The Raven shook his head and took another draw on his cigar. The drugs were out, he thought. No syndicate possessed the sheer sophistication necessary to pursue his men around the world, to seek them out and strike when they were in the midst of highly sensitive exchanges. Escobar, perhaps...but the Colombians had no enforcement arm in Canada or Germany, no interest in the dealings of Vachon or Baader-Meinhof functionaries. Clearly, there was something else...
His mind would not accept the possibility that Escobar, Khaldi and Ludovescu had all been burned by sheer coincidence. The odds against it happening were too high. Reduce those odds, perhaps, because his men — himself — had been on every Western "wanted" list for years; the odds against three identical encounters happening by chance, and several thousand miles apart, were astronomical.
An acid feeling in his stomach made the Raven pause. He focused on the Matterhorn, its craggy silhouette permitting him to put away the images of covers being blown, disguises penetrated, operations going up in smoke. His men were tough professionals, hand-picked, recipients of all the finest training.
But human beings made mistakes, of course, and anything was possible in theory.
A sudden, dark suspicion surfaced in his mind. There was no leak within his team, he knew that much with certainty... but what about the Soviets? With all the scandals and defections recently, who knew precisely what was happening in the clandestine services? You only read about the failures of the CIA or MI 5; the Russians dropped their failures in a hole, or put them on a cattle car directed toward the Gulag. It was entirely possible, he thought, that someone in Dzerzhinsky Square, or elsewhere, might have blown the lid on Project Raven.
Another grim suspicion nagged at him. Suppose the Russians had no leak, what then? Suppose that someone in authority had made the cool, deliberate choice to scuttle Project Raven? Might the rash of incidents result from conscious, orchestrated leaks — or from the intervention of the KGB itself?
A chill had worked its way along the Raven's spine, the short hairs on his neck bristling against his collar. If the Soviets were trying to dispose of him, his ringers, it would only make good sense to let the Western powers do their dirty work. A whispered word, directions to the drop, and CIA, Mossad, GSG-9 — whatever — would be thrilled to take the ball from there, and damned few questions asked. The Russians would preserve deniability and thereby save face with other factions of the underground.
He didn't see the mountains now, although his eyes were open, staring at the panorama set beyond his window. He was looking inward, searching out the shadowed corners of his life, intent on finding any clue that might reveal duplicity by Rylov or the KGB.
He was at a loss to understand why anyone in Moscow should decide to yank the rug from underneath his feet. He had been loyal since he was first recruited out of college in the Sixties. There had been the usual indiscretions, certainly, but only in the early days, while he was rising to the status of celebrity among his fellow terrorists. The KGB had seemed to understand, had even tacitly encouraged him to play the renegade, assert himself in choosing targets in the public eye. It would be damn unfair of them to look back now and turn their hand against him.
But when had fairness entered into his profession? When had justice risen from the status of a revolutionary watchword to achieve reality?
He knew that Rylov might be planning to eliminate him even now. He would be ready when the Russian called, tomorrow or the next day at the latest — ready with some questions of his own, and with some answers for any queries that the KGB man had in mind.
He would be ready with some swift, decisive action of his own in case his dark suspicions proved correct. If Rylov and his crew intended to discard the Raven, they had better think again. Ramirez might be lame, but he was not an invalid, by any means. The tiny troop at his disposal would be capable of wreaking bloody vengeance before they all went down in flames.
He concentrated on the fine cigar, and on the Matterhorn, remote and cold beyond the windowpane. When this was over, he would need to get away, to find some solitude and rest.
When it was over.
Soon.
Chapter Twenty-Six
The rattler's high-pitched warning buzz froze Lyons in his tracks, one combat-booted foot raised in preparation for his next step through the kudzu thicket. Rapidly, he scanned the ground around his feet, index finger tensing on the trigger of his automatic shotgun, praying that he wouldn't have to use the weapon now, when he had come so close. The blast could be his death knell, sounding clearly through the piny forest, bringing down security before he had an opportunity to disengage.
He saw the reptile, a five-foot-long timber rattler, its flattened, heart-shaped head barely visible beneath the drooping ferns a yard in front of his position.
Lyons slowly pulled back his upraised foot before his leg began to tremble uncontrollably. The reptile watched him with lidless eyes, its warning rattle like a swarm of angry hornets, grating on his nerves. He took another backward step, another, and the serpent's tongue flicked out to test the air, a flickered blur of motion at its snout. Another step, and he was moving sideways now, aware that while the snake might soon lose sight of him, it would be sensitive to his projected body heat within a wider radius. He needed distance — but without completely losing his direction in the trees.
A little tremor gripped him, sparked by primal memory, and Lyons shrugged it off. The serpents that he really had to watch for were ahead of him, inside the compound, and they would be walking upright. A rattlesnake or two would be the least of Lyons's worries if they found him now, decked out for doomsday, closing on their sensitive perimeter.
Five miles behind him, the Atlanta skyline was a monument to modern architecture, progress and technology. He could retrace his steps, retrieve the rental car and find himself on crowded city streets within five minutes. Out here, the homes were few and far between — more often aging mobile jobs or weathered shanties. There were still outdoor privies tucked away behind the cabins here — or, rather, you might spot them from the highway. Here among the trees, you found no sign of human life at all.
