Battleground

8

Radar Intercept Officer Lieutenant Satterlee checked his screens in the back seat of the Tomcat high over Nairobi. "Cap, we're tracking on both the targets. We have a weapons-free order yet?"

"Soon, my boy, soon. Stay on the first target." That was the front-seat jockey of the Grumman F-14D Tomcat, Lieutenant Commander Harley Allison.

"Still tracking," RIO Satterlee said. "Range sixty-five miles. We'll go with a Phoenix launch if we get a chance. The bogie might turn tail and run when his radar picks us UP."

"A chance, but we hope he doesn't."

The AIM-54-C Phoenix is unique in U.S. armaments. It's a 985-pound missile with a range of over 120 miles and a speed of just over Mach 5. In the U.S. arsenal it can be fired only by the F-14 Tomcat with its advanced AWG-9 radar-guidance system. The Tomcat's radar was a set-to-track-while-scanning system, and could lock onto six separate targets and guide missiles simultaneously to all six locations.

"Range fifty miles, Cap. I see no indication of enemy radar locking on us."

"Just got a weapons-free signal from Home Plate. Sat, let one fly."

"That's a fox three from Eagle One," Satterlee said, giving the aviator's code words for a Phoenix launch and his own ship's ID.

Satterlee hit the launch button, and the Tomcat bounced higher as it dropped the half ton of missile from its belly. The Phoenix ignited at once under the Tomcat, and jolted forward at more than three times the speed of the Tomcat, leaving a contrail streaming after it.

"Missile-away," Allison said. He brought the Tomcat into a hard climbing turn, then pushed the wheel forward, slamming his bird downward toward the Kenyan countryside below. It was a maneuver designed to shake an enemy missile if one had been coming at them.

Then Allison put the bird in a hard climb.

On the ground, Murdock took the mike from Holt. "Sweepers, this is Ground. We could use some help down here. Anybody listening?"

"Eagle Two, I'm with you, Ground."

"We've got three half-track weapons carriers coming up from the north toward the compound. You won't be able to see them, but they're about a block out along that north-south street that runs right along the compound. Welcome them if you can. We need another twenty minutes here minimum."

The second Seahawk had set down in the compound, and Murdock fought the cloud of dust. He wiped his eyes and spat twice.

"Eagle Two, you copy?"

"Roger that, Ground. Yes, I have the road. I'll make my run away from the compound. Don't expect any miracles with the twenties."

Almost before the transmission ended, Murdock heard the jet coming in. Most of the sound on a jet goes out the rear burners, but they give off a sound wave in front as well as they rip through the air at an operational speed of 1,342 knots per hour. The Tomcat flashed over the compound at less than a hundred feet, firing repeatedly at the vehicles a block away. Then it swept up, vanishing in the night sky.

"DeWitt, that do any good?" Murdock asked on his Motorola.

"Scared two fucking months' growth out of me," DeWitt answered. "Looks like one of the rigs is dead in the water, the second one is wounded. Here comes the third one. Wish we had our own fifty."

DeWitt brought three of his men up with the M-4A1s, and had them start lobbing HE 40mm grenades out of the M203 launchers under the barrels.

Ted Yates set up his HK-21A1 on top of the wall, and began blasting the confused half-track men with the 7.62mm rounds from the machine gun. Six men went down before the rest ran for cover in neighboring houses and stores. The third weapons carrier turned forward, and the .50-caliber machine gun stuttered, slamming the big rounds into the block wall.

Yates slid off the top of the wall and hunted for a better-protected spot. Adams, Bishop, and Lampedusa all worked their.40mm grenades on the half-track. They switched to Willy Peter, and the white phosphorus blazed white trails across the top of the carrier, and brought some wails of anguish as the intensely burning phosphorus burned straight through wood, leather, canvas, and human flesh.

When the dust cloud eased, Jaybird Sterling had the last twenty-one hostages waiting to run from the front door to the Seahawk. The last one on board was Underhill. When he was sure all of his people were safely inside the bird, he stepped in, and the craft jolted into the air and raced toward the coast.

The next Seahawk came down almost immediately. The dust from the takeoff hadn't even cleared.

Murdock was on the Motorola. "DeWitt, get your men up here. We've got transport. I say again. We have transport. Fall back to my position south of the main building to our LZ. Move, move, move."

All the men in the Second Squad heard it. Bishop got off one more shot, and saw his WP land just in front of the slowly moving half-track and spray the engine, cab, and body with the burning chemical. Then he ran for the side of the main embassy building, and down to where he could see the Seahawk with its big top rotor swinging around.

"Twelve, thirteen, fourteen," Murdock counted. "Where are the last two?"

"We need Jaybird and Magic Brown," DeWitt said between gasps for air. He'd sprinted 150 yards, and the last batch of air had been loaded with dust.

Jaybird materialized out of the dust helping Magic Brown, who limped badly. Eager hands pulled both on board.

"Go, go, go," Murdock bellowed. A crewman slammed the side door shut, and the bird jumped off the ground like a frightened deer.

"You still set for the flyboys?" Murdock asked Holt, who sat on the floor of the chopper beside the L-T.

Holt nodded, and handed Murdock the mike.

"Eagle Two, this is Ground."

"Have you, Ground. Is your last Slowboy off the deck?"

"Roger that, Eagle Two. Off and moving. Thanks for the twenties down the road. You saved our bones back there. That last weapons carrier was bearing down on us."

"All in a night's work."

"What happened to the two jets coming in?"

"Eagle One splashed one out about sixty miles. His buddy turned his afterburner on and gunned back the way he came. We have no EFF on them. They didn't respond to our friendly signal, so we know they weren't the good guys."

"Thanks again. You going home?"

"Going to do a little cover work until you get wet; then we'll break it off."

Murdock gave the mike back to Holt, and moved among his men checking them. They had some scrapes and gouges. Nothing Band-Aids wouldn't cure. Then he looked at Magic Brown. The corpsman on the chopper worked on Brown's leg.

"Sir, this man took a round through his thigh. I don't know how he even walked, let alone ran. Said he got it early on. Don't think it hit a bone, but the doctors will tell us that for sure. He's going to be resting up for a week or so."

Magic Brown snorted. "Hell, little scratch like that won't slow me down none. Got me some work to do. We still got to get that fucking ship back in U.S. hands."

The corpsman grinned.

Murdock shrugged. "Hey, he's not your ordinary sailor. This man's a SEAL. Usually bullets bounce off Brown. Don't know what happened this time."

Magic Brown gave Murdock a thumbs-up. Then the morphine worked its magic and he dozed.

In the middle chopper, a corpsman looked over two slightly wounded embassy people. Nothing serious. Then he checked Underhill's arm. "Sir, have you had any medication?"

"No. None available."

"I'll give you a shot of morphine. That's a serious arm wound. We'll have the doctors ready for you when we get in. A little under two hours and we'll have you on board the carrier. Your other people are all in good shape. About half of them are sleeping."

First Secretary and Acting Ambassador to Kenya Frank Underhill nodded wearily. He hardly felt the injection. So many of the embassy people had died. They had to go back and get them. Had to. They just had to. America didn't leave its dead for the butchers to desecrate. Had to go back and get them.

Then he slept.