“Ready to go,” Ed said on the Motorola.
Before Murdock could move, three floodlights snapped on, bathing the whole front of the house and the yard with light.
“Do them,” Murdock said. Ten silenced shots whispered into the night. All the floodlights died from hot lead.
“Move it, First Squad,” Murdock said into his mike, and the eight men lifted up and stormed the front of the house. They took gunfire from firing ports and out the windows.
Seven of the SEALs blasted through the twenty yards, and slammed against the house. One man was down. Murdock ran back and grabbed him, and then ran forward, half dragging Ron Holt to the wall.
“Caught one in the left arm, Commander. Sorry.”
As they talked, Kenneth Ching, Quartermaster’s Mate First Class, had pasted two globs of TNAZ plastic explosive on the house’s front-door hinges. He set timers and looked at Murdock, who gave him a thumbs-up.
Ching pulled out the activating switches. Then he ducked under a window, and rushed away fifteen yards along the house.
The twin explosions came almost on top of each other. Doc Ellsworth, Hospital Corpsman First Class, got to the blown-in door first, and tossed in a flash-bang grenade. He dodged to the wall beside the door, shielded his eyes, and held his hands over his ears. The series of sharp, powerful, but non-lethal explosions erupted inside the room coupled with six brilliant strobe lights. Both light and sound blasted out the open doorway.
When the last strobe faded, Murdock and Doc Ellsworth pulled down their NVGs and jolted through the door. Murdock took the right side, and Doc the left part of the room.
Doc blasted his MP-5 twice. The two bursts of three rounds cut down two Iraqis on his side of the room. Murdock had no targets.
“Clear one,” Murdock said as he and Doc charged to a door at the other side of the room. They hit the wall next to the door, and Murdock threw a flash-bang grenade inside. The screeching, pulsating sound roared through the room as the series of brilliant strobe lights flashed through the doorway. The two SEALs waited flat against the wall on both sides of the open door.
As soon as the last strobe faded, the two charged into the room.
No one was inside. The third room was to the left. They hit it with one more flash-bang grenade, then jolted through the door, their MP-5’s ready. Murdock cut one kidnapper in half with a fully automatic burst from his weapon. The man’s face showed surprise as he dropped the knife he was about to throw, and he crumpled to the floor dead.
Doc put a burst of three 9mm rounds into the second Iraqi, who still held his hands over his ears. The kidnapper took the rounds in his chest, slammed backwards against the wall, and slid down slowly, leaving a wide red smear.
There were no more Iraqis in the room. There also was no hostage.
“Where the hell is he?” Murdock asked.
Doc shook his head. They had cleared all the rooms in the house.
There was no kidnap victim.
“Pull back, Second Squad, pull back to the desert. We need some recon. We’re right behind you.”
2
Murdock motioned to Doc, and they eased out of the house. The explosions that had ripped open the door evidently had attracted no attention. They saw no one, no lights or vehicles.
As silent as sixteen wisps of smoke, the SEALs exfiltrated from the area back into the desert, and hit the dirt facing the small town.
“He wasn’t there,” Murdock told Dewitt. “No fucking hostage, just some Arabs who looked surprised as hell that they were dying. Jaybird, get up here.” Jaybird slid in beside the two officers. “Any other intel on this town?”
“Not much. The house was our target. They said something about a military HQ El Raza uses. It’s at the other end of the town, maybe six hundred yards north.”
“Best bet we have,” Dewitt said. “Hope to hell we don’t have to search every building in this little place.”
“The HQ sounds good,” Murdock said. “Let’s get on our horses and move up there. We know nothing about the building?”
“Afraid so, Commander. Be a good time for a guided tour.”
“This is turning out tougher than they told us,” Murdock said. “So what’s new. Jaybird. Find Douglas, and tell him to take Gonzales with him and go back and see if that truck we passed will run. If it will, have them drive it into the desert and come up beside us here about a quarter of a mile out. We might need it fast. Have them keep pace with us as we move. Go.
““Ed, let’s go up the hill here and find that HQ. It should be the biggest building in the town. At least we hope it is. You keep your squad outside ours as we go north. When we get there we’ll recon the building, and see what we need to do. If that kidnapped guy isn’t there, I don’t know what the hell comes next.”
“Guns Franklin,” Dewitt said. “He speaks Arabic and Farsi. We grab ourselves a prisoner and let him talk to live.”
“Good. Let’s move.”
First Squad walked silently north along the outskirts of the small town. The road in back of the houses outlined the community and kept everyone inside. They walked a half mile, then hit the dirt and checked the area. Murdock and Lampedusa went past the buildings inside the town to see if they could find a large building.
They moved silently from shadow to shadow. Past the first row of houses, the area changed. Here there was a central open area, as if it could have been a market at one time. At the far end stood a building larger than the others, but of the same stone and mortar construction.
Murdock and Lampedusa studied the area for five minutes. They saw no one move. There were no guards around the building. They could see none on the roof or in what looked like a small guardhouse near what appeared to be the front double doors.
“A church, a mosque?” Lampedusa asked.
Murdock shook his head. “No minaret, no tower with small balconies, which is always attached to a mosque.”
“So, maybe it’s the HQ.”
“Let’s go and see.”
They darted from one bit of cover to the next, keeping near the smaller buildings to the side of the open area. When they came to the front of the large building, they found a Russian-built weapons carrier parked and facing outward. A heavy machine gun, maybe a .50-caliber, perched on a mount.
The two SEALs nodded, faded to the side, and went around the place.
Two windows near the back showed lights. At the back of the building they found six armored personnel carriers that had to be Russian-made.
They also spotted a fuel dump of 55-gallon barrels, and a concrete-block building that could hold ammunition and weapons.
“Make a nice bonfire,” Lampedusa said.
“If it comes to that. Easy in, easy out. But that doesn’t look like it’s going to happen. Let’s bring up the platoon and take a look inside. Might be troops in there, and officers and maybe a kidnapped hostage.”
Five minutes later, they found the platoon lurking fifty yards outside the perimeter road. The truck they had liberated growled along in the desert beyond them.
Murdock told the men the situation.
“We know about three doors. Front, back, and side. There may be another door on the far side. We’ll go in the back door, since the lights are in that area. I’ll go in with two men from Second Squad.
First Squad and the rest of Second will back us up covering the side doors and the front.
“We’ll use silencers and knives whenever possible. We don’t want to roust out El Raza’s whole army. Our only objective is to find this hostage and get him out of here. Bring in Franklin and his helper from the truck. We need all the guns we have. Let’s move.”