by Gar Wilson
Lieutenant Vladimir Savchenko triggered his Makarov pistol, blasting a 9 mm bullet into the side of the Asian gunsel's head. The guy's skull burst, and brains spat from an exit wound the size of a quarter. The TRIO thug fell dead, but his two comrades behind the table had drawn weapons and prepared to open fire.
Major Viktor Alekseyev suddenly hit them with three 9 mm rounds, triggering his Makarov as fast as possible. The high-velocity projectiles punched through the flimsy wood tabletop. Two bullets drilled into the abdomen of an enemy triggerman. The Asian hood fell forward, tipping over the table.
The remaining hoodlum found himself without cover. He dropped to a prone position and pointed his pistol at the two Soviet agents. Rafael Encizo had stationed himself behind the bar and removed his H&K machine pistol from the laundry bag. He blasted the TRIO hit man with a volley of 9 mm slugs. Three parabellums ripped into the hood's back between the shoulder blades. Bullets punctured heart and lungs and severed his spinal cord. The guy was dead before he could blink.
* * *
The two Trio hoods who followed John Trent into the rest room got a big surprise. The American ninja was waiting for them with his manrikigusari in his fists. The first man through the door received a hammerlike blow to the left temple. Trent had hit him with a weighted end of the chain in his fist.
The second thug lunged at Trent with a five-inch dagger in his fist. Trent lashed the manrikigusari across the guy's wrist. Steel links wrapped around the target, and a weighted end stung the man's nerve center at the base of a thumb knuckle. The knife fell from his grasp. Trent quickly rammed a knee into his opponent's groin and jammed an elbow stroke under the man's jaw. The TRIO goon's eyes rolled up in his head, and he slid senseless to the floor.
Trent heard the shooting outside the rest room. He put away the fighting chain and drew his Colt Commander. The American ninja emerged from the rest room with his pistol held ready, but the battle was virtually finished. The fighting had been fast and furious. Dead and unconscious TRIO members littered the restaurant floor.
"We have any prisoners?" Katz called out.
"Two or three," James replied as he knelt by the unconscious Yumjaagiyin and began binding his wrists with plastic riot cuffs.
"I've got one here, too," the Phoenix Force commander announced. "Let's round them up and get out of here."
18
"Where the hell have you guys been?" Gerald Crane demanded when Yakov Katzenelenbogen, Major Alekseyev and Gary Manning entered Colonel Hunntington-Smythe's office a few minutes after midnight.
"Oh, I suspect I know where they've been," the SIS colonel remarked sourly. Hunntington-Smythe sat behind his desk, stuffing tobacco into the bowl of a brier pipe. "I heard a news report on the radio about a big gun battle in the Shiang District. They found about a dozen bodies at some restaurant. Sounds like your people were busy this evening."
"As a matter of fact," Katz said with a smile, "you're right."
"Well, whoop-dee-do," Crane snorted. The CIA agent lit a cigarette and forced smoke out of his nostrils. "You hotshots just took off without tellin' any of us where you were going. We've been looking for you all day. Then I get a phone call, and I'm told to meet you jokers here. What's your big news? You've been killin' people at some fuckin' restaurant in the Hong Kong slum district."
"Mr. Crane was surprised when he got here," Hunntington-Smythe added. "He thought I knew what was going on, but I had been called at my home and told to return to my office. You said you had some important information for us, Gray."
"I do," Katz confirmed as he drew his SIG Sauer autoloader from shoulder leather. The Israeli stepped forward and placed the pistol on Hunntington-Smythe's desk. "And I'll explain everything when everybody arrives."
"What's that for?" the colonel demanded, pointing the stem of his pipe at the SIG Sauer.
"The gun is on your desk, not in my hand," Katz replied mildly. "No reason to be alarmed by that. Just relax. We'll explain everything..."
The door opened. David McCarter and John Trent escorted Kauo Yvet-sang into the office. The Chinese SIS agent's right arm was cradled in a sling. He appeared to be upset and confused by the situation.
"Kauo should be in the hospital," Hunntington-Smythe said angrily. "He was shot during the harbor raid, in case you forgot."
"He was going to be released from the hospital in the morning," McCarter replied. "We just brought him out a bit earlier."
