Chapter 7
In the Indonesian province of Irianjaya, a council of war was under way. The small nondescript concrete sided hut with its corrugated iron roof covered with thatched palm fronds was hardly where you would expect a very active cell of the Islamic terrorist unit to work from. But it was out of the way of prying eyes and yet close to communication by road, sea, air and satellite. Outside, the perimeter was guarded by very casual looking men, who on closer examination, could be hired out to scare cops at their annual picnic.
Ramid ben-Ahim was the man everyone in the room was watching. He was on the satellite phone and his conversation, if you could call a series of guttural grunts from his end a conversation, was the speculation on everyone’s mind. He tapped the end button on the phone and hung it to a shoulder belt inside his robe. The better observer would have glimpsed the butt of a dangerous Russian made revolver protrude momentarily. This man was armed, dangerous and wanted on all continents of the planet.
Ramid, lit a long thin cigar and leaned back in his chair. “Friends, we are set,” he said, making eye contact with each individual in the room. “The fires are burning and strong westerly wind over the Australian continent will fan the flames as we light more and more fires. The oil tanker “Ocean King” is now just fifty nautical miles from Hydrographers Passage which is the main entry into the Great Barrier Reef. Samaad has his suitcase on board a privately chartered aeroplane with a flight plan approved all around the East Coast. The haz-chem shipment has been loaded off the truck and is now being sped to dams and rivers in three states.” He paused in his unusually long speech for effect and then added, “Soon it will be time to make our first demands.” Go to your wives and children and say goodbye, many of us will not be returning.
Lundyn stepped from the RIB as Annie brought it alongside the dirigible. Now that he was closer he could see that although three hundred odd feet in length and nearly a hundred foot high that part of the air ship was only the gas container. Large girders ran at the bottom of what looked like an ordinary oblong building with windows and doors leading out to a railed walkway that went all the way around the building. Beneath the girders were huge flexible bags that contained what Lundyn assumed was seawater as hoses slurped and sucked water with the sound of pumps in the background. On the roof of the building were polished gas cylinders painted three different colours with hoses leading off into a type of mixing unit. A not so small pontoon had been lowered to the water to act as a wharf for the RIB. Lundyn mounted this and tied off the painter to a bollard. Annie stepped up beside him again dressed in her white overalls and cap but minus the sunglasses so he could see the wicked smile in her eyes. “I think your going to love this whole experience.”
Inside the building, the ship as Annie called it there was abundant luxury. Leather lounges, oil paintings on the walls and shag piled carpet over polished timber floors. A large galley ran partly down one side of the room and here Annie paused to switch on a coffee machine. Glancing around him, Lundyn could see the control room through a glass enclosure and this had a series of huge glass picture windows angled out from the floor to the over hanging ceiling. A console gave hand driving controls but the computer screen showed an integrated control panel and mapping system of the planet. The building was comfortably air conditioned and a low hum in the background indicated some very quiet motor/aeronautical mechanics in place. He was gob smacked by the opulence and shear immensity of power being used to make everything work. Not possible even on most modern ships.
“So the fuel weight ratio with the gas that keeps you in the air is a secret, but what is the basic operating system?”
Annie smiled and said in a pseudo technical voice, “the envelope or balloon acts as a giant solar panel, it also has stealth qualities built in to make her hardly recognisable by radar, the battery bank, the most advanced and not yet available on the open market, is located between the girders that hold everything in place. The girders are carbon fibre composite, as are the batteries and they in turn are a stealth item. Under all that is a series of bags that hold seawater. This can be pumped in as it is now or scooped up similar to a tilting bucket system. Slowly the water is separated and the hydrogen is taken out, mixed with stabilising gases {top secret} and used to fill the balloon. I add gas if I want to be higher or express it if I want to come lower. Every so often I need to replenish the seawater which also acts as a weight distribution point as I can dump it or take on more as I choose. The engines are a super quiet compressed air style. Take in air from huge fans at the front and it is slowly compressed and then shot out the back. The exhausts can be made to face in almost any direction giving me better manoeuvrability than most choppers. There endeth the lesson for now, lets take this coffee to bed.”
Lundyn had seen many sites in his life of adventure but this had to take the cake. He let Annie take him by the hand and lead him like a big puppy into the bedroom where she was already shrugging out of her overalls, her breasts jiggling alarmingly as she did so.
Roy Donaldson and his son Gary were enjoying two huge T-bone steaks at the Bulahdelah truck stop. Smothered in mushroom gravy with crisp golden fries and a salad of tomato and lettuce. Two busty young girls were sitting at a table next to them. They were engaged in conversation about road conditions on the Pacific Highway north to Brisbane. The two girls were in a campervan and travelling the roads at night to be able to spend days on the beach. Roy and his son gave a good commentary between chewing mouthfuls of steak, the girls were flirting and the guys were eating slowly savouring the attention.
Outside in the trucker’s car park Rory’s truck was, unknown to him, being unloaded by men in overalls using a forklift. Each pallet of forty four-gallon drums was being loaded onto small one ton utes that sped off into the night as soon as the load on their tray was secure. Rory and Gary had a contract for carting hazardous chemicals between Brisbane and Melbourne. This time the load was not entirely destined for Melbourne. The two men eased back in their chairs sipping strong coffee smiling at the large breasted bait.
Each drum was made of plastic and marked with its own haz-chem loggo. At two predestined truck stops, one going south the other north, the utes stopped next to a large van where a small explosive devise with a remote controlled firing mechanism was attached to each drum and to the utes themselves. Under orders the drivers were to drop the drums into water catchment areas, dams and storage areas wherever they could. Many suitable sites had been previously scouted out, but a certain amount of leeway was allowed for on the spot appraisal by the drivers. This was to be a huge undertaking, one of the biggest poisoning of waterways in the world.
JonD
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