Blood Tide Read online

  The back blast rolled across the stern of Flawless Victory and shattered the windows of the bridge. Three hundred yards out to sea, the lead speedboat disappeared in a ball of orange fire.

  Fung and his men pumped their fists and cheered.

  Bolan shouted at the top of his lungs and pointed. His traversing team had been deafened by the first shot, but Fung watched Bolan’s hands like a hawk. The turret began turning. The speedboats began to split off evasively as Bolan fired his spotting rifle and then triggered the top-left weapon.

  The recoilless rifle lit up the stern deck like Armageddon. Bolan’s shot went wide and hurled up a geyser in the dark water. Bolan knifed his hand through the air as Fung and his men heaved against the turret. Bolan couldn’t track the speedboats fast enough. He tilted his guns as his muzzles swung past the target and fired. Back blast blackened the deck as the 106 mm rifle fired.

  One hundred darts bloomed from the muzzle. The invisible swarm of steel expanded outward at 1700 feet per second. The speedboat lurched as it flew into the hail of darts, and splinters erupted along its length. The dozen pirates aboard shuddered like wheat in the wind as the killing cloud rippled through the open cockpit.

  The pirate armada closed to rocket range. RPG-7 rocket-propelled grenades hissed from their launch tubes. One rocket shrieked by the Ontos and detonated over the bridge, blasting shrapnel against the superstructure. The second hit the bow, killing two of Ming’s riflemen. Ming’s men opened up with their M-16s. Red and green tracers crisscrossed in the night.

  Bolan fired his fourth round, but the speedboats were too close and moving too fast. His beehive round ripped a hundred white-water geysers in the wake of a pirate boat. Megawatti’s men were determined to capture the prize. Rustam Megawatti wanted the gold and the opium. The Red League wanted Ming Jinrong dead.

  Bolan fired his fifth and six barrels, barely clipping the nose of one boat and missing the other entirely. “Reload!” he shouted while signaling to Fung.

  Fung and Du pulled fresh shells out of the back hatch of the Ontos while the other men flung open the six smoking breeches and yanked out the spent cases. The speedboats encircled Flawless Victory like a pack of orcas around a gray whale. They fired their RPGs high into the deck rather than into her sides so that she wouldn’t sink or have her cargo be damaged.

  Bolan’s crew slammed the breeches shut on the recoilless weapons. Du shouted to be heard, “Top four beehive! Bottom HE!”

  The speedboats were already beneath the Ontos’s maximum declination. Hooked rope ladders and grapnels clanked over the rail, and pirates streamed up Flawless Victory’s sides.

  Bolan whipped his hand in a half circle. “One-eighty!”

  Fung and his men heaved on the turret and brought the Ontos’s smoking 106 mm muzzles to bear on Flawless Victory, herself. Ming’s voice thundered across the loudspeaker in Mandarin, and then again in English. “Prepare to repel boarders!”

  “Ming,” Bolan shouted into his radio, “get your men flat on the deck!”

  The loudspeaker boomed. Bolan had to give Ming credit. His men were well trained. As a unit, they dropped flat to the deck as if they had been shot.

  Pirates came over the rails spraying automatic weapons port and starboard.

  Bolan aimed his top right gun along the starboard rail. “Firing!”

  Fung and his team crouched as Bolan fired. Sparks shrieked off the side of the bridge as the stream of darts swept the starboard rail from stem to stern.

  “Port!” Bolan roared.

  Rifle fire hammered the front of the Ontos like hail, and two of Bolan’s gun crew went down. His top-left barrel came online, and the weapon swept the port rail like a fire hose. Ming’s men leaped up, slaughtering the survivors and shooting down into the sitting speedboats.

  “Cooper!” Ming stood in the shattered window of the bridge, pointing frantically. Bolan looked back and saw a dozen men climbing over the bow. They couldn’t shift the turret in time. Du, Fung and the two remaining gun crewman clawed for their pistols.

  “Down!” Bolan shouted. “Everyone down!”

  Ming’s voice thundered like god on high from the loudspeakers. His men dropped once more to the deck.

  The pirates came straight for the Ontos, guns blazing.