"At gunpoint," Kauo spat. "And they refuse to tell me why."
"Don't feel paranoid," Crane remarked. "These guys' aren't telling us anything either."
"We will now," Katz assured them.
"Getting a bit crowded in here," McCarter said. "We'll wait outside."
The Briton and Trent left the office. Kauo Yvet-sang took a seat, but Katz, Manning and Alekseyev remained on their feet. The Israeli lit a cigarette before he began the explanation.
"You're already aware that we were at the Green Dragon Restaurant this evening," the Israeli said. "The reason we were there is because a telephone call came through this office for Mr. Nelson. The call was from Hsin Li, Nelson's informer friend. He was the fellow who gave us the tip about the Black Serpent Tong operations at Lung Harbor. Remember?"
"I didn't recall his name," Hunntington-Smythe admitted, "but I know who you're talking about. What I'd like to know is why the hell Nelson gave the man the phone number to my office!"
"He didn't," Manning stated. "The men who forced him to make the call knew the number and they knew they could contact Nelson at this office. Fortunately Hsin Li managed to warn Nelson he was in trouble. The enemy wanted to lure Nelson into a trap, but we turned the tables on them."
"Why didn't you tell us about this?" Crane demanded.
"Because one of you three is an informer," Major Alekseyev announced. "You, Mr. Crane, or Colonel Hunntington-Smythe or Kauo Yvet-sang is a double agent working for TRIO."
"Double agent working for a bunch of hoods?" the CIA agent scoffed. "TRIO is a criminal syndicate, not a spy network. You KGB boys must get pretty paranoid, and I guess the same must be true about Gray and his pals. You find very many conspiracies during your missions?"
"A few," Katz replied with a shrug. "TRIO isn't a street gang, Crane. It's a powerful and sophisticated criminal organization that has adopted espionage tactics in order to successfully function in a covert manner. Not surprising they'd have informers within the police, law-enforcement organizations and the SIS."
"I'm not with the SIS," Crane said. "I'm CIA. You think TRIO could infiltrate the Company, for Christ's sake?"
"Why not?" Manning replied. "Everybody else has."
"You've been working with the SIS since we arrived," Katz told Crane. "That made you a suspect. The only other two who could be informers are you, Colonel. And you, Kauo Yvet-sang."
"This is outrageous!" Hunntington-Smythe declared. "That's the most insulting and offensive accusation I've ever heard!"
"Yeah," Crane added. "It's pretty goddamn sorry when you guys suspect us of being spies for TRIO, but you trust the goddamn KGB!"
"I assure you," Alekseyev chuckled. "Mr. Gray and his friends don't trust the KGB, but they knew we couldn't be informers. Whoever was working for TRIO must have been in Hong Kong before we arrived here."
"So we had to deal with the TRIO ambush scheme without telling you about it, gentlemen," Katz stated. "TRIO was at the restaurant in force. Of course, they didn't expect us to show up in a group. We caught them off guard. Had to kill most of them, but we managed to take five of them alive. You remember I told you Mr. Johnson is very skilled at using scopolamine? He's been busy with our prisoners. Luckily Lieutenant Savchenko and Mr. Collins speak Chinese fluently, so they've been able to interrogate the subjects under the influence of the truth serum."
"We got some valuable information," Alekseyev added. "One of the prisoners is a Mongol named Yumjaagiyin. He's a henchman for a man named Temujin, who is the son of a man who calls himself Tosha Khan. The
khan is the leader of the New Horde, part of the three great criminal networks that comprise TRIO."
"You got this information from a Mongol criminal here in Hong Kong?" Hunntington-Smythe asked with amazement.
"Fortunately," Manning replied, "Lieutenant Savchenko speaks Mongolian. Yuma-what's his name..."
"Yumjaagiyin," Alekseyev supplied.
"Yeah, that guy," Manning said with a nod, "gave us the most important information of all. He told us where the VL-800 is located."
"And," Katz added, "he also gave us the name of the double agent..."
Kauo Yvet-sang suddenly bolted from his chair and grabbed for the SIG Sauer pistol on the colonel's desk. Crane jumped from his seat and seized Kauo's shirt from behind. The Chinese SIS agent bent his left elbow and pumped it back to strike Crane in the chest. The CIA operative fell to the floor as Kauo seized the pistol.
