Tropical Terror

28

“Mr. DeWitt, the Chinese have just barricaded the front doors to Hawaiian Hall and a couple of others by the looks,” Senior Chief Dobler said on the radio. “Not sure what they are trying to do. We need another door. Any ideas?”

“Seems to me I remember an open court around back,” DeWitt said. “Take your men around there and try it. You might beat them to it. We’ll check out the front and then the side.”

From the front of the Jabulka building, he looked at the closest big structure. It was Hawaiian Hall, and it appeared that two other buildings were attached. Maybe the far one would be productive. No sense trying the front door since the Chinese were watching it and had it barricaded. He took his men quickly down the sidewalk, across part of the Great Lawn, and around the far end of the building.

He spotted two doors. One that looked like it was for deliveries or for moving large exhibits. Another man-sized door was nearby. They tried the door. Locked. Minimum damage. He lifted his sub gun and fired three rounds into the lock mechanism near the handle. The door shook a moment, then swung outward two inches.

Lam jerked it open and darted inside. DeWitt went in right behind him. The room was large, with lights on and various displays and artifacts spread out on two rows of tables. A workroom.

They saw a door at the far end of the space twenty feet away, and rushed toward it. All six of the team were inside by then. DeWitt tried the door. Unlocked. He motioned for Ostercamp to come up with his EAR gun. Slowly DeWitt turned the knob and inched the door back so he could see out a slit. Nothing. He pulled it more, careful to stay on the wall side of the door handle. Inside he could see exhibits. He wasn’t sure what they were, but they looked like artifacts from the days of the kingdom. Busts of kings, brilliant robes, seashell displays.

DeWitt could see no Chinese soldiers. He opened the door all the way, staying against the wall. No rifle fire. He looked out, then rushed into the display area and crouched behind a wood carving of one of the kings. Nothing happened.

“Come,” he said into the Motorola. Lam was there quickly. DeWitt pointed toward an open archway that showed twenty feet ahead. They worked around the displays of ordinary items used in the earliest days of the islands.

Lam leaned around the side of a six-foot-wide archway and looked into the next room. More exhibits. These were all wooden products, bowls, bows, all sorts of carved artifacts. A huge koa tree was featured, with charts showing the many things the early Hawaiians made from the wood of the koa tree.

“JG, we have trouble,” Dobler said on the Motorola.

“What kind?” DeWitt asked.

“Found this back door, but it’s locked.”

“Three rounds into the lock and you should be inside. We’re in the far left end of the place.”

“Yeah, just realized this end of it is three stories tall. If we try to flush them, they could go all over.”

“Try not to do that. Let me know when you’re inside.”

DeWitt led his men through the next room and then came to an open area. Ahead he could see a reception desk with a small lobby and four Chinese soldiers evidently talking something over.

Ostercamp rolled into position beside DeWitt and fired one round from the zapper EAR gun. They saw the four men freeze in place for a second, then topple over and crash into each other and the floor.

“Move up,” DeWitt said into the lip mike, and his men rushed forward and took over the small area just inside the main entrance. Two rifle shots exploded in the closed area and sounded like rockets. The SEALs scattered for cover, and Train used the Motorola to say he saw two Chinese troopers at the back end of the main floor exhibit. He thought one of them had fired the shots.

“We’re inside,” Dobler said on the radio.

“We’re using the EAR on the first floor,” DeWitt said.

“There are some back stairs this side,” Dobler reported. “We can take over the second floor and see if any of them got up that way.”

“Go.”

DeWitt checked in front of him into the main floor display devoted to Ancient Hawaii. Overhead he saw the open area three floors tall where a giant whale hung. It was nearly as long as the building. In one terrible second he saw a Chinese soldier lift up from behind a display fifteen feet away and aim his rifle directly at him. The SEAL brought up his submachine gun and splattered six rounds into the invader before he got off a shot.

DeWitt ran through the displays to where he had seen the Chinese man. He lay across an ancient canoe, three bullet holes in his upper chest.

“Five down, ten to go,” DeWitt said into the mike. “Let’s dig them out.”

As he said it he heard the whooshing sound of the EAR gun go off. It seemed different this time, and then he realized he might be well in advance of where it was fired. The enhanced audio made a smaller sound when it hit.

DeWitt felt something pound him in the belly, then drive him to his knees. He dropped his machine gun, but grabbed it at once. He tried to stand, but his balance wasn’t working. He began to crawl back the way he had run only a minute ago. He crawled and crawled and came around a display, and found two SEALs with hands over their ears.

They saw him and ran to him, getting him onto his feet and walking him back toward the main entrance. He was aware that everything was silent, and that confused him. He saw lips moving but heard nothing. Then traces of sound slipped past the barrier.

He could walk again by himself. He shook his head and rubbed his ears, and more sounds came in. A moment later he could hear the men around him.

“JG, you okay?” Someone said it again. He turned and saw Ostercamp. “You okay, JG? We found you crawling back. I had just blasted three of the little devils. Afraid you were too close up there and caught some of it. We decided not to use the EAR anymore inside here. We have eight of them down and tied now, JG.”

DeWitt tried to swallow. He couldn’t. He nodded at Ostercamp. He tried to swallow again. This time he made it.

He tried his voice. “Good. Good.” It was scratchy, but they understood him. “Let’s sweep this floor. Side to side. We still have at least seven bogies in here somewhere. We still have six men?”

