Direct Action

22

The SEALS had entered a thin strip of woods only a few hundred yards across with open areas on either side. But it led deeper into the forest.

Murdock peeled the nylon cover off his watch and checked it yet again. About another kilometer further and it would be time to get on the radio and call in the helicopters. They had just enough time, with a nice little cushion.

Professor Higgins was the first to hear it. A low scratching sound off to his right that could have been whispering. Then a drawn-out metallic click that, despite someone’s best efforts, sounded like a safety catch coming off.

Higgins wheeled about, brought up his weapon, and squeezed off a long burst. Known as an immediate-action drill, it gave everyone time to get down. “Ambush right!” he screamed as he fell forward, but it was lost in all the noise.

A line of muzzle flashes lit up about twenty yards away. Green tracers streaked across the intervening space.

In a short-range ambush, with the element of surprise lost, neither side is usually able to assault forward or withdraw. Survival is awarded to those who first establish fire superiority. That is, those who put out such a heavy volume of accurate weapons fire that their opponents’ ability to return fire is either suppressed or eliminated. Easy to discuss in the classroom, hard to do in real life.

Ed DeWitt lay flat on his stomach. A tree in his path provided convenient protection. He had his pistol in hand, but was saving his rounds in case someone came assaulting through their position.

Beside him Doc Ellsworth was squeezing off rounds from his sniper rifle at the rapid rate. Fortunately the MSG-90 carried a twenty-round magazine.

Magic Brown was firing his AKM single-shot, but so fast it sounded like automatic, putting fire everywhere he saw tracers coming from. His concentration was so intense that he didn’t even notice the incoming rounds kicking up dirt all around him.

Razor Roselli was looking for an opportunity to flank the ambush from the right, but he was solidly pinned down. He couldn’t maneuver, so he fired.

Unless very well trained, everyone shoots high at night. The SEALS were superbly trained and shooting straight. It began to tell with a slackening of fire from the other side. Then at least four more rifles joined in, firing on automatic, as if reinforcements had just come up. That shifted the odds dramatically.

Sensing it, Kos Kosciuszko raised up on his knees and held down the trigger on his PKM machine gun. He worked a continuous stream of fire down the line of muzzle flashes in front of him. Dirt flew, brush and saplings were literally mowed down. The PKM barrel glowed red, then white. It would soon melt, but if they didn’t survive the next few seconds it wouldn’t matter.

It was devastating, and the opposition immediately concentrated all the fire on him.

For Kos the world slowed down until almost nothing was moving. He saw the tracer coming at him, so slow that it seemed he could dodge it, but he couldn’t. Then it felt like he’d been hit by the world’s hardest punch, but red hot. He was a huge man, and strong, and he kept the trigger of that machine gun down, weaving back and forth, up and down the line. Then he wasn’t firing the machine gun anymore. His first thought was that the belt had run out. Then he felt the ground, and somehow he had fallen back down onto it. Then he felt cold, so cold. Then he couldn’t feel anything at all.

Murdock and Jaybird, at the front of the column, had been completely out of the ambush killing zone when Higgins initiated the immediate-action drill. When the shooting started they did not open fire. Instead they began crawling to their left in a wide hook, trying to come around on the enemy’s flank.

They scuttled on their bellies as fast as they could. Brambles tried to hold them up, but they yanked their way free.

Only seconds had passed since the beginning of the firefight, but their crawl seemed to have taken hours. They knew they were getting close because the bullets snapping over their heads were coming from their own side. They came up through the trees, and suddenly they were looking straight down the length of a line of shooters maybe ten yards away. It was the perfect spot for a flank attack. In such a position two men could take on many times their number, because while Murdock and Jaybird could shoot straight down the line of firers, only the man closest to them could twist around and get an unrestricted shot at them.

But if Murdock and Jaybird were to go assaulting down the enemy line just then, they would be cut down by the incoming fire of their fellow SEALS. But not if a signal was given for the SEALs to cease fire first. No human voice could rise above the din; a radio call might not be received by everyone. But there was a signal that every SEAL would recognize immediately, because it came right out of their standard operating procedures.

Murdock and Jaybird fumbled in their pouches and came up with two Russian M75 hand grenades each. Small, barrel-shaped, with ribbed plastic bodies, the grenades were Cold War copies of an Austrian model.

They pulled the pins, rose up from the ground, and distributed the grenades evenly down the line. At the fourth explosion Murdock and Jaybird got to their feet and charged forward, assaulting down the line.

Murdock passed by grenade-torn bodies that he fired into just the same. Then, out of the smoke, a man was on his knees with arms outstretched, begging with what sounded like, “Hai, hai, hai.”

Blake Murdock was not dispensing mercy. His burst blew the man down. Murdock dropped to one knee to change magazines, and then continued on. He reached the end of the line. He heard the thrashing of someone running through the brush, but didn’t fire. From some long-ago training class he heard: Don’t fire unless you can identify your target; it might be a SEAL.

“Jaybird,” he yelled.

“With you, sir,” came the call to his left, right where Jaybird was supposed to be.

Murdock marveled for a brief moment at Jaybird using the word “sir” when he wasn’t in trouble, then keyed his radio. “Jaybird and I have the ambush site secure. Come up on line, and don’t shoot us when you do.”

A series of acknowledgments came over the net, and then the rest of the platoon surged forward in a classic skirmish line. They reached Murdock and Jaybird, and then swept onward into the trees to make sure they hadn’t missed anyone. Murdock and Jaybird now faced around to cover their rear.

Murdock heard a short spasm of firing, then everything quieted down.

“Two more tangos and a bunch of donkeys,” came the unusual message over the radio.

With only one good arm and a pistol, Ed DeWitt prudently hadn’t gone on with the others. He walked up and put his hand on Murdock’s shoulder. “Kos is dead,” he said.