Under Siege (33 page)

“Are there extra hoses?”

“I don’t know.”

Murdock turned to his men. “We need to find all of the hoses that we can to use on the butane tank. Look all over this place.” The men began searching. He heard some yells.

“Jackpot, LC,” Jaybird shouted. “A hundred-foot-long coil, all brand new. You thinking what I’m thinking?”

“If the hose will reach the end of this building, we bore a hole the same size as the hose, get an on-off valve on the hose, and see what kind of a blowtorch we can make.”

Murdock yelled at Bradford. “Take the SATCOM outside, set it up to transmit, and tell Home Team Leader to call off the other teams, we have the plant and are dealing with it.”

“Roger that,” Bradford said, grabbing the SATCOM and hurrying outside.

They found a valve and a nozzle that fit the hose and attached the open end to the tank of butane at one of several outlets. Murdock tested the jet in the open area of the warehouse. He used a lighter to snap at the end of the nozzle and a bright blue flame came out. He held the hose tightly and opened the valve all the way. A four-foot roaring flame jolted out the nozzle.

Murdock closed the valve and the flame disappeared.

Murdock and the rest of the SEALs checked the heavy-duty wall at the end of the building. It was solid, looked like concrete. There was one small observation window. Murdock looked in and saw mounds of white powder. The carrier for the anthrax virus. He couldn’t help but shudder.

The Iranian woman watched them. “You’re going to destroy the anthrax virus?”

“If we can. Are you a scientist?”

She nodded. “Without another virus that will eat up the anthrax virus, heat is the only way to destroy it.”

“I hoped that was the case. Now it’s good to be sure.”

“Two thousand degrees should do it.”

Murdock looked around. “You don’t care if we ruin all of your work?”

“They made me do this. Do it or go to prison and be raped and killed. This sounded better. Please, destroy all of it.”

They bored a small hole through the access window with on-site tools. Murdock turned on the valve so it produced a six-inch flame on the end of the nozzle, then he jammed the nozzle through the hole and four feet of hose inside the sealed room right up to the valve. Murdock took a deep breath and turned the valve slowly until it was fully open.

“Oh, damn, but that’s hot,” Jaybird yelled. “A flame six feet long in there eating up everything it touches.”

“It won’t have to burn it all up,” Kanza said. “When the temperature in the room hits two thousand to three thousand degrees, all of the anthrax virus will be dead.”

“How long will it take?” Murdock said.

“No idea, maybe an hour,” Kanza said.

“Okay, we’re out of here. In an hour we’ll come back for a quick check. Bradford, figure out how to put two quarter pound chunks of C-5 on that butane tank. We’ll blow it when the anthrax is cooked.”

Outside, Lam and Ching came back grinning.

“Hoooorahed them suckers down the road at a slow trot,” Ching said. “Most of them were glad to get away. The soldiers said they would be shot, but I told them better by their own people than by us. They won’t be back.”

“The pot inside is cooking,” Jaybird said.

Murdock looked at the third building. “Lam, you check out that other structure?”

“Nope. Can do.”

“Good, do.”

He left and the rest of them stayed back 200 yards from the cooking building.

“You’re Americans?” the Iranian woman asked.

“Yes,” Murdock said. “But don’t tell anyone, if your government officials ask you. We’re a secret.” He winked at her.

Kanza smiled. “The old government is gone. But this new one will be just as bad. I won’t even admit that
I
was here.”

It was just short of an hour when they heard a noise. It was a small explosion, then a larger one. The far end of the manufacturing building blew its roof off. A thirty-foot section flew into the air and they didn’t see it come down.

Murdock looked at Bradford. “You rig that C-5 with a remote?”

“Did that. I didn’t want to go back inside and push in a timer.”

“Now would be a good time to hit the destruct button.”

Bradford ginned, took out a small red plastic box from his pocket, and opened it. He pushed down a black button, then put his thumb on the red one and looked at the building. He pushed the red button.

A microsecond later the rest of the building blew up with a gigantic roar. Clouds of dust and debris shot into the sky and began falling around them.

They ducked and looked on in amazement at the total destruction of the whole building and damage to the other two standing structures.

“That’s what happens when you touch off seven or eight hundred “gallons of liquid petroleum,” Murdock said. The stuff is better than a bomb that size. Remember that. We may need to use the idea in the future.”

