Once More Into the Fray – Chapter Ten
A/N – Sorry for the delay in bringing this update.
CHAPTER TEN
Kate dropped her eyes, momentarily confused. The events of that fateful night would be forever etched into her memory and for the first time she found herself actually wanting to listen to Mike's story. Oh, she understood his motivation, always had. Every member of the Hammersley's old crew had wanted to take Madeline Cruise down; there was small chance of forgiveness from any of them for the former ASIO agent's treachery.
But Kate had taken Mike's actions as a personal affront to her own command ability – her own suppressed, but long-held insecurities over achieving this coveted command position had all surfaced and boiled over in the emotion of the aftermath of the events. Mike had taken her boat! He obviously didn't have sufficient confidence in her to trust her with this responsibility, quite possibly never had! That had been the underlying canker that kept surfacing and that had fuelled Kate's furious indignation and unrelenting anger at her husband for his actions – his failure, in her mind, to trust her.
Oh, Mike could dress his explanations up with his reasons, but Kate could not ignore the destructive little voice that kept whispering in her mind – he could have waited, could have obeyed Steve Marshall, could have trusted her to bring Madeline Cruise to justice. She had refused to listen to his pleas to let him explain and the angry, hurtful words that had been hurled at him finally pushed a hurt and disillusioned Mike to retaliation.
"Do you know how many regulations you've broken, Mike?" she had coldly asked him after they had finally exhausted their volatile arguing. "You took my ship for a personal vendetta. Against a direct order from Marshall! Everyone whom you've ever upset is going to have a field day with this one and I'm not going to allow my son to suffer for what you've done. I can't live with someone who's as reckless and dangerous as you are!"
He had stared at her in stunned silence.
"What are you saying, Kate?"
"I'm leaving. You're still a cowboy, Mike Flynn, and I simply cannot live with someone who treats the rules with such cavalier abandonment. You can't pick and choose which orders you'll obey. We're in the bloody navy, Mike. We're expected to obey orders. We both know what's going to be the outcome of this – a Board of Enquiry and then a Court Martial. You'll be lucky if all they do is just toss you out and say good riddance! We have to set the example – not just to those who serve under us, but to our son as well. Isn't that what you always tried to hammer home to me?"
"Kate! Don't! You haven't listened to me! You're not hearing what I've been trying to say!"
"I've been listening alright, Mike. And all I hear are your excuses. You've been waiting for the chance to take command of the Hammersley again. You've never been happy with a shore posting and you saw this as your opportunity and you just bloody-well grabbed it – and to hell with the consequences! That's just so typical…bloody…Mike...Flynn! Well, I'm sick of it and I am not going to live my life trying to second-guess you and having to protect our child from the fall-out of your refusal to obey lawful orders. I'll be back later to collect my things – and Jamie's – and we'll talk about the future. I'm too angry to continue this right now!" And before Mike could say anything else, Kate had collected her handbag and stalked out the door, and effectively out of his life.
Mike had lost track of time as he had stood, staring at the closed door, before he finally slumped down on the couch as all the adrenaline fuelled energy of the past night vanished and he felt drained and empty. Kate would be back; he held on to that – he had to. It wasn't the first time there'd been angry words and slammed doors in their household, but their mutual love and commitment had always triumphed. Mike's head fell back against the couch's headrest as he closed his eyes and relived the events of the past 24 hours.
Knowing in his gut that if the small cruiser, now held firmly in Hammersley's lights, was under Madeline Cruise's control they would never be given the luxury of following normal boarding procedures, Mike ordered Dutchy to prepare for a graunch boarding. Immediately the RHIB connected with the larger vessel, Mike had leapt aboard, closely followed by his crew.
His instincts had been right and a brief, intense battle had resulted with the Hammersley's sailors taking the honours and managing to subdue the three men who had fought viciously until subdued and were lying face down on the deck, their hands cuffed behind them with three RAN sailors standing guard over them. Just as Mike and Dutchy, with Robert Dixon watching their backs, approached the hatch leading below decks, it was thrown open and Madeline Cruise emerged pushing a terrified young woman, whose face already bore the evidence of a beating, before her, a lethal Browning pressed to the girl's temple. Behind the traitorous former ASIO agent stood a swarthy, dark haired man whom Mike immediately recognised, a man whom Mike thought had died. Mirhad Moshir – the terrorist leader who had seduced the ASIO agent into his service and who was responsible for the bomb that had killed Jim Roth and Chris Blake as the pair had raced against time to de-activate it.
