Deadly Impact--A Richard Mariner nautical adventure

by Peter Tonkin

  Richard found his own skills of self-control being exercised fifteen minutes later, almost immediately after Engineer Watanabe followed Captain Endo on to the forecastle. While the coastguard officers went into a very private conference and Watanabe’s engineers disembarked from the chopper behind him, the NIPEX engineer strode forward, hand held out. ‘Ah, Captain Mariner,’ he said with a smile. ‘I believe Captain Mrs Mariner would wish me to extend to you her greetings. She has been very concerned for your welfare.’

  ‘Mrs Mariner?’ Said Richard. ‘Has she been in contact with NIPEX?’

  ‘She had been with us in person, Captain. She attended the board meeting yesterday, fourteen hours ago. She is now on board Zemlya.’

  ‘Zemlya? What in hell’s name …’

  Watanabe cut him off. ‘She and Miss Asov went aboard at midnight. Their plan was to move her out of the path Sayonara would most likely take if she failed to stop at our NIPEX facility. I advised them that they should stay on board and continue to do so. Just in case.’

  ‘Let me get this straight,’ grated Richard. ‘You thought there was a chance that a fully-laden LNG carrier would collide with a nuclear power station, so you sent my wife and Miss Asov aboard the nuclear power station?’

  ‘Perhaps, therefore,’ said Watanabe with an unexpected grin, ‘we should try very hard to make sure this fully-laden LNG carrier does not collide with that nuclear power station.’

  Within the hour a skeleton crew arrived, with a pilot called Captain Ito, who was so august he might have been an emperor in a previous life. Without recourse to Rikki Sato’s expertise but in conference with computer engineers Esaki and Murukami, Engineer Watanabe ensured that the computers did not interfere when Captain Ito called for full power and the helmsman from the skeleton crew moved the engine room telegraph to Slow Ahead. Getting the engines ready had been Watanabe’s first order of business and they responded powerfully to the pilot’s instructions. Captain Ito called out speeds and headings. The helmsman echoed them. The engines delivered them.

  Richard stood narrow-eyed on the bridge where he had had so many recent adventures and observed the majestic progress Sayonara made across the last forty miles of her voyage from the Greenbaum International LNG facility in Anchorage, Alaska, to the NIPEX LNG facility in Choshi, Japan. The final two hours of what should have been a one-hundred-hour voyage. And the fact that it had been a ninety-eight-hour voyage continued to nag at him, especially as he was almost certain that when she reached her final destination at thirty-five point seven north, one hundred and forty point nine east, her computers – in spite of everything – would still be telling her that she was forty miles north as well as two hours early, so still had a way to go before her voyage was complete. A way blocked by a nuclear power station which had Robin and Anastasia on board.

  2 Hours to Impact

  Sayonara came into the NIPEX facility at four a.m. Japan Standard Time with the ship’s chronometer reading oh eight hundred hours. The pilot was in complete command of the bridge. His helmsman was quietly repeating his orders to reverse engines and, finally, stop engines. Had the docking manoeuvre been in any way complex, the pilot might well have been out on the starboard bridge wing using the ancillary docking equipment there. But this was a floating facility with a deep-water berth specifically designed for this one ship. And it was lit up like a fairground. The weather had moderated to an almost dead calm. There were no other vessels nearby except for those whose job was to help her to position alongside. A child could have berthed her.

  So Captain Ito remained at his ease in the pilot’s chair. Coastguard Captain Endo stood beside him. The lieutenant stood beside the captains. Engineer Murukami was in charge of watching the computers – a thankless task for they were behaving perfectly. NIPEX Engineer Watanabe was in the engine control room with ship’s engineer Esaki waiting for the final ‘finished with engines’ signal, which would be his cue to meet his team in the cargo control room and oversee the process of unloading the tanks. The facilities on the noon-bright NIPEX dock were all ready to begin unloading the cargo. There was an air of quiet satisfaction on board. And on the bridge, a palpable feeling that someone had been making a lot of fuss over nothing.

