by Peter Nealen
“Cleared hot.” LaForce uttered those welcome words just as Hank took a knee next to him. He lowered the radio and craned his neck to see. “Vipers inbound.”
Hank was tempted to sigh in relief. The Global Sunrise had followed their insert vessels, well within range to quickly get her AH-1Z Vipers into the fight. It was a last-ditch contingency, given the presence of Chinese fast-movers over the Spratlys, but right then, Hank was glad of it.
Ducking back out the door, he looked to the north, where the cutter’s lights were chugging toward them, just in time to see the fiery streaks of rocket fire come roaring in from the west.
The Triarii Vipers were well-maintained for privately-owned attack helicopters, but there were a lot of the military bells and whistles they hadn’t been able to replace. Among them were things like Hellfire missiles. So, they ran with unguided rockets. Still, those rockets could carry some hefty payloads, especially without the need for seeker heads.
Almost a dozen rockets slammed into the side of the cutter with a staccato ripple of explosions. The ship rocked under the impacts, fire and smoke billowing out from her flank. One rocket hit the superstructure, blowing out portholes in a belch of flame. A moment later, the second salvo slammed home, blowing off the radio mast at the top of her superstructure. The cutter was already starting to burn.
The Vipers banked away, clearly trying to stay well away from the island, in case there were more SAMs down there, or even heavy machineguns. Just moving in at less than a hundred feet to hit the cutter had been a risk. Especially with Chinese fast-movers in the air. The J-10s hadn’t returned yet, but it was only a matter of time.
More explosions thundered in the night, more fires adding their light to the otherwise blacked-out island. The incoming fire had slackened in the face of the shock of the strikes on the now-burning cutter. The Triarii increased their own fire, even as Huntsman came up and knelt next to Hank and LaForce. “Last charges are placed, fuses are burning. We’ve got ten minutes.”
It took a lot less than that to get the section down into the water. Hank, Alexander, and Spencer were the last ones out, staying up on the road and keeping the Chinese under fire until the last moment, counting each man out as they headed down to the water. Then they skidded down into the water, grabbed hold of their DPVs, and plunged below the surface, pulling masks and snorkels into place as they went.
Being under the water, they didn’t really hear the explosion as the building blew up, hopefully as the Chinese pursued the Triarii to the shore. Hank saw the water around him light up with the flash, though. He held on and kept his eyes on the nav board.
They’d made it out. Now they just had to get to their extract platform before the Chinese found it and decided to sink it on general principles.
Behind them, Subi Reef burned.
Epilogue
Extract was tricky. While much of the Chinese naval presence had been withdrawn to the north and east, there were still enough drones and armed Chinese vessels in the vicinity that the old fishing boat they were meeting had to be careful. The ship was late to the rendezvous, meaning the Triarii had to tread water for about half an hour, their DPV batteries all but dead.
Once they were finally hauled aboard, Hank got the section immediately to work on weapons maintenance, as tired as they all were. There had been no time on the way out to get the weapons cased, so they’d been immersed in salt water for almost three hours.
Hank was practically falling asleep over his own disassembled weapon when the ship’s captain, a Californian named Hong, came down into the hold and put a hand on his shoulder. Hank looked up blearily at the captain, who inclined his head toward the ladderwell. “Vetter’s on the horn. He wants to talk to you.”
Hank wearily hauled himself to his feet and followed the captain up the steps. The sun had just come up half an hour before, and golden light filtered through the weather-scarred portholes on the bridge.
The radio was still live, and the captain just handed him the handset. “This is Six Four Actual.”
“Status report.” Vetter sounded tired, though not as tired as Hank felt.
“All up and up. All targets hit.” He was almost too tired to talk.
“Good to hear. Seven Two lost a team, but their Actual assures me that their bodies were not captured.” Hank wasn’t sure how Chan had managed that. Maybe the team had gone down on target, where the charges would have obliterated them. “I’ve got the Jacqueline Q heading for a rendezvous just off Taiping Island.” He paused for a moment, and Hank waited. Vetter hadn’t signed off, so there must be something else. “Just for your situational awareness, things got a little wild last night. There are reports that some of the Chinese fast movers off either Subi Reef or Fiery Cross might have dropped on the Lake Erie.”
Hank let out a low whistle. That could have some far-reaching consequences. If the USS Lake Erie had taken fire from the Chinese, then Washington might not be able to ignore the war with the PRC anymore. “Any damage?”
“Unknown, as yet. In fact, there are conflicting reports as to whether it was fast movers or one of the two corvettes that are still shadowing her. The only thing anyone seems to be sure of at the moment is that she took fire last night.” Vetter seemed to dismiss the situation a moment later. “Get back on the Jacqueline Q and head for Palawan. We need to reset while we watch the ChiComs’ reactions and analyze what effects we’ve had over the last twenty-four hours.
“Good work out there, Six Four. See you soon.”
***
It wasn’t a fast voyage back to Palawan. Smythe was taking his time, making it look as much like they were just another commercial fishing vessel as possible.
Reports continued to filter in, and the picture got clearer.
