John O'Brien - Takedown

He rises and leaves control of the sub to the XO. His destination is the crew mess where he knows that Krandle and his team usually hang out. Sure enough, they are gathered around one of the small tables sipping coffee and no doubt talking about what a fucked up situation the captain has forced them into. That’s usual when sailors or soldiers gather. Leonard would rather have them bitching. It’s when they stop bitching that any commander should start to worry.

The room is empty except for the six of them. They rise at his entrance. He waves them back into place and joins them. With the exception of Krandle, their discomfort is easy to see — their fidgeting and their eyes wandering off; their minds searching for any plausible reason to not be here. Leonard has seen them all, with having to use the head being the most popular. He wonders just how many of them are thinking that at this very moment. It’s funny how these men can face the dangers they do yet get nervous about sitting with a commanding officer.

I guess that makes me scarier than a camp full of terrorists , he thinks, watching as one of the men places his hands on the table and makes to rise.

“Sit your ass down, Speer. You don’t have to go to the head and you know it. The captain has graced us with his presence and you’ll sit through every minute of it…and enjoy it,” Krandle says, still looking at Leonard but with a smile in his eyes.

With a sigh, the man named Speer eases back down.

“I won’t make you cringe in terror too long,” Leonard says, looking at Speer. “I came to talk with you for two reasons. The first is that I owe you all an apology. I didn’t believe your story when you returned from the Philippines.”

“That’s understandable, sir. It was a rather wild one,” Krandle states.

“It’s both understandable and not. Regardless, events proved you correct so I apologize. The second is that we are heading down to the town of Seaside. I would like for you to take your team ashore and scout the area. It’s one of the few towns with which we’ll have the opportunity to do so.”

“When will we be arriving, sir?” Krandle asks.

“In about an hour.”

“So a daylight infiltration then?”

“Yes, chief. We won’t be doing any night operations if we can at all help it,” Leonard answers. “I’m sorry but I don’t have any information on the town other than it butts right up against the beach itself. If something comes up, get out and we’ll pick you up. We’re only going in for a look so don’t take unnecessary risks. As agreed to in Bangor, you have the right to decline.”

“Let us look over the town when we arrive. For now, you can count on us going, sir. We’ll make a final determination when we get a chance to see it.”

“Thank you, chief… gentlemen,” Leonard says. He rises and exits.

The captain rises and leaves the crew mess. The captain’s coming here rather than calling for him impresses Krandle. It is something he would never have expected. He knows they didn’t exactly see eye-to-eye before but also knew Leonard was a professional like him. They could work within those guidelines if nothing else. Personalizing the meeting was a long step for them to begin working as a team. Krandle feels better about his decision to stay onboard. He still hates subs but his dislike is less.

“Wait… did he just apologize?” Speer asks after making sure the captain wasn’t going to make another sudden appearance.

“That he did,” Krandle answers.

“About time,” Speer responds.

“Okay, guys, we don’t have a lot of time. Game faces on. We’ll treat this like any other infil. We’re not going in weapons free but watch your corners and each other. Any fire, we respond in kind and disengage,” Krandle says.

“I can’t believe we are going in during the day. We might as well toot horns and wave sparklers,” Speer says.

“You’d rather go in at night, Speer?” Franklin asks.

“Well, no. I’m just saying.”

“You guys done? I can go grab another coffee if you’d like to finish,” Krandle states.

“I’m good. Unless South Side of Chicago here wants to add any of his expertise or deep wisdom,” Speer says. Blanchard just looks at Speer and shrugs.

“Okay. We’ll pick a place to land when we see the town and ride the zodiac in. We don’t know the layout so we’ll check out the main places in town. It’s been a while since this went down so we’ll be looking for tracks or other evidence of survivors. This isn’t a search and rescue so we won’t be going into buildings. If no one comes out, we don’t go in looking. We’ve all seen what happens in them. We stay together. We’ll determine rally points when we glass the area. No matter what happens, we’re exfilling two hours prior to sunset. We’ll stay on button three and use channel four as our zero button. Now, I said we weren’t weapons free but if something is an obvious threat, we don’t hesitate. Apologize later. We all come back. Any questions?” Krandle briefs. There aren’t any.

“Okay, gear up and meet in the equipment room in forty. I’ll go topside to take a look with Franklin and meet the rest of you down there.”

Grabbing his gear from his bunk and locker, Krandle ventures with Franklin into the control room to wait for their arrival at the town of Seaside. The wait is short and they are soon following the watch crew up the ladder. The quarters are tight on top with everyone up but, by allowing only one person to breath at a time, they manage. Krandle looks across the expanse of water at the town abutting the shoreline.

“Seaside, eh? Original name for a coastal city. The town’s founders weren’t very unique,” Franklin comments as he too looks at a magnified view.

“No, but it looks like a nice vacation spot,” Krandle replies.

The city itself is right up against a pristine beach and stretches along the entirety of it. To the north, a waterway empties into the sea. Krandle notices a murky line of sandy water extending out to sea from the entrance indicating a strong current. Across the river, the beach continues on with residential houses set back a distance from the nearly white sands. The city looks to be mostly residential with cabins and smaller houses occupying most of the waterfront. He spots only two high-rises in the entirety of the town. They are two larger hotels next to each other bordering the long strip of sand. A dark line of wet sand shows near the small, cresting waves, indicative of a low or receding tide. This confirms the tide table information that Krandle looked at prior to climbing the steep ladder.

“What do you think?” Krandle asks, lowering his binoculars.

“Well, I would pick next to the river as that is the least populated, but that’s out due to the strong current. The shoreline north of the river looks unpopulated, but who knows how long it will take to navigate around the river into town. Same reasoning for the south shore,” Franklin answers.

“So, right up the middle?”

“As much as I hate to say it, yes. We just won’t have time to land to either side and get into town for a look-see.”

“That’s my thinking. The guys aren’t going to like it much. Hell, I don’t like it much,” Krandle says.

“We could always say no.”

“I know. It doesn’t look that bad. We haven’t been ashore since all of this went down and I’d like to have a closer look for myself.”

“Curiosity and the cat you know,” Franklin comments.

“Yeah, yeah, I know. Good thing I’ve only used five lives so far. Plenty to go with some to hand out if needed.”

Turning to one of the watch crew, Krandle asks him to inform the captain that they are a go.