Lam, the platoon’s head scout and tracker, came on the net.
“Cap, we may not have to do much searching. Somebody is coming our way and not trying to be quiet. I’d guess there are six or seven of them, not more than fifty yards dead ahead.”
4
“We take them out,” Murdock said. “Silenced weapons only. As soon as we positively ID them. On my MP-5.”
They waited. Now the other men in the platoon could hear the soldiers coming. They sounded as if they were on a Sunday afternoon picnic. Only a few Chinese words came through.
“Can’t make out the words, but they sound Mandarin,” Ching said. “Want me to yell at them when they get in our sights?”
“Won’t hurt,” Murdock said. “Spread out in a line. Don’t shoot each other.”
They moved apart, but each SEAL could still see the man next to him in the moonlight. Another minute, then shadows came out of the gloom. Six men walked forward, two by two. When they were twenty yards away, Ching sang out with a question. In Mandarin he asked: “What are you men doing here?”
The six stopped, whispered among themselves, then lifted their rifles. Four MP-5’s on three-round bursts hammered at them. The chuffing sound of the suppressors kept the noise down as five Chinese slammed to the ground. One tried to run. Three rounds hit him in the back and jolted him into a tree. He fell lifeless to the woodsy floor.
“Ching, check for survivors,” Murdock said on the radio. The quartermaster ran forward, touched the men on the ground. He stopped at the third one. The talk was soft and in Mandarin. A minute later Ching worked the other bodies, then returned.
“Talked to one of them. They were on a patrol to see if there were any American troops back this way. He said the officers figured this must be a trap since it was so easy to land on the bay and work inland. Then he died.”
“Leave them where they fell,” Murdock said. “We’ll push ahead a little faster. Might find the camp tonight and get in some more good deeds before daylight.”
For an hour they moved ahead. Lam was out in front testing the waters, stopping and listening every hundred yards. He heard nothing unusual. He soon recognized a night bird and its short, repetitive call. He knew there were wild boar on the island, but they would most surely prowl for food during the day.
Fifteen minutes into the second hour of marching, Lam called to Murdock. He and DeWitt moved up to where Lam lay in some brush. They were still on the half-track’s smashed-down trail. Lam was at the side on a small hill looking ahead and to the left.
“Campfire,” Lam said. “Too big to be a cooking fire. Maybe an outpost?”
Murdock put his binoculars on the spot and studied it. DeWitt did the same thing.
The fire was 150 yards away, Murdock estimated. He could see men moving around the area, crossing in front of the fire.
“Can’t get a count on the bodies,” DeWitt said. “Too much brush. Bet you a buck the fire is against orders. How can an outpost do its job if it advertises with a fire? Might as well hire a band to play the hula.”
Murdock and Lam moved out to get the vitals on the group. They worked ahead silently, sometimes walking, sometimes worming their way through the tangle of brush and vines. Voices and soft laughter came from the camp ahead. When they were forty feet away the two SEALs stopped, and each moved to a better position with an open field of fire.
The men in the firelight would be night-blind to anything outside that light. A large red star showed prominently on each man’s uniform. They all had automatic rifles, one a submachine gun. Murdock counted nine men. Murdock had his MP-5 up. He knew that Lam carried the Bull Pup. They were going to have to get ordnance to build suppressors for the 5.56mm barrel.
The Chinese men were eating. One had just washed out a pair of socks, and held them on long sticks to the fire to dry.
“We take them?” Lam whispered into the mike.
“Yes. Let me see how I can do with the silenced rounds. At the first outcry, use your 5.56.”
“That’s a Roger.”
Murdock zeroed in on the first Chinese, who lay to one side, evidently sleeping or trying to. The first round caught him in the chest and he moaned and rolled over, but didn’t move again.
The second Chinese sat three feet from the dead man eating from a mess kit. No rice rolls? Murdock wondered. The Chinese Army was going soft. His round hit the soldier in the chest and spilled him backward. Somebody yelled something at the man and there was laughter.
Before Murdock got off a third round, one of the men cried out in alarm and lifted his rifle.
“Do it,” Murdock said, switching his MP-5 selector to three-round. He chattered off three rounds at two men side by side, then moved his aim as he heard Lam’s Bull Pup chunking off two rounds at a time.
One man fired his weapon back at them. He must have seen the muzzle flash on the Bull Pup. Another small problem. Murdock emptied one magazine, jammed in another one, and shot at anything that moved.
“Hold,” Murdock said. They stopped shooting.
One man lifted up and began crawling out of the firelight. Murdock sent three rounds into him, and then all was quiet.
“Check them?” Lam asked.
“No. We made too much noise. Let’s get the platoon and haul ass out of here. The firing will bring somebody. Just hope we don’t run into a reinforced company.”
They jogged back to the platoon, veering off the half-track trail but paralleling it heading west. Lam kept twenty yards ahead as the platoon moved out. A full moon crawled out of the east and bathed the whole scene in a half light that seemed too strong for the moon. It made trees cast shadows, and was the kind of scene that could make a man mistake a shadow for an enemy or perhaps a friend.
They kept working ahead.
Murdock heard it this time just before Lam used the radio.
“Yeah, Cap. My guess another moving patrol. Chinese love them. Used them all the time in Korea, my dad told me. Keep roaming around, trying to stir up something. They don’t try to be quiet. Must have heard my firing back there. Looking for us.”
“Coming close to us?” Murdock asked.
“Depends. Right now they’re moving due east, which would put them maybe five hundred yards away. On the other hand, they could change directions at the whim of the patrol leader and head right into our gullet.”
“All stop,” Murdock said. “Hunker down in place and we’ll see where they’re going. If we need to bug out in a rush, we head northeast. No radio talk except Lam. Out.”
It was more than three minutes before Murdock heard the night insects resume what must be their usual chatter. He thought he heard a cricket, but he wasn’t sure if Hawaii had crickets. He remembered that almost every land animal and many of the birds, plants, and trees on the island now had been brought there by settlers and pioneers. He remembered that the Polynesians had brought with them fleas, lice, and flies.
The radio earpiece spoke.
“Oh, yeah, they changed directions. Can’t see them, but by the noise I’d guess it’s at least a platoon, maybe forty men. My guess is that they are now on the half-track roadway and moving toward us. How far are we away from that route?”
“My guess is about fifty yards,” Murdock said. “Not enough. They could have scouts out on both sides. Estimate their distance?”
“Six or seven hundred yards,” Lam said.
“Everyone, we move silently as death a hundred yards to our right. Keep in visual with the man on each side of you. Let’s go.”
It took five minutes to make the silent move. Murdock was pleased with the operation. No noise. Everyone kept in sight except Lam, who would take care of himself. They bellied down in the mulch and leaves and grass, and could hear the enemy troops passing to their left. When the last jangle of equipment died out, the speaker in Murdock’s ear came on.