Salama Masud wiped dust and grit off his face, but he was grinning. “Now I’ll really have something to tell my grandchildren.”

“Let’s see if we can find your truck and get moving out of here,” Murdock said. “Oh, one small task. Bradford, the SATCOM. He reported the total destruction of the anthrax stockpile and the manufacturing plant. He told Home Team
Leader that no civilians were harmed, all were marched off to the little town.

“Well done, Team Three. Let us know when and where you want the chopper to drop in. It will come out of Afghanistan. Much closer there than the other route. Give us a call when you’re ready.”

They hiked up the slope and then down the hill to the pickup. Lam went ahead but saw that it was intact—no bombs, no apparent damage to the vehicle. They loaded onboard, including the Iranian woman.

Masud had just put the rig into gear and turned around when rifle fire slammed into the pickup. The SEALs bailed out and Kanza jumped out and landed flat on the ground.

Murdock had given the MP-5 to Bradford, who now hid behind the rear wheels and fired around them at the muzzle flashes about three hundred yards away.

Lam gritted his teeth. “The LC has been hit. He never left the cab. I’m going to swing around that little slope over there and try to get behind the attackers. Keep shooting, even though those pistols won’t hit anything. They don’t know what you’re using. Hold tight, people, I’ll be right back.”

Bandar-e Bushehr, Iran

After Sadler had checked the map and figured out the general direction, DeWitt drove the Jeep back onto the road and forward. They were still in the country, but the town was coming up fast. DeWitt saw a car slam past him going too fast. He watched to the rear now as more cars came. They met few, since most of the cars and small trucks seemed to be going into the city.

A mid-sized bobtail truck swung by him, turned back into his lane, and slowed. Dewitt had to use the brakes. A car slid in beside him so he couldn’t go around the truck. The truck slowed more and he had to brake again. He looked at the car to his left, a heavy sedan of an unknown make. He waved at them, but they didn’t notice him. The car beside him slowed, keeping pace with him.

“A trap,” DeWitt said. “Hold on tight.” He jammed on the brakes, the other two rigs rolled forward. He was behind them two car lengths. He hit the gas pedal and the Jeep jumped ahead, but the car that was in the second lane didn’t move and he was trapped again.

A man leaned out the rear window with a shotgun aimed at them. He motioned for them to pull over. There was little he could do. Ed growled as he pulled back into the right-hand lane and then stopped behind the truck that had stopped ahead of him. The man with the shotgun came out of the car. Another man got out of the front seat waving a pistol.

“Weapons ready, we shoot on three.” DeWitt said. “One. two, three.”

Four pistols and the MP-5 barked in the darkness. Both Iranians went down before they had a chance to shoot. DeWitt kicked the gearshift into reverse and roared backwards on the road, spun the wheel, turning the jeep around, and raced back the way they had come. The heavy sedan backed up and turned and came after them.

“No contest,” DeWitt said. “That car will catch us in five. They want the Jeep, not us. Bandits roving the country without much law. Just around that next turn, we hit the ditch, get out and make ourselves invisible just off the road. If they want the Jeep, we let them take it.”

A rifle round snarled past the open Jeep. Then a second one hit inside. Dewitt saw Tate jolt forward from where he sat in the front seat, his head hitting the windshield. DeWitt didn’t have time to check the man; he had to power the Jeep around the corner, out of range, and brake hard as they rolled into a shallow ditch and stopped.

“Out, everybody out and into the brush or whatever we can find. They want the damn Jeep. Anybody hit?” DeWitt looked back at Tate. He was still slumped over against the windshield. DeWitt pushed him back to the seat. His hand came away sticky with warm blood.

DeWitt grabbed Tate and boosted him on his shoulders and ran away from the road. He saw the lights of the sedan stabbing through the night. Fifty feet off the road, he went to ground and let Tate down as gently as he could.

“Mahanani, Tate is hit. Over here,” he said to his Motorola.

They watched the bandits race up, jump out of the sedan, and check the Jeep. DeWitt had pulled the ignition key out from habit as if it were his own car. The men shouted at each other, then pushed the Jeep onto the road. They tied a rope or cable to the front bumper and onto the sedan and towed the Jeep away toward the fights of the town to the north.

