Hunt the Scorpion

Chapter One

Act in the valley so that you need not fear those who stand on the hill.

– Danish proverb

Chief Warrant Officer Tom Crocker of SEAL Team Six looked up at the moon rising over the mud-walled compound, which was roughly two hundred feet in front of him. Then he turned to Davis, the blond-haired comms man to his right, and asked, “Any news?”

“The drone is on its way.”

“How much longer?”

“Ten minutes max.”

“Ten additional minutes?”

“That’s what HQ said.”

The SEAL Team Six assault leader looked down at his watch. It was 2202 hours local time, which meant that they’d been waiting for nearly an hour behind the dry scrub that grew around an outcropping of rocks on a hill in South Yemen.

It was a minor miracle they hadn’t been discovered. They sat smack in the middle of al-Qaeda territory only a dozen miles south of the city of Jaar, which had been seized by the terrorists in March 2011.

The lights of a little Yemeni village sparkled in the distance to his right.

This was supposed to be a simple insert-and-destroy, the target a Sunni mullah named Ahmed, formerly a citizen of the UK and currently a vocal leader of al-Qaeda in South Yemen.

Because of U.S. political considerations the target had to be ID’d first, which involved an elaborate trail of digital connections that began with the SEAL team on the ground and ended in a trailer in the parking lot of CIA headquarters, where an officer from the CIA Directorate of Operations had to peer into a video monitor connected by satellite feed to a camera on the drone and confirm that the image on the screen likely corresponded to the intended target. Then, and only then, could he give the order to Crocker and his team to take out the target.

How was the officer in Langley supposed to establish Mullah Ahmed’s identity with any degree of certainty when he was probably bearded and wore a black turban like all the other al-Qaeda terrorists? Why was the Agency being so careful?

These were questions of DC bureaucratic politics Crocker had learned to avoid, as much as they seemed to want to drive him crazy.

Instead of complaining, which he knew would do no good, he focused on applying his extensive training, experience, expertise, and instincts to the mission at hand.

Surveying the area around him through AN/PVS helmet-mounted night-vision goggles, he confirmed that all the pieces of the op were in place. Ritchie (his explosives expert and breacher) and Mancini (equipment and weapons) were in position outside the back of the compound. They were ready to detonate the explosives that would initiate the assault and cover anybody retreating out the back. Akil (maps and logistics), Davis (communications), and Calvin (the Asian American SEAL sniper he had brought with him) hugged the ground to Crocker’s immediate right.

They were positioned on a hill that looked directly into the front of the compound, which was rectangular and approximately eighty by eighty feet and contained three structures-a main house and two smaller sheds or garages. The second and third stories of the house were visible above the ten-foot-high wall. Low yellow lights shone in some of the windows, creating an eerie effect.

“This is Tango two-five. You guys fall asleep? What’s the good word?” Ritchie’s voice came through the earphones built into Crocker’s helmet.

“We’re still waiting for the order.”

“Manny’s getting hungry. He’s looking at me funny. What’s taking so long?”

“We’re waiting for the drone. Stand by.”

Crocker understood their frustration. He and his men liked to strike fast and extract. Cooling their heels in enemy territory only invited trouble.

He hoped that once they got the go-ahead, they could overwhelm the compound quickly and finish the job. First, a big explosion along the back wall, then Akil would run forward and attach C5 to the front gate. Blow it in. Then they’d rush in, taking preplanned routes and firing positions. Should the terrorists show themselves in any of the compound windows, Cal would pick them off.

Once the mullah was down, Mancini and Ritchie could cover their retreat to the helicopter extraction point, which was approximately half a mile behind them.

His team was also prepared for other contingencies, should they occur.

Approximately eight feet ahead and three feet to his right, Cal was completing the setup of the MK11 Mod 0 sniper weapons system, which consisted of an MK11 precision semiautomatic rifle, twenty-round magazine box, QD scope rings, Leupold Vari-X Mil-Dot riflescope, Harris swivel-base bipod on a Knights mount, and QD sound suppressor. The weapon fired a 7.62 NATO round with a muzzle velocity of 2,951.5 feet per second and an effective range of 1,500 yards.

Cal-who looked Polynesian, but was a mixture of Japanese, German, and Irish-carefully adjusted the Leupold scope to factor in the wind blowing in from the southeast. Four clicks moved the point of impact one inch at approximately one hundred yards.

