Sabah chuckled. 'I too have felt as if my stomach is carrying a heavy load. Those thick sauces and all that meat! And the desserts! These Oman sailors live well, do they not?'
A siren suddenly sounded from the harbor area, the wail loud and steady. Mike and Sabah instinctively looked out to sea. A small dark smudge showed on the horizon.
'I wish we had some binoculars,' Mike said, peering past the harbor at the distant open water.
The two continued to gaze into the distance for ten minutes before they were able to discern the shape of Commodore Mahamat's flagship. 'Ah!' Sabah exclaimed. 'They have returned from their victory. Praise Allah!'
'I don't see the other ships,' Mike said. 'I wonder where they are.'
'Perhaps they cannot go as fast as the flagship,' Sabah suggested.
'Actually, they are able to go much faster,' Mike reminded him.
A staff car sped from headquarters toward the officers' quarters and pulled up just below the balcony. The passenger, a chief petty officer, waved up at them. 'The commodore has sent a message that you are to await his arrival in his office. Come at once, if you please.'
The two went into the room, grabbed the naval caps to match their uniforms, and went out into the hall. Their bodyguards, Imran and Ayyub, were startled when they appeared unexpectedly. Sabah told them where they were going and the two youngsters insisted on coming along. When the four got downstairs, it was a struggle for all of them to get into the back of the vehicle.
.
THE COMMODORE'S OFFICE
1800 HOURS LOCAL
A commotion in the hall marked Commodore Muhammad Mahamat's arrival in the headquarters building. Petty officers yelled and enlisted men scurried about as their commanding officer bellowed orders at them, his words tumbling and jumbling into unintelligible shouts. When he charged into his office, both Mike and Sabah were alarmed at his appearance.
'What happened?' Sabah asked.
'There was more than one of those cursed ACVs!' Mahamat said, close to weeping. 'There must have been a dozen! We were outnumbered and the infidels could go much faster than us. We were surrounded and the treacherous dogs loosed missiles at us from all sides! They would appear at one location and fire. Then another and fire! I think we must have destroyed eight or nine of them, but the remaining three or four were too much.'
Mike glanced out the window at the undamaged flagship tied up at the dock. 'How did you get away?'
'Only through the blessings of Allah and my skill as a combat leader,' Mahamat said. 'But they sank all my fast-attack boats. Those poor lads did not have a chance.'
Sabah, visibly shaken, sat down. Between this disaster and having to deal with the ship owner Suhanto's treachery, he had stood about as much as he could. 'What do we do now, Commodore?'
'I have radioed from the flagship for a helicopter at a heliport just north of here,' Mahamat said. 'I will have them fly us to Sheikh Omar's yacht for a council of war. I fear we are finished.'
Mike fought a desire to cheer, making his voice somber and low. 'I think we should go pack our things for the trip.'
'Yes!' Mahamat exclaimed, glad to have something to do. 'We must be prepared to stay with the sheikh for a good long spell.'
'We better tell Imran and Ayyub to get ready,' Mike said.
'No!' Mahamat ordered. 'There may not be room for them on the helicopter.'
Sabah grabbed Mike's arm. 'Let us go, Mikael!'
The pair, with their faithful bodyguards following, did not send for a car. Instead, they ran all the way back to the officers' quarters. By the time they managed to throw a few things together, the sound of rapid honking could be heard out in the street. Mike looked through the window and saw the limousine with a chief petty officer behind the wheel. It was the same vehicle that had brought them to the naval base. Mahamat stood beside it, gesturing for them to come down.
Imran and Ayyub had grown frightened in the atmosphere of panic and trepidation. When Mike and Sabah emerged from their room, the two former baker apprentices followed them to the large automobile. As soon as Mike and Sabah joined the commodore inside, the driver took off.
Mike turned and looked out the back window at the two forlorn kids, standing alone and abandoned.
Chapter 14.
OIL COMPANY HELIPORT
23 OCTOBER
0900 HOURS LOCAL
MIKE and his two traveling companions, Commodore Muhammad Mahamat and Hafez Sabah, were driven across the desert to a lackluster oil-survey station that been scarred and marred by sun, sand, wind, and neglect. This was a far cry from the sleek, well-maintained naval helicopter base that Mike Assad expected to see.
The site was where a French geological survey team was doing illegal work for the Saudis in Oman. The work crew was a mix of unsavory French, Arab, and African workers who looked as if they had been recruited from a den of thieves on the Marseilles waterfront. After arriving at the dilapidated facility, Mike, Sabah, and Mahamat were met by a corpulent, hairy, sweating supervisor who was not pleased to see them. 'My pilot will be veree cross,' he said in a heavy French accent. 'He don' wan' get up from bed until midday.'
As if on cue, the pilot shuffled out of the small dormitory in an unsteady manner. After giving the three passengers a scowl, he escorted them to a dirty, oil-streaked French Aerospatiale SA-360 chopper for the rest of their trip to the yacht. The pilot was a hungover, smelly Italian reprobate who stank of sweat and garlic to the extent his body odor filled the fuselage with an invisible rankness. The aircraft lifted off after a minimum warm-up run of the engine, heading toward the open sea for the relatively short flight to the royal yacht. Mike noticed the guy wore a badly faded military shirt, and the SEAL figured he had probably been cashiered from the Italian armed forces for drinking on duty. But at least he seemed a competent enough helicopter pilot.
A quick landing on the pad located on the
Although Jambarah sat at his desk, he was attired in a bathing suit and sandals, showing he had come in from the stem deck to meet the unexpected visitors. The sheikh's face was glum and an unlit cigar was clenched between his teeth. 'The message given me by the radio room indicated things did not go well in the confrontation with the American hovercraft. What happened?'
'We sailed into a trap, Sheikh Omar,' Mahamat said. 'There was more than one air-cushion vehicle. At least a half dozen sped around and among my ships, firing missiles while taking evasive action and jamming our electronics capabilities.'
'We were told they only had one such boat,' the sheikh said.
'It was all a great subterfuge, Sheikh Omar!' Mahamat cried. 'The infidels cleverly made it appear they had only one by employing a single hovercraft until the battle. Then they brought out the rest along with other warships and even jet airplanes. Squadrons of F-14s raked across our squadron as my brave men were martyred. We stood no chance at all!'
The sheikh looked at Mike and Sabah, asking, 'Were any of you wounded?'
Sabah shook his head. 'We did not participate in the battle, Sheikh Omar.'
'They would have been in the way,' Mahamat explained.
'Very well,' the sheikh said. 'Continue telling me about the incident.'
Mike stood back a short distance with Sabah, listening as the commodore described an attack force that would have served well in the great Normandy landings on D-Day in 1944. As Mahamat continued his verbal after- action report, it seemed that American missiles and bombs rained down from the sky as torpedoes snaked through the depths toward the Zauba Squadron like schools of crazed sharks smelling blood in the water. While Mike Assad
