Vance watched as the frigate got off a warning tracer, but to no effect. The Hind ignored it, as a stream of 57mm rockets from under the chopper's stubby starboard wing flared down, while the radar-slaved machine gun beneath the nose opened fire. Then the weapons operator on the Hind loosed a starboard-mounted heat-seeking Swatter, and an instant later flames erupted on the frigate's bow, an orange and black ball where the forward gun turret had been. As it spiraled upward into the night, the turret and its magazine exploded like a giant, slow-motion cherry bomb.
He could see sailors running down the decks, could hear the sound of a shipboard fire alarm going off, the dull horn used for emergencies. They were calling all hands to station, but their response had come too late. The false-flag approach had caught the U.S. Navy off guard, its defenses down.
The radio crackled alive with a Mayday. Were there any other ships in the area? he wondered. Anybody to take out the bastards in the chopper?
Now it was banking, coming around, bringing the frigate's stern into its deadly view. Then a blaze of 57mm rockets poured in, engulfing the communications gear and antennas. Next the weapons operator loosed a second Swatter directly into the bridge.
Christ!
Seconds later it had transformed the midsection of the frigate into a ball of fire. He watched aghast as the blast flung the men on the bridge outward through the glass partition.
He plunged for cover just as the first airborne shock wave ripped Odyssey II's linen sail loose from its lines. When he rose to try and grab the starboard tiller, a second shock wave caught him and flung him savagely against the mast.
The next thing he knew, he was clinging to the portside gunwale, one hand still tangled in the lines that had been ripped from the sail. The night sky had turned a blood red, reflecting down off the low-lying clouds.
Then he felt a tremor in the hull as a massive wave caught him and the pegs that held the stern together-so lovingly installed-sheared. The aft section of Odyssey II instantaneously began to come apart. The light woods would float- she was, after all, hardly more than a raft with sides-but she would be helpless. His handmade marvel had been reduced to a bundle of planks, barely holding together, sail in shreds, twin rudders demolished.
For a moment he counted himself lucky. His body unscathed, he probably could weather the storm by just hanging on.
Then it happened. Whether through luck or skill, the chopper's weapons operator laid another one of the Swatter missiles into the frigate's stern section, causing a massive secondary explosion, a billowing ball of fire that punched out near the waterline. This time, he knew, a wall of water would come bearing down on him, sending a terminal shock wave through what was left of Odyssey II.
You've got to try and keep her aright, he told himself. Try and lash yourself down with one of the lines…
The wall of water hit, hurtling him over the side. He grasped for a section of gunwale, but it was too late. The wave obliterated everything. Now the swell was churning against his face as he tried to stroke back, his lungs filling with water. His arms were flailing, hands trying desperately to grasp the slippery cypress planking. The Switlik vest was holding, so he was in no danger of drowning. Yet.
Fighting the swell with his left hand, spitting water, he reached out with his right, trying to catch any piece of wreckage floating by. Finally, he succeeded in wrapping a line around his wrist. He gasped, choking, and caught his breath. Then, still grasping the line, he draped his left arm across Odyssey II's shattered side and used the line to pull himself over, into what was left of the hold. If he could stay with her, he figured, he might still have a chance.
Just as he tried to rise to his feet, however, he looked up to see the mast slowly heeling over, coming straight down. He toppled backward, hoping to dodge it, but it slammed him just across the chest. The world swirled into blackness, as even the light from the blazing ship behind him seemed to flicker.
Stay conscious, he told himself. Stay alive.
Holding onto the toppled mast, using it as a brace, he managed to rise. And now the Hind had completed its gruesome handiwork and was banking. Again it was going to pass directly overhead.
By God, he thought, this thing isn't over. Those bastards are not going to get off scot-free.