Chapter 1 "A scary night, well ended"
The warm nighttime breezes moving across the dark waters of the South China Sea ruffle your hair a little as I come up behind you, and together we enjoy the smells and sounds of the island bay we are anchored in, while enjoying the closeness of each other even more. Just as I decide I should kiss you once for good luck I am surprised by the sounds of footsteps behind me on the deck, and the beauty of the scene turns to horror as I see a grinning young man brandishing an old carbine at me.
My heart feels like it's going to jump out of my chest and for a moment I think about how we might distract him and push him overboard, but it's a short moment for another clambers onto the deck up at the bow. Very quickly there are four rather vicious men on our lovely vessel and I am appalled at how easily we have been taken. It's heartbreaking to think about how my precautions, the hidden weapons, the powerful fire pump & hose, and all that horsepower in the engines are for nothing as our boat and ourselves become the property of a rag-tag bunch of Malaysian pirates.
I literally gnash my teeth in anger at their rudeness and demeanor as they swagger about our boat, rudely throwing things around and occasionally hurling various insults and threats in our direction. After a few minutes they force me to start the engines, and soon we are out to sea. In a short while we meet up with their vessel which is already heading out to sea also. It's an old wooden dhow driven by couple of outboard engines, with several armed pirates resting on the deck as they motor along. Their boat is nowhere near our match in speed so we must slow down considerably to match pace with them.
They exchange congratulatory shouts with one another as I begin to make a plan as to what to do. The two boats turn towards some islands just off the straits of Malacca, where no doubt they have a hideout and communications equipment with which to make their demands. We can do nothing but sit against the bulkhead in the galley where they are keeping us.
The opportunity to make a move comes soon enough, when one of them asks me how to operate our head ( the very latest in marine toilets). This is the moment I have been waiting for. I point towards the now open toilet seat, and just as he looks down at it I reach over and close the venting valve while with my other hand I flip the macerating pump into "dumping" speed and pressure begins to build. He looks at me with a quizzical expression, then back to the toilet which at that moment reaches the limit of its valve and explodes a large part of the sewage tank's contents all over the hapless criminal.
I try not to laugh as he screams in disgust and anger and lashes out at me, but since he is now quite slippery all he can do is tumble to the floor in a puddle of filth while I swing a belay pin hard against his head. He is out of action for some time to come. The man standing in front of you starts to step towards me pointing his gun and trying not to shoot his boss. Naturally you are ready to take advantage of the situation and you grab a skillet and CLANG! There goes #2. I know I haven't much time so I jump back up to the wheelhouse and reach up to the console while shoving the port engine into reverse just as pirate #3 rounds the corner of the aft deck. The sudden spinning of the boat flips him neatly over the railing so its three down and one to go. I grab #2's gun and step onto the deck, and when pirate # 4 realizes he is outnumbered he makes a quick but smart decision and jumps over the side to join his friend.
We throw a pair of life jackets in after them, and in a moment the unconscious pirates #1 and #2 are tossed over the side to join their friends, wearing new life jackets just to show we are civilized, which is likely more than they would have done for us.
Now we turn our attention to the old pirate boat, motoring alongside us, still blissfully unaware that their friends are doing a 5 mile dog paddle to shore. We know they had other hostages, because we had heard them talking about bringing them to our boat so that we could be offered as a package deal. We quickly decide to change their situation as well. With a good long kiss for luck (no interruptions this time!) we make a plan and then we make our move. The noise of their motor covers all other sounds so they are quite surprised when our searchlight lights them up behind, and even more surprised at how quickly we can clear their deck of pirates with our fire hose. I am very happy now that I brought many extra life jackets. A quick hit of the hose to their engine air intakes quickly renders them motionless.
I keep the remainder of the pirates below decks with the fire hose as you tie us onto their boat, then we both hop onto their hapless vessel with our weapons loaded. We look carefully down the ladder to the pirates and their captives below deck. I see several of them there looking up at us, with two (rather attractive) female hostages, and their leader is pointing a gun at one woman's head. I think for a moment and then unload about half of my clip through the leaky wooden floor, which begins to gush gallons of water into the old boat. He looks up at me in shock and I make it clear that if he shoots her he will die in the next second, and if he does nothing they will all drown. With a look of utter disgust he pushes the women up the ladder, and we take them and quickly leave, watching while they frantically patch the gaping holes in their hull.