Chapter 19 - THE RETURN TO CORONADO
By zero-six-hundred hours, the rain over Coronado had stopped, leaving behind a crisp, golden morning sky as the sun broke over the eastern horizon.
The base was coming to life. The hum of jet engines echoed from the airfields, and the rhythmic sound of hundreds of boots marching across the parade grounds filled the fresh morning air.
Inside the Coronado mess hall, the forty operators of Squad Three sat at their stainless-steel tables for morning PT breakfast.
The atmosphere was vastly different from the previous evening. There was no loud laughter, no boastful jokes, and no clattering of trays. The operators ate their eggs and toast in quiet, disciplined order, their eyes occasionally drifting toward the central aisle.
The hydraulic doors at the end of the hall opened with a heavy hiss.
Commander Grant Mercer walked into the room. He was dressed in his crisp service dress blues, his posture erect, his silver oak leaf insignia catching the morning sunlight streaming through the high windows.
Beside him walked Senior Chief Rhodes.
The forty operators sat up straight in their chairs, their eyes following their Commanding Officer as he walked down the central aisle, stopping at the head of the room beneath the American flag.
Mercer looked across his men. His face was pale, but his eyes were clear, holding a new, profound gravity that had replaced the arrogant certainty he had carried twenty-four hours earlier.
"At ease," Mercer said smoothly.
The forty men relaxed their posture by an inch, but kept their attention locked onto him.
"Yesterday afternoon," Mercer spoke, his baritone voice carrying clearly through the silent room, "this unit was subjected to an unannounced operational evaluation by a senior representative of the Special Warfare Executive Directorate."
The operators exchanged fast, silent glances, every man remembering the young female lieutenant in the olive shirt who had crushed Mercer's authority without lifting a finger.
"Lieutenant Carter has completed her evaluation," Mercer continued, looking down the center aisle toward the clean, stainless-steel workbench where her canvas bag had rested. "Her findings have been submitted directly to Naval Special Warfare Command. Squad Three has been cleared for full operational deployment to the Pacific Theater effective zero-eight-hundred tomorrow."
A low, collective sigh of relief passed through the forty operators.
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"However," Mercer added, his tone sharpening into cold steel, "if I ever hear a single man in this command question the authority, the rank, or the presence of any operator who walks into this base—regardless of their uniform, their assignment, or their appearance—I will personally strip his trident and have him reassigned to fuel detail in the Aleutian Islands. Do I make myself clear?"
"HOO-RAH, COMMANDER!" forty voices bellowed in absolute, synchronized unison, their shout echoing off the concrete bulkheads like a thunderclap.
