Seal Team Seven #19: Field of Fire (19 page)

“Yes, Lam. Good. Easier to do if we knew what was in front of us in the Syrian line. There might not be a line at all, just a series of units without much lateral support. That we have to scout out and pin down. Let’s get up within about eight hundred yards from the MLR and hunker down and see what we can find out in front. I’ll go with you on the scout. Nothing else to do back here. How many rounds do we have for the twenties? Fernandez, how many on you?”

“Skipper, I have fifteen rounds. What we started out with. That makes thirty between the two of us. We can raise a lot of hell with fifteen even without airbursts.”

“How many for airbursts?”

“I only have three,” Fernandez said.

“I have four, the rest are Navy contact type. Good
enough. When we get up there, Jaybird, you have the con. Keep everyone in the area, spread out enough for safety, and keep up a guard especially out front. How close now, Lam?”

“A little over a mile, I’d say. We can leave anytime and let Jaybird take the company up to the half mile.”

Twenty minutes later, Lam and Murdock lay in a growth of tall grass in front of a line of trees and brush, and checked what they could see of the front Syrian lines. There were shadows of men moving along the tree line.

“Must be a river of some kind there,” Murdock said. “Looks like the Syrians are on this side. What we need is to find one of their command posts. Some spot that the officer in charge can call in some of his men on his flanks to help protect the CP.”

“No way we can find that without enough light to see the place by.”

“All we need is a big bunker, an old building, lots of troops around,” Lam said.

Murdock scowled again. He’d been doing that too much lately. “Let’s go downstream and get closer and see how thick these Syrian soldiers are along here. They sure don’t have anybody in reserve.”

They worked closer, silently, taking advantage of some clouds crossing a sliver of a silver moon to move in the darker times. Murdock figured they were less than forty yards from the river now, and they could hear some rifles firing. Lam grinned.

“Yeah, I’ve got three guys talking almost dead ahead. Can’t tell what they’re saying. One soldier coughs a lot. Must not be any officer along here, or these three would be spread out ten yards from each other.”

“How about our firing six rounds of the twenties into the line down along the river, say three hundred yards away. Make it look like a night attack from the Israelis. Then hope these guys will get called down there. If they don’t, we go in with Rafii and his knives and he clears the way for us to get into the river and find some safe spot on the other side.”

“We’d make a lot of noise going over the river,” Lam said.

“Not if we move slowly and angle downstream a little. Worth a try. Otherwise we’re sitting mallards if we stay on this side until daylight.”

Murdock used the Motorola and called up the troops and students. “Be absolutely quiet. No coughing or throat clearing, no talking, no jangling jewelry. We’re talking about staying alive here, guys. Jaybird. Bring them up due south, a tad to the right. Lam will be out two hundred to show you in.”

Lam nodded and headed back toward the rest of the group. Murdock watched the front lines again. This had to work. Otherwise they could get caught in a crossfire between the two sides, and both sides would think the other one was attacking.

Murdock kept watching ahead. He heard some more talk, but it was muted, maybe from downstream. He turned and Lam was just behind him. Murdock hadn’t heard him coming.

“Got them,” Lam whispered. “The squad’s got them quiet and scared, which is good. Not even any complaints from Monica.”

“I want the twenty up front,” Murdock said softly into his throat mike. He and Lam picked out the target. They were on a small rise and the river made a slight turn away from them upstream just over two hundred yards. There would be some troops on the bend.

Fernandez slid in beside them. “We shooting?”

“Yes, upstream. Use contact rounds. Keep it simple. We put two rounds each into them there, then two more each about fifty downstream.”

“Right, Skipper. Ready when you are.”

Murdock sighted in on the bend and fired. A second later Fernandez fired. The explosions of the 20mm rounds in the stillness of the Israeli darkness came as a jolting surprise to that sector of the MLR.

The second group of four rounds hitting farther down brought some shouts and quite a bit of return fire aimed across the river.

Murdock waited five minutes, then he and Lam crawled forward and looked for the Syrians. There hadn’t been time to really dig in. Some places they found shallow slit trenches. They checked a twenty-yard stretch where it looked like there had been troops, but now they found only one man. Lam used his silenced MP-5 and dispatched the Syrian soldier with a round to the chest, then another one to the head.

