Pirate Alley: A Novel Read Online Free PDF Page B

surface warship is an hour and a half away,” the American navy dude said, “but we will have a helo overhead in twenty minutes.”
    “Send it.”
    Penney handed the phone to Harry Zopp and consulted the computer screen that showed all the surface targets in the area, their course and speed, and the prediction of where they would be in a minute, or five or ten, if they didn’t change course or speed. The computer’s information was derived from the radar. The computer operator had to designate which targets were which.
    Arch was not without a plan. He and the other captains of the cruise line, together with the senior captain, had worked out a contingency plan for just such an attack and presented it to management, which had insisted upon some changes designed to protect the company from lawsuits, then approved it.
    The plan was The Plan. Unfortunately cruise ships did not carry weapons of any kind, not even a pistol to take down a raving, homicidal berserker. So The Plan relied upon speed and mild maneuvering to keep boatloads of armed, homicidal pirates at bay. However, the cruise line was not willing to have the pirates slaughter a great many of its customers, so if the pirates persisted in shooting into the cruise ship, the captain was supposed to surrender, on the theory that the pirates would then ransom ship, passengers and crew. It all sounded very logical in the boardroom of the cruise company in London.
    “We have insured against the risk,” the chairman told Captain Penney. Ah, yes. Insurance. Even if the company had to refund fares and ransom ship, passengers and crew and pay a few families damages because they lost a family member, the cruise line wasn’t going to lose money. Comforting, that.
    Sultan of the Seas carried 490 passengers and 370 officers and crew. Eight hundred sixty defenseless people. Still, the international task force, Task Force 151, was out there on patrol, just over the horizon, ready to intimidate those naughty pirates and protect honest people from violent, unwashed, starving Africans.
    “Don’t worry, Captain,” the chairman had said. “You can outrun them. The allied navies can deal with them.”
    Arch Penney looked again at the computer display. If he maintained this course and speed, the helo would arrive eight minutes after the pirates.
    Eight minutes. How many people would the pirates maim and kill in eight minutes?
    He picked up the mike for the ship’s public address system and flipped it on.
    “This is the captain. As you may know if you are on the weather decks, we are being intercepted by at least six small boats, which may contain pirates. We will do all we can to protect you and this ship. I request everyone to clear the weather decks and move to the interior of the ship, away from the windows, balconies and portholes. If your stateroom has a balcony, please step out into the passageway and remain there. I will keep you updated.”
    He switched off.
    Harry looked at him with a raised eyebrow. “Going to panic the old pussies, aren’t you?”
    Arch Penney shrugged and used his handheld radio to call the bosun. “Are you ready?”
    “Two minutes.”
    “Use the LRAD whenever they get in range.” The Long Range Acoustic Device aimed a powerful sound blast in a narrow cone. At one hundred yards, the high-pitched wail was painful. At fifty yards, it was capable of rupturing eardrums. The ship had four LRADs installed, two on each side.
    Now Penney asked the computer operator, “Where’s that chopper?”
    “One-two-two degrees true at forty-eight miles.”
    “Our speed?”
    “Twenty-eight knots and increasing,” Harry Zopp said. “We are full ahead, sir.”
    “Very well. Helmsman, use slow rate on the turn and come starboard to course one-two-zero degrees. Steady on it.” These new cruise liners had no rudder, but instead had engines in pods mounted below the hull. The helmsman was actually turning the pods. Maneuvering up to a pier, the pods allowed the