  Richard was out on the starboard bridge wing, where Captain Ito would have been if he had felt a little less confident, still certain that there was something they had all missed. He was right out on the uncovered section, surrounded by the redundant docking controls. Ivan was immediately inside the covered section with Richard’s laptop open across his massive thighs and his father’s portable hard drive attached to a port in the side. Harry and the Pitman sat opposite. All of them were notably disarmed. And, on the screen of Richard’s Galaxy, Robin made up the last of the team except for occasional reference to Anastasia who was sharing the control bridge of Zemlya, which was still sitting, unmoving, two hours’ sailing time to the south.

  ‘Right,’ said Richard. ‘Let’s go through this.’ He held the Galaxy near his face so that Robin could hear and see him. ‘The ’Ndrangheta. Both Robin and I have also heard of them, though this is the first time we have actually come across them mano a mano, so to speak. Its base is in Calabria and it more or less runs the port of Gioia Tauro. It is import/export brand leader for cocaine coming in from South America and going on across Europe and the north. Because of increasing public awareness and Italian government pressure, a capo of one of the most powerful ’Ndrangheta clans is planning to expand his business overseas. He is already moving his influence through Europe and across the old Soviet Union, using Italian ex-pat communities in the same way as the Triads are said to use Chinese ones. This man Francisco Lazzaro was able to infiltrate Sayonara’s insurance syndicate because he supplied desperately needed funds just at the moment Tristan’s Italian wife walked out on their marriage and their business – and took her family fortune with her. Lazzaro has apparently decided to finance this expansion by over-insuring Sayonara and sending a team of mercenaries aboard to ensure that she and her cargo are lost; something that will net him and his people one hundred and twenty-five million dollars of pure profit – if he can pull it off. But that’s not all. According to the FSB, extrapolating the word of one of their spies, since unfortunately deceased, the loss of Sayonara will lead directly to the ’Ndrangheta being able to take over Bashnev/Sevmash and use their legitimate shipping and distribution systems for the transport of cocaine, which means that Sayonara must not only sink but she must do so in a way that damages Bashnev.’ He stopped. As there were still no interruptions, he focused his intense blue gaze on Robin’s face, which filled the screen of his Galaxy. ‘Which brings us to Zemlya. It seems logical that Lazzaro plans to use Zemlya to sink Sayonara, thus destroying at least one and probably both vessels. Bashnev shares will crash on the stock market and Lazzaro will buy the company for a song. He might even plan to do the same to Heritage Mariner if our shares are hit. But that means the two vessels must collide.’ He stopped again, thinking. The vantage point of the bridge wing showed him how close Sayonara was to docking, and how little time he had left to complete his thoughts.

  ‘But how is he planning to ensure a collision? Both of these vessels are so carefully watched, and fenced round with so many cut-outs and fail safes. A collision such as they plan is even more difficult to arrange than crashing one plane into another – and on purpose, in a post-9/11 world. And we’re still not sure how they have planned to pull it off. But it has obviously involved an intricate set-up. Members of the A Team have been targeted as double agents. Pressure has been brought on those with any contact with Italy, most obviously Rikki Sato. How did Lazzaro get the names of the Japanese team members? Perhaps through Rikki. But how did he get the Risk Incorporated names?’

  Ivan looked up. ‘My bad,’ he said gruffly. ‘I let Aleks pick his own team.’

  Richard nodded. ‘So that confirms it. Aleks must have been one of Lazzaro’s men as well. But don’t give yourself a hard time. Remember, Dom DiVito
and Steve Penn were feeding him information too, by the look of things. They knew everything Greenbaum International knew about the cargo and, via Greenbaum’s contacts with us, everything Heritage Mariner knew about the ship and the crew, and the A Team. But not about me choosing to lead them. Nor about Harry and the Pitman until it was too late for them to interfere. And in any case, Tristan Folgate-Lothbury was feeding them everything we told Lloyd’s and our insurance syndicate about, probably in all innocence, just passing on whatever he was asked to the man who appeared to be his saviour and guardian angel. Which was, of course, everything.’ He looked down at the bustle on the deck below as Captain Ito’s men came out, preparing to throw the mooring lines on to the dock. And the dock was bustling with men waiting to receive them. Time was running out now.

