Final Strike (The Gargoyle Trilogy Book 3)

Book summary

In "Final Strike," Bob "Gargoyle" Morgan and Cat "Calico" Roberts, now a married couple, face off against the international criminal organization Hantu in the fjords of Norway. Hantu unleashes a series of deadly attacks worldwide, including targeting a U.S. Navy aircraft carrier. With the help of both old and new allies, Gargoyle and Calico embark on a globe-spanning mission to locate Hantu's remaining bombs and bring their leader to justice.

Excerpt from Final Strike (The Gargoyle Trilogy Book 3)

Kang Wuhan, formerly Shang Xiao, or Captain, Kang Wuhan of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army Navy, stood on the bridge of a Chinese-built Type 22 patrol craft. The catamaran-hulled boat sliced through the South China Sea at its top speed of 40 knots, faster than any other vessel in the area. The Type 22 displaced 224 tons with a length of 43 meters and a draft of only one and a half meters. It used two diesel engines to drive four waterjet propulsors, and its aluminum hull had a polygonal-designed superstructure to reduce its radar cross section.

As designed, the Type 22 was armed with eight, YJ-83 anti-ship cruise missiles, the Chinese version of the infamous French Exocet, and an AK-630 six-barreled Gatling gun for air defense. However, this Type 22, along with nine others, was quite different when it left its Shanghai shipyard. The boats operated by the PLAN were armed and sported a blue, grey, black, and white disruptive camouflage paint scheme. The Type 22 Captain Wuhan sailed this night had its missiles temporarily removed, the weight savings allowing for four knots of additional speed and extra space below decks. Its hull was painted a matte black with special paints which further reduced its radar observability.

Captain Wuhan looked down at the Type 362 surface search radar display and smiled grimly.

The target is twenty nautical miles ahead of us. Thirty minutes until we’re in range.

He turned to his second in command, a former Australian Special Air Services sergeant named Mitchell Davies.

“30 minutes, Mr. Davies. Get the team into position.”

“Sir,” Davies replied in a manner typical of an Australian military non-commissioned officer.

Wuhan looked again at the radar scope and noted the rate of closure towards the target. The time to intercept, based on the radar’s calculations, was decreasing at a rate greater than he anticipated. He turned to the mercenary at the ship’s helm.

“Slow to 35 knots.”

“35 knots, aye” the helmsman replied.

The helmsman was one of the many men trained by the late former SEAL, Waylon Merrill. Over the past couple of years, Merrill had trained several teams of men from the navies, marines, and Special Forces units from around the world specifically for this mission. He had specialists in deck seamanship, navigation, marine engineering, demolitions, and due to the nature of the target’s cargo, chemistry. The teams were now spread across the globe conducting operations like the one he and his team was conducting this night. It was a shame that Merrill had let his personal feelings get in the way of his job. Feelings which led to his death, and the death of his Chinese lover, Xue Fang at the hands of the CIA operative, Bob Morgan. Once this mission was finished, Wuhan hoped to have his opportunity to avenge both his friends and the organization he now dedicated his life to, Hantu.

Captain Wuhan looked out over the bow and saw lights on the horizon. He raised the binoculars that hung around his neck and examined the contact.

Perfect! We’re coming up on the stern. Between our stealth capabilities and the target’s low-quality radar, we’re invisible.

He looked down at the radar display and nodded to himself.

It was time to get the team up on deck. He pulled a hand-held radio from a clip on his belt.

“Mr. Davies, get the team on deck.”

Wuhan returned the radio to its clip and looked out the starboard rear-facing window and saw the 16-man team moving out the door from a compartment that, on ordinary Type-22s, held the C-802 anti-ship missiles. Now, his boat’s main battery of commandoes prepared for attack. He ordered the helmsman to alter course and reduce speed incrementally, maneuvering the patrol boat carefully until it lay a few yards off the target’s stern. With the boat’s speed now matching that of the target, Wuhan spoke again into his radio.

