Firestorm sts-5

by Keith Douglass

  "Magic and Horse take the right," Murdock said into his mike. The four messengers of death began working down the rows of bunks. Now they could see there were about thirty bunks in the room arranged two-high. One shot came from halfway down the right-hand side, and Horse hosed down the area with a nine-round burst.

  Murdock saw a figure rise up from behind a metal bunk. He jolted three rounds into the man's chest area, the easiest body mass on a target to hit, and the Chinese slammed backward and didn't move.

  Jaybird worked ahead slowly, checking under the bunks and on top of them.

  "Clear right," Magic said.

  A moment later Jaybird fired a three-round burst and then Murdock heard his words. "Clear left."

  They worked back up the aisle between the bunks and hurried through the kitchen. Once in the main room they lifted their night-vision goggles, and Murdock heard a voice in his earpiece.

  "L-T, I've got a live Chinese who's able to talk. Could you come up here and give me a hand. He's a tough little guy-"

  "Right, Ching. Be right there."

  Murdock's earplug came alive again. It was Lieutenant Dewitt. "Murdock, we've got trouble out here. Looks like half a company of Chinese regulars. They know how to fight. We're in good defensive positions but we could use that other MG and Magic out here."

  "Copy that," Murdock said. "Horse, Magic, Red, and Doc get outside and lend a hand. Use those forty-millimeter rounds. Move."

  "Thanks, Skipper," Dewitt said. "We'll hold the fort."

  The four SEALS sent outside went to the rear door quietly. Magic shook his head. "Nobody home," he said. They left the back door and hurried around the side of the building like four black shadows. At once they heard the sharp crack of the rifles out front, then the stuttering sound of a Chinese burp gun.

  Magic was surprised that they still used them. The only ones he knew about were the.45-caliber squirt guns the Chinese had used in Korea fifty years ago. They couldn't still have those old weapons, could they?

  Back inside the building, Murdock found Ching halfway down the center aisle. A Chinese soldier lay on his back. His right side was soaked with blood. His right arm was shattered and bloody from his shoulder down.

  "He's tough and still alive, but he doesn't want to talk," Ching said.

  "Ask where he lives," Murdock said.

  Ching chattered at him in Mandarin, and the man looked surprised and mumbled something. "See if he has a family," Murdock said. Ching talked to the man again. He seemed to relax a little.

  Ching pointed to the missile next to them and asked if it was a Dongfeng DF-15. The wounded man said all of them were. High explosives, blow up half of Taiwanese town, he told Ching.

  Ching asked him about the smaller missiles, the ones with the poison gas in them.

  The wounded soldier's eyes went wild for a moment. He chattered and waved his arm and talked again. Ching had to stop him.

  "He says he knows nothing of the poison-gas missiles. They don't have any here. Never did have any." Then he snorted and said, "all lies. That's what the generals tell them to say. The Chinese people are afraid of the poison-gas missiles. So afraid they move from a place where they are kept." Ching asked him if the small missiles were there, the Dongfeng DF-11. The Chinese soldier didn't answer for a Moment. Then he nodded. "Yes, here, right here, but you will never find them," he told Ching in Mandarin. Ching translated for Murdock.

  "Why never find them?" Ching asked the man.

  He shrugged and gasped in pain from his wound. He said again that the Western devils would never find China's number-one weapon. His left hand worked under his left leg slowly.

  Murdock stepped on his wrist and the Chinese screamed in pain.

  Murdock reached down and brought out a small-caliber handgun loaded and ready to fire.

  Ching talked to the man for another five minutes, but that was all he would say. The missiles were there, but the Western devils would never find them. The Chinese grew weaker as he talked. At last he shook his head, laughed at his questioner, and took a deep breath and died.

  Murdock stared at the lifeless body a moment. "So the missiles are here, but we'll never find them. I've got a hunch we'd better soon. Dewitt out front could run into more trouble than he was now."

  Murdock touched his lip mike. "Everyone on the inside. The missiles we're hunting are here someplace. They can't be in the second story, so maybe they're in a basement. Everyone get busy looking for any hint of an opening into a basement. Secret panel, stairwell, elevator, anything. Let's move."

