Tropical Terror

9

Commander Blake Murdock looked at the magazine. It carried 5.56mm rounds, which could be used in dozens of different international weapons. There was trouble ahead. So they’d snatched the two admirals. What were they going to do with them? Hold them hostage for some ridiculous prize was not reasonable. They must have a more practical plan.

“Holt, let’s get on the air.”

Ron Holt came up with the SATCOM radio, broke out the antenna, spread its little dish antenna, and aligned it with the right orbiting satellite. When the set beeped that it was in the right position, he gave the handset to Murdock. Only then did the commander look at his wristwatch. He punched the light button and saw that it was only a little after 2100.

He had a response from CINCPAC after the second transmission.

“Mr. Stroh is not here. He’s on the phone with Washington. Admiral Bennington is anxious to hear about the two officers you’re hunting.”

Murdock brought the man up to date, and he said he’d relay the information to the admiral and to Stroh.

“Tell Stroh we may need some backup. The Jefferson could send us a pair of fully armed Sea Cobra gunships. Ask him to have the carrier put a pair on standby for us. Our Sea Knight choppers should be at the airport here for transport. We flushed out one bunch of armed Chinese, but the two admirals are still missing. We’re moving out.”

“That’s a Roger on the aircraft, Commander. I’ll get the signal off at once. Your red-signature order is still in effect.”

“Good. We’re out and gone.”

The white van ground up to the front of the old house, and Murdock and Mahanani carried Jaybird to the van and laid him on the wide seat.

“Franklin, keep some pressure on that belly wound,” the corpsman said. “Don’t let it bleed. Keep him secure on the seat.”

“Driver, you know where there’s a hospital with an emergency room?” Murdock asked.

“Yeah, I been figuring the shortest way there. It’s no more than six or eight miles from here. I’ll get him there as fast as I can without wrecking this thing.”

Murdock nodded. “Good. Franklin, you stay with him, keep his gear. Leave his weapon and vest and any explosives and ammo in the van. Move it.”

Murdock watched the van roll out of the yard into the track of an old road and pick up speed.

“Now, ladies, we move into the interesting part of our demonstration. We find those bastards and kill them all. Let’s move out. Lam, you’re out in front as far as you can be and still see me. Go.”

They moved through a field, past some dark houses, but Lam could tell that the trail did not divert to the houses. “The Chinese seemed to be in a hurry,” Lam said.

Just over a small hill they came to what looked like an old manufacturing plant.

“Maybe used for pineapple processing,” DeWitt said.

“Or sugarcane,” Jefferson said. “Lots of cane back there a ways.”

Murdock stared at the dark building a quarter of a mile away. He didn’t like it. Too damn convenient. What did they have to gain going there? Murdock couldn’t think of a thing they could benefit from. Get the two admirals on board a Chinese warship and they would have a bargaining chip. This way?

DeWitt squatted beside Murdock. “What in hell they doing out here with the top brass? How can they benefit?”

“What I’ve been trying to figure out.” Murdock stopped. “Let’s move up on them. We need about fifty more yards. Too damn far off here. We go now, troops.”

The SEALs walked through a field that might have once raised sugarcane. There was little cover. About forty yards from the building they found what looked like an old irrigation ditch. Murdock put them in the grass-covered depression and watched the building again.

“See anything, anyone?” he asked the mike.

“Nada,” somebody said.

Murdock waited for another two minutes, then frowned.

“Hear that? Lam?”

“Yeah, Cap. I’ve got it. Coming in from the beach. Some kind of a chopper, but not the Sea Knight. Not big enough. Coming this way fast.”

They watched the sky to the west, but could see nothing. Then the bird came almost directly over them.

“Four-place job,” DeWitt said. “Yes. I can see the red and yellow star over the red and yellow outlined bar of the Chinese Air Force.”

“Take it down with twenties,” Murdock thundered. He had his own weapon up and sighted in with the laser. Three of the Bull Pups fired at nearly the same time. One airburst came just in front of the chopper. Two other rounds exploded against the side and rear of the ship on contact. The engine sputtered, then died. The rotors spun on automatic as the air rushed passed them and the bird fell from three hundred feet straight down. The small helicopter burst into flames when it hit, and there could be no survivors.

“Move it fast,” Murdock barked into the mike. “Fifty fast yards to the left, go now. Go, go, go.” They jumped up and ran flat out for the fifty through what appeared to be a pasture. Moments after they left their previous position, it was raked with more than a hundred rounds of machine-gun fire.

Murdock took another long look out front at the old packing plant. He had spotted at least three muzzle-flash areas. He had no idea how many weapons had fired at them.

DeWitt slid to the ground beside Murdock. “Now why in hell didn’t they make a stand at the mansion? They had much better defenses over there.”

“I’ll ask them when we catch them. Lam says there can’t be more than ten or twelve men left. They have the advantage because they know we won’t open up on them as long as they have the two valuable admiral chips.”

“The chopper,” DeWitt said. “Coming in to take the admirals for a ride out to a Chinese destroyer?”

“Probably, then to their carrier. They have to have one out there somewhere. Why didn’t the Navy see it? Maybe they did. Was it part of their goodwill visit as well, I wonder?”