"It isn't loaded," Katz said with a sigh. "Did you really think it would be?"
"But this gun is loaded," Alekseyev declared, aiming his Makarov at Kauo. "And I'll use it if you give me half a reason."
Kauo Yvet-sang placed the SIG Sauer on the desk and raised his uninjured arm. Yakov stepped forward and retrieved his pistol. He held it in the left fist and pressed the magazine catch. An empty mag dropped from the well.
"Shit," Crane muttered as he picked himself up from the floor. The CIA agent rubbed his bruised chest and glared at Katz. "Why did you bait the fucker with the empty gun? If you already knew Kauo was the double agent..."
"Because we didn't know," Katz answered. He held the P-226 in the tri-hooks of his prosthesis as he shoved a magazine loaded with fifteen 9 mm parabellums into the butt of the pistol.
"Bau-shir!" Kauo Yvet-sang exclaimed. "But you said..."
"We lied about that," Manning told him. "None of the hoods we interrogated knew about the TRIO spy within the SIS. So we hoped you'd panic and expose yourself when we :laimed one of them had told us who you were."
"My God," Hunntington-Smythe said, shaking his head. "Why, Kauo? You've been my aide for two and a half years. Why did you agree to spy on us for TRIO?"
"The answer is simple," Crane growled. "M-O-N-E-Y. Right, Kauo? You little shit..."
"Money had nothing to do with it," Kauo said defensively. "I was born to a family that has belonged to the Black Serpent Tong for more than a century. My father was a member of the tong and his father before him. You do not understand the loyalty we have to our tong. To you, we are simply criminals."
"That definition seems good enough to me," Manning told him. "You can defend your actions — and the tong's — when you go to court."
"I'll never stand trial," Kauo replied. "I won't live that long."
"Maybe you will and maybe you won't," Crane commented. "I can think of worse things than you gettin' offer while you're in prison, asshole."
"What about the TRIO headquarters?" Hunntington-Smythe asked Katz. "Was that a lie, too?"
"No," the Phoenix Force commander replied. "The Mongol prisoner really did give us that information. We're planning to raid them just before dawn. Will you help us, Colonel?"
"A pleasure, Mr. Gray," the SIS officer assured him.
19
The British submarine Manta silently cruised twenty leagues beneath the surface of the South China Sea. It was headed for the small island of Chiwey-Wu. A strip of land roughly a mile in diameter, Chiwey-Wu was the property of a respected Hong Kong businessman and banker named Chou Minchuan. He employed a private security force of twenty-three guards, all licensed to carry automatic weapons.
Phoenix Force, Trent, their KGB allies and Colonel Hunntington-Smythe sat at the captain's table in the officers' mess. The cabin was as large as most living rooms, but Gary Manning was uncomfortable inside the submarine. The Canadian suffered from a mild case of claustrophobia. The sooner he got out of the underwater sardine can the better. Major Alekseyev and Lieutenant Savchenko were also uncomfortable inside a British military vessel, although the captain and crew were unaware that two of their passengers were Soviet agents.
"I must say," Captain Robert Bradsworth remarked as he sipped tea from a thick mug, "I've had some unusual assignments in my day, but this is one of the oddest and certainly the most sudden. Really no time to prepare at all, you know. Still, when the orders come directly from the Prime Minister, a chap doesn't question matters much."
"We're glad we could arrange this transportation," Yakov Katzenelenbogen remarked. "And we realize this is all very unorthodox, Captain."
"To say the least," Bradsworth agreed. "Most of the time, duty here is rather bland. Submarine patrols seem almost unnecessary since Mao died. The Chinese haven't been hostile toward Hong Kong and the Soviets haven't tried mucking about here much. Of course, the Americans have a fleet in Taiwan considerably larger than the naval forces Her Majesty has stationed here."
"Excuse me, Captain," Colonel Hunntington-Smythe said, glancing at his wristwatch. "But we should be pretty close to Chiwey-Wu by now. Perhaps we should get ready."
"The torpedo tubes are empty," Bradsworth stated. "There are six tubes. How many of you will be going ashore?"
