The sound hadn’t come from the hatch to the control room, however. Its locking mechanism remained stationary.
More noise was audible now. Men’s voices, yelling, their words indistinct. The shouts were tumultuous, full of urgency and growing louder.
Then the wheel on the hatch began to turn, and the two soldiers took a step back. As they moved, they brought their rifles up to their faces, the short barrels pointing like deadly appendages toward the doorway.
The wheel stopped. So did the commotion on the other side.
“Stand down. It’s Larsen,” a voice shouted through the door’s thick steel.
“You’re covered,” Grimm yelled back.
He and the chief lowered their weapons, but even from my vantage point, I could see that their knuckles were white. If something threatening thrust itself through the doorway, they wouldn’t waste much time bringing the rifles to bear on it.
As the hatch swung open, Larsen came into view, and my heart accelerated again. His face was flushed, sweaty and freckled with blood. He stepped into the control room, then turned toward the door.
“OK, pass him through.”
“No, I’m fine!” came a voice from the other side. Vazquez hooked his left arm through, shrugging off a hand on his opposite shoulder. “I can fucking walk. I got all the way up here, didn’t I?” He ducked and worked his way through, only allowing Larsen to offer an occasional steadying hand.
When Vazquez stood, my breath caught in my throat. His right arm was soaked in crimson from elbow to wrist. He let it dangle, keeping pressure on the forearm with his other hand. His childlike appearance was gone.
I left the doorway to the officers’ mess and moved down the hallway, listening to more SEALs pile into the compartment. But when I crouched at the doorway it all stopped.
They turned toward me, guns raised, except for Vazquez, who stood behind them, panting. I froze, unable even to beg for mercy. The barrels of their rifles seemed to be the unblinking eyes of Death himself, and I couldn’t look away.
Larsen broke the spell.
“Hold your fire. It’s the doctor.”
As a unit, they relaxed. A couple slung their weapons on their backs and tended to Vazquez. The rest began to talk all at once. The SEAL leader caught my eye and beckoned me into the compartment.
“Two more dead,” he said after I had worked my way through his men.
“Did you get the Serpent?”
“No. Dammit. Vazquez got off a few rounds at him, but there’s no body. Nothing.”
I glanced at Vazquez. The men who were aiding him were trying to persuade him to sit down on the nav table.
“Let me look at him,” I said, taking a step toward them. “We need to get that bleeding under control.”
But Vazquez straightened up and half-turned away from me.
“No! I don’t need a doctor. This… this is nothing. It’s not deep, didn’t hit any arteries.”
The vehemence in his tone stopped me. Jakes, the SEAL who had been manning the forward torpedo room, gestured at me with a half-open medical kit. His watch cap was askew, revealing a close-cut afro.
“It looked a lot worse when we found him, but he’s right, it’s not deep. Just long. I’ll slap a bandage on it, and he’ll be in good shape.” Jakes pulled a gauze pad from the kit and unfolded it.
I was doubtful. Spatters of blood dotted the floor where it had dripped from Vazquez’s fingers. But his face wasn’t ashen, and he didn’t seem to be in shock.
Larsen tapped me on the shoulder. “The Serpent got him.”
And you want me to tell you how he did it, I thought as I turned back to him. Great. Once again, I was welcome in Larsen’s operation.
“We sent one team of three men forward of the engine room on the lower deck and another team aft. Campbell was stationed in the engine room, covering the flanks of both teams.
“Campbell, get over here,” he said, then continued talking to me. “When Vazquez shouted, he was the first to respond, so he saw… well, he can tell you.”
Campbell now stood next to us. He also was flushed, and although his rifle was held in an at-ease posture across his chest, I could see his index finger flexing on the trigger guard.
“Tell her what you saw, Warrant Officer Campbell. And start from the beginning, because I don’t know the whole story, either.”
The SEAL had been staring at nothing, but Larsen’s voice got his attention, and Campbell addressed the platoon leader in a crisp, official manner.
“Sir, I was holding position on the upper deck of the engine room. I could see Fire Team Bravo through the aft hatch, five-by-five. The area below me was clear after Fire Team Alpha headed forward on the lower deck. Then I heard a clatter and… and a yell. It was Tracy, I knew it was him, you know, because he’s got that hick accent, and he yelled something like, ‘What the hell?’” His demeanor was becoming more conversational. “So I yelled for Bravo to back me up, climbed down and ran into the aft battery bay. Well, there was no one there. That was where Vazquez was supposed to be. So I knew something was wrong. Then I hear, like, a struggle further forward. And a couple of seconds later, three shots.”
He paused, his eyes unfocusing again.
“You’re doing fine, Campbell,” Larsen said. It took all my willpower to hide my surprise at the grandfatherly note in his voice. But his face was still and cold.
“Right. Thank you, sir.” The SEAL pulled himself back into the story. “So I’ve got my rifle up, and I say, ‘Vazquez! Tracy!’ And right when I say that, Vazquez goes flying by the hatch to the galley. I mean, flying. He was horizontal, like he had been shot out of a fucking howitzer. I hear him hit something and land. And then he starts shooting.
“So I advance toward the doorway. I’m ready to shoot. If this thing so much as sticks a toenail into my view, it’s getting blown off. But right before I get to the doorway, the shooting stops. And I hear Vazquez yell, ‘Get him! Fucking get him!’
“I crouch and look into the galley. Nothing in there. I mean, nothing moving. Mac’s body was lying to my right. I could see his feet, and I knew he was dead. I can’t explain it. Just the way they were lying, it wasn’t natural.”
I was lost in Campbell’s recollections. The slain SEAL was clear in my mind, the sound of gunfire reverberating in my ears.
“I couldn’t see Tracy yet. But I moved sideways a little, and I could see Vazquez lying there. He had impacted the stove area. There was a dent. But he was sitting up, fucking with his rifle, trying to get another magazine in there one handed. His right arm looked like a mess. All I could see was blood.
“‘Where’d he go? Where’s the Serpent?’ I’m yelling at him. He looks up, and he’s like, ‘It’s gone.’ Behind me I hear Bravo. It’s Chacho talking to me, I know it’s him, because he’s asking, ‘What’s going on, who started shooting?’ So I felt it was safe to advance.”
He looked at Larsen, questioning, unsure.
“You had backup. You had a platoon member in danger. You did the right thing,” Larsen said. I couldn’t tell whether he meant it. But I sensed that, sincere or not, such a reassurance was the only way to get Campbell to continue.
“That’s what I thought, sir,” the warrant officer replied. “I entered the room. Vazquez was facing me, so I immediately scanned the area behind him from where I was standing. It was clear of threats. Then I turned around, and that’s when I saw Tracy.
“Paul… Jesus, man, Paul,” he said, his voice wavering. But he kept going. “I saw his eyes blink. He was still there. He was still with me for a second. But there was too much blood. There was nothing I could do. The gash was huge! All the way across his throat! It was like someone had tried to saw his fucking head off… there’s no way anyone could have survived that.”