“We have to take down that building or blow them out of there,” DeWitt said.

“Great. How?”

“We’ll use the old forty-five. I’ll take Bravo Squad out to the far side and set up at a forty-five-degree angle to the target. You move up from here to a forty-five from this same side. We won’t shoot up each other and we have a cross fire on the turkeys inside.”

“We still can’t blast away with the two chips inside.”

“We can with the EAR weapons. We give them about three shots on each angle and wait and see what happens.”

“Think it will work?” Murdock asked.

“One fucking way to find out.”

“Then you and I go in on point and recon the place for survivors?” Murdock asked.

“You bet. Hell, you want to live forever?”

Murdock stared at the building again. Damn few windows. They would have to get shots through two of them. At least now they knew the sound blast would go through the average windowpane.

“Yeah, gung ho, let’s do it,” Murdock said. “Give me three clicks when you’re set up and ready with the EAR.”

Bravo Squad moved out two minutes later. They jogged like dark ghosts through the soft Hawaiian moonlight, past some trees and brush, and made it to the forty-five. Murdock moved his squad up to the right angle and called up Bradford, who carried the EAR weapon.

“Three shots through any two of those windows on the first floor. Only is one floor. Any questions?”

“We have that ten-second charge-up time between rounds, remember,” Bradford said.

“Yeah. Get me three good ones. Then DeWitt and I are going in to check your handiwork. Make it damn good. I’m not ready to take ten or twelve NATO-sized rounds in my chest.”

“No sweat.”

Murdock grumbled. “You know that’s exactly what Houdini said just before he tried that last escape trick that killed him?”

“Cap, who the hell is Houdini?”

Murdock snorted. Bradford didn’t know. Figured. He settled down in the grass and made sure his Bull Pup was primed and ready. Then he waited for the three clicks on the Motorola.

They came a few breaths later. “Fire,” Murdock said to Bradford. The big guy leveled in and checked for the red light, then pulled the trigger.

The swooshing sound came and Murdock tried to follow the blast of the highly compressed dart of ambient air. The window broke, and then inside there was a thumping sound, not nearly as heavy as the one at the mansion.

Another shot came from in front of them with the same results. It must be a wide-open area inside.

Ten seconds later both weapons fired again, then a third time.

“Moving out,” Murdock said into the lip mike. “Just DeWitt and me. The rest of you stand backup.” He came to his feet and sprinted the forty yards to the one door on this side of the structure. He saw DeWitt coming from his position. They had heard nothing from the building since the rounds from the Enhanced Audio Rifle went off inside. Non-lethal. They had to be non-lethal. No way he would say he’d killed two admirals.

DeWitt hit the wall next to the door. He nodded. Murdock turned the knob. The door opened inward. Ed kicked the door and dove through to the left. Murdock took the right, rolled once, and came up with the Bull Pup ready to blast.

Murdock coughed. The inside of the building was one huge dust cloud. He stifled the next cough and listened. He heard another cough to his left. He moved that way. DeWitt went the other direction. The man coughed again.

Could you cough when you were unconscious? He decided that a body could do that. He flipped down his NVGs and looked through the dust. Better. Another cough. He saw a man to his left. He lay on the floor, a submachine gun in his hands. Unconscious. Murdock tied riot cuffs on his hands and ankles and moved on. The dust settled more now, and he could see it was a large, open-beamed building with rows and rows of tables in it. Maybe a packing shed.

There were no lights.

“Found one out like a light,” Murdock told the lip mike.

“I have one more over here.”

“Where are the rest of them?”

Sing struggled through the darkness, glancing over his shoulder now and then at the packing plant that was supposed to be his salvation. He had radioed the chopper to come in. By this time he and the two American admirals should have been halfway to the coast in the helicopter heading for the deck of his destroyer.

He swore and stopped. It would take the Americans some time to clear the whole packing shed. He had left three men there to slow down the advance. It just might give him time to get into the town and fade into the Chinese community. That was one good part about being Chinese. There were ethnic Chinese in almost every nation in the world. With his good English, he would fit in perfectly. The seven men with him would have a harder time. It was better than being shot as invaders.

He had seven men, two automatic rifles, and the radio. He wondered if another Chinese destroyer would send in its helicopter on a dangerous mission to rescue him and his two prisoners. One might. He would try later when they were nearer to the coast. He had spent a week in this area and knew it well. He was four miles from the coast, and another mile or so to a safe house where he could settle down, get more American clothes, buy some identification, and become an American.

Where had it gone so wrong? The master plan had been a good one. Not even the admiral thought they could invade Hawaii and conquer it. Just a thrust to tell the world that China had reached the level of the other great powers. They had made a good start with the strike at Pearl Harbor with the missiles. Fired from over four hundred miles away from their best submarine. They carried only explosive warheads, but usually were fitted with nuclear warheads.

The two American admirals remained a problem. He had them tied together and hobbled so they could take only small steps. If he melted into the Chinese society, what did he do with the admirals? Should he kill them and hide the bodies? Would the Americans keep hunting him down if he did that? He was sure they would.

He nodded when his lieutenant came up.