“That’s a Roger,” Lam said. “When I saw you coming back I counted. All accounted for.”

“Let’s do it, people.”

They worked from exhibit to exhibit, all from the earliest days of the Hawaiian people when there were dozens of gods and sacred spots and the kings and queens ruled. Twenty minutes later they came to the far wall and worked behind the exhibits, but found no more Chinese.

DeWitt used the radio. “Dobler, you doing any good up there?”

“Found two who gave up. Still looking for five more. There’s the third floor.”

“Moving up there,” DeWitt said. They went up the stairs, put up in l899 with the main building.

“Found one more hiding on the second,” Dobler said on the net. “Should leave four we know about.”

At the top of the stairs, Lam caught DeWitt’s shoulder. “JG, you stay here. Let us do the sweep. You took quite a jolt back there.”

DeWitt shook his head, but when he did it, he saw two of Lam, two of everything. He sat down with his back against the wall, and waved the men forward.

Lam pointed the other men down aisles. These exhibits showed the diverse cultures that make up the current Hawaii. The SEALs went past a thatched early Hawaiian house and a finely worked red and yellow cape made of feathers. The Chinese, Japanese, and Filipinos were all represented.

Lam came around a corner of a display and found a Chinese lying on the floor with his rifle pointed at him. The rifle fired. The bullet missed. Lam’s weapon jolted down and snapped off three shots, drilling the Chinese from chin to chest. He died in an instant. Lam heard firing two aisles over. He charged that way.

Train stood over two soldiers, both gasping out their last breaths. Train’s Colt M-4A1 still covered the two. When they died, he kicked them both and then dropped to his knees, his hand on his left shoulder coming away bloody.

“Three more down and out,” Lam said on the net. “We have one wounded. Train caught one in the shoulder. I don’t know how bad.”

“Clear floor two,” Dobler said on the net.

“Clear floor three,” Lam said. He hurried back to talk to DeWitt. He grinned when he saw the JG. He was standing up, walking around in a small circle. He grabbed Lam.

“How bad is Train?”

“Not sure. Quite a bit of blood. We’ll let Doc look at him.”

“I’m back to normal, Lam. Thanks for the work up here. Let’s get the troops on the ground and compare notes.”

On the ground floor, they continued on out the back door of Hawaiian Hall and flaked out on the grass. After a five-minute talk they decided that none of the invaders could have left the building. When the first EAR round went off, Dobler and his squad had had the rear entrance blocked. The Chinese must have all gone upstairs and been caught or killed.

“Hang tough here,” DeWitt said. “Lam and I will go out front and see if we can find somebody to talk to. They’re going to need a coroner and some ambulances and a police unit to do a clean sweep of the whole inside of the museum campus. We’ll be back.”

They found two police cars with radios and six museum officials at the front entrance eager to come inside. DeWitt explained to them what they’d done.

“There is some incidental damage, but nothing major. It could have been a lot worse. Two doors had their locks shot off and one or two exhibits got nicked by flying bullets.”

The museum director gripped DeWitt’s hands. “We thank you and all the ancient Hawaiian gods for your good work here. We’re sorry to hear there are casualties, but it was not our war in the first place.”

One of the cops waved his small notebook. “I’ll need some statements from you about any deaths.”

DeWitt smiled. “This is a military operation, Officer. It’s out of your jurisdiction. You can talk with Admiral Bennington out at Pearl if you want any statements. Now, I have a wounded man I need to get to the hospital.”

DeWitt and Lam turned, their submachine guns slung over their shoulders, and walked away from the gaping civilians at the front entrance.

The bus had stayed where DeWitt told the driver to hold. The SEALs loaded on and soon were on their way back to Pearl.

Train’s wound just below the shoulder through the fleshy part of the arm, miss the bone. It would heal in a month or so.

When they arrived at Pearl Harbor, DeWitt let the men off at their quarters, then took Train with him to the hospital. The corpsman looked Train over, treated his shoulder, and released him. Then the two went and visited Murdock. His shoulder was giving him fits and he had given the nurses a bad time. The doctor said he could be transferred to Balboa Naval Hospital in San Diego in a day or two.

Both Ronson and Jaybird Sterling were recovering and out of danger. Both could be transferred to Balboa after a final check.

Back in their quarters at Pearl, DeWitt reported to the men on the medical cases. Then he took a call from CINCPAC.

“Yes, sir, we cleared up the problem. Suffered one casualty but his wound is not serious.” He listened for a minute.

“We figured there were about thirty-five of them. We killed or captured thirty-three, and figured we had them all. The thirty-five was an estimate.”

He listened again.

“Yes, sir. We’re functioning at a forty-percent casualty rate, sir, and request that we be returned to our home base at Coronado within the next week.”

DeWitt smiled. “Yes, sir. Thank you, sir. It’s been a pleasure. We’ll coordinate with Commander Johnson. Thank you again, Admiral Bennington.”

DeWitt put his feet up on the training table and grinned. So, they were to be cleared for return within a week. The war was over for all but a few mop-ups. The Chinese Navy had suffered tremendous losses, and it might be ten years before it recovered.

All that and there still would be time to do some shopping in Honolulu for Milly. He grinned and went to tell the men the good news. All of them were at special chow or sleeping. Yeah, he could tell them in the morning. Ed DeWitt grinned all the way to his quarters. It was going to be a great week ahead.