Hell's Choir (NICHOLAS SHARP THRILLER SERIES Book 3)

by Mark Mannock

  “You don’t owe us, Mr. President. After fighting beside you as we broke out of the terrorist’s camp and watching you stand up for those parents and children, I’m certain you’d have done the same thing in our position.”

  Blake remained silent.

  “If you don’t mind me asking, sir, how does it feel knowing you are stepping back into the Western world as the number one man?” Greatrex had never been never comfortable with thanks; changing the subject was his workaround.

  “I can tell you this was never my plan. I only came on board as vice president with the proviso that it would be a one-term thing. Some heavy hitters in the party, who I respected, made a persuasive case. His heart problem didn’t seem a consideration at the time.”

  “So, you didn’t sign up because of President Carlton?” I asked, probably stepping over the line.

  Blake hesitated for a moment. “I shouldn’t really say this, but no. I stepped up despite Carlton and what he stood for. Please keep that to yourselves.”

  “Well, now you don’t have anyone else to answer to, you can do things your own way, Mr. President,” said Greatrex.

  Blake turned away from us, staring out over the water toward the darkening horizon. “Yes, I suppose I can operate more independently now, but I disagree with you, Jack. I still have a boss, in fact I have around three hundred and twenty-eight million bosses.”

  Greatrex looked suitably humbled.

  “Not only that,” continued Blake, “I’m accountable to every serviceman who defends our democracy. In particular, I’ll work for the families of those Secret Service agents and US Air Force personnel who lost their lives in the last few days trying to protect me. I will be their president.”

  The three of us remained silent for several minutes, listening to the sound of water splashing on the boat’s hull.

  “Sorry to get so serious,” said the president. He then let out a slight chuckle.

  “What is it, sir?” I asked.

  “I was just thinking, Nicholas, about the offer to share a return ride to the States with you, back at the hotel in Khartoum.”

  I nodded.

  “Who would have thought the ride would end up being a sail down the Nile in a rusty old ferry.”

  After the laughter, the silence soon returned. I looked out into what had now become a windless desert night. We remained far from home with a long way to go. At the edges of these borders, hidden among the righteous communities of Sudan and Egypt, lurked some terrible people. They would do anything to get their hands on the president of the United States. Right at the moment, our leader was vulnerable, traveling with only two unarmed men to protect him on a journey through a hot bed of volatility.

  I knew with certainty the Shararaa, and those like them, wouldn’t stop. I also knew they wouldn’t hesitate to kill twenty innocent children and their families to get their man. Our man.

  I just stared out into the darkness. They were out there somewhere. I could feel it.

  Chapter 22

  They came two hours later.

  I was prowling the lower deck, lost in my own thoughts, when I heard the engines. At least two outboards, possibly more. I moved toward the stern of the ship. Through the darkness, I saw two lots of white foam forming V-shapes around two small craft. They traveled at speed, engines straining. A crewman materialized next to me as I peered out over the railing.

  “Is this normal?” I asked him.

  “No, it’s too early,” he said in faltering English. “The Egyptian authorities usually come later. They board and then process people. We are still in Sudanese waters.”

  Still in Sudanese waters.

  Out of nowhere, Greatrex appeared.

  “Trouble?”

  “Maybe. Make sure Blake stays in his cabin. Also, see if you can get Salah to throw on Blake’s civilian clothes. They are about the same size.”

  He looked perplexed for a moment and then nodded.

  Three minutes later, the two rigid-hull inflatable boats pulled up on either side of the ferry. Ninety seconds after that, uniformed Sudanese Armed Forces personnel swarmed over the ferry’s rear deck. Their drawn faces and aggressive stances matched the automatic weapons they held tight.

  One group of three men made their way up to the bridge. A second group disappeared downstairs. The others spread out along the deck.

  “Papers, travel documents, please,” they asked to no one in particular.

