Rick Hunter rejoined the other three, about eight feet now below the surface. They could hear the hum of the big generators inside the destroyer. Rick and Catfish clipped their attack boards on their belts and then they separated into two pairs, diving down into the dark, kicking their big flippers, driving along the steel hull of one of Zhang Yushu’s most prized warships.
Rick Hunter counted carefully. On the twenty-fourth kick he stopped, confident now he was right under the section of the destroyer where all the guided missiles and torpedoes were stored. Right here he could see the lights of the ship reflected in the water, but both SEALs knew it would be pitch-black when they reached the keel.
Rick felt the surface of the hull as he went, and it was very rough, covered with barnacles and small sea growth. None of this was good news unless you happened to be a naturalist: the magnetic clamps of the mine were never going to grip this. Buster would realize the same thing when he reached the other side.
Within a few seconds both SEALs were standing on the sandy bottom in water black as oil. They could feel the rough surface, and they unclipped the harnesses that held the limpet mines on their backs. Rick saw Buster turn and swim underneath the keel, feeling his way in the dark. And he himself again ran his hand against the metal of the ship.
He uncovered his magnetic clamp and screwed it into the mine with its five pounds of explosives. He tried it on the hull, but it would not grip. So he drew his kaybar fighting knife and, holding the blade with two hands, he scraped a section clean on the hull. Again he tried the clamp, and this time he felt it pull, then lightly thud home. He could see the small dial of the timer glowing lightly, showing its 24-hour setting. Rick checked its timing again against that of the clock on his attack board. Then he set it for 0345. Then he ducked under the keel and showed the exact time to Buster, who was just finishing scraping with his kaybar knife.
Thus synchronized to the split second, they made the fix to the hull of the ship, took a compass reading and kicked straight back down course one-zero-five, straight back to where the ASDV awaited them. Fifty yards in front were Catfish Jones and Mike Hook, whose swim down the hull of the frigate had been much shorter, and whose hull had been much cleaner.
They picked up the intermittent homing beeps from Matt Longo’s fathometer, and kicked in toward the hull of the minisub. Only when Commander Hunter signaled with four knocks on the hull, that all four of them had made it back, did Lt. Mills return to the deserted surface of the water, and one by one they clambered up and into the dry compartment. They were all breathing heavily as they unhooked their Draegers, pulled off their masks and sat down. Again the hatch was shut and clipped, and Lt. Mills took her 20 feet down once more, right in the now-desolate main channel.
“Okay, guys?” asked Rick Hunter.
“No problems for us,” replied Catfish. “What took you two so long?”
“Much longer swim down the hull, and when we got there it was coated with barnacles. You know what little bastards they are to clean off. We couldn’t get the magnets to pull until we’d scraped a section. But it’s fine. All set for 0345.”
“Same,” said Catfish. “Damn creepy down there under the hull, though. Wouldn’t wanna do it every night, I’ll tell you that.”
Lieutenant Mills ran back down the channel, steering course two-zero-zero from the 16-degree line of latitude on the GPS. They ran for just less than 20 minutes at six knots, then they all felt the ASDV make a turn to starboard, slowing down while Lt. Longo scanned the water for Wolf Rock. He found it just to their north, and then he guided Lt. Mills in until the submarine was 150 yards off its southernmost point. They took a visual, and Matt could see its shape jutting out of the water.
“Okay, guys,” he said, “this is where we say ‘so long.’ Your landing place is dead ahead. Steer three-two-zero, for no more than 350 yards. Right there you’ll be in the marshes, north of that river, so you won’t have to cross it. You just got a short walk in from there.”
Rick began to distribute big plastic cups of cold water. “I’m suggesting you drink one of these before we go. Because we’re probably going to get hot, and we have no time to get our suits off. Just don’t want anyone getting dehydrated, because it makes you feel lousy.”
The SEALs drank, pulled up their hoods, loaded up with six satchel bombs, plus medical supplies, radio and one shovel. They took the greatest care loading up two of the rookies with two 50-foot rolls of “det cord,” the hugely volatile detonator link that burns at the rate of five miles per second, and is beloved by all SEALs.
Then they slung their personal weapons on their backs, the Heckler and Koch light submachine guns packed in waterproof cases. And they lifted out the bigger M-60 machine gun, which would be used only in a dire emergency, if they had to fight their way out. But their most precious cargo was two heavy armor-piercing bombs, about three feet long in special waterproof carrying cases. These had been especially adapted by Naval ordnance in San Diego. They would not explode in contact with other explosives: they would only explode with heavy impact on the point of the nose cone. And heavy impact they were going to get.
Inside the ASDV, Draegers were connected and tested, masks pulled down, flippers fitted on and several belts of ammunition in waterproof sheaths were split among the SEALs not using attack boards. The vicious-looking kaybars were adjusted in combat belts, ready for easy access.
At 0016 they began to exit the submarine, one by one, each man rolling out of the deck hatch and into the still, calm waters of the Bassein Delta. There was a pale moon rising to the east casting low, ghostly shadows on the water. And there was no sign of life save the increasing number of black-hooded heads above the surface, each man breathing in the fresh night air deeply, treading water and waiting for the adrenaline to die down.
It was 0026 when Dallas MacPherson, manhandling the big machine gun with Bobby Allensworth, slithered down the hull and essentially fell into the water, the heavy gun now made much lighter by the special air pockets inside its waterproof cover.
Rick Hunter dived to their swim depth of 10 feet, adjusted his attack board and kicked forward on the short swim into the marshes. Ten minutes later all ten of them grounded into long marsh grass growing out of firm sand. Rick stood first and listened, pulling back his hood and shoving his mask into a holster on his belt.
They had already decided to hide the Draegers. They were too heavy to carry, and they walked on together to the beach, found a wooded area beyond the sand and dug out a hole to bury them. In an emergency they could run back and find them, if they needed to escape. If not, no one would ever find them. They covered them over with grass, then wet sand, and dumped the shovel under thick undergrowth.
The six men with the light attack boards clipped them onto one another’s backs; the bombs were similarly carried. The SEALs drew their weapons, Rattlesnake Davies held the wire cutters, and Rick Hunter checked the compass and decided on a tight group in single file walking carefully through the light grasses 100 yards inshore from the beach.
The landscape was uninhabited as far as they and the satellite could tell. The first sign of life they would encounter would be in the guardhouse right on the south perimeter wire. And so they went forward, moving steadily across the ground, their start point no more than 1,200 yards from the fence. Their watchword was stealth. There was no mileage in causing an uproar, nothing to be gained from a gunfight, except almost certain death. The SEALs had no immediate backup, no hope of immediate rescue. The Chinese guards in the dockyard had access to at least three helicopter gunships, plus almost a thousand armed Navy personnel — not to mention the entire Burmese Navy base upriver with even more access to fast patrol gunboats.