The Chinese had not abandoned the Spratly Islands, but what forces they still had in the South China Sea were now primarily clustered around Fiery Cross Reef. That first of the PRC’s artificial islands in the South China Sea had been hit as well, but Eight Four and Three Three had fared much less well than Hank’s and Chan’s sections had. They’d destroyed fewer than half their targets and taken a lot of casualties. So far, no bodies had been paraded on Chinese media outlets, so it looked like their efforts to avoid leaving target indicators behind had been successful, but the island’s airstrip was still operational, and they still had power, along with about half their defenses.
The Shandong was limping back toward Hainan with those escorts that were still intact. There were reports that the Taiyuan and the Huanggong had sunk, but those were still unverified.
All the setbacks aside, however, by the time they finally arrived back in Puerto Princesa, it was starting to look like they’d put a real dent in the PRC’s ability to project power into the Pacific.
Which only made Hank more paranoid. The more positive reports came in, the more tense he got, waiting for the other shoe to drop. They were still a small, guerrilla force against a nation with over two million soldiers on active duty, and plenty of allies and vassals all over the world. Something was bound to go bad soon.
When they met up with Vetter ashore, the look on the mission commander’s face confirmed that the other shoe had dropped.
“You boys might want to sit down.” Vetter had a tablet in his hands, standing near the window in the hotel room. There was no sign of any of their Philippine allies.
“What is it?” Hank didn’t want to sit down. He’d been sitting and resting aboard the Jacqueline Q for the better part of a week.
Vetter handed the tablet over. There was a news article on the screen, but he went ahead and summarized it anyway. “Beijing has declared that with the current security breakdown in the South China Sea, the People’s Republic of China is now forced to act to ensure its security out to the Second Island Chain.”
He sighed heavily. “Full mobilization to take Taiwan is already underway. They issued the ultimatum yesterday. Unconditional surrender, or be returned to the mainland by force.”
&n
bsp; Vetter looked up at him. “We’ve got a few reinforcements just getting into the Sulu Sea now. I can send them on to Taiwan to offer assistance while you boys recover and stay back here to keep harrying the Chinese in the Spratlys, maybe up into the Paracels. Or, I can set them to replace you, and send the Jacqueline Q and a few others, the Slow Company included, north to Taiwan. It’s up to you.”
Hank glanced at Chan. The other section leader’s expression was as hard as his own. Chan nodded shortly. “We’ll head for Taiwan, Doug, if it’s all the same to you.”
THE STORY CONTINUES IN:
POWER VACUUM
MAELSTROM RISING BOOK 8
From the Author
I hope you’ve enjoyed this seventh chapter in the Maelstrom Rising series. This one had the fewest fictional organizations and groups of the series. The Triarii and the Moro Ikhwan are about it. The People’s Armed Forces Maritime Militia is very real, and has been responsible for quite a bit of destruction and aggression toward our allies in the Pacific, as well as off the coasts of South America and Africa. They are a “gray zone” weapon of PLAN strategy, and the PRC is not shy about using them.
It was the PAFMM that led to the idea for this book. Hiding guerrilla strike forces amid commercial shipping is hardly what we’ve come to think of as “honorable” warfare, but in the situation the Triarii find themselves, it’s a choice between turning the PRC’s tactics against it, or giving up.
The next book, Power Vacuum, will return to Matt Bowen, in a European theater that looks very little like the Europe they first landed in before Escalation. Things are moving, and actions in both theaters will start to have far-reaching consequences. To keep up-to-date, I hope that you’ll sign up for my newsletter—you get a free American Praetorians novella, Drawing the Line, when you do.
If you’ve enjoyed this novel, I hope that you’ll go leave a review on Amazon or Goodreads. Reviews matter a lot to independent authors, so I appreciate the effort.
If you’d like to connect, I have a Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/PeteNealenAuthor. For those who have departed FB, I’m also on MeWe at www.mewe.com/i/peternealen. You can also contact me, or just read my musings and occasional samples on the blog, at https://www.americanpraetorians.com. I look forward to hearing from you.
Also By Peter Nealen
The Maelstrom Rising Series
Escalation
Holding Action
Crimson Star
Strategic Assets
Fortress Doctrine
Thunder Run
Area Denial
Power Vacuum
SPOTREPS – A Maelstrom Rising Anthology
The Brannigan’s Blackhearts Universe
Kill Yuan
The Colonel Has A Plan (Online Short)
Fury in the Gulf
Burmese Crossfire
Enemy Unidentified
Frozen Conflict
High Desert Vengeance
Doctors of Death
Kill or Capture
Enemy of My Enemy
War to the Knife
Blood Debt
The American Praetorians Series
Drawing the Line: An American Praetorians Story (Novella)
Task Force Desperate
Hunting in the Shadows
Alone and Unafraid
The Devil You Don’t Know
Lex Talionis
The Jed Horn Supernatural Thriller Series
Nightmares
A Silver Cross and a Winchester
The Walker on the Hills
The Canyon of the Lost (Novelette)
Older and Fouler Things