30

New Year’s Eve

Julius and Rebecca sat with several Orizon couples in one of the cruise ship’s largest staterooms, all of them looking exactly like the rich passengers that filled the ship, unaware of the imminent dangers they were facing.

After checking that they would not be disturbed, Julius stood up and dismantled the wheelchair he had been using since arrival, removing the cleverly hidden Orizon crystal daggers and specially made crossbows with their crystal arrows from within the frame.

He gave most of them to Rebecca to distribute to the others while slipping a few daggers into the pockets of his wide jacket. He then reassembled the chair and sat back down in it. He covered his legs with a soft, thin blanket, his crossbow armed and resting between his knees, ready for action.

“Let’s test communications,” he said, pressing a button on his large, loose-fitting jacket as the Orizons inserted their ear mics.

“Do you copy?” he asked.

They all nodded.

“Well then, time to mingle. Remember - everyone is a potential suspect, from the most distinguished passengers to the most humble members of the crew.”

The Orizons left the stateroom and walked casually towards the ballroom, where the New Year’s Eve party was winding down. Rebecca pushed Julius’s wheelchair, smiling at the last revellers as they passed on the way to their cabins. Julius pressed his button so that he could transmit to them all at once.

“The ship just changed course,” he said. “I can feel it. I’ll go to the bridge. Take your positions, just in case.”

As the Orizons discreetly exited the ballroom, Julius checked his watch. It was 2:50 a.m.

The two duty officers and the helmsman were obviously shocked when Rebecca pushed Julius into the wheelhouse of the bridge.

“Can we help you, Sir?” the senior officer asked.

“Hi!” Julius said. “The name’s Jefferson, lovely night. I’m sorry to be a pest but, as a former ship’s captain, I was surprised by the change of course.”

The two men relaxed visibly. “Pleased to meet you Captain Jefferson - hope you’re enjoying the cruise. We’ve been informed that a small ship is on fire about three miles to port and there’s no other ship close by. We already have a visual. There are women and children on board, as well.”

“That’s terrible! How long till we reach them?”

“A few minutes.”

“Where’s the Captain? I was talking to him just a while ago.”

“Our Captain has just been notified and is on his way here.”

“Are they in a position to abandon ship in lifeboats?”

“Apparently they have loaded the women and children into their one small lifeboat. The other passengers are in the water. Their captain and a few crew members are still on board trying to put out the fire.”

The cruise ship’s Captain entered the bridge. “Hello again, Captain Jefferson. Not at the party? Well, just in time to enjoy a rescue!”

A few minutes later they could see the glow of the burning ship and, as they drew closer, they could make out figures jumping into the ocean. The fire appeared to be raging out of control.

“All stop,” the Captain ordered. “Drop anchor. Lower the big motorboat.”

“Yes sir!”

The ocean waters were dark as the survivors struggled with the waves. A small lifeboat, overloaded with women and children, floated away from the burning ship. They could hear the sounds of crying babies carried on the wind.

The motorboat hit the water and sped to help the swimmers as the lifeboat came up alongside the cruise ship.

The Captain spoke through an intercom to his crew on the lower deck. “Lower the ladder and open the port door!”

One man, clearly a strong swimmer, followed behind the lifeboat. From time to time, he held on to the stern and caught his breath. As the door on the side of the cruise ship opened, four crewmen helped eight women - two with small babies - and seven children to climb up the ladder into the reception area. The swimmer clambered up behind them.

The two women distracted the crewmen as they set their babies down, before all of them pulled automatic weapons out from under their loose clothes.

One of them threw a gun to the swimmer, who now appeared to be taking on the role of their leader.

“Nobody moves,” he ordered the four crewmen. “Don’t make a sound!”

He and four of the women ran to the lift while the others secured the crewmen in the reception office.

Half a minute later, the leader and the four women burst into the bridge.

“Captain, come here!” the leader shouted, forcing the Captain out of the bridge ahead of him at gunpoint. Two of the women went with them while the other two remained, holding the officers, the helmsman, Julius, and Rebecca at gunpoint.

The motorboat which had picked up the male terrorists arrived back, with the rescuers also being held at gunpoint. They, too, were locked in the office with their colleagues. An inflatable boat with one man on board pulled up alongside the ship.

“Go, go, go! Move!” the leader shouted as his men worked to unload boxes of explosives from the inflatable boat. The leader checked everything before roughly pushing the shocked Captain out of the room.

“Back to the bridge,” he shouted.

As they burst back onto the bridge, Julius kept his right hand - which he had been holding awkwardly so as to appear disabled - under the blanket. He feigned fear and none of the terrorists were paying him much attention as they concentrated on executing their plan.

“Start the engines!” their leader ordered. “Resume course.”

Julius hugged his daughter and leaned closer as if to comfort her. “Stay on my left side,” he whispered.

Rebecca nodded and moved to his left.

“At dawn, we’ll send a message all over the world that this ship and its five and a half thousand passengers are under our control,” the leader announced to everyone in the bridge. “We’ll tell them that we will be killing everyone on board and sacrificing ourselves and our children. This is our way to protest against the criminals who have victimized our people for hundreds of years.”

