Sea fighter

by James H. Cobb

  “I’d say we still have around forty, fifty prisoners all told, Stone went on, gesturing toward a small, sullen cluster of African boatmen crouched under Marine guard amidships. “What do you want us to do with them?”

  “Dump them on that little peninsula over to the west,” Amanda replied shortly. “We’ll let the Union worry about getting them home. We can’t be bothered with them now. Any trouble?”

  “Nah. Not really. One of the Bogs got past you and tried to hide up in the swamps, but our Predator teams busted him. Beyond that none of these old boys were packing any guns worth mentioning. Once we got the drop on them, they all gave it up pretty quick.” Quillain’s head turned, examining the bullet-scarred bow of the Queen, the battle damage apparent even by moonlight. “How’d you all do with the Bogs?”

  ”Carondelet was hit. Two wounded, but it looks like they’ll make it. We lost Chief Tehoa, though.”

  “Damn!” The Marine let the single bitter exclamation hang in the air for a long moment before speaking again. “That is a forever crying shame. He was one of the good ones.”

  “He was,” Amanda replied softly, neither sure nor caring if anyone else heard her.

  “How about the gas and boats, Skipper? What do you want us to do with them?”

  “Burn them. Burn them all!”

  Off the Coast of the West African Union

  Seven Miles West-Southwest of Cape Palma 0516 Hours, Zone Time;

  August 22, 2007

  The sun heralded its rising with an azure and tangerine curtain of light to the east, mare’s tail clouds glowing incandescently above the horizon. Holding off the Union coast, the small U.S. squadron completed the night’s tasks.

  The Sirocco and Santana had arrived on scene. The former took the crippled Carondelet under tow for the long haul back to Floater 1, while the latter served as a transfer platform, the last of the wounded Union survivors being winched from her decks to a hovering medevac helicopter.

  Closer inshore, the Queen of the West and the Manassas oversaw another duty.

  Topside aboard the Queen, Amanda maintained a solitary lookout. The bloodstains on her shirt and on the backrest of the cockpit gun ring had dried, but there were others that were going to remain fresh for some time to come.

  Lifting her binoculars to her eyes, she swept the seaward edge of the salt swamps, noting the stealthy hints of movement within the verdant undergrowth. Union army patrols were arriving on scene, seeking the fate of their navy comrades.

  She lowered the glasses. Let them come. Her Marines were all safely embarked and away. The Union troops could only look on as the last act played out. Let them see and let them take word back to General Belewa that not one fragment of good would come to him from this night’s work.

  The twoscore-odd pirogues and pinasses of the smuggling fleet had been rafted together and anchored in half a dozen clusters strung parallel to the shore. The dawn’s light shimmered and rainbowed on the water as petroleum slicks spread around each raft, gasoline and diesel from punctured cans and drums overflowing the sides of the low-riding boats.

  Amanda heard movement on the access ladder. Glancing back, she saw Scrounger Caitlin emerging from the weather deck hatch. The whole crew had been hit hard by the death of Chief Tehoa, but none more so than the female turbine tech. Amanda could sense a difference in the quiet and pale girl, a sudden new-grown maturity as if some grim wisdom welled up within her.

  “We just got a call from the last medevac helo, ma’am. They say they’ve got room aboard for … for the Chief. They’re asking if we want them to make pickup.”

  Amanda studied the young sailor thoughtfully. “Well, Sandra,” somehow using a nickname didn’t seem right at that moment, “you’re our new chief of the boat, and you knew Ben just about as well as any of us. What do you think he’d want?”

  Caitlin hesitated, then shook her head. “He’d want to ride back with us, ma’am,” she said. “He’d want for us to bring him home.”

  “Then make it so.”

  “Thanks, Captain.” The girl hesitated for a moment, looking out toward the sunrise. “I was talking to the Chief about something just before the fight. I wonder now if I’d …” Her voice trailed away.

  “You wonder what?”

  “Nothing, ma’am. Nothing that would have made any difference, I guess.”

