Fire in the Sky

by Don Pendleton

  "Phew!" Haines said, winded, as they pounded the stairs. "I ain't had this much fun in fifteen years."

  "Not bad for an old-timer!"

  Five flights passed in a blur and they came out on the first level of the parking garage to find Howard, bent over, gasping for air.

  "More...exercise than I'm...used to," the boy gasped, as Bolan patted him on the back.

  "You did great, kid," he said.

  "Now what?" Haines asked.

  "We've probably got less than ten seconds to get the hell out of here," Bolan returned, eyes already scanning the darkness of the parking garage. "Fred, you take Howard in your car. It's me they want, not you."

  Haines stared at him for several seconds, his urban terrorist's mind immediately grasping the logic of Bolan's words. "Got it. You gonna be okay?"

  "Yeah. Thanks to you."

  Haines handed Bolan Chuck's gun, then grabbed Howard by the arm, pulling him across the lot. "What the hell!" he called over his shoulder. "It was fun!"

  Bolan stood his ground until he heard the roar of the hard guy's engine and the squeal of tires. Then he hurried to the stairs again, moving down to level two.

  He jogged out into the nearly deserted parking area, shouts erupting from near the building entrance. He ran to his Jeep and cranked the engine to life.

  He geared into reverse, watching shadows charging his position from the distance. Backing quickly, he jammed the brakes and threw it into first, the vehicle jumping forward with a squeal as the first bullets tore into the plastic back window.

  He distanced them quickly, racing across the parking lot at sixty miles an hour, not a security guard in sight.

  The outside gate was closed. Bolan didn't give a thought as to whether the vehicle could survive the impact. He merely tromped on the gas, set the wheel and ducked.

  He hit the gate hard, metal grinding against metal as the barrier slammed open. A twisted pole grazed his shoulder as it hurtled through the windshield.

  Bolan slumped down, the pole gouging a huge hole through his seat, preventing him from sitting upright. Without slowing, he twisted the metal junk hard, finally jerking it loose and pushing it back out through the windshield and onto the pavement. He was free.

  Ike was dead, and Chuck, maybe even Smyth. He had drawn Peg Ackerman into the open, but had been lulled by the leisurely pace of the institute. He'd known that the GOG people played for keeps, but had let himself slide enough out of the combat mode that he hadn't expected the severity or swiftness of the repercussion. He'd been lulled by civility. He felt the deaths of his co-workers were partly his fault, but he wasn't enough of a martyr to not place the real blame exactly where it lay — squarely on Peg Ackerman's shoulders.

  The gloves were off now. He'd opened the hostilities and Peg's people had responded in kind — and now he owed them.

  He became aware, finally, of something in his hand, looking down to see that the dead airman's dog tags were still wound around his fingers. He pulled the chain off and stuck it and the tags in his pocket. This time he had evidence.

  He drove quickly, but had slowed down to within the speed limit, his mind slotting back to combat mode, settling into patterns of surveillance and awareness. As he drove Orlando Drive toward Colonial, he used a free hand to reach over and pick up Chuck's gun from the passenger seat.

  The weapon was a short-barreled .38 revolver, the kind that was called the Police Special. Using one hand to drive, he clicked open the cylinder to a full load, then snapped it closed, taking off the safety. The .38 would do in a pinch, but he itched for the feel of Big Thunder in his right hand.

  Two blocks before reaching the intersection of Orlando and Colonial he heard sirens, checking the rearview mirror to see two fire trucks speeding up behind him. He pulled out of the lane and slowed to a stop, watching as the trucks hurried past.

  Bolan felt the short hairs at his nape prickle as the fire trucks turned onto Colonial, in the same direction as he was headed.

  When he turned in, he could see the flames licking at the sky just above rooftop level several blocks ahead and just off Colonial to the south. The flames served as a beacon, drawing him, and within two minutes he found himself looking at the raging inferno that had been the home of Peg Ackerman.

  Smoke filled the night air, the light cast by the cherries of police cars and fire engines barely slicing through it. The smell of charred wood permeated everything. Bolan pulled up as close as he could and walked toward the fire, a small crowd being kept at a distance by several police officers.