“Move up,” Murdock ordered. “Jaybird, bring them single file, five yards apart and move them quickly. I’ll stay here. Lam is going across the river. Not deep. Doesn’t look more than knee wet, we’ll see.”

“Roger that, we’re on our way.”

Lam checked the shore both ways, then stepped into the cold water. It came just over his knees almost to the middle of the forty-foot-wide stream, then he went in up to his waist and waded silently on across.

“We have waist-deep water,” Murdock told the SEALs on the radio. “Warn the civilians that they will get wet to their waists. Once across we’ll try to dry out and find a safe spot until we can touch the Israeli lines.”

Five minutes later, Murdock ushered the last of the students into the water. The girls gasped, then kept quiet and waded across. All wore slacks or shorts and they made it easily. The SEALs and the two pilots were the last ones over. Murdock knew it was taking too much time. His arm hurt like fire but he beat down the pain and kept watching upstream. That’s where some of the Syrians could be coming from. He was in the middle of the water when he saw three men walking down the trail along the river. They were out for a stroll. Murdock aimed a 20mm round ten feet in front of them and fired. The round exploded and sent a storm of shrapnel slashing toward the three Syrians. None of them had a chance to survive. Murdock hurried then and got out of the water just as a flurry of rounds slammed into the far bank a hundred yards upstream.

Jaybird had moved the group fifty yards into the brush and trees along the river and due south away from the enemy lines. The Israelis had to be out there somewhere.
But Murdock asked himself how they contacted the friendlies without getting their asses shot off.

Jaybird had an idea. “Cap, we have the girls sing ‘God Bless America.’ What could be more us?”

“How close are we to their lines?”

“Lam is out taking a look. He said in here it would be murder unless they could get all the way to the river. He spotted some small hills just behind us. The Israelis might be holding the high ground there and in the morning will be using some tanks to blast the MLR down here just across the wet.”

“Sounds reasonable. How are your charges holding up?”

“That Kathy is a wonder. She’s pumping them up, talking them out of feeling sorry for themselves. She’s the only one of the kids with a gun and they know that she’s ROTC.”

“We’ll put her in for a medal if we get out of this mess,” Murdock said. “You’ve got security out?”

“Front and back. I’m no tadpole here, Commander.”

Murdock snorted. “Hell, you eat tadpoles for lunch. Any sprained ankles or twisted knees?”

“Not that I’ve heard about. If there were, Kathy would have them talked out of it before they decided it hurt. Now, there is a girl.”

“She’s too young for you.”

“She’s just right for me.” Jaybird snorted. “Of course once we get out of this mess, I’ll never see her again.”

“Count on it,” Murdock said.

Without warning and without making a sound on his approach, Lam dropped down beside them. “Jaybird was right, the Israelis have the high ground. I got within about twenty yards of them and could hear some low talk. I’d guess machine guns up there and at least one tank.”

“How close can you get the girls?” Jaybird asked.

“You going to let him try this, Skipper?”

“Sounds like it might work. They sing, I yell, and maybe we can get some free passage.”

Lam shook his head. “Skipper, I want to place everyone we have under cover, especially the girls. Do you agree?”

“Absolutely. This is no time to be taking chances. Let’s get to it before we run out of darkness.”

Five minutes later Monica rebelled. “I won’t sing. I think that’s a sappy song. I have a thing about singing in public anyway. I won’t sing.”

Kathy stood nose to nose with her. “Fine, Monica. Fine. I’m sure your father will really like it when he hears about this.” She turned to the four boys. “Any of you tenors? We could use a couple.”

Kenny stepped forward. “I used to be a boy soprano, now I’m a man tenor. Yeah, I can keep up with you. If I can remember the words.”

“Easy, we’ll go over them now a dozen times.”

Jaybird came up a few minutes later and helped Lam place the singers behind small trees and one big boulder. He nodded. “Any time you’re ready, maestro.”

Kathy grinned and hit a note. Then they all sang loud and clear. “God bless America, land of the free. Stand beside her, and guide her through the night with the light from above. From the mountains, to the prairie …”

A shot slammed over the heads of the singers.

