Seal Team Seven #20: Attack Mode (27 page)

“With this boat you go could into business,” Murdock said. “We have been instructed by the U.S. Navy that this boat is a prize of salvage. All you have to do to own it is to sail it back to your atoll and file the salvage papers. It’s yours, the three of you.”

One man squealed in delight. The third one had to be told what had happened, then he grabbed Murdock and kissed him on both cheeks.

“Maybe we should be calling back our chopper,” Murdock said. He went to the deck and used the special Navy radio they had loaned him. The chopper responded on the first call.

“Hey, you said it wouldn’t take long. How many to fly back to the carrier?”

“We have six. One Arab without papers, who Don Stroh is going to be crazy to talk to. Let me read you our
GPS coordinates.” He did. “We have two crated jugs of plut for you.”

Ten minutes later the chopper shone his spotlight on the small ship that had turned and was heading back toward the atoll. Murdock called the Navy to get a heading for the small boat to sail back to Rongrik. The Hawkeye came through and the three islanders cheered.

The Sixty came in on the stern. The boat had gone dead in the water. The SEALs stepped into the cold Pacific as the SH-60 edged up toward them. He was about twenty feet in the air and the rope ladder didn’t reach the water. He went around and edged down lower until the rope trailed in the water. Jaybird swam to it and went up first, then Lam, and Vinnie Van Dyke. Bradford held the rope as Murdock went up, then came up himself. Murdock talked to the pilot, who came in so his rotors would miss the boat’s antenna, then let down a rope to the rear deck. The new boat owners tied the rope securely around the still bound Arab, under his arms, and fastened it snugly. They gave two short jerks on the rope and the Arab was pulled upward into the SH-60, where the SEALs swung him in the door and dropped him on the floor.

“Oh, but Don Stroh is going to have a field day with you, my man,” Bradford said.

Thirty minutes later they were on board the carrier, which had changed directions and was steaming at full speed toward the Wotje Atoll. There was still no word from Gardner and his crew about developments with the other plutonium-packing boat.

Don Stroh paced the narrow confines of the CIC. “Why in hell doesn’t he call in?” Stroh asked no one. “He can’t be more than two hundred miles away. What the hell is happening at Wotje?”

Wotje Atoll

Marshall Islands

Lieutenant (j.g.) Christopher Gardner with his five SEALs and his eight U.S. Marines grouped around the SH-60 Seahawk helicopter from the carrier. They waited. Lieutenant Gardner had just come back from a trip to the tiny general store next to the dock on the amazingly blue lagoon.

“They told me no boat had arrived here in the last two days,” Gardner said. “So we wait for it. We’ll scout out good firing positions and be ready to take him down when he docks.”

“Doesn’t feel right,” Canzoneri said. “Just doesn’t seem quite kosher to me somehow. I know the Hawkeye reported the boat had slowed, maybe from mechanical trouble, but how did we get here so much ahead of it?”

“The old laws of physics and the art of traveling through the air instead of on the water,” Rafii said. “Hell, we’re here, they aren’t—we wait for them and zap the bastards before they know what hit them.”

“Hopefully,” Gardner said. “We saw some planes at that little airstrip when we came in. Two of them looked too large for pleasure craft. Canzoneri and Fernandez, grab two Marines and go check out the planes. See if you can find out how long they have been here and who owns them or who flew them in.”

“Roger that,” Canzoneri said. “We’re moving.” He pointed to the two closest Marines and they jogged away
from the softball field the chopper had landed on, toward the airstrip a quarter of a mile away.

“Mahanani, you’ve got the con here. I’m taking Prescott and two Marines with me and contact the local law. Let them know that we have governmental permission to land and function on any of the atolls in the country.”

The police station was half of a building. The other half was the post office. The entire building was the size of a twenty-man tent. Gardner cautioned his men to sling their weapons muzzle-down as they went into the lawman’s office.

At first glance, Gardner thought it was a movie set. A counter angled across the room a third of the way back. One desk behind it held a lamp and some papers, but no cop. In front of the counter stood a second desk where a pretty, dark-haired girl in a print dress sat working on a computer. She turned and smiled.

“Yes, the U.S. Navy is here. We heard on the net that you were in the process of chasing some bad guys. Are they heading for our atoll?”