Crocker had relied on Cal before in similar circumstances and knew him to be a deadly shot. He was also an avid conspiracy theorist, hunter, and Texas hold ’em enthusiast in his spare time. A somewhat odd but friendly fellow who claimed to have won over half a million dollars playing poker. Unmarried, unattached. Almost never spoke about his personal life. His eyes and mouth upturned in a seemingly perpetual smile.

Having adjusted his weapon, Cal turned and flashed a thumbs-up.

“See anything?” Crocker asked.

“Got one of the camel jockeys in my crosshairs through the upstairs window. Can I take the shot?”

“Any minute now.”

“I’m ready. More than ready.”

“Hold on.”

“I’ll make this easy. Pop. Pop. One dead mullah. We go home, listen to some music.”

“Negative, Cal. We’re waiting for the drone.”

Crocker glanced at his watch. More than ten minutes had passed since the last time he’d looked. He crouched behind a car-sized rock listening for the hum of an approaching drone, but all he heard was the low whistle of the wind over the mostly barren hills and goats braying in the distance.

He turned to Davis and asked, “What the fuck is taking so long?”

“Apparently the Predator got lost.”

“What?”

“The Predator got lost.”

“How does a drone get lost?”

“Some doofus entered the wrong coordinates into the computer.”

“Fuck that.”

“Human error dinks us one more time.”

Crocker started to think about all the SEALs he knew who had lost their lives because of bad intelligence or some careless screwup-a helicopter full of them in southern Afghanistan, at least half a dozen outside of Fallujah, Iraq. He stopped.

Akil, the tall, barrel-chested Egyptian American maps and logistics expert, leaned in and said, “I think we ought to set off the explosions now.”

Crocker wanted to bark Don’t think, just follow instructions. But he was a better, more restrained leader than that. He valued and welcomed the input of his men. Six disciplined, combat-tested brains were better than one.

He said, “First, we’ll find out if the drone can see through the windows up front using its infrared camera. Apparently it’s also equipped with some new camera gizmo that can deploy inside buildings.”

“Sweet.”

“But don’t ask me how it works.”

“I won’t. You still haven’t figured out how to change the oil in your car.”

Akil was referring to a recent mishap Crocker had had at home, in which he had failed to fully tighten a gasket after an oil change on his wife’s Subaru Outback, which caused her engine to lock up on the highway.

Again he heard Ritchie’s voice through his earphones. “Tango two-five here. Looks like we got something moving in from the southwest.”

Crocker’s calves and knees were starting to ache. “What?”

“Appears to be a vehicle.”

“Only one?”

“I’m gonna say one, yes.”

“What do you see, exactly?”

“Two headlights approaching, slowly winding down out of the hills to our right, your left. Direction northwest.”

“Roger, Tango. Heads down. Weapons ready.”

“Roger and out.”

He turned to Davis manning the radio and said, “Tell HQ we’ve got a vehicle approaching.”

“Yes, sir.”

From somewhere in the hills beyond the compound, he heard an engine. Then the grind of tires on a dirt road. Saw what looked like a light-colored extended-cab pickup swing into the half light.

Crocker readied his MP5, then spoke into his headset: “Tango two-five. Report a white truck. Looks to be at least two individuals inside. Approaching the compound.”

“Correct that. I see three, sir. Two in the cab. One in back.”

“Three, then.”

“Roger.”

Crocker watched the gate to the compound open and a bearded man wearing a black turban wave the battered Toyota pickup in. He made out a man with a long beard sitting in back with an AK-47 held between his knees.

He saw Cal to his right, peering through the scope of the MK11 Mod 0 sniper weapons system, ready to take a shot. Felt a rush of excitement.

God, he wanted to give the order now. Now was the time to attack-while the gate was open. But discipline held him back.

He heard Davis’s urgent voice to his right. “Boss. Boss?”

“What? You spot the Predator?”

“No, headquarters says abort.”

“Abort, now?” He thought it had to be a joke.

“Abort. That’s correct.”

“What do they mean, abort? Tell ’em we’ve got the terrorists in our sights.”

“I did already. They want us to pull back to the extraction site.”

“Now?”

“Yes.”