  I edged my way toward the bridge. Before I made it within ten feet, I heard men arguing. Most of the discourse was in Arabic, but from what I figured, the ferry captain wasn’t too happy about having his boat boarded.

  I wanted to check on Blake, but I didn’t want to attract attention to him. Before I’d developed a plan, a young soldier appeared next to me.

  “Yella! Awaraag wa mustana datat al safr!” he half yelled, his nerves clearly taut.

  “Sorry, I only speak English.” Nicholas Sharp: calm and collected.

  “Your papers and travel documents,” he repeated in English, pointing his rifle toward the rear deck where his commanding officer had begun checking everyone’s documentation.

  I made out I needed to get them from my cabin even though I had them in my pocket, and so I made my way down the cramped space, noting the palpable feeling of alarm. The mothers and children in our group bunched together, exchanging nervous whispers.

  Bravado seemed to be the best tactic. I walked straight up to the soldier with the most decorations on his uniform. “I assume you are the commanding officer here. My name is Hayes.” I continued speaking before he uttered a word. “My colleague and I have been entrusted with the safety of this group. We’ve traveled from Khartoum. Here are our papers.” I concluded by thrusting our documents in his face.

  The officer looked surprised at my aggression, clearly accustomed to people being deferential around him.

  “I speak English, Mr. … er… Hayes,” he said, grabbing the papers. For five minutes he looked carefully through each set of papers.

  “These are only temporary papers,” he said. “Where are the originals?”

  “We lost them in Khartoum the night before we left. I suppose you’re aware there was a coup, riots in the streets. The courier carrying our passports and original documents was mugged and our papers stolen.”

  “And you could get temporary papers straight away?”

  “It took twenty-four hours. I have a friend who is well placed in the bureaucracy. He was able to help,” I replied.

  The soldier looked me up and down, the half-smile on his lips expressing his amusement. “How very fortunate,” he said. “Now you have two other Americans traveling with you,” he looked down at the papers. “Mr. Scott?”

  On cue, Greatrex stepped forward out of the shadows. Again, the SAF man gave him a once over, without saying a word.

  “And Mr. Carter?” Greatrex had cued Salah Bahri to arrive on deck just after him. He wore Jefferson Blake’s Western clothes.

  “You are Carter?”

  Salah nodded.

  “You look very African to me,” said the soldier.

  “Yes, sir, I originally came from Sudan. I have lived in America for several years. Carter is now my legal name.” The slight American inflection that Salah pulled off was impressive. Perhaps all Sudanese are actors.

  The officer issued instructions to an offsider who rounded up our families. Three other soldiers spread out, surrounding them.

  “Count them,” said the officer. “There should be ten children, nine women and one man.” Speaking in English, it was clear the lead man wanted us to understand his orders.

  After counting heads, the soldier walked back to his commander and spoke to him in Sudanese. The officer paused before glancing up at me.

  “There are ten children and nine women. There is a male missing. Please explain this?”

  Everyone remained silent, eyes locked on me. The only sound, the throb of the ferry’s engines as the ship meandered forward.
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  I looked across the deck. The focused expressions on the soldiers’ faces suggested this was no routine inspection.

  “Answer me now, Mr. Hayes, or we shall have to turn this ferry about and return to Wadi Halfa until we sort this matter.”

  “That man never boarded the boat,” I said. “He took ill with a fever at the wharf. He returned to town to seek medical attention.” It was a risk. If the soldiers went to the hospital to check, I hoped our doctor would back us up. “In the confusion, he must have forgotten to take his papers.”

  The officer hesitated. A small seed of doubt planted.

  “One moment please.”

  The soldier surprised me by strutting over to the railing and calling down into the darkness. I edged over to get a look. Two men in robes perched in one inflatable. Each had a Kalashnikov sitting on his lap.

  There was a heated exchange between the men and the officer, the latter seeming under duress.

  The women and children clasped each other, wide-eyed and terrified. There was nothing I could do to help them.

