The Malacca Conspiracy (32 page)

“Now, this general has gone on television and threatened the United States with nuclear blackmail.

“We think this guy might be holed up in the palace. The lieutenant is now passing out photos of him. If we see him, we are to take him out. Am I clear on this?”

“Yes, sir!”

“Aye, Captain!”

“Put the map back up, Lieutenant.”

“Aye, sir.”

“Now we think that perhaps Perkasa, if he’s in the palace, could be operating in the vicinity of the president’s office, which is here.” He tapped on the map at the hallway outside the presidential office.

“The other principal target is here.” The captain was pointing to a different area of the map. “The medical clinic.” He eyed his men. “If there are injuries, or if there have been fatalities”—Captain Noble glanced at Zack—“we expect the dead and the injured to be here. We may have to shoot our way through. But if the lights are out, we have an advantage. We own the night.

“Remember, our objective is the safety and rescue of our people. That means bringing the ambassador and Lieutenant Commander Colcernian out of there. We move quickly once in the palace and then we report back to the roof, where the choppers will be waiting. Anyone not back on the roof will be left behind. We must work quickly and efficiently, and we must be deadly. Any questions?” A hand went up. “Yes, Lieutenant.”

“Sir, will we be receiving backup from the battle group?”

“The plan calls for air cover by F/A–18s from the
Reagan.
Hopefully that will keep the Indonesian Air Force off our tails if they discover us. But we’re vulnerable to anti-aircraft fire from the ground. That answer your question?”

“Yes, sir. Thank you, sir.”

“Other questions?”

There were none.

“Very well. Let’s get moving.”

Jakarta Air Base

7:15 p.m.

T
he pilots had given him no more trouble, but had obeyed his orders to land the plane. As well they should have. The arrogant punks.

And now, as the Indonesian Air Force C–9 taxied down the runway to the tarmac, the pilots would see.

They would see by the reception awaiting him exactly who they were up against. When they saw him promoted to the rank of colonel on the spot, they would think twice about causing trouble over the incident on the plane.

Hassan stood up. Standing in the aisle of the taxiing plane, he pulled out a handkerchief and rubbed his medals. Then he rubbed his bars signifying his rank as captain. This would be the last time, he thought, that he would have to worry about a smudgy fingerprint on his captain’s bars. From this day forward, he would be wearing the insignia of a colonel. Or perhaps, yes, perhaps they would promote him directly to general right here on the spot. He could not help but to shiver at the thought of it.

The plane rolled to a stop. A moment later, one of the stewards opened the door to the plane. Hassan took a breath and stepped out onto the portable stairwell. He looked down.

No lights.

No honor guard.

No television cameras.

The bastards! They had rolled the plane to a stop at an area of the airport away from the ceremony. All to embarrass him…to avoid having to witness him receive his just promotion in his glory!

“We are in the wrong place!” he yelled back at the steward. This would not go without repercussions. “I want to see the pilot! Now!” Hassan screamed.

The pilot stepped to the door. “What is it now, Captain?”

“Why have we rolled the plane to a stop here?” he demanded.

The disrespectful pilot looked sarcastically at the steward, and then back at Hassan. “Captain Taplus, we stopped the plane here because we were ordered by ground control to stop the plane here. We park the plane wherever ground control tells us to park it.”

What garbage.
“It is a crime under the Indonesian Code of Military Justice to lie to a superior officer,” Hassan screamed. “You are a liar, and you will not go unpunished!”

“With all due respect, Captain,” the pilot snarled, “you are not my superior officer. I am a captain too. We are of the same rank.”

“We will see about that,” Hassan snapped. He reached for his pistol. As his hand felt the grip, an Indonesian army sergeant bounded up the portable staircase toward the cockpit entrance.

“Captain Taplus!” the sergeant shouted, flashing a salute as he approached the two men. “Colonel Croon sent me to pick you up, sir.”

“Colonel Croon is not here?” Hassan returned the salute. The ungrateful piece of scum. Sending a sergeant to the air base. Croon was undoubtedly feeling threatened already and was trying to undercut his promotion.

“The colonel is with the general,” the sergeant said. “Your presence is needed.”

