by Tom Clancy
"Bro, there's a four-by-four up there," said Smith. "You see him? That ain't the captain! That looks military!"
"Matt, this is Bo," called Jenkins. "What's going on up there?"
Chances were high that the four-by-four belonged to the army and that the Spring Tigers had ordered patrols out during the predawn hours as part of their larger plans. Ramirez held his breath as the truck pulled up behind them and stopped.
The side-view mirror reflected a green truck not unlike the Brave Warrior but with a canvas top and large windows. Two armed soldiers got out and came toward them, pistols drawn.
Ramirez looked at Beasley, whose gaze was trained on his side-view mirror.
"Here we go, bro," Beasley whispered.
Suddenly, more lights wiped across the overpass, and the two soldiers whirled to face yet another military truck turning off the road and coming down toward them.
The second truck rolled to a stop behind the first, and the soldiers turned to face it.
"Joey, now!" stage-whispered Beasley.
In unison they bolted up, hung out their windows, and shot both men, who dropped, even as a third soldier was emerging from the second truck.
Before he could get back inside to take cover, and before either Ramirez or Beasley could fire, the soldier's chest blew outward, and he slumped below his open door.
Ramirez detected movement in the passenger's seat. Yet another troop.
As he shifted his aim, a thump came from the canvas window in back, and blood clouded the windshield.
"Bravo Team, this is Diaz. You're clear now. We're coming down."
"Roger that," said Beasley.
Ramirez turned back into the SUV and slumped in his seat, taking long, slow breaths. "She could've told us they stopped," he snapped.
Beasley frowned. "She does that." He opened his door and started out of the SUV.
"So much for the quiet exit," said Ramirez, joining Beasley outside. They grimaced over the dead soldiers, the fourth lying in a pulp inside the other car.
The sight of death hardly bothered them. The ramifications of those deaths did. "They've lost contact with their unit."
"Yep. We have their attention," said Beasley with a groan. "Give me a hand with these bodies."
Ramirez snorted and gestured with his sling. "One is all you're getting."
SAND SPIT PIER
XIAMEN HARBOR, CHINA
APRIL 2012
Montana had slipped in under the patrol boat, gliding into the pass between Haicang and Gulangyu Island. She had headed northeast, coming around to the east side of the spit, where SEAL Chiefs Tanner and Phillips locked out and swam ashore.
Tanner had thought it was high time that he and his blond, freckle-faced colleague got more involved in the Ghost Team's exfiltration, and after the captain had briefed them on the mission and asked if they had questions, Tanner had answered, "Sir, SEAL Chief Phillips and I have just one question."
"And that is?"
"We don't understand why Mitchell and his team didn't join the navy."
Gummerson had grinned and dismissed them.
Now they sprinted up from the beach and reached the woods, where they wove a breathtaking path through the trees and neared the pier, just as Gummerson called to say there'd been trouble back at the boat dock. Four soldiers dead. More undoubtedly on the way. The Ghosts were loading up now, but they couldn't sit at the dock. They'd have to putter down the coast a thousand yards or so, slip up to another pier, and wait there, while hell broke loose behind them.
So Tanner and Phillips had even less time to get the job done. Wearing a pair of NVGs, Tanner studied the ferry and crane, just as the operator lowered a pallet of fifty-five-gallon fuel drums onto the pier under the watchful gazes of three members of the barge crew.
Tanner gave Phillips the signal.
They moved in.
FISHING BOAT
XIAMEN HARBOR, CHINA
APRIL 2012
Mitchell had ordered Jenkins and Beasley to haul Buddha's body onto the fishing boat and lay him along the rail. Boy Scout lay beside him. The DIA had been emphatic about returning the bodies and not allowing them to remain in China, where they might provide clues that could topple an even larger network of spies still in the country, some of whom also worked for the National Security Agency.
Mitchell remained on the deck at the stern, monitoring the SEALs' progress via his HUD, while Jenkins took the wheel. They chugged slowly away from the pier, everyone down low, weapons at the ready. Dark waves thumped and lapped at the hull, and their foamy wake was quickly swallowed back by the harbor.