"Eight," Hunntington-Smythe answered. "Everyone but me."
"All of you?" the captain glanced at Katz. A middle-aged man with a prosthesis had no business getting involved in an armed assault on some sort of enemy base, in Bradsworth's opinion.
"That's right," Rafael Encizo told the captain. "Six of us can leave simultaneously through the tubes. That'll leave just two men to follow."
"We'll let you out about three hundred meters from shore," Bradsworth declared. "The swim won't be too bad. After the first hundred meters, the water should be pretty shallow. Probably be able to wade the last hundred."
"What about our gear?" Alekseyev inquired. "We certainly can't carry it and swim that great a distance."
"We're putting everything on a scuba sled," Calvin James explained. "The gear will be sealed in waterproof bags and strapped to the sled. It has its own propellers, so it's easy to push through the water. One man can haul four hundred pounds of stuff on a scuba sled. Our stuff doesn't weigh nearly that much."
"I have some experienced frogmen among the crew," Bradsworth announced. "I'm certain I can get some volunteers to assist you..."
"Thanks, but I think we'd better use our own people," Katz answered. "Nothing against your men. Just for security. The fewer people who know any details, the better."
"Well, I don't know many details myself," the British officer said with a shrug. "Now, let me make certain I've got everything straight. We let you blokes out through the torpedo tubes and leave you to do whatever at the island?"
"Right," Manning confirmed. "Then come back in four hours. We'll fire a red flare to signal you to pick us up."
"If we don't see the flare, then I'm supposed to order my men to fire a missile loaded with incendiary explosives," Bradsworth said, frowning. "Enough to burn everything on the island into a cinder."
"Wait a minute, mate," David McCarter said sharply. "First you circle around the bloody island and look for either a flashlight signal in Morse code or two small campfires near the beach."
"Oh, yes," Bradsworth nodded. "And the Morse code message will be 'R.I.P.', I remember now."
"Don't bloody forget," McCarter warned. "I don't care for the idea of getting cremated because our damn flare gun didn't work and you didn't recall the alternative signals we'll use in an emergency."
"I won't forget," Bradsworth insisted.
"If he does, I'll remind him," Hunntington-Smythe assured the men of Phoenix Force.
"But if we don't send up any flares or use the other signal devices," Katz added. "Burn the island. That absolutely has to be done unless you see our signal."
"I understand," the captain nodded. "I don't understand why, but I understand the instructions."
"Good," Katz said. "Then let's get ready."
* * *
Phoenix Force and its three allies were ejec
ted from the torpedo tubes and swam to the shore of Chiwey-Wu. They waded to the beach, dragging the scuba sled with them. The beach was hardly a romantic spot for lovers. The sand was mostly mud, and slippery rocks extended along much of the coast. Had the waves been more powerful, the beach landing would have been hazardous.
The men removed their face masks and Emerson air tanks. McCarter unzipped the rubber "body bag" that contained smaller waterproof bags filled with their gear. The Briton eagerly found his and opened it. McCarter hated being unarmed under any circumstances, but to be unarmed at an enemy stronghold was especially upsetting.
"Damn," Katz rasped as he gazed up at the pale orb that poked above the horizon. Shimmering lights reflected on the water like diamonds on a velvet cloth. "Sun is rising."
"We're only ten minutes behind schedule," Encizo remarked, checking his wristwatch. "Maybe daybreak was earlier than we expected this morning."
"Well, we're here now, folks," Manning sighed. "Just have to do the best we can."
"Any major changes in the plan?" Alekseyev asked as he took his bag from the sled.
"Not really," Katz replied. "Except our chances of being seen by the enemy are greater than they were before. Do you know any ninja tactics of invisibility that might help us, Mr. Collins?"
"One way to be invisible is to blend with the shadows or with surroundings," John Trent replied. "Another is to be where your opponents aren't looking."
"Sounds nice," McCarter said. "But how is that going to apply to this situation?"
"How do I know?" Trent said with a shrug. "I haven't seen the enemy stronghold yet. I don't know which method will apply or how to best handle it."
"Yeah," James muttered as he pulled off his diving fins. "Give the dude a break, man."