Conflict Zone

by Don Pendleton

  Umaru ducked his head as Cooper whipped the MINI Cooper through a squealing U-turn in the middle of the street while bullets flew around them. They were halfway down the block and taking scattered hits before Umaru realized that he was laughing like a madman.

  "What's so funny?" Bolan asked him.

  "This car! A MINI Cooper" Umaru gasped in reply.

  "Hilarious," the American said. "When you get over it, you want to watch for any chase cars on our tail?"

  * * *

  Valentin Sidorov took a last drag on his cigarette, tossed it away and stepped out of his car. He looked both ways along the street, not merely glancing, but examining the shadows that surrounded him. It was a lifelong habit of survival.

  And this night, it wouldn't help him.

  He was meeting with the enemy, a meeting he'd requested, and Sidorov knew a dozen unseen snipers could be tracking every move he made through night-vision scopes without revealing themselves to his unaided eyes. Still, he reached beneath his jacket and stroked his GSh-18 pistol in its holster, just for luck.

  Which he would need, if he was going to survive the night.

  Crossing the street, Sidorov passed into a dimly lit alleyway and moved halfway along its length until he reached a bright red, freshly painted door. The men who flanked it were Chinese. The weapons they carried were Type 95 assault rifles, the 5.8 mm bullpup design introduced by China North Industries in 1997.

  Sidorov didn't speak to the guards, nor they to him. One of them knocked on the red door, and it was opened seconds later by another Chinese, this one with a shaved scalp and a handlebar mustache. He left the guards in place and led Sidorov down a narrow corridor, to reach an office on the left.

  "You're armed?" he asked Sidorov when they reached their destination.

  "Certainly," the Russian said. "Are you?"

  The bald man stared holes in his skull for thirty seconds, then opened the door without knocking and ushered Sidorov into the presence of Lao Choy Teoh.

  "He has a weapon, sir," the guard announced.

  "We all have weapons, Shin," Lao replied.

  "Is this a suicide mission, Comrade Sidorov?"

  "Hardly. And we don't call each other comrades anymore."

  "Good. No comrades here, then. Shin, bring... vodka? Whiskey? Beer?"

  "Coffee," the Russian said as he sat in the lone chair facing Lao's small desk.

  When Shin had closed the door, Lao said, "I admit that you surprised me when you asked to meet. It is... unorthodox."

  "We're living in confused and troubled times," Sidorov said.

  "Indeed. And my superiors have reason to believe the troubles are your fault."

  "My boss is of a similar opinion," Sidorov replied. "Someone has taken pains to make him feel that way."

  "Meaning?"

  "Meaning I know that none of the attacks on CNP were ordered or directed by Uroil. Whoever told you otherwise is lying through his teeth. I'm willing to believe the same about the claims that you and Mr. Chan have sponsored hostile actions against Russian interests in Warri."

  "You believe in cutting to the chase, as the Americans would say."

  "I don't have any time to spare," Sidorov said. "If I'm mistaken, and you are behind these incidents, then I'm as good as dead. Case closed. But if there's someone out there, stalking both of us for reasons I don't fully understand, our interests would be better served by joining forces than by stabbing one another in the back."

  "You are aware of the attack on Mr. Chan, at his home?"

  Sidorov nodded. "As I'm sure you are aware that someone fired on Mr. Eltsin in his office."

  "Yes."

  "And Mr. Chan received some kind of warning, I assume?"

  "He did."

  "Which implicates Uroil in the invasion of his privacy?"

  "Perhaps."

  "And prior to that, a telephone demand for money."

  "Mr. Eltsin, also?"

  "Someone's playing us," Sidorov said. "And not just us. Whoever this is has the Ijaws and the Itsekiris at each other's throats all over town. You will have noticed that, no doubt."

  "It's come to my attention."

  "I suggest," Sidorov said, "that we can win this bastard's game if we join forces. Change the rules. Surprise him, them, whoever it may be."

  "And how would we accomplish that?" Lao inquired.

  Sidorov smiled and said, "I thought you'd never ask."

