The Emperor's Revenge (Oregon Files 11)

“I don’t like this. Something’s wrong with this scenario.”

Max peered at the screen and saw an odd protuberance on the Achilles’s deck.

“Linda, zoom in on the yacht as much as you can.”

Because the yacht was so far away, the picture was blurry, but there was definitely a gray object on top of the yacht that didn’t fit in.

Then to Max’s surprise, it rotated.

A turret. And now the gun barrel was obvious.

“What the . . .”

A flash of light erupted from the barrel.

By the time he finished yelling, “Battle stations!” the Narwhal’s superstructure had blown apart in a fiery explosion.

The timing didn’t make sense. The explosion on the cargo ship happened much too fast after the shot was taken.

“Murph, how long from shot to explosion?”

“A little more than two seconds, by my calcs.”

“The projectile traveled five miles in just over two seconds,” repeated Max. “That’s impossible!”

The muzzle velocity of a typical shipboard gun was 2,600 feet per second. The round should have taken ten seconds to cross that distance.

The Achilles’s gun fired again. This time, he counted to himself. Two seconds later, another fireball erupted from the Narwhal.

There was only one type of weapon that could launch rounds at that speed.

Murph beat him to it. “My God, they have a railgun.”

The Narwhal was being systematically taken apart. Most likely the crew was already dead. Another few rounds and the ship would be in pieces.

The Oregon’s gun would be useless at this range.

“Mr. Murphy, ready an Exocet.”

The ship-to-ship missile was one of the deadliest in the world. A single one fired by the Argentine Navy during the Falklands War sank the Royal Navy destroyer Sheffield.

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“Exocet ready!”

The Achilles launched another round.

“Fire!”

“Missile away!” The Exocet rocketed from its tube.

At the same time, the railgun shell tore at the foundering Narwhal, which was awash in flames.

The missile skimmed across the water at seven hundred miles an hour. At that speed, it would cover the fifteen miles in a minute.

It would be too late for the Narwhal, but seeing how the railgun was systematically dismantling the cargo ship, Max was now more worried about the Oregon.

“Mr. Stone,” Max said, “put us bow on to the Achilles. I want us to present as small a target as we can.”