At once the SEALs’ machine guns and two long rifles cascaded a rain of fire against the sandbags and enemy gun. Two of the soldiers went down in the first barrage. The next one battered and riddled the top sandbags, and a round nailed the machine gunner, who had managed only a short burst before he died. Murdock saw the fourth man lift up and dart toward a door at the side of the hall. He didn’t make it, spinning to the floor with two rounds in his chest.
“Cease fire,” Murdock said on the radio. The SEAL guns fell silent. Murdock studied the area behind the gun again through his night vision goggles. Movement. Who? A man in a white shirt. A civilian.
“Everyone move up to closer cover,” Murdock said. He and Lam darted ahead to the blasted door. The machine gun lay on its side, ten yards ahead. Murdock could see two hall doors open. A soldier ran from one, looked back down the hall, then fired a four-round burst and vanished again. The green flare weakened and soon burned out, leaving the hallway dark.
Now Murdock could see through the goggles more civilians being moved down the hall.
“No return fire. Civilians in the hall. DeWitt, take four men and run to what must be a back door down this wing. I think all of the defenders are with the hostages. We’ll try to surprise them if they try to leave the building. The rest of you, move closer but maintain cover between moves.”
Murdock touched Lam, and they ran into the wing and pushed into doorways on both sides just past the machine gun. Murdock cleared the room on his side with his goggles. They all had moved on. Why? Where were they going?
He checked for bodies. Only the three soldiers showed. No civilians. No dead ambassador. Was the army man bluffing? What good to kill a hostage if no one could see it?
Ahead, Murdock heard a door close. Where? He hadn’t thought of the second floor. Nowhere had he seen stairs leading upward.
“Ed. If you can get inside that back door down there, check to see if there’s a stairs to the second floor. If so, block it and set up a fence across the hall.”
“That’s a roger, Cap. Almost to the door. We’ll move carefully.”
Murdock adjusted the NVGs and moved into the hallway with Lam in tow. They worked ahead on silent feet. Murdock checked both open doors they passed. No bodies. Where were they going?
The bullhorn blasted into the silence. “Well done, SEALs, but not good enough. We have the edge in manpower, and we know the terrain. You’ve found no American bodies? True. I made the living ones carry the two dead ones. Now for a final solution to our little problem. We are at a stalemate. I have the prisoners, you have the better weapons. However, to use those weapons, you run the risk of killing the reason you came in here.
“Oh, to add to your stress, we have a radio report from our commander that your helicopter and two of the fighters that came with it have been shot down and crashed in flames. That should make you think about your mission. You have no way to get out of here.”
There was a moment of silence.
“No response? I didn’t think so. This is the situation. Each of our hostages is holding a live grenade with the safety pin pulled. All that is keeping them alive is not dropping the grenade or letting the arming spoon flip off. Right? Soon some of them will become tired and one or more bombs will go off. None of my men are near them. You can’t find them or get past us. Now you must surrender.”
Ed DeWitt heard most of the talk as he and his four men slipped in the rear door. He had the other pair of NVGs. The things were heavy, clumsy, and not a favorite of the SEALs, but they did come in handy now and then. He looked past a doorway just inside the hall and listened. He heard movement in the room directly above him.
Where were the stairs? He looked along the hall again and fifteen feet ahead saw the steps leading up. One room showed on both sides with doors closed. He took Franklin with him and edged up to the door. Silently, he twisted the knob and pushed it open. No response. He looked inside with the NVGs and saw no one. The other side door yielded the same results.
Ed looked at the stairs. Somebody was upstairs. The man on the bullhorn sounded like he was in the hallway. It extended far down ahead of him. He saw at least six or eight doors in the misty gloom of the greenscape.
He touched the other three men, and they all moved to the steps and slowly went up them. One flight with a landing on top almost against the wall. They all stopped and listened. Again there were movements of feet and some whispers. The civilians?
They paused on the landing in the dark. DeWitt could see the new hallway on the second floor. There were more doors opening off it as if this were a dormitory.