  ‘So the not so angelic Lazzaro suggests to Tristan that he try one more security test,’ Richard continued. ‘But he substitutes his own team for Tristan’s. The exchange happens on Hawadax Island and the old team end up floating in Rat Island Pass and frightening the life out of the local fishermen. He can make the suggestion of the final security test as I say because he has agreed to back Tristan financially after the Folgate-Lothbury marriage hits the rocks and his ex-wife cuts off access to her father’s fortune, perhaps at Lazzaro’s suggestion – more Calabrians.’ He paused. ‘Now, where was I? Ah, yes. There is some kind of confrontation on Hawadax Island and Tristan’s team end up in Rat Island Pass. In much the same way, he ends up in the Thames. Macavity and his men come aboard. Tristan has warned Lazzaro that the A Team will respond, and so Lazzaro makes it part of his plan that certain members of the A Team, whose details are fed to him by Alex, are bribed, blackmailed or whatever. Or there are already mafiosi in place, like these guys at Duisberg Reinsurance in Vancouver.’

  ‘OK,’ the Pitman interrupted. ‘They come aboard, but what do they do? They piss about with dud grenades and signal blockers that are not attached to bombs after all …’

  ‘They keep us occupied,’ said Richard. ‘But they do so in a way that does not endanger the ship. They can’t risk a shoot-out like the one on Hawadax Island because they haven’t got complete control of the A Team, which is well armed and up for a fight, and although their bullets won’t penetrate the tanks, ours will when we start shooting back. They muck about with the programmes, make enough changes to spook us and get the already compromised A Team out, secure in the knowledge that the man who wrote the computer programmes, the man who will therefore be in charge of undoing the damage, is completely under their control. So, up to the point that Harry became involved, the plan was for Rikki to make things worse, not better. Which also explains why Aleks was so keen to proceed so slowly and so calculatedly by the book. Then the storm shut everything down and Harry managed to sneak some sort of control into the system after all, which has brought us to this point. To safe haven. Except …’ Richard watched the first lines snake towards the dock. The NIPEX men there caught hold of the light lines, crossed to winches and fothered them on, ready to pull the heavy mooring lines ashore. Sayonara was all-but docked.

  ‘Except?’ demanded Robin, her voice seemingly as distant as he, in fact was, nearly forty miles further south on board Zemlya.

  ‘Except that we’re missing something,’ said Richard. ‘Something vital.’

  On the command bridge, Captain Ito gave his final order to the helmsman – the last words of a pilot’s job well done. The tugs were snugging Sayonara safely against the fenders of her berth. The voyage was over. There was nothing to do but to get those on board onshore and start to unload the cargo. ‘Finished with engines,’ ordered Captain Ito. The helmsman put the engine room telegraph levers into their final position.

  And then the opposite of what should have happened, happened. Sayonara’s computers came alive. Her helm froze at Dead Ahead, her engines came up to the top of the green and the vessel surged forward out of the dock, tearing her mooring lines off the shoreside winches as she gathered pace, heading inexorably, unstoppably, south towards Zemlya.

  Impact

  Suddenly the starboard bridge wing was very crowded. Captain Ito appeared beside Richard. ‘Have you done this?’ he shouted. Captain Endo and the special ops lieutenant were at his shoulder, both looking confused and angry. Sayonara’s last mooring line snapped with a sound between a gunshot and a whip-crack. The bridge radio became a babble of questions from the shore. Richard held his hands up. ‘Nothing to do with me.’

  ‘Richard! What’s going on?’ demanded a distant voice. Richard cautiously lowered his Galaxy. ‘Looks like you and Anastasia had better get ready for company,’ he told Robin. ‘Sayonara’s on her way south again and no one on board seems to have any idea what’s happening.’

  ‘Bloody hell!’ she answered. ‘You’d better find out and stop it. In the meantime, Anastasia and I will try to move this thing out of your way.’

  ‘To hear is to obey,’ said Richard. He turned back to Captain Ito, who had swung round to watch the vanishing facility with unbelieving eyes. But it was not the pilot he needed to speak to most urgently. ‘Lieutenant, I really need to talk to Doctor Sato. Whatever programme has just taken over, he either put it in place or has a good idea of who did. And what it’s designed to do.’

