Target Lock

by James H. Cobb

  The gangway had been thrown aside with the impact, but the tilting deck of the LSM now leaned over the right-hand pier. The taipan slid under the bottom cable of the rail. He hung from it for a moment, then dropped to the sprung planks, his mind leaping ahead. He must organize the delaying action and the retreat. As per the disaster contingency plan, he must get his people out and away to the Morning Star bases deeper in the jungle.

  And he must take Amanda away with him. That was one prize they wouldn’t win back.

  “Everyone! Follow me!” he yelled, rallying the remaining scattered handful of guards and ship’s crewmen on the pier.

  USS Cunningham, CLA-79 on Buccaneer Station

  30 Miles West of Crab’s Claw Cape

  0810 Hours, Zone Time: August 25, 2008

  The Sutanto slid out of sight within the cavern. The real-time imaging on the primary large-screen display in the Combat Information Center was beaming back from one of the two Eagle Eye fire control drones the Cunningham had hovering over the engagement zone.

  “They’re in, sir,” Hiro’s TACCO commented. “So far, so good.”

  “So far,” Hiro replied quietly. “Shift imaging. Bravo drone.”

  The tactical officer called up the feed from the second RPV The distant cameras aimed downward on a patch of dense forest growth in the center of the cape. Rents had been torn in the tree canopy by the rocket barrages, and billowing smoke rose in half a dozen locations. Still, there was no visual hint that the landward entrances of the tunnel complex rested below the tree cover. They still existed only as radar traced coordinates in the targeting systems.

  Hiro spoke. “Mr. Carstairs, verify gunnery bombardment mission ready to fire.”

  “All forward mounts ready to fire. Targeting coordinates set and projectile guidance programmed. The mission board reads green.”

  On the Cunningham’s foredeck monitors, the muzzles of the VGAS tubes and the barrel of the bow turret lay trained on the dark smear of land along the blue oceanic horizon.

  “Mr. Carstairs, proceed with the mission.”

  “On the way, sir. Firing the mission.” The TACCO’s thumbs flipped a pair of guards up and off from over a pair of glowing green keys. The keys went white as he depressed them.

  Whump! … Crack! … Whump! … Crack! … Whump! … Crack! …

  Autoloaders and firing circuits cycled sequentially, the two big fixed VGAS tubes fired a round apiece every fifteen seconds, with the lighter five-inch turret mount adding its contribution in between. The black and orange muzzle flashes were small compared to the flame jets of the ATACM launches, but still most impressive.

  Like the ATACMs, the 155- and 120-millimeter “smart shells” extended guidance fins as they cleared their gun barrels. In a world of shockproof, solid-state technology, it was easier and more effective to simply tell the projectile to steer where it was supposed to go than it was to try and precisely aim the gun.

  Using terminal laser targeting, the average area of probable impact for precision-guided shells such as these could have been reduced to a circle a meter and a half across. For this mission, however, GPU guidance alone with a fifteen-meter area of probable impact had been deemed adequate.

  A dozen rounds were in the air before the first struck.

  As the CIC crew watched the drone view of the bombardment zone, the fire streams systematically chewed the forest canopy away from around the tunnel entrances, hits alternating between two targets. The hooded fortifications stood momentarily naked amid the splintered tree trunks, then the hammering shell bursts began to gnaw at the heavy concrete.

  As a roiling cloud of dust and smoke blanketed the scene, the Cunningham’s TACCO spoke quietly. “To paraphrase an album cover I saw once. ‘Nobody’s getting out of there alive.’”

  Crab’s Claw Base

  0811 Hours, Zone Time: August 25, 2008

  In the dusty half-light of the passageway, Stone Quillain rolled off the form he had protected, relieved because he felt movement but concerned because he also felt the hot wetness of blood.

  “Belle, you okay?”

  “No,” the SB officer sobbed, “I’m shot in the butt and I really feel stupid. How’s the lee helm? He caught it too.”

  Quillain glanced onto the bridge, noting that Admiral MacIntyre was dragging himself to his feet. He noted the other unmoving form as well.

  “Your guy’s dead, Belle,” he stated simply. There was no time to fool around.

