A quick update for y'all and a bit of a filler. With an important plot point, though. Enjoy and please review.

Chapter Thirteen

The bar was quickly filling with foreign tourists as the night began to set in—the clubs would open soon. Australians that would regularly flock to Kings Cross or Surfers Paradise for a party were holidaying in a neighbouring and friendly nation and enjoying the local spirit sensitised by Western expansion. As Dutchy glanced around the room at the celebratory antics of under-30s, a deep-rooted fear and shackling sense of dread came over him. A terrorist attack here, again, would be disastrous.

"Okay, mate?" Swain's voiced sliced through his thoughts. "You seem… I don't know… spaced."

"Do I?" He had a handsome smile on his face, and it may have worked to deter his new CO from his back, but not his fellow senior sailor.

Swain just placed the beer in front of him. It was response enough.

"I hate just sitting here, Swain," Dutchy admitted, staring at the foaming brown fluid.

"So get up and dance," he advised with a smile. Inside, he knew that wasn't what was meant by the admission.

"Hey, guys," Bird said with a stumble as she approached their table. Newly eighteen, it was very clear that the young sailor did not hold her alcohol very well.

"I think that's enough for you, jelly legs," Dutchy recommended with an amused grin.

"We should be heading back in about an hour anyway," Swain told her. "Let the others know. We're not staying out late."

They watched her return to Sharkey and 2Dads on the dance floor. The three of them were grouping with a cluster of mostly Western tourists who had already conceded to the demands of cheap alcohol.

"What do you think the officers are up to?" Dutchy put in. His eyes were still on the junior sailors and wouldn't desist. It was his job to watch them.

"Intelligence briefings," Swain answered nonchalantly.

"A bomb and a missing naval officer," Dutchy mused. "How do they connect? Are we waiting for an attack?"

"I don't know."

"You haven't tried to find out? You haven't contacted your police buddies?"

Dutchy was really pushing him. "I've tried," Swain protested. "I asked them about Lieutenant Commander Watson. I asked them about what Feds pulled off those boats and out of those men. They had nothing."

"What do you mean 'nothing'?"

Swain finished his beer. "I mean 'nothing.' It's seems to be a buzzword around here. Everything's classified."

"The Feds had to have something to tell you," Dutchy fought.

"Listen to me, mate," Swain said, "they had nothing to tell me. Everything's classified at the highest level. They don't know anything. We don't know anything. And the people that do can't tell us anything."

It wasn't too much for him to wrap his head around, but it was close. The situation was worse than he first assumed. "Are you saying that some secret government agency hijacked this case from the Feds?"

"That's exactly what I'm saying." And there was nought but truth and honesty in Swain's expression. "I think that something really bad is on the schedule."

Dutchy didn't even want t touch his beer. "Yeah. And we're smack-bang in the middle of it."

They weren't answering their phones. It wasn't like them, especially not now with all that had happened. An unspoken rule of working together on such a crucial assignment was that each and every member could always be contacted. In this case, two members of the team and a driver were in the wind. They had gone to the Hammersley, Raffy's mind screamed. They were going to pick up dinner on the way back. Where the bloody hell were they?

Ethan's set-up was on the second floor of the Intercontinental Hotel. The expensive suite had been turned top-secret and technologically advanced for the purposes of his operation. He didn't need to knock on the door. He had a key.

The ASIS Intelligence Officer was labouring over his computer set-up with a box of Thai, a mouse in one hand and chopsticks in the other. He probably noticed Raffy entering the room—IO's of his calibre weren't likely to miss something like that—but he didn't register the intrusion.

"I can't find Commander Flynn or Lieutenant Commander McGregor," Raffy announced. He didn't take a seat. He stood aimlessly in the centre of the cream-carpeted room.

"Okay," Ethan replied without so much as a caring word in his direction.

"Okay? They're missing. That's not okay."

"Calm down, Raff," Ethan advised. "They went to the Hammersley."

"That was four hours ago." No part of Raffy was calm and Ethan's infantilising advice was just annoying him. "They were supposed to pick up dinner and come straight back to the hotel."

"So maybe they went out for dinner? We are in Bali."

To Raffy, it did not look like Ethan was remotely interested in his concerns. He was absorbed in his work and the young Lieutenant could not even begin to wonder what that was.

"They wouldn't have gone out," Raffy argued. "Not after what we learnt today. We have work to do. We had plans for a working dinner."

"Well, at least I'm still working," Ethan said brightly.

"I can't believe you're making jokes. Something has happened to Mike and Kate!"

"There's nothing to suggest that," Ethan put in.

Raffy opened his mouth to respond. He didn't get the chance. His phone was ringing.

"Lieutenant Rodrigues… Where?..."

A long pause told Ethan that Raffy was busily receiving information.

"Well, what about the others?"

Ethan could hear an exasperated explanation on the other line but no more.

"Yes, there were others!" Raffy shouted into the receiver. "There were two Australian naval officers in that car. A man and a woman… Well, did you check the hospitals?... What do you mean?"

Ethan shifted uneasily in his chair as another pause ensued.

"Find out what happened to them… Yes, I'll take care of it. I'll call you back." And he hung up the phone and stared at Ethan with a surprised and concerned expression.

"What?"

"That was Danny Sulista from the Balinese police," Raffy said unsurely. "There was a car accident. Charlie Willis is dead. His throat was slit. Mike and Kate were not in the car when they found it, but there was blood in the back seat. You still think they're fine?"

"Willis had his throat slit?" Ethan asked. The colour in his face was as missing as their friends.

"And somebody took Mike and Kate," Raffy clarified wildly. "We have to find them." He started towards the door and then turned around to stare at Ethan. "Are you coming?"

"Don't bother."

"WHAT?"

"Get back over here," Ethan repeated. He recovered quickly from the shock and had the same firm, authoritative and composed voice.

"What is so important on your damn computer?" Raffy argued. "We need to get out there and look for them."

"No, we don't." His tone remained unchanged and he hadn't moved from his seat.

The younger man didn't voice his question. It was written all over his face.

"I already know where they are," Ethan told him, and pointed to his screen.

Raffy walked over at a rush and glanced over his shoulder. A map of the city wrapped the LCD monitor and two small dots were blinking at the same location in downtown Denpasar Selatan. Then and there, a part of Raffy deeply suspected that this hard been Ethan Sanders' master plan all along.