by Dick Stivers
"Yes, sir. Certainly."
Lyons started to say something else to the woman when a strong deep voice cut across the room.
"So! You're the one Andrzej always talked about." Lyons turned to see a wiry black man standing in the doorway. He wore a denim shop apron, and his chest pocket had a plastic liner holding pens and pencils and a micrometer. He motioned for Lyons to enter. "I'm Randall. I'll introduce you to the others."
As if to free his right hand for a handshake, Lyons transferred the flight bag to his left hand. He carried both cases with one hand as he paused in the doorway.
Lyons did not trust anyone associated with the Central Intelligence Agency. Though these technicians had been friends of Andrzej Konzaki, he expected the worst. His eyes scanned the workshop before he entered. His right hand remained free and ready to grab the Colt Python he wore under his sports coat.
Steel cabinets dominated two walls. Machines and workbenches took the other walls. On the opposite wall, an open door revealed a dimly lit corridor. He saw a beer-bellied technician standing up from a drill press. Another man looked up from a workbench covered with tools and the components of a Kalashnikov rifle. Lyons saw no one else.
He finally entered.
The beer belly approached, smiling, his hand out in greeting. "Hi, Carl. I'm Lloyd. Konzaki and I were in the Corps together."
"And I'm Bob," the other technician said. "Andy called me the jeweler. He ever mention me?"
"Yeah, he did." Lyons shook hands with the three men.
"There was some work even Andy couldn't do," Bob said. "I was his specialist. A specialist for the specialists, that's what he called me. In fact, I did some of the work on your Colt Frankenstein."
In four quick strides, Lyons crossed the workshop and glanced through the open door leading to what he assumed to be a corridor. He saw a fifty-foot-long firing lane with mechanical targets at the far end.
"That's where we test-fire our work," Randall told him. "Saves us driving out to a rifle range."
"So, how can we help you?" Bob asked.
"I need my weapons checked. Maybe they need some work, maybe not. Can't take them to a gunsmith."
"Konzaki's creations!" Bob looked like a kid invited to a party. "They've been out there a year. Let's see how they look. They hold up okay?"
"No problems," Lyons said, snapping open the larger case. "This is preventive maintenance. The Atchisson." He zipped open the flight bag. "Here's the Colt."
Randall picked up the heavy selective-fire assault shotgun. "Why do you call this an Atchisson? It isn't, you know."
"Because that's what Konzaki told me."
With the confidence of expertise and long familiarity, Randall explained the differences. "My man, what you have here is a redesigned and reengineered Armalite rifle incorporating components of other weapon designs. Notice the receiver and the handle and the grip and all that. This is not an Atchisson. Bob, could you please get me a for-real Atchisson while I set this man straight?"
The technician went to a set of the steel cabinets and opened a door to reveal a rack of shotguns. He took three shotguns out. Randall continued his explanation.
"You see, this Konzaki-created wonder weapon represents the fusion of several designs. Components designed by the immortal Mr. Stoner. Components by Mr. Atchisson. And of course, components designed by Andrzej."
Bob put the shotguns on the workbench. Randall picked up an odd weapon with two pistol grips. "Notice the box magazine. Notice the lack of a shoulder stock. This is a fully automatic submachine shotgun made by the Muslim gunsmiths of the Phillipines. Made before 1970. No semiauto. Undependable safety. Metal crystallized and subject to stress cracking. But this may represent the beginning of the modern assault shotgun. The designer didn't take a semiauto shotgun and make it full-auto. The maker redesigned a submachine gun to fire twelve gauge."
"Open the thing up, professor," Bob interrupted. "Show him the bolt, that's what's different."
"I was getting to that." Randall opened the receiver of the Phillipine shotgun. "I know all this stuff and nobody wants to listen to the details. Man, frustrating. Look. Here's the bolt. Is that heavy? That's the single most important design change, that heavy bolt. Heavy bolt, then heavy springs, heavy sear mechanism, heavy receiver — got to make it heavy duty to fire 12-gauge."
Lyons weighed the bolt in his hand. "That's why my Atchisson's so heavy?"
"You don't have an Atchisson," Randall corrected.
"Then what is it?"