Before DeWitt could move, the door opposite him opened, and a soldier left, locking the door behind him. He felt his way toward the steps with one hand out in front. The other hand carried an automatic rifle.
As the soldier came closer, DeWitt grabbed Fernandez’s sniper rifle and waited. When the Colombian soldier was a step away and still blinded by the darkness, DeWitt swung the heavy rifle like a club, hitting the soldier in the throat. The man dropped the rifle, and it clattered to the floor. DeWitt surged on top of the man as he fell. The soldier grabbed his throat, then wheezed twice and his head rolled to one side.
DeWitt certified that he was dead, then found a key in his pocket and went to the door the soldier had just left. He turned the key in the lock and edged the door open. With his NVGs, he saw that the people inside were civilians.
“U.S. SEALs here,” he whispered. “Quiet. Is the ambassador here?”
A man stepped forward, tears running down his cheeks.
“Yes.”
“Murdock,” DeWitt whispered into his mike, “I have the whole staff, all safe and well. No grenades. You are facing a force of one man.”
“Roger that,” Murdock whispered back. He began to edge forward. The bullhorn had been pushed out one of two rooms into the hall. It was silent now. Which room? Murdock picked the first one to clear or to kill. He moved to the very edge of the door and looked around. No one in the room.
He waved at the men to stay where they were, even though he knew they couldn’t see him. The other room across the hall had the door open.
He stepped that way silently and started to look around the doorjamb. A figure stepped outward, nearly colliding with him. Murdock brought the butt of the MP-5 submachine gun upward in a vicious butt stroke that connected with the man’s chin and rocked his head backward.
The man dropped the bullhorn, stumbled backward a step, and then fell to the floor, his neck broken. Murdock checked for a pulse at the carotid, then used the mike.
“DeWitt, troops. This thing is over. Holt, move outside through the back door and see if you can contact that chopper. He must be hanging around somewhere.”
“Mahanani, go turn on the lights,” Ed DeWitt ordered. “The hostages are all well. None was killed. Two have wounds from the assault and takeover. From what I hear, there were only about twenty soldiers here. We took out a lot of them, and the others ran for cover.”
“Everyone just hold in place except Holt until we get lights. Then we’ll move outside and find an LZ. SEALs, do we have any casualties?”
No one replied. “Alpha Squad, report in on hurts,” Murdock said. All checked in as not wounded. The same for Bravo Squad.
The lights blossomed, and everyone was blinded for a minute.
Murdock heard the people coming downstairs. He looked at the last man he had killed. He was a Colombian sergeant and had two grenades in his belt, but both had the safety pins still in them.
Ten minutes later, outside near the spot where the chopper would land, a red flare burned brightly. The ambassador and the rest of his people stood to one side, hugging each other. Some cried. Others looked back at the embassy that had been their home for years.
They heard the chopper coming in. The SEALs were in an extended perimeter defense, lying on the blacktop of the parking lot. They saw no movement around the once again blacked-out embassy.
The bird came in and la
nded, and Jaybird and Murdock ushered the civilians to the chopper door and helped them inside. Once they were all on board, the SEALs piled in the door and found floor space wherever they could.
The Sea Knight was on the ground a minute and twenty seconds, then the crew chief slammed the hatch and it lifted off.
Murdock went up front and used the bird’s radio. He raised the carrier and reported a success so far.
“Now all we have to do is get back to Camp Bravo, and we can call it a completed mission.”
Don Stroh tried to talk, but Murdock cut him off. “Sorry, Stroh, can’t talk right now, I have some people to take care of. See you soon.”
Murdock grinned. Damned if he was going to get another fucking mission before this one was even completed. Twice during the next hour, Murdock heard reports from the F-14s flying cover that they had blips on their radar. The bogies tended to come forward to within about thirty miles of the chopper and then headed back the other way.
They landed at Camp Bravo and said good-bye to the Tomcats that went back to the carrier.
