Before they got there, another jet roared overhead. This one slammed another two dozen of the 20mm rounds into the front of the prison and slanted upward and away.
A small sentry position at the outside of the wall was not manned. The door in the wall was metal. Quinley unrolled his primer cord, made two circles around the door handle and its lock, and inserted a timer detonator. He waved the SEALs back twenty yards and set the timer for ten seconds. Then he ran.
The primer cord exploded with a shattering sound and impact. The lock disintegrated, and was blown into the prison yard. One side of the door itself tore off the top hinge, and pivoted downward on its bottom holder until it slammed into the ground on the inside.
SEALs moved up to the door cautiously. Murdock looked inside past the smoke from the explosion. Two Kenyan rangers shook their heads trying to get their hearing back. Murdock cut them down with a three-round silenced burst from his MP-5. He saw no other defenders.
Murdock touched the throat mike. "First Squad inside. Second Squad hold at the door."
Red Nicholson jolted through the opening in the wall, followed by Murdock and Holt. They raced the fifty yards across a prison yard toward a pair of wooden doors in a two-story building with no windows.
A rifle fired at them from a catwalk along the top of the building. Nicholson hosed the area down with a half-dozen rounds from his M-4A1, and kept running. All eight men of the First Squad pressed against the main prison wall. Jaybird was closest to a door. He tried the handle. Locked. He leaned back and fired a burst from his HP-5. The 9mm whizzers pulverized the door lock, and it creaked open six inches.
Murdock ran up and kicked the door inward, then jolted back behind the wall. As he did, an automatic weapon blasted a dozen rounds from the inside through the door opening. Jaybird, on the other side of the door, pulled a fragger from his combat harness. He tugged the safety pin from the round and smooth M-67 hand grenade, and bounced it through the door.
Four seconds later the blast shattered the sudden silence. Jaybird and Murdock charged through the door. Murdock took the left side and swept the area with his NVGs. He found no enemies. Jaybird checked the right side, and cut loose with one three-round silenced burst.
"Clear right," Murdock said.
"Clear left," Jaybird said.
They were in a room thirty feet long and ten feet wide. It held boxes and some desks and looked like a storeroom. One door led out at the center of the rear wall.
"Come," Murdock said in his mike. "DeWitt, move up to the outside of the main building."
Jaybird tried the inside door. It was unlocked. First Squad got against the inside wall and out of the line of any fire. Murdock turned the door knob slowly, and swung the door outward.
A machine gun chattered in front of them, and angry messengers of sudden death slammed through the doorway. It was a ten-round burst, then a five, then a ten.
"We need a prisoner alive," Murdock said.
"You go talk to him," Jaybird said.
Murdock shrugged. "Next time." He pulled a fragger from his straps and let the arming spoon spin off the bomb. He held it for two seconds, then threw it through the door. Almost at once it exploded, and Magic Brown and Red Nicholson darted through the door into the next area.
They could hear the jets hitting again. The cannon fire rocked the old structure for a moment; then the birds were gone.
"Promised us ten minutes worth of shelling," Holt said. "They're about ready to go upstairs and ride shotgun to see if we need any help or cover."
"Clear right," Brown said.
"Clear left," Nicholson said on the Motorola.
"Let's take a look," Murdock said. "DeWitt, come into this room when we leave."
They faced a steel security door that blocked their way.
"About time they had some steel here," Murdock growled. "Get Quinley up here."
When the explosives man arrived, he looked at the door and the heavy metal bars on the rest of the entrance.
"Electric lock," he said. "Shouldn't be too tough. Locking bars into the steel sidebar. Sliding door. I'll have to hit all three weak points. Better get the troops back a ways."
He went to work with packs of TNAZ explosive. When he had it all positioned correctly, he inserted detonators in the pliable material, set them for fifteen seconds, pushed the timers to the on position, and ran back around the corner.
The three blasts went off almost at the same time, pounding through the hallway like a freight train out of control. When the sound and the shock wave had worked down the corridor, the SEALs checked Quinley's work. The lock was shattered. The two push rods were broken off, and the door had rolled back two feet. It wouldn't move any farther.
"Close enough," Murdock said. "Now, what the hell is behind the door?" It was a long corridor that could run from one end of the big building to the other.
The hallway had night lights glowing every fifty feet. The NVGs came in handy in the low light. They could spot no one either way. One Kenyan lay crumpled around a machine gun to the left. "Which way?" Jaybird asked.
"Which is the longest way?" Murdock asked him.
Jaybird shrugged. "We could split up. One squad each direction."
"No, no splitting," Murdock said. "We stay together unless we need a rear guard. How in hell are we going to find those sailors in this huge place?"
They had spent the past two hours eating, and drinking wine that Pita had brought home. Two days before, they had given her all of the shillings they had left, 2,512. She had been surprised, pleased, and delighted. She had said she would buy some special food for them.
Now the wine was making everyone friendlier. Pita hadn't changed from her seduction clothes, and now and then her blouse slipped open a little. Vuylsteke tried not to look. Perez stared the other way. Tretter grinned at the flash of rounded breasts.
Just before 2300 the wine was gone. Vuylsteke yawned where he sat on the floor. Tretter sat beside Pita on the couch. She bent over and kissed him on the lips, and he growled softly. She stood, reached for his hand, and led him to the bedroom door.
Vuylsteke looked up and shook his head.
"By God, no, Tretter."
"Man, you got no rank on me here."
"Don't go in there. Could mess up our whole cover."
"Not a chance. Anyway, I figure this little lady has saved our asses for three days now. If she wants something in return, I ain't gonna be the one to turn her down."
"I'm warning you, Tretter." Vuylsteke stood.
Perez came to his feet and moved in front of Vuylsteke. "Hey, easy. Take it easy. It's Pita's call. None of our damned business. We're guests in her house, right? Now just cool it. You take the couch tonight, I'll sleep on the fucking pillows."
Pita smiled at them all, then caught Tretter's hand again, led him into her bedroom, and closed the door.
12
"We move left," Murdock said looking down the long corridor. "As I remember, the bulk of the building was to the left."
"We clear all these doors?" Jaybird asked.
"No, this isn't a prisoner area. We look for some stairs or an open area or cell blocks. Where the hell do they keep the bad guys in this place?"
They trotted down the corridor on the concrete floor. Four lights down they came to a stairway to the left. At the top of the one flight of steps, a steel security gate barred the way. Quinley had stayed close behind Holt this time, and moved up to the barricade without orders. This one was different.