Executive Orders

Chapter 5 Recompense

RECOMPENSE

FIVE

“Every action has an equal and opposite reaction.”

Sir Isaac Newton

U.S.S. TITAN

The short red headed engineer, a Senior Chief aptly nicknamed “Red” expertly stepped between girders, her right hand keeping her balanced as she guided Caleb through the bowels of his beloved ship. The combination of tight quarters and body heat had made the humidity almost unbearable. Red’s hair had become a giant ball of fire colored curls.

Gunny King wiped sweat from his brow and glanced ahead towards his future father in law. The back of his t shirt was soaked through with sweat and the tattoos looked as if they might melt from his massive shoulders.

The small group of sweaty pissed off sailor and marines inched forward as fast as their surrounding allowed. More than once someone miss stepped and almost plunged to the bottom of the ship. There were no floors here; a fall would be loud and deadly.

A sailor at the back of the group slipped and let an expletive fly out, as a group of mutineers strode past on the other side of the bulkhead.

“Hey, Joe?”  One of the voices sounded less than a foot from where King stood balanced on an I beam, fingers wrapped tightly around this grips of his stolen pistol.

“What? Did you hear that?”

“Hear what?”

“There was a noise.”

“It’s an old ship. It creaks, now come on.”

Greene released the breath that had caught in his throat and slowly lowered his pistol before he climbed down a level, barely squeezing through places that Red slipped through easily.

As Red grasped the wrench that Greene had handed her, she tucked her .45 caliber Heckler and Koch pistol into the small of her back and stuffed a clump of fire red curls behind her ear. Red took a breath as she took off the first bolt and dumped it into Greene’s waiting hand. A few painstaking moments later the panel had been removed and carefully placed on the deck of a small aft weapons hold.

Greene stepped inside, moving with silent ease, honed from years of sneaking about. Chief Red beckoned to him.

“Sir, how do we know if they’ve reached to video room?”

“Well, Chief,” he motioned to the security camera sweeping the room. “we aren’t dead yet.”

“This is a bit by the seat of our pants isn’t it Sir?”

“Yes,” He grinned. “But that’s the only way I know how.”

Two soft thumps caused Greene and Red to spin towards the door, weapons drawn. They relaxed and opened the door when there came a knock followed by two short raps and another knock.

The others had set the video feed to a loop and now needed to be armed. Greene’s people only had twenty minutes to get ready before the computer reset and the video loop collapsed. Arms and ammunition were passed around like candy on Halloween.

Caleb stepped out into the corridor carrying some more shells to a Marine standing watch when a bullet whizzed past his head. His return fire only grazed the shooter as Caleb dove into an alcove. He could see his future son in law firing a rifle and then ducking back before a round bounced off of the bulkhead he was crouched behind.

“Boss!” he yelled as he took a bead on a mutineer. “You hit?”

“No!” Caleb grunted as he shifted his pistol from on hand to another, searching for a spare magazine in his pockets. “I’m just pissed!”

Bullets sparked on the bulkhead to his right as he turned and fired his last two rounds into the chest of an attacking female Officer. Frustrated and out of rounds he threw his pistol hitting one of the mutineers in the stomach.

One of them came charging towards Caleb with his shotgun. Greene pulled a knife. As the boy sprinted past Caleb spun sinking the eight inch blade into his heart. His look of bravery turned to surprise and then fear. There was nothing to be done for him now. Greene ripped the shotgun from the dead boy’s body and racked the slide, bringing a twelve gauge slug into the chamber. He fired only twice, each round drilled into the chest of a strong young man who just happened to be on the wrong side of the mutiny.

Bullets ripped through bodies and Caleb knew that the whole of Commander Basilio’s forces were going to descend upon their position. A glance behind him told Greene that Red and King knew that same.

Suddenly the return fire stopped. Greene poked his head out just enough to see that there were bodies strewn about the corridor.

“CANDY!” a voice shouted from down the hall.

“APPLE!”  Caleb shouted the agreed upon code word back to the voice.

Each team slowly stepped from cover their guns up and pointed at each other until visual confirmation was made that they were who they said they were.

“Admiral,” the older Chief of the Boat greeted him. “We’ve picked up some friends along our way and they seem to be in need of some supplies.”

Caleb shook his hand after all had been rearmed and they began to move out. C.O.B. Kaffee’s team joined Caleb’s push towards C.I.C. and the Fleet Bridge. Together they fought compartment by compartment never stopping until they reached the Bridge.

The team took the Bridge without a shot being fired. Caleb left the room in the capable hands of the C.O.B. and Master Gunny King. The old man exhausted and sweaty crept to his office, where he knew Commander Basilio would most likely be.

He was right; the traitor was lying down on his couch, his face hidden by his blue camouflage cap. The bastard had raided Caleb’s liquor cabinet, hidden under a display case which had also been ransacked.

Basilio stirred as the light from the hall behind Caleb hit his face, and then jumped with a start when he realized whose shadow was before him. He leapt to his feet as Caleb rushed towards him and he pulled a large revolver from the small of his back as Caleb’s right shoulder drove into his stomach.

Both men grappled for the long barreled six-gun. With a sharp crack to the back of Basilio’s exposed neck, Caleb wrapped his fingers around the well-worn cherry grips. As he stumbled to his feet a sharp pain in his left ear brought him back to his knees. He rolled to his side grabbing for where he dropped the pistol. A mirror polished black shoe pinned his hand. All Caleb saw was a shiny nickel plated barrel and an old friend before the other shoe caught him in the face.