  Outside, Magic and his three SEALS came to the front corner of the building. They were only four dark shadows. They saw a Chinese six-by-six drawn up fifty yards down the street. Rifle fire came from the protection of the truck. Other Chinese weapons sounded from the buildings on the far side of the street.

  Horse Ronson set up his machine gun and fed in a new belt of NATO rounds.

  "The damn truck," he said. Magic nodded. Magic faded along the front of the building to a concrete barrier that prevented any trucks from crashing into the place. It also served as a protected firing position.

  Red moved next to him, and Doc shared the same twelve-foot concrete barricade.

  Ronson opened up on the truck with five-round bursts. The sound of the machine gun brought immediate return fire. Magic and Red concentrated on the fire coming at Ronson. Four bursts later, the truck's gasoline tank blew and the truck billowed into a raging ball of flames. Chinese soldiers rushed away from the rig. It highlighted them for good targets, and half of them never made it into the darkness.

  Toward the center of the string of concrete barricades, Ed Dewitt touched his mike. "Good shooting, Ronson. We didn't have a good angle from here. Looks like some of them are getting discouraged."

  Those with NVGS used them, and here and there a silenced round drove a Chinese soldier to the ground wounded and hurting. Down the line two SEALS fired 40mm grenades where they saw three or more Chinese in a group. In the distance the SEALS heard sirens, but they didn't seem to be coming toward them.

  "Looks like they're pulling back," Dewitt said into his mike. "Let's hold steady and see if they regroup."

  Inside the factory warehouse, Murdock stood with his hands on his hips. "If I were a Chinese, where the hell would I hide missiles I filled with poison gas so they wouldn't scare half the population?" The only place he could think of was underground.

  "Let's do it again, guys. Go over this floor like it was your bank vault. There has to be something here somewhere to tip us off how to get into the fucking basement."

  25

  Sunday, May 17

  0218 hours

  Missile assembly building

  Amoy, China

  It took the SEALS five minutes to find any hint of a basement. Then Ron Holt realized that one section of the floor was made of wooden planks.

  "Could be something down there, L-T," Holt said. They checked how big the wooden area was. It covered nearly a third of the floor.

  "Scour the whole section of the plank floor," Murdock said. "Look for anything that might be able to move."

  Five minutes later, Magic Brown stumbled on it. There was a slot in the floor against the far wall and next to it an open space. Against the wall was a panel that Ching said read "Lights." They opened it and found a series of buttons. Ching read the markings under them and began pushing green buttons.

  At once a section of the floor detached and swung downward. The part of the plank floor that moved was twelve by fifteen feet. It swung down on hinges, and at once an elevator platform filled the void, rising into the place where the floor had been.

  "Let's take a ride," Lieutenant Murdock said, and the four men stepped on the elevator. Ching pushed another button and they were lowered into the basement area. It had a twelve-foot ceiling and was brightly lit. They saw no workers, no guards.

  At once they saw the missiles, the smaller ones.

  "These are the Dongfeng DF11," Ching said. He rea
d the markings on them. "They also don't look like HE rounds. The nose cones are different. These are larger and with silver and green streaks of paint down them."

  "Careful down here," Murdock barked. "No shooting unless absolutely necessary to save your life. Now, Ching, what can we do to disable these babies?"

  Ching frowned, then shook his head. "Damned if I know. We need Scotty Frazier in here." Murdock used his Motorola and called Frazier off the security detail.

  Ching rode the elevator up, and brought him down two minutes later. Frazier looked at the missiles.

  "They loaded with the bad juice?" Frazier asked.

  "We have to assume they are," Murdock said. "How do we disable them?"

  "We don't blow them up, burn them down, or shoot them full of holes, that's for damn sure. We try that and we all fucking die along with half of Amoy. Mechanical. There must be something I can do to the propulsion."

  He started at the closest missile and began tinkering with it. He pulled out a pair of pliers, a crescent wrench, and a screwdriver and went to work.

