Tropical Terror (20 page)

“So, American politician, you think about your situation. I have a more pleasant task.” He slapped Governor Itashi gently on the cheek and left the tent.

The lieutenant went down two tent frames and entered the fourth one. Two women were chained to the barren wooden bunks. Both sat watching the single candle that burned on a built-in table.

He saw fear growing on the women's faces.

“Was that a shot I heard?” the older one asked.

“Yes, the governor has one of my bullets in him. Now, which of you would like to volunteer for special duty?” He watched them closely. Neither said a word nor looked at him. The oldest one was about forty, he decided, but with a slim body she had taken good care of and with fine breasts. The younger one was chunky and not appealing.

He moved forward and unchained the older one. “Your name is Sara, as I remember.” He took her by the hand. “Come, Sara, you have special duty tonight. I think you'll find it most interesting.”

“No,” the woman screamed. “I want to stay here.”

He jerked the end of the chain locked around her left wrist. Sara screamed again. Lieutenant Hing snorted and yanked the chain, pulling her with him out the flap of the tent and
toward his tent at the end of the line of six. Sara screamed all the way.

 

In the heavy growth less than five hundred yards below, Murdock and the rest of the SEALs heard the screams.

“The bastards must be doing the women,” Dobler said. “Two on the staff up here are women, right?”

Murdock said he was right.

“Time we start moving up the hill,” Murdock said into the Motorola. “We'll go in an assault line, ten yards between. They must be somewhere right above us. Let's move out, silently as all hell. I'd like to give these bastards a real SEAL surprise.”

Murdock had been worried about the hostages ever since they took on this assignment. One of the women was forty-one years old, the other one twenty-six. The older one was the governor's chief administrative assistant, extremely competent and said by some to be the real brains behind the governor. She evidently was something of a triple threat. The short description of her he had read at Pearl said she was brilliant, pleasant, and a former Miss Hawaii who had a doctorate in government administration.

The other woman was reported to be smart as a computer and an expert in public relations, but as plain as a mud fence.

Murdock ran forward ten yards and stopped behind a tree trunk. He could hear nothing from above now. They must have protection out. But a 360-degree circle protection would be tough with the men spread thin. Still, the SEALs were getting so close. He would have had at least an outpost out this way.

Lam came on the Motorola. “Skipper, I don't understand this. Where the hell is the defense? It's a walk in the park
right here. I must be no more than five hundred feet from the top of the ledge.”

“Hang on. Won't bother me if we can walk right into the middle of them.”

Five minutes later, they knew the problem. Murdock sat on the ground looking up. It was a sheer cliff with not a chance climbing it without a lot of pitons and ropes. No wonder the Chinese didn't need any security along here. It was natural protection.

Murdock used the radio softly. “Okay, we're stopped here. We move on around the side of the mountain until we find a way up. This rock wall can't last forever. Let's move out. Lam, get to the front of the column. Maintain the ten yards. Move it.”

 

Sara Livingston stood in the middle of the tent and stared at her captor. “Lieutenant, I have no doubt why you brought me here. We are both intelligent adults. There is no reason that we should have to act like animals. I have been married twice. Usually I enjoy sex. Now, with your brutal start, I'm not sure that I would.” She watched him closely for some indication of compassion. She found none.

“Lieutenant, I won't try to fight you off if sex is what you want. Is that why you brought me here?”

Lieutenant Hing smiled. “Of course. I spent four years in school at UCLA. I know all about American women and their fondness for wild sex. I'm glad that you are taking a reasonable approach to this situation. I find you most attractive.”

Sara nodded and sat on the bunk, which had an air mattress on it and army blankets. She began to unbutton the white blouse that she wore under the warm ski jacket.

“What are you doing?” he asked.

“Undressing. I assume you want me to.” She paused in the opening.

He smiled and then laughed softly. “Yes, but I want to do the unwrapping myself. Like on your Christmas.”

Sara nodded and folded her hands in her lap. He sat down beside her.

“This will be much more pleasant for both of us,” he said. His hands covered her breasts and fondled them through her
blouse and bra. “Oh, yes. I had forgotten about you American women and your big tits. I love big breasts.”

“You can call them tits, I don't mind.”

As he undressed her, Sara let her mind drift away. She saw herself when she was thirteen and overwhelmingly interested in boys. She had found out something new about boys when one afternoon in the woods behind her parents' house, two boys undressed her. They were too frightened to do anything else. They both ejaculated and then ran away screeching in wonder and delight. She had smiled and put on her clothes.

