Only a few of the tank farm’s arc lights still burned; failing maintenance and energy rationing had extinguished the rest. The Marines had night-vision visors, the militiamen did not. Unaware of the threat converging on them through the shadows, the Union patrols walked into ambush.
Grenade launchers leveled. Invisible targeting lasers lashed out, designating impact points. Fingers contracted on triggers.
A series of soft, tinny thumps sounded in the night, the noise almost lost in the beating of the rain.
The grenade launchers had been loaded with silent-discharge shells. Rather than firing their projectiles directly from the launcher tubes, the hot gases released by the low-yield propellant charges were contained inside telescoping shell bases to vent away slowly and silently. The pistoning action of the shell bases explosively doubling in length hurled the payloads on their way.
The projectiles launched were nonlethal “beanbag” rounds, small disk-shaped envelopes filled with high-density plastic beads. They struck with the force of a .38-caliber revolver round but with the impact dispersed out over several square inches rather than at a single point.
To the targeted militiamen, the experience was similar to being slugged in the gut by an invisible heavyweight boxer. Even as they crumpled retching to the muddy ground, the Marine ambush parties charged in, finishing the job with carbine butts and sap gloves.
Binding and gagging the members of the security patrols with the same kind of coarse local cord that had been used at the guard shack, the Marines carefully dragged the unconscious Union soldiers up onto higher ground, away from the fuel storage tanks. They were also careful to seek out and recover the discharged beanbags, each round having been marked with a dollop of the same luminescent chemical used in the Marine IFF light sticks.
“Phase two complete. Patrols are down. Tank farm secured.”
“Acknowledged. Proceed to phase three.”
Stone Quillain looked around at the remainder of the strike force clustered behind the guard shack. Sergeant Tallman and the other black Marines who had masqueraded as the Free-town boatmen had redonned their uniforms and equipment harnesses. Padded tool rolls had been opened and heavy-duty bolt cutters and steel pipe cheater bars were being distributed.
“Okay, boys, you know the drill,” Quillain said, pulling down his AI2 visor. “Corporal MacHenny, your fire team maintains gate security. Be ready to fall back to the extraction point the second you get the word. The rest of you know your objectives. Remember to watch your equipment inventories! If we brought it in, we take it back out! Let’s go!”
Breaking up into two-man assault details, the Marines dispersed, Quillain and Tallman heading for the nearest of the multithousand-gallon storage tanks.
Scrambling over the pressed-earth leak-containment berm that surrounded the tank, the two men followed the feeder pipelines to its base. Christine Rendino had discreetly hacked the Shell engineering database and had acquired a set of technical schematics for the Wellington Creek installation. Thus, Quillain and Tallman knew exactly what they were looking for and where it would be located. Powering down their tactical electronics as an antispark precaution, they set to work.
The maintenance dumping valve was located on the north side of the tank and, as expected, a heavy, padlocked safety chain had been looped through the valve wheel. The bolt cutters and the brawn of the two Marines made short work of it, however. Rust provided a second line of defense, but a second application of brawn defeated that as well. Creaking, the valve opened.
Pressurized by its own weight within the tank, diesel oil burst forth. Half a dozen turns of the wheel sent a horizontal jet of fuel eight inches wide and thirty feet long spewing out on the rain-sodden ground, hundreds of precious gallons wasting away each minute.
Tallman yanked the wheel off the valve stem and spun it away into the night like a steel Frisbee, while Quillain unwound a grounding wire from the cheater bar, stamping its free end into the soil at the base of the tank. They fitted a cheater bar over the vertical shaft of the stem, and then, with muscles bulging and boots slipping in the mud and oil, the Marines strained against the length of pipe.
Slowly, the valve stem gave way, bending from the vertical to the horizontal and farther. Even after the open valve was discovered, closing it again would be no small chore.
The two Marines stood back, taking a second to catch up on their breathing. “Man,” Tallman commented, eyeing the rapidly spreading pool of oil. “I hope nobody smokes in bed around here.”
“Yeah, the rain should help keep things damped down, though. And with the wind blowing offshore, nobody’s going to notice the fumes for a while. Let’s go.”
They sloshed out to the containment berm, already wading through more petroleum than water. Once clear of the oil pool, Quillain reactivated his systems.
“Tank two,” the first report came in from out of the darkness. “Diesel. Open.”
“Tank four. Diesel. Open.”
“Tank three. Gasoline. Open.”
“Tank five. Dry hole.”
“Tank six. Kerosene, maybe jet fuel. Open.”
“Tank teams acknowledged. Tank one diesel and open. Tank teams proceed to extraction point. Establish extraction perimeter.”
A volley of double clicks came back in reply. Quillain switched channels and accessed the seafighter command circuit. “Royalty, this is Mudskipper. Phase three completed. Operation successful. Standing by for extraction.”
Amanda Garrett spoke no words of praise. Those could wait until the raider force was off the beach. “Acknowledged, Mudskipper. Initiating extraction. Boats are inbound.”
“Roger.” Click! Stone bounced back to the raider force commo loop. “All elements. All elements. Extract! Extract! Extract! All elements acknowledge and fall back to extraction point. Move!”
The extraction point was the tank farm’s handling pier where, during better days, the Shell Oil barges had unloaded their cargoes. The other sabotage teams were already there, crouching in a wary half-circle around the foot of the pier, weapons up and scanning the darkness. Quillain stood within the half-circle, counting in his men as the security teams jogged in from the night.
“Sixteen… eighteen… twenty-two… twenty-four. Tallman, d’you confirm the count?”
“Twenty-four out, twenty-four back. All hands accounted for, Captain. We good to go.”
“Tool count on the cheater bars and bolt cutters?”
“Six and six.”
“Right. All hands! Double-check your gear! We don’t leave nothin’ behind. Nothin’!”
There was movement out on the Sierra Leone estuary. Three patches of shadow defined themselves into a trio of sixteen-foot miniraider Zodiacs. Ghosting in on silenced outboards, they drew alongside the pilings of the loading pier, tucking in against the floating personnel stage.
“Designated personnel for boat one, go!” Quillain called hoarsely. The billowing waves of raw petroleum fumes saturating the air were starting to rasp at his throat.
Eight Marines peeled out of the security perimeter, moving with quiet haste onto the pier and down to the landing stage. Drilled repeatedly in the boarding procedure, each man knew the order in which he’d board and his place in the little craft. The loading took only seconds and then the miniraider pushed off, the Navy coxswain opening his throttle for the run out to the recovery vessel.
“Boat one away, Captain.”
“Personnel for boat two, go!”
Quillain and Tallman were the last two men aboard the last boat, Quillain’s boots being the last to leave the dock.