Korea Strait Read Online Free Page A

newbie’s got to study up. You guys have one for me. Let’s get together at zero-eight for breakfast and talk over the ship assignments, and then—what time’s the flight to Pusan?”
    They said noon. He shook hands, slapped backs, and moved off.
    Then he turned back and beckoned to Henrickson. The analyst peeled off, yelling to the others to wait. “Yeah?”
    Dan lowered his voice and turned away from the street. “Two questions, Monty. One: who’s in charge of this outfit?”
    â€œWhich outfit?”
    â€œUs. TAG Bravo. Is it you or me?”
    â€œYou’re the one with the silver oak leaves.”
    â€œYou’re the one with the doctorate.”
    Henrickson snapped his head back and forth. “Uh-uh. We’re under orders. TAG works looser back in the building, more collegial, but when we’re on the road, it’s all military. Next question?”
    â€œOkay, that clears things up. Next is, what’s the story on this O’Quinn character? Why do Rit and Donnie call him ‘Captain’?”
    â€œBecause he’s a captain.” He caught Dan’s puzzled frown; if O’Quinn was a captain, why was a commander in charge of the team? “A
retired
captain.”
    â€œOh. Okay… retired. I guess that makes sense. But why do I get the feeling…?”
    Henrickson lowered his voice. “I figured everybody knew.”
    â€œI just got here.”
    â€œRemember the
Buchanan?
”
    He searched his memory. A guided-missile cruiser, the class before Aegis and the Ticonderogas. Hadn’t there been an accident…? “The collision. The guys who were below—”
    â€œRight. The engine room, main space was flooding. Joe was in command. And he lost it. Ordered the hull techs to weld a hatch shut. Saved the ship, but… left six guys on the wrong side of the hatch. He wasn’t going anyplace after that. Resigned after the court of inquiry. Lost his wife too. I don’t know the story behind that part, but she’s history.”
    â€œHoly smoke.” Dan glanced O’Quinn’s way. The man stood alone, hands in his pockets, cigarette dangling from his lip as he studied the mist-wreathed hills. “So what’s he doing here?”
    â€œOh, he knows his stuff. Works for a civilian contractor now. But if we ever get in a tight spot…”
    Dan could finish that sentence: don’t trust him not to weld the hatch shut on you.
    â€œAnyway, so long.”
    â€œSo long, Monty. See you guys in the a.m.”
    THE hotel phone’s electronic cheep sounded so much like the one that had been in USS
Thomas W. Horn
’s at-sea cabin that in the split second before he was awake he relived the whole explosion, the damage, their daylong fight to keep her from going down that sunny afternoon off the Israeli coast. By the time he reoriented and got his eyes locked on the red light that was the only illumination in the darkened room, his heart was pounding and he was bathed in sweat. His upper spine felt as if someone had mauled a log splitter into it.
    â€œLenson,” he snapped.
    â€œHey, Dan? Dick Shappell. With CNFK?” He sounded taken aback at Dan’s tone. “Sorry to get you up.”
    â€œYeah. No problem. What—what is it?”
    â€œLike I said, sorry to wake you. But Fifth Flotilla, down in Chinhae, cornered something interesting. Thirty miles off Sokch’o. That’s—you probably wouldn’t know—that’s south of the DMZ, on the east coast.”
    â€œYeah? Sokch’o.” He cleared his throat, straining to see what time it was. He couldn’t make out his watch, but when he skated the drapes open it was dark outside except for the dirty rose sky, the endless blue-white glitter of city lights. “They cornered something interesting? What?”
    Shappell hesitated, as if unsure what to say over an open line. “Something that