“Sutanto, Sutanto, this is Flight Lieutenant Anna Torres off the USS Hillary Clinton. We have you on visual. Commencing payload run.”

“Hurry up Clinton, hurry please. We are running low on ammunition.” Damiri babbled, hoping that he wasn’t overplaying the act.

“Be cool Sutanto. The bad guys are toast.”

Damiri rolled his eyes and smiled at his comrades on the bridge. They all turned binoculars on the remaining Japanese ships, which were performing beautifully. Their guns fired ceaselessly, raising geysers of water all around the Indonesian vessel.

Damiri felt compelled to wish them all the best in Hell.

But he didn’t pick up the radio. There would have been no point.

The explosion that tore up the nearest destroyer was so violent that he shivered in the face of it. He’d watched the dark, hypersonic bolt as it skimmed across the waves and speared into the Karukaya. But he hadn’t been ready for the titanic eruption that followed. Even in bright sunshine the flash of the blast dazzled and partly blinded him. Somebody cried out.

“Allahu akbar!”

The other Japanese destroyer perished in identical fashion, ripped apart about three thousand meters off the port side. A few seconds later Damiri distinctly heard the tinkle and clatter of metal rain on the steel cladding of the Sutanto.

He gestured for the others to shut up and composed himself before keying the radio mike.

“Thank you Clinton. Thank you.”

The dark, predatory blur of a F-22 streaked past about six hundred meters away.

“Buy me a beer back in Pearl, Sutanto. We’ve got some tall tales for you.”

The fighter rolled over and accelerated away. Apart from two thick clouds of dark oil smoke, almost nothing remained of the Japanese ships.

The speakers crackled into life again.

“Sutanto, this is the Clinton. Please advise us of your status.”

Damiri grinned.

“We’re alive, Clinton! But we don’t know what’s happened. Our communications are down, our GPS is gone, we can’t raise anyone. And these pirates!”

A new voice, masculine, broke in over his chatter.

“Sutanto, this is Admiral Kolhammer. Please advise us of casualties at your end.”

Damiri raised his eyebrows. The infidel leader himself. Any anxiety he had felt before was gone now. He gazed contently out over the long swell of the western Pacific.

“Admiral Kolhammer, sir. I am Sub-Lieutenant Damiri, acting commander of the Sutanto. Captain Djuanda is dead. Many of the officers are dead or injured. We have eighteen killed and twelve badly wounded. Over.”

Kolhammer’s voice growled out of the speakers.

“Can you care for your own casualties, Ensign? I’m afraid we have a situation here, too. There’s little point sending medevac out to you. Our own facilities are already swamped. Over.”

Damiri didn’t want to press too hard. The last thing he wanted was to have Americans coming aboard now. But he had to play for real, too.