  Amanda returned her attention to the anchored clusters of smuggling boats. She lifted her arm, then brought it down in a sharp chopping gesture.

  Two hundred yards away, the coxswain of the Queen’s miniraider lifted his own arm in acknowledgment. Gunning the engine of his small craft, he started a pass down the line of rafted boats. In the bow of the small RIB, a Marine grenadier crouched with his M-4/M-203 combo weapon. As the raider passed each moorage, the Marine lobbed a flare round into the center of the cluster.

  Fire blossomed on the sea, flames radiating outward, engulfing and consuming the small craft. Exploding oil drums thudded like a ragged artillery barrage and dusky smoke boiled into the sky. The separate plumes merged into a single column, trailing away in the offshore breeze as if marking a warrior’s funeral pyre.

  Mobile Offshore Base, Floater 1 0516 Hours, Zone Time;

  August 22, 2007

  Christine climbed into the briefing trailer to recover some notes she’d forgotten. She also took a moment to stretch and yawn, wondering if she would ever be able to restore herself to a normal human day-night biorhythm again.

  Reclaiming the hard copy from the head of the conference table, she turned to go. But then she noted the words written on the blackboard beside the wallscreen. Amanda Garrett had chalked them there many long months ago at that first big mission briefing when the task force had gone on the offensive. The three strategic missions being undertaken by the Union navy:

  POWER PROJECTION

  MAINTAIN SEA LINES OF COMMUNICATION

  MAINTAIN FLEET IN BEING

  Amanda herself had drawn a line through POWER PROJECTION on the night they had destroyed the Union’s boat hides along the Guinea coast. Now Christine Rendino took up the chalk and slashed decisively through the second.

  Mamba Point Hotel, Monrovia,

  West African Union 0516 Hours, Zone Time;

  August 22, 2007

  Brigadier Sako Atiba knocked at the door of General Belewa’s office. At one time it would have been a needless formality, but of late, a formality had returned to his relationship with his commanding officer.

  “Come in.”

  The Premier General sat at his desk, his elbows propped on the blotter, the heels of his hands pressed into his eyes as if the pressure would ease a great pain. Atiba came to attention before the desk, his hand flicking up in his morning’s salute.

  “The Chief of Staff reporting as ordered, sir.”

  Belewa did not look up. “You have been to Operations? You have heard?”

  “Of the failure of the convoy, sir? Yes, sir.” The temptation to emphasize the word “failure”was strong, but Atiba resisted.

  “We lost them all, Sako. I lost them all. And for nothing.”

  Belewa dropped his arms to the desk, and for the first time Sako noticed the typewritten sheets on the desk before the General. It was the operational outline he and Umamgi had submitted those weeks ago. Belewa looked up into Sako’s face and smiled a tired, saddened smile. The smile of a man weary to his soul.

  “You were right, old friend. And bitter though the thought might be, so is Umamgi. A soldier cannot afford too much pride, and the leader of a nation even less.”

  The General tapped the operations plan with his finger. “Set up a meeting with the Algerians. Now we will talk about this.”

  Mobile Offshore Base, Floater 1 2001 Hours, Zone Time;

  August 22, 2007

  Dear Mary and Cassy:

  I know yo
u have been told by now that your father will not be coming home. As your father’s captain, I am writing to you on behalf of myself and all of his other shipmates to say how very sorry we are. I know this won’t make things hurt any less, but we hope it will help for you to know we are thinking of you and your mother at this time of great sadness.

  Your father was greatly liked and admired by everyone here who served with him. He was very wise, very kind, and very, very brave. He was killed saving me and the crew of his entire ship, and I am going to see that he receives a medal for his courage.

  I know you are asking why this had to happen, why your father had to be taken like this when you and your mother needed him so badly. The only answer I can give is that your father was a very special kind of man. He was not greedy with his life; he wished to share it. Something inside made him go out to where there were people in trouble. Something inside made him want to help them and to make the world a better and safer place, both for his family and for everyone everywhere. We call such people heroes.

