Typhoon Fury (Oregon Files 12)

“Aye, Chairman.”

Juan watched as two Kuyogs came in from both sides simultaneously. Murph hit the first one but missed the second, which was aimed directly at the Oregon’s stern.

“Incoming!” Juan called out.

The drone went out of sight of the camera and detonated in a huge blast that echoed through the op center. The aft end of the Oregon momentarily lifted up from the impact.

“Speed falling,” Eric said. “It must have damaged one of the engines.”

Juan didn’t want to distract Max from his duties helping out Murph, so he got Linda on the line. She was now on the ferry’s flying bridge with Max and MacD, who was propping himself up on the railing to take the weight off his injured ankle.

“Linda, did that explosion sever any of the tow lines?”

“No, they’re still intact,” she replied. “But it looks like the starboard Venturi nozzle was hit. It’s spewing water upward, so it’s doing nothing for propulsion. I recommend shutting it down.”

“Do it, Eric,” Juan ordered. “Linda, what’s the ferry’s status?”

“It’s just a matter of time before she goes under. The passengers are scared stiff, but Linc and Eddie are doing a good job keeping the situation from melting down. Everyone has been moved to the stern of the ferry to keep them away from the explosions.”

“Good work.”

Juan hated having his people on the sinking vessel. But there was no way to bring them back over now. And if the Oregon detached to fight off the Kuyogs, the ferry would sink before they could tow it to safety or evacuate the passengers.

They were all getting to the beach. Or none of them were.

• • •

FROM LINDA’S VANTAGE POINT, she could easily see the results of shutting down the Oregon’s starboard tube. Water no longer jetted up at an odd angle, and the froth on that side subsided.

She felt useless as she watched the Oregon struggle to pull the ferry to dry land. Max and MacD were beside her, noting the positions of the speeding Kuyogs and passing the information on to Murph, who continued to deftly take them out one by one. By this point, however, the Gatling guns had been spitting out 20mm tungsten rounds for far longer than normal, and she could see steam rising from the overworked barrels. If they overheated, the guns would jam, and there’d be no stopping any more drones.

The sea was being churned by waves from the approaching typhoon, making the progress of the two ships that much more difficult. Because they’d been able to modulate the closing of the water-tight doors, the ferry was no longer in danger of capsizing, but the bow was dropping closer and closer to the surface, with some of the bigger whitecaps now breaking onto the deck.

Linda glanced up at the sky, but, judging by the cloud density, it didn’t look like the worst of Hidalgo itself would be arriving before the ferry could be off-loaded by the Coast Guard. Assuming, of course, that there was a ferry left to off-load.

A black dot caught her eye as it danced in front of one of the ominous gray clouds. At first, she thought it was a bird, but the way it moved was more like a fly buzzing around a kitchen.

She nudged MacD and pointed at the darting object. “Do we have a UAV in the air?”

MacD peered at it and said, “Let me check.” He passed the question along to Max, who got a quick response from Hali that it wasn’t theirs.

“Then tell the Chairman we’ve got a spy in the sky,” she said.

Max called it in and got a confirmation that Juan would take care of it since Eric and Murph were busy.

Seconds later, a deck plate near the stern of the Oregon slid aside, and a large rectangular block mounted on a rotating armature rose above the Iranian flag fluttering on the jackstaff. On the front of the block was a grid of one hundred holes, which were actually the ends of the barrels of the Metal Storm gun.

Unlike the six rotating barrels in the Gatling gun that fired a stream of rounds fed by a belt, the Metal Storm antiaircraft/antimissile system was completely electronic, so there were no moving parts, making jams impossible. Rounds were loaded into the grid of barrels so that the projectiles lined up nose to tail. The electronic control allowed for a precise firing sequence that made the Gatling gun’s rate of three thousand rounds per minute seem pokey. With each barrel of the Metal Storm gun firing simultaneously at a staggering rate of forty-five thousand rounds per minute, the weapon could pump out its entire load of five hundred tungsten slugs in six milliseconds.

The Metal Storm gun swiveled around and tilted up until it was pointed at the unknown UAV, presumably Locsin’s observation drone watching his Kuyogs trying to finish off the Oregon.

The gun fired with a thunderous boom. The rounds flew out of the barrels so fast that it seemed like a single flash of light.

The UAV didn’t stand a chance. The heavy tungsten rounds formed a wall of shells that would be impossible for even the most dexterous operator to evade. In a fraction of a second, the UAV simply ceased to exist.

The Metal Storm gun then disappeared back into the deck for reloading in case it was needed again. At the same time, the Gatling guns continued their buzz saw howls as they picked off more Kuyogs. Linda counted more than fifteen destroyed so far, either by the guns or by the drones hitting their target.

A moment later, a large UAV emerged from the bowels of the Oregon on a deck elevator. This one was the Corporation’s heavy supply drone. Slung underneath it was a device Linda recognized as the decoy beacon that Murph and Eric had showed her. The supply drone’s eight propellers whirred to life, and it took off from the deck, flying low over the ferry.