SEAL Team 666: A Novel

Walker poured himself coffee, added one sugar, then carried it into the other room. He stared at the door to the conference room for several minutes before he made his decision. He went to the door, turned the knob, and cracked it open.

The room looked like some kind of hurricane had slammed into it. Paper was stuck to the walls in several layers from floor to ceiling. It was on the table and covered the floor. Beneath the table was a pile of paper so large it looked as if it had been used to cover the body of a dead man.

A whiteboard had been brought into the room. On this was a combination of characters and diagrams that could have only been made by the love child of Michio Kaku and Carl Sagan. It was either physics, algebra, or some sort of scientific notation he’d never seen before. Here and there he recognized some Chinese characters. Laws was sprawled in one of the chairs.

“You get us a clue?”

Laws turned his head. “I think so.”

Walker’s eyes widened. “No shit?” He stuck his head out the door and called for the others. While he waited for them to come, he found a seat and sipped his coffee. “Man,” he said. “You look like crap.”

“Thanks.” Laws smiled weakly. “I feel like crap.”

Ruiz and Holmes joined them, each with his own coffee. Holmes carried a folder with the familiar red cover sheet that proclaimed it as secret.

Finally Yaya and Hoover came in. They’d been running together and both were still a little winded. Yaya had a bottle of water. He made some room on the floor by pushing some papers away, put down a collapsible doggie dish, and filled it with water for Hoover.

Walker admired the skill with which Yaya had befriended Hoover. In the short time the new SEAL had been with the team they’d become all but inseparable. Even now, as the dog lapped at the water, she looked up at Yaya to see if he was there. In fact, it almost looked as if Hoover was grinning.

“I think we can start now,” Holmes said as he snapped the file shut and laid it in front of him. “SPG didn’t learn anything we don’t already know. So what can you tell us that a whole platoon of college-educated CIA agents can’t?”

Laws swiveled in his chair and stared at Holmes with tired eyes. The only thing that didn’t seem exhausted about him was the grin he wore. “I can tell you who the bad guy is.”

Suddenly he had their full attention.

Even Holmes seemed impressed. He leaned forward and clasped his hands together on the table. “So who is it?”

“First things first,” Laws said, standing. “Let me show you how I got there.” He stepped over piles of paper to get to the board. He grabbed a red marker and tested it to see if it still worked. When he was ready, he turned back to the assembled SEALs, poised like a seventh-grade math teacher.

“It all begins with the long,” he said. Laws circled a Chinese character. “This is long. It means ‘dragon.’ When I finally figured out what I was doing, it was this character that started things moving. You see, Chinese isn’t like other languages. There is no alphabet. No method of sounding out a word.” He glanced at Ruiz. “You know, like you did with the word ‘truck’ last week when you first learned it.”

Ruiz turned to Walker, who knew exactly what to do next.

“Tru—” said Ruiz.

“Uck,” said Walker.

“Truck,” they said together.

“Today’s Electric Company is brought to you by the letters F and U,” Laws remarked, unimpressed.

Yaya snorted.

“Come on, guys. Give him a break,” Holmes ordered.

Walker glanced at Holmes, who hadn’t taken his eyes off Laws the entire time, but under the table his knee bobbed impatiently. Holmes wanted to get on with it, but he was willing to let Laws have his day in the sun. After all, while they’d been drinking on the beach, Laws had been secluded in the conference room like a freshman preparing for finals.

“So,” Laws continued, letting the sound carry on for a few seconds, “we were talking about dragons. Normally you’d see the characters hong long

on Chinese restaurants or signs in Chinatown. That combination is very common. It means ‘red dragon.’”

He checked to see if he had everyone’s attention. When he saw that he did, he resumed. “In Western mythology dragons are considered evil, but it’s not the same in the East. Not at all. Chinese dragons traditionally symbolize power, good luck, and control over water elements. There’s literally dozens of dragons in their mythology. From shen long, which means ‘god dragon,’ to fei long, or ‘flying dragon.’ What I found curious in the papers from this ship was that the only instance I found for long was for chi long. At that point, I thought I’d figured something out, but the Chinese are tricky that way. Chi long literally means ‘demon dragon,’ but it translates better to ‘hornless dragon.’”

“That creature we fought was anything but hornless,” said Ruiz.

Laws pointed toward Ruiz and nodded. “That’s right. I thought the same thing. So I looked more closely at the character for chi.”