  The lieutenant hesitated. ‘We have two hours,’ Richard emphasized. ‘The programmes have been fooled into believing that the final GPS position Sayonara has been heading for is forty miles south of here. And that’s where she’s going now, at full speed. In just less than one hundred and twenty minutes, the computers will have delivered her safely to her destination. But there’s no dock there, just a nuclear power station. A power station that we probably won’t be able to close down, uncouple and move out of the way in time.’

  The lieutenant opened his mouth to speak, but he was prevented from doing so by his personal radio. ‘Can anyone hear me?’ came Engineer Watanabe’s unmistakable voice, loud enough for all to hear and, like the pilot’s, lacking its usual reserve. ‘What hakuchi ordered Full Ahead Both? What baka’s at the helm?’

  ‘It’s the computers,’ answered the lieutenant. ‘Captain Mariner is on his way down to see if he can override them.’

  ‘Harry,’ said Richard, already stepping through on to the covered bridge wing. ‘I’ll need you. Lieutenant, tell Mr Watanabe I want Mr Murukami through in the sick bay as soon as possible. And then could you find some way of contacting the Japanese Embassy in Rome. Find Yukio Sato, postgrad student of Applied Economics at the University of Cosenza. Ivan has her address.’

  ‘It won’t be easy, but I’ll try. However, I must ask, what’s the point of doing this?’

  ‘She’s Rikki Sato’s daughter. I’m pretty certain that the men who arranged this are threatening her but I need her father’s full and immediate cooperation. That’s our best chance.’ He looked around. ‘The rest of you can go back on the bridge and I suggest that someone starts talking to the people onshore; beyond that, it doesn’t really matter where you are if the computers are conning the ship.’

  ‘Conning,’ said Harry as they ran down the rickety companionway. ‘Now there’s a good word. We’ve all been conned, not just Sayonara!’

  ‘You can say that again,’ agreed Richard. ‘You see what they’ve done? Having Macavity and co. vanish, leaving the ship ready to be brought home, then allowing Captain Ito to pilot her in, took the heat right out of the situation. Everyone relaxed. I bet that not even the Japanese navy could get a ship to us in less than two hours now. Not at four a.m. There’s no ship nearby with enough power to stop Sayonara or even to get a line aboard and tug her off course. I don’t see how they could disable her, though if they had a submarine handy they could try and blow the propellers off. I’d guess even Mitsubishi would have trouble scaring up a team of engineers capable of coming aboard and killing the engines at this time of night. The only alternative to crippling her that I can see is to blow her up, which would make one hell of a bang. And which they can’t do while we’re
on board, I hope. But two hours isn’t enough time to get us off – unless we all go over the side. And, of course, Macavity took the only lifeboat when he jumped ship. You’ve got to admit, it’s pretty sodding neat. They get their men off safely, make the authorities relax, apparently put us back in control while disguising the fact that their plan is still very much alive. For Lazzaro and co. it’s a win, win, win situation!’

  ‘But we can’t just let Sayonara collide with a nuclear power station!’

  ‘That’s what I’m saying, Harriet. I’m damned if I can see how they can stop her. Not in less than two hours.’

  ‘So it’s down to us, then.’

  ‘Looks like it, one way or another. Do or die.’

  Murukami met them in the sick bay as ordered and the three of them crouched round Rikki’s bed while the lieutenant’s men stood suspiciously in the background. The chief computer engineer responded only groggily to Richard’s urgent hand on his shoulder and blinked owlishly. He tried to sit up but flinched as his wounds tore and he fell back, suddenly pale. He eased his twisted neck, clearly in even more discomfort but more focused, as though the pain had kicked his brain into gear. ‘Where are my glasses?’ he slurred. Murukami passed them to him, then slipped an arm round his shoulders and supported him into a sitting position. ‘What happened?’ asked Rikki. ‘Last thing I remember I was on the bridge.’

  ‘The windows came in. You were badly cut up and washed headfirst down the companionway. We were told you had fatal lacerations and probably a broken neck. You were left for dead,’ Richard explained.

  ‘Captain Mariner has saved your life, Rikki,’ emphasized Murukami. ‘Now he needs your help to save the rest of us.’