“He’ll appear any minute,” Jake said without taking his eyes from the screen. “The guys guarding me were altogether in a group like that just before he arrived.”

The three men continued to watch the footage. Sure enough, three minutes later they saw the door open and Flynn stride in.

“Mr Noah, congratulations.” His voice could clearly be heard from the console’s little speaker.

“That him?” Coote enquired.

“That’s him,” Jake confirmed.

They watched for ten minutes as the video confirmed everything that Jake had told Coote about Flynn and his plan.

Sixty-Three

HALF AN HOUR later, Jake, Coote, Ralf, and two dozen submariners including Eric and Ewan were assembled in the junior ratings’ mess. The video of Flynn and Jake on the bridge had just been screened to all the men present. Ralf tapped at the touchscreen of a small tablet he was holding, and the big screen on the wall flickered, then settled.

“This is the live feed from the bridge,” he said.

“Jake, can you give us a quick who’s who? For the benefit of these men?” Coote looked around the room.

Jake stood up, walked to the screen.

“This man sitting in the captain’s chair is Flynn, as you just saw. He’s in charge, no doubt about that. He took a bullet to his shoulder, but I don’t think it affected his mobility in any way. This man here on the helm, that’s Pedro. The man watching him, the one with the gun, is called Zhang. He’s dangerous. I watched him kill a man, one of their own. It certainly looks like Pedro is acting under duress. He’s a good man, I don’t think he’s working with them by choice. These other men, I don’t know their names but they are all working with Flynn. They’re some of the disciples you heard him talk about.”

“He said there were twelve disciples in all,” Eric said. “With Zhang, I see five on the bridge. Where do you think the others are?”

“No idea. I am guessing they’re keeping some of the bridge crew captive somewhere. Hoping, anyway. We know that he took Lucya, the chief radio officer. And before that they took another hostage, the head of housekeeping. They may have other hostages, and they must be holding these women somewhere. Some of the disciples will be guarding them.”

“Any thoughts on where he would be holding them?” Coote asked.

“None. There’s no brig or secure cell on the ship. We looked for Tania and didn’t find her, even when we surveyed every cabin. I guess they moved her around. They could be anywhere. Maybe more than one location.”

“So we have no way of identifying these guys,” Ralf said.

“Not all of them. But anyone carrying a gun you can probably assume is one of them. Apart, maybe, from Max, our head of security. He had access to the gun locker, but I believe they took his key, violently. I might be wrong, and he could be armed and active, but I think it’s more likely he’s a hostage, or dead.”

“Thank you Jake. Ralf, the plans if you could?” Coote looked over to the tattooed man.

Ralf tapped away on his tablet. The screen flickered, then the image was replaced with deck plans.

“Our entry on board is here, the landing platform for the tender. We have visual confirmation that they haven’t closed it up. It provides access to deck two. The bridge is located on deck ten. This is the most direct route.”

As Coote spoke, Ralf zoomed in on the relevant sections of the blueprints. The plan was discussed in detail for two hours with Jake providing as much information as he could.

They were to board the Spirit of Arcadia at twelve thirty hours. There had been discussion about waiting until night when most passengers would be asleep and out of danger. The consensus was there was too great a risk that Flynn could already be harming or even killing people, that they should not waste any time. At the hour they had chosen, passengers were likely to be in the restaurants for lunch rations, so the risk was somewhat reduced.

They filed out of the mess to take up positions for the mission. Coote turned to Jake.

“Maybe this boat isn’t so poorly named after all eh? The Ambush is about to engage in an actual ambush!”

• • • • •

Jake was to remain aboard the submarine until the men had secured the bridge of the cruise ship. They were trained in combat, he wasn’t. He would only get in the way and risk the mission. Instead, he was stationed next to Ralf. They were to provide radio support. The live feed from the bridge would be crucial information.From a station next to Ralf’s, another officer was monitoring the video feed from the periscope array.

The most delicate part of the operation, Coote had explained, was surfacing at exactly the right spot. They wanted to remain hidden for as long as possible. The captain was now in the main control room overseeing the helmsman. An open audio feed between the two control rooms meant Jake had a good idea of what was going on. They had pulled alongside Spirit of Arcadia and matched her speed exactly. Using a fancy sonar trick, they had been able to engage some sort of autopilot that would keep them in position, provided the cruiser stayed on relatively straight course and didn’t execute any tight turns. They were now in the process of surfacing. Instead of just rearing up out of the water as they had done in front of the life raft, they were attempting to partially surface. Clipped orders were called out, status updates called back. Jake got the impression from the tense atmosphere that this was not something they practised regularly.

“Steady!”

“A little more out of the aft tank please Budden.”

“Aye sir.”

“Tower has broken the surface!”

“Keep it steady Budden. Another three metres.”

“Two…one…”

“Hold her here!”

“Holding.”

“How do we look from outside?”

The officer to Jake’s left replied into his headset: “Looks like we’re creating a slight bow wave, nothing too conspicuous.”

“Any sign they’ve spotted us?”

“Negative,” Ralf responded. “All quiet on the bridge. Primary target looks to be sleeping.”

“Red team, proceed with caution. I repeat, proceed with caution.”

Jake watched the periscope monitor intently. It had a wide field of view, and he was able to see a hatch on the top of the fin pop open. He counted a dozen armed submariners as they crawled out of the small round hole, then leapt from the tower onto the landing platform from which he himself had been dispatched so recently. They mounted the steps in formation. The lead man entered the boat. Thirty seconds later the others followed.

“Red team abord.”

“Roger. Blue team stand by.”

“Standing by.”

There was radio silence for a few very tense minutes.

“Red team approaching engine room.”

“Roger. Blue team go go go.”

Jake listened attentively. Ralf’s screen showed no movement on the bridge. On the other screen he saw twelve more men leave by the hatch. The followed the same formation, and within two minuets all had disappeared from view.

“Blue team aboard.”

“Red team, we have secure the engine room. I repeat, we have secured the engine room.”

“How many disciples?”

“Two gunmen. I don’t think they were expecting us.”

“Casualties?”

“None. No shots fired. These boys gave themselves up easily.”

Jake breathed a small sigh of relief. They knew that until a few days ago these so-called disciples were just regular passengers, not soldiers. They hadn’t expected too much of a fight. Even so, Coote had insisted that frightened men with guns could be unpredictable. Nothing was to be taken for granted.

“Blue team, we are on deck ten. Approaching bridge.”

“Roger. Keep this channel open.”