  Bolan pumped his electrical trigger, firing rifles three, four and five. The left-hand beehive round swept the starboard rail again, and the HE round in the barrel beneath it streaked out into the night. The right-hand gun sent a swarm of darts directly into the bridge.

  Three plumes of superheated gas and fire erupted across the bow as the 106 mm weapons back-vented. The pirates charging the Ontos were engulfed in the multiple back blasts. Their blackened and smoldering bodies folded in upon themselves as they fell out of the smoke.

  The pistols of Bolan’s gun crew cracked as they finished off any charred pirate still twitching. Bolan leaped out of the turret and moved astern. The attack had ended as quickly as it had begun. Four of the speedboats were streaking away into the night in full retreat. The deck was littered with dead pirates. Ming and his men crouched with their rifles pointed at a cluster of fuel drums. Bolan approached Mei and Ming. “What’s going on?”

  “We have a situation,” Mei responded.

  The fuel drums had been filled with concrete as a makeshift fortification for Ming’s men. Bolan could see that someone was crouching behind them. “I can see his knee. I can take him from here,” he said.

  “He says he has a bomb,” Mei replied calmly.

  “Really? Who is he?”

  “He is the prize.” Ming continued to peer down the sights of his M-16. “He is Isfan Megawatti.”

  Bolan was surprised. “The Megawatt’s son?”

  “The little Megawatt,” Ming said. “He says one of the speedboats is loaded with two, one hundred-pound charges of C-4 plastique with which they had intended to scuttle my ship after they had relieved her of her cargo.”

  “On a deadman’s switch?” Bolan asked, already sure of the answer.

  “So he claims,” Ming replied.

  “Does he speak English?”

  “Indeed.”

  “Okay.” Bolan rose. “Isfan Megawatti! My name is Cooper! I’m an American with Interpol! I am prepared to negotiate with you!”

  “Don’t shoot!” A young Indonesian man of about twenty stood up slowly. He was wearing a blue tracksuit with body armor over it. In his hands he held an AK-74 and a black box. “I’ll blow us all to hell!”

  Bolan walked slowly to the port rail. A speedboat was hooked to the side of Flawless Victory by a rope ladder. Two bulging canvas rifle bags sat across the seats. Bolan walked back and spoke quietly to Ming and Mei. “He doesn’t have enough to blow up the ship, but he has enough to sink her.”

  “Unacceptable,” Ming declared.

  “Negotiate?” Mei suggested.

  “With the man who came to rob and assassinate me?” Ming lifted his chin imperiously. “Cooper, can you not do something?”

  “Yeah.” Bolan sighed wearily. “I’ll do something.”

  “Isfan!” The Executioner began walking forward. “Disarm the charges. I promise you I will not allow you to be harmed.”

  “I will recall my boats. The opium and the gold will be loaded onto them.” Isfan Megawatti smiled to reveal gold teeth. “Ming may keep his life, for now.”

  Bolan raised his carbine as he kept walking forward. “Disarm the charges!”

  “One more step!” Isfan brandished the box. “Just one more!”

  Bolan stopped and lowered his carbine slightly. He was within twenty feet. The problem was his target was wearing Kevlar, and armored vests made excellent insulators. Bolan aimed at Isfan’s legs. “I don’t know if Ming will go for that deal.”

  “I shan’t,” Ming declared.

  “You’d goddamn better go for the goddamn deal!” Isfan was shaking. He had come to collect the opium, the gold and Ming’s head, and had planned to return to his father a hero. No
w, he was one-half of a Mexican standoff.

  “Listen, we can work this—” Bolan snarled at one of Ming’s men. “Stand down!”

  Isfan turned to look, and Bolan pressed the button on his weapon system’s laser sight. A ruby dot appeared on Isfan’s pant leg.

  The young pirate’s head snapped around. “What—”

  Bolan squeezed the trigger on the X26. The twin probes flew through the air trailing their wires. They plunged into Megawatti’s right thigh. Bolan held down his trigger. The weapon had been modified to Bolan’s specifications. The Executioner pumped a full twenty-six watts into Isfan Megawatti on continuous pulse.

