating the computer keys, he found the formula to magnify the view by seven.

  In the enhanced view, he could see that dozens of trucks, jeeps, and personnel carriers were on fire. More of them exploded as he watched. Hoods and doors leaped into the air. The canvas coverings on troop carriers were aflame.

  Most of the buildings were made of wood, and structures adjacent to targeted buildings began to catch fire. The skyline was taking on a rosy hue.

  Panicked men were running everywhere. They were dressed in white underwear, streaking across the streets, around the corners of buildings. Lights were coming on in most of the buildings. A few of the men pulled fire hoses behind them.

  It was all very quiet. Within the insulated cabin of the Sea Spectre, with the headsets in place, they could not hear the screams and the agony. That much was disappointing.

  “Missiles in place,” Rahman reported.

  “Raising launcher,” Heusseini said.

  Within three minutes, the last two missiles detonated in yet two more areas of the base.

  There was fire everywhere. Fire trucks were now responding. Red and blue strobe lights blinked against the six separate infernos.

  “Retract the launcher, and close the doors,” Badr ordered. “We will now go see if
Abdul Hakim has deserted us.”

  Chapter 9

  0241 hours, CINCLANT

  The activity in the Operations Center was considerably more controlled than what was taking place in Camp Lejeune, Monahan thought.

  He had made the trip from his home to the Center in record time, arriving a few minutes before Admiral Clay. Fortunately, he had had fresh khakis on hand, and he felt and looked better than either of the admirals. Matthew Andrews had had his last Chivas and water not too long before he had received his call. He appeared a bit unsteady in his chair at the table, talking earnestly to someone in North Carolina.

  Bingham Clay came into the Center under full steam, tossing a briefcase toward one corner of the room. He came to a stop against the table, leaning into it, staring at the plotting board.

  “Tell me, Jim.”

  Monahan had come to his feet as soon as Clay appeared. “Not good, Admiral. The reports are still coming in, but it looks like they were hit with six missiles.”

  “Casualties?”

  Andrews, with a telephone pressed against the side of his face, responded. “I’ve got the hospital on the line, Bing. Ambulances are still coming in, but so far, we’re counting forty-two dead and one hundred and twelve wounded. Some of those are damned serious. The fatality count is going to climb. I’ve ordered aircraft to transport burn cases to San Antonio.”

  “Son of a bitch!” Clay snorted.

  One of the things that Monahan had always respected about Bingham Clay was the man’s concern for people. He worried about the men and women assigned to his command first and everything else second.

  “Matt,” the admiral said to the intelligence deputy, “you see if they need more medical help down there. If they do, you get it to them.”

  “Aye, aye,” Andrews said, and went back to the phone.

  “We got Washington in on this?” Clay asked.

  Monahan nodded. “Lieutenant Commander Horan is the duty officer. He called the CNO’s office right away, and they’re monitoring our board.”

  Monahan had a mental picture of the staff cars converging on the Pentagon. Someone would have gotten the President out of bed by now.

  “Targets, Jim?”

  “From what I’ve got right now,” Monahan waved the telex he was holding, “it looks sporadic. One wing of the headquarters building; a warehouse full of soft goods — bedding, uniforms, and the like; and a motor pool — fifty-six vehicles damaged at last count. Three barracks buildings were hit, and that’s where we took most of the casualties.”

  “Shit, shit, shit! Any doubt in your mind that it was the Sea Spectres?”

  “No sir,” Monahan said. “I think, though, that only one of the boats was involved.”

  “Why?”

  “Elapsed time of the attack. With both boats, we’d have had eight missiles launched in the first wave. There were only six total, and there was almost a five-minute pause from the first salvo to the second.”

  “They’re holding one of the boats in reserve, then?”

  “Yes. Or they’ve sent the other boat on to the Persian Gulf.”

  “Give me an impression, Jim.”

  Monahan took a minute to sift through the images in his mind. “I think the primary objective was shock value, sir. They didn’t go in with preset targets. The impact pattern is too random. There were other targets available that would have been more spectacular. Fuel and ammunition storage sites, for example.”

  “Matt?” Clay looked to Andrews.

  Andrews nodded while continuing to talk on the phone. His expression said he did not necessarily want to agree with Monahan but did not have a better alternative prepared at the moment.

  Clay pointed at the plotting board. There were so many symbols converging on the coast of North Carolina that it was difficult to read. “What the hell’s going on there?”

  “Task Force 22 is three hundred miles southeast. America has sent Tomcats and Intruders. Langley Air Base has put up F-15s. There’s some Coast Guard cutters in the area. Every naval installation within four hundred miles has scrambled air and sea search craft.”

  “Who in the fuck ordered that?”

  Monahan held off on an answer, and Andrews finally spoke up, “I did, Bing. We’ve got to pin that SOB down while we’ve got him in a known sector.”

  Clay frowned, slipped out of his uniform blouse, and tossed it on the chair next to him. He sat down.

  “Well, let’s get some order injected into it. Commander Horan, get a headset and stand by. Jim, you go find an airplane and get down to Lejeune.”

