The key was not to do it for too long. Confusion and intimidation were what mattered. Bolan had to time his movements, shifting from point of cover to point of cover, striking and then repositioning himself so the enemy could not get a bead on his position. He was getting ready to shift again when he caught sight of the Russians, at the far edge of the perimeter, getting ready to make a move of their own.
He recognized Dobry Mikhailov again. The Russian OMON leader led a small contingent of his men away from the relative safety of their tour vehicles. They were carrying something with them, something heavy they had brought from the back of one of the trucks. Bolan recognized the outline of the weapon.
It was a 9M113 Konkurs missile system.
Essentially a wire-guided antitank weapon, something about this Konkurs was different. The Russians positioned the weapon, not in the direction of any of the North Korean vehicles—where they could guide the weapon by wire to the target—but facing up, into the sky.
“Uh-oh,” said Bolan quietly.
He looked around without panic for the cover he would need. If what he suspected was true, it was about to get much, much worse for anyone within the Konkurs system’s field of fire.
He ducked from one pit to another, finding one that had a wrecked “tour” vehicle wedged into it at a forty-five-degree angle. It was the best he was going to do. He scrambled past dead Russian OMON soldiers and under the SUV, using it like a giant lean-to.
“Pozhar!” one of the Russians shouted. Bolan could make out that much before the Konkurs belched fire and smoke into the sky.
From the shelter of the SUV, he could just detect the trail of smoke as the wire-guided munition flew into the air. Bolan knew what happened next would be devastating.
Moments later the weapon exploded.
He felt and heard the whistling of dozens—maybe hundreds—of cluster munitions raining down. This was something new, a variant of the Konkurs Bolan hadn’t seen before. The SUV protected him from the worst of it. Where the cluster bombs fell, they exploded, raining razor-sharp shrapnel in every direction. Terrible screaming erupted on the field of battle.
Bolan couldn’t wait any longer. He climbed up out of his foxhole. Bloody men were running toward him—SSD troops—in blind panic. Those who still had weapons tried to raise them. Bolan calmly and methodically shot them down with his M-16.
A cluster of SSD men were grouped behind the flaming wreckage of one of their Mercedes sedans. Bolan opened the M-203, loaded a “beehive” round, and ran for it. When he was near the corner of the wrecked car, he dropped into the grass and rolled. That put him on the ground, facing up, when he triggered the beehive. A cluster of .22 bullets blasted the clump of SSD gunners, ripping through them like a giant shotgun. Bolan followed up by spraying out the magazine in the M-16.
Standing, he maneuvered to keep the battlefield wreckage between him and the Russians. He needn’t have bothered. Now that the North Korean perimeter was broken by their fearsome weapon, they had abandoned the launcher and were making a hasty retreat in what was left of their vehicles.
Except for the crackling of fires, the area was suddenly very quiet.
Bolan approached the Konkurs, meaning to check the weapon to make sure it couldn’t fire again. Almost too late, he realized the Russians had rigged it with a timed charge. He saw the satchel and dived for the nearest vehicle pit, nearly landing on several bodies already at the bottom. The demolition charge on the Konkurs detonated and spread pieces of the device across the field.
Bolan willed himself to be still. He waited and listened. There were no footfalls, no more explosions. Soon, he could no longer hear the sound of the Russians’ engines. Carefully, he pulled himself up out of the pit and looked around.
He saw nothing but bodies. This had been an empty stretch of land in Pennsylvania farm country. Now it was a killing field, soaked in blood and littered with burning machines. He looked back toward the berm, hoping Hazan and Octavios had made it clear, and wondering what he would find when he moved to catch up with them.
He started through the slaughter-grounds. At the edge of the perimeter, near one of the shattered Mercedes sedans, he caught movement. Approaching carefully, M-16 at the ready, he skirted the vehicle and found a man leaning against one of the rear tires.
It was Choi Kwang Sik.
Choi was bleeding from his mouth. With every breath, bubbles formed on his lips. He was holding in his guts with his hands. There was a pistol on the ground near his body, but he made no attempt to reach for it. He was staring beyond Bolan at nothing. When the soldier took another step closer, Choi managed to make eye contact.
“Ghost,” he said.
“I’m real.”
“You...are a ghost,” Choi repeated. “One of the shadow killers. One of the American...warriors.”
Bolan shrugged. “You could see it that way.”
“Do not kill me, ghost,” Choi said. “I am dying anyway. Let me...look at the sky...while death takes me.”
The soldier followed Choi’s gaze and realized that the North Korean was indeed staring at the blue sky over Pennsylvania. If not for the bloody war before him, it would have been a beautiful day.
“Did your government send you here?” Bolan asked.
Choi almost laughed, but the sound caught in his throat. He coughed blood. Racked with spasms, it took him a few moments to speak again. “Of course...it did. And of course...they will say they did not.”
“Yeah. I was just talking to somebody about how that game is played. Anything you want to get off your chest?”
“I do not...understand.”