About a kilometer ahead, to the southwest, the pier jutted out from the sand spit, and Mitchell barely made out the silhouette of the crane with his naked eye.
"Well that didn't take long," said Diaz, pointing toward the stern.
A pair of headlights came down the shoreline road, and the vehicle appeared, another military truck turning toward the boat docks.
"Jenkins, throttle up a little bit," said Mitchell.
"You got it, Boss."
"Joey, how are you doing?" Mitchell asked, raising his voice over the engine's higher-pitched gurgles and whine.
"Alex gave me that shot," answered Ramirez. "Arm's numb."
"The dragon didn't pounce on Taiwan, but it stepped on us pretty good, eh?" asked Mitchell.
"Yes, sir. But it was worth it."
"I agree," added Diaz. "In more ways than one." She pursed her lips and nodded at Mitchell.
"Captain, I can see the patrol boat," said Jenkins. "And I'm not sure, but I think she sees us."
"Get up close to that pier!" shouted Mitchell. "Now!"
Mitchell brought up his tactical map and studied the patrol boat, red diamonds flashing over its dark outline displayed in his HUD.
A flickering light emanated from the end of the pier, and Mitchell zoomed in on that area, even as Jenkins said, "Fire on the pier, Captain."
"All right, everybody. Stand by. Let's see if they take the bait."
SAND SPIT PIER
XIAMEN HARBOR, CHINA
APRIL 2012
Tanner and Phillips had used a small amount of C-4 to set off one of the fuel pallets on the pier before dropping back into the murky water. Tanner swam toward the crane, while Phillips worked his way around to the fuel barge.
The patrol boat was already en route to investigate. If Tanner were the captain of that Shanghai, he, too, would want to know why his gas station was on fire.
Tanner swam around the crane's floating platform, keeping the crane between him and the oncoming patrol boat. The crane operator and his assistant had run down to the edge of the barge for a better look at the fire, allowing Tanner to climb up onto the platform and race across it to the crane's cabin, where he placed his C-4 then dove into the water, swimming hard and fast back toward the pier.
A minute later he came up under one of the pilings and stole a breath.
He waited another thirty seconds, then began to grow tense. Abruptly, Phillips's head popped up a few meters behind him. "We're all set. Come on!"
Together they swam along the pier, and by the time they reached the shore and huddled beside the first pair of pilings, the patrol boat was drawing up on the crane and barge.
"Ghost Lead, this is SEAL support. Get ready for a big salute to the Chinese who invented gunpowder!"
Tanner knew he'd catch hell for his glib remark over the radio, but he didn't care. He glanced over at Phillips, who was studying the patrol boat through his binoculars.
"They're almost lined up," said Phillips.
"Good."
"Don't move," screamed someone in Mandarin.
Tanner glanced directly up into the eyes of a man, presumably a member of the fuel barge crew, who was pointing a pistol down at them. Where the hell had he come from? How had he been so quiet?
Though his Mandarin was rudimentary, Tanner knew enough to get by. "All right, we will come with you."
"No, you don't move." The man glanced up and began screaming to those still aboard the fuel barge, something about him catching thieves who might be trying to hijack their shipment. He couldn't tell in the dark that they were Americans, especially while they wore their dive suit hoods.
Tanner exchanged a look with Phillips.
FISHING BOAT
XIAMEN HARBOR, CHINA
APRIL 2012
Mitchell realized with a start that a third individual was at the end of the pier with the two SEALs, and his attempts to contact SEAL Chief Tanner went unanswered.
He got on the network, reported the news, and General Keating chimed in, "Mitchell, trust those SEALs to get the job done. Just get out of there, son! Move!"
"Jenkins, hit it! Everything she's got!" Mitchell ordered.
"But, Captain, they haven't—"
"I know. Just do it!"
"Sir," called Diaz, who was wearing her own ENVGs. "The patrol boat's slowing, and they've launched a Zodiac with six guys. They're heading for the pier. What the hell are those SEALs waiting for?"
"There's a third guy. Don't know who he is. But we're out of time."
