be upon the sons of the Prophet . . . '
BdL Dos Lindas
'Dos Lindas, this is Trinidad. I've got a ship, a smallish freighter, maybe five thousand tons, maybe six, heading towards you. Considering what we've just been through . . . '
Fosa picked up the microphone and asked, 'Can you see the name?'
The speaker crackled back, 'Hoogaboom, it says.'
'Didn't we warn her off?' Fosa asked aloud.
'We did, Skipper,' answered a radio man. 'About thirty seconds after the attack started.'
Radar spoke up. 'Captain, I wasn't paying close attention, but I don't recall them coming to a stop before we lost radar. I mean . . . '
'It would have taken a while for them to have come to a stop,' Fosa finished. 'I understand. But it wouldn't have taken this long.'
It could just be a mistake . . . but what are the odds? What are the odds when you factor in the very complex ambush they set for us here? And then . . . oh shit, they never touched the pork.
Fosa's voice was just short of panic. 'Trinidad, Agustin, STOP THAT SHIP!'
* * *
So far, so good, thought Kurita. Though the smoke was still atrocious and the heat almost unbearable, the fires were under control and there had been no more secondary explosions. He knew, from long years at sea, that the ship was drifting without power. That could be fixed and, so long as the carrier didn't sink, would be, he was sure.
The damage control and firefighting efforts had reach past the twenty foot gaping hole in the hull blasted by the cruise missile. Resting against this while waiting for another bout of vomiting to claim him, Kurita saw the outline of a freighter, bearing down on the immobile Dos Lindas.
He heard the loudspeakers proclaim, in Fosa's voice, 'Surface action, Port. Surface action, Port. We're not out of this yet, boys. On the port side is a ship . . . I think it intends to ram us. Surface action, Port. All guns: engage.'
Kurita looked around, thinking, Things are under control here; nothing the centurions can't handle, surely. Let's go see to the guns. They lost some crew to the missile attack, I'm sure.
PTF Santisima Trinidad
Clavell and Guptillo worked their gun furiously, sheltering behind the mantlet at the heavy return machine gun fire from the ship. The Trinidad's own machine guns returned fire, of course, but seemed to be having absolutely no effect.
'Shit,' cursed Clavell. He keyed his microphone and told Pedraz, 'Skipper, we're hitting the thing, easily, and penetrating it, too. I can see the shells going off inside. But they're having no effect that I can see.'
Pedraz was about to respond when a sudden flurry of fire burst from the Dos Lindas. He followed the tracers to where they impacted on the bow of the Hoogaboom. It was being chewed apart; that much was clear from the pieces of hull sloughing off under the fire. But beyond that? Nothing.
Machine gun fire raked out from the Hoogaboom, sweeping Trinidad's deck. Most of the crew was under reasonable cover. Not so, the machine gunners, and notably Santiona who was the target. With a scream, he went down, minus his legs and with the stumps gushing blood.
Without being told to, the ship's corpsman raced out from under cover and began tourniqueting off the wounded Santiona's stumps.
Hmmm . . . even the forty isn't doing shit to the ship. Hmmm . . .
'Clavell, target that ship's machine gunners.'
God, why the fuck didn't we mount torpedoes on this thing? We're a fucking Patrol Torpedo Fast and we don't have torpedoes? Shit.
MV Hoogaboom
Deep in his steel cocoon, Hoogaboom's captain thought, Thank Allah they don't have torpedoes. If they did, we'd be lost. For that matter, thank you, Almighty, that none of their aircraft were carrying, or got off with, any large bombs.
Overhead the captain heard what he thought must be aerial rockets smashing the upper deck. No matter; those can't penetrate. He looked at the screen tied in to the forward cameras. It was in this that the enemy ship was in view. There on the screen, the image amplified, a short man pointing with a sword directed the futile fire coming at Hoogaboom's bow. The captain laughed. Maybe if you had a couple of days to chew through, it might do some good, he thought. But you have mere minutes.
* * *
That worked, thought Pedraz, looking over the smoking holes in the enemy ship created by the forty, but it didn't buy us much.
Indeed, it had not bought anything but a reduction in fire from the freighter. It still closed on the helpless Dos Lindas; the distance now was just over one thousand meters.
Especially did it not buy us any time. Oh, God, for some time. With time even our forties could chew through. With time . . .
* * *
The patrol boats launched by the Hoogaboom went by the simple names of 'Wahid' and 'Ithnayn;' 'One' and 'Two.' Why, after all, invest any emotion or any name into what amounted to throwaway weapons?
They'd held back, One and Two, after being launched. This was not out of any fear; the men aboard the boats had no expectation, nor perhaps even any desire, to live. But there were only the two. Ahead, they'd be vulnerable to the defensive armaments of the target. Astern, they could react to any threats that arose to their primary, and do so especially well against any threats to their primary's greatest point of vulnerability, it's long, broad flanks.
Thus, when the captains of One and Two saw the tracers from Trinidad, they'd begin to move cautiously and carefully through the smoke to where they thought they would find the rear quarter of whatever was engaging the Hoogaboom. Side by side they moved until the bow gunner on One saw the infidel boat. He immediately engaged, followed by Two's bow gunner as soon as that boat had closed enough to make out a target.
* * *
Pedraz felt more than heard the incoming fire from his starboard aft quarter. Indeed, the first he actually heard was when the machine gunner on that point screamed at being chopped apart by the concentrated fire of first one, then two, then a half dozen enemy machine guns that came from astern.
Poor Marco, Pedraz thought as he applied throttle to get the hell away from the position in which he found himself. Unseen, Legionary Turco's body slid across the deck, leaving a broad swath of blood behind, before plunging over the stern. He'd never had a chance to strap himself in.
* * *
There wasn't a lot of advantage either way. All three patrol boats, Trinidad, One and Two, were sleek and fast and armed. Trinidad with her forty, was much more heavily armed. Sadly, though, the forty could not fire astern and Trinidad could not turn without presenting a vulnerable side to the pursuing craft.
'And that fucking freighter is closing on the Dos Lindas,' Pedraz fumed. 'Shit, shit, SHIT!'
A near burst of machine gun fire passed just to Pedraz's right, splintering the glass to his front. 'Shit!' Pedraz repeated.
