Dale Brown - Dale Brown's Dreamland 04 - Piranha(and Jim DeFelice)(2003) (17 page)

 
          
Magandang
hapon
po
.

 
          
He
could link to Dreamland Command and get a native speaker whispering in his ear
if he had to. He’d take the first shot on his own, make the effort.

 
          
Danny
pushed toward a thick clump of vegetation clustered around a row of gnarled
tree trunks. He struggled through about ten or twelve feet of thick bamboo
before he could see beyond. Finally, he saw a swamp and pond about twenty yards
across, beyond the edge of the thickest brush. Two small patches of dull brown
appeared about twenty-five yards to the left just above the shoreline, partly
obscured by rocks or old tree trunks. High magnification showed they were
sheets.

 
          
IR
view picked up the embers of a fire beyond them. a cooking fire, probably; the
vegetation was too thick to see clearly.

 
          
A
whistle broke the silence. Danny looked toward the water as a duck darted
downward, grabbed something from just the surface, and then flapped its wings
in an arc away, the prize in its beak.

 
          
The
person he’d been following was crouched at the edge of the water, thirty-five
yards away.

 
          
Watching
him? Or the whistling duck?

 
          
Danny
thought of standing and waving. Before he could decide, the figure turned and
moved away, walking slowly, without alarm, past the sheets. There looked like
there might be a hut there, but Danny couldn’t get an angle to see.

 
          
He’d
have to find out more about the camp. Maybe go in there, find out who these
people were. At the moment, though, there were more important things to do—he
could hear the distant thump of helicopters bringing in supplies.

 
          
Couple
of people in the jungle weren’t much of a threat, especially if they stayed
were they were. He’d set up a sensor picket, keep tabs on the ridge and the
valley until he decided what to do, or got some advice from the colonel. They
might have to move these folks out.

 
          
They
could use that stream for a sensor line. Put some video cams on the swamp and
pond. There looked like only one way across the water and deep muck, off on the
right, not counting the sharply rising slope to the left.

 
          
Danny
began moving back up the hill, pausing every so often to make sure he wasn’t
being followed. It was presumptuous to think of moving the people who lived
here. How the hell would he feel if someone snuck into his neighborhood, spoke
a few words in halting English, claimed to be long-lost friends, then said,
sorry, you
gotta
go? We have a top-secret? We have a
top-secret airfield in your backyard and we can’t have you stripping over it.

 
          
But
that was the way it went sometimes.

 
          
Dreamland
Command Center

 
          
August
22, 1997, 2321 local (August 23, 1997, 1421 Philippines)

 
          
As
Colonel Bastian took a fresh gulp of coffee, he told himself the scratch in his
eyes was due to the ventilation system’s lack of humidity. Under other
circumstances, he’d been snoring in bed. He’d put in a long day, and unlike the
crews that had flown out to the Philippines, didn’t have an opportunity to take
a nap; he always felt he ought to be the one in the Command Center when the
shit hit the fan—as it was now. He rubbed his eyes, then began pacing near the
large screen at the front of the room.

 
          
The
Chinese aircraft had gone down on its own, obviously because the idiot pilot
decided to play cowboy with the Megafortress. The Chinese were
out-of-their-minds furious about it; they’d already filed a protest note in
Washington claiming it had been shot down. While the politicians postured, Dog
considered the more important development: the sinking of the container ship.
The attack seemed to have been the work of the weapon they were supposed to be
gathering data on, the Kali missiles, apparently launched at long range by a
diesel-powered
snorkler
—seemed and apparently being
the operative words, since Quicksilver had been too far away to gather
meaningful data on the weapon or launch platform.

 
          
Had
Breanna simply ignored the Chinese aircraft and continued on her patrol, that
wouldn’t have been the case.

 
          
Not
that she necessarily should have. Still …

 
          
According
to the analysts who had examined the data, the radar indications and probable
warhead size showed interesting parallels to the Russian SS-N-12, a very large
antiship
missile known as “Sandbox.” But the SS-N-12 was
far too big to fit into a submarine or be launched from beneath the water.

 
          
Presumably
anyway.

 
          
“Sir,
stand by for communication from the White House Situation Room,” said the lieutenant
at the com console. “Mr. Barclay.”

 
          
“Go,”
said Dog.

 
          
The
lieutenant’s fingers pounded on his keyboard. Jed Barclay’s pimple-strewn face
flashed onto the screen. He had deep black bags under both eyes; back East it
was around three in the morning.

 
          
“Colonel,
uh, Jed Barclay here.”

 
          
“Go
ahead, Jed.”

 
          
“Pacific
Fleet’s making some noise. The boss man wanted me to give you a heads-up.
USCINCPACCOM’s throwing a territory fit.”

 
          
“Acknowledged,”
said Dog, who actually would have preferred to say something else.

 
          
“Whiplash
order is being reviewed. They’re going to look for an opinion from you,” added
Jed.

 
          
“Opinion
on what?”

