The SEALs caught the Rangers as they had taken cover in the jungle along the narrow road. Murdock used the Motorola and put his men in the jungle cover.
“We had one round of fire from in front,” Domingo told Murdock on the radio. “I sent a three-man patrol up there to flush him out. One of them has a radio. No word.”
They waited five minutes, then moved ahead cautiously. The Rangers were out front. The radio crackled. “Hey, we’ve been under attack. Somebody shooting arrows. Yeah, Jose took one in the shoulder and it hurts like hell. We can’t hear them, can’t see them. Who the hell shoots arrows anymore?”
“The Negritos?” Juan said.
“Maybe coconut hunters,” Lam said.
“Talk to them in Filipino,” Juan said. “Tell them that we are not chasing them, we’re looking for the bad men with long guns.”
The radio was silent for a while.
“Would it help if we told them we know one of their chiefs?” Lam asked. “What was that little guy’s name we ate wild pig with?”
“Could help. Tell them we know Blackie and his band,” Juan said.
There was some talk on the radio that was not aimed at the mike. Soon the voice came on the radio again.
“Okay, all clear here now. I told him that we knew Blackie, and he said the chief with the funny talk was known to them. They are here to collect coconuts and take them back into the hills.”
“Let’s move up,” General Domingo said.
The Ranger scout out front with a Motorola moved slowly, watching everything he could in the dense jungle growth. Twice he stopped and listened, then moved ahead. He was halfway across the open plain when a submachine gun chattered directly in front of him, and only the dense growth saved him. He jolted into the moist ground cover and waited. The weapon fired again at close to the same place, but six feet over, missing him. He lifted up, but couldn’t see the shooter.
“I can’t dig this guy out,” the scout said.
“How about an EAR?” Murdock suggested. “Enough of the shock wave should get through the brush and growth to knock out the shooter.”
Domingo agreed, and moved his man with the borrowed EAR to the front. He crawled up to the scout. They whispered a moment, then the Ranger fired the EAR where he was instructed.
“Move up cautiously,” Domingo ordered. The two men crawled and wormed their way twenty feet forward, and found one rebel sleeping at the switch, his weapon at his side. They bound him hand and foot, took his sub gun, and the scout moved out again.
“EAR worked good,” the scout said. “I’m moving forward.”
Five minutes later the Rangers passed the sleeping rebel and worked ahead through the jungle.
The Ranger scout came on the air. “General, I’ve got a sandbagged machine-gun position dead ahead. Not over forty yards. Lots of jungle between us, but I can see him. Behind that it looks like the outline of a building of some kind, but it’s been entirely overgrown with jungle vines and trees.”
“Hold there,” General Domingo said. Murdock moved forward as well with Lam. They all converged at the point man about the same time. Domingo had brought an EAR gunner with him.
“That should be the hideout right behind the MG,” Domingo said. “We can’t use the EAR unless we want to carry everyone out.”
“Sir,” Lam said. “I can move over there about thirty yards so I’ll be shooting at the MG nest, and the rest of the power will go out in the jungle, not inside the building.”
Domingo looked at Murdock. “Are they that directional?”
“From what we’ve seen before, General, I think it would work the way Lam said.”
“Move out,” the general told Lam. “Lieutenant Quezon, bring up the rest of the men. Extreme quiet. Not a sound. DeWitt, bring up the SEALs too. No sound. We’re about thirty yards from the old building.”
Murdock used his binoculars on the vine-encased building, but couldn’t see much inside. It was like looking inside a tree. At last he spotted something moving deep in the structure. Yes, there were men in there. It would be worth the risk. Only, where were the hostages?
Lam radioed that he was in position. The rest of the troops had not arrived yet. Then Murdock growled deep in his throat. As he watched, six civilians were marched out into the open just in back of the machine-gun nest. They were in plain sight, some even with shafts of sunlight slanting off them. Four women and two men. The rebels darted back into the old building.
“Hold fire, Lam,” Murdock said. The general nodded. “What the hell can we do now?”
General Domingo contacted his men and told them to hold in place.
Lam whispered into his mike. “Skipper. Remember how tight the focus is on these things, maybe only four feet wide at a hundred yards? I’m at a different angle from you. I can still see into the old building, and I have an eight-foot slice of space between the backs of the hostages and the inside of the building. Plenty of space to get off some shots without harming the hostages.”
Murdock grinned. He looked at the general.
“Yes, Lam, take your shots,” the general said. “Do it now. Do four shots in forty seconds. Quezon and DeWitt, bring up the troops. We need the best snipers we have up closer.”
“Every man behind a thick tree,” Murdock said. “After that first EAR shot, all hell is going to break loose from that machine gun. Hold fire for a minute, Lam. We need to get situated.”
The men found thick trees and stood behind them.
“Fire when ready, Lam,” Murdock said.
Murdock watched around his tree. He concentrated on the machine-gun crew less than forty yards away. The gunner’s head jolted toward the whooshing sound; then he pivoted the machine gun in that direction. Murdock had a clear shot. He aimed the Bull Pup on 5.56 on single-shot, and before the machine gunner could pull the trigger, a deadly slug jolted into his chest and knocked him off the gun. The second gunner rolled him out of the way and got behind the automatic weapon. Murdock’s second shot nailed him in the throat.
Lam’s second EAR shot blasted into the structure behind them.
Murdock leaned out. “Hostages, run to either side of the gun emplacement. Get lost in the jungle. Go now before those inside recover.”
One man translated, and the hostages scuttered away, walking, running, and semi-jogging. There were no shots from inside the building. Murdock sent twelve rounds into the machine-gun nest, and saw the third man there half stand, then dive over the side of the parapet but not quite make it. He didn’t move.
“Let’s go in,” Murdock said. Lam stood and rushed forward. The EAR was around his back and his Colt M-4A1 in his hands. Murdock charged across the forty yards with General Domingo and his scout right beside him. They darted into the vine-covered structure and saw the whole place go dark.
“Like a tunnel in here,” Lam said. He held up his hand, and everyone stopped moving. They could hear nothing. Then what could only be a door banged shut. Lam saw in the dark better, and he ran forward, past a green wall, around some old furniture that was molding and falling apart, and through what could have been a grand living room. Then he was at an outside door that perched half-open on long-rusted hinges. Lam pushed it all the way open and jumped behind the wall.
Six hot lead messengers blasted through the open space. Lam turned his head to hear better out the door, and heard someone crashing through the jungle.
“Left side clear,” Lam said. “Skipper, we’ve got one live one, maybe as many as three, heading out through the jungle.”
Murdock slid to a stop beside him.
“What the hell are we waiting for?”
They ran into the heavy, green, moist growth for ten yards, and Lam stopped, listening. General Domingo had not been close enough to go with them. Lam pointed to the left and they moved that way, slipping through the growth, making as little noise as possible. Twenty yards forward and Lam stopped again, with Murdock right behind him. Lam listened.