  At that moment, the ship’s captain came barreling down to the rear deck. He addressed the officer in English.

  “I direct you to leave my vessel immediately. In less than a minute, we’ll enter Egyptian waters where you have no authority. Unless you wish to create an international incident and all the ramifications that go with it, I suggest you go now!”

  “Then stop the boat,” yelled the officer.

  “You idiot—even if I turned the engines off straightaway, we would drift into Egyptian waters before we could turn about. The Egyptian authorities know we are here. I spoke to them as soon as I noticed you approaching us.” Hell hath no fury like a ship’s master whose authority has been questioned.

  The Sudanese officer hesitated for half a moment more before turning to me, his eyes blazing. Fear or anger, it was hard to read.

  “Get all the men back on the boats… now. We’re going.” His offsider obeyed.

  Ninety seconds later, the decks clear of soldiers, our group melted into a sigh of collective relief.

  Too soon.

  Just before the inflatables pushed off, two pairs of weathered hands grappled the side rail. The two robed Sudanese who had been sitting alongside vaulted over the balustrade.

  Before Greatrex or I reacted, each of them had a gun pointed directly at us.

  “Mr. Sharp, Mr. Greatrex, you will take us to President Blake right now, please.”

  To make his point, the speaker swiveled his weapon, aimed it across the deck at one of the crewmen, and gunned him down in a burst of automatic fire.

  We’d been so close.

  Chapter 23

  They pushed us along the starboard deck, toward the bow. The armed men stood far enough back that we couldn’t disarm them and close enough that they could gun us down if we tried anything. I stopped when we reached the stairwell that led down to Blake’s cabin.

  “I don’t know who you are,” I said, “but this is a complete waste of time. I told the soldier that the man—”

  “Just shut up, Sharp. Do you think we are stupid? You have murdered Atha Riek and killed too many of our brothers. The only reason you are alive now is to hand over your president.”

  Straight to the point.

  Halfway down the stairs, one terrorist lunged forward. For a split second, I figured he’d moved to assault me, but the surprised look on his face told a different story.

  I stepped aside and shoved the man passed me, letting gravity do its thing. As he fell, I pressed myself against the wall, bracing for the slugs from his comrade’s Kalashnikov to tear through the enclosed space, but it didn’t happen.

  At the top of the stairs the other man stood gasping for breath. The cause of his discomfort was a large forearm around his neck; muscles tensed, squeezing his throat like a python crushing its prey. By the time I picked up his dropped weapon, the terrorist had gone limp.

  The arm pulled back and the terrorist’s body fell away. In his place stood President Jefferson Blake.

  “I told you I’d been going stir-crazy down there,” he said.

  At that moment the ferry’s captain came bustling around the corner. He paused when he saw the dead terrorists.

  “Well, that’s that then,” he announced.

  “It was very fortunate, Captain,” I began, “that we were entering Egyptian waters. Without you pointing that out, we would have been in a lot of trouble.”

  “What do you mean?” he responded, a smile creeping onto his face. “We don’t enter Egyptian territory for another twenty minutes.”

  Thank God for angry sailors.

  After we’d disposed of the terrorists’ bodies over the side, Blake, Greatrex and I gulped down a warm cup of coffee with our newfound friend, Captain Mahir. The captain had assured us ten minutes previously that we were now really in Egyptian waters. The relief for everyone, including our fleeing families, was immense.

  Captain Mahir had left us in no doubt about his attitude toward authorities bullying desperate refugees.

  “These days I’m just a ferry skipper,” he said, shrugging his shoulders. “My wife prefers me closer to home as we enter our dotage. Sadly, in my thirty years at sea, I’ve seen too many unpleasant situations where war mongers rule at the point of a gun. The arrogance of those soldiers boarding my vessel was intolerable.”

  We were glad for his intolerance.

