Someone stumbled against a table and there was a sharp report of shattering glass.
“Go easy on the crockery, eh?” The bartender growled at Murdock’s back.
Murdock sighed. Reaching into his hip pocket, he pulled out his wallet, then unfolded a five-pound note, which he slipped across the counter. “Sorry.”
“No problem, mate,” the bartender said, making the money disappear. “Long as we settle up when I call time, right?”
“Right.”
The bartender, Murdock reflected, didn’t seem too upset at the fact that so many of his customers had been driven away tonight. With all the heavy-drinking SEALs and their new SASmen buddies, he was probably doing three times his normal business.
While Murdock retained enough of his officer’s training formality to keep him from joining in the fun — even a SEAL officer was expected to maintain a certain amount of decorum in front of his men, after all — he’d come along to unwind with his men… and maybe to look after them as well.
Though details of any upcoming mission were still vague, everyone knew, with that undeniable and insistent sixth sense that the shooters in any elite team always possess, that something was going down. By way of preparation and possibly of initiation, the SASmen had invited their SEAL compatriots to a pub in Dorset’s strip district as soon as they’d stood down from the last of their training exercises that afternoon, and the party promised to get even more raucous as the evening wore on.
With the pub named The Golden Cock, the SEALs could hardly have refused, even if they hadn’t felt the need to uphold their international reputations as hard drinkers. There’d already been a great deal of ribald bantering between the Brits and the Americans over that noun, which, though not exactly common in refined company in England, was still a perfectly legitimate term either for a rooster or for nonsense. Somewhere in the shared linguistic past of the two countries, the term “cock and bull story” had been broken in two, with the English taking the cock while the Americans got the bull. Polite Americans, it was noted, didn’t like using the word “cock” under any circumstances, and the SASmen delighted in ribbing the SEALs about getting drunk on “rooster-tails” before dinner, or about going off half-roostered.
MacKenzie and DeWitt had stayed back at the Dorset base, continuing to go over the platoon’s gear and filling out the paperwork for the munchkins back in CONUS, but the rest of the men had joined up with First Troop and descended on the objective with the enthusiasm of Sherman’s visit to Georgia.
“Good to let the boys have one over the eight,” Wentworth said. He signaled the bartender for two more.
Murdock looked at him and blinked. “Beg pardon?”
“Get sloshed.”
“Pissed?”
“Don’t think they’ve quite reached that point yet, Leftenant.”
“Let’s have another round, gents!” an SAS trooper called out.
The crowd began clamoring at the bar. Murdock and Wentworth grabbed their drinks and a half-empty bottle and moved off to a table, safely out of the way. The men jostled one another happily and noisily, and it was impossible — unless you knew their faces — to separate the British SAS from the SEALs.
“So what do you think, then?” Wentworth asked him as they took their seats.
“About what. The men?”
“The situation, actually. About being on alert and not knowing when the curtain’s going up. Or even if it’s going up.” He toasted the men at the bar with an upraised glass. “Them I know about!”
“Not a lot to go on, is there?”
The standby orders had been routed through to the SEALs late that afternoon, but with precious little explanation. According to the background faxed through to SAS headquarters from Norfolk, terrorists had taken over both an oil-production platform and an American tanker and were threatening to touch off a nuke if anyone so much as came close. The British had a bit more information available, thanks largely to the BBC broadcast at noon that day. The group responsible was the PRF… the same group that had been involved in the Middlebrough takedown.
That strongly suggested that this was the big operation hinted at by the German BKA.
The Third Platoon’s orders directed them to be “made ready for possible immediate operations against hostiles in connection with the current situation on the Bouddica oil production facility.”
Yeah, right. The bad guys had a fucking nuke in there, and the SEALs were to be “made ready.”
The orders passed down to the First Troop of the 23rd SAS were a bit more explicit. A reconnaissance operation was being contemplated for the following afternoon — sometime after noon on Thursday. Wentworth had been in on some of the early planning missions, and was scheduled for another at 0800 hours the next morning. Initial planning had concentrated on the use of a BGA service boat out of Middlebrough to deploy an SAS assault force, possibly backed up by SBS commandos.
“No, not a lot to go on,” Murdock finally said. “SOP, really. Not enough intelligence and we’re operating in the dark.”
“I’ve been wondering about why you SEALs were put on alert,” Wentworth said. “Not really your bailiwick, is it?”
“Well, the way I see it, Colonel, the brass’ll probably make it a political decision. You Brits will take on the oil rig, since that’s British property, while we hit the tanker.”
“If the brass ever gets off its collective arse,” Wentworth said, “and decides to do anything. If you ask me, I think they’re afraid to move.”
“Well I suppose a one-hundred-kiloton nuke could have that effect on someone,” Murdock said. “But damn it, we have to do something.”
“Of course.” Wentworth downed a slug from his glass. “We will await further orders. Or do you Yanks do things differently?”
Murdock turned his gaze on the men gathered at the bar. “I wonder.”
Wentworth’s eyebrows arched up. “You’re worrying me, Yank. I can hear the gears clicking away from here.”
“Yeah. I was just wondering about a quiet little exercise.”
“Exercise?” Wentworth took a deep breath, then poured himself another couple of fingers from the bottle. “I suppose you mean a reconnaissance exercise.”
“Full gear. Full simulation. Open ocean.”
“Possibly with a ‘simulated’ target?”
“I had in mind one of those North Sea oil rigs. A big one.”
“I was afraid of that.” Wentworth took a deep breath. “You know, Yank. I should say no right now. What you’re suggesting, going in without orders? They could bloody hang you from the yardarm.”
“Actually, I think I have the orders end of things pretty well covered. UNODIR.”
“What’s that?”
“‘Unless otherwise directed.’ The Special Warfare warrior’s friend. They just want me to stay where they can reach me… and that means keeping them informed at all times of where I am.” He patted the beeper in his jacket pocket. “Like this. So, I write out a set of orders. ‘Unless otherwise directed, SEAL Seven Third Platoon shall under the command of Lieutenant Murdock, et cetera, et cetera, conduct an independent reconnaissance in preparation for possible operations against hostiles in connection with the current situation on the Bouddica oil-production facility.’ I transmit that to Norfolk a few hours before we get wet. By the time someone back in Norfolk reads it and starts getting nervous, we’ve gone in, done it, and gotten out again.”
“You’re mad. There’s a procedure to these things. They’d never accept that.”
“I don’t know about you Brits,” Murdock said, considering his glass. “In my neck of the woods, the main consideration is always, always CYA.”