Daniel Ganninger - Icarus Investigations 02 - Peeking Duck by Daniel Ganninger Read Free Book Online

the syringe who showed no emotion.  Almost immediately the room began to spin, and Dimitri noticed the room turning black.  He fell helplessly back on the bed before blacking out completely, the result of a heavy anesthetic.
    When Dimitri awoke , the porthole showed nothing but black outside.  He looked at his watch, surprised he was allowed to keep it.  It now displayed 4:41 in the morning.  He was numb from the waist down, and when he reached for his gunshot wound he felt small sutures in his thigh.  Someone had repaired his wound.  On the desk was a pill bottle with the words “pain killer” scribbled on it. 
    Dimitri was shocked.  Why had the pirates sutured his gunshot wound?  He hadn’t expected to be alive.  He considered the reasons why they may want him in good health and hoped theses reasons extended to the crew as well.
    He reached for the pill bottle.  “I’ll take my chances,” he decided as the pain in his leg began to grow.  Dimitri threw back two of the pills and waited expectantly for the result of the pharmaceutical.  After twenty minutes he felt the pain in the leg subside.
    Dimitri scanned the room again , realizing there was no possibility of escape.  He stood and tested his weight.  It was painful, but the leg held him.  Dimitri tried to scrape off what was on the window, but it was some sort of clear adhesive and didn’t budge.
    The first mate pondered the thoughts running through his head.  Why keep him alive?  Perhaps the pirates were after the most common reason for hijacking—ransom money.  Millions of dollars could be made from the ransom of a crew, its cargo, and the ship.
    Dimitri didn ‘t believe this was the reason, however.  Something told him that these men weren’t after a ransom.  He had no evidence other than the pirates, or what he believed were mercenaries, were too polished, highly trained, and deadly.  They had a well coordinated plan and timeline in place.  These mercenaries were not poor thugs.
    Dimitri considered it again rationally and it struck him.  If the pirates were after the cargo, as he assumed, then what would they need to get to it?  They would need the loading officer for the unloading of the cargo, but they would need him for the security codes.  The crew of the Trusian was not aware that some of their cargo had security systems in place on the containers themselves.  Only Dimitri knew the codes of these containers.  It was not common practice to have this type of high-level security on their type of vessel.  The contents of the containers were confidential, but he knew it must be valuable.  “This must be what the pirates are after,” he thought.
    There were millions of dollars worth of goods on the Trusian .  How to offload them was the bigger problem.  This was a gigantic vessel, capable of carrying thousands of tons of materials.  The pirates would need container cranes to offload any of the containers.  Those particular ports where these cranes were located were highly regulated.  If the pirates were interested in a particular group of containers, another problem arose.  If those containers had been loaded deep into the ship, then hundreds of other containers would need to be moved to get to them—a daunting task. 
    Dimitri figured he would be called on soon enough by the mercenaries , and he would know their plan.  But what would they do with him when he was of no more use?  The fear spread throughout his body.  At least if the crew were held for ransom they would have a chance.  Dimitri hoped that was all the pirates were after.  Until then he needed to find a way to alert the authorities or escape, even if it might prove impossible.

-Chapter 8-
     
    The main offices of Regentex Maritime Shipping sat in a downtown office building in San Francisco, California.  Their dispatch and operations were contracted through a company in Los Angeles called SeaBoard Logistics.  Seaboard tracked the vessels and cargo of