  Murdock hovered over him, saw it bothered Frazier, and walked away.

  "That's one of them, L-T, but we ain't got time to do them all," Frazier said. "Take three or four hours. Up topside Mister Dewitt said he thought some more troops were coming. My suggestion is to lift up the elevator and disable it, so they can't get the fucking missiles out of this cave."

  Murdock nodded, but kept looking around. His gaze swept over a coiled fire hose against the wall. He grinned.

  "Maybe we turn this place into a swimming pool. That wouldn't do the missiles any good at all, would it? Then we jam the elevator. Turn on every fire hose you can find down here full blast."

  The SEALS scurried to the hoses, strung them out, and turned them on. There were no keys or safety measures. Soon water began to cover the floor.

  "Let's move it, guys," Murdock said. They ran to the elevator platform and Ching hit the buttons to move them up. At the top, he studied the panel a minute, then took out his Sig-Sauer.45-caliber P266 pistol and put six of the big rounds into the control panel. He didn't have the silencer on the heavy weapon, and the crashing sounds of the six shots billowed through the building.

  "Let's get out of Dodge," Murdock said, and the five men trotted toward the door and the hallway to the back entrance. They went outside and came around the side of the building into a firefight.

  Murdock used his radio. "Lincoln, where the hell's that Chinese truck?"

  "Half a block down," Lincoln said. "I can get to it from here. Where do you want me to pick up you guys?"

  Murdock had been thinking about that. There was an alley along the side of the building across a thin wooden fence.

  "Alley down this side of the building, the right-hand side if you're facing the way we drove up here. Got it?"

  "Yes, Sir. Be right with you."

  Dewitt spoke into the net. "Skipper, want us to make a slow withdrawal to the right side of the building?"

  "Roger that. Start to pull some men over. Be at least five minutes before Lincoln gets here. Don't let them know you're moving."

  "Right. I've got one wounded. Doesn't seem to be too bad. See you soon."

  Murdock sent Horse Ronson up to the corner of the building to help lay down machine-gun fire to help the SEALS pull back. He spotted half-a-dozen fire points and began raking them with five-round bursts. Two SEALS moved past him and around the corner. One of them was limping.

  Ronson kept up his chattering fire. He spaced out the bursts, conserving his ammo now so he could last through this fight and any others.

  Another SEAL came past, turned, fired a final 40mm grenade, and darted around the corner before the round hit a hundred yards down the street. Al Adams with his CAR15 dropped beside Ronson.

  "Holding them off. Thanks for the help." He started to load a 40mm grenade.

  "Better save it, mate," Ronson said. "We ain't back in the bay yet. Might need some more firepower." Adams waved and ran around the corner of the building.

  The rest of the SEALS came back singly until Lieutenant Dewitt dropped down beside Ronson. "That's all of us, Ronson. Heard the truck yet?"

  "No, sir."

  "We better give the Chinese something else to think about."

  Just then three figures jumped up from thirty feet away and charged the corner of the building.

  Ronson cut down two of them with two five-round bursts. Lieutenant Dewitt lifted his MP5 and sent six rounds into the last Chinese, who staggered and fell only a dozen feet away.

  "Let's move back halfway," Dewitt said.

  They heard a truck coming, and saw it as a black shadow as it rolled down the alley twenty feet across the wooden fence.

  "Yeah," Ronson said. "Moving time."

  They both set up as rear guard as they heard the fence smashed down and the SEALS stomping over it. Jaybird ran up to them and motioned them back. He stayed where they had been and sent a burst of rounds from his MP5 toward the far corner the rear guard had just left. He kept the curious Chinese soldiers from firing around the corner. A horn honked once, and Jaybird sent another six rounds screaming toward where the Chinese must be coming. Then he turned and ran for the truck. As he climbed on board, Magic Brown was slamming one round after another over the tailgate of the truck and into the spot where Jaybird had just been. The truck lurched ahead and they rolled down the alley and into the street.

  That was when they heard the sirens. Murdock sat in the front seat beside the driver Ross Lincoln.