Feeling like the wind had been kicked out of him, he asked, “Why?”

“No reason given. It’s a simple abort.”

Twenty-two minutes later, Crocker and his team had strapped themselves onto the benches of a Black Hawk helicopter and were cradling their weapons as it lifted off the desert ground.

Ritchie, his dark eyes blazing, sat to Crocker’s right.

“Boss?”

“Yeah.” Shouting over the helo’s engines.

“What just happened?”

“Beats the shit out of me.”

“Were we at the wrong compound?”

“Not as far as I know.”

“SOS, huh, boss?” Meaning same old shit.

“Yeah, SOS.”

“Crazy-ass way to fight a war.”

This wasn’t the first time this had happened. They’d spent the last five weeks on the Arabian Peninsula training, collecting intel, practicing for different ops, then being told to abort at the last minute. Adding to their annoyance was the fact that they missed their families and needed a break from the 24/7 pressure of being deployed.

Davis’s wife had a young baby and was expecting another. Ritchie’s new girlfriend was threatening to start dating other men if he didn’t return home soon. Crocker’s wife wanted some relief in dealing with his daughter, her stepdaughter, who had been living with them for a year. Mancini’s wife was looking after his younger, wheelchair-bound brother, who was suffering through the final stages of pancreatic cancer and about to die. Akil’s Egyptian-born father’s jewelry repair business was losing money.

Every one of them had myriad problems and concerns outside their jobs.

As Crocker unbuckled his helmet the copilot, in a camouflage flight suit and helmet, walked over and tapped him on the shoulder.

“Sir?”

“Yeah.” Holding on to the bench as the copter banked sharply.

“You Chief Warrant Officer Tom Crocker?”

“That’s correct.”

“Orders to fly you and your men to USS Carl Vinson in the Gulf of Aden.”

“What for?”

“We’re operating on a need-to-know basis here, sir. Those are my orders.”

“Received. Thanks.”

Fifteen minutes later they had safely landed on the deck of the Carl Vinson. A landing signal officer handed Crocker a bottle of water with the ship’s seal stenciled on it and underneath it the Latin motto Vis Per Mare-“Strength from the Sea.” She was strong, all right. A metal beast measuring 1,092 feet long with a capacity to hold up to ninety fixed-wing aircraft and helicopters, she carried a crew of over six thousand, including airmen. She was one of a fleet of ten Nimitz-class supercarriers-the largest, most lethal warships on the planet.

He’d been up twenty-four hours and would have preferred something with a little kick, like black coffee, Red Bull, or a can of Diet Mountain Dew. But water was better than nothing, especially with the taste of the desert still in his mouth.

The last time Crocker had stood on the deck of the Carl Vinson was the morning of May 2, 2011, when he and his team watched the corpse of Osama bin Laden being disposed of in the ocean. As much as they’d wanted to kick and piss on that piece-of-shit terrorist, they weren’t permitted to. But they had cheered as his white-shrouded body was slipped overboard and devoured by sharks.

It seemed like a lifetime ago now. Since the death of the notorious al-Qaeda leader, Crocker and his team had been running ops almost nonstop. Over fifty in the last year, to places like Pakistan, Afghanistan, Yemen, Sudan, and Somalia.

Still, Crocker managed to squeeze in a few races. Like the 150-mile, six-stage marathon across the Sahara in Morocco (called the Marathon des Sables) that he and his men were scheduled to compete in next week. They had been trying to build up to it with at least sixty miles a week, plus a thirty-mile run on their day off. Which explained why both his Achilles were tight and his knee and lower back were barking. Crocker was used to dealing with pain. He thought of it as weakness leaving his body.

The lean, white-shirted LSO led him briskly along the flight deck past one of the steam catapults (known as a Fat Cat) that was capable of accelerating a thirty-seven-ton jet from zero to 180 miles per hour in less than three seconds. The marvels of technology. As much as Crocker admired engineers and scientists, they still hadn’t invented anything that could replace the versatility and ingenuity of men on the ground. He and his men were arguably the most highly trained, battle-tested, and lethal fighting force in the world, prepared to deal with anything on sea, air, or land. Raids behind enemy lines, commandeering ships or airliners, rescuing hostages, assassinations, sensitive intel-gathering ops-all in a day’s work.

