The Arrangement

Gunter Wayan and Eka Endah were running for their lives. Unarmed, they wove through the maze-like corridors as two North Korean men with AK-47s gave chase, bullets flying past and peppering the walls and floor inches from their bodies. They didn’t have a clue in hell where they were going. They were trying to stay alive and escape their captors. The Indonesian private investigators were in decent shape, more so than the seamen trying to kill them. That became apparent the more prolonged the chase ensued, the gunfire decreasing as their pursuers dropped further behind. Five minutes after they dodged the last salvo, they saw a ladder that went to the deck above and took it. As they stepped off the top rung, their mouths went agape. They were unprepared for what they saw. They were standing on an abandoned oil platform with nothing but water visible from horizon to horizon. More surprising were the five massive ICBMs sitting on mobile launch pads. Connected to each missile were two eight-inch steel tubes wrapped with thick metallic insulation. Each branched to the missile from a different separator, which received whatever it was pumping from somewhere below deck. The steel tubes were extremely cold given the quarter-inch layers of ice that surrounded their entries into the ICBMs. “They’re getting ready to launch these bad boys,” Wayan said. “It looks that way. That begs the question of why they brought us here.” “I think this was a stop the ship was scheduled to make before we were kidnapped and put on board. We weren’t meant to see the platform or the missiles. If we didn’t escape, we’d still be locked in our cabin and have no idea about any of this.” Wayan turned and saw one of the seamen who was chasing them come out of a hatch fifty yards to the rear. The man shouldered and aimed his AK-47 assault rifle, which could discharge bullets at eleven rounds per second. They were the definition of the walking dead. However, he didn’t fire. Wayan wasn’t about to ask for an explanation and grabbed Eka's hand and ran towards an ICBM, not about to overthink the situation and give the young seaman a chance to reassess pulling the trigger. “He didn’t shoot,” Eka said in wonderment. “I’m guessing the only reason we’re alive is that this missile was behind us and being fueled,” he responded, trying to keep up with her. “If one of his rounds missed and hit it, we’d all be plucking a harp.” With the seaman running towards them and trying to get a clear shot, they found themselves being herded by him away from the missile and to the right corner of the platform. Not wanting to go for a swim, they took the only option available and scrambled down a ladder leading to the deck below. Taking successive down ladders, they continued their descent until they reached the superstructure deck, where the ship on which they were imprisoned was docked. Two vessels were berthed at adjacent docks. “How long do you think we have before they look on this deck?” Eka asked. “They’ll want to search every room on each deck to ensure they don’t miss us. At least, that’s what I’d do. Judging from the size of the platform, we should have around an hour. That assumes someone doesn’t see us while boarding or coming off one of these ships.” The ship docked directly in front of them, which flew the Iranian flag, was the Bahri Ghazal—the name painted in thick white letters on the vessel’s bow. Protruding from its deck were two large, insulated steel tubes—the same type connected to the missiles. The steel tubes extended to the platform and were attached to circular junction boxes, each with a cutoff wheel. They exited these boxes at a ninety-degree angle and ran along the exterior of the platform to the upper deck. “What do you want to do?” Eka asked. “What I want will probably get us killed.” “You want to destroy those missiles.” “Think about it. Five huge ICBMs are being fueled for launch on what appears to be a deserted oil and gas platform in the middle of the ocean. These aren’t test flights. A lot of people are going to die when they reach their targets.” “I saw Hangul lettering along the sides of the missiles,” Eka said, referring to letters from the Korean alphabet. “That makes them North Korean.” “Which makes sense since they kidnapped us,” Wayan added. “I think I know where the missiles are going.” “Israel.” Wayan nodded in agreement. “The Iranian flagged ship that’s pumping fuel to them means Iran is involved. I can’t see them fueling missiles owned by North Korea unless it’s to their benefit. If Kim Jong-un could transport the missiles here, he could also bring the fuel. Therefore, why get it from Iran and risk exposing whatever he planned? That makes me believe he sold them to Iran to get hard currency.” “Israel will respond by taking out the country’s military bases and leveling their nuclear research and storage facilities. They’ll also destroy Iran’s oil industry, which will drive it into bankruptcy in no time.” “That’s the response I’d expect if these missiles are carrying conventional warheads. If they’re nuclear-tipped with have a single warhead or MIRV,” he said, referring to a multiple independent reentry vehicle, “then Israel will be decimated and won’t be able to respond.” “And Iran can deny any knowledge of the attack because the missile tracks will show they were launched from whatever ocean we’re in and not the Islamic republic,” Eka added. “Israel has a lot of enemies. Iran will claim the attack was by one of them. Without proof, who’s to say it didn’t? Both countries will chew on each other in the United Nations, but that’s all that will come of it.” “That brings us to the question of how we destroy these missiles.” “We start a fire,” Wayan said. “That will ignite the missiles and send the platform to the floor of the ocean.” “Along with us.” “Not if escape by borrowing one of these ships.” “That might work. How do we start the fire?” “We break the glass, take a flare gun,” Wayan said, pointing to a pair in a steel box affixed to a support beam, “and send the flare into a fuel tube. The fire will ignite the fuel all the way to the missiles. Boom.” “We'll be in the center of that boom because the fuel ship behind us will explode,” Endah countered. “Not if we cut off the fuel at the circular junction boxes and ignite one of the fuel ducts on the other side of it. I’ll wrap my jacket around my hands. The vapor coming from the ice encrusting the cutoff wheel looks cold enough to give me frostbite and pull the skin off.” “It would,” a voice said. Startled, they looked to their right and saw a man five feet, five inches in height, with piercing black eyes and a patch of black stubbles trying to break the surface near the rear of his head. With a 12-gauge shotgun in his hands, he looked at them in the brutal way a predator saw its prey. “That’s an excellent plan. The missiles are being fueled with liquid hydrogen, which leaves this ship at minus four hundred twenty-three degrees Fahrenheit,” Jae-Hwa Ock said, nodding toward the Iranian vessel. “The other large conduit is delivering liquid oxygen, which is the oxidizer. It’s at minus two hundred ninety-eight degrees Fahrenheit. Touching either of the cutoff wheels on the junction boxes with your bare skin would give you frostbite and a serious burn.” “I guess it’s time to return to our cabin,” Wayan said, raising his hands. Eka also put her hands in the air. “Unfortunately, that’s not an option,” the man replied as he raised the shotgun to eye-level and fired twice in rapid succession. The force of the blasts hurled Wayan and Eka backward. They landed hard and were motionless on the metal deck. The man walked to the bodies and kicked them to ensure he didn’t receive a response. It was over.