'Not us. We're too smart.'
Ravi put his arm around her. 'Smart but careful, that's the trick,' he told her. 'Remember, our business is very dangerous. One serious mistake could end our lives.'
Shakira looked thoughtful. 'Do you sometimes think we have done enough? You know, we should just retire from the battle and go and live somewhere peaceful?'
'I do sometimes think that. But I would like to see a great Islamic State, free of the influences of the West and Israel. Certainly here in the Middle East. And I think I know how to achieve it. Which is why we are here. A lot of people are counting on me, and I'm not ready to let everyone down.'
'I guess you shouldn't be so brilliant, my darling,' she replied. 'At the Nimrod Jail, you showed everyone a standard of professionalism they had never seen before. Now you are some kind of messiah to half the Arab nations.'
'I can teach them,' said Ravi, quietly. 'But first I must show them.'
They left the teahouse shortly afterward and took a taxi back to the Kerman Grand Inn, packed, and left for the airport for the once-a-week Iran Air flight down to Bandar Abbas, a distance of around 320 miles.
It left on time at six o'clock and arrived at the seaport forty-five minutes later. They checked into the now jaded but once renowned old Hotel Gamerun on the south side of Bolvar-e Pasdaran, overlooking the Gulf. Renamed the Homa Hotel, it still carried an air of opulence, and its restaurant, once famous, was now adequate. Just. But the chef knew how to make battered prawns with fresh steamed rice, the staple dish of Iran. They drank mango juice, and then tea, before taking a walk in the gardens overlooking the ocean.
The night was warm and the moon rose in the east, from out of the desert, casting a light on several strollers along the pathways. The hotel was full, mainly with tourists, as it often was at this time of year. Bookings were impossible, but the Iranian Navy had several permanent rooms under contract, which was how Ravi and Shakira had slipped so smoothly onto the guest list with three days' notice.
News of the Nimrod jailbreak had had a stunning effect on Arab morale. But it was the Ayatollahs who had insisted on Hamas revealing who, precisely, had been responsible. Hamas had been shy, guarding the identity of their military leader. But as the months went by, the Ayatollahs, who had done so much to finance operations in the Middle East, had their way. The name of General Rashood was given to them, along with the shining fact that he was an Iranian-born Muslim.
This quiet walk in the garden may have seemed like a carefree, romantic interlude for two people who had been devotedly in love for almost two years. But the atmosphere between them was fraught with tensions. First thing in the morning, General Rashood was to report to the Iranian Naval yard on the western side of the town, where he had been summoned to discuss the future with the top brass of Hezbollah, plus that organization's military sympathizers and two senior hard-line clerics from Tehran who had for many years provided funds for various acts of destruction against the West.
An Ayatollah paymaster of very senior government rank would chair the meeting, which would take place behind locked doors in the Ops Room Block. Four guards would patrol every entrance. All notes and notebooks would be surrendered for inspection at the conclusion of the discussions. For many months, no one would ever be informed of the decisions reached nor indeed what any single person had stated.
As classified military gatherings go, this one was secret. And it would decide the immediate future of General Ravi and his Palestinian bride-to-be. Neither of them knew what tomorrow might bring, even though the main purpose of the meeting in the dockyard was to hear the world view of the revered Hamas military Chief.
Ravi and Shakira slept restlessly, each in turn awakening and wondering where they would go and what tasks might be allotted them. Shakira would not be permitted to attend the meeting, but for the moment she was a guest of the Islamic State of Iran and would remain at the hotel until the General's business was concluded.
They went down the wide stairs for breakfast at eight o'clock, Shakira eating the traditional lavash bread with yogurt and honey, Ravi insisting on cornflakes and then a couple of fried eggs with toast despite, by Iranian standards, the monumental cost. The Homa Hotel's accounting department reasoned that anyone who wanted a thoroughly Western breakfast was a thoroughly Western tourist with thoroughly Western cash, which was, essentially, to be encouraged.
The Navy staff car arrived for the General at a quarter to nine. He wore Arab dress and spoke Arabic to the driver, who steered them westward through the seaport and out toward the Headquarters of the Iranian Navy.
Ravi noted the big sign to the left of the main entrance: headquarters first naval district. Below these large white letters was an uncompromising communication:
AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY
INTRUDERS WILL BE SHOT ON SIGHT
Their route to the Ops Center took them past the jetties. Ravi, like all SAS Commanders, was familiar with warships and he recognized a guided-missile frigate when he saw one. Right before his eyes was moored Iran's 1,300-ton Alvano Class Vosper MK5, Sabalan, which was built over thirty years ago in England and now carrying the very adequate Chinese cruise missile C-802.
Ravi could see the number 73 painted on her hull, and there were seamen boarding her and others leaving. He couldn't work out whether she was just departing or just arriving. Either way, she looked like a force to be considered in a Naval confrontation.
They arrived at the Ops Center a little after nine o'clock, and the General was ushered into a downstairs office where he was greeted by the burly, bespectacled figure of Vice Admiral Mohammed Badr, Head of Tactical Headquarters and Iran's most senior submarine expert.
'General Rashood!' he exclaimed with genuine warmth. 'I am honored to meet you. We have all heard so much.'
'Some of it good?' said Ravi, offering the Muslim greeting, arching his hand down from his forehead.
'All of it superb, General,' said the Admiral, bowing his head and giving deference to the rank of the officer before him. This, despite the fact that Ravi had been commissioned in a dirt cellar and had never led a force of more than fifty men, while he, Mohammed Badr, was the Head of a National Navy comprising 40,000 personnel and 180 ships, including three Russian-built Kilo Class submarines.
Admiral Badr, a native of the southern port of Bushehr, had been in command of the entire Kilo Class program of the Iranian Navy. Indeed he had been in command of the dockyard when an American hit squad had wrecked all three of the original deliveries four years previously. The three Kilos, now in his possession, were brand new, in pristine operational condition, and the Admiral intended they should stay that way.
He loathed America and everything the West stood for. He had actually been known to tremble with fury on the deck of an Iranian frigate when a line of giant U.S. tankers out of the Texan Gulf coast moved arrogantly through the Strait of Hormuz as if they owned it, to reload with crude oil, oil from the Persian Gulf, his country's sea, his people's oil. Not America's.
On the wall of his office was a photograph of a young Naval officer dressed in the dark blue dress uniform of a
Nakhoda Dovom (Commander), with four gold stripes on his sleeve, the uppermost one containing a gold circle.
'My son,' said the Admiral, glancing across the room. 'Ben Badr, Commanding Officer of the guided-missile frigate Sabalan. He's a good man, thirty-five years old now. He'll be here in a moment to meet you.'
'I'll be honored,' replied Ravi. 'Did the Sabalan just arrive? It looked busy.'
'She docked shortly after midnight,' said the Admiral.
'Will Ben join us at the meeting?'
'Certainly. He is very highly regarded here. A lot of people say I'm just keeping this chair warm for him.'
'Has he worked in submarines, like his father?' asked Ravi, slightly out of context.
But Admiral Badr did not regard it as such, and he replied steadily, 'All of his career. This is his first surface command.'
'Broadening his experience, eh?'
'Precisely so.'
'Can't have a Navy Chief who's spent his entire life underwater, right?'
The Admiral chuckled. 'Not these days. But Ben's a quick learner, and he's dedicated to our country and our
