April Rose had then entered Bolan's life and Bolan never did have the opportunity to discuss April with Eve.
Evita dropped out of sight following the Smoky Mountain rendezvous, probably into the work for her government that had eventually taken, her into Leonard Jericho's unholy operation.
At the time, Bolan had not been overly concerned. It was her job. Each of them had many times dropped out of sight from the world for months on end.
Mack Bolan reached the ridge of a dark dune that overlooked a downhill slope toward Aujila oasis and the base under the star-studded Libyan night.
Eve was there. It figured. He was sure. Big Eve, yeah.
Bolan had been calling her that since they first met because Evita Aguilar reminded him of the very first Eve. Eve had eaten of the apple of truth and become banished forever from the fairyland Garden of Eden of hoped-for "normalcy." During that transformation, Evita Aguilar had evolved into the only kind of woman that Mack Bolan could ever love. Like April, she understood that gentle did not mean soft; that hard did not mean bad.
And now... they had her.
Jericho and Santos the Butcher.
Inside the base that now stretched out before him.
Activity at the base was more distinct. But Bolan's view was blocked by towering oasis palm trees that thickly surrounded much of the installation.
He would need a better look.
19
Bolan was splayed out flat, elbows anchored in the hard desert earth, steadying his vision through the Starlight spotting scope.
A bitter night wind cut in from the north. Sand hissed along the desert floor, playing with the strands of his hair, stinging his face like thousands, of pinpricks.
He was scouting the terrain with a slow panning motion. The Aujila oasis, and the Libyan army base that occupied most of its acreage, were clearly defined in the Starlight's greenish glow.
He advanced on a zigzag course. When he had followed the sloping descent of the terrain to a point three hundred yards north of the base perimeter, he flattened himself to the ground again and commenced a more detailed inspection of the installation and its environs.
From Bolan's position, the land leveled off for two hundred yards of rocky flats before the shadows of shrubs sprouted haphazardly for another thirty yards, when denser desert vegetation began thickening.
An advancing force of any size would have been detected. But one man, of Mack Bolan's capabilities, could attempt far more.
Generally, an oasis in this part of the Sahara would host quite a degree of activity catering to the nomadic Bedouin tribes who roam the land, or the occasional intrepid traveler who might stop to rest.
Aujila oasis was deserted of any human habitation except for the outpost. To the southwest of the installation stood the abandoned huddle of a douar, a native village of about seven mechtas, the mudwalled Arab houses, centered around a well beneath a cluster of shaggy, plump-topped date palms. The previous citizens had most likely been evacuated by government troops when the base was under construction.
Bolan could hear the dry rattle of the palm fronds in the breeze, and it was the only sound from that direction.
Inside the installation's outer perimeter fence, all shadows were dispelled by the merciless glare of powerful spotlights placed on tall steel posts.
Bolan read the north perimeter as their weakest point.
The base was a rectangle two hundred yards by one hundred and fifty yards. The main gate, at the southeast corner, was watched over by a gatehouse with, by Bolan's count, four military guards all armed with AK-47s. Bolan could see no other breaks in the barbed-wire-topped fence that surrounded the base.
A parade field in the center of the compound was squared off by the placement of three buildings (headquarters building to the north, motor-pool garages to the east and what must have been the CO's residence to the west) with the fourth side of the square being a broad tarmac crowded with what Bolan made as Soviet-manufactured implements of war, tarp-covered to avoid notice from passing aircraft.
From his angle on the ground, Bolan easily recognized the tell-tale outlines of twenty T-62 tanks armed with 115mm smoothbore cannons. He could make out the lines of another two dozen BMP armored personnel carriers, which he knew to be armed with 73mm antitank guns.
Too much damn equipment for a mere company of men, even a company of armored cavalry.
This confirms Lansdale's intel, thought Bolan. Colonel Shahkhia was fronting a Soviet-instigated coup against Khaddafi for sure. The remote base at Aujila was the rebels' arms depot, or one such depot, for the planned overthrow. All of the men soldiering the Aujila base would be rebels paid well for their loyalty by Shahkhia and the Russians.
Bolan saw a two-man patrol team by the cache of Soviet hardware, but no other activity in that area.
Most of the activity onbase was centered on the parade field that now doubled as a landing area for the two Hueys. One had carried Doyle here, away from the desert skirmish with Bolan and Hohlstrom.
The matching chopper could only belong to Leonard Jericho's party. They would all be in a rush here now, because of the actions in the desert that had upset the orderly progress of their terror.
The full company of base personnel appeared to be standing in formation, not far from the two choppers on the parade field. Every enlisted man, standing at parade rest, was armed with an AK-47.
Bolan could see Doyle's three mercs and pilot. No sign of Doyle himself.
But yeah, that was Doyle's chopper.
The cargo of Strain-7 was here.
Which meant Lenny Jericho — the real Lenny Jericho — was also here.
And Santos.
And Eve.
Bolan sensed vibrations of expectancy in the atmosphere of this Libyan base that were so strong as to be almost tangible. He could sense it through the Starlight scope at three hundred yards.
