Contagion Option

by Don Pendleton

  Not that the man now known as Kent Stevens minded. He had more than a few pokers in the fire, plots spreading around the world. If one failed, he’d move on to another. Still, the Dugway Solution would prove to be an interesting exercise in mass murder. If it came to full fruition, he’d either exterminate an entire city within a few hours, or condemn millions of livestock and humans to death through fast-acting neurodegenerative disease. If he was truly lucky, both prongs of his operation would claim millions of lives. As it was, he went for the scattershot effect, allowing for either end of this operation to succeed at the expense of the other. The assembled resources of the World Health Organization and American government would be insufficient to deal with both plagues. Especially with concurrent epidemics he’d planted in Third World nations—outbreaks of cholera and other lethal, but lower grade diseases. Natural droughts and famines also assisted.

  It had taken a decade to set up this operation, delicately balanced, but with his preparations, and the forces he had at his command, Stevens would be able to pull it off.

  The presence of the man in black, however, did give the lethal genius some pause. He’d lost associates to him, and he was certain that Mi Qua was dead, as well.

  “Shame really,” Stevens said.

  “Clarice? Yeah,” Pave replied. “That one-man army did her job for her.”

  Stevens looked at his bodyguard with bemusement. The huge warrior had a soft spot for her. The doctor felt sorry for the big man, and for his own sake, withheld the information that Mi Qua’s usefulness was at an end with the assassination of the general and his staff.

  “Should we have someone intercept him in Japan?” Pave asked, struggling through his depression over Mi.

  “It would be a waste of resources,” Stevens replied. “Besides, we’re already pulling in all our foreign assets for this operation. They’re en route to home. Captain Jaye is on his way back, too, but he’ll be too late to participate. He’s going to escort us out of the country in the wake of the mission.”

  Pave nodded.

  “I need you to get me there, Pave.”

  “Yes, sir,” the giant responded.

  “That means your head has to be clear. We can mourn for our brave operative later,” Stevens replied, giving him a tap on one thick forearm.

  Pave nodded. “Thank you, sir.”

  Stevens grinned, this time putting as much warmth as he could into it. He knew it wouldn’t change much, however. The bony genius, his red hair cropped short, his eyes shielded by one-way red lenses, was hardly a man known for his ability to convey sympathetic reassurance. Still, Pave’s sadness burned away to cool determination.

  “How goes the observation of Professor Reader and Agents Graham and Marrick?” Stevens asked.

  “They’re still holed up in his lodge. Efforts at electronic surveillance have been defeated by a jamming field across several frequencies,” Pave reported. “Telescopes have been defeated by window treatments.”

  “He seems a bit paranoid, doesn’t he?” Stevens inquired.

  “You’re not paranoid if they truly are out to get you,” Pave responded. “Shall we move in?”

  Stevens shook his head. “That lodge may be too well defended. Just look at the window placement on avenues of approach.”

  Pave nodded. “Good fields of overlapping fire. And Reader has already demonstrated that he knows how to use an automatic weapon.”

  “He’s got a Class III license, so it is legal for him to own one. In fact, a records check shows he owns several,” Stevens replied. “We’d need the same kind of firepower to take that lodge that we would need to take down Dugway. Especially since they are expecting trouble.”

  Pave nodded. He turned away as an assistant entered the room and handed him a note.

  “They just received a phone call. Encrypted and the point of origin was unknown. On the land line,” Pave said. “Nothing much we can get from it, but they were called by an outside source.”

  Stevens nodded. “Our man in black is on the way.”

  “You think that was him?” Pave asked.

  “Or the people he’s allied with,” Stevens returned. “A man like that has a network of supporters and allies.”

  The scientist frowned. “Have our people keep an eye on the lodge. Maintain surveillance, especially if they leave. Chances are, we can intercept them when our man in black arrives.”

  Pave nodded.

  “Have your best man lead the intercept team, and make certain that they are fully equipped,” Stevens replied. “You saw what he did to a base full of armed and nervous North Korean troops.”