  The words had barely left his mouth when our world lit up. Night turned into day as an arc of bright lights blazed across the length of the ship. We swiveled to get a look. At least six rigid-hull inflatable boats, similar to the ones used by the Sudanese soldiers, surrounded the vessel. The one difference: they had access to modern, silent-running outboards.

  The captain reached toward the throttle. “We can’t outrun them, but we can make it harder for them to board.”

  I placed my hand on his arm. “I would wait, Captain. This may not be what you think.”

  Within two minutes, all the ship’s decks were swarming with military personnel in Egyptian uniforms.

  “What the hell?” said the captain. “The authorities from Cairo usually send one craft with just a couple of men to process our passengers.”

  At that point a soldier, high-ranking, judging from his uniform, stormed onto the bridge. Four armed soldiers accompanied him.

  He addressed the skipper. “Captain, I am Major Gamal from the Egyptian Special Forces Unit 777. I command you to halt your vessel, immediately.”

  “Like hell,” replied the skipper, his voice peaking in anger.

  It was time to defuse the situation, the voice of reason. “Before things get out of hand, Captain, I should explain something about our human cargo.”

  Five minutes later, with our captain in shock about his VIP passenger, we listened to a terse conversation between Jefferson Blake and the Egyptian officer.

  “Mr. President, sir, I have explicit orders to transfer you, Mr. Sharp, and Mr. Greatrex off the vessel now. Your refugee friends are to continue their journey and go through the usual immigration process, albeit fast-tracked, considering the circumstances.”

  “With all due respect,” replied Jefferson Blake, “I don’t care what your orders say, Major, I am not leaving this ship without the entire contingent of people I boarded with.”

  “But, sir, my instructions…”

  “You’d better contact your superiors and tell them you’re unable to extricate the president of the United States and had to leave him in transit with terrorists in pursuit.”

  Greatrex and I shared a grin. With every passing minute, President Jefferson Blake was growing in my estimation.

  Blake walked over to the edge of the bridge and looked over the side of the ship. “You have brought enough small craft to carry everyone, although it may entail leaving a few soldiers behind.”

  “Mr. President, we need the soldiers to guard and transport you.”

  “Not if I’m not going.”

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nbsp; The major was outclassed.

  His shoulders sagged as he collapsed in defeat. “One moment, please, sir—I will make a call.” With that, he disappeared back onto the rear deck.

  Three minutes later, we could hear orders being barked across the deck. The officer returned to the bridge.

  “It would be my honor, sir, to escort you, your two colleagues and the rest of your party to our boats. As we speak, transportation arrangements are being made for all of you for an extended journey.”

  Deal done.

  The next few hours were a morass of activity and movement. When the US government kick in, they kick in big-time. So do their allies. No chances were being taken in extracting the US president from a volatile situation.

  A fleet of four-wheel drives waited for us on the riverbanks. We drove a few miles to a flat and remote location. Right on cue, two American Pave Hawks appeared from above. The Egyptian troops ushered our party onboard, just before the choppers fled upward, into the darkened sky.

  Tiran Island hosts a Multinational Force and Observers peacekeeping force, overseeing implementation of the peace treaty between Egypt and Israel. The US is part of that force. We alighted the helicopters into the warm night air as we waited there for our final ride to arrive.

  Making the most of the brief time we had, we used the MFO communications office to check on the fate of the family members sent abroad by the Shararaa. All but one had made contact through our social network campaign.

  “Who hasn’t established contact?” I asked Greatrex as he sat at a table in a corner of the room checking off names.

  Jefferson Blake had begun a debriefing process by US Intelligence elsewhere on the base. As he predicted, a wall of security surrounded him as soon as we arrived in US hands.

  “It’s Salah Bahri’s wife, Sua’d,” said Greatrex.

  “Damn it.”

  One of the US communication personnel walked across the room toward us.

  “Mr. Sharp?”

  “Yes, Officer, what can I do for you?”