  He checked street addresses just to be sure, as neighbors rushed around their houses with hoses, trying to protect their roofs from errant cinders. But the fire hoses were taking most of the water, leaving pitiful little pressure for everyone else.

  Bolan moved up and merged with the crowd, watching as the two-story frame house was consumed. The heavily suited firemen were hosing mammoth jets of water onto the structure to no avail. It was a raging, uncontrollable inferno.

  He tried to go closer, but a policeman stepped in front of him. "Back behind the line."

  "I know the woman who lives there. Can't I..."

  "Better use the past tense, buddy," the cop said, and pointed to a group of coughing firemen who carried a stretcher to a waiting ambulance.

  Bolan pulled back, skirting the crowd to come up on the ambulance just as they were loading the covered body into its back.

  "Please," he said, reaching for the cover. "I need…"

  "Who are you?" a burly fireman asked, grabbing Bolan's hand; the man's face was smeared with soot beneath the heavy metal hat that he wore.

  "I — I'm her husband," he said, reaching again for the blanket.

  He wasn't stopped this time as he peeled back the woolen cover to gaze at Peg Ackerman, who had died from smoke inhalation, her eyes wide in horror, her mouth opened in a silent scream.

  Bolan dropped the covering and stumbled away from the dead woman.

  "Hey!" the fireman called. "Come back here!"

  But Bolan had already turned and was running, tripping over hoses in the street as smoke choked up everything, twisting the landscape into a surreal nightmare.

  He'd had no idea of what he was setting in motion this morning when he'd rattled her cage. They'd gone for him and, apparently, were cleaning house completely, killing their informant, clearing the boards. As he reached the Jeep and jerked open the door, there was but one thought on his mind: were they going for Julie, too?

  Chapter Sixteen

  Bolan tore through the streets, his thoughts as dark as the moonless night that presided over the chaos that seemed to be spreading through Orlando.

  He fought for control, his feelings for Julie clouding his rational mind, only to find himself pushing the Jeep too hard, his foot locked on the gas as visions of Peg Ackerman's death mask pushed unrelentingly to the forefront of his brain.

  Why didn't he take to the mattresses after he'd discovered they were under surveillance? He didn't because Julie didn't want to and he gave in to her. Why did he let the woman cloud his judgment? He'd been a fool to let her stay there, worse than a fool — stupid. And now they'd have to pay for that, perhaps with their lives.

  He took the corner of Aloma and Avondale on two wheels, nearly rolling the vehicle, the revolver sliding off the seat.

  "Damn!"

  Bolan regained control and gunned the engine, speeding down the dark residential streets, keeping his eyes on the road and alert for any pedestrian who might stray into his path.

  He screeched to a stop in front of his house and saw the van that he had fallen from Saturday night parked two houses away.

  He jumped out of the Jeep and ran around to the passenger side. As he tore open the door, the sound of gunshots cracked obscenely from within the house.

  The warrior knelt on the floor, reaching beneath the seat, feeling around wildly for the .38. As his fingers closed on cold steel an explosion rocked the house, shattering the front wi
ndow, which spewed a huge ball of flame.

  He stood and charged toward the house, auto fire punctuating each step. Another gasoline bomb exploded in the house, flames eating away at the interior. He remembered how quickly Peg's place had burned.

  The warrior reached the kitchen stoop and jumped the steps to stand beside the door. Within himself he found that place of calm, and took several deep breaths to keep himself under some measure of control.

  He reached out and tried the knob. Locked. He brought up the .38 and smashed the butt against the kitchen window, reaching a hand through to open the lock from the inside.

  Quietly he opened the door and crept into the dark kitchen, which was rapidly filling with smoke. He could feel the heat through the walls.

  Several single shots boomed, and he recognized the sound of Big Thunder. He hurried through the kitchen, chancing a quick look around the doorframe into the hallway.

  The entire living room was engulfed, tongues of fire licking into the hallway. At the end of the hall, a lone figure crouched before Julie's doorway fifteen feet distant, reloading a shotgun.

