“Pegasus, this is Rover, we’re coming out. Your reception will be spotty. Over.”
There was no answering call. Howie tried it again, kept Jaybird moving the antenna a little until he received the beep and at once he sent a signal. “Rover coming out. Rover coming out. Pegasus, this is Rover coming out.”
This time there was a broken up response. “Peg—, Hear y—. Com — ut. Co — out.”
Murdock tapped Anderson on the shoulder. “He got it, wrap it up, we’ve got to stay low.”
Somewhere behind them another submachine gun fired. The sound came in angry six-round bursts. Murdock figured they were aimed at the water. What better escape route from the house. He bent lower and tried to will the IBS to move faster.
“Full throttle,” Murdock said into the mike. “Let’s get our eighteen knots plus another five out of the current and get out of this fucking river.”
The engines gave a small growl, then steadied down to the new power surge.
More lights showed along the riverbank on the right, then Murdock saw lights coming on at the opposite side of the river as well. Headlights poked along the road. Now and then a truck seemed to pull in to face the river and stop. Troops must be deploying along the river. Why would there be truckloads of Chinese troops in a small area like this? Maybe brought in especially to protect the prize catch of the tourist season.
Downstream a mile, the SEALs and the senator and family saw two star shells blossom over the middle of the river. Their brilliant light glowed for thirty seconds, then faded out.
“That’s going to be a problem,” Murdock said. “Unlimber those EAR guns. Anytime you see activity along the near shore by trucks or men ahead of us, send them a round. One EAR in each boat?”
“Roger that,” someone said softly.
“Pick your targets so you don’t both hit the same one. Do it.”
Three hundred yards ahead a truck ground to a halt with its headlights throwing a bright path across the water.
“I’ve got it,” Lam said. A moment later the familiar whoosh sound came, but there was no noticeable effect on shore.
“At least the driver is in dreamland,” Lam said.
A quarter of a mile on downstream they saw floodlights snap on along the right shore and three army trucks were brightly lit. Men jumped out of the trucks. “Both EARs,” Murdock said.
The guns got off two shots each and the SEALs could see the Chinese soldiers fall to the ground and not move.
“Senator and family, that’s our EAR weapon. It’s non lethal. It’s our enhanced acoustic rifle, that sends out a powerful pulse of sound waves that knocks out the victims. They’ll be unconscious for four to six hours and wake up with a headache but unharmed.”
When a squad of men came into the light to check on the downed soldiers, Lam fired again putting them into a dream world as well.
Fifty yards on downstream a machine gun began chattering six-round bursts. Murdock thought he could hear them slapping into the water, but he wasn’t sure.
“Move to the left bank,” Murdock said to his mike. Both boats swung that way. They were still less than forty yards from the far side of the narrow river.
“Anyone spot the muzzle flash on that MG?” DeWitt asked on the net.
“Got him,” Jack Mahanani said. A moment later a whoosh came and the machine gun stopped firing.
“Halfway to the sea,” Murdock said. “They don’t know where we are, and that helps. They must have more tricks.”
A moment later a guttural growl came from far downstream and Jaybird groaned. “Got to be a patrol boat motor, Cap. We’ve heard the bastards before. We can’t stop it with the EAR.”
“Can’t stop it, but we can stop the men from operating it,” Mahanani said. “When they get close enough, we pop a couple of EAR rounds at it and there will be nobody on the throttle or the wheel, she’ll go dead in the water and wash out into the South China Sea.”
They listened, then heard the motor as the patrol boat came toward them. It was sweeping both sides of the shoreline, probably with small S loops. As they watched a searchlight jolted into the night cutting a swath of brilliance along the shore and the river.
“What’s the range on the EAR?” somebody asked.
“Effective is six hundred yards, tops,” Jaybird said.
“Hold fire,” Murdock said.
Another machine gun blasted away from the right-hand shore. More truck lights bounced along the road but no more aimed lights into the river. Lam fired twice more and silenced the machine gun.
“Range on the patrol boat at seven hundred,” Jaybird said. “A guess, but what have we to lose.”
“Mahanani, take two shots,” Murdock said.
The whooshes came ten seconds apart. The sound of the patrol boat engine slowed, then nearly stopped before it picked back up to its original sound.
“Too far,” Mahanani said.
“Hold fire on the boat,” Murdock said. “Let’s be sure next time.”
They powered toward the patrol boat at twenty knots, Murdock figured. The next time he checked the river boat, he estimated it was no more than four hundred yards. “Both EARs one round,” Murdock ordered.
The blasts came almost at the same time, like both men had been sighting in on the patrol boat waiting word.
This time the engine slowed gradually and then stopped. The regular route of the boat wavered, then it turned lazily in the now moonlit river and began to drift slowly downstream.
“Oh, yeah,” Lam said. “I get to paint a half a patrol boat on my locker record board.”
They were close enough now so they could see the lights at the entrance to the river. Now new lights turned on, on the right hand side across from those they had seen before
The chattering of the machine guns came at the same time from opposite sides of the river, and this time Murdock could hear the rounds splashing into the river ahead of them.
“Interlocking machine guns,” he said. “Too far off. When we’re three hundred yards away, we hit them with two rounds on each MG nest. We knock them out, or we eat rice for one hell of a long time.”
The senator touched Murdock’s shoulder. “Commander, I’m sorry I got you into this mess. My fault entirely. I should have known better. My view of my importance made me think the Chinese wouldn’t have the guts to bother me, let alone arrest me.”
“Senator, you can worry about that only if we don’t get you out of here. This is no sweat for my men. We train to do just this sort of rescue mission. Of course, we’d rather not get shot to pieces doing it, but those are the chances we take as SEALs. Sometimes people do get hurt.”
“Have you had KIA’s on missions like this, Commander?”
“In the past two years I’ve lost twelve good men.”
“All that and the public doesn’t have the slightest idea of what you do, right? All of your missions are covert, like this one is. I won’t be allowed to say a word about it when we get out. There will be no newspaper story or TV flash. It will be buried in the records of your after-action reports somewhere, forever hidden from civilian eyes.”
“Way it has to be, Senator Highlander.”
There was a long sigh. “Yes, I know. But I wish it didn’t have to be that way. I know damn well that I’ll never skimp on appropriations for the SEALs.”
Murdock chuckled. “Hey, maybe this will be a good mission for the SEALs as well as the Highlander family.”
A rifle cracked from the right-hand shore. Murdock heard the round hit and a startled cry from someone in his boat.
“Lam.”
The answer was a whooshing shot from Lam’s EAR.
“Saw his muzzle flash, Cap. He must have spotted us in the ribbon of light the moon casts across the water.”