  The Indonesian’s automatic carbine sprayed on full-auto as his finger clamped spasmodically on the trigger. Bolan sprang as the man’s body locked and began to fall. Bolan tossed away his carbine as he dived, cutting the charge as he hit the pirate like a fullback. He slammed both of his hands around Megawatti’s fingers and the detonator box. His shoulder smashed into the pirate’s chest, and the two of them flew in a tangle of limbs up and over the fuel drums. The young man gasped, ribs cracking, as Bolan landed on top of him. He twitched and spit as Bolan held his hand between his in a death grip.

  Feet thudded on the deck, and Bolan was suddenly surrounded in a ring of M-16 rifles. Ming peered down over his front sight. “You have it?”

  Bolan grimaced as he held Megawatti’s hand and the box in a white-knuckled vise. “We’re fine as long as he doesn’t raise his thumb.”

  Ming slung his rifle and drew one of his broadswords. “Shall I cut off his hand?”

  “Marcie, peel his fingers back from the box, one at a time, starting with the little one,” Bolan said.

  Mei knelt and began peeling fingers back from the black plastic box. Megawatti struggled. Bolan pressed his thumb down against the edge of the red button as Marcie pulled the young man’s thumb away. He took the box and slid the arming switch back to safe. Ming’s men sighed collectively as Bolan rose and handed the box to Ming.

  The Chinese gangster shook his head in wonder as he took the detonator. “I know kung fu masters who cannot move with your speed, Mr. Cooper. Breathtaking, simply breathtaking.”

  “Listen, I know he came to kill you, but I need him. He’s an intelligence asset,” Bolan said.

  “Oh, indeed, I suspect he has information I wish to know, as well.” Ming dropped to his heels beside Megawatti. “You wish to live. My friend and student here has urgent questions.” Ming loomed over the twitching pirate prince. “We are now going to renegotiate your release.”

  7

  Polillo Island

  Rosario Blancanales’s six-foot Okinawan bo staff blurred toward Ali’s head. The youth formed an X with his escrima sticks to block the strike.

  Calvin James stood outside a ten-foot circle drawn in the sand, a copy of the Koran in his hand, quizzing Ali like a schoolmaster as the young man and Blancanales did battle within the tiny arena.

  Ali’s rattan batons hummed through the air and clacked against the six-foot white-oak staff in rapid staccato, seeking an opening in the older man’s defenses.

  Ali froze as the tapered end of Blancanales’s staff suddenly slid past his batons in a brutal thrust that stopped a hairsbreadth from his exposed throat. Ali lowered his rods in recognition of the killing blow.

  James had been testing the young man’s knowledge of the laws of his faith. It was quite clear that Ali was fully aware he had broken every law of his adopted faith. He was clearly remorseful and grateful to the Stony Man fighters for their guidance.

  James nodded and closed the Koran as Bolan walked out from the cluster of trees. “Ali, do you remember this man?”

  Ali dropped to his knees and bowed at Bolan’s feet. “He is the man I have offended.”

  “And what will you do to atone for it?” James asked.

  Ali rose and looked into Bolan’s eyes. “All that is required, including the giving of my life.”

  James knew how eager Ali was to make amends. “You have partaken of lies, Ali. You have broken the laws of Islam. Yet you were spared. You were spared for the purpose of saving the lives of the innocent. There is no higher tenet of Islam, other than that of freeing fellow Muslims from slavery. Those are your goals. To protect the innocent and free your fellow believers from the slavery of a faith that has been perverted. Do you accept this task?”

  Ali bowed his head. “I do.”

  Bolan’s blue eyes burned down on the young man. “Wait.”

  Ali looked up and blinked in surprise.

  Bolan locked his gaze with Ali’s and held it. “I am going to give you a choice. You can come with me, and see this thing through to the end. Or, if you wish, I will take you back to Mindanao. You will be given a new identity, money and the opportunity to start a new life.”

  “I will go with you—”

  “My goal to destroy those you served, Ali,” Bolan said. “I’ll use treachery and every other device within my means to do so. It’s possible I will die in the attempt, and you could too if you accompany me. You are young, and you’ve already escaped death once. Are you really so eager to risk it a second time?”