They were waiting down there.
Not for Bolan.
But, yeah... waiting.
Waiting for Colonel Shahkhia.
There could be some personnel in the barracks that backed the east perimeter who might spot a silent intruder. Another low, elongated structure running behind the barracks, the garage of the motor pool, could also have a crew on duty.
Bolan decided against penetrating the base from the west. There stood the commander's residence, of Moorish stone architecture, where Leonard Jericho and Doyle would be awaiting Shahkhia's arrival. The command house would be well guarded.
He must not tip his presence here at any cost until after he located Eve Aguilar.
If she was here.
If she was alive.
He also ruled out an approach from the south, since such a strategy could get him seen by the guards at the main entrance gatehouse, who would be especially alert tonight.
This left as his only real option an approach on the stretch of fence behind the two-story HQ building. It would be near-vacant, with all the base brass in parade field formation, awaiting Colonel Shahkhia's arrival. This was a big moment for the rebels. The building would be empty except for a skeletal crew on duty in the CQ room.
The headquarters building would have detention cells.
He would find Eve in that building.
In a windowless "interrogation room."
Bolan's throat constricted at the thought.
He tucked the Starlight scope into his belted pouch and moved out.
The detailed recon had consumed less than thirty seconds.
He sprinted the stony slope of the knoll toward the outer reaches of the oasis. He soundlessly covered the flat stretch of rock and shrub and pale grass. He paused when he reached the base of one of the many outlying palm trees.
The chain link perimeter fence was another two hundred yards across dense shrubs and a turf of healthier grass.
From his present position, the penetration specialist's initial impression confirmed that there was no activity around the back of the administration buildi
ng, fifteen yards inside the fence.
Bolan spotted a three-man roving patrol just outside the fence, walking east to west away from him. He waited until they had rounded to the western perimeter of the base and were out of sight. Then he left the cover of the palm and darted through the night toward the fence.
He met no interference.
He reached the foot of another palm with its trunk a short two yards from the installation's perimeter.
Bolan climbed the palm tree, rope-climbing style, working his way up to where the trunk curved, fifteen feet off the ground.
One of the tall steel lightposts, accommodating two of the powerful lamps that illuminated the area, towered up from a point fifteen feet inside the fence.
Bolan propelled himself in a free-fall away from the trunk of the palm tree, reaching out as he became airborne.
Two heartbeats, and his fists wrapped around the crossbar of the lamp post, breaking his fall as he rode with the gravitational pull, swinging underneath the crossbar like a trapeze artist, releasing it at exactly the right instant as he flew, feet first, into this new hellground.
At the exact same beat of time, a roving three-man patrol, dispatched since Bolan's recon, came strolling around the corner of the headquarters building, less than ten paces to Bolan's left. All three Libyan regulars were toting AK assault rifles.
Bolan was still airborne.
The sighting was instantaneous on both sides.
20
The three Libyan soldiers had flaring moments to register some sort of reflex as the black-clad figure sailed in at them from out of the night sky.
It was all Mack Bolan gave them time for.
The Executioner twisted his body in flight at first glimpse of the guard patrol. He came in at the point man with a far-outreaching, stiff-legged kick to the guy's forehead that impacted skullbone into brain matter, ending that soldier's existence.
The two flank sentries fell away to the side, their eyes white and wide in the glare of the lamps as they fought time, slinging their AK-47s up and around on the invader who had already struck death and was now hitting ground with catlike grace.
Bolan executed a smooth roll that brought him up to face them in a low crouch, the silenced Beretta pulled and popping 9mm kisses of doom.
The sentry to Bolan's left caught a hot pill up his nose and out the back of his head. Bolan registered a death flop as the man pitched backward. Then his attention shifted, with the Beretta, to the second soldier. He could not afford any alarm raised at this time.
The Belle chugged again. Like the preceding sounds, the small handgun's husky sneeze was absorbed amid the steady hubbub of the army base around them.
The 9mm death round checked the rebel soldier's last move toward survival, a sidelong lunge as he tracked up his AK. The bullet cored in one ear and out the other, turning the survival dive into a final skid into Hell.
Bolan did not pause to verify the hits.
There was no response from the other side of the building, where the two helicopters and Colonel Shahkhia's rebel troops were situated.
The Executioner moved off soundlessly through the night.
He had to find Eve.
He had to find Leonard Jericho.
He had to hijack the cargo of Strain-7 from the center of that parade field in front of headquarters.
Bolan was certain that the container for the live virus was sitting out there, right now, in the well-guarded Huey chopper.
According to Jack Grimaldi, the virus was being transported in a 1-1/2 X 1-1/2-foot metal box, with handles and a warning gauge on the outside, strapped to a shock-absorbing device underneath.
That cargo of Strain-7 would always be Colonel Shahkhia's ace in the hole, no matter how his attempted coup turned out. Shahkhia could whisk the unholy stuff away from here, to someplace where only he would have access to it, and it would be his key to power.