“Very well.” At least that comment would let the pilot know who he was dealing with. He turned back to the pilot. “This is your lucky day, Captain. I will deal with you later.” He turned to the sergeant. “Let’s go, Sergeant.”

United States Embassy
Jakarta, Indonesia

7:20 p.m.

T
he warm tropical night air was blowing from the north, barely noticeable against the wind gusts generated from the whirling blades of the three choppers sitting atop the embassy helipad.

The Uzi strapped over his shoulder, Zack stood on the helipad alongside Captain Noble, watching the captain bark orders.

“Move, move, move!” Captain Noble was motioning with his hands and directing the SEALs, who were climbing in an orderly fashion into the three SH–60B Seahawk Navy choppers on the pad.

Because the embassy itself was less than a mile from Merdeka Palace, the execution plan called for the choppers to make a wide swoop in the air, first to the south, then circling all the way around the city to hit the palace from the north.

Choppers One and Three would attack the palace’s power plants with rocket-propelled grenades, while Tomahawk 2, spearheaded by Captain Noble’s group, would lead the burst onto the palace roof.

“Okay, let’s go, Zack,” Captain Noble said. “Head down. Stick with me.” Sprinting across the roof behind the other SEALs, Zack followed Noble to Tomahawk 2, jumped in the cargo bay, and strapped into a nylon jump seat. “Get these birds in the air,” Noble ordered. A second
later, Tomahawk 2 lifted off, pulling away from the lighted embassy below.

With hot adrenaline rushing down his neck, Zack gritted his teeth and gripped the Uzi like it was the only present his mama ever gave him.

He was going to kill someone.

He knew it.

Soekarno-Hatta International Airport
Jakarta, Indonesia

7:22 p.m.

T
he sound of buzzing hornets swarmed into the headset again. The controller cursed, then ripped the headsets off and tossed them down as the radar screens went blank.

“Chief, we’ve lost all contacts on radar again!”

Other air traffic controllers in the room stood and waved their hands in the air. “Mine’s down too!” shouted one. “Radar’s blank!” another yelled.

“What the…” The chief air traffic controller stormed across the room, unleashing a string of profanity. “Notify all inbound traffic. Radar failure! Get these planes turned around. Now!”

SH–60B Seahawk (“Tomahawk 2”)
Over Jakarta, Indonesia

7:30 p.m.

T
he Seahawk’s cargo door was wide open, and six US Navy SEALs sat on the chopper floor at the ledge, their legs dangling down over the white city lights of Jakarta just below them.

Zack grasped the gun and carefully crouched on the deck just behind them, about four feet from the edge. Not even the supercharged adrenaline flowing through his veins was sufficient to fully erase his fear of heights that had been with him since the first time his granddaddy had sent him up to the top of a tobacco barn when he was just a boy.

Zack looked out, not down.

Out to the right, Tomahawk 1 was flying slightly ahead of Zack’s chopper, and Tomahawk 3 was flying to the left.

“Stand by, men,” Captain Noble said. “We’re going once we turn out the lights. Stand by. Three, two, one…”

Pwfffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff.

A blazing rocket streaked from Tomahawk 1 to the left wing of the palace.
BOOM!

Pwfffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff.

BOOM!
Another rocket, this from Tomahawk 3, rocked the right side of the palace.

The palace went dark.

“Let’s go, baby!” Captain Noble said.

“’Twas the night that the lights went out in Jakarta!” someone yelled.

“Woooooooooo!” Someone imitated WWF Heavyweight Ric Flair.

Tomahawk 2 dipped its nose and feathered down on the center roof of the building.

“Go! Go! Go!” Captain Noble shouted. The first wave of SEALs leapt out of the chopper. “Let’s go, Zack!”

Zack’s feet hit the asphalt roof. He sprinted—following the SEALs in a straight line at a forty-five-degree angle from the chopper.

Chit-a-chit-a-chit-a-chit-a-chit-chit.
“Hit the deck!”

Gunfire ricocheted off the roof and the steel guardrails at the edge of it.

Zack dived, hitting the deck right beside Captain Noble.

Chit-a-chit-a-chit-a-chit.
The SEALs returned the fire.

