"They're staying right on us," Hugo Voorst observed, looking up. “They don't have us yet, but they've probably figured out we'd make a beeline for Andikythera, so all they have to do is just work the corridor for all it's worth."
"Then let's get on with it." Armont nodded through the rain. "Do we have everything you think we might need?"
"We've got everything we can bloody well keep afloat," Reggie yelled back. "We're leaving half of what we need." He knew that seven men in the single Zodiac, together with their gear, was going to be pushing it to the limit. The sea was still rising, which meant they would be bailing for their lives as soon as they cut loose.
"All right, then, Willem, set the timer on the flares." Armont shook his head sadly.
"If we keep having to abandon equipment," Hall could be heard grumbling, "this is going to be a damned expensive operation. Where in bloody hell is it going to end? When we're down to a bow and arrow each?"
"It's beginning to feel that way now," Willem Voorst groused. He had finished and was clambering into the single raft. With his weight aboard, it listed precariously, taking water as the waves washed over. He settled in, grabbed a plastic bucket, and started bailing.
Now the Seahawk was coming down the line again, making an even slower pass. Time had run out.
"All right, cut her loose," Armont ordered.
The radio they left had been set to broadcast a Mayday; the engine was locked at full throttle; and a couple of life jackets with saltwater-activated beacons had been tied to a line and tossed overboard. The flares had been set to a timer, giving them three minutes to put some blue water between them and the decoy.
With a sigh, Dimitri Spiros leaned out and severed the last connecting line.