A wise man named Friedrich Nietzsche once said, “Many are stubborn in pursuit of the path they have chosen; few in pursuit of the goal.” Crocker had committed those words to memory. They were his mantra. Don’t worry about the fuckups and bumps in the road, focus on your goal.

The goal was to protect his countrymen from people who wanted to destroy their way of life, take away their freedoms, shred the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.

That wasn’t going to happen as long as Tom Crocker was alive. No way. He hadn’t earned his reputation as Chief Warrant Officer Manslaughter for nothing. People oohed and aahed over high-tech drones, listening systems, heat imaging. But when real nasty, difficult shit needed getting done, it was sheepdogs like him and his men who had to step in to protect the sheep from the wolves.

Crocker followed the LSO down steep metal steps and through a tight corridor that led to the captain’s quarters. Photos of the ship’s namesake, Congressman Carl Vinson-the only man to serve more than fifty years in the U.S. House of Representatives-lined the walls. Another bald-headed, sharp-eyed man in a suit. All Crocker wanted when he grew old was a shack in the woods, his wife-hopefully-and a means of securing food and water.

The LSO stopped and opened the door to a state-of-the-art conference room. The captain-an energetic man with a lantern jaw and short-cropped gray hair-stood and squeezed Crocker’s hand.

“Welcome aboard, Warrant. Glad you could make it.”

“It’s good to be back, sir.”

“Take a seat and we’ll drop the disco ball.”

Crocker, still dressed in his desert cammies, barely got out a question-“Sir, what’s going on?”-before the lights dimmed and a panel of four large color LED monitors descended from the ceiling and lit up. On one of them he recognized the gaunt face of his CO back at SEAL headquarters in Virginia, which caused him to sit up at attention. Instinctively, he started to wonder what he had done wrong.

“Crocker, is that you?” His CO, Captain Alan Sutter, was squinting through wire-rimmed glasses.

“Affirmative, sir.” Crocker focused on the bump where the captain’s nose had been smashed during Operation Urgent Fury in Grenada, 1983, when his chute had failed to open and he crashed into a tree. Lost a mouthful of teeth, too.

“Can you hear me?”

“See and hear you clear as day, sir.” His CO was damn lucky to be alive. So was he.

“Good.”

“How are things back at headquarters?”

His CO didn’t answer, cutting the small talk. “A critical situation has come up. Somewhat of a strategic emergency. Demands a swift response.”

“My men and I are ready, sir, to do whatever’s needed.”

“We need someone we can trust with a very difficult scenario who’s deployed in the area,” Sutter continued.

Crocker was going to say “Difficult is my call sign,” but bravado didn’t go over well in SEAL teams. Operators were expected to be humble, do their jobs, and limit the chest pounding.

“I appreciate that, sir,” Crocker said instead, fighting through his exhaustion. He wasn’t twenty years old anymore but in his midforties. And even though he was in incredible shape, his body needed time to recover.

He could probably forget about resting tonight.

From the video monitor, his CO continued: “Involves a pirated cargo ship off the Somali coast.”

The word “pirated” intrigued Crocker. He’d heard stories of local gangs stopping cargo ships and even supertankers off the coast of East Africa and the Malacca Straits in Indonesia.

An aide slipped a pad and pencil in front of him, and Crocker took notes as his CO and two officers from the Agency’s Counterterrorism Center related the ship’s position and various details, including info gleaned from the vessel’s emergency signal and satellite surveillance.

Crocker was wondering why a cargo ship of Australian registry was getting so much attention when his CO mentioned that it was transporting “sensitive nuclear material” from Melbourne to Marseille.

Among Crocker’s various duties, he happened to be the WMD officer at SEAL Team Six. “You referring to yellowcake, sir, or something else?” he asked. Yellowcake was uranium ore concentrate. Once it was enriched in a process that involved turning it into a gas called uranium hexafluoride, it could be used to fuel nuclear bombs.

“The exact nature of the material is classified. It’s not dangerous in its current state. But it’s important. Very goddamn important.”

“I understand, sir.”

“The White House wants this handled immediately.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Get your men geared up and ready to deploy.”

“You can count on us, sir.”

“There’s no time to fly in another team or the cigarette boats. You think you and your men can handle this situation alone?”

“Absolutely. We’ll take care of it, sir, as long as someone can get us there.”