“Israelis on the high ground,” Murdock bellowed in his best parade ground voice. “We could use a little help down here. Cease fire and listen. Are you listening?”

“Right, listening and sending for our lieutenant. What the hell, man, you got women down there?”

“Yes, we’re Americans.”

“Oh, yeah. Who holds the football when Charlie Brown kicks it?”

“Lucy holds it, only she jerks it back just as he kicks.”

There was a silence that stretched out.

“Hey, Israelis. You still there?”

“Right. We’re not going nowhere. Hey, I was raised in Brooklyn, then we came over here. Got me some army time. How you get girls in the front lines?”

“College kids in a kibbutz up by Zefat.”

More silence.

“Americans, you really down there with some girls?” The voice was different. “Lieutenant Shamma up here with the Twenty-first.”

“Yes, sir, we are. Lieutenant Commander Blake Murdock, U.S. Navy SEALs, requesting permission to come into your lines with two chopper pilots, eight American college students, and six SEALs.”

“I’ll be damned.” This time Murdock could hear two or three people talking.

“You armed, SEALs?”

“Always, even when we sleep and eat.”

“Hold your position. I’m sending down a six-man patrol to check you out. Don’t fire on us. You understand? Don’t fire.”

Just over an hour later Murdock stepped into the cab of a two-ton truck that bumped over a field, bounced through a ditch and hit a gravel road.

The Israeli driver kept staring at Murdock. “Pardon me, sir, but I’ve never seen a U.S. Navy SEAL before. You really brought those four girls through the Syrian lines?”

“It was too far to go around.”

“What’s that weapon, sir? Never seen nothing like it before.”

“It’s a twenty-millimeter shoulder-fired rifle.”

“You’re trashing me. Can’t fire no twenty-millimeter cannon from your shoulder.”

“This one does. The Syrians thought you were hitting them with tank fire.”

“Blessed be.”

“About the size of it. How long before we get to Haifa?”

“Over these roads, sir, about two hours.”

In the back of the big truck, Kathy Burnett sat beside Jaybird. Ten minutes after the ride started she made a little mewing sound, put her head on Jaybird’s shoulder, and promptly went to sleep.

Haifa, Israel

Murdock awoke twice when they hit bumps in the road and his shoulder jammed against the door. He rode out the sharp pain and felt wetness down his side. He was leaking again. He could make it another half hour into Haifa.

When they stopped just inside the gate at the Rahat Air Base, for the guards to sort out the passengers, Kathy stormed up to the lieutenant in charge and demanded an ambulance for Murdock. He had remained seated in the cab, and when the Israeli officer came, he tried to get out but Kathy stopped him.

“Look at his left shoulder,” she demanded.

The officer looked at Murdock’s shoulder that was now wet with blood. He made a radio call and less than three minutes later an army ambulance with red lights flashing pulled up to the side of the truck.

Kathy watched them put Murdock on a gurney and lift him into the ambulance. She jumped in before they could stop her, and the lieutenant shrugged and closed the doors.

At the hospital they asked her to leave the emergency room, but she put on her silent rage face and demanded to stay with Murdock until he was treated. Two doctors showed up at once and cut off the sleeve and examined the wound.

“Miss, he has a slug in his shoulder. Well below the bone and not all that serious. We’ll operate, take it out, and he’ll be almost as good as new in a week.”

The doctor smiled. “Yes, in a week. Now, we need you
to go to room A-12. The rest of your student friends are there and you all will get a quick check for any problems, before we can release you to the American representatives.”

“I’m fine.”

“I’m sure your are, miss. Nurse Sharon here will take you down to the others. Now, I have to operate on the commander.”

It took the medics less than an hour to check over the eight students. They found several scrapes, some bruises, and gave Monica a shot to calm her down when she showed a mild case of hysteria.

The truck sat outside the hospital. The guard lieutenant from the gate didn’t know what to do with the heavily armed SEALs.

“Give your General Menuhin a call,” Jaybird said. “We’re working for him on a special assignment.”

The Israeli officer hesitated. “I can’t just call the general.”

“Then call your officer of the day or whoever else is in charge around here. Find out if an American CIA man named Don Stroh is on base. Come on, get some action. I’m tired of sitting around in these wet pants and I could do with a big steak dinner.”