Gardner stepped forward. “Miss, I’m Lieutenant (j.g.) Gardner with the U.S. Navy SEALs. We’re expecting an outlaw boat to be coming into your lagoon shortly. Just wanted to check in with the sheriff or police chief or whoever is in charge.”

The girl stood. She was slender with long black hair and an infectious smile.

“Well, that would be me. I’m Sheriff Ronsan, duly elected by a majority of the voters on Wotje Atoll. As I remember I won the election twenty-one to twelve. Not a good turnout. Welcome aboard. It’s good to have some real firepower. Do you know about our visitors?”

“The ones who flew in the planes down at the airstrip?”

“Yes, those. Most visitors we’ve had here in years. There are ten of them, all men, some Arabs, some Orientals, and two I couldn’t categorize.”

“All men, I’d guess, and they aren’t here on vacation. Right?”

“True.” She frowned. “I really need to know why
they’re here. But this is a free country, and we don’t restrict travel or anything like that. But I want to know why these men are here. They all have money, more money than most of us on the atoll have seen in some time.”

“Where are they staying? I don’t see a big motel or resort.”

“Oh no, not enough tourists. But we do have three bed and breakfast houses on the net. They are staying there. Been here for three days now and are getting irritable. Last night two of them drank too much at our local bar and I had to help them get home.”

Prescott edged up to his squad leader. “Skipper, sounds like they could be customers for the plut.”

“Sounds about right.” He turned to the girl. “Sheriff, could you point out where those three bed and breakfast houses are? We need to have a talk with your visitors.”

She frowned, hooding her eyes for just a moment. “Be careful. I know they are armed, handguns I’d suspect. But I didn’t have the firepower to challenge them.”

“Now you do,” Murdock said.

“Great.” Her eyes sparkled. “Want me to come along?”

Gardner hesitated, then shook his head. “No, ma’am. It will be better if you stay here. There my be some gunfire there and when a boat comes in that’s due anytime. Remember, we’re the good guys.”

Outside, Gardner sent one of the Marines back to the chopper. “Tell the pilot to call the carrier and tell them our situation. We landed here, the boat isn’t in yet, there are some large planes at the small airstrip and some suspicious visitors waiting around, probably for the boat to come in.”

Gardner angled past the small cafe to a house right next door. It was wood frame but had Polynesian art on the doors and window frames. He knocked on the door. A round little woman answered. She was no more than four and a half feet tall, and her face was a huge ball of a smile.

“Oh, yes, the U.S. Navy. We saw your helicopter come in and land. You want bed and breakfast?”

“Sorry, no. We’re looking for your guests. I understand three or four strangers are staying with you.”

“Yes, yes, no room for more. Others go to other places. Not as good as Mary’s House. That’s us, here. We Mary’s House. Best bed and breakfast in all of Marshall Islands.”

“Yes, I understand. And you must be Mary.” She laughed and nodded.

“Me, Mary, yes, yes. No more room. So sorry.”

“No, we don’t want to stay here. We just need to talk to your other guests. You have four?”

“Four good men, yes. Pay good U.S. dollar right up front. Mary love these four guys.”

Something moved behind the small woman. Then a figure came out of the low light in the house’s front hall. He was tall, with heavy shoulders and a shaved black head. He was dressed in a black T-shirt and black pants and held his big hands loose at his sides like a boxer ready to pounce.

“Mon, you got the many questions. You ask me.”

“Good, we’re on a special U.S. Navy cooperative assignment with the Republic of the Marshall Islands, to interdict drug trafficking. We’ve had information that this atoll is to be used as a distribution point for twenty tons of heroin right out of the Golden Triangle. Would you know anything about that?”

“Drugs. We don’t do that shit. No drugs. Get out of our face.” The man turned and walked away.

Gardner nodded at the small, round woman. “Thank you for your time and good day.”

They went back to the street of crushed coral, and Gardner used his Motorola. “Canzoneri, what do you find with the aircraft?”

“You were right, Skipper. Two of the four planes are big enough that they each could haul out of here one crate of plut the way it’s packaged now. Probably what’s coming on that boat, if it ever gets here. The other two planes are six-place passenger craft. Used like taxis for inter-atoll hopping. The guy who runs the airstrip said the twin engine planes came in three days ago, and the flyers gave
him a hundred dollars for each one for tie-down and refueling. He’s delighted.”

