Thank you everybody for reading and responding. I didn't get around to finishing this chapter yesterday and I probably won't get the next one up until Tuesday or Wednesday.
P.S. Oddly, Raffy's thoughts in this chapter on last night's A-League match mirror my own.
Enjoy and please review.
Chapter Two
A briefing had been put together extraordinarily quickly by the XO. Watchers were shifted in the middle, downtime was sliced in half and equipment checks were put on hold to compensate. Few people recognised the extreme organisation and management skills that went towards keeping the ship running on schedule. And those organisers had to be flexible enough to deal with routine-altering changes when they came. It was a position that Kate once held for a long time, so she understood its demands. The impressive attributes of her new XO were on display once more and she felt a new appreciation for him.
The senior sailors had gathered in the ship's office with Raffy and were only waiting for their boss to get off the phone with her boss. They all suspected that it had something to do with the money, but as of yet, none of them had been alerted as to a plan of action or anything else in the investigation. There was a presumption that whatever information the CO knew would be passed on to them in due course.
After a few minutes, Kate walked in and shut the door behind her. Dutchy was sitting on the table at the front, Raffy was against the far wall and Charge and Swain were sitting at the back of the small room.
"Was that Commander Flynn again?" Raffy asked.
"Yes," she answered bluntly. "And it appears that the situation has become much more difficult."
Nobody spoke. Their expectant looks and waiting silence beckoned her to continue.
"Apparently, the money is a ransom drop," Kate told them. "The CEO of the company, Chinamin, is claiming that his son has been kidnapped."
"How sure are we of this?" Raffy asked pertinently.
"Xiao Taiqiang, the CEO, has a six year-old son," she answered. "Edison Xiao Lipeng. We found out that he attends an exclusive private school in Brisbane."
"And he's not there today," Dutchy guessed with a rather conclusive air.
"No, he's not," Kate replied. "He hasn't been there for the past week. There's only circumstantial evidence to suggest the boy is actually missing, but we're to treat this as a kidnapping. The worst case scenario if we're wrong is that we find out what's really going on."
"Did he say who took the boy?" Swain questioned.
Kate was visibly uncomfortable. "He said Australians. And he was reluctant to trust Commander Flynn with this information."
"Australians?" Charge examined. "But who?"
"It could still be anyone," Swain put in.
"Yeah," Dutchy agreed. "It's not like he narrowed the list down that much."
Kate looked to her XO, who had yet to comment. "X?"
He jumped a little at the sound of his name. Zoning back in, he answered, "Chinamin is currently in negotiations to buy out a large portion of the Australian aluminium company, OZ-AL. Obviously there's a lot of controversy surrounding the deal on both sides. The jobs that will be lost if this goes to offshore purification… But the cash injection will do wonders for our economy, an economy that has largely survived the GFC."
"But for miners to kidnap a child just to force or nullify a deal…" Swain said, his words trailing off into the distance. There was some consensus in the room. It did seem a little farfetched, but apparently not to Raffy Rodrigues.
"Oh, you don't know industrial espionage," Raffy told them palpably. "They're almost as bad as their state intelligence counterparts. And if there's someone who doesn't want this deal to go through, they'll do almost anything to stop it. It's a 22 billion dollar deal. There's a lot at stake."
"If that's the case," Kate said, "then why ask for a ransom? A ransom of only half a million? In the grand scheme of this deal, that's small change."
"I know," Raffy agreed. "It'd make more sense to force Xiao to pull out of the deal. I don't know how the money fits into this theory."
"Well, the money's the only thing we have that's not circumstantial, sir," Swain responded reasonably.
"Swain's right," Dutchy said. "If the money's not a part of this, then what do we have?"
"Maybe they thought they could throw us off track with the money," Charge put in.
"Or it could be somebody that knows this guy is rich and wants to get some money out of him," Dutchy added over the top of Charge's more farfetched assumption.
"Either way," Kate said, "we're going to find out soon enough." She turned to Swain. "The EPERB is still transmitting?"
He nodded.
"Good. We're putting it back in the water."
"Reconnaissance mission, ma'am?" Raffy asked with a wide smile.
