Tropical Terror

22

Murdock stopped his SEALs fifty yards from what looked like the top of the mountain. In the darkness he could only estimate, but the distance felt right. Ed DeWitt came over and they worried it.

“We can’t use the twenties anymore up here,” DeWitt said. “We don’t know where the hostages are. That damn shrapnel explodes out fifty to seventy-five yards on an airburst. That would go through a tent like leaves on a tree. Can’t take the chance.”

The fire from above had been murderous. They had machine guns overlapping, and could send down a killing barrage anytime they saw a target. Murdock had only one other casualty, that a heel shot off Ostercamp’s boot.

“So how do we get up the damn hill?” Murdock asked.

“Wait until morning and establish our absolute limits on the use of the twenties. We might be able to use them on the machine guns after all.”

“Long night ahead. Let’s do some recon and try to pin down where the tents are.” Murdock waved at his JG. “Have Lam go take a gander. I’m going to check in with CINCPAC and see what else is going on.”

DeWitt moved out to find Lam. Murdock used the Motorola to call up Ron Holt. They had to move to a new location where Holt could get a clear shot at the satellite. When the set beeped that the dish antenna was aligned properly, Holt gave the handset to Murdock.

“CINCPAC, this is Red Hill.”

The speaker came on at once. Holt lunged forward to turn down the volume. “Yes, Red Hill. We read you.”

“Have found the camp. Made contact with the hostage-takers, but have not located the tents and hostages yet. On hold until daylight and we can better assess.”

“Thought you guys could do anything.”

“Not against interlocked machine guns, sir.”

“The other war fronts are winding down. Most of the little men are on the run, captured, or dead. We’ve been talking with a Lieutenant Hing about the captives. He knows we won’t negotiate. He could be getting nervous and dangerous.”

“He’s already dangerous. Will report in tomorrow or with any new move here.”

“That’s a Roger, Red Hill. Out.”

Murdock sat back and looked at the set. “Not one hell of a lot of help,” he said to Holt.

“For damn sure, Skipper. We stuck here for a while?”

“Unless Lam can get us a hundred yards of separation between those machine guns and the tents.” He used the Motorola. “Two on guard for each squad. The rest of you get some shut-eye. It could be a long night.”

Karl Tucker bored into the rain forest — like growth and stopped after fifteen yards. He listened, looking behind, but no one chased him. There should be another guard down this way. He crept soundlessly back to the edge of the clearing and sectioned the area. Then he did his search again. One more guard, then he’d find the guys out there who were on his side.

He had to work harder to find the third guard. For ten minutes he searched the sectors. Karl was about to give up when he saw movement in a tree. Yes. This soldier wasn’t smoking. He seemed to be alert. He sat in the low crotch of a tree. He was only six feet off the ground but had good sight lines.

The old Marine training took over and Karl worked through the brush to a spot where he had some good cover to move forward. The sentry had picked a spot at the very edge of the woods. This gave him an excellent view of his area, but also put him in more danger from the cover behind him.

After twenty minutes, Karl had worked his way soundlessly along the edge of the brushy woods to a spot fifteen feet from the Chinese sentry.

A sitting duck.

Karl knew he should simply shoot the guard and move on to find the Marines. There was no reason for stealth. Not after his shootout with the other guard. Karl grinned. He hadn’t had a chance to play Marine for five years. The old urges were still there. He lifted the knife, an eight-inch blade with a well-balanced handle. He held the knife in one hand and crawled on hands and knees toward the sentry.

Karl froze as the Chinese soldier looked his way. He stared at the shadowed spot where Karl lay. Then his gaze moved on, covering his post and his assigned area. He was doing a good job, which made Karl’s approach harder.

Karl surged forward ten feet when the guard looked the other way. Then he came up charging, the sub gun in his left hand, the knife in his right. He was six feet away from the sentry. The man turned back and saw Karl coming, but by then it was too late. The heavy knife drove into the Chinese man’s chest and slammed him backward. Karl dove forward with the blade and landed hard on top of the sentry.

Karl kept up the pressure on the steel until the soldier gave one long sigh and his bowels discharged. Karl searched the dead guard quickly, took three filled magazines for the sub gun and pushed them inside his shirt, then slipped back into the brush and moved to his left, where he had heard the gunfire. Now all he had to do was find the Marines without getting his head blown off. He grinned. These were Marines. He’d have to be damn careful so he didn’t get his hide full of 20mm cannon shrapnel. Karl grinned and began jogging forward.

Murdock took the patrol to the left. There had to be a better way to get up to the mesa than this slope. He worked beyond the fields of fire of the two machine guns, and found what he was afraid he would: another sheer cliff rising over a hundred feet almost straight up. None of his people were skilled at hard-rock climbing. That was why Hing had put his machine guns on the slope.

Murdock came back to his small HQ and looked at DeWitt.