He shook her gently. “Pretty Sara, you are not with me. You were far away. I like my women to be with me.”

She saw that she was naked and so was he. He was just another man. Nothing she hadn't seen before. She sighed and nodded.

“What do you want me to do?” she asked.

He told her.

Afterward he said she might as well spend the night with him. The bed was softer and they had plenty of blankets. Sara nodded. It made little difference to her. Here she might be able to do some damage to the lieutenant, but she had seen nothing in the tent that she could use as a weapon. There was always the three-inch hat pin she used in her hair to keep part of the side in place. He might find that.

She looked around. He had been careful to keep his submachine gun and his knife on the far side away from the bed. She relaxed. This was just another small problem she had to help solve for the governor. The big problem was his wife. That one would take a lot of planning and work, but she would do it. The current first lady would be gone within a year. That had been the promise she made herself.

The lieutenant dressed and went outside to check on his troops. He told her not to dress; he would be back soon.

Now he came in shivering from the high-altitude chill, and flipped the blankets back and stared at her naked form.

“Again,” he said.

She nodded. “Why not?” she whispered.

This time she thought about her first two marriages, her husbands. The first time when she was only twenty and Miss
Hawaii. Grand and glorious, a roller-coaster ride of ups and downs and loops and standing on your head wondering who you were and if people really liked you or only your title.

Then the year was over and she married in haste and not well. It lasted three months.

No, no. Don't think about old days. Today. How could she help Tom get out of this one? This jaunt was no surprise to anyone. Everyone had known where they were going for the week. The Chinese must have known as well. His gun. She had to get hold of his gun and kill him. She never blinked or wavered. As she had done all her life, she would do what was required to get the job done. She could do it. Now all that she needed was the opportunity.

From outside she heard gunfire rip into the softness of the Hawaiian night. Lieutenant Hing tensed for a moment, then leaped off the bed, ran naked toward the door of the tent, and looked out. He held the submachine gun in his right hand.

Quickly he pulled on his pants, scooped up a belt filled with magazines for the weapon, and ran outside.

 

Murdock fired again. “Where the hell them motherfuckers come from?” he bleated on the mike.

“Six of them up here from the look of the muzzle flashes,” Lam said.

“I've got at least four on my end,” DeWitt said.

“We've got a shit-pot full,” Ron Holt chimed in.

For the past one hundred yards they had been moving around the slope of the mountain. They had been forced downward until they were at least a thousand feet below the camp. The terrain over them now looked to be one gentle slant up to the top. An ideal spot to attack, and just as perfect for the Chinese to set up a stiff defense.

“Use the twenties,” Murdock said. “Laser on the flashes. It should work.” As he spoke he brought up his Bull Pup and sighted in on the next series of flashes. Then he pulled the trigger. The weapon was new enough that the blast of the 20mm round caught him by surprise. The heavy weapon recoiled more then he remembered.

He sighted in on the next laser flash, but caught an airburst
flash instead and triggered. By then there were six men firing the Bull Pups at the targets. He let each man fire four or five rounds, then called a cease-fire on the radio. One more flash came from above, then the night quieted.

“What the hell, we waste all them puppies?” Bill Bradford asked.

“At least we scared the shit out of them,” Jefferson said.

“Any casualties?” Murdock asked on the net.

“My turn,” a weak voice said.

“Doc, that you?” Murdock asked.

“Yeah. My lucky day. Caught one in the arm. When the fuck am I gonna learn to keep my damn head down.”

“How bad, Doc?”

Jack Mahanani sighed. “Hell, not sure. Went through. A five-five-six maybe. Ostercamp, you near me?”

“Moving your way, Doc. Hang tough.”

“Rest of us move forward,” Murdock said. “We take it easy. If we get to some bodies up there, we grab their MGs and tote them. Never can tell.”

They moved slowly, working up the hill through the darkness and the heavy growth for nearly fifty yards.

“Skip, I got Doc's arm bandaged up. Bleeding stopped. He's gung ho to keep coming with us. Your call.”

“His call. Be glad to have him. Both of you get your tails up here with the troops.”

Murdock stumbled over the first body a few minutes later. He put his back to the top of the hill and used his pencil flash. The Chinese trooper had shrapnel slashes on his head and torso. The twenty had nailed him.