“Right. Well done. Now get back here so we can set up around the dock. Boat should be coming in anytime now.”

“Roger that, Skipper. We’re moving.”

The SEALs and Marines went to the dock and checked it out. Gardner picked out spots for four guns. He had two sniper rifles and two Bull Pups. All four men were behind protection and concealed from the dock. He’d use them if he had to. He posted Rafii, Prescott, and two Marines to cover the dock.

“Now we need some intel. Fernandez, see what you can find out about heavy equipment on the atoll that could lift the plut crates. Forklift, maybe a crawler tractor with a front bucket. Anything that would do the job. Check out the stores first, all three of them.”

Fernandez nodded and jogged toward the first store, which billed itself as “Hardware, House Wares and Everything Else.”

Gardner was well aware of the effect of heavily armed men walking up to a house and asking questions. He relied on the shock value and knocked on the next bed and breakfast door. A man answered. He was a local, with heavy black hair and broad features. He was five-eight and overweight. His eyes were so dark they could have been black, and Gardner caught a hint of irritation in the man’s stance.

“Good morning. We’re with the U.S. Navy on your atoll looking for some men who are imposters and here to perform some highly illegal acts. We wonder if we could talk with your visitors.”

“No. Not your business. Our business. You go away.”

“They paid you well to say that, didn’t they?” Gardner said, swinging the muzzle of his MP-5 submachine gun upward so it centered on the man’s chest. “Now, let me ask you politely again to go bring out your visitors so we can talk with them. If you don’t, my men and I will have to move inside your house and find them. My men are
clumsy and might break all sorts of things in your home. I’m sure you understand.”

“Yeah, you sombitch, I understand. Wait a minute.” He turned and left the door. Gardner pushed it open and kept his MP-5 pointing into the hallway. It was thirty long seconds before anyone came, then a man dressed in an expensive suit and carefully knotted tie, with a white handkerchief in his upper pocket, came to the door. He wore a small mustache and above it his blue eyes were pinched in a frown.

“Why this inquisition, and lower your weapon. We’re here on business that is no concern of yours. Any more of your threats and I’ll be forced to call the sheriff.”

“Please do. We’ve already cleared our visit with you with her. We’re looking for drug smugglers, and you and your friends seem like prime suspects.”

The dapper man laughed. “Drugs. You must be insane. I would never touch drugs. Here it would be heroin from the Golden Triangle, I would guess. Wrong on all counts. I’m not in the drug smuggling business.”

“Not when something is much more valuable, right?”

“Like what?”

“Like plutonium 239.”

The words left the well-groomed man speechless for a moment, then he recovered.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Before Gardner could get his foot in the way, the man slammed the bed and breakfast’s front door.

Gardner took his squad into the street and looked for the third bed and breakfast house. There weren’t more than twenty houses in the whole village. Before he found it, the Motorola came on.

“Skipper, we’ve hit paydirt,” Fernandez said. “There are two rigs on the atoll that could handle the size and weight of the plut crates. One is a large forklift, the other is a wheeled Massey-Harris tractor with a two-yard bucket on the front. The forklift can load the first crate into the bucket, then pick up the second one and choggie. Both these rigs are hired and paid for. Three hundred bucks to
do some work today. They are to come when they get a phone call. Supposed to go at once to the boat dock.”

“Copy that. Good work. Fernandez, see if you can rent or borrow a pickup over there, and come to the street here and grab Claymore and two Marines and go down to those planes. I’d like to see the rudders on both of those large transport planes blown all to hell. By this time they may have some protection for their aircraft down there, so be careful.”

“Roger, that, Skipper. I’m on my way.”

Five minutes later Fernandez rolled up in a six-year-old Ford half-ton pickup, loaded on his Marines and Claymore, and drove toward the airstrip. Fernandez stopped a hundred yards from the planes, and the four got out and stood behind the pickup. Fernandez had his Bull Pup. He had just gone prone behind the pickup and started to sight in on the closest twin-engine transport, when rifle fire slammed into the pickup. All four men darted behind the protection of the Ford and waited. After a flurry of a dozen rounds, the rifle fire stopped.