  I could not bring your father home to you; his other shipmates and I have to stay here and finish the job he started. But I hope I will be able to meet you someday soon. Your father showed me your pictures often, and he was very proud of you both. You will be in my prayers, and if there is anything I can ever do for you or your mother, please get in touch with me.

  Your friend,

  Amanda Garrett

  Capt., U.S.N.

  There were moisture marks on the paper as Amanda folded the letter. Tucking it into the envelope, she placed it in her hard mail rack to go out on the morning flight to Conakry. Wiping her eyes with the back of her hand, she crossed her arms on the desktop and let her head sink down to rest on them.

  Amanda was well into her second twenty-four hours without sleep, yet still she felt as if she never wanted to sleep again. She found herself wishing for a certain bold and youthful helicopter pilot and five minutes to call her own. Just five minutes. Enough time to bury her face into a strong shoulder and be held by a pair of gentle arms. Enough time for some one to whisper those kindly, futile words. “Everything’s going to be all right.”

  Someone thumped briskly on the door to her quarters. Straightening in her chair, she wiped the heel of her palm across her eyes again before responding to the knock. “Enter.”

  Stone Quillain appeared in the doorway, bearing a small battered ice chest with him. “Evening, Skipper,” he said jovially. “How’s it going?”

  “Oh, fine, Stone. What can I do for you?”

  “Oh, nothin’, nothin’ at all.” Doffing his utility cover, he crashed down into the chair facing her across the desk. “It is just that this is beer night over at the platform exchange, and since I was just passing by, I figured I’d bring your ration over to you.”

  He popped the lid on the ice chest and produced a pair of Budweiser cans, condensation dripping from the chilled aluminum. With a theatrical flair he slammed them down on the desktop. As she had never even considered drawing her two beers-a-week ration since stepping aboard Floater 1, Amanda looked on puzzled.

  “Thank you, Stone,” she said, “but I’ve really never been much of a beer person.”

  “Know exactly what you mean, Skipper,” Quillain replied. “Although it’s a hell of a thing for a good rednecked Georgia boy to admit to, neither was I for the longest time. It just didn’t sit right. Sort of rasped on the way down. It took me a while to learn that I had to have a kind of a chaser with it to really enjoy a good glass of beer. Something to smooth things along, don’t you know?”

  “Such as?” Amanda inquired, intrigued in spite of herself.

  “Well, I find that a good grade of bourbon generally works for me.” His hand emerged from the cooler again, this time bearing a half-empty fifth of Jack Daniel’s. “You might want to give it a shot. It could change your whole view of beer drinking.”

  An automatic refusal rose to Amanda’s lips, but then she paused. Something in Quillain’s eyes and voice, beyond his somewhat forced jocularity, hinted that the big Marine was trying to offer something more than mere alcohol. Amanda smiled. “You’re right. I guess it wouldn’t hurt to try it, anyway.”

  A total of four empty beer cans had been consigned to the wastebasket, and only a thin amber film remained on the bottom of the bourbon bottle. Amanda Garrett realized that she was very close to being drunk on duty. She also discovered that for once in her life she simply didn’t give a damn.

  She sat with her chair tilted back and her sandaled feet propped on the edge of her desk. Stone Quillain matched her slouched posture, his boondockers claiming a corner across from hers. Cradling his Styrofoam cup shot glass in his lap, he listened as she spoke, interjecting an occasional comment or encouraging grunt, an expression of somewhat studied sobriety on his angular features.

  Amanda realized that she had been doing most of the talking for the past couple of hours. Nothing on matters of any great import and little of it particularly coherent, just a rambling on a string of minor topics, the flow loosened by the effects of the alcohol.

  And yet she also felt better for the sheer inconsequentiality of it. The razor edges of existence were softening. Amanda recognized the effect. Like a drug addict completing a cold turkey withdrawal, she was coming out of her combat jag and reentering the normal world.