“Would you like to tell me anything?” Bolan said. “Unburden yourself of any nasty secrets you’ve been carrying around? Like where the rest of your troops are?”
“But...ghost...you are more than capable of killing them without my help. As you have killed me.”
“That wasn’t me,” Bolan said. “That was the Russians.”
“They seek to murder the Greek, too?”
“They’re trying to capture him. That was your mission? Murder Octavios so his pile of secrets would spill out in the world?”
“So the Supreme Leader willed,” Choi stated. “Ghost, I have changed my mind. I do not wish my family to suffer for my disgrace. Will you do me a service? Will you honor your vanquished foe?”
“What is it?” Bolan asked.
“Shoot me...in the head. Put my gun in my hand. I wish the...Supreme Leader...to know I fought to the very moment of death.”
“It doesn’t have to be that way,” Bolan told him. “You—”
Choi’s hand shot for his pistol. Bolan let his rifle fall to the end of its sling, snapped the Beretta out of its holster lightning-quick and put a single 9 mm round into Choi’s forehead. The SSD commander slumped to his side next to the Mercedes.
Bolan shook his head. The gun was already in Choi’s dead hand; he took out his secure smartphone and took a picture of the corpse. The Farm would file it in Choi’s dossier, then close it.
One of them was indeed a ghost now. It wasn’t Mack Bolan.
Chapter Twelve
Outside Bradford, Pennsylvania
It was indeed a long walk west, but Bolan finally saw the Malibu. Hazan had parked it near a stand of trees that broke up the otherwise flat landscape. She was sitting on the trunk of the car, cross-legged, writing in a small, leather-bound notebook. The Tavor was in her lap, ready to go. She saw Bolan coming from a long way off, waved to him and then waited patiently as he approached.
Octavios appeared to be sleeping in the passenger seat of the car. Bolan nodded to Hazan as he got close, then went around to check on the Greek. He was sleeping peacefully, his chest rising and falling. His complexion still looked odd to the Executioner.
“He is not well,” Hazan said.
“You noticed that
, did you? I can’t get him to admit what it is. I don’t believe in coincidences. Something doesn’t wash here, and I’m not going to be happy until I figure out what it is.”
Bolan walked around to where the Mossad agent was sitting and stood next to her. He put his hand above his eyes and scanned the landscape in every direction. He knew he could find his way back to the road from here. Then they could resume their journey.
“Whomever tasks you with your missions probably thinks they are clever,” Hazan said.
Bolan arched an eyebrow in query.
“Cooper, please don’t insult me.”
“Maybe you should explain.”
“This,” she said, spreading her hands. “All this. Foreign troops on American soil. Firefights that should be enough to send nations to war. The stakes involved where a man like Javier Octavios is concerned, yet here you are...driving him cross-country like this is some manner of road trip. Your president could easily have had Octavios taken by helicopter to anywhere in your nation. He could have assigned gunships as escorts. He could have sent a military column with tanks and heavy artillery. Instead, he sent you.”
“What’s your point?” Bolan asked.
“You suspect it already,” Hazan replied. “Perhaps you’re even certain of it. If it hasn’t occurred to you, you aren’t the man you seem. The American government arranged this. They’re using Octavios as bait.”
“The data dump he’s threatening is real,” Bolan told her.
“I don’t doubt that,” she said. “You certainly seem capable where protecting his life is concerned. But be honest, Cooper. Dragging this out, sending Octavios cross-country. It is a smoke show.”
A smile ghosted across Bolan’s face. “Smoke screen, I think you’re going for.”
She rolled her eyes. “Does it matter? Your government wanted to know who would respond. Who had the most to lose. Who was the most desperate. So they leveraged this real problem, this real threat, and then gave you room and leave to draw out all parties involved. My handlers suggested as much when they assigned me to help.”
“About that. If you know Hal Brognola, why didn’t you go through him? Why sneak in and then have to prove yourself to me?”
“Because we have no idea who we can trust, just as your president does not,” she said. “I am running a smoke show of my own.”
“You certainly are.” Bolan forced himself not to smile. “But what do you mean?”
“Mossad intercepted a message,” she said. “One we did not share with your government. It was sent to several nations hostile to the United States, nations small enough that their interest in killing Octavios would likely override any considerations about capturing the man to interrogate him.
“The message contained the precise specifications for tracking Octavios using two separate signals. One of those signals has been stopped. My guess is that was from a device or a bug that you found and eliminated. The second of those signals remains active. It is how I was able to track you and, in so doing, continue to acquire the North Koreans.”
“That’s...interesting.”
“You see my position,” Hazan said. “We have no way of knowing who is part of these leaks and who is not.”
“How do you know I’m not looking to take him out, somehow?” the soldier asked.
“If you were, he would be dead,” she said simply. “You’ve had more than enough time to manage it since taking him into custody.”
“So where does that leave us, Agent Hazan?”
“Alisa,” she said. “Call me Alisa. I will accompany you, back you up, while you transport your prisoner. Israeli Intelligence wants to see him remain alive until your experts can disconnect him from his device. Our goals are the same, even if some of the tech experts back home thought they might be better qualified for disarming Octavios’s data bomb.”