  “Shit! Shit! Shit!”

  Quillain hauled himself to his feet as a Marine radioman and a couple of SB hands staggered up from the communications room farther aft in the bridge structure.

  “Goldberg, you and one of the other guys get Miss Nichols to a corpsman! You, get on the SINGGARS, get through to the task force, and tell ’em we’re operating! Move it!”

  “Aye, sir!”

  “Yes, sir!”

  Stone would have liked to say something more to Labelle—that she was going to be okay—but he didn’t have time. Nor could he fool with saying anything to MacIntyre just now.

  Unslinging his SABR, Quillain raced for the starboard bridge wing, the port side being gone. Within the hull of the dead ship, boots were hammered on deck plates as his Sea Dragons poured topside. Stone had to seize control of the situation.

  This was going to be the tricky part. They’d had no visualization of the tactical setup inside of the ship pen and tunnel complex. Quillain had to get the assault force deployed and advancing, developing his battle plan even as he was executing it.

  Hunkering down for cover behind the bullet-riddled spray shield, he allowed himself one good look around, totting up the critical tactical factors.

  The light was going to be bad. While daylight streamed in through the entrance, the back of the cavern was still heavily shadowed. The air was heavily smoke-hazed as well. Friggin’ twilight, too damn bright for night vision to work well, and too dark for the Mark One eyeball to be fully effective.

  The two ships were wedged in solidly between the piers, side by side, the midships rails almost level with each other, the LSM with its ramp still down.

  The left-hand pier looked pretty badly broken up. The right-hand one would probably be the same. Slow and careful moving would be required, with no cover. It looked as though there were all kinds of crap back on the stone shelf at the rear of the cavern, though, stacks of crates and such. And weren’t those tunnel entrances back there—two of them? That would match up with the surface entrances. There’d be laterals extending out from and maybe a cross connector between those two main shafts deeper in.

  Stone could hear the intermittent thud and rumble of artillery fire topside. That was good. The ships were closing the surface entrances. The topside garrison wasn’t getting in. There wasn’t any shooting in the cavern yet. That was bad. Whoever was pinned down in here with them was holding their fire, staying concealed, conserving ammo, and waiting for targets. The mark of good troops.

  Right. Forget the docks. Secure the ship’s decks and establish overwatch and suppression fire from the higher positions. Clear the LSM and assault down her ramp to clear the main cavern. Worry about the tunnels later.

  It had maybe been twenty seconds since the frigate had crashed the gate and Quillain had his battle plan.

  His communications carrier still hissed reassuringly in his earphone, and he slapped the communications pad on his chest harness.

  “Dragon Six to Dragon elements. Deployment orders follow….”

  Amanda shoved Sonoo into the technicians’ quarters ahead of her. Pausing for a moment, she snagged the machine pistol from the dead guard, along with the magazine pouches he had carried slung over his shoulder. Three more sets of reloads plus the readyuse magazine in the second Sterling. She hoped it would be enough.

  She backed into the doorway with her back to the frame, positioning to keep an eye on what was happening both inside the room and out in the passageway.

  Inside, half a dozen men of four
different races stared at her. The room itself had been chiseled and blasted out of solid rock, then lined with concrete. Perhaps forty by twenty feet, its ceiling was curved and low enough so that an average man might hunch to stay below it. The door way Amanda occupied was the only entry or egress.

  Some efforts had been made to improve the habitability. The walls had been scraped and painted white, but the lichen and slime were already creeping through once more. An odorous chemical toilet had been curtained off in one corner, and cots, camp chairs, and lockers had been provided; each claimed patch of floor space testifying by its degree of order and tidiness to the personality of its holder.

  Amanda could readily see why Sonoo had wanted to get out of this place so badly.

  “Greetings, gentlemen,” she said with a degree of grim humor. “I presume most of you speak English. If anyone doesn’t, please translate. For those of us who haven’t been formally introduced, my name is Captain Amanda Garrett of the United States Navy. And that is the United States Navy attacking this complex, and you are my prisoners.”