The civilians were met by two State Department officials who took them into Cali by bus. The ambassador shook Murdock’s hand once more before he left.
The SEALs gathered up their gear and caught a ride back to their barracks. Murdock knew there was another job for them out there in Don Stroh’s little black book, but he’d be damned if he was going to talk about it before he had that steak dinner, a long, hot shower, and at least twelve hours of sleep.
Damn, but he was tired. He didn’t even think how long it had been since he’d seen a bunk. Just like hell week. Hoooooooyah!
20
Camp Bravo
Cali, Colombia
Murdock and the rest of the SEALs slept in. Some put in twelve hours in the rack, some eight. Murdock came to the surface after ten and had a shower a big meal and was surprised to find that it was almost noon. He checked with Senior Chief Dobler.
“Weapons are all cleaned and oiled and equipment is repaired or replaced. Most of the men are up to regs and ready to go. Two are still snoring, but I’ll move them along. You heard anything from Don Stroh?”
“Haven’t given him a chance. Figure the men need a short break before we head out on another one of these small fires to put out.”
“Holt asked me if he should turn on the SATCOM. I told him to wait and ask you. Sure as hell, Stroh is going to be yelling at you.”
Murdock grinned. “I’m about to leave him off my next fishing trip.” He rubbed one hand over his face. “Hell, we might as well find out what the spook wants. It won’t be good. Where’s Holt?”
Five minutes later, Holt had the SATCOM zeroed in on the satellite. A minute after he turned it to receive, the set spoke.
“Roamer, this is Home Base. We need to talk. You awake yet over there?” There was a pause.
“Oh, yeah, Home Base,” Murdock said. “Awake. You sound rushed.”
“We’ve been handed a new assignment. You’re moving north to the Caribbean. The carrier Jefferson is floating around up there somewhere off Cartagena, a Colombian port town with a lot of shipping. We’ve got a COD warming up on deck. It will be at your location at 1300 to move you.”
“North? Shipping?”
“Right. I’ll be on the Greyhound so we can chat all the way up across the Pacific and a flyover of part of Panama. I think you’ll like this one.”
“Don Stroh, sir! You know we always love the assignments we get. We take all of our goodies?”
“Everything you took in with you. All your gear, ammo, and TNAZ.”
“Thirteen hundred. We’ll be ready.”
“Any more wounded?”
“We’re full strength again and raring to go.”
“See you then.”
They signed off. By then, half the platoon had gathered around the radio. “So, we’re moving. Senior Chief, roust up the rest of the men and we’ll have a quick talk.”
The Navy COD, officially a Greyhound C-2A, took off from the small field at Camp Bravo near Cali at 1310. The COD is a Navy acronym for carrier on board delivery plane. It can land and take off from the larger carriers and is routinely used to deliver VIP personnel, mail, and important equipment and goods needed in a rush by the Navy.
It was derived from the E-2C Hawkeye aircraft. It cruises at 300 mph, with a ceiling of 33,500 feet, and can haul thirty-nine troops or twelve hospital cases on litters. It has a range of 1,200 miles loaded, carries two pilots and a flight engineer, and is powered by two Allison turboprop engines.
Stroh talked to the men as soon as they loaded and before they took off.
“We’re going to the Carrier Jefferson somewhere in the Caribbean Sea north of Cartagena, Colombia. There you will get more specific details about your missions. Roughly, it’s a three-part assignment. You’ll go ashore in the harbor and destroy any way practical the four tons of powdered cocaine loaded on two freighters due to sail in two days.
“Then you will destroy a pair of warehouses where more than a thousand barrels of ethyl ether is being stockpiled by the Medellin drug cartel. I understand ether burns well and when vaporized is volatile and extremely explosive.
“After that, you will get some sort of transport to the small town of Plato, where the Medellin drug cartel has just built a new airfield for its drug trade. Planes come in from Bolivia and Peru bringing in coca paste. There are several processing plants in this area as well as more stockpiles of finished coke ready to be sent out to the States by plane. Planes, trucks, processing plants, and stockpiles will be your targets.