"Mitchell, Keating here," cried the general. "Remember those soldiers you took out? Well, we got new intel. Those guys were part of Admiral Cai's defense plan. And I got more bad news. Seems there's an R44 police chopper in the air — but there's a catch. We've intercepted their communications. Montana tells us it's being manned by Cai's special ops people. He sent his attack choppers up north as part of Pouncing Dragon, so these guys must've commandeered this bird. This isn't the local puppy patrol, Mitchell. These are hardened Chinese fighters up there. ETA to your location: two minutes."
THIRTY-THREE
SAND SPIT PIER
XIAMEN HARBOR, CHINA
APRIL 2012
SEAL Chief Tanner wouldn't let some punk with a cheap pistol ruin his night. Phillips's eyes said likewise.
In unison, they squeezed the triggers on their remote detonators and rolled under the pilings, out of the barge worker's aim.
The guy fired, the shot ricocheting off the rocks behind them, just as the first pair of detonations resounded so loudly that even Tanner, a veteran of blowing stuff up, was awed by the initial cacophony and blast wave, which threw him and Phillips back against the rocks.
It was the fuel, all that fuel, whose sound and detonation Tanner could not have anticipated.
Then came the reverberation ripping through the pier like an earthquake, tearing up the farthest planks in succession as he and Phillips got back to their feet, dashed below the pier, and came up the other side, where the barge worker had turned to face the dozens of fireballs lighting up the entire spit.
Tanner summarily shot him, then he and his partner raced back into the woods, their backs warmed by fires.
After jogging a few dozen meters, Tanner stole a look back, saw some of the patrol boat's crew members jumping ship and swimming toward the shoreline, even as the Zodiac motored away from the explosions.
Tanner swore and hurried to catch up with Phillips, who had already found their secondary position and was ready for the next detonation.
FISHING BOAT
XIAMEN HARBOR, CHINA
APRIL 2012
Mitchell's mouth fell open, and he found himself clambering to his feet for a better look.
Fifty-five-gallon drums burst apart, catapulting others into the air, all part of a hellish fountain swelling up from the pier to spew orange and red showers of burning diesel fuel. Dozens of smaller bursts mushroomed up before walls of black smoke as the stench of fuel and hot metal finally reached them across the water.
SEAL Chief Tanner had been right about the gunpowder remark, but it was the Chinese who had also invented fireworks, and this display rivaled anything Mitchell had ever seen — in combat or otherwise.
The fuel barge itself finally went up in a single, massive blast, the intense, near-white light coming first, followed by a boom that made everyone aboard flinch as it echoed off the opposite shoreline.
Thousand of pieces of flaming debris shot high into the air, like a swarm of bottle rockets, then tumbled down into the dark water, immediately extinguished, the hissing steam fanning out in ringlets as the bow of the barge suddenly appeared behind the flames. That bow tipped up and began sinking, the rest of the boat either gone or simply unseen behind the raging fires.
The crew aboard the patrol boat, which had been gliding up toward the barge, was scrambling on the deck, the boat beginning to turn away from the catastrophe off their port bow.
But then the crane cabin tore apart in yet another thunderclap, shards of metal slicing through the air like throwing stars that tore into the patrol boat's hull and pilothouse as a dragon's breath of fire spread over the deck, igniting crew members who staggered to the rails and threw themselves overboard.
Tanner's placement of the C-4 was sheer artistry. While the debris continued slamming into the patrol boat, the crane's massive boom blew loose from its support fitting and slowly came down with a screech and groan as piercing as it was foretelling.
And if timing was everything, then Tanner's delay had been intentional, because that boom caught the forward corner of the patrol boat's pilothouse like a sledgehammer on a loaf of white bread.
Metal peeled back amid flurries of sparks and flames licking along the surfaces, but the boat's twin diesel engines kept on, dragging and bending the boom with it, waves suddenly rising up over her sides under all that added weight. Suddenly, her bow became entirely submerged, the water streaming up to her antiaircraft guns.
"Captain, I know fireworks," cried Hume. "And the navy's putting on one hell of a show!"