  The technicians took it in varying ways: the Koreans with wary stoicism, the Arabs with fearful disbelief, the Indian with simple fear, and the younger and more fit-looking Russian with anger. Amanda swung the muzzle of the Sterling in his direction.

  “It would be advisable for you to want to stay my prisoner as well. Consider it carefully, gentleman. Right now, you six are a huge security risk to both Harconan and your respective corporations. Your testimony about what you have been doing here will destroy them all. At this moment, there is nothing they’d want more than to have you taken out into the jungle somewhere and fed to the crocodiles. Now, get back against that far wall, sit down, and think about how I’m your only way of getting out of here alive.”

  They did so, obediently, hesitantly, sullenly.

  Like a fighter pilot, Amanda kept her head on a swivel, one glance inward toward the technicians, the next out into the passageway. It was dank and almost chilly this deep in the complex, but she felt the sweat accumulate on her palms, slickening her grip on the machine pistol.

  Suddenly the crash and clatter of small arms reverberated through the tunnels building rapidly into an echoing roar. The last battle was on.

  “Chief Hanrahan,” MacIntyre yelled into his lip mike. “What’s the ship’s status?”

  “Flooded to the waterline, sir, but resting stable. One or two small fires under control,” the answer hissed back in his headset. MacIntyre had reclaimed his M-4 carbine from the deck but had lost track of his helmet somewhere.

  “Right. Stand by to move across and secure the LSM as soon as the Marines get her cleared. Stand fast until you get the word.”

  “Aye, sir, will do.”

  The cavern was a chaos of sharp-edged echoes. From the forecastle and upper works of the wrecked frigate, Marine SABR men and SAW gunners were engaging targets on the cavern floor, a score of different weapons types replying from the shadows.

  Stone Quillain directed the developing fight from his ad hoc command post on the bridge wing, the Sea Dragon commander issuing a steady flow of orders, some over the tactical radio net, some by sheer leathery lung power.

  “Heavy weapons. Hold and secure the frigate! Corporal, get your fire team dispersed aft along the portside rail. Yeah, to port! Maintain the suppression firebase. Assault Able, clear the LSM’s upper works and put the right side of the dock area under fire! Assault Baker … Hey you dumb bastard! Keep your head down! You plan on dying young?… Move into the LSM’s superstructure and commence compartment clearing! Watch out for hostages. I say again, watch out for hostages!”

  MacIntyre moved in behind the Marine and clapped him on the shoulder. “Keep it up, Stone,” he yelled over the gunfire. “I’m going across with Assault Two. Keep me advised. See you later;”

  Quillain didn’t even look around. “Aye, aye, sir. Good luck. Recon Alpha and Bravo, hold in reserve on the main deck….”

  It wasn’t until after MacIntyre had started down the tilted outside ladderway that Quillain looked after him. “Gillruth, heads up,” he said into his lip mike. “Eddie Mac is comin’ down to hook up with your platoon. I want him back alive! You hear me, Lieutenant? Alive!”

  Assault Platoon Baker made its jump off from the settling stern of the Sutanto, crossing to the higher fantail of the Flores. This kept the LSM’s superstructure between the Marines and the volume of fire from the cave front.

  It also mandated a leap up to the LSM higher-deck edge and a five foot vertical haul to get oneself over the lip. Eddie Mac prided himself on the conditioning he maintained for his age, but as he sprang and straight armed himself up he heard and felt long-forgotten musculature pop and creak in protest.

  Dammit to hell entirely, Eddie Mac, a red Corvette would have been a whole lot easier!

  A youthful Marine, carrying three times Maclntyre’s burden, effortlessly bounced over the rail at Madntyre’s side. Turning, he reached down, extending a hand to the admiral. He was rewarded with a glare that could have maimed, and he hastily retreated.

  Marine fire teams were already at work inside the deckhouse. Flash bangs were plentiful and they were doing a fast and dirty cleanout: a concussion grenade through every door, followed by a charge and a sweep around the space with a ready gun barrel.

  Not too ready, however; these were SOC Marines, drilled in hostage rescue work. Fingers were kept off triggers and held extended out parallel to the weapons’ frames, mandating that extra fragment of conscious thought to fire, a deliberate risk taken to avoid a blue-on-blue kill of the hostage they were there to rescue.