“Sir, we have no word from the three men we left at the packing shed. I assume they were killed or captured.”

Speaking was his second in command, who had been a strong leader during the mission.

“We head for the coast as fast as we can,” Sing said. “A mile from here we will tie the two Americans and leave them unharmed. Then we get to the coast and have the submarine come into shore and pick us up. It is our only chance. Tell the men. We’ll be working hard the next few hours, but it could mean our rescue.”

He ordered the men to change into the civilian clothes they had brought in their packs. Every mile they would discard uniforms well off their trail. By the time they reached the beach settlement, they would be eight civilians on a hike. By then they would have hidden their weapons and be totally defenseless — but also that much harder to identify as Chinese invaders.

Sing stripped out of his commander’s uniform and folded it carefully, then hid it under leaves and dirt well off the trail they were making through the countryside. It appeared to be a pasture on rocky ground. He had half his men put on their civilian clothes here. Then they left the admirals tied securely and jogged across the land toward the coast. By the time they came to the first row of houses and streetlights, they were seven civilians walking toward the coast. Sing was the only one who spoke English, so he was at the front of the group. They expected no trouble before they came to the sea. The radio with its powerful signal was stowed safely in the backpack one of the men wore. Now all they had to do was find the beach.

The Chinese officer led the men around a street blazing with lights. It was a business section. Two miles later they came over a green stretch of land and looked down at the Pacific Ocean. He smiled. It was like coming home. They jogged the last quarter mile, and huddled behind a small sand dune as the radioman took out the radio and began making his calls.

The plan was simple. They would call in the submarine, which would pinpoint their transmission location. It would come in to within a half mile of the shore. The men would swim out to meet the sub. The waterproof radio was also equipped with a sonar device to send a signal underwater to the sub for tracking. With no mixups, the last of the Chinese force sent to capture the two American admirals would be safely on board the submarine within two hours.

Murdock settled down next to the two admirals. Their mouths had been taped shut and arms and legs tied securely. Lam had spotted them twenty minutes ago, and had done a complete recon around them for a quarter of a mile. It was not a trap.

“How many Chinese are left?” Murdock asked.

The two-star admiral swallowed hard, then took another drink from Murdock’s canteen and spat out the water.

“Damn mouth don’t work good yet.” He swallowed again. “How many? Seven or eight. Your men cut them down fast. I have no idea why they kidnapped us. Doubt if they knew either. Probably just some commander doing what he was told.”

“You say they changed into civilian clothes?” DeWitt asked.

“Yes. I saw them all changing. They hid the uniforms. I saw two of them hide their automatic rifles as well.”

“They’ll hit town and pass as civilians,” Murdock said.

“I want them caught, Commander, especially that snot-nosed one who speaks English.”

“We’re considering that, Admiral.”

“I’m surprised you aren’t charging ahead right now to catch them before they get into that little town out there. They shouldn’t be hard to spot.”

“Admiral, we’re operating under strict orders from Admiral Bennington. Our job was to find and rescue you and your families. That we’ve done.”

“Then, Commander, I’m ordering you to pursue and capture those damn chinks who kidnapped us.”

“With all due respect, Admiral, this is a combat situation. We’re at war with China. I am on a secret mission and in command of that mission. I report directly to the CNO in Washington, D.C., and the director of the CIA. As such, sir, and with all respect for your rank, I simply outrank you on this mission.”

The admiral started to get red in the face, then relaxed and chuckled. “Yeah, Commander, you sure as hell do. I don’t think I ever thanked you for rescuing our people back there at that mansion, and for finding us. Can we get the hell out of here now and back to our families?”

Murdock said they could. He called on the SATCOM for the Sea Knight chopper at the local airfield to come and get them. He had news about the two admirals’ families as well.

“We’ll have a chopper here in ten minutes, Admiral,” Murdock said. “Your two families are now safely back in the resort where you were staying. We’ll drop you off there on the way. We’re all angry and sorry about your loss.”

“Thank you, Commander Murdock. Thank you very much. You’ve done a fine job here. I’d like to write an addition to your after-action report.”

“As you wish, Admiral.”

Murdock called in their position and designated two men to put down red flares in the LZ. Holt came up to him.

“You called, Cap?”

“Yes, see if you can get on the phone system and find out where Jaybird is. Some Maui hospital. Keep calling until you locate him and get a report on his condition.”

“That’s a Roger, sir.” Holt sat down in the grass and began switching dials and talking. Soon he had the phone number of the Central Maui Memorial Hospital in Kahului. He talked to the emergency room. When he finished he found Murdock.

“The head nurse said that Jaybird took a serious gunshot wound and that he’s being treated. He made it to the hospital in time and the peritonitis was minimal. He’ll be there in recovery for at least a week, but he should heal completely.”

“Good,” Murdock said.

Five minutes later, Holt was back with a curious expression.

“Something cooking, Cap. Just had a call from some captain on board the carrier Jefferson. He said he had cleared it with Admiral Bennington, and Don Stroh. Our Sea Knight bird is to fly us directly to the carrier, which is about twenty miles off Maui. He says he has a highly classified and important mission for us. He said get our asses over there as fast as we can.”