  *

  0250 hours, 30° 19’ North, 74° 12’ West

  The Prebble had joined up with Task Force 22 just after midnight. The flagship had stationed her three miles ahead and one mile to the port side of America.

  Since 0220 hours, Barry Norman had been pacing his bridge, pausing frequently to watch the flights of aircraft taking off from the carrier. Their afterburners streaked the horizon behind the destroyer.

  He was angry and frustrated. He was mad as hell about the success of the attack on the Marine Corps base. It made a statement, not only about the value of the Sea Spectre as an assault craft, but also about the complacency of American troops in a peacetime garrison.

  His frustration was a result of being stationed within the task force, when he should be closer to the scene. The Prebble had the best, if not the only, chance of locating Badr.

  “Bridge, CIC.”

  Norman recognized Perkins’s voice and crossed the deck to the intercom mounted on the bulkhead. “Bridge. Go ahead, Commander.”

  “Message just in, Captain. CINCLANT’s suggesting that only one boat was involved in the attack. All Safari elements are to continue observation of commercial vessels while simultaneously mounting the search in the North Carolina sector.”

  Norman had figured out sometime before that only one boat was involved. It was about time the commands figured it out, too. On the task force radio net, broadcast from the overhead speakers, he heard the flagship detaching some ships to continue surveillance of the tankers and freighters they had been dogging. The rest of the task force was given a new course heading.

  “Commander Perkins, send a message to CINCLANT, copy CINC TF22. ‘Commander, Prebble recommends her detachment at flank speed to scene of crisis. Rationale, Prebble mounts anti-stealth gear.’”

  “Right away, sir.”

  Twelve minutes later, Perkins called him back, unsuccessfully disguising the jubilation he felt. “Captain! We’ve been released from the task force! We’re now Safari Echo.”

  “It’s about damn time somebody started thinking,” Norman said. “Instructions?”

  “Wide open, sir. ‘Proceed at best possible speed. Engage search at your discretion.’”

  “Thank you, Commander.” Norman turned to the second mate, who had the watch. “Susan, give us a course for Onslow Bay. And we want every knot we can get out of her.”

  “Aye aye sir.”

  Norman went below to his quarters to catch a few hours of sleep but found himself spread out on his bunk, eyes closed, wide awake.

  He felt the vibrations as the turbines met the challenge of full power. The chief engineer would have all of his people on duty, watching those shafts.

  He kept thinking about that one boat.

  A damned terrorist could cause a lot more havoc using both boats. Since when did someone like this Ibrahim Badr think rationally?

  He did not want to underestimate Badr or anyone like him. As far as Arabic logic went, Norman was the first to admit he did not fathom it, but still…

  Terrorist groups were not known for holding back. Hell, if Norman was directing a similar operation and had both boats available, he would have used them.

  Devlin McCory.

  Norman had looked up his old correspondence with Devlin. Clear back in 1985, he had mentioned a design he was working on for a stealth boat. Twice more, in later letters, he had referred to it. There was nothi
ng specific, but he had sounded excited about it.

  But Devlin was gone. Only the boy was left, and Norman had no idea what had become of him. Kevin, that was the name. From the tone of Devlin’s letters, he suspected that father and son had been close.

  Maybe Kevin had Devlin’s drawings? Could he be helpful in tracking down the Sea Spectre?

  No.

  But Norman could not let go of it. He ought to tell someone.

  He sat up on the edge of his bunk and pressed the intercom button. “Comm, this is the Captain.”

  “Comm, Captain.”

  “Find me someone to talk to at CINCLANT. Somebody who’s working on Safari.”

  *

  1413 hours, Miami, Florida

  Rick Chambers had driven the full length of Florida, on the Gulf side, and he was getting tired. He hoped to hell that Malgard was right about this. By the time he found Kevin McCory, he was going to be in a mean mood.

  Since February of 1987, when the old man died, McCory had worked, or holed up, in six different marinas. So far.

  He was living aboard an old home-built cruiser named the Kathleen, and he worked a few charters or got himself a job on the docks for a few weeks before moving on.

  It hadn’t been easy. Chambers had followed a dozen false leads. “Guy named McCory? The Kathleen? Damn, seems to me ol’ Cap’n Eddie said he’d seen him over ’round Siesta Key. Might try there.”

  It got so Chambers didn’t know whether the good old boys were putting him on or not. Most of them kept their jaws clamped tight. They didn’t talk to Northerners who weren’t buying a charter. He was certain some of them had sent him on deliberate wild-goose chases.

  After a while, though, he learned to chat up the younger women hanging around the marinas. More often than not, Becky or June or Melinda would remember the handsome young master of the Kathleen and be happy to talk about him. More often than not, also, Chambers would see the yearning in their eyes. Pissed him off, is what it did.

  He took the Tamiami Trail across the city to the Atlantic side, turned north on Biscayne Boulevard, and pulled into the first convenience store he found. He got out of the green Taurus, stretched, and headed across the parking lot for the public telephone.

  Chambers had learned to search out the low-end marinas. McCory didn’t go for the world-class stuff. The trouble was, the yellow pages didn’t tell him what was first class and what was crumbling. Every advertisement pictured or narrated a state of the art marine operation.