  “Yes, sir,” Pave answered. He left the genius known as Mojo to think and plan.

  Above the Pacific Ocean

  MACK BOLAN WAS traveling light in the 3200 miles into the 5500 mile trip, having refueled for the second time in the air. Grimaldi was pushing the envelope of the 500 mile mission radius of the awesome fighter plane, but right now, there was very little else they could do except abuse the hell out of its 20,000 pounds of thrust per engine, running it at nearly three-quarters the speed of sound. Six hours, and Bolan had gotten a lot of sleep since they’d started. The Tomcat’s acceleration couches were comfortable, but for this amount of time, even on autopilot, Bolan could tell that Grimaldi was running thin.

  He tilted his head and saw that his friend was catching a quick catnap, passed out at the stick. Bolan’s console informed him that the autopilot was in effect, and they were maintaining a steady thrust, racing along at 530 miles an hour. Bolan sat back, not wanting to disturb Grimaldi’s rest. The strain of getting Dragon Slayer out of North Korea, avoiding two enemy fighters, and conducting two aerial refuelings was the kind of pressure you would find in a week of flying. Bolan was glad that when they got to Utah, they’d have an Air Force base to land at, even though he knew Grimaldi was skilled enough to park the supersonic fighter on an aircraft carrier, even after a ten-hour flight.

  As experienced in land combat as the Executioner was, the pilot nicknamed G-force was equally skilled in the cockpit of any aircraft. From helicopters to the most powerful, spaceship-like aircraft in the U.S. government’s arsenal, Grimaldi had flown it all, and had circled the globe hundreds of times.

  Bolan rested his head back, but didn’t sleep. When he closed his eyes, he still remembered the twitching, spasmodic horrors of the Thai teenagers, degenerating due to CJD, in the basement of the slaughterhouse, the corpses of those who had already died mixed in with cattle carcasses intended for grinding into protein meal to mix with cattle feed. Humans and animals, mixed in an unholy concoction, both species infected with lethal prions that could destroy nervous systems after only a short year of work.

  He would avenge them. Mojo was a man already wanted for other atrocities, and he had earned the Executioner’s wrath many times over.

  But now, the personal plea of a dying youth echoed in his mind.

  “Kill me…please,” he remembered.

  Brognola promised him, in a quick communication, that when he got to Hill AFB in Utah, someone would meet him and provide him with the tools he’d need to combat Stevens’s co-conspirators. The head Fed had also promised that Kirby Graham and his partners would pitch in. Bolan wished that he didn’t need the help, but they were more familiar with Salt Lake City and its environs. Plus, they’d been involved in that end of the mystery since the start. Cutting them off would seem cruel, though he realized that their assistance to him could very well get them injured.

  He remembered Zing’s injury.

  The young Korean attaché was lucky to have been among friendly forces when he’d been shot. Chances were, the kid would survive his wound, but it was still close.

  So far, Bolan had been lucky. His only other ally, Grimaldi, had been unharmed. But it still showed him how dangerous this mission was. Half of the people he’d worked with were seriously injured. Given the opponents he was facing, Bolan wondered if his allies would end up as assets or cannon fodder b
efore Stevens’s forces.

  Heavy thoughts continued to weigh on the Executioner’s troubled brow as he endured the next seven hundred miles of flight to the next refueling in lonely silence.

  Washington, D.C.

  HAL BROGNOLA SHUFFLED through the side entrance after his flight in from Stony Man Farm. He surrendered his weapons to the Secret Service who were guarding the President, then trundled into the Oval Office where the Man sat.

  “Striker penetrated North Korea?” the President asked, cutting straight to the point.

  Brognola nodded. “He’s on his way back to the States now.”

  The President winced and motioned for Brognola to take a seat. A cup of coffee sat on the table in front of the chair. “I’ve been getting a lot of conflicting reports. Somehow this is involved with North Korea’s WMD development, and yet it’s not North Korea? And there’s something going on, related to this, in Salt Lake City, and you were clued in thanks to something about a bank robbery?”