  "Which way, L-T?"

  The sirens came from the bay side. "Wanted to go back the way we came, but those sirens must be bringing more troops. We better head the other way for a mile or so. Then we'll cut back to the east and then south again and hope we can find the bay. I'd love to get back to the water as soon as we can."

  The street they were on was narrow, a side street of some kind with mostly industrial buildings on both sides. They had turned left from the warehouse, and soon came to a wider avenue heading south the way they wanted to go.

  Lincoln paused at the intersection. They looked right and saw two sets of blinking red lights racing toward them. They waited. One Army car and an ambulance went screaming past with sirens wailing.

  "Straight across," Murdock said. "No other choice. We still need to go left when we can."

  "What about the troop transports, sir?" Lincoln asked.

  Murdock frowned and rubbed his face. "We ignore them. If the planes don't drop the paratroops to secure the dock areas, the troops can't land. If the missiles don't fly, they won't wipe out the Taiwan military. I think the troops on those transports are moot right now. They don't mean a fucking thing."

  Two blocks later they came to a wider street heading south.

  "Take it," Murdock said.

  They swung that way, and another block down they saw a roadblock ahead. Two military rigs sat crossways in the street closing it. Murdock reached into the back of the truck through the back window of the cab.

  "Give me a machine gun," He barked. He got one in his hands at once and pulled it into the cab. There was a belt of ammo hanging from the receiver.

  "Keep going, then slow down as if you're going to stop," Murdock said. "I'll fire and you ram us right through hitting the center of the barricade."

  When they were forty yards from the two Chinese Army cars, Murdock rammed the HK chatter gun out the passenger's-side window, leaned out, and sprayed a five-round burst into each of the two Cars. Then he concentrated on four soldiers standing behind the cars. In a moment they took return fire.

  One round cracked the windshield. Murdock fired across the hood and scattered three shooters. Then he saw the collision coming and held on to the door frame and the weapon.

  The heavy truck hit the two smaller rigs and drove them forward with scraping and tearing of metal. Then the much heavier truck pushed the small rigs aside and was through the barricade. The SEALS in the back of the truck poured out deadly fire
at the defenders of the fort, who were now exposed and too dazed even to fire back. Half a block later they were free and clear.

  "Good driving, Lincoln. You ever been in a destruction derby at your local racecourse?"

  "Just once, sir. Lost my radiator and my engine on the first crash. Nobody told me you had to back up into everyone."

  The street they drove down was less industrial now and showed an occasional business and a house or two. The street swung slowly to the left.

  "Sir, looks like we're heading right back toward that main drag we came up to the missiles place. We want to do that?"

  "No, take a right on the next good-looking street. We don't want to hit any more roadblocks."

  The next street was wider than any they had been on. Here the buildings were all retail firms, and only a few had two stories. They drove half a mile, and then Lincoln pointed.

  "Looks like another barricade ahead, sir, about three blocks. Three or four rigs and some flashing reds."

  "Right next street," Murdock said. "We don't want to get lost, but we can't take a lucky round into the radiator which would stop us dead in half a mile. We need to get out of town. Let's keep on this street as long as we can. At best we're going parallel to the coast. Then all we have to do is cut cross country and find Mother Ocean."

  Murdock hoped it would be that simple. He touched his radio mike. "Casualty report," he said.

  Dewitt came on. "Frazier has a slight side wound. Not critical. He's fit for duty. Doc tied it up and gave him a shot. The other problem is Fernandez. Nasty hit in his right forearm. Might have touched a bone. He says he can still manage his M89. Doc looked at it and wrapped it and gave him a shot of morphine. I'll watch them both."

  Murdock acknowledged the report. So far all of his men were fit to fight. It might not last. All they had to do was get back to the water. But how in hell did they do that? A good road map would help.

  "Ching," Murdock called. Ching poked his head through the opening between cab and truck body.

  "Yes, sir."

  "We need to get to the coast. Are there any road signs that could help us? Poke your head out and check every cross street and road we see. We're fucking lost."