  Bolan stepped into the burning hall, an intense machine of destructive energy geared for the kill.

  "Looking for someone?" he asked.

  A startled face looked up from the shotgun. Bolan didn't give the man a second to realize what was going to happen to him; he raised the .38 and squeezed the trigger. The small gun coughed in his hand, its messenger tearing a third eye in the forehead of the killer, who slid, wide-eyed, into a sitting position on the floor. Five shots left.

  Another gunner poked his head out of the bedroom doorway, and Bolan let go a shot, driving him back into the room. The Executioner eased past the flames and against the wail the door was on, pressing his back against the hot Sheetrock.

  A shotgun blast tore into the wall near Bolan's previous position, the gunner coming halfway through the door.

  Bolan fired twice, both shots taking the man chest high. He stumbled through the doorway, still alive, and disappeared into the darkness of Bolan's room.

  There were more shots from Julie's room. Bolan slid along the wall, turning back once to see that the entire hallway behind him was engulfed in flames.

  The air was getting thin, the smoke choking.

  He heard glass breaking in his room as he came around Julie's doorframe to find a third shooter hiding behind a dresser, firing a shotgun at Julie, who was inside a closet on the other side of the room.

  Bolan drilled two shots into the man just as his weapon discharged for the last time. He whirled, startled, as Julie staggered out of the closet, wild-eyed, her hands locked around Big Thunder. She fired a shot from the huge handgun before dropping it to the floor.

  "God, Julie!" Bolan yelled, running to her.

  "Oh, Mack!" she cried, collapsing into his arms and clinging to him desperately. "They came... came and…"

  Part of the ceiling fell in, and where walls had once stood, sheets of flame now roared.

  "The window, quick!" Bolan yelled, picking up a vanity chair and throwing it through the only exit.

  "Wait!" Julie quickly retrieved Bolan's combat harness from the closet.

  The big man, combat harness slung over his shoulder, climbed through the window, then reached back in, helping her through just as the rest of the ceiling fell.

  Julie staggered away from the inferno, wanting to throw herself on the ground to rest.

  "No!" Bolan took her by the arm to keep her on her feet. "There's still one of them out here. We'll rest later."

  They moved around the front of the house, the very air hot with fire, sweat pouring from Bolan's face. He discarded the .38 and pulled the Beretta from its sling in the combat harness.

  Jack Durbin, his next-door neighbor, was out hosing down his roof, his son, Mel, standing beside him. Suddenly a shadow staggered out of the bushes.

  Bolan tracked with the Beretta, but the shadow darted to Durbin's side, putting him in the line of fire. The hood grabbed up Mel, wrapping the youngster in his arms, a gun to his head. Durbin had dropped his hose, he and his wife pursuing their child's abductor.

  "Back!" the punk yelled.

  "Stay away from him!" Bolan ordered, bringing up the Beretta in a two-handed Weaver's grip.

  "No!" the mother shouted, horrified. "No shooting! Please!"

  The man dragged the petrified boy to his van, Bolan tracking him with the Beretta.

  "What do you think?" the goon asked, dark eyes flashing as he passed barely ten feet in front of Bolan. "Want to watch the boy die?"

  "Let him go," Bolan said, and he gauged his shot, convinced that the man would kill the boy as soon as he reached the van. Mel was hoisted high, head-to-head with the killer. Only a small portion of the man's face was visible, a risky shot at best.

  "Go to hell," the punk said, squeezing Mel tighter and jamming the barrel of his automatic pistol into the boy's ear.

  "For God's sake!" Jack Durbin screamed. "Don't argue with him!"

  Bolan could see half a smirk peeking out from behind the boy's head and walked slowly abreast of the kidnapper as the man got closer to his van.

  "Let it go." Julie's voice came from behind.

  "You just keep the parents off me."

  "Mack…"

  "Do it!"

  The man kept moving. A few more feet and he'd be back into the shadows, no shot possible. Sirens were closing in from Aloma.