He had been hiking for the best part of an hour, since he dropped the rental car, deliberately pausing every dozen yards or so, alert for any trace of sentries, dogs or technological security. He could have traveled faster, but for the moment Lyons was content to take his time.
Another fifty yards, and he could see the compound now. The base maintained by Gerry Axelrod for training of his would-be Aryans reminded Lyons of Vietnam. It had the same barbed-wire perimeter, the barracks and command post up on stilts to guard against the snakes...
Unconsciously, he glanced around him, probing at the kudzu with the muzzle of his shotgun, alert for any hint of slender, gliding forms. The silent shadows mocked him, and he bellied down among the ferns to scan the compound from a distance, searching for a handy point of entry.
It was getting on toward dusk, as he had planned, long shadows deepening among the trees, reducing visibility for any sentries on the night shift. Lyons counted off a dozen figures moving in the compound, all decked out in camouflage fatigues, but they did not appear to follow any military regimen. One sentry on the gate, his cigarette a winking beacon in the semidarkness, and no evidence of any guards along the wire. They were playing soldier here, and that made all the difference in the world.
The Able warrior had prepared himself for doomsday, unaware of what he might encounter when he reached the compound. Camouflaged from head to toe, rigged out in military harness, he was ready to confront the enemy on any level they required. The Colt Python .357 Magnum was secure beneath one arm, an autoloading .45 in military leather on his hip. His head weapon was the lethal Konzak shotgun.
Lyons worked his way along the perimeter, remaining under cover in the omnipresent kudzu. A wiry vine of Asian origin, the creeping pest had been transplanted accidentally, and it had proved indestructible in Georgia's warm climate. Now the tangled vines made pe
rfect cover for Lyons, rendering him invisible as he pursued a means of access to the target zone.
He found a stretch of wire behind the makeshift barracks, safe from scrutiny by the guard on duty at the gate. If he timed it properly, his entry to the compound should be unobserved.
Bellied in against the fence, he took a pair of insulated cutters from his belt and snipped the wire. He spent another moment listening for any sound of movement, then wriggled through, securing the flap behind him with a pair of twist ties, safe from any casual inspection.
If Axelrod had been on hand, there might have been a walking sentry on the fence. But the ruling honcho of the Brotherhood was nowhere to be found — perhaps still running from the shitstorm in Toronto.
He crossed a narrow stretch of open ground, found shelter in the shadow of the command hut. There was no light inside, and Lyons risked a glance around the corner. Voices from the mess hall told him that the troops were occupied; on station at the gate, the solitary lookout kept his back turned toward the compound, staring at the darkened woods outside.
It would be now or never, and the Ironman made his move, the pry-bar in his hand and ready as he reached the door of the CP hut, found it locked. He wedged the jimmy in against the jamb and twisted the bar. A loud metallic snap and he was in, the jimmy tucked inside a pocket now, the pencil flash in hand.
The CP hut was unremarkable, equipped with cb radio and telephones, an Army-surplus desk and filing cabinets, gun racks on the wall with riot shotguns, semiautomatic rifles, carbines. Strictly legal on its face, but Lyons would have bet his life that there was other hardware on the grounds. He knew of Axelrod's proclivity for automatic arms, the reputation of the Brotherhood for preaching Armageddon... and preparing for it on the side.
He crossed the room to stand before the filing cabinets, scanning with the pencil flash. Unable to decipher coded labels, Lyons chose a drawer at random, rifled through the bank of thick manila folders. He picked out business correspondence, bills of lading — food, supplies of every sort — and carbon-copy requisition forms. Another drawer was stuffed with maps, a third with files on personnel that he did not have time to scrutinize in any great detail. He started on the second cabinet and scored immediately, lifting out a bulky folder labeled Euro-Earth.
He spread the folder on the desk and riffled through its contents, reading by the narrow flashlight beam, his hackles rising by the moment. Lengthy correspondence, much of it in code, revealed what Hal Brognola had suspected: a working link between the Brotherhood and the pacifist Earth Party, based in Germany and France.
It made a crazy kind of sense, despite the widely differing philosophies involved. The Brotherhood was frankly neofascist, from its thunderbolt insignia — inherited from the Gestapo, via factions of the Klan — to public declarations that minorities and communists were undermining Aryan America. The Earthers were socialists who sought a unilateral disarmament of Western powers, bending over backward in their zeal to toe the Moscow line. The factions should have been inherent enemies, and yet...
There had been indications recently of deep dissension in the Earth Party ranks, suspicions that the group might be connected with the fighting spearhead of the Baader-Meinhof gang and Red Brigades. Their enemies — the bankers, Zionists, established government — were not so very different from the targets of the Brotherhood. If Axelrod had managed to establish common ground in terms of cash for military hardware, lifted from the source at Steyr...
Footsteps sounded on the wooden stoop outside, and Lyons stiffened, knowing instantly that he was out of time. There was no hiding place inside the hut, no open window granting access to the night. Lyons braced himself and killed the pencil flash, the final numbers toppling in his mind.
