SEAL Team Six Hunt the Scorpion(8)

Crocker raised his hand and tapped his head twice, which was the signal to deploy they’d worked out during their abbreviated PLO, or Patrol Leader’s Order—Ritchie, Mancini, and Cal toward the stern and the ship’s superstructure; Crocker and the other two in the direction of the bow, always staying in visual contact with one another.

Seeing someone climb out of the forward cargo bay, Crocker extended his right arm and lowered it. Akil and Davis behind him quickly knelt down out of sight. He pointed to Akil, then placed his hand on his KA-BAR knife.

Akil nodded, then ran in a crouch along the centerline bulkhead to the forecastle bulkhead. Crocker, meanwhile, took two steps to his right. Past the forward mast, he saw a man in black standing with his back to him on the forecastle deck. He watched him push a button that lowered the crane into the cargo bay. A few seconds later the man punched another button and the crane rose, bearing a fifty-gallon orange barrel with a triangular yellow deadly-materials symbol on its side.

The question that flashed through Crocker’s mind was Why were pirates unloading sensitive nuclear material from a ship?

That’s when he realized that the man operating the crane looked too well dressed to be a pirate. And when he turned sideways, Crocker saw that he was somewhat light skinned and had a close-cropped beard.

The SEAL team leader watched Akil spring from the foredeck and grab the man from behind. His left hand covered the man’s mouth while his right dragged the blade of the KA-BAR across his neck.

Textbook, Crocker thought, until Akil let go and the slumping man slipped off the wet bulkhead and pitched forward into the open cargo bay.

Mistake!

Shouts and exclamations echoed out of the bay, then someone started firing up at Akil, who hid behind the foremast. Sparks were flying everywhere from bullets ricocheting off metal as weapons discharged.

“We’ve been compromised. Let’s go!” Crocker shouted.

He and Davis followed the path Akil had taken forward. Halfway there, he heard an engine start up on the port side of the Contessa. Detouring left, away from the bulkhead to the port rail, he caught a glimpse of the launch.

It wasn’t a funky pirate vessel, but rather a clean, military-type fast attack boat painted gray. No markings, no name. Seventy to eighty feet long, armed with deck-mounted .50-caliber guns fore and aft.

“Watch out!” Davis shouted.

Seeing a bearded man on the deck aiming an AK-47 at him, Crocker jumped back and ducked behind a ventilator. He was joined by Davis, who reported seeing orange barrels stacked along the bow of the launch.

“How many?” Crocker asked.

“Half a dozen.”

“Pirates, my ass.”

An explosion went off near the top of the Contessa’s superstructure, where Ritchie, Cal, and Mancini had deployed. It pushed Crocker and Davis into a round metal ventilator and sent shards of glass and hot metal flying through the air, smacking the deck and mast. Crocker felt something embed itself into his left forearm, more painful than disabling.

I’ll deal with it later, he thought.

Men shouted at one another from the boat below while others continued to fire from near the bow of the Contessa toward where he and Davis hid on the deck. The shouting sounded more like Persian than Arabic.

Iranians? he asked himself.

It made sense. The Iranians needed parts and nuclear fuel for their atomic weapons development program. And they’d been hit by a series of UN embargoes that made it almost impossible for them to import uranium legally.

So they’d hired pirates to hijack a vessel transporting the things they needed.

Kind of clever.

“We’ve gotta stop that launch!” Crocker shouted as bullets smashed into the metal in front of them.

“What about Akil?”

A teammate in a firefight was always a priority. “We’re going to save his ass first.”

Not only was Akil pinned down near the Contessa’s foremast, but pirates firing automatic weapons had climbed out of the cargo bay and were attacking him from two sides.

On Crocker’s hand signal, he and Davis moved to the bulkhead at the center of the deck. From a position twenty feet forward, they fired their MP5s and caught two pirates by surprise—one in the chest, another raked from his knees to his sternum.

Akil took out a third with his 9-millimeter handgun. All those years of daily live-fire practice had paid off.

The foremost deck became quiet.

“Dammit to hell,” Akil groaned, holding up his right hand. “I got stung!”

“Where?”

“Back of my hand.”

Although it was a bitch to see in the minimal light, Crocker did the best he could, feeling through warm blood along the palm to the knuckles and fingers, ascertaining the extent of the damage.