“I’m not interested in anybody’s territorial squabbles,” Bolan told her. “And I don’t give a damn about other nations’ secrets.”
“You might, if they revealed the workings of whatever secret agency you work for,” she said. “Oh, don’t look so surprised. Is it so farfetched an assumption?”
“You have me there,” he said.
“Shall we get moving? It must be a long way to...where, exactly?”
“Nice try,” Bolan quipped. “Get in the car and we’ll work out the rest.”
* * *
“Dobry,” Smyrnoi said. “This is madness. You will alert our superiors to the situation here.”
“Do you think they will not be alerted when someone kills Octavios and releases Russia’s darkest secrets to the world?”
The two men had pulled over to the side of the road, as far from the scene of the battle as they had been able to get before Mikhailov demanded they stop. Now the man was threatening to call for reinforcements. This would require activating several OMON squads that had been staged for emergency use.
Mikhailov’s argument was that this was precisely what those squads were for. They were a contingency to prevent them from failing their mission. But Smyrnoi was only too aware of how this would look. They had fielded a troop contingent that boggled the mind, in terms of the number of armed men they had put on foreign soil. Now Mikhailov wanted to double down. It would raise suspicions and, worse, they still might not succeed. Not if the Warlock continued to thwart them.
“I need you to inventory our resources,” Mikhailov said. “Weapons. Ammunition. Give me a head count of the men in the two remaining SUVs. Whom have we lost? Do it by hand, on paper. There is a notebook in the glove compartment, I believe.”
Smyrnoi moved for the glove box and froze. He turned, looking back up the road the way they had come. A state trooper was pulling up slowly alongside them.
Mikhailov rolled down his window. From his pocket he produced his fake driver’s license and paperwork corresponding to the rental of the tourist SUVs. He waited patiently as the state trooper parked between the two other vehicles on the shoulder. The trooper himself climbed out and, unhurriedly, walked to Mikhailov’s window.
“Officer,” Mikhailov said, faking a convincing American accent. “What’s up?”
The trooper frowned. “Just wondering if you folks need any help,” he said. “You all right? The vehicle behind you looks like it’s been burned in a fire.”
“Oh, that.” Mikhailov laughed. “We’re not really a tour group.”
“How’s that?” the trooper asked.
“We’re filming a movie,” the Russian replied.
“But you don’t have any camera equipment,” the cop stated.
“It’s for the internet.” Mikhailov held up his phone, slowly and carefully, so as not to make the officer jumpy. “My friend Randy there is a big-time social media celebrity. Maybe you’ve seen his channel?”
Smyrnoi managed what he hoped was a convincingly vapid smile.
“Can’t say that I have,” the trooper said. “So that burn on the truck is...what, set dressing?”
“Yes,” Mikhailov replied. “It’s a whole big thing. We’re doing special effects and stuff. Making it look like aliens attacked.”
“Aliens.”
“Yepper,” the commander said, still smiling.
“Well, just be mindful of private property,” the trooper told him. “Having fun is fine and all, and I don’t want to interfere in anybody’s freedom of speech and art and so on...but don’t bother anybody. And you should probably get your act together and get off the side of the road here.”
“Sure thing, Officer! We were just going over our filming strategy. We’ll be on our way.”
“All right, then.” The trooper nodded, returned to his vehicle and spent several minutes checking something on the terminal in his car. Smyrnoi assumed he was running their plates. Finally, when nothing raised any red flags, the trooper pulled away and drove off. He
seemed in no hurry. The Russians watched the road for several minutes, nervously, waiting to see if he came back.
“If he had searched the vehicles, found the weapons...” Smyrnoi said.
“Filming props,” Mikhailov told him. “For our alien battles. Besides, you forget. This is the United States. They all have guns.”
“They do not all have select-fire Kalashnikovs.”
“It’s time to go,” his superior officer stated, frowning. “We’re calling up the others.”
“We shouldn’t do it,” Smyrnoi insisted. “We will look weak. We will look like failures.”
“Then what do you suggest?” Mikhailov demanded.
“Something unconventional. The Americans are trying to keep Octavios alive. It’s why they took custody of him. It’s why they are transporting him. Why else would they drag him across two states and an international border? We want him to remain alive, too. The Americans are adept with technology. If anyone can disable Octavios’s booby trap, it is them. Why do we not join forces with them, escort the American while protecting him? What could be the harm?”
“I will choose to forget,” Mikhailov snapped, “that you spoke of such treason. It is not enough for Octavios to remain alive. He must be alive in our custody. We must wring from him the means whereby he learned so many of Russia’s state secrets...and then we will make him pay for what he’s done.”
“Dobry—”
“Silence! I am summoning all of the reinforcements. We will bring to bear on this Warlock so much force that he will die at our hands. We will not only solve the problem of Javier Octavios, we will deny the Americans one of their most effective intelligence assets. Now is the time, Egor. Now is Russia’s time.”
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