“Roger that.” A second later, the .30 caliber machine guns rose out of their barrels and swiveled to point at the Triton Star.
“Is the portable decontamination station ready near the gangway?” Juan asked Max.
“It’s up and running.”
“Good. We might need to use it. Eddie and I are going after him.”
They sprinted to the hatch and descended into the bowels of the ship.
* * *
—
Rasul checked behind him as he ran down the corridor. He had lost his pursuers for the moment. He’d just finished putting on his NBC suit when he heard the container doors open. Then he heard a man calling for reinforcements, and Rasul knew he needed to get out of the chamber before he was trapped there.
Luckily, he’d already attached the Novichok device to his waistband. The only thing left to do before activating it was to put on his gloves.
His stomach went cold when he reached for his pocket and realized the gloves weren’t there.
The attack had happened so quickly that he’d left the specially designed gloves back in the decontamination chamber inside the duffel. He would need to either get them back or find replacements before he could carry out his plan for the nerve agent.
The other item he needed was something that all cargo ships were required to carry: a SOLAS rocket line thrower. The Safety of Life at Sea regulations stated that a ship of the Triton Star’s size was supposed to be equipped with four of them, which could be used to fire ropes to men overboard even if they were hundreds of yards from the ship.
During one of his midnight excursions onto the deck, Rasul had seen one of the rockets in its yellow plastic bucket hanging from the bulkhead directly under the lifeboat. He’d have to go outside to get it, but only for a moment.
When he reached the stairs nearest to the lifeboat station, he heard the crew being herded out of the mess.
“Come on,” one of the guards said. “Back to the other ship.”
That meant they’d be going in the other direction. Perfect.
Rasul climbed the stairs, his G36 assault rifle at the ready. The hallway was empty.
He went out the door, and there was the line thrower. The bucket had a plastic lid and a handle with a trigger secured by a pin like a grenade.
Rasul took it down and lifted the lid. Inside, the rocket was centered in the bucket with the thousand-foot nylon line coiled around it. The rope was tied to a steel wire clipped to the rocket, which would make it easy for him to attach the Novichok cylinder in its place. The bucket even had helpful instructions on the outside for its operation and how to install a replacement rocket. All he needed to do was dump out the rope, set the Novichok to a two-minute countdown, and tie it to the rocket.
Now he just had to get back to the decontamination chamber. As long as he could get there unseen, he’d have plenty of time to jury-rig his weapon. They’d be scouring the rest of the ship for him. No one would suspect he’d go back to the same place.
He retreated behind an external bulkhead for cover and took out his phone, then opened the specially designed launch app. Once he’d typed in his code, the screen allowed him to change the targeting coordinates that came up. He entered the longitude and latitude for Diego Garcia.
Target confirmed, came the app’s reply.
He navigated to the screen titled Launch. He slid aside the icon protecting against inadvertent activation, and the screen revealed a round red button with a caption that said Launch now.
He clicked the button and smiled as he thought to himself, This will keep them distracted.
* * *
—
“We’re not going to help the Chairman?” Raven said as they double-timed it back toward the gangway and away from the gunshots.
“Orders are orders,” Linc said. “Remember that from the Army?”
“There’s a reason I left the Army.”
“The Chairman worries about his crew more than himself.” He threw her a grin. “Besides, as soon as we get to the Oregon, we’ll put on some NBC gear and see if we can convince him to let us come back.”