was the easiest target in the world. You pulled up and the staff invited you right in. Guests were always welcome. Delivery vans came and went, day and night. Busy, busy, busy. Perfect for a bombing.
* * *
Adnan’s load had lightened considerably. Only two packages of C-4 remained in his suicide vest. He’d put the others exactly where Parvez had told him to. One of these last two would deliver the maximum damage to the most forward part of the hull; four other bombs had been placed aft.
The tanker was much bigger than any ship Adnan had ever sailed on—the length of at least two soccer fields, with many levels. When he’d studied the diagram of the Dick Cheney with Parvez, setting up the bombs had looked simple, but everything about the supertanker seemed oversized, even to a seasoned sailor like him. And his job had never entailed rigging a massive ship to blow up and sink.
Finding his way through the warren of hallways, berths, and storage rooms had taken Adnan hours. He’d worried constantly that around every corner he would be ambushed by seamen who’d hidden in the bowels of the tanker. Although only he and the leader of the Waziristanis had survived the assault on the ship, the crew had proved compliant when faced with automatic rifles, the RPG, and a suicide vest. More useful than those had been the short-handled ax that the jihadist had grabbed from a cache of firefighting supplies. While Adnan held an AK-47, the Waziristani had threatened to chop off crewmembers’ legs and arms if they didn’t tell him where other sailors were hiding. They all swore that everyone was on the bridge but the Islamist had still chopped off the hand of an African, just to make sure no one was lying. Sickened, Adnan had looked away. Later, he’d tripped over the amputated hand on a lower deck; the jihadist had thrown it away. The injured man had screamed and screamed until the Waziristani shot him.
Then the jihadist had killed them all, except for the captain, just as the plan demanded.
Adnan couldn’t have committed the Waziristani’s gruesome crimes. This is different, he reassured himself as he checked the wiring of the last bomb. You’re a martyr, he thought once more, not a murderer.
Studying the diagram of the ship, Adnan had learned a great deal about tankers. The newest ones were designed so that if one part of the hull were compromised, the other holds would not lose their valuable—and often dangerous—cargo. But now that he’d rigged all the bombs to go off in quick succession, the Dick Cheney would split apart in sections and dump all the iron oxide it carried.
Then, while billions watched him, he would stand on the main deck and detonate the lone bomb left in his vest. The world would never forget the sinking of the supertanker. Or the martyr from the Maldives.
As he started back up the stairs, Adnan felt as if he were already ascending to heaven in earthly triumph.
* * *
Parvez sat in the café at the appointed hour and watched two likely looking men walk in a few minutes later, one much taller and thinner than the other. Without a glance in his direction, they headed straight for his table. They must have been surveilling the café and seen him enter. He should have been as cautious.
Both men were piously bearded and looked serious, and both said their name was Mohammed. Parvez did not believe them, but understood their caution.
The taller man, whose glasses sat below the bridge of his nose, glanced censoriously at a dark-haired Western woman in a short white skirt. The brother looked like he might throttle her. Parvez would not have blamed him if he had. But perhaps she was one of the reporters staying in the hotel. If so, there was no need to hurt her now; soon she would die in flames and rubble. And for those who survived, whose desperate calls for rescue would rise from the ashes, there would be the final knowledge, in the last seconds of their lives, that they had lured even more infidels to their deaths.
Parvez and the Mohammeds shared a pot of tea. They talked about the weather, but even these common words were fraught, as they must be in times teeming with peril.
“There will be sudden storms,” the shorter man said, scratching his chin through his beard. “They will arrive out of nowhere.” He smiled. “Not even the scientists can