Typically pirates operating off the coast of Somalia held ships and their crews hostage while they negotiated five- and six-figure ransoms. So Crocker asked, “Have there been any communications from the pirates, sir? Have they made any demands?”

“None so far.”

Strange, he thought.

“Approximate number of pirates?”

“Expect six to ten. Secure the sensitive material because the White House would like to use it as evidence.”

Evidence of what?

“Deploy as quickly as you can,” his CO said.

“Yes, sir.”

As soon as the room’s lights illuminated, the supercarrier’s operations officer appeared at Crocker’s side. A big man with a shaved head, dressed in a khaki uniform, he said, “Give me a list of what you need and I’ll turn this carrier upside down to find it.”

Crocker thought quickly and answered, “A helicopter that can get us there fast, two Zodiacs with twin outboards, wet suits and skin suits, fins, Dräger LAR V rebreathers, twelve frag grenades, a telescopic pole and caving ladder if you have one, flares, TUFF-TIES, comms, SMGs, and pistols.”

The op officer scribbled everything down. “That all?”

“A cutlass and eye patch, if you can find them.”

“What?”

“It’s a joke.”

“I should find most of this in one of the Conex boxes from the last SEAL platoon on board.”

“Works for me.”

“Be on the flight deck in fifteen minutes with your men.”

“Yes, sir.”

Crocker was thinking about his wife, Holly, as a tall navy officer led him through a maze of corridors, past a gym, commissary, and barbershop. She worked for State Department Security and was about to deploy overseas any day, too. He wanted to call her, but there was no time.

They entered the ship’s mess, where he found his men feasting on Szechuan chicken and chow mein noodles. Moving them over to a corner table out of earshot, he briefed them as more aides arrived with nautical charts and satellite photos.

According to the latest intel, an unmarked assault boat appeared to be towing the MSC Contessa to the Somalia coast, which was highly unusual. What were primitive pirates doing with a launch that was powerful enough to tow a forty-thousand-ton ship?

Crocker and his men would soon find out.

Still chewing a mouthful of chicken, he helped his men carry their gear and weapons up past the ship’s hangars to the flight deck. There they were greeted by a fresh ocean breeze, a welcome relief from the stale air and claustrophobic atmosphere below.

Crocker didn’t like the confined feeling of ships, particularly the submarines he and his men had deployed from a dozen or so times over the years, which seemed like sardine cans filled with pasty-faced men. He especially disliked Swimmer Delivery Vehicles (SDVs), which were basically mini-subs.

He covered his ears as an F-18 Super Hornet approached the Vinson’s flight deck, its engines screaming, its tailhook deployed. The F-18 hit the deck, sending a tremendous shower of sparks into the night sky. The fighter jet was slightly off track and missed the ship’s arrest wire, so it quickly zoomed up to full throttle and took off again with a roar.

Crocker noted that the sky was cloudy and the sea choppy, which caused the carrier to rock side to side.

“That can’t be easy,” Akil remarked.

“Flying in at a hundred and seventy-five miles an hour and trying to hit a wire. You try it sometime.”

“No thanks.”

The LSO who was escorting them shouted into Crocker’s ear, “Be careful where you walk. A year ago one of our maintainers got his cranial matter sucked right out of his head when he stood too close to the intake of an A-6E.”

“Good to know.”

Right under the ship’s superstructure, known as the island, they met the pilots and copilots of the two MH-60 Knighthawk helicopters that had been tasked with flying them in. Each helo was equipped with M240 machine guns and Hellfire missiles. The four stood in a huddle studying weather charts as Crocker’s men loaded their gear. One of the pilots-a lanky-haired man with gray eyes and a Fu Manchu mustache-turned to Crocker and said, “Expect the flight to be a little rough. We got some weather blowing in from the south.”

“What have you got in terms of in-flight entertainment?”

“If you watch carefully you might be able to see a pelican taking a crap.”

“Just get us close. We’ll be fine.”

“You planning to fast-rope onto the deck?”

“No, I’d rather take the bastards by surprise,” Crocker answered.

“How far away you want us to drop you?”

“You’ll need to approach lights-out. Drop us about a mile behind the stern so we can’t be seen.”

The lead pilot nodded. “We can do that.”

“Then what are we waiting for?”