The Captain and officers stayed silent. Rebecca pulled herself up to her fullest height.

“Even if you were right to feel so angry, you’re certainly wrong to threaten to kill so many innocent people!” she said bravely.

“What? How dare you talk? Who are you?”

“We came to watch your rescue,” she replied calmly. “You’ve come here with automatic weapons against innocent, unarmed civilians. Do you think you are brave?”

The leader seemed disconcerted by her calmness and the Captain saw a chance. He rushed at the nearest woman. Without even blinking, she gunned him down with a single burst. The continuing momentum of his dead body crushed her to the ground as it fell.

The two officers and the helmsman rushed to aid their captain. There was an explosion of gun shots and they all fell.

Julius swivelled his hand under the blanket and his crossbow spoke twice. Arrow holes appeared silently in the foreheads of the leader and the woman beside him. As the other terrorist struggled out from under the Captain’s body, Julius neatly executed her too.

It took Julius and Rebecca only a moment to determine that the Captain and his three colleagues were beyond help.

Julius spoke through the radio microphone to the others. “We’re in the bridge. There were two women and their leader here. They’re dead, as are the Captain, two of his officers, and the helmsman. Rebecca and I are going to the radio room. The rest of you spread through the lower decks.”

Rebecca pushed Julius in his wheelchair into the radio room, where they could see the radio operator slumped over his desk. Two women terrorists were now in control of the room. Julius lolled his head to one side as if he were very ill. His left hand covered the arrow holes in his blanket.

“What are you doing here? Get back - back to the tourist area!” one of the women ordered.

“But my father’s ill,” Rebecca said, “ and we can’t find the doctor! We must radio his doctor in London for help.”

“His doctor can’t help him now,” said the woman.

“What do you mean?” Rebecca asked innocently.

“Because nobody’s leaving this ship alive, so his health is not a problem now, is it?” she sneered and relaxed her gun. The other woman looked outside, puzzled by the silence from their leader. Julius shot twice and both women slumped to the floor.

“The two terrorists in the radio room are dead,” he told the other Orizons. “They’ve killed the radio operator. Rebecca and I are on our way to the reception area. One of you needs to take over the radio.”

In the reception area, three of the female terrorists had guns in their hands, while the fourth sat in a chair and breast-fed her child as the other children huddled at her feet, wide eyed and silent.

As Rebecca wheeled the sick-looking Julius in, the armed women swung their guns at them.

“My father’s seriously ill,” Rebecca wailed. “We’re trying to find the ship’s doctor! Can you help us please?”

The women relaxed their aim and three seconds later, all three lay dead on the floor.

Julius turned his crossbow on the fourth woman and hesitated as she sat frozen with fear, the baby still at her breast. Suddenly, she threw the baby onto the seat beside her as if it were a rag doll, grabbed her automatic, and fired.

Rebecca dove to the ground as she hurled a dagger deep into the woman’s neck. She drew another knife and was ready to throw as the terrorist clutched at her throat with both hands, her eyes glazed, and toppled to the floor, scattering the children.

Rebecca ran to her father. His mouth was open and his eyes stared at her from the next world. She crumpled to her knees beside him, tears streaming down her face. With her left hand, she stroked Julius’s hair, her right hand still holding the dagger by the tip. She kissed his forehead and made a conscious effort to control her sobs.

The children were huddling close to the bodies of the women on the floor, wailing as they tried to shake them awake. Apparently overcome with grief and realising that they could not rouse their dead mothers, they ran to Julius, punching his dead body with small clenched fists.

Their hands became drenched in blood and their screams grew deafening in Rebecca’s ears.

“Stop!” she shouted. “Please... Stop it now!”

She was shaking as she pushed the children away. Eventually, their fury seemed to subside a little and they crawled back to the bodies of the women, whimpering helplessly.

Rebecca was moved by the sight of their misery. To them it was of no consequence why her father had killed their mothers. They didn’t care whether he was justified or how many lives he had saved with his sacrifice. They didn’t understand that he was the reason they were alive, or that their mothers would have been killed anyway - along with them - when the ship blew up.

The small speaker inside Julius’s jacket crackled.

“Julius, what’s going on?”

Rebecca took a breath and managed to get back in control of her shaking hands.

“This is Rebecca. My father’s - Julius is dead. Four more female terrorists have been killed. Their children are all here, safe, but terrified and out of control.”

There was a pause. Then, an Orizon spoke: “We’ll take care of the children. You take the lift to the main deck, Rebecca. We’ll see to your father.”

Rebecca looked at her father one last time and unwillingly ran from the carnage of the room. Her watch said 3:55 a.m. Neutralising the attack had taken just over one hour.

Rebecca arrived on the main deck to see the Orizons heaping the bodies of the remaining terrorists onto luggage carts.

“We got them all,” one of them explained. “We’ll move them, along with their weapons and explosives, to the reception area. We’ll dump our daggers, our crossbows and arrows, and the rest of our equipment into the sea together with them and their explosives.”

They bound some dead terrorists, weighted and bundled up the guns and explosives, and dumped the bodies over the side, into the ocean.

The cruise ship sailed silently on its way - its passengers still blissfully asleep after their night of revelry and quite unaware of how close to death they had been.