Tehabo had arrived with Van Dyke, and he spoke up. “Yes, sir, Commander. We have four levels of lookouts down the trail almost to the ten-mile dock.”
“Good, then I don’t see any problem doing some conditioning work with my men.”
After noon chow, the SEALs took an hour break. Then Gardner put them into squad formations and took them into the valley created by the tributary to the Amunbo River. The flat land was half a mile wide and laced with small plots filled with growing and harvested crops. Murdock brought up the rear. He wanted to watch Gardner in action with the men. He still had to prove himself to them. Working with them with his wounded arm would be a plus.
It was just after 1500 when Murdock and the men heard the first shots. They came from the village. The SEALs turned and raced down a trail toward the village. Murdock figured they were two miles away. The shooting continued from Tinglat, then tapered off. Murdock was more worried when the quiet settled in. Lam charged ahead of the pack to report on the situation. A quarter mile from the village, Gardner put the SEALs into the brush and waited for Lam’s radio recon report. It came quickly.
“Sir. The village is quiet. There is some wailing, which must mean dead villagers. I see no government troops. Moving in closer. People are coming out of the jungle and out of the huts and houses. Two buildings are burning and there’s no way to douse the fire. I’d say the bad guys have left. I don’t see any of the Loyalist troops.”
The SEALs charged into the village at a run. The mayor came out with tears streaming down his face.
“They attacked without warning,” he said. “They killed three men in the open, then searched every building. They found the two Americans and tied their hands behind them and hustled them downriver.”
“They took the Vice President and Don Stroh?”
“Yes, both unhurt, but both gone.”
“How big a force?” Gardner asked.
“Not large, maybe thirty.”
“We’re going after them,” Murdock said. “If they harm the Vice President, all of us might as well resign from the Navy and start digging ditches. Let’s move. Alpha out front. We’re on double time down the trail. Lam, sprint out front a quarter and keep your eyes on.”
Within a minute the SEALs had formed up and jogged out of the village and down the jungle trail along the river. It wasn’t wide enough for side by side, so they went single file with five yards between them.
Lam moved out a half mile ahead, then slowed. He worked a gentle jog that would eat up six miles an hour. He had every sense on top alert. Every fifty yards he stopped and listened. The fourth time, he heard a rifle or machine-gun bolt slam forward somewhere ahead. He slowed and worked into the jungle out of sight, then moved forward without making a sound. It took him ten minutes to spot the rear guard. Three of them and a machine gun set up to command fifty yards of open trail.
“Skipper, we’ve got a rear guard. I’ve got my twenty. Should I wipe them out?”
“That’s a go, Lam. One round should do it. How far ahead are you?”
“In front of you probably less than a half mile. I’ve lost ten minutes moving up, so you’re closer now. No sound of the main body.”
“Do it, Lam.”
Lam moved a small branch, leveled in the 20mm sights, and triggered the weapon. From thirty yards the round exploded on target at almost at the same time the report came. Two of the federal soldiers were blown into the air, their bodies laced with shrapnel from the twenty. The third man sat on the bank of the river a moment, then pivoted over and slid into the river without a splash. He sank immediately.
“All clear,” Lam reported. “I’m moving out at a six-mile trot.”
“Don’t get too far ahead of us. We’re moving faster now. Watch it.”
Lam kept up his pace, his eyes and ears straining to pick up any sound out of the ordinary. He blocked out the calls of native birds, dulled the buzz of insects, and ignored the wind whispering through the trees. His total concentration was downtrail for any foreign sound whatever.
He went another mile before he sensed the danger. He stepped into the brush and behind a large tree just before a machine gun chattered off twelve rounds that slammed into the tree and cut brush and leaves from the vines and brush around him. He dropped to the ground and slithered deeper into the jungle, then worked ahead slowly.
“Found another MG,” Lam said on the Motorola. “This time they saw me first, but I avoided their hot lead. I’m working downstream toward them. Must be camouflaged well and have a good field of fire. Later.”
It took him twenty minutes to probe downstream. Twice he edged up to the trail itself without exposing himself. On the third look he saw the target. Three soldiers with a machine gun poking out over a fallen tree. The men behind it had total cover and concealment from the front. Only the muzzle of the MG and the gunner’s head showed over the tree.
Lam was thirty yards away. He could take out the man behind the MG. Or he could put an airburst into the tree over the federal soldiers’ heads. Would an airburst work this close? He wasn’t sure. No way he could take down all three of them silently. He wasn’t that much of a knife man.
Lam settled in and aimed at the tree a dozen feet over their heads. He checked his aim again, and fired. As soon as the Bull Pup went off, he rolled away from the edge of the trail and crawled deeper into the woods.
He heard no reaction from the machine gunners. Slowly he worked back to the trail and peered around a large tree trunk. The MG still rested on top of the log. He could see no one behind it. He hurried through the brushy jungle until he could see behind the fallen tree without exposing himself. Without a sound he lifted and looked over some brush at the fallen tree.
Two men lay sprawled on the ground. A third man tried to lift his arm, then let it drop. He shook his head and tried to stand. He fell face-down in the jungle floor. Lam watched him for five minutes. He didn’t move. Lam rushed into the spot and checked all three. Dead now. He took the MG and threw it into the brush, then settled down and called Murdock.
“One more MG cleared,” he said. “You all can come on down.”
“Moving,” Murdock said.
“I’m back to checking down front.”
Lam went to the trail and listened. Nothing. He moved slower now, wondering if the federals had continued to hike toward home, or if they had slowed or even set up another ambush. They had to know someone was following them. The MG rounds and then the two 20mm shots would tell them that much. If they were listening.
“If you catch them, Lam, remember we can’t fire into the group. We don’t know if Stroh and the Vice President are with them or if they took them down by boat. Caution.”
“Roger that.”
He slowed again. Lam was almost at the point where the trail widened into a wagon-sized road. He paused in the brush checking it out. Something didn’t seem right. What was it?
He grinned. Yes. No birds calling or singing, no insects chirping. Too many men around. He could see smoke coming from the next village’s cooking fires, but they were a mile away. Where were the soldiers? He sectioned the scene before him, both sides of the trail, all the way to the river, twenty yards. Nobody.
Unless they were as good as the SEALs.
Where were they?
He faded into the jungle more and hit his Motorola. “Cap, some trouble up here. Too damn quiet. They must have laid a grand ambush. Suggestions?”
“Let’s ambush the ambush,” Gardner said. “Lam, you hold there and keep the major ambush locale under observation so they don’t move it. Alpha can join you. Bravo will go into the green a quarter mile, go around your position, come back to the trail well beyond the federals, and move up until we find them. Then we hit them from both sides at once. Skipper, what do you think?”