Hunter Killer - Alex King Series 12 (2021), A BATEMAN [urban books to read TXT] 📗

reasons for owning one. He had seen a large scope attached but had not been able to identify the weapon at such a distance, but the rapid follow-up shots had meant that it was a semi-automatic, and in that calibre, that meant assault rifle. He had felt the impact of the bullet against the rifle stock but had lost consciousness when he had landed so heavily and did not hear any rapid follow-up shots. Although that would mark the gunman as a pro. No target, no shot. Karlsson had not elaborated further on the gunman or the incident, which told King that she either had her suspicions, or didn’t have a single lead. More likely it was the latter and she probably hoped the incident would go away as soon as King boarded the ship to the Aurora platforms a hundred miles to the south. No harm, no foul.

King took out his smartphone and opened a browser. He first searched for the Northern Lights, or Aurora Borealis. The effect of disturbances in the magnetosphere caused by solar wind. The disturbances caused by the sun are sometimes strong enough to alter the trajectory of charged particles of electrons and protons in the upper atmosphere where they collected hydrogen particles. The resulting ionisation emitted light of varying colour and complexity, seen best the nearer you are to either poles – the South Pole’s equivalent being Aurora Australis, visible from Southern Australia. To see the Northern Lights, it was generally agreed that you needed to be far to the north and away from light pollution. King knew that the further north you went, the less light pollution was an issue, but as he searched where the lights could be seen he saw that it was in fact possible to view them from Scotland and the north of England, particularly in Northumberland. It was what enthusiasts considered to be a partial observation, at around forty percent of what you would see in Canada, Alaska, Russia, and Scandinavia. King continued to search and discovered it was in fact possible to occasionally see the sight in Poland. Not regular, and certainly not the full show, but possible. He cursed, hoping that he had found a lie in Daniel’s story. Next, he searched for seals and whales and Greenland sharks. He recalled most of what Madeleine had said, and he figured that she was either legitimate in her claims to be a marine biologist, or she had a well-rehearsed back story. King decided he would delve deeper when he saw her next.

Since landing on Spitsbergen and checking into the hotel King had had his suspicions. Aurora was hosting the international delegation of salvage workers that would make up the team to raise the submarine and tow it to the Faroe Islands, where the Royal Navy would assume command and receive their vessel. Hostile forces would be among the salvage crew with their own agendas, just as King was there to defend his country’s interests. He had earmarked Daniel and the American, but both had been on the beach at the time he had been shot at. But he still had reason enough to suspect the young American. The man he assumed to be Russian, staring at him across the luggage carousel had disappeared. King couldn’t identify the shooter, so was nowhere nearer to hunting him down, or remaining out of harm’s way. He stood up slowly. There was pain in his right knee now; his landing had been heavy, and the ground had been frozen solid. King walked over to the window and stared outside. The room was on the second floor and he could not see the ground below, such was the thickness of the bank of fog. Outside, vehicle headlights made slow progress, like eerie spectres in the ether. He doubted the crane operators could even see the ship, let alone load the supplies and equipment safely on board. He looked back at the two samsonite cases and again felt uncomfortable without the pistol, but more so at its disappearance. With the fog outside there was little more he could do today, and it felt as if his enemies were circling, and he had no move to play.

Chapter Seventeen

 

50° 00’ 08.99’’ N 6° 38' 24.38’’ W

Atlantic Ocean

30 miles off the Cornish Coast

 

Keshmiri Pezhman studied the ship in the periscope. It was a Panamanian registered tanker and sailed under the name Golden Star. The ship was in fact Iranian owned and loaded with unrefined oil on her way past the Scilly Isles off the coast of Cornwall having made an unsanctioned delivery to a West African nation suffering from trade embargoes, on her way to the Northern Sea Route across the north coast of Russia, where it would arrive for processing in what the world knew as North Korea, officially and somewhat ironically called the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. As two countries both the subject of world sanctions, Iran had kept the oil fires burning in North Korea for more than twenty years, while its neighbour China traded in food and coal. The submarine would follow the tanker for another one-hundred miles and then refuel from the vessel’s vast diesel tanks midway between the Scilly Isles and the southern Ireland coast. When there was no other shipping for miles the submarine would surface and the tanker’s crew would secure them while the fuel was pumped and the submarine’s engine crew would clean the scrubbers and recirculate the air, while fresh water was pumped in and waste swapped for supplies. The entire process would take no more than thirty minutes with the Golden Star’s radio operator studying the radar and sonar array for approaching vessels.

Keshmiri Pezhman was the rank of Nakhoda Dovom - or Commander – in the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps Navy. The elite corps of submarines trained in covert surveillance and the hunting of enemy ships and submarines. The hunter-killers. The young Iranian was