Rogue Warrior: Dictator's Ransom Part 20

"What the h.e.l.l is this?" yelled Trace from the cabin. "Jesus."

"Since when are you so sentimental about dead sc.u.m-bags?" I said mockingly.

"Since they're all Yong Shin Jong."

I let go of the rope and went down the ladder to the cabin. Trace had turned over the bodies and played her flashlight on their faces. Sure enough, she was right-three Yong Shin Jongs, each one deader than the other, lay on the deck of the small cabin.

20 One of our technical advisors says that I was actually looking at the backup controls, and that the helicopter did indeed have high-tech gear that would have worked with a whisper and a curse, had I properly plugged in the helmet I was wearing. All I can say is: where were you when I needed you?

21 At some point in the future, this sort of mission may be carried out by a high-tech carbon fiber inflatable like the Stiletto, whose M-shaped hull not only can take her over fifty knots but also is gentle on the back. For now though, the rubber met the waves.

22 Shotgun, on the other hand, surely would have tried that.

8.

[ I ].

THREE FOR THE price of one?

"They have to be body doubles," insisted Trace. "Doesn't Kim do that?"

Kim was certainly notorious for using body doubles, but did his son do the same? And were all three doubles, or only two?

It was dark, they were dead-any one of them could be the dictator's b.a.s.t.a.r.d. Or none. One looked a little chubby, another too skinny, the third too tall. The more I stared, the more I questioned. They were definitely dressed like the man I had seen-and who knew if I had seen the real McCoy or one of these men?

I certainly didn't. I went back up to the wheel, ducked under the instrument panel, and with the help of my knife got the motors running. I set a course due west, toward North Korea-and, I hoped, the ship that I had seen earlier.

"Where have you been, pond sc.u.m?" asked Doc when I checked in, flattering me with his overwhelming affection.

"Trace and I went for a quick swim."

We traded sitreps. The SEALs had reestablished their link to the submarine, and I was able to give Doc our position and heading. According to the GPS, we were 120 miles off the Korean coast, well outside of North Korea's coastal waters-but tell that to the crew of the Pueblo.

For those of you who were still twinkles in your daddies' beer in 1968, the Pueblo was a navy "research" ship that went fishing for electronic signals off North Korea, only to be captured by the North Koreans. The crew was tortured by their gracious hosts, even more so after said hosts realized their guests were giving them the finger in the propaganda photos they'd taken. The ship's captain was eventually given the choice of apologizing for being in Korean territorial waters-which of course he wasn't-or watching his crew get shot one at a time. He opted to save his men, and thus wrote the first apology in the history of the world that peed on his captors. (The commander used the word "paean" in a sentence along the lines of "we paean the great leader of Korea." The Koreans looked up the word "paean" in the dictionary and figured they were being honored.) The cabin cruiser's engines had been tweaked, and if the instruments were to be believed, were able to propel the boat to forty-two knots at the red line. The engine work was hardly the only modification made to the craft. Large auxiliary fuel tanks had been installed, and there was a GPS system on par with my mobile unit, and a radio sophisticated enough to pick up everything from standard military communications to old I Love Lucy reruns still circulating in the ionosphere. A computer hard-wired to the cabin desk was connected to the Internet via a satellite link. The browser's memory had been wiped clean.

"I know there are ways to look for deleted files," said Trace. "What if I give Junior a call and see if he can talk me through them?"

It was worth a shot, so I handed over the sat phone. In the meantime, I held a straight course and contemplated the $64 million question: Was Yong Shin Jong one of the dead men below, or had he escaped to whatever ship it was I was following?

I know what you're thinking: d.i.c.kie, you've gone about as far as you can with this one; pack up your tent and go home. There's not going to be any $64 million payoff at the end of this rainbow; there's not even going to be a rainbow. Even a.s.suming that Yong Shin Jong is alive, and is aboard that ship, how are you going to get him?

Truth be told, I might have asked myself the same questions, if I hadn't seen a smudge on the horizon ahead to port.

Not just a smudge-a moving, ship-shaped smudge. I changed course to follow.

THE SHIP LOOKED like a coastal freighter, a bit smaller than the trawler that had held the missiles. It was making about sixteen or seventeen knots, moving diagonally to the North Korean coast, traveling south as well as westward.

I called Matthew back at Sado-ga-shima. Jimmy Zim had just left for Tokyo, but that was just as well. I told Junior to try and get some information on the ship we were following from our navy friends. He came back about fifteen minutes later with the news that it was registered in Myanmar, the country you and I used to call Burma.

"But I did some checking," added Junior. "I hope you don't mind."

"Tell me."

"It's been back and forth between a dozen South and North Korean ports over the last eighteen months. And before that it was in Russia," he said, a note of triumph in his voice. "Kamenka. Same place you just raided."

"Good work, Junior," I told him.

