The SEALs charged the opening, darted through it, and the acrid smell of the explosive, and into the main entryway of the communications building.
The two chunks of the big door lay against the wall twenty feet from where they usually perched. Someone cried out in pain near one of the doors. Murdock found a Chinese soldier with one leg blown off. He died a minute after Murdock found him. Jaybird found another dead Chinese. Then they took fire from someone on the stairway. The figure fired, then scurried on up the steps and out of sight on the second floor.
“Ronson, Bradford. Cover each other up the steps,” Murdock told his lip mike.
A loudspeaker on the ground floor snapped on and a voice came out that spoke perfect English but had a bit of a Chinese accent.
“Yes, American force. We know you are inside the building. We have hostages here. If you do not vacate the building in two minutes, we will start shooting hostages. We are starting the timing now.”
“Let’s clear this floor,” Murdock said. “Half of you each way.”
Murdock’s order was obeyed as two of the remaining SEALs went each way into the series of offices, hallways, and more cubicles and storage areas. Three minutes later they came back to the stairs.
All clear.
“Up the steps,” Murdock said. He had heard on the radio earlier that DeWitt and his squad had penetrated the place and were moving past the second floor to the third, where the enemy had holed up with all of the vital broadcasting equipment and the hostages.
“On our way up the middle stairway,” Murdock radioed.
“We’re at the far end moving in,” DeWitt replied. “You heard that about hostages? We have two of our EM who work here. The Chinese shot the captain in the head just after they took over. Don’t plan on a quick surrender.”
DeWitt sniffed. There was only a slight hint of tear gas in the air. Some damn efficient air filter had wiped the air clean before it exhausted it into the system. He checked his pockets.
“Let’s go with flashbangs,” he said quietly to the radio mike. “I want three men to throw two bangers into the main room. Get them as far inside as possible. Get them out and ready. Five seconds.” He waited for a count to seven. “Throw them now.”
He cracked the door and three men threw the non-lethal grenades into the other room, then let the doors close.
Inside the larger area, the flashbangs wouldn’t be as effective, but they could easily put down and out of combat half the terrorists inside. When the last of the flashes blasted through the crack in the door, DeWitt and his men charged into the room.
It was one large area, with all sorts of communications gear. Three civilians with weapons tried to stand, but were cut down at once by 5.56mm rounds from the Bull Pups and the Colt Commandos. There were two aisles that led to the doors. Each had a group of partitioned offices with the walls seven feet high. DeWitt charged them, found two more Chinese civilians with guns and holding their heads. He kicked away weapons and had the men cuffed.
“I’ve got three over here,” Jefferson said. “Hiding behind some expensive-looking hardware.”
“Save the equipment,” DeWitt said. “But don’t get hurt. Maybe another flashbang beside them.”
The room shook with the vibrations from the cracking explosions of the grenade. Then the strobes of intense light cut through the already bright room lights.
“Oh, yeah,” Jefferson said. “Tony and me got the fuckers. Still holding their ears.”
DeWitt heard Murdock bring Alpha Squad through the twin doors.
“What’s the score?” Murdock asked on the radio.
“We’ve accounted for about twenty hostiles,” DeWitt said. “Checking the rest of the area.”
The Navy communications personnel began coming out from under desks. Two dozen had been locked in a storage room. The rest of them filtered back to their workstations.
A three-striper came boiling up and looked at Murdock. He held out his hand.
“Damn glad to see you and your men, Commander. They caught us with our pants down for damn sure. Won’t ever happen again. This will be a personal-weapons station from now on.” He paused. “Oh, I’m Commander Lethridge, operations officer.”
“Lieutenant Commander Murdock here. The admiral said he wants the whole damn operation back in gear in ten minutes. Better call him right now and let him know you’re on the way.”
The commander shouted some orders, and the men and women sailors in the room settled into their assigned tasks, getting the communications system up and operating.
“Casualty report,” Murdock told his lip mike. “Alpha Squad?”
The men chimed in one after the other in their line-of-march order. No one had even been scratched except for Lam. “Picked up a ricochet somewhere, Cap,” Lam said on the net. “Figure it was in the hall and that first fire we took. Left arm, Band-Aid type.”
“Jack, take a look,” Murdock said.
Bravo Squad reported in with no injuries.
Commander Lethridge detailed some of his crew to haul the dead Chinese to the ground floor. He put the tied-up prisoners there as well.
The admiral telephoned his congratulations to Murdock, then went back to running his war.
Murdock took his platoon out of the building and gathered them in the parking lot in back of the commo building. The truck and two Humvees were there waiting for them. Murdock had Holt listening on the SATCOM for any news he could find. Several of the units were using SATCOMs as the only way to communicate with each other.
“Hey, Cap,” Holt called. “The Jefferson heard about the invasion on Kaneohe Bay on the windward side and sent twenty F-18’s over there. The pilots say they hit at the Chinese boats in the bay and some more coming in. The troops on the island were invisible. They had landed and moved inland through the civilian houses and into the country toward the hills of the Koolau ridges. No real targets on land, but they shot hell out of those landing craft.”
“Keep up the eavesdropping, Holt. We need to know everything we can. Now, let’s mount up and go back to the quarters we had before that training exercise this morning.”
An hour later, they had their weapons cleaned and new loads of ammo in their combat vests when Murdock received a call. They had a new mission. Admiral Bennington was in full command again and was worried about the estimated two thousand men the Chinese had landed at Kaneohe Bay. They were somewhere in the green belt behind the highway and the town itself and the Koolau Range. Just where they were and what they were doing was a major concern.
The area was not densely populated, with fewer residents the closer you went to the mountains.
“Murdock, I want you and your team to go in there and find the enemy, then harass them. Cut any supply lines they may have, disrupt their communications, hit and run, night raids. Do anything you can do to keep them tied up and busy so they don’t go pouring down the highway toward Kailua or try to get over to the highway heading for Honolulu. We can resupply you with arms and ammo and explosives by chopper out of Pearl or from the Jefferson, whichever is closer. I want you to be a damn loose cannon in there rattling around in their belly.”
“Aye, aye, sir. We can go in with first dark if you have a Sea Knight chopper that can get us into the area.”
“Commander Johnson is still your man. He can arrange it. You get my red-signature approval on anything asked for. Good luck.”
“We’ll stay in contact with you on the SATCOM for any change in orders.” They hung up, and Murdock saw a Humvee pull up outside their barracks/operations center. Commander Johnson jumped out and ran for the operations center door.