She picked up the black whiteboard marker and drew them a diagram. Raffy had to admit that her island might have passed Mr. Squiggle, but it would fail Art class. She added the Hammersley into the picture further away and marked an 'X' in the water, a little way off the shore, and a 'D' on the shoreline.
"Dutchy and Charge, you'll be here," she directed, pointing to the 'D.' "We'll be throwing the money back in at X. And then, we follow them staying just over the horizon."
"Follow them?" Raffy asked. "We're not picking them up."
Kate shook her head. "Our priority is the boy. Commander Flynn is doing everything he can to ascertain Edison Xiao's whereabouts and, if he is indeed missing, we need to find him."
The men under her command nodded in unison. One by one, they cleared the room, until Swain was left in the room with Kate.
"Something to say, Swain?" Kate asked as she gathered the displaced reports in her arms.
"Just that I hope we find the child, ma'am," he replied instantly. "If Charge and the X are right and this does have something to do with the mining deal, then I can't believe that someone would use a six year-old boy to force his father's hand and for what?"
"Money," she said simply. "These people have 22 billion reasons to take that boy."
"It's just money," Swain argued.
Kate nodded sympathetically. "Money means a lot to some people."
"Ma'am?" Swain started as Kate awkwardly stumbled towards the door.
"Yes, Swain?" she said, a little distractedly.
"Do you need a hand with those files?"
She smiled and handed him half. The trip back up to the bridge was made so much easier. Many hands make light work was obviously more of an adage than a cliché.
The land-bound duo was in the RHIB ten minutes later, packaged money in hand. They were to drop it in the water at the zone marked 'X' before going ashore, where they would use the cover of mangrove trees to shelter them from the elusive arrival of the kidnappers. Kate watched, formidably and forebodingly, from her elevated position on the bridge. Raffy, her XO and right-hand man—literally, because he sat to her immediate right—monitored the radar as the Hammersley made its way to a safe distance from the drop zone.
They watched a zodiac approach from the west and stop in the area. Contacting Dutchy on the Sat-Phone, Kate learned that this boat was, indeed, the one they were waiting for. The pick-up was made in under five minutes. The water was not deep, but the tide had risen and wave activity had picked up. It would have made finding the package a challenge. Clearly, they were dealing with professionals.
Slowing only to launch and, ten minutes later, repatriate the RHIBs after kicking Dutchy and Charge off the island, they were very soon in hot pursuit of the kidnappers. Raffy watched a radar contact 220 degrees to the west of their position. He suspected what would happen, and he wasn't remotely surprised when it did. The zodiac returned to its owner.
"What is it?" Kate asked, peering over her X's shoulder. "Pleasure cruise?"
"Likely," was the response.
"Maintain our distance," she spoke authoritatively. "And RO?"
"Yes, ma'am?"
"See what you can find out about our friends over there."
And so they travelled, heading west, for some time more, remaining just below the horizon and keeping a weather eye open with their expensive OTH radar. As time passed, they switched watches and roles and as many men left the bridge as came. Raffy, however, remained in his chair long after his shift had expired. With one eye on the radar that Kate was now minding, and another on his MacBook, he persisted in the same position he'd assumed hours ago.
"What?" he said suddenly.
The bridge stopped. Sure, there was somebody maintaining visual contact with their suspect vessel, but all eyes were generally on the XO… and the XO's eyes were glued to his computer screen.
"Is he serious?"
"Something the matter, Lieutenant Rodrigues?" Kate asked with increasing intrigue and amusement.
The look on his face said no. If Kate had to guess, he looked like someone had skinned his puppy. "Oh no, ma'am. Just this A-League match," Raffy said blandly and unconvincingly. He looked away with a disgusted malcontent. "I can't watch this anymore."
Kate reached across the air between them and pushed the screen of his computer closed. "Better?"
Raffy glanced with disbelief at his Mac. "Much."
"Ma'am," RO spoke up over their mismatched conversation. "On this bearing, we'll be in Gove in approximately an hour."
Kate, looking a little rattled at missing that crucial realisation earlier, jumped from the CO's chair and checked his calculations along the map. He was right.
"The boat's heading for Gove?" Raffy asked intently.
Kate didn't answer. She, instead, looked over at the sailor that had interrupted them. "Inform NAVCOM and the AFP. This is ours until they get there."