Countdown: H Hour (30 page)

CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

Only those who lack it use the adjective

‘excess’ in front of testosterone.

—Dan Goodman

Caban Island, Pilas Group, Basilan Province,

Republic of the Philippines

Graft and Semmerlin strained at the rope, hauling up the last of the equipment they’d brought with them. Naturally, the package stuck at the very edge of the cliff.

“Go get it,” Graft ordered. “I can hold the rope here.”

“Sure.” Semmerlin sniffed “Hey, why do you smell like piss?”

“Just go do it.”

Semmerlin slithered out and got his hands on the bundle. By main strength he and Graft pulled it up and over. They quickly untied the main rope. Then Semmerlin took a piece of dark duct tape and an infrared chemlight from his combat harness. He attached the plastic tube to a point a about twenty feet above the rope’s free end, then tossed the rope back over the cliff.

From the bundle emerged all manner of wondrous things. First came two rope ladders. Each man took one of them to different trees flanking the main rope. To these the ladders were attached, then viciously pulled on to make sure they were secure. The ladders were pushed over the cliff as well, unrolling as they fell.

“You know,” whispered Semmerlin, “for the very first time I begin to suspect this shit might actually
work
.”

“Shhh,” said Graft. “You want to jinx us, ya dumb ass?”

“Sorry.”

Next came a brace of weapons, a suppressed .510 caliber rifle matching the one across Semmerlin’s back, and a regimental standard Pecheneg machine gun. Graft laid the rifle beside himself. It would be his primary weapon for the festivities if and only if things got out of hand.

A dozen claymore mines came out, filling the local air with the pungent, plastic aroma of C-4. Though still in their bandoleers, eight of the mines had already been rigged with det cord to form two daisy chains of four each. Each man slung one set of daisy chained mines across his shoulder. The clackers were in the bandoleers. The other four mines had been left as singletons, though each was equipped with a trip wire device that merely needed arming and setting to become a rather effective booby trap.

Thermal scopes came out. Graft took the first and, after telling Semmerlin to turn around, affixed it to the latter’s rifle. Then he did the same for his own, returning the rifle to its spot on the ground.

Semmerlin began pulling boxes of belted machine gun ammunition out, hanging these from his body as he did. Graft grabbed an entrenching tool and stuck it on his own gear.

This, plus draping themselves with still more goodies, didn’t take very long. They’d rehearsed it, over and over, back on the ship, unpacking and repacking their equipment bundle over and over as they did.

Finally, fully accoutered, the two men patted themselves to make sure everything was in its proper place. They each did a couple of short leaps upward to ensure they weren’t rattling, banging, or making any other distinctive sound. They then began the trek down to where they believed Mr. Ayala was being kept.

Their job was not actually to retrieve Ayala from the island. It was possible they could have, of course. But it was also risky, and would become especially risky once the presumptive means of early evacuation, the helicopters, were heard by the enemy. Instead, what Graft and Semmerlin were tasked to do was find him and secure him, then move him to as safe a spot as they could find, on the island, while the island was being cleared. Indeed, even the rest of A Company was not intended to clear the island, nor even help much. Once landed, they, too, had the job of securing Mr. Ayala, once the company, plus Graft and Semmerlin, linked up. Part of securing Ayala was keeping him alive, once secured. For that, Cagle had accompanied A Company.

Clearing the island, on the other hand, so that evacuation could proceed safely, once all the Moros were dead, was the job of C Company and the aviation detachment. That’s where the
serious
firepower was. At most, A Company could ease C Company’s way, as Graft and Semmerlin had eased the way for the rest of A Company.

Part of Graft’s and Semmerlin’s shipboard rehearsal had been to ensure that they didn’t clank when they walked. They didn’t; everything was either wrapped in something soft or, if not, kept away from anything hard or metallic. Still, they were carrying enough sheer mass that walking was a little awkward, especially since they really had to stay off the trail that led from the cliff to the main Moro cantonment. Fortunately, the island being mostly jungle covered, the ground was actually fairly clear of vegetation other than large tree trunks. The NVG’s, touch, and long experience helped guide them around those, though the goggles had a nasty tendency of making hanging vines look like draped snakes.
That
could be very creepy. No one ever quite got used to having what appeared to be a large fat snake suddenly and unexpectedly appear in their vision.