  * * *

  "There. The middle of the next block," Taiwo Babatunde said. He pointed with one massive hand, while the other clutched his SIG SG 543 carbine.

  The weapon, stock folded, resembled a toy in Babatunde's hands, but it was lethal all the same, a selective-fire assault rifle chambered in 5.56 mm, one of half a dozen standard-issue small arms used by Nigeria's army. With a full-auto cyclic rate of 800 rounds per minute, it could shred a man before his lifeless body hit the ground.

  And if that man was Agu Ajani, why, so much the better.

  Babatunde had taken his master's order to heart. He couldn't return without "good news," which meant Ajani's death, or, at the very least, some major blow against the Ijaw warlord that would leave him reeling, vulnerable to a coup de grace. All Babatunde had to do was to find Ajani, penetrate his personal defenses, kill him and return alive with evidence to satisfy his oldest living friend.

  Simple? Not quite.

  On any other night in Warri, Babatunde and his dozen gunmen, packed into three sleek sedans, could have driven straight to Ajani's home and hoped for the best. Do or die. Kill or be killed.

  But someone else had already raided Ajani's estate, leaving chaos and corpses behind. That strike had driven the Ijaw commander deep underground, thus far beyond the reach of Babatunde's most trusted informants. Thus, the hunt became more complicated.

  And more urgent.

  Babatunde had squeezed an address from one of Ajani's confederates, snatched off the street while a woman distracted him and driven to a neighborhood where screams were commonly ignored. He'd been a long hour dying, but he had revealed the information Babatunde needed.

  If only it were true.

  According to the dead man, Agu Ajani had a "special" lady who resided in the house their little convoy was approaching. His attachment to this woman verged upon obsession, to the point, perhaps, where he might risk his life to see her in the midst of war.

  It was a lead, at least, and all that Babatunde had.

  If Ajani wasn't at the woman's apartment, perhaps she would know where he was. Failing that, she might make a useful hostage.

  "Here!" the giant told his driver. "Stop in front."

  The three sedans parked nose to tail, engines still running as the doors began to open. Babatunde had one size-fourteen shoe on the pavement when lights blazed around him, from the house and two of its neighbors, followed by an amplified voice from a bullhorn.

  "Stop where you are!" the voice commanded. "Lay down your weapons!"

  The first shot sounded from somewhere behind Babatunde, instantly multiplied by a dozen or more as weapons chimed in from all sides. A bullet cracked the windshield, inches from his face, as Babatunde raised his carbine, firing toward the lights that nearly blinded him.

  "Get out of here!" he barked at his driver. "Hurry up!"

  His car screeched away from the curb on command, slamming Babatunde's door on his extended leg. He cursed and grappled with the door, dragging his injured limb into the car before he slammed it shut. Behind him, his companions followed in their vehicles, all taking hits as they retreated from the battleground.

  And there were more headlights behind him, now, as other cars gave chase. Not squad cars, he decided, since they had no flashing lights or sirens, but a trap.

  He'd blundered into it, and now the question was, would he survive that grave mistake?

  * * *

  "I had begun to think you wouldn't call again," the voice in Bolan's ear declared.

  "I've had a busy night," he told Huang Li Chan. "
And so have you, from what I hear."

  "Indeed. Given the recent progress of events.....

  "You'd rather call it off?" Bolan suggested. "Hey, no problem. Keep the hundred thousand. Maybe it will tide you over while you're looking for a new position."

  "Wait! I have the money, and I need the information we discussed. Now more than ever, it appears."

  "Well, if you're sure," Bolan said.

  "Absolutely. How soon can we meet?"

  That tipped it over. With his recent near-miss fresh in mind, Chan shouldn't be that quick to volunteer for any meeting with a stranger, much less an extortionist.

  "How's midnight sound to you?" Bolan inquired.

  "Midnight?" Repeating it for someone else's benefit, perhaps. Delaying long enough to get the nod. "Yes. That is satisfactory," Chan said. "And where?"

  "I'll call back thirty minutes prior and let you know."

  "But.....

  Bolan broke the link and turned to face Umaru.