They found five bodies. Two of them lay on weapons Murdock determined to be H & K 53's, a German submachine gun that fired a rifle cartridge in the 5.56 size. A beautiful little weapon. It had a curved twenty-five-round magazine. Murdock grabbed two full mags from the corpse and slung the 53 over his shoulder.

“Hold here until Doc and Ostercamp get here,” Murdock said. “There are some good weapons here if you can find them H & K fifty-threes.”

Murdock checked ahead. More trees and brush. He could barely see the top of the mountain against the rising moon.

“What next?” Lam asked on the net. “Now they know we're here with firepower.”

“Lam, take a scouting walk to the left. Franklin, do the same on the right. Go out seventy-five yards or so and see if you can hear any more outposts.”

Doc Mahanani and Ostercamp came up and the corpsman sat and leaned against a tree. Murdock knelt beside him.

“Hey, sawbones. Can you still pull a trigger?”

“Damn straight.”

“What day is this?”

“Don't have the foggiest. I'm lucid. You kidding about a sub gun that shoots out a five-five-sixer?”

“No lie. You're lucid. We take five and wait to see that no outposts close in on us on our flanks.”

Lam and Franklin both reported in that they'd neither found nor heard any outposts or Chinese activity.

“Come back, double time,” Murdock said. “Then we're going to charge up this hill and overrun that outfit.”

 

Above them at the camp, the four men prisoners were in the same tent. The Chinese had said it was for better security, only one tent to guard.

Karl Tucker was the governor's top money-raiser. He had the ideas and connections and could throw a thousand-dollar-a-plate dinner or a dog-on-a-stick picnic with equal panache. The governor knew his background, and had shown outward surprise at the way Tucker had acted when they were overwhelmed and captured. Two of the men had had to be knocked down and tied up. Tucker had dropped to the ground cowering when the armed Chinese ran toward him.

The governor had not spoken about it to Tucker. The man was brilliant. He must have something in mind.

Karl Tucker had been the smallest man in his company when he went through Marine Corps recruit training at San Diego. He stood no more than five-six with his boots on. His loose shirt concealed a muscular upper body that could power-lift more than three times his weight. He had excelled in hand-to-hand and other types of one-on-one combat exercises and training routines. He had applied to be in the
Marine Recon Force, but had missed passing the physical due to his height.

This night, he decided, was the right time. He had heard the gunfire outside, and could pick out the distinctive sound of the 20mm rounds exploding. He had no idea who had a twenty weapon up here, but it was time to help.

He was chained to the tent wall posts, as were the other men. There was no way to slip off the chain. The men had been stripped of all the items in their pockets, but Karl had saved a hairpin. He'd hidden it in his own hair.

Now he took it out and worked quickly on the locks on the chain around his wrist. He had it opened in less than thirty seconds. Only the governor was awake. They tended to go to sleep when it grew dark. Their tent had no candle.

Governor Itashi heard Karl moving. “Tucker, you all right?”

“Fine, Governor. Just waiting to make my move. Going to kill me a few Chinese, then try to hook up with that outfit attacking them. Must be some Marines out there.”

“Be careful, Karl. We have big plans.”

“I know, Governor. Semper fi.”

It was the last sound Tucker made before he slipped out the tent's loose door and paused in the shadows checking out the area. He had tried to remember it from the first day. Six tents. No buildings. Where would the interior guards be? He waited. A shadow moved to his left, thirty feet away. For just a second a match flared, and Karl grinned. A sentry smoking. That was suicide. He moved that way. The guard would have no night vision after the flare of the match for at least a minute.

Karl hurried toward the sentry. Caught the smell of tobacco, then saw the glow of the cigarette. He moved up from the side, waiting until the man looked the other way.

When he turned, Karl hurtled at the sentry on silent feet, hit him with a shoulder block on the left side, and drove him off his feet to the ground. The sentry made only one gurgled sound before Karl's hands closed around his throat and cut off all sound and air. It took the man two minutes to die. Karl had felt a body go limp and dead before. He eased away, took the sentry's knife and his short, deadly weapon. Some
sort of submachine gun. Good. He found three full magazines on the man, but nothing else of value. He looked at the end tent. It would be the most obvious for the Chinese officer to use. Then a squad of eight men jogged toward him. Karl went flat on the ground next to the tree and held his breath.

The squad jogged on past in step and vanished into the night to the west. He heard three more shots from the west. That must be where the attack was taking place. He looked at the end tent. At least two candles burned inside. With the action outside, it was for sure that the lieutenant wouldn't still be in his tent. There must be more guards around this area.