I fucking
hate
snakes
, thought Semmerlin, jumping back from a swaying green apparition.

Navigation—or guidance, anyway—was helped a bit by the RPV. Its thermal imager was powerful enough to see them, at least most of the time, and would have provided warning if there’d been any unfriendly strangers, close by and ahead. This further allowed somewhat less careful walking, upright and hence faster, than if they’d been unescorted.

In a fairly short time they were at the edge of the cantonment. This was where things got dicey. Graft reported, just in case the RPV couldn’t see them for the nonce, “Crater.”
We are at the edge of the cantonment.

MV
Richard Bland,
Sulu Sea

The operations chart suggested it, or perhaps demanded it, but Welch had to do his own calculations in his head.
The Zodiacs are forty-five minutes out from the cliff. Graft’s almost at the target. The
Bland
’s about twelve miles from the island. With slinging it over the side, and loading the troops, that’s two and a quarter hours for the LCM. An hour and fifteen minutes for the Zodiacs to land, my people to scale the cliff, and to set up a perimeter to secure Mr. Ayala. I think . . .

“Skipper, land the landing force.”

“Aye, Major. All stop.”

“All stop. Aye, aye, Skipper.”

As usual, Kirkpatrick and his crew went over the side with their LCM. Someone had to be there to control the thing and cast off from the crane’s cables. No sooner was the boat settled in the fairly comfortably calm water then the crew sprang to undo the shackles. Immediately, and enthusiastically, the men of C Company began surging over the gunwales and down the net. Only two platoons plus Stocker’s headquarters were going in this load; the rest, under the exec, Simon Blackmore, would load and move to shore when the
Bland
had closed substantially on the island.

One reason, and not a small one, for the men’s enthusiasm was the news of their home regiment’s success, back in South America. It had seemed so impossible—an impossibility weighing on their souls like a tombstone—that the news had propelled their morale to the very heights. They felt they could take on the world.

Balbahadur went with that first group. His pipes were silent and would remain so until contact was made. He thought,
No sense, after all, in warning them we’re coming. Lots of sense in frightening the piss out of them once they know we’re there.

Caban Island, Pilas Group, Basilan Province,

Republic of the Philippines

From behind, Semmerlin overwatched, looking through the thermal scope of his suppressed .510 caliber rifle. Flat on his belly, Graft aimed the claymore out to graze across the main trail junction leading, on the one hand, to the main pier and, on the other, to the cliffs. Sixth inch thick detonating cord led from one side of the claymore to the next in the series. The other side of that claymore had a standard blasting cap and wire. The wire already ran back to where Semmerlin overwatched. The clacker was, sensibly, in Graft’s pocket.

Finished with sighting that mine, Graft dragged himself, his rifle, and the bag of claymores to the left, then began setting up the next in his series. Once finished with all four, he crawled back to the trunk of the grand old tree behind which Semmerlin covered and whispered, “Your turn.”

Crawling off with his rifle cradled in his arms, Semmerlin left his Pecheneg resting on its bipod, aimed up the trail. He, too, took his clacker in his pocket. His area for his daisy chain was a little farther forward, almost at the one true building—an almost pagoda-looking mosque—the camp boasted. Once he was done, he crawled back. Then he and Graft connected four clackers to the four wires running from the ends of their daisy chains.

And now,
thought Graft, finally standing to make his way into the camp,
. . . now it really gets dicey.

The cantonment was surprisingly quiet, as Graft, sans most of his equipment, slipped from hut to hut, staying always in the shadows and trying to stay downwind. Fortunately, the camp remained quiet. If there were any dogs around—and there might well not have been since the Koran is not precisely a doggie fan book—they neither heard Graft nor caught his scent.

Somewhere in the village Graft heard in his earpiece Lox’s voice, “I’ve lost you among all the other images. You’re on your own.”

Gee, thanks.

Well, it wasn’t like I wasn’t expecting it at some point. Now let’s see . . . there’s the mess area, I can smell the residual smoke and food. Hmmm . . . okay, past that and online, up the trail, is a bigger hut. That’s the Harrikats’ headquarters. So . . . Ayala is . . . there.