  "Suddenly, Chan's hot to pay and play," he said.

  "A trap?" Umaru asked him.

  "Absolutely."

  "You'll avoid it, then."

  "And keep him waiting? That's just rude," Bolan replied.

  "But if he's waiting for us.....

  "Chan can't set a snare unless he knows where to expect me. Neither can the others. If we bring them all together.."

  "Can you do that?"

  "Only one way to find out," Bolan said as he keyed another private number on his cell phone.

  Three calls and seven minutes later, he closed and pocketed the phone, smiling. "All aboard," he told Umaru. "Seems they can't wait to get in the game."

  "You didn't call Yetunde."

  "He's a fifth wheel, literally," Bolan said. "I don't put him on anybody's side, except his own. The rest can pair off, feeding one another's paranoia while they wait for me to fix the meeting."

  "And they'll all send gunmen."

  Bolan nodded. "Sure. I'm counting on it."

  "Will we even be there?" Umaru asked.

  "I will," Bolan answered. "If you want to skip it, that's okay with me. You've done more than your share already."

  "Just enough, it seems, to end life as I knew it."

  "Change won't kill you," Bolan said. He almost added "necessarily," then let it go, hoping that the next few hours wouldn't prove him wrong.

  "What shall we do until midnight?" Umaru asked as he reloaded one of his rifle's spare magazines.

  "What else?" Bolan replied "Turn up the heat and see who squeals."

  Chapter Seventeen

  Bolan left the hijacked MINI Cooper at a housing project on Ward's west side, where he hot-wired a five-year-old Kia sedan and escaped without being spotted.

  Cruising in the Kia, killing time until his enemies convened to kill him, Bolan kept his promise to Umaru. He was turning up the heat, intent on keeping everyone off balance, even as they schemed to trap him at midnight. He didn't know if any of them would be bringing cash, as ordered, but it made no sense to count on it.

  The narcoirafficanies had a saying in Colombia: plata o piano.

  Silver or lead.

  It normally applied to situations where a bribe was offered, and refusal meant a bullet would be coming next, but Bolan thought he could adapt it to his current situation. He'd demanded cash from four men who could spare it, but who wouldn't give it up without a fight. Now, all four had agreed to pay him off at midnight, the location of his choice, but Bolan had a hunch they'd be long on weapons, short on cash.

  Just as he'd planned.

  The fun, if you could call it that, would come from seeing how the several groups reacted when they all showed up together — if they showed.

  The trick, at least for Bolan, would be getting out of it alive.

  But first he still had some time to kill.

  And people, too.

  "This is a place where stolen cars are kept and sometimes broken down," Umaru said.

  "A chop shop," Bolan translated.

  "On newer models, they may only change the registration numbers. Older ones, they sell for parts. The money goes to MEND."

  It was the first junkyard, per se, that he had seen in Warri. Older cars than some of those he saw parked on the lot, behind a chain-link fence topped by a roll of razor wire, were bustling up and down the city's streets all day and night. The main shop was a structure made of corrugated metal, with a roof to match, that had to be an oven in the afternoons.

  And it was going to get hotter in a few more minutes.

  Bolan found the main gate padlocked, passed it by and cut a flap in the chain link, along the junkyard's north perimeter. He had already checked for dogs, scanning the lot and whistling softly, without getting a response. If there were any on patrol inside, trained not to bark or show themselves before a strike, he'd deal with them as they appeared and offer up a silent commendation for their souls.

  He slipped inside the lot and held the flap of wire for his companion, who'd insisted on joining the party after their snafu at the Hotel Hebe. Bolan would've liked to double back and burn that place, assuming it was closed to customers after the ambush, but he knew the risk would be too great.

  New targets. New frontiers.

  Someone was working in the shop, and they'd apparently forgotten to post guards. Maybe the chop-shop trade was deemed too insignificant to rate a hit. Maybe someone had simply dropped the ball.

  In either case, he owned them now.

