"Sweepers, this is Slowboy, we're approaching. Any more visitors?"
"We'll watch for any mounted reinforcements coming in by land. Expect no air. Our last run completed. Good hunting."
The Seahawk pilot looked over at Murdock. "Get ready, Lieutenant, we're going in. See down there in the spotlight? There's an area just this side of the main building where I can set down. Close, but I can make it. You want us to hold or take off?"
"There'll be sortie damn angry rebels down there. You scoot, and come back when you see a red flare. Shouldn't take long. Looks like the Tomcats did a good job."
Three minutes later, the tricycle landing gear on the Seahawk touched the Kenyan dirt inside the enclosure, and the crewman jerked open the side hatch. Murdock hit the ground running, and heard the rest of Third Platoon right behind him. That was when they took the first enemy small-arms fire.
Frank Underhill heard the jet plane roaring past again, then the explosions above. He wondered if there would be anything left of the embassy. For the past fifteen minutes the jets had been attacking the rebels above who defended the grounds. None of the Kenyan soldiers had tried to enter the basement room.
Underhill and the two Marines had barricaded the doors, and put a two-by-four through the large handles of the doors. They opened inward. The two-by-four would need to be broken to get the doors open. At least no Kenyan could rush in and machine-gun them all.
Underhill's shot-up arm hurt like fire. He tried to forget about it. Two women clung to each other. They had been that way since the strafing began. He saw several people with their eyes closed and their lips moving as they fingered their rosary beads. The woman with the bad chest wound had quietly died about an hour ago. There was nothing they could do for her except hold her hand.
Somebody was going to pay.
"Mr. Underhill," someone said beside him. He looked up at the big Marine. "Sir, you think we should open the door yet?"
"No. Not until the firing stops. What's happening up there, Sergeant?"
"Well, the strafing is done. They were bigger rounds than machine guns. Maybe twenty-millimeter cannon. Makes a nasty mess if it hits someone. Then I'd think, with the jets pulled up, some assault choppers would come in. Only I don't know where they'd come from.
"Course the jets came from somewhere, maybe a Navy carrier. So they would have some choppers. Could be a detachment of Marines from the carrier."
They heard the stutter of automatic fire from above. Someone pounded on the basement doors and fired some rounds at it, but the steel door held and wasn't penetrated by the rifle slugs.
The marine sergeant nodded. "Oh, yeah, the guys on top have auto M-16's, or maybe some other automatic weapon. Bet they give them Kenyan GIs a bad time. Wish to hell I was up there with an M-16 and about twenty magazines. Damn!"
A woman wailed in the far corner, and Underhill went over to try to calm her. He hoped that he could.
Lieutenant Murdock sprinted to the stub of a block wall, and dove behind it. He heard rounds going over his head. Single shots. Good. He saw Magic hit the ground down about ten feet, and a moment later Ron Holt skidded in beside him. Holt was the radio operator for the platoon, and carried his ever-present radio. It was the AN/PRC-117D. It was extremely compact at fifteen inches high and eight inches deep. It weighed only fifteen pounds, and was the most sophisticated tactical radio in the world. They called it the SATCOM. It could send and receive UHF satellite communications on the SATCOM. That meant it could reach literally anywhere in the world. It could use UHF line of sight to talk to the Tomcats or the choppers above. With VHF or FM, it could use the bands that most of the world's armies use.
Changing bands was easy as flipping a switch and deploying the right antenna. Its power could go from ten watts maximum down to.1 watt to reduce enemy interception. An encryption system was embedded in the hardware, and the crypto keys could be changed daily by punching in a new set of numbers. It could transmit in voice, data, or video, and with a special interface could even link into the worldwide cellular telephone system.
Murdock could talk directly with the CIA in Washington or the President.
Murdock saw winking flashes of weapons firing ahead coming from the front and side of the embassy. He hadn't seen anyone shooting out of the embassy windows.
They worked their attack plan. Ed DeWitt and his Second Squad would circle around to the back and clear that area. Then they would charge inside the building, flushing anyone inside out the front door. Murdock and his squad would eliminate any hostiles in the front of the building, and be ready for anyone trying to get out that way.
Murdock saw the rest of his squad spread out along the near side of the building and this wall. He motioned at the three men he could see, and waved them ahead. They ran with assault fire at the windows as they charged forward and jolted against the end of the main structure.
Murdock whispered into the filament mike perched below his lower lip. It connected to the Motorola MX 300 each of the SEALs wore for instant communication. They each had an earpiece, and a wire down the back of the neck through a slit in the cammies and plugged into the Motorola unit secured to the combat harness.
"Ed. Progress," Murdock said.
"Couple of stubborn boys back here." He heard more firing of the M-4A1's, then the karumph of a fragger grenade exploding.
Murdock looked at the front of the embassy. In the faint light he could see some pockmarks from the 20mm. In the dark he couldn't see much, but the soft moonlight helped. A figure bolted from the front door and darted toward the open steel front gate in the block wall.
Two three-round bursts brought him down in the dust of the courtyard. He didn't move.
Fire erupted from two windows along this end of the second floor. Murdock lifted his MP-5 Heckler & Koch submachine gun, and sent four three-round bursts into the first window. He heard the heavier sound of the M-4A1's with the sliding butt-stock pounding away. For a moment there was no more firing.
Murdock surveyed the land. He had to move across an open space to get to the protection of a pair of cars. They would give him a perfect field of fire on the front door and half of the windows facing the street.
Murdock used the radio again. "Horse, can you cover the front door?"
A moment later Ronson's voice came back. "If I move about five yards toward the street. Just a minute."
Murdock figured his thirty-round magazine was more than half full.
"Yeah, I got it," Horse responded. "Cover for you ready."
"I'm moving to those old cars. Now, Horse."
The HK 21A1 machine gun blasted off six rounds to Murdock's left. The Platoon Leader and Holt came out of a crouch and jolted forward, sprinting the fifteen yards for the pair of parked cars. Both cars had been hit by 20mm rounds, Murdock decided.
Half way there an automatic rifle opened up from the second story window. A spray of hot lead drilled the ground just in front of Murdock and Holt.
Behind him he heard the 7.62 nun NATO rounds slamming out of Horse's machine gun. By then Murdock had hit the dirt behind the tire-flattened cars and caught his breath. Holt skidded in close behind him.
A dark figure ran from a door half way down the building. Magic Brown saw him, brought down the 6 x 42 telescopic sight, found the target and fired the H & K PSG 1 sniper rifle without the suppresser. The 7.62 NATO slug slammed into the figure's chest and jolted him into the dust.
Murdock heard more firing from the back of the building. He hit the mike again.
"Ed, need any help?"