"Ask him about the computer," hissed Trace. "Tell him the files are erased. Isn't there a way to get them back?"

There was. Junior talked her through the procedure and came up with some interesting e-mails-interesting largely because they were encrypted and couldn't be read. There were also some Web p.o.r.n sites he didn't know about.

"I can take the e-mail addresses and see if they mean anything to the No Suchers," said Junior.

"Good. Do it. And get yourself a milkshake. Call me if you find anything."

"Ike's on board that ship," said Trace as I disconnected. "What are we going to do?"

"Just follow for a while."

"What's the plan for going on board?"

"Who says we're going on board?"

"We can't just let him get away."

"We're not. We're following him."

"We have to stop him. We can sneak on and grab him."

"Polorski?"

"Yes."

"He's not necessarily on the ship, Trace. And it's Yong Shin Jong we're interested in."

"You know he is, d.i.c.k. He wasn't at the base, and he wasn't on the other ship-he took Yong Shin Jong with him. The real Yong Shin Jong. These were imposters-I'll bet backups that he was going to use if he couldn't get the real one. He's going to deliver him now."

"Or one of them was the real Yong Shin Jong and your love toy was told to kill him," I said.

"Why bring him all the way here if you're going to kill him?"

"Why bring the imposters?"

"In case someone on the ship's crew tried to get nasty. No one would know who was the genuine b.a.s.t.a.r.d."

"Maybe."

"We have to get him, d.i.c.k. Whether Yong Shin Jong is with him or not. Let's do it."

"Someday I'm going to sit down with you and give you a long lecture on not getting your emotions involved in an operation."

"I'm not letting my emotions get involved."

"You don't want to kill the son of a b.i.t.c.h?"

"I do want to kill the son of a b.i.t.c.h. With my bare hands. After I've dragged him under the hull of his ship a few times and fed his b.a.l.l.s to the sharks."

"And you're not emotionally involved?"

"Of course not."

Apache logic. Hard to argue with.

I turned the wheel hard to port, setting my course parallel to hers. I took out the sat phone to call Doc-then noticed that Trace was rummaging through her gear.

"What are you doing?"

"I'm look for the pancakes."

"Pancakes" was her quaint term for the suction cup devices we'd packed as backups to get aboard the trawler. While Navy SEALs do use the devices, they're really a last-ditch choice-they're literally suction cups, used to pull yourself up the side, arm length by sagging, cramping arm length. You press a b.u.t.ton to release the grip, then smack it on the hull a little higher, moving up perhaps a few excruciating feet at a time.

"You're not thinking of boarding the ship, are you?" I asked her.

"Aren't you?"

I was in fact, but not without help. I called Doc back, but my timing was off-he'd just gotten aboard the submarine and for the moment couldn't receive the signal from the satellite.

Trace gave the vessel a good look-over with the night goggles from her pack, staring intently at the ship.

"This will be easier than I thought," she said suddenly. She handed the gla.s.ses to me. "Look."

The vessel was trailing a line near midship, possibly inadvertently left earlier when they had hooked up with the motorboat and made the exchange. Poor seamanship-but very common.

"We can use the line to get aboard," said Trace. "Easy as one, two, three."

Using the line to get aboard the ship was easier than using the pancakes, but ease was a relative concept. It was also easier than hiking up Mount Everest in my underwear while carrying a polar bear on my back.

"If we're going to get Yong Shin Jong, we're going to have to get aboard before daybreak," said Trace. "They're only a few hours outside of Korean waters."

"That's just it-we're going after Yong Shin Jong, not Tall, Dark, and Polack," I told her. "You have to keep your emotions in check. This isn't a lovers' quarrel we're involved in."

"f.u.c.k you."

Isn't that just like a woman? Always trying to sweet talk you into something.

The sat phone buzzed; Jimmy Zim was returning my call.

"You've lived up to your reputation," said the CIA officer. "Washington is very pleased."

"Sorry to hear that."

"Excuse me? Our connection must be bad."

I'm not in the business of pleasing Washington, but I dropped the matter without further comment and explained our situation. Zim's tone changed abruptly.

"There's no way we're going to get any kind of okay to use the SEALs against that ship, d.i.c.k. Just zero. Less than zero."

"What if Yong Shin Jong is aboard?"

"Is he?"

"I don't know."

"Even if he is, it'll be a hard sell. A very, very hard sell. How close is the ship to Korean waters?"

Close enough that the Greenville would never reach it before it crossed over the line. It was no use arguing with Jimmy Zim; he was just the messenger.

But I argued with him anyway.

"You get on the line with Washington and tell them we have to stop that ship. Tell them Yong Shin Jong is aboard. Tell them the nuke is there. Tell the State Department to drop dead."

"d.i.c.k-"

"Just tell them. Call your boss, and tell him, too."

"Who?"

"Admiral Jones."

"I don't think the director-"

"Call him. And get our submarine moving. I'll be on the ship."