“Yeah. Figured you’d have an answer. I still think it could turn into a whole bucket full of worms.”
“If it does, we’ll throw the bucket overboard.” Murdock turned and looked hard at the CIA man. “Hey Company man, you have any late dope you aren’t telling me about?”
“So help me, Murdock. Just what you heard. The captain of the Queen of the Seas is a Dutchman who speaks good English. He has a lot of Filipinos in the crew as well as Dutch and Greek. Most of them speak English. Best I can do.”
“Tell the president we’ll do our best. I better get back with the men.”
The SEALs hooted at some of the clothes that came for them. They at last found something to fit everyone that wasn’t too outlandish. None of them looked exactly like upper-class tourists, but the only ones they had to fool were the Chicoms.
The timeline held. At 1400 they took off in a 46 chopper heading for the destroyer. It had positioned itself thirty miles off shore from Hong Kong. It would be an hour and a half on the Pegasus at twenty knots average. Murdock didn’t think about the timing. He’d do that after they were on the destroyer and had checked out the Pegasus and all of their equipment. They wore their civilian clothes to get used to them. Murdock chuckled as he watched his men in the chopper. What a motley crew they were. They looked like some college tennis team heading for a match.
An hour later, Murdock settled into the quarters they had provided. His crew was fed and then told to get some sleep. They would be up all night and would need the rest.
Murdock and DeWitt talked with the destroyer’s captain, a three-striper named Lason.
“We’ll have a SATCOM on line with you on channel two,” Larson said. “The Pegasus will also be on the channel with a SATCOM. As I understand it, any exfiltration support you need will come from the Stennis in the form of F-fourteens and F-eighteens. Now, how do we work out your timing?”
They kicked it around figured an hour and a half in the Pegasus to a point just off Hong Kong Harbor.
“We can get you within two miles of the harbor entrance, but beyond that we could get in big trouble. There’s a whole shitpot full of islands around there, and the harbor is on the north side of the island. We’re south of that.”
“Two or three miles out will be fine. A warmup for our work on shore. Do we have any idea where in the harbor the cruise ship is?”
“No, but those things always have a million lights on them. Should stand out like a WP flare.”
They decided they would shove off in the Pegasus at 2200. That would be an hour and a half for the boat ride, a half hour to swim into the port and another half hour to find the ship. Then they could be in position by 0100 to take her down.
For weapons assignment, they decided on taking all of the H&K MP5s they had.
“Should all be close-in work,” DeWitt said. “Be sure to have a pistol along and two mags.”
Murdock had the only Bull Pup for any long-range action, and Bradford and Mahanani were given the EAR guns. They wound up with ten MP5s, the Bull Pup, two EARS, and one Colt M4A1 with grenade launcher. Their drag bags were light this time. They would carry only weapons and ammo, and a few grenades. Murdock decided to take a few quarter-pound chunks of TNAZ in case some of the Chicoms barricaded themselves.
When the Pegasus slowed to five knots, the SEALs could see the massive lights of Hong Kong across the water.
“Looks like a circus over there,” Ching said.
“Over ten million people,” Jaybird said. “That’s the size of New York City and Chicago thrown together.”
The Pegasus had the throttle at five knots as they worked through the West Lamma Channel due north to the East Lamma Channel and on north until they could see the sweep of Victoria as it rounded the north side of the Hong Kong island. It would be a three-mile swim around Victoria and then slightly south into Hong Kong Harbor itself.
They could see Kowloon just across the bay from the harbor and New Kowloon to the north, one giant sea of lights.
The young ensign named to lead the Pegasus crew was not happy. “Hell I’m ten miles inside territorial China already,” he wailed. “You guys can do three miles, can’t you? Figure that’s about how far it is around the city of Victoria there to the harbor.”
“No sweat,” Murdock said. “When you come back for us, if you have to, we’ll get to this point. We hope to be sailing out on the ship with a batch of Navy fighter escorts.”
The SEALs had been suited up in their wets and Draegr rebreathers. Murdock gave hand signals and the SEALs went into the water, one by one. Both squads were tied together with buddy lines that stretched between the eight men with Bravo and the six on the Alpha Squad. They went down fifteen feet, checked their compass bearings and headed for the harbor.
After a mile, Murdock surfaced with his men and saw thirteen dark blobs in the water nearby. They swam together compared notes and dove again. Their next surfacing would be at the edge of the harbor to see if it was like the charts they had seen.
They swam through the dark waters in their two teams, counting strokes until they came to what should be two more miles. Murdock came up last, and found DeWitt eying the harbor. The big luxury cruise ship wasn’t hard to find. It indeed had five to ten thousand white lights outlining the ship itself, on the lines from the bow and stern to the highest point on the ship, and glowing on every deck.
“Half mile more,” Murdock said. They dove again. This time they had tied all fourteen men together. Now was no time to get lost.
They were about to surface when they heard the snarl of a motor through the water. They went deeper and felt the ship plowing the waters overhead as it moved out the channel.
Murdock gave two sharp jerks on the buddy line and surfaced. Soon all the SEALs were spitting water and breathing fresh air. Murdock found DeWitt.
“Big freighter,” DeWitt said. They all heard the next sound, the eerie whine of a high-speed engine. They turned toward the harbor and saw a patrol boat with searchlight and flashing red lights heading directly for them. It was only a hundred yards away.
“Dive, dive, dive,” Murdock said and the SEALs pulled on their rebreathers and duck dived, then stroked surely downward to get to twenty feet. Murdock scowled through his mask. How could anyone know they were there? How could a Chinese patrol boat be coming after them?
17
The SEALs, still tied together, swam forward underwater. Murdock could hear the craft coming closer. All he could think of were depth charges. What if the boat had them and set one at twenty feet? It would blow all of the SEALs right out of the water and into hell. No, no, patrol boats didn’t have depth charges. He’d been seeing too many submarine movies lately. So what was the patrol boat doing?
It came closer and Murdock wanted to hold his breath. Then the engine sounds were louder until they rumbled directly over the SEALs.
A moment later it was gone, speeding away, and the sounds coming softer with each minute. Murdock gave two quick tugs on the buddy line that were repeated down the row and the SEALs went up. Murdock looked around as soon as his face broke the surface. They were off course. They were around the point of Victoria and could see into the harbor. Another quarter of a mile.
He pointed down and they dove and swam forward on Murdock’s new course. He used the underwater compass and moved strongly forward. Just inside the harbor, the SEALs surfaced again. Now they could see the luxury liner at the dock. The huge white-painted ship was awash with light from all the strings of bulbs. Murdock surveyed the area.
Jaybird popped up beside him. “That old dock just aft of the cruise ship might be a good spot to set up.”