Just over to the left beside the guard shack that led down into the building, two male silhouettes staggered, then fell.

“Let’s rock!”

The SEALs rose, rushing the guard shack.

“Door’s locked, Skipper,” one of the SEALs said, as Choppers One and Three feathered down on the roof.

“Concussion grenade! Now!”

“Aye, Skipper.” A SEAL tossed a hand grenade at the locked door.

BOOM!

The door blew open.

“Let’s go!” Captain Noble shouted.

Zack got up and moved forward with the SEALs.

Another silhouette appeared quickly from behind the guard shack, his gun drawn on Captain Noble.

Zack raised his Uzi and squeezed the trigger.
Chit-a-chit-a-chit-a.
The silhouette slumped over.

Tonight, I’m going to kill somebody.
His instincts were right.

“Jones. Rogers. Check the back of that shack and make sure the roof is clear.”

“Aye, Skipper.”

Zack followed a group of SEALs into the shack, then quickly down the steps. From overhead, more bursts of machine-gun fire, then the roar of American fighter jets.

They reached a first landing and jogged down another twelve steps or so to a second landing. They stopped, gently pushed open a door, and stepped into a large, dark hallway. The sound of voices could be heard throughout. A flashlight beam shot down the hall, then disappeared.

Captain Noble motioned his squad of six men into the hallway, which was visible through the night goggles. They moved swiftly about fifty feet down the hallway, which led to another open corridor, where crisscrossing flashlight beams cut across the floor.

The SEALs stopped at the entrance of the corridor, tucking themselves into the dark crevices away from the direct path of the flashlight beams. This was the corridor where the medical clinic was located. Zack’s heart pounded. Perhaps Diane was only a few feet away.

Captain Noble motioned again. Crouching, the SEALs turned carefully into the hallway, hugging up against the wall as they moved forward in an effort to avoid the flashlight beams. Zack was in the middle of the moving column, with three SEALs in front of him and three behind.

They had moved about fifteen feet down the corridor when the first flashlight beam caught the front of the column.

Machine-gun fire from the lead SEAL.

Now a flashlight beam from the rear.

More machine-gun fire.

The flashlight beams vanished from both directions. Four Indonesian guards, two at each end of the corridor, lay slumped on the floor.

Another thirty feet down the hallway where two of the dead Indonesians lay bleeding on the floor, they approached two swinging doors.

The entrance to the medical clinic!

Captain Noble pushed open the doors and led the SEALs into a reception area. Two women in nurse uniforms were on the floor, cowering.

Shhhhhhhhhhhhh.
One of the SEALs motioned with his finger to his lips.

“Rodriguez. Jones. Post here. Nobody comes in. Nobody goes out,” Noble said.

“Aye, Skipper.”

“Anderson. Jenkins. Round up all medical personnel in the clinic and hold ’em in here.”

“Aye, sir.”

“Okay, let’s check the examination rooms in the back,” Captain Noble said. “Move, move!”

Residence of General Perkasa
Jakarta, Indonesia

7:37 p.m.

G
eneral, we have an urgent situation developing!” Suparman Perkasa, the new leader of the Islamic Republic of Indonesia, looked up and saw Colonel Erman Croon rushing into his office, past the array of television cameras. Croon had a frantic look on his face and was waving a paper in his hand.

“What is it, Colonel?”

“I’ve gotten a call from Merdeka Square. It appears that Merdeka Palace is under attack!”

“Under attack? By whom?”

“We have reports of helicopters landing on the building. Radar is out all over the city. At first controllers attributed it to an internal malfunction. But now we think perhaps external jamming.”

“Jamming?”

“Yes, sir. There are reports of fighter jets circling over the palace. They are not ours.”

Perkasa pounded his fist on the desk. “Americans.” He stood and folded his arms. “I expected them to try something. But not this soon.”

“Agreed, General,” Colonel Croon said. “They probably think you
are at the palace, sir. My guess is that they are trying to take us out, sir, before tomorrow’s deadline.”

The colonel was right, Suparman knew. He had to think quickly. “We must strike now, Erman,” he said, referring to Croon by his first name. “This attack changes the dynamics.”