  Brognola nodded. “It’s a tangled skein, and it all started on a ship smuggling humans and livestock from Thailand to North Korea.”

  “Livestock?” the President asked. “That seems like a strange thing to do.”

  “American-style cattle. Species normally used for beef in Western or European nations, as opposed to Asian-style,” Brognola explained. “I also just received word about the smuggled cattle before I came to your office. Tests have been conducted and about forty percent of the animals found on the transport ship were infected with Mad Cow disease.”

  The President nodded, frowning. “I’m glad Striker caught them.”

  “This was the endcap of ten years of development, sir,” Brognola explained. “Mad Cow can cause a similar effect in humans. Bovine spongiform, I believe the disease is called.”

  “Yeah. It happens when cattle ingest protein from other cattle with recessive genes,” the President answered. “That recessive gene produces a mutated protein that causes nerve tissue to degenerate.”

  “I forgot you know a little about ranching,” Brognola responded.

  The President nodded. “As much as my critics would like to think so, I’m not a complete idiot. What happened to the cattle carcasses from this plant?”

  “They were mixed with human victims of Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, and reduced to feed.”

  “Human…victims.” The President’s face screwed in disgust. “The victims, they were infected with the prions from the tainted meat.”

  Brognola nodded.

  The Man stood and walked to the window, looking out into the darkness. “When you called, you said this wasn’t the only aspect of this Kent Stevens’s plan.”

  “There have been sightings of unidentified flying objects around Dugway Proving Grounds,” Brognola replied. “And, recently, Korean street gangs have been arming up uncharacteristically.”

  “The collapse of the building in Salt Lake,” the President responded. “I saw that in my morning threat matrix. The FBI is on the case there. You think it has to do with a terrorist operation against Dugway?”

  Brognola nodded. “One of the FBI contract agents believes that the gang was erasing money trails through the bank.”

  The President looked through the preliminary file that Brognola had faxed to him. “Stan Reader. Hasn’t he been working on portable X-ray cameras for the FBI?”

  Brognola nodded. “And a bunch of other things. Smart…and nosy.”

  “He thinks that this wasn’t a bank robbery,” the President said.

  “There was a large electromagnet that wiped tape drives in the basement of the bank,” Brognola stated. “The snipers upstairs were cover for a team destroying hard copy records.”

  “All of them?” the President asked.

  Brognola nodded. “They even had a virus launched to take out records at other sources.”

  The President looked down at the files on his desk. “So, if he has the nerve degenerating diseases, why is Stevens trying to cause havoc in Dugway?”

  “Overload,” Brognola responded. “With Salt Lake City hit by a massive anthrax release—or whatever other crap is stored there—the Centers for Disease Control will be distracted from the CJD release.”

  “Works better than an envelope filled with powder,” the President grudgingly admitted. “We haven’t heard any demands from Stevens yet, have we?”

  “Nope. We’re not even sure of the location of his base of operation,” Brognola stated. “He usually isn’t an upfront kind of guy.”

  “Works behind the scenes,” the Man answered. “He helped Chemical Ali with the gas attacks that killed thousands of Kurds. And wasn’t he involved in another mess that Striker stopped?”

  Brognola nodded. “He’s bad news. But, we’re working on him. Once he’s in Striker’s sights…”

  “I wouldn’t count on it being so easy,” the President responded. “He killed three CIA hit teams. Or his bodyguards did. We couldn’t really tell.”

  Brognola nodded. He’d seen the photographs of the remains of the CIA teams mailed back to Langley. They had been sent in a set of jars, organs separated and sent in alphabetical order. Their removed skins and boxed skeletons had been matched up with fingerprint and dental records finally. Except for being broken down to their component body parts, clean and bloodless—the blood had been jarred separately—there was no sign of the trauma that had slain them.

  The CIA had been unnerved by the bold return of their murdered agents.

  Brognola didn’t want to think of Mack Bolan sent to the White House in a series of crates. He shook off the image. “Striker has fought worse. And we’re trying to wrap up Able Team’s and Phoenix Force’s subsequent missions to assist him. We already have FBI agents ready to support him.”