When the bandits left, the SEALs grouped around Mahanani and Tate. The men knelt shoulder to shoulder, shielding the light the medic used.

“LT, Tate is bad. That round must have tumbled after it went through the seat. It cut up his chest something fierce. I don’t know how bad. Must have hit a lung. He’s lost a lot of blood and his breathing is shallow and slow. Pulse is pretty good. If we had a chopper in here now, we might save him.”

“Break out the SATCOM,” DeWitt said. “First we move Tate and the rest of us a quarter of a mile off the road so we aren’t sitting ducks. Careful with him.”

Ten minutes later they were in a small ravine and had the SATCOM set up. It answered to DeWitt’s first call.

“We’ve got trouble, Home Team Leader. We have a casualty and need an immediate chopper evac.”

“Roger, copy. Your evac is on the way in five. Murdock’s team found the factory and destroyed it. Your work there is done. Give me your GPS coordinates. Estimated flight time to you should be about two hours.”

DeWitt looked at Mahanani.

“Ask for a doctor and nurse on the chopper.”

“Our medic asks for a doctor and a nurse to be on the chopper. He’s not sure our man can live four more hours without some serious medical attention.”

“We’ll try. Give me those GPS coordinates again as a double-check. The chopper will lift off in five. I’m assigning a medical team, and I’ll relay the coordinates to the pilot again. Do what you can for the man.”

“Will do. Rush it. Tate is critical.”

The SEALs spread out in a perimeter defense facing outward with DeWitt, Mahanani, and Tate in the middle. There was nothing they could do except wait. DeWitt checked his watch. It was nearing oh-three hundred. In two hours it could be starting to get light. He had no idea when sunup was in this part of the world.

DeWitt checked Tate. “Is he still unconscious?”

“Yeah. At least he isn’t hurting. He took a wicked hit. Too bad we didn’t get the word to abort about an hour earlier.”

“Yeah, too bad.” DeWitt stared at his bloody hands. He could just make them out in the darkness. The road had more traffic now. He wondered where the Jeep was. Those had to be road bandits, blocking in a car or truck they wanted. No way around. The sudden braking had given them a chance. Blowing away two of the bandits had opened it up for them. DeWitt pinched his eyes shut and wished that he had set up a regular schedule for checking with Home Team Leader. Too damn late now. This was the part he hated, waiting for help to come and absolutely nothing he could do to hurry it. There was no way he could have prevented what happened. Totally random. Wrong place at the wrong time. The damn bullet could have been two feet over and gone through him instead. Milly would watch him and in her soft way tell him to stop feeling sorry for himself. This was the life he had chosen, live with it or dump it. Milly was a most practical wife. He watched Tate. His breathing was even but light, shallow. It would be a miracle if he lived. Ed shook his head and looked around. He had four other men to take care of. He sat up and stared at the dark landscape. They all were on guard, but it wouldn’t hurt if he moved out a little and watched the road better. He didn’t want the bandits coming back and trying for some vengeance for their two dead men. He moved to the top of the ravine. He could see over the dirt and check the cars moving along the highway. More of them now, and a few small trucks. He wondered just how much civil law there was left in this part of Iran. Those bandits were a bad sign.

An hour later, Tate seemed a little better. He was in and out of consciousness. He asked them where he was hit and they said just a scratch. He grinned and dropped off again.

As DeWitt watched from the top of the gully, he saw a
small army convoy go past heading south. Three six-by-sixes, two Jeeps, and a half-track with what must have been mounted machine guns. He was glad they hadn’t run into that one earlier.

At oh-four-thirty he started watching the sky to the east. There were a few first hints at dawn. He couldn’t tell how Tate was. He was still alive, that’s about all he knew.

It was oh-five-fifteen when they heard a chopper to the east. The Blackhawk came soaring over the ground at thirty feet. They didn’t have any red smoke to show an LZ. DeWitt climbed up the last few feet of the ravine and waved his arms. The bird circled once, then came down on a flat spot fifty feet from the ravine.

Neal had them moving Tate as soon as he heard the bird. Two men carried him in a chair position with another man behind him. Dust kicked up a cloud as they walked toward the bird. The door came open and DeWitt hurried them along. Inside the chopper was a folding cot that they put Tate on. A doctor and a nurse were there with a large suit-case kit of medical equipment, including a portable defibrillator in case Tate’s heart stopped.