Bolan's starting point was the tarmac, beyond the barracks and motor pool structures to the south, where he had spotted all the Soviet military hardware.
He hustled along the back wall of the motor pool garage until he came around to the massed tarp-covered weaponry.
This cache of hardware would serve Bolan perfectly as a diversion.
Bolan found the T-62 tanks and the BMP armored personnel carriers parked together in their own tight cluster. Not bad at all. It took him all of twenty-seven seconds to plant enough plastique explosive to blow the entire arms cache sky high. The detonators would be radio-triggered from a little black box, the size of a matchbox, which Bolan pulled from its belt location where Grimaldi had stashed it with the plastique and slipped into one of his blacksuit pockets as he moved out. His work here was done.
He had just quit the periphery of tarp-shrouded shadows when he came face to face with two more patrolling guards who entered the scene from the southeast corner of the motor-pool building.
Bolan terminated the rebel soldiers with waist-level shots that pitched both men into a tangle of death.
He zigzagged away from the encounter, retracing his way across the floodlit stretch behind the elongated motor-pool structure, heading back north in the direction of the headquarters building.
He glanced at his wristwatch as he trucked along. Two minutes and forty-two seconds had elapsed since breeching the security of this place.
Six men were already dead and Bolan knew they were only the first.
He swung around the north corner of the motor-pool garage, and several more yards brought him to the back entrance of the HQ building.
Bolan tried the door.
Locked of course.
He stepped back, cocked a foot and kicked the door in at lock height, the metal panel busting off its hinges, flying inward with Bolan the Executioner coming in right behind it.
A foyer. The CQ office was through an open adjoining door. A hallway reached off the length of the building.
Bolan entered the CQ office.
Two Libyan soldiers were manning the Charge of Quarters watch that is military SOP the world over. Both were visible from the doorway and responded to Bolan's sudden entrance.
The man seated behind a desk reached for a holstered pistol that rested on the desktop inches from his fingertips. He never touched it. He took a silenced 9mm death-dealer from the Beretta in the throat. The rebel was already a corpse when he slammed back into a wall map of Libya behind the desk, splattering the map.
Soldier number two had been sitting in a chair next to a coffeepot with his heels hooked on the window sill, gazing out on all the activity on the parade field. He was now drawing a snub-nosed handgun.
Bolan was near enough to chop down his Beretta hand with a sharp slash. Wristbone snapped loudly and the soldier howled in pain, dropping his gun.
The soldier took one look at his dead buddy and forgot his own troubles. He only had shocked eyes for the imposing figure in Executioner black who stood before him.
Bolan eyed the injured rebel down the length of an extended arm that ended with the snout of the Beretta.
"Where is she?"
The soldier's eyes were frantic. He spoke English, as did many Libyans.
"The man, Santos... he has her in the basement... do not kill me!"
"You brought yourself here," said Ice Voice.
The Beretta spat. The cannibal went down to join his dead friend.
Bolan swung away. A quick glance down the hallway that stretched before him showed a stairwell at the far end of the corridor.
He moved toward those stairs, swift and careful, passing other doors, some open, some closed.
He paused when he came to the armory. He stepped inside, reaching for more plastique. There was no one in sight. Most of the long room was row after row of empty racks. The soldiers awaiting Colonel Shahkhia's arrival were armed with the rifles that were kept here. But the rebels had left behind several Sagger AT-3 antitank guided missile launchers and Soviet 82mm mortars, as well as walls of stored ammunition.
So far, so good.
But still much to do...
The building was silent and lifeless around him, like a tomb. His footfalls echoed faintly.
He approached the stairwell. He eased open the metal door. A lighted stairway slanted downward for fifteen steps, then doglegged to the right.
Santos the Butcher was down there.
With Eve.
Bolan quietly closed the stairwell door behind him, then descended the stone steps, his back to the wall, the Beretta up. The stone wall felt cool, damp against his shoulders. Man and weapon were ready for what ever lay around that dogleg at the bottom.
He heard the murmur of voices speaking English.
He reached the bottom step and eased an eye around the corner for a look.
Three of Kennedy's American mercs stood guard in a boxlike, earthen-floored passageway to a closed door behind them.
These boys weren't outfitted with anything exotic. They carried .357s on their hips. Two toted Thompson submachine guns, the third held a pump shotgun. Back in the States, they would have been cheap Mafia street hoods. Maybe they were.
They certainly weren't expecting anything in Libya like Bolan. Two mercs were leaning back against the wall of the basement. The third man, with a tommy-gun, stood with his back to the wooden door they were guarding.
They were smoking cigarettes, conversing in words too low for Bolan to overhear.
Then he did hear something.
It was a sound more subtle than the murmur of conversation. It was a sound that burned his nerve ends raw.
A barely human sound.
A wailing moan of suffering that had no beginning or end: an eerie, modulating pitch that came as if from some weird musical instrument of the damned. But it came, Bolan knew, from the depths of a living soul in torment.
A woman made those sounds.
Just behind that door.
Eve!
Bolan darted around the corner with the Beretta spitting lead.
The Libya Connection te-48 Page 10