The door swung inward, granting him a glimpse of someone cast in silhouette before his fingers found the light switch. A startled Aryan was blinking at him, studying the muzzle of the Konzak and seeing sudden death behind the intruder's eyes. One hand was drifting toward the holstered hardware on his hip.
"Don't try it," Lyons cautioned, almost whispering.
The bastard tried it anyway, a warning shout erupting from his throat before he reached the holster, wrestling with the flap. The Konzak erupted with a single blast, dead on from fifteen feet away, the impact slamming him beyond the door frame.
Already men were shouting from the mess hall, rallying to meet the enemy. Lyons took the time to drop a thermite bomb behind him, cleared the open doorway as its fuse ran down, and he was sprinting for the fence and safety when the night caught fire.
The CP hut was instantly engulfed, the white-hot coals of thermite burrowing through walls and roof and floor, igniting anything they touched. A squad of startled soldiers grouped outside the mess hall, staring at the bonfire, stunned, and Lyons hesitated long enough to let them meet the Konzak firsthand. He tracked the piece from left to right and back again, its recoil trembling along his arms, and watched the straw men come apart downrange.
Two gunners stumbled, sprawled with the initial blast, the others scattering for cover now, too late. A third was breaking for the mess hall when his legs were cut from under him; he fell across the line of fire and took a second blast, already dead before he hit the ground. Two more were wounded, thrashing on the ground and rolling in their blood as Lyons turned away and left them to it.
Sporadic small-arms fire erupted at his back, but they were firing blindly now, still unsure of what was happening. The CP hut was burning brightly, casting shadows everywhere, obscuring the battlefield with drifting smoke. Ideally, he should have saved the suspect files, but there had been no opportunity and he had seen enough to satisfy himself in any case. The Brotherhood was dealing with its own acknowledged enemies, and any premature exposure of the fact could only damage Axelrod.
Thirty feet still to the wire, and suddenly a silent figure came at Lyons from the smoke. The sentry was confused, disoriented, and he struck at Lyons with his rifle butt instead of firing. The Ironman sidestepped, grunting as the stock impacted on his shoulder, throwing him off balance. As the sentry tried to follow up his advantage, Lyons whipped the Konzak around, its muzzle cracking hard against the guard's jaw. He stumbled, going down on one knee, and Lyons shot him in the face at point-blank range, the sentry's skull evaporating into crimson mist.
The shotgun blast had given his pursuers a direction, and they were already closing on him now. He ripped a frag grenade off his harness, pulled the pin and lobbed it through the smoke in the direction of their milling voices. The night was torn asunder and the shouts were suddenly transformed to cries of pain. A second looping overhand — more thermite now, to feed the failing flames — and he was sprinting for the fence as sizzling hellfire rained down on the forest compound.
Lyons reached his exit gate and ripped the makeshift ties away, already wriggling through as aimless, scattered small-arms fire erupted from the clearing. Behind him, hell on earth was rapidly devouring the barracks and the mess hall, thermite coals igniting secondary fires among the trees and undergrowth. Considering the recent rains, it would be easy to control — but Axelrod would have some questions waiting for him when he returned from his secluded hideaway.
Assuming that he did return, of course.
It was entirely possible that he would keep on running, to his Swiss accounts and on from there to parts unknown. The bastard made a living at survival, after all; he could survive the momentary setbacks caused by the destruction of his Georgia base and the publicity that followed after. There were other camps around the country, Lyons knew, and other hideaways where members of the Brotherhood could lick their wounds in relative security. The group was still young, as native-born extremist movements went, but it had not been wasting any time. Arrangements could be made with other neo-Nazi factions, with the Klans if necessary, to conceal the would-be fiihrer of America.
But Axelrod could not conceal himself forever. In time, he would be forced to surface — by his ego, if by nothing else. Th
e man simply could not abide obscurity. He would pursue the limelight to his own destruction, given half a chance... and Lyons meant to give him every chance available.
He would be waiting when Axelrod revealed himself again, prepared to ring the curtain down and bring his redneck road show to a close.
If Bolan didn't find the bastard first.
But Lyons worried all the same. His little show tonight had proved nothing, in the long run. Axelrod was vulnerable, but they had already known as much. In spite of setbacks he remained a smooth and dangerous competitor, perhaps with other tricks in store. If he was working with the Raven now — or was it Ravens — then the danger would be magnified.
The Able warrior snagged his jacket on some kudzu, cursed and wrenched it free. The game was far from over yet, he realized, and anyone could take the jackpot with enough determination, guts and will to win. He knew from grim experience that abstract justice didn't count for anything when lives were on the line and it was down to jungle rules.
Survival of the fittest was the game, and they were all professional survivors.
Bolan.
Axelrod.
The Raven and his clones.
Carl Lyons.
Toby Ranger.
Katz and Dave McCarter, working undercover, who knows where.
The mixture was explosive, and it was possible that none of them might walk away this time. For damn sure, it would be impossible for everyone to come out on the other side alive. The competition simply didn't work that way.
There were no consolation prizes in the jungle. You were either good enough, or you were dead. There was no middle ground.
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