across his back, where it would jangle less.
LB asked, “What’re you doing?”
“Gotta go find them.” Wally rolled off his knees to his haunches. To Jamie, he said, “Stay ready. We’ll move after we know where they all are.”
LB blocked Wally’s path. “What’s gotten into you?”
“Move.”
“No. PJs don’t work alone.”
Mirroring Wally, LB swung the big Zastava to his back. From under his pants leg he pulled a blood-sullied blade.
LB shrugged. “Okay, I admit. I kinda forgot that.”
Wally unsheathed his own knife.
Wally lost sight of LB quickly. Squat and thick, LB disappeared into the jumbled terrain like a cat, shadows gathering across his back. Wally jackknifed himself as small as he could, bending at the waist and knees, and sped from cover to cover, the breeze and sea sounds shrouding the scuffles of his boots. LB scoured the right half of the bow, Wally the left. Around the corner, Jamie kept an infrared eye on the two pacing Somalis. Every few seconds, he murmured to the crawling LB and Wally about where the pirates walked or looked.
Wally crabbed sideways, pausing in pools of shade made crisp by the harsh light overhead. He checked for places a tired pirate might loaf on a warm hijacked night. Maybe away from the light, or near the rail so his mates could wake him if a boss came near. Where was a soft place on this hard bow?
Wally stole between hawsers. He scurried into the open to hide behind the bulk of a giant spool, one of two windlasses for hauling the great anchor chain. The machine had a broad shadow, and there he found his pirate. The napping Somali was sprawled on a heavy nylon line laid out in switchback rows to make a bed. Beside him lay a rocket grenade launcher.
“Got him,” Wally whispered. “Sleeping on a pile of rope. Next to the left windlass.”
“Roger,” Jamie uttered. “You’re clear so far.”
“LB?”
“Hold.” Moments passed, then LB came back. “I see the ropes on this side. No one on them.”
The reek of corrosion dripped from the iron chain. Wally slunk deeper into the shadow of the links.
“LB. Anything?”
“Nothing. This side of the bow’s clear.”
“Sit tight. Jamie.”
“Go.”
“Looks like there’s only three targets up here. You still have visual on two?”
“Roger.”
“Can you make both shots?”
“The one close to me, yeah. The one over by you, that’s forty yards. He’s moving. There’s too much stuff in the way.”
“Can you make the shots?”
“Clean? Negative.”
Wally tapped the blade against his gloved palm. The plan formed fast for him, and he saw no other way.
“LB?”
“Go.”
“Can you get over here?”
“Yeah.”
“Okay. I know you’re hating this.”
“Shut up, Wally. I’ll do him.”
“All right. Move.”
Wally raised his head to get a fix on the pirate twenty yards away, strolling the port rail. The quarter moon had slipped above the horizon, gilding the waters where the Somali cast his attention.
Wally could take him. He slid away the knife and shed the M4 from his back into his hands. This pirate was chubby, with a protruding belly under the dangling Kalashnikov. How could that be, from such a poor country? The man walked barefoot with a lazy gait.
Wally detected a rumple in the shadows. LB emerged to sidle next to him in the shadow of the windlass, knife in hand.
“Jamie. LB’s in position. On my mark.”
“Roger.”
The shadows altered LB’s face. He looked younger, the crevices smoothed. Wally laid a hand on LB’s crusted shoulder.
“I’m sorry. Go.”
LB stayed under Wally’s touch for a moment before pivoting away.
On his toes, agile for his girth, LB appeared to float to the sleeping pirate. Moving into a patch of light, he did little to attract the eye, creeping ahead, doubled tightly. He held the blade tucked like a talon behind his wrist to prevent a flash. He slipped into the carpet of shadow where the Somali lay.
Wally alerted Jamie. “Ready.”
“On my target.”
LB did not pounce on the pirate but knelt beside him gently, as if to anoint rather than kill. Wrapping both hands around the knife’s handle, he raised the blade above the pirate’s torso. Wally needed to take his gaze away, to put them on his own target, but a realization glued him to LB. The missions he’d jumpmastered for Gus DiNardo long ago hadn’t been just recon.
LB hovered a last moment, then rammed the knife in two-handed. He fell forward behind the blade, driving it down under his full weight. The knife sank up to the hilt in the pirate’s chest. LB spread-eagled across the man to keep him from