Graft had two choices, neither particularly good. He could try to slice his way into the hut, through the wall. If he had the wrong place, and it was just possible he might have, and more possible that Ayala had been moved, and if anyone was awake or awakened by the sound, he was screwed. On the other hand, while the normal entrance had two guards as of the last report, a disadvantage not to be underestimated but also a pretty good indicator that Ayala was there, he could make a pretty good effort at killing them before they got the alarm out. He opted for the normal entrance.

“Graft,” came the whisper in his ear, “if that’s you I see about fifty meters southeast of Ayala’s hut, the number of guards remains two. There are maybe a dozen more, lying down, unless a couple of them are fucking a couple of others, in the long hut across the trail. I’d suggest you jump around or something, so I can know, but that’s probably not such a great idea. For what it’s worth, Terry says the rest of A Company will be climbing the cliff in ten minutes, and half of C Company is almost at the point where the Harrikat will be able to hear the LCM’s motor anyway. He’s putting the aircraft into the air. You’re authorized to start the party.”

Good timing. thanks. No, it’s a really bad idea. And I can
hear
them, chatting.

Okay, now how do I do this? There’s just not a lot of room for subtlety and cleverness. If I edge around the hut’s wall, I’ll see one first. But if I shoot him I won’t have a shot at the other. If I expose myself to where I have decent shots at both, good chance they see me and raise an alarm. If I get in position to take one, and wait for the other to expose himself, good chance I get seen . . . like when the sun comes up, because I just might have to wait that long. And there’s no time for that anyway.

If I were about five-four and skinny, I’d just walk right up to them. But I’m not . . . and there’s not all that much time.

Brute force and ignorance it is, then. Oh, this is so gonna suck.

In fact, that—brute force and ignorance—wasn’t precisely what Graft did. First, he got down on his belly and crawled to where he could see one of the guards. From its bandoleer, he gently took one of his two remaining claymores. This he set up on its legs, but without pushing them into the soil, and aimed at the guard. He then offset the aim almost entirely to the right, to make sure that none of the seven hundred-odd steel ball bearings in the thing went into the hut. Then he sunk the legs. Backing off, taking the clacker with him, he set the other claymore up at a safe distance from the first, and aimed at the guard shack across the trail . . . aimed
low
.

This is
not
my first choice. But if I have to, then I have to . . .
With that, Graft settled down in the muck among the shadows, pistol in hand and the clackers at his feet, waiting and hoping for both guards to appear at one time.

That happened, but not in a way Graft would have chosen.

The further guard announced to the other, “Man, I have got to piss.”

“Just wait for the relief,” the other said. “You know what’ll happen to us if you go to the latrines and you get caught.”

“Fuck that,” said the first. “I’ll just go piss over behind the hut. Won’t take a minute and if the datu comes by you can tell him I heard a suspicious noise.”

“Oh, man . . . you can’t do that. Janail is
death
on pissing or shitting in the camp except in the designated latrines.”

“Fuck him; he’s not Allah.”

With that, the first guard left his post and began walking in the direction of Graft, undoing the buttons of his trousers as he did. That had him automatically looking down when his right foot caught on something that he really didn’t expect to be there. He stopped and bent over, feeling down.

Oh, no
, thought Graft, seeing the Moro undoing his fly.
No, no, no; not again, not tonight. I’m all pissed out, frankly pissed off, and not going to get pissed on, again.

When the Moro bent, he thought,
Uh, oh, I’m in trouble. Well fuck it, I see them both now.

The better target was the farther one. Still wearing his goggles—no time to lift them off—Graft fired three shots, hitting the Moro twice in the chest and missing once entirely. His left hand was raising his goggles even as his right was bringing the .45 down again. The clanking of his pistol’s slide brought the other Moro’s head up, just before he got his eyes close enough to see what had snagged his foot. At a range of under fifteen feet, Graft fired again, putting his bullet just off center from the bridge of the Moro’s nose. Brains, blood and bone flew out the back of his head, dropping him like a sack of potatoes.