  “Clear!”

  “Clear!”

  “Clear!”

  The shouted chant from the fire-team leaders resounded through the passageways. No resistance met. The crew of the Flores had abandoned rather than fighting it out ’tween decks.

  There was no cry of “We got a friendly,” either.

  MacIntyre attached himself to the squad climbing two levels to the upper deck and to officers’ country and the wheelhouse. The things they were looking for would be there if anywhere aboard.

  According to the rebuild diagrams MacIntyre had seen of the refurbished Froche LSM, the captain’s quarters and those of the three mates were located in a deckhouse just forward of the squat exhaust stack and under the wheelhouse and radio shack.

  As he and the Marines worked forward around either side of the funnel, MacIntyre noted a curious sense of oppression and claustrophobia totally alien to what should be felt on the decks of a ship. A man couldn’t stand erect atop the LSM’s wheelhouse without striking his head on the rock ceiling of the cavern. The admiral jumped as something black flickered past his face, a panic-stricken bat fleeing its sanctuary, preferring even the hated day to the growing chaos.

  The fire team rushed the rear entry of the deckhouse, and flashbangs roared again.

  “Clear!”

  “Clear!”

  “Clear!”

  “Clear!”

  Four for four again. No contacts.

  Having gotten the Sutanto inside the cavern, MacIntyre hadn’t wanted to sit on his thumb aboard the hulk, waiting while somebody else did the dirty work. He’d wanted in on the hunt for both Amanda and Harconan. But he also wasn’t a fool. He was quite aware he wasn’t an SOC Marine and that many of his Special Boat skills were rusty. He’d been content to be the trailer at the rear of the clearing squad, with no more mission than to look back over his shoulder.

  That’s what he still was, outside of the exterior hatch with his back to the steel of the bulkhead, when it happened.

  Inside the deckhouse he heard the clunk, and clatter of something bouncing down a ladderway.

  “Grenade! Grenade! Gre—”

  There was an explosion—not the sharp crack of a flashbang, but the crash of the real thing. Two of the SOC Marines who had preceded MacIntyre through the door were hurled back out through it, partially by the force of the bomb and partiall
y by their mad scramble to escape its effect.

  He could not consciously recall how he got there, but MacIntyre found himself kneeling in the doorway, his carbine up-angled and firing ready. Only two Marines lay sprawled in the central passage of the deck house; the others had either been in one of the four cabins that opened off it or had dove for cover there. The attack had come from overhead, down the ladderway that led to the bridge.

  Fortunately the grenade had been an offensive concussion model that didn’t spit shrapnel. It had flattened the assault force, however, leaving them open for a follow-up attack.

  The carbine in MacIntyre’s hands was firing and he didn’t know why, ripping off burst after three-round burst at the top of the ladder. Then he caught up with himself and realized he was firing at movement seen through the opening in the overhead.

  And what was he yelling at the top of his lungs? “Hostiles on the bridge! Hostiles on the bridge! Men down! Men down! We need corpsmen!”

  Someone in the wheelhouse screamed and a second hand grenade dropped to the passageway deck. Now totally detached from his own actions, MacIntyre wondered what he was up to now as he dropped the M-4 and lunged forward.

  The evil little sphere of the grenade skittered across the linoleum, and frantically MacIntyre groped for it. His time sense was so adrenaline-distorted that he couldn’t count the passing seconds. He got his hand on the bomb and twisted to throw it … but where? Semiconscious and wounded Marines sprawled in every adjacent compartment and outside of the only open exterior hatch. The ship’s funnel blocked a clean pitch over the stern.

  The searing realization of his own mortality seized Elliot MacIntyre by his throat. A crazy, kaleidoscopic jumble of images tumbled behind his eyes. His sons, his late wife on her wedding day, his daughter Judy as he had held her in his arms that first morning in the hospital, Amanda Garrett as she would have looked smiling up at him in that black-lace chemise. He clutched the grenade to his stomach and wrapped himself around it to smother the blast.