Not a second after Hume finished, the ammo stored in ready lockers on the patrol boat's stern deck began cooking off in dozens more pops, cracks, and bangs that lit up the shattered boat like a rock concert.
The bursting of more fuel drums on the pier, the roar of the still-burning fuel barge, and the creaking of the toppled crane, along with the patrol boat's exploding ammo, combined to form a brilliant beacon of devastation easily seen and heard for kilometers, especially by those situated along the powerless coastline.
And those in the air.
"There he is!" cried Diaz, as they sailed directly opposite of the burning pier. The marksman had already taken aim with her secondary rifle, the Cx4 Storm SD.
"Got him," replied Mitchell, spotting the helicopter, whose doors had been removed to allow gunners to hang out either side.
The chopper's searchlight painted a gleaming puddle in the harbor as thick smoke wafted through its beam. Mitchell squinted as the light momentarily blinded him.
And then, just as the beam shifted, two helmeted soldiers lifted their rifles.
"Weapons free, fire!" ordered Mitchell, cutting loose with his own MR-C, Diaz's weapon rattling a second after his.
The pilot reacted immediately, banking hard left and pulling up, the chopper's belly gleaming with ricocheting rounds for a few seconds until the pilot finally ascended out of the fire.
"Give him more lead, more lead," cried Mitchell, seeing how much faster the chopper was than his team had anticipated.
Jenkins, who was still at the wheel, turned the boat left, bringing them past several long piers crowded by old sampans and a few junks with crimson sails waiting to be unfurled. A trio of more modern ferries was moored behind them. Jenkins made one more turn, now heading directly toward the gap between Haicang and Gulangyu Island.
"He's not coming back," said Smith, lowering his rifle. "What the hell?"
The downlink channel appeared in Mitchell's HUD. "Better step it up, son," warned General Keating. "Remember, Montana won't surface till you get past that gap. And she won't surface with that chopper up there." The general turned away from the camera. "What is it? Hold on, Mitchell."
"Can't you go any faster?" hollered Beasley.
Jenkins shook his head.
"Aw, man, look at that!" cried Ramirez.
As Mitchell turned toward the bow, Keating appeared once more in the HUD. "All right, Mitchell. You don't have one chopper to deal with — you got two."
And Mitchell didn't need that new intel now. The second bird swept in behind the first, and now both soared back toward their boat, noses pitched forward, gunners taking aim.
If the Ghosts survived this, there was a great lesson to be learned: Never bring an old fishing boat to a helicopter battle.
He cursed then shouted, "Alpha Team, target left chopper. Bravo, take the right. Diaz, go for the pilots. And Smith? Hold fire and deploy my drone!"
Smith dove to the deck and sloughed off his pack. He withdrew the MAV4mp Cypher and tossed it hard like a Frisbee over the side, while the others began firing at the choppers.
Mitchell took control of the drone with his wireless controller and steered it directly toward the chopper on the right.
"Keep up that fire!" he ordered as both helicopters swooped down to strafe them.
Shifting the drone's camera to a forward view, Mitchell took the UAV into a dive, then came right up toward one of the gunners leaning out his open door.
The gunner looked up, frowned, as Mitchell throttled up and slammed the drone directly into the guy's head, even as he continued on, bringing the Cypher inside the chopper.
"Zai jian," Mitchell muttered.
He thumbed a button.
The drone exploded inside the chopper with a small flash and subsequent puff of smoke. Despite the relatively small charges, the self-destruct was still powerful enough to take out both gunners and blind the pilot, who suddenly pulled up, breaking off in an erratic turn.
"Put your fire on him!" ordered Mitchell.
But he'd failed to realize that the second chopper had dropped like a hawk, talons extended to snatch a fish from the water. Streaking now off their port side, the chopper edged closer, the gunner opening fire as Beasley and Smith answered in unison with their MR-Cs, while Diaz released a salvo at the cockpit window.
Ramirez, one-handing his MK14, directed his bead at the smoking chopper, automatic fire chewing into glass and metal.