“Nothing new, Skipper. No word from CINCPAC. A few rounds from the MG now and then to remind us they’re still there.”

“Lam back yet?”

DeWitt shook his head.

“If we don’t have enough separation, we’re in deep shit here, men.” Murdock said. “No way we can go through those MGs. They could wipe us out with random fire and never know it.”

“We’ve got to have enough space between them and the tents or we are in deep trouble,” DeWitt said.

The machine guns cut in again, each weapon sending six bursts of six rounds across its field of fire. The SEALs jammed behind the largest trees available.

“I hate those fucking machine guns,” Train Khai barked.

“Yeah, unless it’s us who are firing them,” Bradford countered.

The firing stopped. No SEALs returned any rounds.

“They won’t know if we’re still here or not this way,” Murdock said. “Where in the hell is Lampedusa?”

“Right behind you, dead man,” Lam said, stepping into the small cleared place from the brush. No one had heard him coming.

“So?”

“The MG on the left is plenty far from the tents, but I’m not positive about the one on the right. Too close to be safe.”

Six of the SEALs had gathered around.

“We use the airbursts on the left one and contact detonation on the right one,” Ching said. “The AP rounds should burrow through any sandbags they have and go off inside their little bunker.”

“Sounds like a go to me,” Bradford said. The others looked at Murdock.

“How about the forties?” Jefferson asked. “We can lay back two hundred yards and lob in a dozen or so, get ground bursts and not push out shrapnel more than thirty, forty yards.”

“Small target,” Canzoneri said. “We’d waste eighty percent of our rounds and might not get a direct hit.”

“Let’s go with the twenties,” Murdock said. “Lam on the airbursts to the left. Get your laser on the muzzle flash, then on your own airbursts. Canzoneri with your twenty on Contact Detonation on the right-hand sucker. Disperse, find cover you can shoot around, and wait for the next machine-gun rounds. Six or eight rounds each should do the job.”

Before they could move, a voice boomed at them from six feet away. “You guys sure as hell are funny-looking Marines.”

The SEALs turned weapons on the sound.

“Hold your fire, I’m on your side. I’m Tucker, one of the former hostages up above. I used to be a Marine. Took out three of their guards and figured I’d come find better company.”

“Come on in, Tucker,” Murdock said. “We can use all the help we can get. Mostly for you to tell us the layout up there, how many men they have, and where those damned machine guns are.”

Tucker came out of the gloom and grinned. “Damn glad to see some combat harness. Just who are you guys?”

Murdock explained.

“Heard how you shot up that outpost. The guy who escaped was screeching his head off about airbursts. True?”

“Damn straight,” Murdock said. He explained the Bull Pup. “Now what do they have up there?”

“Came in with thirty men from two choppers that scurried back to sea. Off a destroyer, my guess. They should be down to twenty-two men now. A lieutenant in charge with two non-coms. Looked to be seasoned troops. All have rice rolls for chow. Most of them ate up what supplies we had brought. I don’t know what they did with the two nuns who run the place.”

“The machine guns?” Lam asked. “How far are the tents from the MGs directly above us?”

“Not over fifty yards if they’re covering that gradual slope I saw the first two days we were here.”

“Okay, same orders,” Murdock said. “Let’s get spread out and do in those MGs. When everyone is in place, check in with your squad.” The SEALs moved.

“Airbursts with twenty-millimeters. Damn, wish we’d had that when I was in the Marines.”

“When we’re ready, I’ll throw up a couple of.556 bursts to see if they will respond with the MGs,” Murdock said. “Then we clobber them.”

Murdock motioned for Tucker to find a tree. He slid behind a two-foot-thick pine tree someone had planted many years ago. Three minutes later word came in that all SEALs were in cover.

Murdock fired two three-round bursts from his MP-5. He aimed where he remembered the left-hand machine gun had fired from.

There was no immediate response. Then both MGs began to pound off rounds, most aimed at the spot where they had seen the muzzle flash. Canzoneri slammed six 20mm contact rounds into the right-hand MG nest. He heard the others firing, and saw the airbursts to the left. Then the last of the SEAL rounds exploded. Both MGs were silent.

“Did we nail them fuckers?” Mahanani asked on the net.

“You run up there and ask them if they’re all dead,” Fernandez directed.

A silence stretched out.

“Murdock?” DeWitt asked.

“Give it another ten minutes. Then I want DeWitt and Canzoneri to go up there with hand grenades and see what they can see. You take the right-hand side. Bradford and I will take the airburst bunch. In ten minutes from now. Mark.”

“Skipper, I only have two frags,” Bradford said.

“Work the squad. We should have six each. Bring me four when you’re ready.”

“Aye, aye, Skipper.”

“I’ll go up with you, Commander,” Tucker said. “Then if it’s clear, I can show you where the Chinese have set up their bivouac.”

