The navigator tapped the screen, and the map zoomed out slowly until finally Gregorovich spotted a yellow dot directly in their path.
“Heard Island,” the navigator said.
By tapping the screen at the island’s location, Kirov was able to bring up a block of information about it.
“Australian territory,” he said, reading from the screen. “Volcanic. Last appreciable eruption 2005. Covered in glaciers and completely uninhabited.”
Kirov looked up, a grin plastered from ear to scabbed-over ear. “That’s it,” he said. “Heard Island is the target. That’s where Thero’s hiding. Austin finally showed his hand. We can kill him now along with his crew and finish the job without worrying about them.”
Gregorovich didn’t like the idea of losing his counterweight. Nor did he think, after proving so crafty for so long, that Austin would have been dumb enough to blunder into revealing his secret with such ease.
“Zoom out,” he ordered.
The Vietnamese navigator did as he was told, and the map expanded again. Another set of dots appeared. These were roughly two hundred and seventy miles beyond Heard Island, directly on the same course line, 323 degrees.
Austin had maneuvered the Rama to a point where they were approaching both islands simultaneously.
“French Southern and Antarctic lands,” the navigator said.
“What kind of a name is that?” Kirov blurted.
“One you won’t forget, I trust,” Gregorovich said. “The same course line takes us to both of them. Thero could be hiding on either one. Or Austin could take us a little closer and then turn us in a new direction. We can’t kill him until we know for sure.”
“And once we know for sure?”
“Can you not think more than one move ahead?” Gregorovich asked. “Suppose Thero’s lab is on Heard Island. Our orders are to destroy it with a nuclear weapon. It’s Australian territory. Do you not see the advantage of leaving a few charred and radiated American bodies at the outer limit of such a blast?”
Kirov nodded.
“Launch the long-range drones,” he said. “If anything’s moving on Heard Island, I want to know about it.”
* * *
The noisy hum of piston engines caught Joe Zavala’s attention as he neared the ship’s mess with Hayley Anderson at his side.
“What’s that?” Hayley asked.
Joe cocked his head to listen. The sound reminded him of unmanned military aircraft he’d worked with a f
ew months back. “The Russians are launching something up on deck,” he said. “A small plane, or maybe a drone.”
“Why would they be doing that?”
Joe considered several possibilities but put the thought aside when he saw a gaggle of the Russian commandos coming down the passageway. “No idea,” he said. “But let’s get in that chow line before those guys do.”
Turning quickly, he ducked into the mess hall. Hayley lingered just behind him, keeping an eye on the hallway.
Stepping to the buffet, Joe inhaled deeply. He loved Vietnamese food, the spices and all the vegetables. The ship’s cook had whipped up a pretty good spread. It almost seemed a shame to ruin it.
“They’re coming,” Hayley whispered.
Joe nodded, smiled at the chef, and began to load up his plate with heaping piles of everything on the menu. It was enough food for him and two others.
As the cook stared at him in wonder, Joe rubbed his stomach. “Nothing works up an appetite like being shipwrecked in frigid waters and then being kidnapped by your would-be rescuers.”
The cook’s face remained blank. Joe guessed English was not one of his languages. He put his hands together and bowed slightly. “Kam ung,” he said, thank you being one of the few phrases he knew in Vietnamese.
The cook smiled, his smooth face genuine and true. In a way, the Rama’s crew were as much prisoners of the situation as the Orion’s survivors.