LEAD RAIN OVER LAUT SELATAN
"Down!" Indah yanked Joko by the collar of his jacket and slammed him onto the cabin floor, which was littered with broken glass.
Heavy bullets tore through the boat's wooden walls like hot knives through butter. Wood splinters flew through the air, slicing Indah's cheek. Their wooden boat began to list, its hull punctured by gunfire.
Indah knew they wouldn't last another two minutes on this boat. She had to take extreme measures.
"Joko, put on your life jacket. Grab the laptop and flash drive. When I tell you to jump, you jump!" Indah ordered.
"But what about you?!" Joko shouted over the roar of gunfire.
"I'll buy us time."
Indah crawled out of the cabin toward the rear deck. There, reserve fuel tanks—gas cans strapped to the stern—waited. She pulled a stun grenade's pin from her tactical belt and tied the grenade to one of the cans with a thin plastic cord.
She waited until one of the pursuing Skiffs came in for boarding. It was now only ten meters away. Three fully armed agents prepared to leap onto the wooden boat.
Now.
Indah shot her own boat's fuel tank with her pistol. The bullet's spark ignited the gasoline instantly.
BOOM!
The rear of the wooden boat exploded into a massive fireball. The blast hurled the boat forward while creating a wall of fire that blocked the enemy's view.
"Jump, Joko!" Indah shouted.
Joko leaped into the cold, dark seawater. A second later, Indah followed, making a low leap and diving as deep as she could.
Underwater, the world felt silent yet deadly. The orange glow of the explosion above illuminated the churning surface. Indah could see the black shadow of the enemy Skiff's hull directly overhead.
With a swift movement, Indah swam toward one of the Skiff's jet engines. She drew her karambit, jammed it into the turbine intake, then twisted her body to pull the emergency fuel-release lever beneath the engine—the one she'd learned about from a military manual.
The enemy boat's gasoline leaked underwater. Indah ignited the waterproof lighter in her right hand and threw it toward the stream of fuel rising to the surface.
Zzzt—BOOM!
The second explosion erupted underwater, destroying the first Skiff's engine and hurling the agents inside into the sea.
Indah surfaced for air. The seawater tasted salty and warm from the burning oil. She saw Joko struggling to stay afloat a few meters away, clutching his watertight backpack.
The two remaining enemy Skiffs began turning around, their searchlights sweeping across the water in search of survivors.
"Come here!" Indah pulled Joko beneath the shadow of the wooden boat's wreckage, still floating and burning. The heat stung their faces, but it was their only protection from the enemy's thermal cameras. The heat from the wreckage masked their body heat.
"They... they'll find us," Joko whispered, his teeth chattering from the cold and fear.
"Not if we reach that island first," Indah said, her eyes fixed on the black silhouette of the volcanic mountain rising in the distance, barely a kilometer from their position. "We have to swim."
"A kilometer? In a storm like this?" Joko stared desperately at the raging sea.
"Our choices are to swim or be shot to death here," Indah replied coldly. She gripped the collar of Joko's life jacket with one hand while paddling with her right. She moved with inhuman strength, fighting the powerful current and cleaving through the darkness toward the place where her fate had first been written.
Behind them, the random crackle of gunfire still struck the water, but Nightingale had vanished into the storm's embrace.