Part 26 (2/2)
”I think these guys are living inside the broken-off section of the fuselage. If so, they're fish in a barrel.”
”Are you sure?”
”No, but I can't find any camp in back of that section of the plane. It's thirty feet long or more. The whole tail section has broken off; we saw that from the air.”
”Would grenades thrown in there harm the bomb?” Rafii asked.
”Probably not,” Murdock said as softly as the others were talking. He nodded. ”How much farther do we have the way cleared?”
”All the way to the c.o.c.kpit jammed into the ground. About thirty yards.”
”Gardner, move the rest of the platoon up near the c.o.c.kpit and take cover. Lam and I will do one more recon.”
Murdock took the imager from Rafii and let Lam lead out. They moved cautiously, not making a sound. The jungle floor here was soft and moist, and each step was an adventure to find out if something underfoot would snap or some animal would scream in protest.
At the nose of the plane, they looked around. They could see the faint image of the ragged front of the fuselage where it had broken off. Behind it they saw nothing. Lam motioned up the hill. They moved at a right angle to the plane, working thirty yards into the jungle growth, worming under much of it, stepping over roots and branches and sliding around trees.
At that distance, Lam turned a right angle to the left and worked until he figured they were in front of the middle of the stricken aircraft. He pointed down the slope and they edged that way through the trees and underbrush. Each step they took was only after a quick sweep of the area ahead with the thermal imagers. They spotted no guards. Another rocky place allowed them to move faster, and soon they were with thirty feet of the plane. They stopped. A low murmur of voices came. Then a match flared somewhere inside the dark outline of a door that had been torn off the big aircraft in the crash.
Murdock and Lam looked at each other and nodded. Murdock's whisper came softly.
”We need four men on the far side of the plane at the other door. They might try to get out the far door. Two men to cover the broken-out front of the tomb and two at the tail section. Bring the rest up here by a shorter route. The quicker the better. We'll use three beeps on the radio when each unit gets into place. After four of the signals, we'll be ready. Tell the three off-side units to toss in grenades as soon as they hear five beeps from me. Go now before the mercenaries and their friends miss those three sentries they had out. When everyone is in place, the party will begin.”
31.
Murdock waited twenty minutes, and then he crawled forward inch by inch until the thirty feet from the plane had been cut in half. He had one fragger in his hand and the other hand held the Bull Pup set on the 5.56 barrel. He watched the dark hole in the white-painted airliner fuselage. Now he could hear a soft mumble of voices. No one that he heard inside tried to quiet the men. He wondered how many there were. Twenty? Even thirty? They were probably mostly mercenaries, but they had fired at his men and they were working for a terrorist. That made them fair game, and many of them would die within the hour.
Five minutes after he was in his chosen position to throw two hand grenades into the airliner door, he heard the first three-beep signal on the radio earpiece. The in-ear signal could not be heard by anyone without the Motorola.
That would be the men at the broken-off front of the fuselage. It would take the other two units longer to get in position. Another five minutes crawled past before he heard the next series of three soft beeps in his earpiece. Then two minutes later the last set of three signals came through. All units in place. He dug out the second grenade and laid it beside his rifle. Then he pulled the safety pin on the hand bomb and held down the long thin metal handle that would arm the grenade once it flew off. He touched his radio and sent five beeps. The next second he lobbed the first grenade into the open door. Before the 4.2-second fuse train on the bomb set it off, he threw the second one through the door and ducked behind a fallen log.
Then the night roared with explosions. His bomb in the mid door went off first, followed by two near the front of the fuselage. Then he couldn't tell from where the blasts came. He did count nine grenades going off. Two men came screaming out the door in front of him and jumped to the ground. Murdock cut them down with a three-round burst for each one from the 5.56 barrel. He heard screams from inside. He watched but saw no flames; nothing had caught on fire from the explosions. Good.
”I've had two jumpers out the side door,” Murdock said in the mike. ”Hold your positions. Any more jumpers?”
As he said it, he heard gunfire from the front and from the far side of the dead airliner. Then all went quiet.
”Three in front who jumped their last time,” Gardner said.
”We've had two try to get out the back section,” Jaybird said. ”They didn't make it. Count is seven down.”
”Hold your positions. Where is the other thermal?”
”At the nose,” Gardner said.
”See if you can get a man up to the opening without any danger and scope the inside. There have to be some live ones in there.”
A minute later the radio came on. ”Fernandez has the imager and is now working up to the opening. We haven't heard anything from inside. Not a cry or a groan or any screaming.”
”Waiting us out,” Murdock said.
Another burst of gunfire from the rear of the plane.
”One more jumper,” Jaybird said. ”It's four feet to the ground. He's down and out of the game.”
”Skipper, I'm back down,” Fernandez radioed. ”I was s.h.i.+elded by some boxes but I caught two white images. I didn't take them out.”
”You did good, Fernandez. We might need a live one. Let's give them another twenty minutes. Then I want you to get up near the same place you were and call into them in Spanish to turn on a flashlight and go to the mid door in the left-hand side and give themselves up. Tell them if they try to run they will be killed.”
”Right, Cap. I could hear a few words but not well enough to understand them. They were Spanish. I'll go in twenty on your command.”
Ten minutes later, Murdock had moved closer to the open door. He was less than six feet away, behind a tree that had survived the crash. His head jerked around when he heard a pounding on the plane just inside the door. The three poundings came again. He listened carefully. Bang bang bang. A pause. Bang-bang-bang. A pause. Then bang, bang, bang. Murdock snorted at the poor man's SOS.
Murdock's thermal imager lit up with a man standing in the open door.
”Okay. Give up. Okay, no shoot.”
From near the front of the aircraft sharp commands came in Spanish. The man turned and looked forward, then laced his fingers on top of his head and sat down on the edge of the floor in the open door.
”Salto,” Fernandez's voice bellowed from the front. The man jumped off the plane and landed on the brush four feet below. Murdock grabbed him and moved him up and away from the plane.
”Cap, how fast does a body cool off so it won't show on the imager?” Fernandez asked.
”No idea. They forgot that in our training.”
”I've got some faint images, but nothing starkly white. My guess is that there are no more live ones inside the plane. I'm in the front of this section, so no more grenades in here, you guys.”
”Roger that. I'm putting cuffs on this live one, and then I'm coming inside from here. So hold.”
Murdock put a plastic riot cuff on the Mexican's wrists behind his back and then one around his ankles. The commander looked at the floor level of the big plane four feet off the ground. Just like the OC. He jumped, caught the opening with both arms, and levered himself onto the floor. He brought the imager out and scanned what he could see of the inside.
”I'm in, Fernandez. Check the front. I'll clear it back here. Use your flashlight after scoping.”
”Aye, aye, Cap.”
Murdock scanned the back twenty feet of the plane, but found no white ghosts on his small screen. Then he turned on his three-cell flashlight and scowled. Four feet behind him sat a large wooden crate six feet wide and probably twice that long.
The nuclear bomb.
He looked around it. He counted eight bodies in that section, and then turned toward the front.
<script>