  She tipped back the last few drops of whiskey out of her cup, able now to enjoy the warm glow of it flowing through her. This had been a bad one. “Stone,” she inquired. “Have you ever taken casualties?”

  The Marine didn’t respond for a moment, but memories stirred behind his eyes. “Yeah. I’ve been lucky mostly, but I had to pay the butcher bill one time.”

  “Where?”

  “In Yugoslavia, or what was left of it. Kosovo.”

  “Kosovo? I didn’t hear of us losing any Marines there.”

  “You weren’t supposed to. Hush job.” Quillain took a hefty bite of the bourbon remaining in his cup. “It’s been a while, so I guess it doesn’t hurt to talk about it now.”

  “What happened?”

  “It was back in the spring of ’99, you know, when the ethnic Albanian majority, the Kosovars, in what had been the Kosovo Province of Yugoslavia, decided they were tired of being treated like field hands by the Serbian ruling minority. They figured it was about time for a revolution, and they threw themselves one.

  “The problem was that the Kosovo Serbs were part of Slobodan Milosevic’s so-called Serbian Republic. A very mean outfit if you didn’t happen to be born a Slav. He sent in his bullyboys and just ran over the place like it was a possum in the road.”

  “An apt simile,” Amanda commented. “Admiral Maclntyre’s told me some stories about doing duty in the Adriatic back then. It didn’t sound like a pleasure cruise.”

  “Boy howdy, I’ll tell the world.” Quillain gestured with his cup. “This was just before NATO got into it with the bombing. We could see from air recon that things were looking nasty, but nobody knew for sure just how bad things were getting on the ground. The Serbs had chased out all the U.N. observers by that time, and the fragmentary intel we were getting from the Kosovar refugees was pretty ugly. Anyhow, NATO inserted a series of covert Long-Range Reconnaissance Patrols into the province to assess the situation.

  “There were ’bout half a dozen teams all told: American Green Berets, British SAS, Marine Force Recon. I was with Recon back then, a butterbar louie fresh out of OCS with one cruise as an enlisted man behind me. Anyhow, I led a four-man fire team in on the Marine patrol.”

  Quillain slowly shook his head. “I hope I never see hell, but if I do, Kosovo was good acclimatization.”

  “That bad?”

  “I couldn’t begin to tell you, Skipper. The place was crawling with Serbian militia and military police, all of them hate crazy and killin’ like rabid dogs. Killin’ just for the
sake of killin’. And then there were the refugees—Albanians, Serbs, Gypsies—all of them just trying to get away to somewhere where they could stay alive.

  “We were on the ground four days. Harboring up during oh light hundred in swamps and brush piles and moving on a mile or so at night, mostly crawling on our bellies. You’d lie in a pool of your own piss all afternoon because a Serbian sentry was standing three feet away from you and you couldn’t move to take a leak, and you went hungry because you didn’t dare crinkle the wrapper on a ration bar.

  “By day four we’d documented as much as we could, and we weren’t helping anything by hanging around. Besides, I was getting leery about the Serbian security operations in our area. They were acting as if they knew somebody was in the neighborhood who shouldn’t be there. I called for extraction and a recovery package launched at first light the next morning.

  “Problem was, the only landing zone we could reach was near a highway. That couldn’t be helped because of all the activity in our sector. We couldn’t risk moving cross-country to another LZ. At any rate, we were at the extraction point by first light. The recovery helo, an Air Commando MH-53 Battlestar covered by a couple of A-10 attack bombers, was inbound and everything was looking good. Then we heard the trucks on the road.”

  Quillain hesitated, crumpling the empty cup in his hand. “I’ll always wonder about the call I made next. Whether I should have aborted the extraction and tried to escape and evade through the woods. But hell, the helo was on final approach and I figured we could beat ’em out of there. Besides, I’ll admit it, I was getting a little bit scared about then.

  “The A-10s circled the area as the MH-53 set down and we started across the field to the helo. And just about then half of the Serbian army came charging out of the forest on our flank, screaming and yelling and firing AKs from the hip.