LITMIR.BIZ

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upper arm. ‘Save the ones you can save.’ That was the moment when he realized that they all might die there. It hadn’t occurred to him before – but here they were, cut off from the city, easy targets, with Alan the only shooter. He was carrying the sniper rifle himself now, because Jagiello, it turned out, had panicked and forgotten to take his safety off when the shooting started.

      Alan looked up at the blown-out windows of the starboard wing of the bridge.

      ‘Patel!’

      The dark head of the lookout appeared. ‘Sir!’

      ‘What’re the Kenyans up to?’

      ‘Very active in aid of finding the missile launcher! Twenty or more guys running about! Some shooting!’

      Hansen had got on to the Kenyans twenty-five minutes before. Now, two hundred feet beyond where the Harker’s sloping deck met the water, the crippled fireboat, its radars shorn off and its deck littered with metal fragments, had stopped pumping water on the Harker but had stabilized itself. Alan had to be grateful for the hit on the fireboat, because, without it, the Kenyan Navy wouldn’t have come out.

      Beyond the fireboat, a Kenyan Nyayo-class Thornycroft cruised slowly between the docks; beyond it, eighty yards from where he stood, he could see the tiny figures of Kenyan sailors swarming over an anchored dhow. He guessed that they were searching the ships there – too late – for more snipers and missile launchers.

      It occurred to Alan that the hundred-foot Kenyan patrol boat carried a potent surface-to-surface missile that he hoped they wouldn’t decide to use in these close quarters. As if in answer, the boat could be heard to back its engines, bringing it to a stop, and at once a 20mm repeating cannon opened up. Instinctively, Alan ducked, but he heard the rounds hit behind him and knew that the Kenyans had solved the problem of the sniper in the warehouse: they had taken out what was left of every window in the wall – and the wall, as well. (And collateral damage beyond? he was thinking as he ran to a ladder and started for the bridge.)

      It had turned out that the Kenyan Navy had a facility two docks down from where the Harker lay. They had gone on full alert when the explosion had gone off, putting their three boats to sea and hunkering down for some kind of assault, but they never explained why they had not at least sent somebody to gather intelligence on what had happened. Alan suspected some sort of wrangle between the Navy, a minor part of the Kenyan establishment, and the army, with the GSU thrown in on the army’s side. More to the point, perhaps, was the huge fuel depot that sat behind where he now knew the Navy installation was: they were guarding that, they said, because if the explosion that destroyed the Harker was repeated there, all of Kilindini, maybe all of Mombasa, could be afire. At least that was the explanation the government would give later, although by then there were rumors that somebody had ordered the Navy to stay in barracks to keep them from helping the Harker.

      Alan ducked as he came out on the bridge’s wing. He glanced aside, saw the shattered roofline of the warehouse.

      ‘Done nicely,’ Patel said from the windowless bridge.

      ‘Very nicely.’

      Alan went up one level to the communications space, where Hansen was still trying to patch in a secure transmission unit.

      ‘How you doing?’

      Hansen had established a radio link to the Jefferson, but it wasn’t yet secure. Until he had secure communications, Alan couldn’t tell the CV anything but the bare bones of what was happening. He had been trying to raise LantFleet, Norfolk, on his cell phone again, but, as soon as he got somebody on the line, he’d lose the connection. He tried once more, waited two minutes, then gave it up. He laid the cell phone on Hansen’s table. ‘If they call back, tell them I tried.’

      There was firing far up the dock. Presumably, the Kenyan sailors had found the missile launcher.

      If they could secure the area – if, the Big If, and if the Kenyans would stay with them – he could call the Jefferson and tell them to fly in Marines and medics. It was an irony of the situation, of course, that when he could do that, they would already be more or less secure.

      Twenty minutes later, Alan was heading below to check on damage control when a snappy-looking black man in a pale blue uniform shirt and body armor came striding over the deck toward him. He was smiling, but he was clearly not going to kiss any white man’s butt.

      ‘Ngiri, Maiko, lieutenant, Kenyan Navy.’ He gave a partial salute. ‘You are in charge?’

      Alan nodded.

      ‘You are civilian?’

      ‘Craik, Alan, lieutenant-commander, United States Navy.’

      ‘Oh!’ Ngiri snapped to, really saluted, put on his helmet and fumbled with the chin strap. ‘Sorry, sorry, sir, they said this was a civilian ship –’

      Alan waved all that away, pulled the man into the shade and relative privacy of a bulkhead. ‘What’s the situation up the dock, Lieutenant?’

      ‘Neutralized.’ He got the buckle fixed and snapped to again. ‘One shore party, under my direction, sent to neutralize missiles launched against our fireboat: mission accomplished, sir.’

      ‘What’d you find down there?’

      ‘Two Islamic terrorists, sir. One launcher, I think a bazooka. Bazooka?’

      ‘Yeah, could be – bazooka-type, yeah, could be one that hit your fireboat.’

      ‘And two surface-to-air missiles.’

      Alan stared at him, stunned. A SAM could have taken out a helo – of course, that had been the intention. The explosion on the Harker was supposed to bring in help; the SAMs and the snipers would then destroy the help. Alan thought that through, then jumped back to something the lieutenant had said. ‘Islamic terrorists. You sure?’

      The lieutenant smiled. ‘Nothing else they could be, sir. We have a so-called political party, the Islamic Party of –’

      ‘IPK, yeah, yeah –’

      ‘You know? Well, then!’ He squared his shoulders. ‘I am a Christian.’

      Alan decided to let that pass. ‘You killed both of them?’

      ‘We did.’ With some satisfaction.

      ‘We’ll want to examine the surface-to-air missiles, if we may.’

      ‘They are the property of the Kenyan Navy, sir.’

      Alan stared at him, nodded sharply. Embassy business. ‘Can you tell me what kind of SAMs, lieutenant? Country of origin, manufacturer –?’

      Ngiri bristled because he did not know. ‘I am not an expert, sir. You must ask my superiors.’

      Above, on the superstructure, Hansen was waving at him. ‘Come with me,’ Alan growled.

      ‘I have been ordered back to my base, sir.’

      Out in the open water, the Kenyan patrol craft was still idling between the docks, its guns threatening the shoreline. Alan pointed at it. ‘Your guys are still out there. Hang on for a couple of minutes, okay?’ He guessed that Hansen had got his secure comm link at last. Could he now order in helos, with the possibility that a couple more SAMs were waiting somewhere in ambush? ‘Lieutenant?’

      Ngiri’s face was blank. ‘I will ask my superiors.’

      Alan started away, turned back. ‘What’s it like out there on the end of the dock now?’

      ‘Very quiet.’

      ‘Room to bring in a helicopter?’

      Ngiri had never brought a helo in anywhere, he guessed. Still, the lieutenant said, ‘Oh, yes, maybe – perhaps –’

      Alan took a step closer to the Kenyan. ‘Lieutenant, Mwakenya na mwamerika ni rafiki – kweli?’

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