And shoved in front of him bleeding, but defiant, was Ryan White, Mike's son. Like the terrified girl, whom Mike didn't know, Ryan's face was battered with his hands pulled roughly behind him. The terrorist held a knife across the young man's throat as he roughly thrust Ryan in front of him. Mike had been momentarily frozen. Ryan had been another whose name he had deliberately dropped from the group of crew members he had recalled to crash sail that night, in what now appeared to have been a vain attempt to keep his son from any involvement in this.
"Well, if it isn't Captain Courageous himself," Cruise spat the words out contemptuously, her hard eyes firmly fixed triumphantly on Mike. "You didn't think I'd come out here unprepared, did you Captain Flynn? I knew it'd be you or that sanctimonious blonde of yours. I'd rather hoped it'd be her…I'd have liked to have some fun with little Miss Perfection. But you'll do…especially since we have your son and his little ladylove. You're going to tell your men to put down their guns, or these two are going over the side. Oh, and they'll be dead before they hit the water," she added almost conversationally.
"Mike, don't…" Ryan's defiant words were cut short as his captor kneed him cruelly in his lower back, causing the young man's throat to be more closely thrust against the knife. Mike saw a fine trickle of blood appear as Ryan tightened his mouth in his determination not to cry out.
"I mean it, Flynn," Madeline Cruise pushed the Browning further against the girl's head, causing her to flinch and bite her lip as she desperately sought to maintain a brave front. Her terrified eyes beseeched Mike Flynn to do something, anything, to save her.
"Killing two more innocent people isn't going to achieve a thing," retorted Mike equally coldly. "You kill them and you'll both be dead before their bodies hit the deck. You're in a lose, lose situation Ms Cruise. I've given Hammersley instructions to blow this boat out of the water along with all of us if you look like getting the upper hand. You are not going to succeed, Madeline. This boat will never reach its target."
"You're bluffing, Captain," Cruise's confidence in her own success was, as it had always been, supreme.
"Try me." Forgive me, Ryan, forgive me Kate, forgive me Maxine, Mike had silently prayed as he stared unmovingly at the woman he detested on so many levels. Behind both the terrorists, he could see Robert Dixon slowly and carefully closing the distance to Moshir. How Robert had moved out of their line of vision, Mike didn't know – and he didn't care. All he knew was that their one hope of saving innocent lives lay in the hands of his former Radio Operator and he was desperate not to give any clue to either Cruise or Moshir. The events of the next few minutes happened so quickly that Mike could never be entirely sure of their sequence. In the same instance that Dixon swung the butt of his F88 downwards onto the back of Moshir's head, Dutchy swung his own up in a lightning quick arc and knocked Madeline Cruise off-balance. Mike immediately lunged forward and grabbed the female hostage, pushing her roughly to the deck and out of any line of fire. Cruise's browning spat and Dutchy recoiled as the bullet hit his chest. Without further thought, Mike pulled his own trigger and the woman crumpled to the deck landing on the unconscious body of her terrorist lover and accomplice.
Mike had quickly assessed Dutchy's condition, applying emergency first aid and ordering Dixon to summon immediate help. Ryan had stumbled over to him, virtually ignoring the traumatised girl now huddled on the deck and staring wildly at the bodies surrounding her.
"Mike…Dad…is he...is Dutchy…?" The young man's voice had trailed off as he had stared down at a man whom he had admired and who had once been something of a big brother figure to him.
"I'm not sure, Ryan," Mike had felt an immense weariness sweep over him. "We need a medivac chopper."
"Sir!" Robert's voice had interrupted urgently and Mike looked up to see Dixon pointing and staring disbelievingly at the large RAN frigate that had silently appeared beside the Hammersley.