Murdock had decided to say no, but changed his mind. “Yeah, Tucker, you might come in handy. You say you killed three guards. How?”

“I had no weapon when I picked the lock on my chains, so I had to strangle the first guard. Dumb ass was smoking. Got this sub gun from the first guard, then the second one spotted me so I shot him. The third one I did silent with a Chinese knife. Not a bad weapon.”

“You have ammo for the fifty-three.”

“That what this is? Yeah, I have six mags.”

“Good, you might need them.”

Murdock gave them the marching orders at precisely 2304. Tucker fell in behind Bradford, and the three began working up the slope as quietly as possible. If there was even one man left alive on the MG, he would be ready to use it. By now the Chinese could have sent in a new squad to work the weapon. There was a chance that one of the airbursts had damaged the weapon itself so the machine gun wouldn’t function. That was the best hope.

Murdock scowled. One way or another they would all know in about ten minutes.

Murdock scurried ten feet ahead and dropped behind a stout tree. He looked behind in the hazy moonlight and saw Tucker using proper techniques, working forward quietly and staying low. The guy must be for real.

Lam had led out. Murdock let him go halfway, then tapped him on the shoulder and worked his way past him. Four minutes later, the spot where they had seen the machine gun was no more than fifty feet ahead. Murdock stopped and listened. All he heard were some night birds far off, some buzzing insects, and the rustle of some small creature working through the forest floor searching for dinner.

A cough racked through the stillness.

Murdock turned toward the sound directly ahead of them in the area they thought had the machine gun. Survivors or a new crew? He checked the terrain again. They were still on the downslope, forty feet from the top. He could swing to the left and go up a steeper part, but would not be directly below the position. Then he remembered the hand grenades.

He had made no arrangements with DeWitt about when to use the bombs. The inference was whenever they got in position. He waved the other two men up. He passed a grenade to Tucker and indicated the target. Lam came up and shifted five yards to the side. They all pulled the safety pins on the bombs, looked at each other, and nodded. They all threw the grenades.

Murdock ducked with his head into the ground and counted off the four seconds. Never had it seemed to have taken so long for the explosions. Two came muffled. The third, evidently more in the open, detonated with a cracking roar.

He heard shrapnel singing through the three branches over his head. Somewhere to the west, a machine gun cut in with three six-round bursts. Before the last one finished, a grenade went off over there, then another, then two more.

Murdock looked for Tucker. He had left his former position and was crawling toward the machine gun. Murdock hurried after him. They went over the top of the short ledge together, and fell into a dug-out spot four feet deep. Murdock spotted the MG. It lay on its side in the bottom of the hole. A wooden crate had furnished it with a platform to fire over the lip of the ridge. One body sprawled on top of the weapon.

Lam came over the top and dropped to his feet. He nodded.

Tucker lifted up and stared to the west over the top of the bunker.

“This is the far east end of the clearing,” he said. “The Chinese put a small tent bivouac under some trees about fifty yards back toward the tents.”

“Murdock, clear on MG right.” It was DeWitt.

“Clear on MG left. Hold your position. We may have the troops move up. Evaluating.”

“They can’t have more than twenty men left,” Tucker said.

Murdock used the mike. “Whoever has those EAR rifles, get your asses up here. I want one in each of the old MG bunkers. Move your fat asses. We could get a counter at any time and we can’t use the twenties up here near the tents. Move it now!”

Murdock didn’t know who had the EARs, but they seemed the best bet. Even the 5.56’s could send a lot of danger at the tents if the five men up here had to fire at oncoming Chinese.

“Let me go take a look, Skip,” Lam asked. “I’m sure none of the little bastards are out this way. I won’t make any contact, just peek and snoop.”

“Go. Radio me anything vital like you getting pinned down. Take Tucker with you.” Tucker grinned and nodded. The two went over the side of the bunker on their bellies, came to their hands and feet, and then ran soundlessly toward a splotch of pine, cedar, and juniper on the left.

A pistol shot jolted through the bunker, and Murdock felt the white-hot fury as a poker reamed into his left leg and dug deep, burning all the way far into the flesh of his left leg. He whirled and fired six rounds from the Bull Pup into the body that had been draped over the MG on the bunker floor. He must be tired. What the hell was he thinking? None of them had made sure the body was dead. It was now. He saw the pistol slip from the Chinese man’s hand and a last gush of air come from dead lungs.

“Skipper, you all right?” In his earpiece.

“Yeah, our Chinese friend wasn’t quite dead. He is now.”

“You hit?”

“Yeah, but not bad, just in the left leg. What are you finding?”

“Nothing yet.” The words were whispers from the night. “Tucker says the bivouac is just ahead.”

There was silence for a few seconds. “Oh, shit, Skip. Here they come, a damn assault line. Must be fifty of the little bastards and they’re heading straight for you.”