back and forth as he scans the murky waters below us. I check the decks, not expecting to see Moira out in the open, but I gotta say, I’d feel better if I saw her safe and sound.
Alpha team, who’s listening in, hops on the channel. “Approaching Mayberry.” Max’s gruff voice cuts off with a buzz of static. Mayberry signifies they’re approaching the bow.
They’ve got it rough, approaching a ship this size from the bow means they’ve gotta cross the massive bow wave thrown up as the tanker pushes through the water. They’ve got one hell of a rocky ride ahead of them.
We hear nothing for a bit while I catch movement on top of the stacks of containers. “Four men on top of the containers.”
“We see them.” My disembodied technical teammate responds. “Smaug’s on it. Can you get a closer view? See if they’re armed?”
“On it,” Ariel answers, and we bleed off altitude, sinking fast. My stomach slams into my throat with the gut-wrenching sensation of falling. Helicopters are pretty damn cool, but they do a job on my stomach.
Banking hard, we turn around for another sweep, then dive toward the dark river and the ship slowly pushing upstream.
I practically lean out of the helicopter to get a better look below me. Sure as shit, those men are armed.
“Four armed men walking the stacks.”
“Copy that.” Max keeps his reply short and sweet. We’re not expecting armed resistance, so this is a red flag.
“Mitzy, you sure no other boats came alongside?”
“Sure as shit.”
“Then what’s up with the welcome brigade?” I watch the men, taking note of their actions. They’re looking down, in between, the tall stacks of containers, which makes no sense unless… “They’re searching for something.”
Or someone.
No need to finish that thought. But why would the crew of the tanker be looking for Moira? In our experience, they’re unaware of the critical cargo they carry.
But this is no ordinary operation.
Moira isn’t trapped inside a cargo container, out of sight of the regular crew, which makes me wonder how her kidnappers smuggled her on board. If they smuggled her at all? I’ve got more questions than answers with no way to find them, at least not now.
“Copy that. Passing Hugo,” Max calls out the progress of the team. Hugo means they’ve attached the RIB to the outer hull and are beginning their assent up to the deck.
“Watch your backs.” I don’t like my team heading into danger, at least not when I’m not in the thick of it with them.
The men on top of the stacks won’t be able to see over the side of the ship, but they’ve got a bird’s eye view of the deck below them. Only, they’re looking in between the stacks. Alert and focused, they’re meticulous in their search, using a standard grid-like search pattern.
So far, they’ve made it a quarter of the way toward the bow. They split up. Each man checks up a bit, then crosses over to the next row and circles back toward the stern.
They shine lights down into the dark labyrinth of passageways formed by the cargo containers. Stacked as closely as possible, the space between them is barely wider than the breadth of a man.
There are about four spots where the stacks aren’t the same height; one a few rows forward of the back row, two about midway, and another close to the bow.
Ariel circles around and skims off even more altitude. Soon, they’re going to take notice of the helicopter circling overhead. Not that they can see us, we’re running dark, but there’s no way to hide the chopping of our blades through the air.
“Passing Francine,” Max lets everyone know they’ve scaled the side of the ship. Alpha is officially in play.
I relay the positions of the four men walking on top of the containers. They’re making good time and are nearly a third of the way toward the bow. None have looked up, which tells me they haven’t yet heard the chop of our rotors, but that won’t last long.
We swing out wide, lose another few hundred feet of altitude, and circle around for a closer look. I switch to the internal channel for the helicopter.
“I want to see those holes in the stacks.” A bad feeling stirs in my gut.
“Copy.” The helicopter banks hard as Ariel circles around.
Right about now, my team should be releasing Mitzy’s tiny dragonfly drones. Those will scour the ship using a combination of visual, night, and infrared scans to locate positions