and spray. The M-16 roared, chopping into rebel soldiers, slamming them down in blood and flailing arms.
'Down! Down!' Loomis was shouting as he cleared the door so the other Marines could come through with a clear line of fire. 'U.S. Marines!
Everybody down!'
The other Marines joined in, some with carefully placed single shots, some on rock and roll. One rebel threw up his arms and pitched back over the registration desk. One tried to run and was cut down before he'd taken two steps. The hostages were screaming, a wild, eerie sound that drowned out the gunfire.
Another rebel pitched back into the lobby from the foyer near the elevators. More Marines were coming through there, the second assault team from the other side of the hotel. And from the front of the lobby, huge sheets of plate glass exploded inwards, engulfing the rebels clustered there.
'U.S. Marines!' Loomis kept shouting. 'U.S. Marines! Everybody down!'
Some of the rebel soldiers were already throwing down their guns and raising their hands.
Colonel Kriangsak heard the explosion of gunfire from the lobby. He'd been racing through one of the hotel's shops with two of his men, trying to find a vantage point which would let him see inside the big helicopter's cargo bay when automatic weapons fire began its insistent, full-throated rattling elsewhere in the building.
He knew at once that an assault was underway, that the helo's arrival had been a ruse. He reached a window in time to see two lines of Marines storming down the helo's ramp and rushing the front of the building. There was a loud thump of a grenade, then another. Smoke billowed from beneath the awning over the sidewalk in front of the hotel.
Kriangsak raised his M-16, aiming at the charging Marines through the window… then lowered it again. If he opened fire, he could kill three or four, perhaps, but that would not help the coup and it would guarantee Kriangsak's own death.
SA David Howard had volunteered to help load the extra Stokes stretchers onto the big Sea Stallion that morning, never guessing that he was getting a front-row seat to a hostage rescue. The helo's cargo chief had simply asked if he wanted to come along to help with the stretchers at the other end, and handed him a cranial and a life jacket when he agreed.
He wasn't sure why he'd volunteered. He still felt the shock ? and the horror ? of the deaths of his three friends in Bangkok. There'd been no official announcement yet, but word had already spread through the Jefferson's grapevine. It was horrible.
And that same death had come so close to claiming him as well.
Maybe it was a need to lay those particular ghosts to rest… or possibly he just needed to be busy. In any case, he'd said yes.
Within minutes of receiving the emergency call from the American embassy, the helo was lifting off from the Jefferson. Howard was enthralled by the sight of the carrier ? the small city in which he'd been living for the past months ? dropping away astern until it looked like a toy, finally vanishing in the distance. The Sea Stallion had touched down at the embassy thirty minutes later and taken aboard at least fifty grim, face-blackened Marines in full combat gear. The flight to the hotel had taken only a minute or two more.
The assault on the That International Hotel was over almost as soon as it began, and Howard saw very little of it. The Sea Stallion had dropped to the pavement in front of the hotel and lowered the ramp, but the body of the aircraft was turned so that people inside the hotel could not see into the machine's cavernous cargo bay.
He waited, unable to see, packed in with at least fifty Marines who, save for their garb and weapons, seemed to be men very much like himself. Some chewed gum, others made grim jokes. Most simply stared past the padding covering the inside of the cargo bay and kept their thoughts to themselves.
It occurred to Howard that he was going into combat himself. He heard the sudden crackle of muffled gunfire.
Then the word crackled over an officer's helmet radio loudly enough for Howard to hear it. 'Sunday Punch, Outpost! They're in the lobby. Take 'em down!' An order was barked, and the Marines thundered down the Sea Stallion's ramp, the tramp of their feet on metal amplified by the cargo bay walls.
'Marines!' someone yelled, and the cry was taken up and repeated by the others with one thundering voice which drowned out the noise of the rotors.
Howard heard the double bang of a pair of grenades, the smash of shattering glass, the crack of gunfire.
When the Marines were clear of the Sea Stallion, the cargo chief talked briefly with the crew through his helmet mike. Gently, the big helo lifted off the ground, rotated, and settled to earth again, this time with the open rear ramp pointed at the hotel entrance.
Smoke gushed from canisters hurled by the Marines as they'd charged.
Howard could see through the fog to the gap-toothed ruin of the front windows, could see movement inside the hotel's front lobby, but the smoke obscured his view. Four Marines crouched on the sidewalk outside, mounting guard.
He could hear more shooting over the rotor noise, even distinguish the sharp yells of the Marines, though he couldn't make out the words.
A shape moved through the smoke to one side of the entrance, a shadow in fog… followed by another… then a third.
Howard was about to shout a warning when one of the shadows opened fire on the Marines by the front door. There was a wild, confused exchange of gunfire. Two of the Marines crumpled to the ground as one of the shadows was sent spinning back against one of the pillars supporting the awning over the sidewalk. Rifle shots cracked from another direction as snipers out beyond the parking lot saw this new threat and opened fire. A ricochet struck the sidewalk, screaming.
A second shadow went down.
The third shadow never stopped, never hesitated. It materialized into a man, a That wearing a rumpled officer's uniform and carrying an M16. His boots clattered up the Sea Stallion's ramp as he stormed the helicopter's cargo bay by himself.
Howard leaped to one side. The M-16 in the intruder's hands spat full-auto noise and flame, and a white hot hammer struck Howard high in the left shoulder, slamming him back against the bulkhead. The crew chief collapsed in a heap. The invader hurried past, ignoring them both.
David Howard did not think of himself as a brave man, but after the first shock his arm didn't hurt. And the That officer was heading for the cockpit.
A red-painted CO, fire extinguisher hung from its mounting bracket on the bulkhead above Howard's head. He grabbed the cylinder and wrenched it free.
At the sound, the invader turned suddenly, the M-16 coming up.
Howard had thought he might spray the intruder's face with cold, high-pressure gas, but there was no more time for thinking, no time to pull the arming pin, no time to do anything but act. Continuing the motion begun when he pulled the fire extinguisher from its rack, he swung the eighteen-inch bottle with all his might. It struck the muzzle of the M-16, knocking the weapon aside just as it fired, sending rounds chewing into the helicopter's bulkhead. Howard swung again, this time catching the invader full in the face.
He struck again… and again…
The next thing he was aware of was a Marine standing beside him. 'It's okay, son,' the man said. 'You got him.'
CHAPTER 25
The That UH-1 Hueys touched down in a clearing less than fifteen kilometers from U Feng, as troops of the
