Armen Gharabegian - Protocol 7

He knew that the others had their own reasons for being here: Hayden wanted his ship back; Andrew wanted to prove his tech; Sam was here to try and protect them all. But Simon had not forgotten the one and only reason he had set all of this into motion: to find his father. To save him. To bring him home safe.

Simon was the first to arrive at Doc A-67. The hollow sound of his boots on the wooden slats was far too loud to suit him; he felt like a giant tromping on a drum skin. His father’s journal was a constant weight against his heart. As he walked closer to the water’s edge, he noticed an old freighter looming out of the sea-a black-painted cargo vessel with two huge, dormant smokestacks, dark and silent since the vessel’s energy conversion. Until all this had begun, Simon had been unaware of how completely sea travel had changed in the last fifty years, with new propulsion systems and new fuel economies. Still, a seaworthy hull was a seaworthy hull, and every ship that could stay afloat was still working, one way or another, including this barnacle-encrusted behemoth buried in the fog. He strained to find its name and registry number painted on the bow, and almost gasped when he found it.

The S.S. Munro.

It was the ship they had been looking for-the one whose navigation system they had already hijacked, back when they were in Corsica.

Simon already knew how it was going to work out. It would not be pleasant for Donovan or his crew, but no one would die; if they were lucky, no one would even be hurt. That remained to be seen.

As he approached the large vessel he noticed a wide-bodied, broad-shouldered man in a seaman’s cap standing at the bottom of the gangway, smoking a twisted cheroot and staring into the fog. Simon recognized the iron-gray hair and the hands as gnarled and scarred as an old oak. Doug Donovan looked exactly like what Hayden had described: a once-retired ship’s captain who had spent most of his career at sea in the last century, and who had returned to the sea because it was where he belonged. A man who had managed to wrangle an incredibly important contract with the military and the UK because he was one of the best damn sailors still at sea, under any flag, and everyone knew it.

He turned and looked at Simon, his gray eyes glittering with amusement and curiosity.

“Well, hello mate,” he said, chewing on his cigar. He looked to one side and gave the choppy sea of Puerto Williams an assessing glare. “Almost didn’t make it, the southern seas are pretty rough. Swell was pounding the whole way through.”

Donovan pointed over Simon’s shoulder with his chin. “Look behind you.”

Simon turned to see almost his entire team walking down the dock toward them.

“Quite a group you got there,” Donovan allowed. “Though one did arrive a bit earlier-hours ago, in point of fact.” He chewed the cigar a bit more and squinted, deep in thought. “Quite a looker.”

“I hope you’re not referring to my buddy Max?”

Donovan pretended to scowl at him. “Don’t be cheeky, you know who I’m talkin’ about.” The team reached his side with Max slightly in the lead. “Permission to come aboard, Captain?” he said to Donovan, as if they were old friends. “Permission granted,” the captain said gruffly. “All’a you.”

They murmured greetings to Simon as they filed by, hefting their bags and crates of equipment as they went. Simon noticed how much more confident they all were, approaching and boarding the vessel as if they had done this before.

“Come on,” Donovan said, “Let’s get out of here, I have cargo that needs to be delivered.”

As Simon boarded the Munro and put his feet on the main deck for the first time, his eye tried to measure the breadth and depth of the boat. It didn’t seem nearly large enough to accommodate Spector VI.

Donovan knew what he was thinking. “It barely did the trick,” Donovan said, waving a gnarled hand at the huge doors set into the deck itself. “The whatever-it-is takes up the entire hull. Used the biggest damn crane I’ve ever seen, at a loading station no one’s ever seen before, just to get this bloody thing on board. Not nearly as heavy as I expected, but big, Simon. All of six feet clearance front and back, and a hair more than that left and right. Extremely tight fit.” He stopped at the base of a massive winch that was bolted directly to the superstructure of the boat with connectors as thick as his wrist. “My engineers tell me this here winching system will get that whatchamecallit out of here once it’s free from its wrapping-wherever or whenever that might be.” He scowled and almost bit his cheroot in half, then leaned forward and spoke in a mock-whisper, his rough voice dripping with sarcasm. “You can see, I assume, how much I enjoy being left in the dark.”

The Spector had been camouflaged in a sealed wrap when it was first placed into the vessel-Simon knew that much. No one had seen it “undressed” yet; not even Donovan had an idea of what it really looked like, nor was anyone supposed to. His orders had been simple: get it aboard, sail at best possible speed to a particular location, and wait. Nothing more, and don’t ask questions. Donovan hadn’t even been particularly surprised when the destination coordinates had changed completely and unexpectedly in mid-mission. That kind of evasive maneuver was fairly common during black ops; he’d been through it before. As far as Donovan was concerned, Simon and his team were military personnel-that’s what he’d been told. According to the coordinates and instructions he had received, the team was supposed to rendezvous here at Port Williams. And all had gone as instructed.

“I feel as if we’re the slaves who dragged that horse up to the gates of Troy,” Donovan said. “Some big damn piece of work, here for some big damn important reason.” He cocked an eye at Simon.

“One of these days,” he said, “Someone’s going to have to tell me what that thing is.”

“Oh, I think it’s better not to know too much sometimes,” Simon assured him. “But let’s just get to where we need to go and we’ll see.”

He looked at his watch as he spoke, and Donovan nodded in agreement. “I know. We have a three-hour window starting in about eight minutes. I need to get this thing moving.”

“Thank you, Captain,” Simon said.

“Don’t mention it. Your guys in the military pay me a good sum for this bloody job.”

They looked at each other for a moment, and then Simon turned away and asked for directions to the hull.

I wonder if you’d say that, he thought wordlessly as he moved below decks, if you knew what we were actually planning to do.

S.S. Munro, 10:46 AM

As Simon entered the main cabin, he noticed the team gathered around the table waiting for him. He could sense the hesitation and fear but was glad to see that everyone was there on time. Max was the last to walk in. He looked at his watch and smiled at Simon.

“I think this is the first time you’ve beat me.” He dropped his bags at the door and said, “Okay, we need some coffee.”

Simon noticed Nastasia in the corner, chatting away with Samantha and Hayden. Ryan greeted him with two mugs of coffee-one for Simon and the other for Max.

“Here you go. Just poured.”

Hayden looked back at Simon and said, “Nastasia tells us there’s a storm approaching. We need to go downstairs and power up the Spector.”

Donovan paused at the door long enough to scrape the room with his eyes. “Lines are free,” he said. “We’ll be on our way in a moment.” His gaze held Simon’s for a moment. “Hope she’s intact,” he said referring to the cargo, and then he was gone.

Max turned to Simon with a look of stunned surprise. “What?”