  Bolan peered through a gap in the corrugated wall and saw four men working on a Volvo station wagon. One wielded a cutting torch, the other three had wrenches. Bolan found a window they'd left open, pulled the pin on a white-phosphorus grenade and lobbed the bomb through the opening, watching it bounce across the concrete floor and disappear beneath the front end of the Volvo.

  Time to split.

  As Bolan turned away, the shop went blazing white inside and people began to scream. The screaming didn't last long, but the fire he'd started would burn through the night, devouring flesh, concrete and steel.

  A little something else for Ekon Afolabi to consider as he counted down the hours to midnight.

  * * *

  Valentin Sidorov worried that he might have spread himself too thin, but what did he have to lose?

  Only his life.

  After his meetings with the Chinese and Arkady Eltsin, he was going back to see Agu Ajani one more time, to try to keep the lid from blowing off a city racked by violence.

  Sidorov didn't like his chances, but he had to try.

  Ajani was expecting him, the guards staked out around an old abandoned factory where he had gone to ground. It reminded Sidorov a bit of the drug plant their common enemy had already razed, but he guessed that Ajani wouldn't appreciate the comparison.

  The sentries were expecting Sidorov and passed him through, after studying his face a moment longer than was necessary in the glare of three flashlights. Sidorov thanked them in a tone that left no doubt about his sarcasm, then trailed a slender guide past silent, rusty machines to reach a tiny office, where Ajani occupied a swivel chair without a desk to match.

  "What news?" the Ijaw warlord asked before Sidorov had a chance to speak.

  "First thing," Sidorov said, "I spoke to the Chinese. I don't believe they're behind the trouble you've experienced."

  Ajani rose to pace the room. "All right," he said. "Who is responsible?"

  "It may be MEND, or someone else."

  A mocking smile twisted Ajani's lips.

  "Is that supposed to help me?" he inquired.

  "I'm hoping that you'll take a breath, calm down and let me work this out," Sidorov said. "We've been in touch with someone claiming he can solve this problem. I suspect, in fact, that he's behind it. We're supposed to meet at midnight."

  "As am I," Ajani said.

  "Wait, let me guess," Sidorov said. "He wants a hundred thousand dollars for the information?"

  "It would seem that we are doing bus
iness with the same man, after all," Ajani noted.

  "Yes. Except that I don't plan to give him any money," Sidorov replied.

  "Nor I," the Ijaw tribal leader said. "If I can capture him alive, so much the better. And if not, at least I'll shake the stone out of my shoe."

  "What if he's not the only stone?" Sidorov asked.

  "I've thought of that. It's why I hope to bring him in for questioning."

  "I see no reason why we can't cooperate on this," Sidorov said.

  "You think I need your help to take one man?"

  The Russian shrugged "You haven't done so well with him so far. None of us has."

  Ajani thought about that for another moment, then replied, "What is it you suggest?"

  * * *

  Captain Johnson Mashilia waited on the street corner outside a pawn shop where a steady stream of customers traipsed in and out, bearing heirlooms and trinkets that they swapped for petty cash. Each man and woman passing by paused long enough to eye his uniform with various expressions of suspicion or contempt, while Mashilia tried to ignore them, watching the street for his ride.

  He had ordered his driver to drop him a block from the point where he stood, then park the squad car and wait until the captain called him back for a pickup. The driver, a sergeant, was told to ask no questions and to keep his mouth shut if he valued job security.

  Now Mashilia waited, feeling painfully conspicuous. He had begun to wonder if Yetunde might be planning to eliminate him as an object lesson to the other officers who banked bribes and couldn't deliver satisfaction on demand.

  He was about to give up waiting, actually had the cell phone in his palm, when he saw Yetunde's limousine gliding along the curb. He pocketed the phone, patted his holster just to reassure himself that he was armed and waited for the car to stop in front of him.

  When he was seated in the back, facing Yetunde from his jump seat, the captain waited for the usual barrage of questions. What he got, instead, was simply, "Well?"

  He knew that "Well, what? " would not serve him, and might even get him killed by one of Yetunde's four hulking gunmen. Instead of risking it, the captain said, "Regrettably, I have no further information. Since you called me here.....