“Fire the grapples.”

Up on deck, Mr. Davies and another mercenary fired two grappling hooks from shoulder-fired launchers. The hooks immediately caught the target’s lifeline stanchions, and the two men wrapped the lines around the patrol boat’s bow-mounted capstan. A third man operated the capstan and as the it revolved, Captain Wuhan applied small bursts of the boat’s engines, which drew the two vessels closer together. With both ships now a less than a meter from each other, Captain Wuhan picked up his radio and issued an order which harkened back to the days of sail.

“Away all boarders!”

Out on deck, the mercenary team scrambled up the set of two lines and onto the target ship’s main deck. They split up with four men heading inside the skin of the ship and down into the engineering spaces. Another group of four moved quickly up the target ship’s superstructure external ladders towards the bridge. The remaining eight moved forward towards the ship’s cargo deck.

Captain Wuhan turned up the volume on his radio and listened to the team’s progress in achieving the mission’s objectives. Soon, he heard each group report on their efforts.

“Group 1, engineering secured.”

“Group 2, bridge secured.”

“Group 3, cargo secured.”

“Group 4, in position to place detonation system.”

Wuhan looked at his watch and noted that the entire operation took just over three minutes from start to finish. He spoke into his radio.

“All groups, this is the Captain. Make the ship ready to sail to the rendezvous. Out”

He moved towards the door leading from the bridge to the boat’s fo’csle. He opened the door and shouted at the mercenary out on deck.

“Cast off all lines!”

“Cast off all lines, aye!”

The mercenary removed the lines from the capstan, and the Type 22 began to drift free from the target ship. Wuhan turned to the helmsman.

“All back one third, right full rudder.”

“All back one third, right full rudder, aye!”

The helmsman pulled his throttles back to the one third astern setting, then turned the wheel right until the rudder angle indicator showed the rudder over full. The Type 22’s waterjet propulsion pulled the boat away from the target while the rudder swung the boat’s bow away from the target ship’s stern. Once he was satisfied the bow was cleared, Wuhan issued another order to the helm.

“All ahead one third, rudder amidships.”

“All ahead one third, rudder amidships, aye!”

After the helmsman carried out the order, the Type 22 came to a brief stop as the propulsion system transitioned from astern to ahead direction. Once the water jets took hold, the boat began to move slowly ahead as the rudder kept the bow at a new heading. Wuhan watched as the distance between the two ships opened. When the distance reached 5,000 yards, he noted the target ship’s course and issued one last order.

“Come left, steer course 045 degrees true. All ahead standard.”

“Come left, steer course 045 degrees true. All ahead standard aye!”

The Type 22’s bow swung to the left and the wake behind the boat became more turbulent as its speed increased. Once the boat steadied up on its new course and speed, it lay 5,000 yards off the target ship’s starboard quarter at a speed of 15 knots. Checking the radar, Wuhan saw the target’s course and speed were steady, a testament to the team’s training. He looked up and saw some large, man-shaped objects began to drop over the target’s side.

The ship’s original crew.

Satisfied that all was in order, he picked up a satellite phone up off the radar control panel. He switched it on and dialed a number from memory. After two rings, a male voice answered in English.

“Yes,” the voice at the other end said.

“This is Wuhan. Target secure, and we’re en route to our base.”

“Well done. Report when you arrive.”

“Yes, Raj Hantu.”

Elyas bin Agus, the Raj Hantu hung up his desk phone. He turned his desk chair around to the huge picture window behind him. He looked out over the Singapore skyline arrayed around him and smiled.

Perfect!

Captain Wuhan’s team was the last team of ten to report in, and all ten teams were successful. Hantu now had ten liquid natural gas carrier ships under its control. Each LNG carrier had the explosive potential of 775 kilotons of TNT, fifty times the power of the atomic bomb that destroyed Hiroshima. The world didn’t know it yet, but Hantu was now a nuclear power.