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once, twice, several times, until its magazine was empty.
    He let the rifle drop against its strap and skidded down the rope. The captain hit the water and bounced backward, rolling against a rock, half in, half out of the sea. Pushing forward, he willed himself in the direction of a boat floating nearby. Gunfire erupted from above. As he was about to dive into the water, he saw a shadow behind him on the rocks; it had to be one of his men. He twisted back, half hopping, half crawling, aiming to grab the man and drag him into the sea and safety. Bullets danced around him, but Sattari focused only on the black shadow that lay in front of him. He grabbed the man and pulled, growling as he did, a threatened bear cornered in an ambush. Pulling the soldier over his shoulder, he went back to the water, growling the whole time.
    The steamy hiss of a rocket-launched grenade creased the air; a long, deep rattle followed. The water surged around him, pushing him down, but Sattari kept moving until hands reached out and grabbed him. The commando was lifted from his back, and Sattari was pulled into the raft. He pushed himself upright, looking around. They were the last boat to get away.
    â€œDetonate the charges,” he told the coxswain when he saw his face.
    â€œNow, Captain?”
    â€œNow.”
    Aboard the Abner Read ,
off the coast of Somalia
2345
    S TARSHIP STEADIED THE W EREWOLF A MILE IN FRONT OF THE small boat’s bow. The Abner Read was now less than two miles away, but the warship sat so low in the water that even if the smugglers had infrared glasses they probably didn’t know it was there.
    â€œWerewolf, we’re about to radio them to stop,” said Eyes. “Go ahead and turn on the searchlight.”
    â€œRoger that,” said Starship.
    The halogen beam under the Werewolf’s nose caught the bow of the little boat dead on. Starship looked at the image from the Werewolf’s video feed; he saw shadows in the cabin but couldn’t make out much else.
    A warning was broadcast in English, Arabic, and French on all of the maritime radio channels. Starship came over the craft and fired a “log”—an LUU-2 illumination flare—which lit up the boat and the sea around it. At the same time, a boarding party pushed off the Abner Read in a rigid-hulled inflatable boat.
    Called a SITT, or shipboard integrated tactical team, the specially trained team of sailors was heavily armed and well-versed in dealing with smugglers. Starship’s job was to get a good look at the boat so the boarding party would know what to expect. He would train his weapons on the smuggler’s craft. The boat was so small it was likely the Hellfire missiles or even his 30mm cannon could sink it within seconds if he fired.
    So could the Abner Read —its forward deck gun was already zeroed in.
    â€œI have nobody on the forward deck,” Starship reported. “Uh-oh, here we go—two guys coming out to the stern. Going to the boxes.”
    â€œAre those weapons?”
    â€œNegative—looks like they’re trying to cut the crates loose. Want me to strafe them?”
    â€œUnidentified ship has failed to acknowledge,” said Eyes, whose remarks were being recorded as evidence of the encounter. “ Abner Read SITT team is en route. Werewolf, see if you can stop the smugglers from throwing the contraband overboard.”
    â€œRoger that,” said Starship. He selected the aircraft’s 7.62 machine gun and sent a string of bullets into the rail of the small boat. He saw the people on the boat ducking as he flew past; wheeling the helicopter around, he steadied the nose to spray the stern again, using his weapon to keep them away from the back of the vessel.
    A man emerged from the cabin. A second later the Werewolf’s flight control computer sounded a tone in his ear—the smuggler had fired a rocket-launched grenade at the small aircraft.
    Starship jammed his throttle,