 
          
“Whether
the Megafortresses can stop ships from being sunk.”

 
          
“Okay,
we’ll start working on it.” Colonel Bastian wasn’t sure they could; they had no
ASW weapons on the Megafortresses. Besides, protecting shipping was a Navy
task, and if that became the primary mission, the Pacific Fleet would surely
get the job. Their most likely role would be working with PACCOM as they had
with CENTCOM in the Middle East, thought the personalities here were
considerably more prickly.

 
          
“I
think the Navy may suggest escorts, flagships, like they did in 1987 with
tankers in the Persian Gulf, the oil crisis,” added Jed. “But most of the fleet
is still up near Taiwan and Japan, uh, due to the situation on the mainland.
The other major assets are near India and the Gulf—I guess you know that. So,
uh, they’re scrambling to figure out where to allocate what. I don’t know how
long it will be before there’s a decision. Might be days or weeks.”

 
          
“Okay,”
said Dog.

 
          
Barclay
blinked.

 
          
“Maybe
you ought to catch some Zs, Jed,” said Dog. “Have you slept since you got
back?”

 
          
“Thanks,
Colonel.” Barclay managed a weak smile. “You look a little tired yourself.”

 
          
“A
little.”

 
          
“You
have any more information about the Chinese plane?” asked Jed.

 
          
“NO.
I imagine the pilot make it,” said Dog. “Zen had a Flighthawk nearby and we
don’t have any video showing an ejection, let alone a chute.”

 
          
“Yeah.
Tough luck for him.”

 
          
Dog
nodded, thought he felt more sympathetic. While the Chinese pilot wasn’t
exactly an ally, it seemed a waste that he had died. Dog hated the idea of any
pilot dying in accident, even if he’d caused it himself.

 
          
“Um,
State may contact you,” added Jed. “They’re a little behind the curve on this,
so they may need a full, uh, briefing. Director says do it, but you have to
watch their clearance.”

 
          
“What
exactly does that mean?”

 
          
“Nothing
on Kali,” said Jed.

 
          
“Then
what’s the sense of briefing them?

 
          
“Yeah.
Not my call,” said Jed, which Dog had learned was Jed’s standard response when
he agreed something didn’t make sense, but his boss hadn’t listened to the
reasons. “I guess you have to do what you can do.”

 
          
“All
right, Jed. We should have the cargo planes on the Philippines tonight,” added
Dog.

 
          
“I’ll
keep you updated,” said Jed.

 
          
“Thanks.”
Dog killed the connection himself with his remote control, then clicked onto
the Quicksilver circuit to update them.

 
          
Aboard
Quicksilver, over the South China Sea

 
          
August
23, 1997, 1430 local (August 22, 1997, 2330 Dreamland)

 
          
Cargo
stretched across the water like so many icebergs. The fantail of the ship
jutted upward from the water, its large screw looking like a bizarre metal
daisy waiting to be plucked. Zen brought the Flighthawk down for a pass at two
thousand feet, his airspeed bleeding back under two hundred knots. He could see
bodies in the water; two or three appeared to be clinging to something, and
there was a man on one of the floating cargo containers.

 
          
“I
think we have survivors,” he told Breanna. “I’m going to take another pass and
try to get better video. You might want to radio any ships that are coming.”

 
          
“We’re
in the process of making contact now,” she told him. “We’re going to pipe your
feed up here.”

 
          
“Hawk
Leader,” acknowledged Zen.

 
          
He
checked Hawk Two, still in trail above and behind Quicksilver, then turned Hawk
One around for another run. The feed off the robot plane was being pumped back
to Dreamland, were it could be analyzed for potential survivors, as well as any
hazardous cargo or weapons.

 
          
The
merchant ship that had been sailing ahead of the container vessel when it was
struck had made a large, cautious turn in the water and was approaching the
debris field slowly. It hadn’t yet lowered boats into the water. In answer to
the SOS, another vessel, a tanker, was about ten miles away, coming north at
fifteen knots. Several miles beyond the tanker, but making better time, was a
cruise ship. Collins had ID’s the tanker and cruise ship already—the Exxon
Global and the Royal Scotsman—and now Ferris clicked in to say they had
acknowledged his message that there survivors in the water. The closer merchant
ship, meanwhile, did not answer on any of the frequencies the copilot tried,
even as it continued at a snail’s pace toward the bobbing containers.

 
          
“Hawk
Leader—we’re getting something twenty miles west of than tanker—odd reading on
the water,” said Ferris. “Could be our sub getting ready to surface. We want to
change course to check it out.”

 
          
“Yeah,
go for it,” said Zen, immediately turning toward the coordinates.

 
          
Hawk
One cruised in range just in time to see a submarine rise gently above the
waves, the black, elongated oval of its conning tower pushing aside the water.
Zen slid around the sub at just over three thousand feet; Collins ID’s it as a
Russian Kilo, a diesel-powered boat that according to his brief usually didn’t
operate this far south.

 
          
“This
bastard that sank the container ship?” questioned Zen.