  “FBI agents, and Striker. Where three CIA wet-works teams failed,” the Man said.

  Brognola nodded. “I’d suggest increasing security at Dugway.”

  “I’ll have the Joint Chiefs on it in the morning.”

  “Thank you, sir,” Brognola replied.

  “I’ll see about getting the CDC and Army Biowarfare teams to prepare for an operation in the area.”

  “If you do that, Stevens might just destroy Dugway and make off with whatever weapons are there. Or kill our intervention teams,” Brognola stated. “And then we’ll never know what their plans are for the infected cattle carcasses.”

  The President grimaced. “If we react, we either have to shut down the country and throw it into martial law—”

  “Which is what Stevens and his partners wanted last time,” Brognola interjected.

  “Or we let him do what he’s planning,” the President said, “and lose millions of lives.”

  “We have to be ready to pick up the pieces should Striker fail. But he won’t,” Brognola promised.

  “He better not, Hal. I know he’s pulled off miracles before.”

  Brognola nodded. “He knows what’s at stake.”

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Stan Reader joined Graham and Marrick in his basement workshop, after giving them a respectable amount of time to clear the air.

  Marrick’s mood had lightened, and she managed a weak smile for the scientist, her animosity faded now.

  “Sorry,” Reader lied. “I was checking perimeter security and scanning for enemy transmissions. I don’t know where the time went.”

  Graham quirked an eyebrow. “We were just talking, anyway. I didn’t want to acquire any gear for Striker until I got your permission.”

  Reader nodded and looked at his watch, despite the fact he knew exactly what time it was. “He should be arriving in an hour and a half, according to Mr. Brognola.”

  “Crud. That’s on the other side of the lake,” Graham observed. “Though, we could take 215 and speed.”

  “Not too much,” Reader replied. “Seventy-five miles an hour to reach it if we leave in fifteen minutes, and I know how you drive.”

  Graham rolled his eyes. “Hell…We got plenty
of time, then.”

  Marrick shuddered. “What would this Striker guy need?”

  “He usually carries two pistols. One silenced, and one heavy. A Magnum,” Graham explained.

  Reader looked through his pegboard and took down a pair of handguns. “What does he like in long arms?”

  Graham took the Walther P-990 with a threaded barrel. He checked it. A .40-caliber handgun, it was flat and compact. “Got the extra-large back strap for this? He’s got big hands.”

  Reader rummaged through his box of spare parts, then tossed him a plastic bag with the spare inserts and replacement sights. “I’ve got a Gem-tech suppressor for the Walther, too.”

  Graham nodded and loaded them into a bag. He then did a quick check on the Magnum handgun that Reader had given him. A Taurus 446 Raging Bull revolver. The stainless-steel .44 Magnum was an impressive, powerful piece. Graham found a hip holster for it, complete with speed loader loops. The Walther itself went into a shoulder holster, with an open bottom and a breakfront that allowed it to be carried with the compact suppressor in place. Graham screwed on the silencer and wrapped the holster straps around the weapon, and magazines were stuffed into hanging pouches. As he had for the Walther, he loaded it, and quickly assembled speed loaders as he had filled the Walther’s spare magazines.

  “We’re going to need something smaller than these rifles if we’re going out to Hill,” Marrick noted. She went to the rifle rack. She picked a Heckler & Koch PDW and an MP-5 with a collapsing stock. “Two long guns that we can at least hide.”

  Reader nodded and looked through the rest. “The PDW and MP-5 take the same magazines, so no worries about that. However, common ammunition with the others—”

  “It’s overrated,” Graham cut him off. “You forget, I know people who’ve been in some heavy fights. Nobody ever told me that they borrowed someone else’s ammo in the middle of the shit.”

  Reader nodded and took an Olympic Arms OA-93 Entry pistol. “This is basically an M-16 with a pistol-length barrel and no stock. Think he knows how to use one of these? I mean that he packs Magnum handguns.”