  Bolan took several deep breaths and tried to detach himself totally from his surroundings. He had made this shot, difficult as it was, several times in the hell grounds. But nobody died if you missed.

  "Drop the gun!" the goon ordered, and Bolan had run completely out of options.

  He had reached a place beyond thinking, almost as if he had become the barrel of the gun. An extension of his finger, he pointed it at the place where the laws of physics told him he couldn't miss. His fingers pulsed with his heartbeat on the trigger... "Drop it now!"

  ...and when he was between heartbeats, he let his mind float and become a gun sight, and he squeezed the trigger gently and lovingly.

  The sound of the gunshot brought him immediately back to reality. The goon was down, and little Mel was crying loudly, charging past Bolan to the waiting arms of his parents.

  Bolan turned to see the flashing lights of the fire engines and police cars at the end of the block. "Let's get the hell out of here."

  * * *

  Brognola stood in his living room, a glass of Scotch in his hand. His sleeves were rolled up past his elbows, and his tie unknotted, collar unbuttoned.

  He was glad that Helen wasn't there to see what they'd done to her house. The living-room furniture had been either pushed against the walls or removed to the garage, replaced by the plain wooden table full of telephones in the center of the room. The walls were covered with maps. Brognola's house had become the command center for counterinsurgence on Project GOG.

  The room was full of people, trusted allies willing to put themselves on the line for the preservation of the union and the constitution. They manned the phones or worked the computer terminals tied into the phone modems. There was an air of urgency surrounding the entire operation, and Brognola was proud that so many good people were willing to give so much just on his word and the word of Gunnar Greggson.

  Hendry, a skinny young man with glasses, had one of the phones turned over on its back, alligator clips attached to phone leads running back to a counter of some sort. Small headphones were resting on his neck as he applied a screwdriver to the bottom of the phone. Brognola stopped beside him.

  "How's it going?"

  "Your phone lines are clear," Hendry said. "No sweat. If anyone tampers with them at this point in any way, this will happen..."

  Hendry stuck the screwdriver onto one of the leads, causing a red light set in a black box on the table to light up.

  "Thanks." Brognola looked at his watch, worry lining his face. It was after nine, and Bolan hadn't made his nightly call.
The Fed took a sip from his tumbler, set it on the table and cleared his throat.

  "Okay, people." He spoke loudly to be heard above the buzz of conversation. "As you know, we've been making some progress with Baylor Goggle. Let's see where we're standing right now with everything."

  Greggson was sitting in the corner on a fold-up metal chair with one of his computer people. He raised a hand and spoke. "I think we should address the problems and possibilities of cracking into the GOG computer network."

  "Go for it."

  The computer man, a Japanese-American named Bob Ito, stood and smiled shyly. "The question has been raised of the possibility of particulars about Project GOG being filed directly in the government computer network. In my opinion, that's not just possible, it's probable."

  "That wouldn't be very smart," said a woman near the phone bank. "I mean, why would anyone put their plans for a takeover of the government in the government computers where anyone could see them?"

  "Several good reasons." Ito pushed back a shock of black hair that had fallen on his forehead. "First of all, if you're dealing with the military, you would be putting information into a system that everyone uses already, the quickest and easiest way of disseminating information. Secondly, not just 'anyone' could see them. The file would be coded, so only people who knew the proper password could access the file. Theoretically the idea is beautifully simple. You could pull a complicated coup d'état right under the noses of those you wish to depose, simply by using their own systems against them."

  "If that's the case," Brognola interrupted, "then couldn't we access the same files by working to find the password with experts like you, Bob?"

  "Perhaps," the man conceded. "You must keep in mind that computer hacking is a great deal like espionage, working through layers upon layers. For instance, whoever thought up this program, if it exists, would have to consider the possibility that someone, either deliberately or by calculation, would try to crack the file. So, safeguards would be set up."

  "What sort of safeguards?" Brognola asked as he walked to the window, peering through the brocaded curtains and into the moonless Silver Springs, Maryland, night. He pulled the cigar he'd been chewing on all day out of his breast pocket and stuck it between his lips, fighting the urge to light it.