  “I choose it. Of my own free will, and because Allah and honor demand it.” Ali stared at Bolan defiantly.

  James stepped into the circle and handed the Koran to Ali. He held out his hand to Blancanales. “Go with this man, Ali. Go with God.”

  Ali took the Koran without breaking eye contact with Bolan. “I am your man, Makeen. I will find you.”

  Bolan nodded once. The die was cast.

  BOLAN AROSE. He had allowed himself the sleep his body needed. He rolled out of his bedding and followed the smell of coffee to the kitchen. James sat at the table reading The Economist. He glanced at Bolan and inclined his head toward the pot on the counter. “Morning.”

  “Morning.” Bolan poured himself a cup of Javanese coffee. “Where is everybody?”

  “Pol took Ali in the seaplane at dawn. You caught him off the Sulu Archipelago, so Pol’s going to release him back into the wild on Tawi Tawi Island. His cover story is that he and his team attacked the wrong boat and that the yacht was owned by heavily armed drug dealers. There was a fight and he got knocked overboard. He washed up on the beach. He was hurt, but after a couple of days he managed to signal a fishing boat and make his way back.”

  Bolan sipped his coffee. The story was plausible, but for rejoining a secret society, he knew it was as thin as hell.

  James read his mind. “They’ll probably kill him out of hand.”

  That was undoubtedly true. But Ali was young, brave and lower echelon. His chances were slim, but he had a chance. “He volunteered,” Bolan said in reply.

  “Jesus, Mack—”

  “I know,” Bolan said. “You like the kid.”

  “Yeah, well…” James shook his head ruefully.

  “I like him, too, Cal, and he did volunteer. I gave him a choice.”

  “Yeah, I know. I guess Pol and I kind of adopted him. I know what he was, but I know what he is now. For good or ill, he’s part of the team. I’m worried about him.”

  Bolan was worried, as well. “What kind of intel did you and Pol get out of him?”

  “Not much. Ali was pretty much a rank and filer in the organization. We know he was indoctrinated in prison. When he got out, he was contacted by an agent of the sect and driven up into the hills blindfolded. It was a two-day trip, rural Philippine roads…” James trailed off with a shrug.

  “So it could have been anywhere in the lower half of Mindanao.”

  “He says there was a kind of encampment and a farm where he was given religious training and worked for about three months. Then he was driven to the coast, blindfolded again and taken out to sea.”

  “Celebes or Sulu?”

  “The boy doesn’t know. They were at sea for about three days. He was taken to a small island where he and a dozen other young men received further bladed-weapon training by someone they simply called “Mast
er” and rudimentary care and feeding of the AK-47 from a Chinese man who spoke Arabic and administered most of his instruction through pantomime and beatings. He was there for about a month when a minor cleric came and gave them instruction on how to prepare themselves physically and spiritually to run juramentado. They were taught how to put themselves into trance. They spent about two weeks on it.”

  “Then what happened?”

  “Then they were told they were ready. They were told they had a target, and they received a visit from the Mahdi, himself.”

  “Mahdi?” Bolan set down his cup. “You’re sure that’s the word he used.”

  “That’s the word Ali used, and that’s the word he said all of them used.”

  Bolan’s stomach sank with the implication. Mahdi meant “Expected One” or “Guided One of the Prophet.” The long-awaited messiah of the Muslim faith. A Mahdi was the Muslim equivalent of a Second Coming of Christ. During the 1880s, the last self-proclaimed Mahdi had, with an army composed mostly of men armed with swords and spears, destroyed a well-armed Egyptian force and then drove the British out of the Sudan.

  Bolan’s worst fears of a strategic religious terror movement were being realized. “This isn’t good,” he said.

  “No. No, it’s not.”

  “What’d he say the Madhi was like?”

  “The boy was kind of vague on that. The minor mojo man on the island had them hopped up and tranced when the Mahdi and his entourage showed up. All Ali remembers is that he wore white, he looked like an angel and spoke like God. They made a night of it.” James shook his head. “From Ali’s description, it sounded like a real old-fashioned holy rolling and shaking revival meeting, but with a lot of machetes and hemp smoking involved.”