“If you have time and personnel, you will proceed by your own devices to locate and eradicate from one to three of the top men in the Medellin cartel. They are supposed to be at the airport facility there for a planning meeting now that they own Colombia and have their government in power. Any questions?”
Just then, the turboprop engines turned over, and conversations inside the COD were limited. The flight engineer came back and told Murdock that they would have a two-and-a-half-hour flight.
They landed on board the Jefferson fifteen minutes sooner than that, and Murdock saw his men put in quarters and their equipment spread out in an assembly compartment.
“Commander Murdock?” an officer who walked up asked.
Murdock saw a short, thin lieutenant commander in a tailored uniform.
“Yes, Commander.”
“I’m Lieutenant Commander Kenney, your liaison with the ship. You have the highest priority I’ve ever seen, Commander. The admiral says that anything you want, you get. Right now I can arrange a meal for you and your men. You have your quarters. There were some indications that you might need arms or explosives and ammo. All I need is a list.”
“Thanks, Commander. You’ll work with Senior Chief Dobler. We have an appointment with your XO in forty minutes. First we need to do some planning and figure out what we’ll need. Sit in, if you like.”
Murdock called his key people around a small table and they made notes on pads of paper as they talked.
First the coke.
“Can’t blow it up or burn it,” DeWitt said.
“How can we melt it the way we did down by Cali?” Jaybird asked.
“Fire hoses,” Senior Chief Dobler said. “The goods will be packaged in plastic to protect it from the salt air and any spray or leaks. We’ll need to slice it open and soak it down using the firefighting hoses and pumps on the ship.”
“If we get the time,” DeWitt added.
“So, we soak it down and melt it,” Murdock said. “Sounds like the only way. Not even sinking the merchant ship at the dock would do it. The goods would just float.”
They moved on the ether situation.
“Talk to Canzoneri,” Murdock said. “Find out how much explosives we’ll need to set the stuff on fire. If it’s in a warehouse it will be best, one big bonfire nobody will be able to put out.”
Dobler went to find Canzoneri.
“This
Plato deal is going to be a tough one. First we have to get down there,” Murdock said. “Stroh tells me it’s about eighty-five miles south of the port city. They just said do it, not how we get there. Any suggestions?”
Jaybird swore under his breath. “The sombitches did it to us again. We’re on the Caribbean, right. At this port city. So after we do the bonfire, we get into our rebreathers and fins and swim out a half mile where we meet a Sea Knight after dark for a ladder pickup and transport to Plato with our resupply of ammo and explosives the Sea Knight brings us.”
Murdock looked at the others. “Any more suggestions?” Nobody said anything. “Well, it’s a long swim up the river that runs through Plato and out at the port we’ll be in. The resupply with the Sea Knight sounds like a good plan. How else could we get down there?”
“Long walk,” DeWitt said.
“At Plato we have production vats, ethyl, stored coke. Why not do a few of their small transport planes as well?” Murdock looked at his watch. “Okay, the four of us are going to see the admiral. I told him I was bringing my staff, so look important.”
“Oh, hell, yes,” Jaybird said. “Admirals are always kissing up to me.”
They arrived at the admiral’s compartment early but were let in by a master chief. His brows went up when he looked at Jaybird with no rank showing on his cammies and Senior Chief Dobler.
“The admiral will be right with you.” He indicated a conference table with five chairs. The SEALs sat.
A moment later, Admiral Tennant came through a door from another section of the large quarters, and the SEALs jumped to their feet.
“At ease. I’m Admiral Tennant. As you were.” The admiral smiled. “Glad to see you men. I know a few ex-SEALs. You do good work.”
Behind him came a captain and Lieutenant Commander Kenney, their liaison. The admiral motioned to the second man.
“Gentlemen, this is Captain Wilson, the Jefferson’s XO. You know Commander Kenney.”
Senior Chief Dobler and Jaybird stepped back from their chairs, offering them to the other two officers.
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