What was a red-blooded guy to do? The staff meeting would last for hours. That fat bore of a Chief Staff Officer would argue every last detail of every agenda item. But he couldn’t just miss it without raising suspicion. His irritability was reaching entirely new heights.
His yeoman knocked on the office door and stepped inside, “You wife is calling on line two, sir.”
He picked up the receiver. “Yes, dear. What do you want?”
He held the phone away from his ear as she yammered. Her incessant jabbering drove him insane. What had he ever seen in her? True, her father had been an admiral when they met. That had been useful, at least until the old goat retired. Now she was of no use to him.
Then his ear picked up words that registered on his cortex when nothing else had. “I need you to come home and talk to your son. He skipped school to surf, again.”
He answered, “Dear, I’ll be home as soon as I can. I have a lot of things that need to be wrapped up here before I can leave.”
He replaced the receiver back on the hook and grabbed his hat as he walked out the door. “Yeoman, I’ll be out the rest of the day. Family emergency. Tell the Chief Staff Officer to call me on the cell phone if anything is really important.”
He jumped in the Porsche, revved the engine and headed out the North Gate and sped on to the Nimitz Highway. The run to her apartment in Pearl City was only ten minutes. He had the whole afternoon with her. The wife and that brat of a son could wait.
21 Jun 2000, 0600LT (20 Jun, 2300Z)
Boats lay in the surf line watching. Nothing moved ashore. Just the normal jungle sounds. He was so familiar with them that they were comforting. Not the slightest sign that anyone was expecting their arrival. No movement in the trees, betraying an ambush. He raised his hand slightly and waved the all clear signal.
In a carefully orchestrated and practiced maneuver, one black-clad team member scurried across the sand and into the tree line while being covered by team members crouching in the surf.
The sun peeked over the horizon as the last of the squad crossed the sand, carefully erasing any traces of their passage. In the growing light, they buried their swimming gear in shallow holes scooped out of the sand. Shouldering their combat equipment, the team moved inland to find a place to hide for the day.
They slipped through the heavy coastal mangrove swamp undergrowth. Several groups of patrolling soldiers passed them by without ever seeing the moving green shadows. The SEALs heard the nervous chatter and smelled strong pungent smell of tobacco smoke from the passing guards long before the guards were even near.
These were not highly trained combat soldiers. Even so, they could be very dangerous. They were anxious about something and were nervously patrolling. The squad would have to be extremely cautious not to accidentally encounter a random patrol or to leave telltale traces that would betray their presence.
Avoiding the few built up trails, the SEALs slithered through the swamp. They soon learned why the Nusa Funata mangrove swamps had a reputation for being impenetrable. Wading in brackish water, frequently up to their necks, they struggled silently inland, toward higher ground. The tangle of mangrove roots constantly blocked their progress. The slippery, thick volcanic mud sucked them down. Hordes of biting and stinging insects voraciously attacked any exposed flesh.
They frequently spied snakes either slithering through the tree branches or swimming in the brown water. Boats hated snakes. He had hated them ever since the encounter with a fer-de-lance in Costa Rica during an exercise early in his career. He had nearly died and his left leg still bore the scars from the necrotic actions of the venom. Nusa Funata was home to Sea Kraits, Taipans, Deaths Adders, Tiger Snakes and a host of others, some yet to be named. This was not a hospitable place.
Onward they labored, measuring their progress in scant feet. The heavy packs seemed to snag on every obstacle. Each step involved tripping over a submerged root. Bubbles of methane and hydrogen sulfide burst under their noses, kicked free by their passage. The humidity was cloying, the heat stifling. The fetid odor of rotting vegetation surrounded them like an annoying cloud. No gentle sea breeze could possibly penetrate that maze.
21 Jun 2000, 1400LT (0700Z)
After hours of exhausting slogging, the team finally reached semi-dry ground. The sun was already passed its zenith when they discovered a small hummock, providing good cover and reasonably visible approaches. Boats laid out the guard positions so all the approaches could be covered with a murderous crossfire if need be.
While the men settled in to get what rest they could before the upcoming night’s activities, Jankowski set up to the SATCOM transceiver to communicate with Roland on SAN FRANCISCO. The communications were quick, concise and to the point. Just a report that they were safely ashore. No sign of detection. They would be in position tonight for their missions. The chosen approach route could not be reused. A more direct route was needed.
As they settled down for a short rest, the sky opened with a late afternoon deluge. The downpour reduced visibility to inches and seeped into every seam of their raingear. The uncomfortable bivouac was all the SEALs could expect. They simply huddled a little deeper in the undergrowth, secure in the knowledge that the rain that made them uncomfortable also kept the guards from patrolling and drove away the bugs.
21 Jun