"Do you need help there, Captain Flynn?" Mike had vaguely recognised the voice of the HMAS Melbourne's Commanding Officer through the ship's loud hailer and he pushed himself to his feet. "Standby for our MO to come across."
Mike had felt strangely detached as he watched the Melbourne's MO treating Dutchy before overseeing his transfer to the frigate's sick bay. The body of Madeline Cruise had also been removed, Moshir taken into custody, the small terrorist cruiser attached to a towline behind the Patrol Boat, and both Ryan and the young woman had been sufficiently patched up to allow them to rest in the Hammersley's Ward Room under the care and oversight of Petty Officer Ruby as Mike returned to the Bridge and gave the order for their return to port, closely shadowed by the Melbourne.
As Mike had entered the Bridge, Dixon had quietly turned to him.
"Commodore White is on the line, sir. Do you want to take it in the ship's office, sir?"
Mike had shaken his head and silently accepted the handset Robert held out to him.
"I've just had an update from Commander Shaw on the Melbourne, Mike. He tells me you're both heading for Cairns as we speak."
"That's right, sir. I presume he's given you our ETA as well?"
"He has, Mike. I'll be waiting when you dock."
"Of course, sir. Will that be all, sir?"
"For the moment, Captain. We'll be talking when you get back."
As he had hung up the handset, Mike looked slowly around the Bridge that had been his for so many years. "Not quite how I thought it would all end," he had thought. Philosophically, Mike knew, had known from the moment he had disobeyed Steve Marshall's orders, that his career in the RAN was probably over. Despite the reason behind his actions, despite the outcome, he knew would be facing a Board of Enquiry and disciplinary action. He knew a very difficult conversation with Kate lay ahead, but he was completely confident that once the shouting was over that she would stand by him.
Conversation on the Hammersley's bridge was desultory at best as they made their way back to port. Although only one or two of the more senior sailors on board realised the full import, and the likely outcome, of Mike Flynn's actions that night, everyone was deeply concerned for their popular bosun now in the care of the medical staff on board the Melbourne. Andy Thorpe had come to stand by his long time friend and former commanding officer.
'You did what had to be done, Boss," he had murmured quietly offering his support. Mike had glanced and up sideways from where he was seated in the command chair into Charge's concerned face.
"I hope so, Andy. I hope so." Mike's use of Thorpe's first name rather than his onboard nickname, or rank, told the engineer a great deal and in a completely uncharacteristic gesture, he briefly rested his hand on Mike's shoulder giving him the merest of supportive squeezes before quickly, almost embarrassed at his action, dropping his arm to his side.
"We're all with you, you know, sir," he spoke just as quietly as before and held Mike's gaze for a moment longer before nodding and moving back to his duty station at the rear of the bridge. Mike returned his gaze to the front, watching as Trinity Inlet opened before them and they quietly slid into position at their home dock. The Melbourne was carefully beginning its own docking procedures at a quickly allocated dock behind the Hammersley as Mike gave the order for the crew to disembark and made his way down to the deck where he saw both Steve Marshall and Kate standing awaiting his presence.
"Is everything secure, Captain?" Marshall had asked in a carefully neutral voice.
Upon receiving Mike's affirmative, he had informed his errant subordinate that he was to accompany both Kate and himself back to Steve's office.
"And the rest, as they say, is history, Kate," Mike had finally turned his eyes back to Kate's. There was a long silence which neither seemed willing to break, until Mike drew in a deep breath.
"I've told you my story, Kate. Now, since we've agreed to disregard our rank insignia for this conversation, I have a question for you." He continued to look at her, his face becoming more challenging.
"Why exactly did you pull the plug on us? Oh I know," he held up a hand as she began to protest, "you gave me all that stuff about not being able to continue to live with my cowboy antics, but I'm not sure I really buy that any more. What really made you so furious with me that you weren't willing to let me try to work things out? I fully understand your being infuriated with me over taking the Hammersley, and disobeying Steve's direct orders, but what I've never understood is why you weren't willing to move past that. Surely we had something that was worth keeping. We'd been through so much, you and I. There had to be something deeper…something that I still don't understand."
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