"Call it a Konzaki, whatever. Here's the Atchisson." Randall picked up the futuristic selective-fire assault shotgun. He touched the components as he identified each one. "Atchisson made this from existing components. Incorporates the front hand guard and stock from an M-16. Thompson pistol grip. Browning trigger mechanism. What's new is the receiver and bolt. This receiver," he said, indicating the long cylindrical housing going from the barrel to the shoulder pad, "houses the world's heaviest bolt, that is, for an assault weapon. Three pounds. Operates on the blowback principle. Pull the trigger, the firing pin pops the round, the recoil drives the bolt back. This bolt goes all the way back in the receiver tube. Since he went into production, Atchisson's making these with a different look, but the mechanism is the same. Now this is an excellent weapon, but Konzaki didn't like the reciprocating bolt handle. If the handle's moving forward and backward with the bolt, things could get jammed into this long slot here. Didn't like that. So he figured he'd use Armalite components to put together his version..."
"Also," Lloyd interrupted, "he wanted the shotgun to look like an M-16. In the Corps, we learned that the man who carried the unusual weapon got hit first. If an enemy sniper had a platoon coming, and he had the chance to pick the target for his first shot, he'd shoot the man who looked like the officer or weapons specialist. So the man carrying the .45 auto would get hit, or the man with the M-60, or a man carrying the fancy subgun. Andy said he didn't want you drawing more than your share of fire, so he made his shotgun look like a standard weapon."
"Yeah, makes sense," Lyons said.
"Damn right," Lloyd emphasized. "We've been there. We know what you're up against."
"Returning to my discussion of this fascinating creation of our late dear friend," Randall resumed, snapping open the selective-fire assault shotgun Konzaki had custom-fabricated for Lyons. "On the outside, it looks like an oversized M-16. But on the inside, it gets radical. Heavy blowback bolt, heavy springs, heavy buffer spring, heavy trigger mechanism. Operating features of an M-16, but the firepower of 12-gauge. How has it worked?"
"It knocks them down. Almost useless past a hundred feet."
"What about with slugs?" Bob asked.
"I shot at a rifleman one time," Lyons told them. "He was about a hundred yards away."
"A hundred yards!" Lloyd marveled. "With shotgun slugs? You positive?"
"Situation got desperate. They had us in a no-exit ambush. He was moving into a position to fire down on us. I put in a magazine of slugs and kept shooting until one hit him. It was hit him or die."
"But the Konzak got you out," Randall said, nodding.
"Konzak," Lyons repeated. "Yeah, that's the name. Konzak Assault Weapon. So can you check this thing out?"
"Sure, no problem." Randall glanced at the Konzak components.
"What we'll do is X-ray it," Bob suggested. "Eyeball it for extreme wear and tear. Then X-ray it to look for crystallization, hairline cracks."
"What about that super-Colt Konzaki put together?" Lloyd asked. "How's it holding up?"
Lyons took the modified-for-silence Colt Government Model out of the flight bag. The gun had been redesigned and hand machined by Andrzej Konzaki to incorporate the innovations of the state-of-the-art Beretta autopistols. The interior mechanisms of the Colt no longer resembled what Browning had invented and patented. But it fired silent, full-powered .45-caliber slugs, in semiauto and 3-shot-burst modes, at a thousand feet per second.
"How many rounds
have you fired through it?" Randall asked as he took the pistol from Lyons. After checking the chamber he folded down the left-hand grip lever and sighted on the wall.
Lyons considered the question for a moment, thinking back over the past year, counting the missions and the firefights. "In action, a few hundred. But after every mission I fire a minimum of a hundred rounds through it. I try to break it at the range..."
"Instead of it breaking in the field," Lloyd added. "There it is, break it when you can fix it. What's the accuracy?"
"At combat distance, it's good enough."
"What's that distance?" Lloyd asked.
"Fifty feet or less. Usually arm's distance."
"What about farther than that?"
"I've got the Interdynamics for that."
"Oh, yeah," Lloyd nodded. "That kit that silences an M-16."
"But only one shot at a time," Bob commented.
"The other guys have got Berettas," Lyons told him. "The Berettas are more accurate at a longer distance, even though they don't have any knock-down power. But then neither does the Interdynamics."
Randall flipped the left-hand grip lever up and down. The lever provided a firm hold for the shooter's left hand, converting the pistol to a compact submachine gun. "When Konzaki started working on this thing, I didn't know what that man thought he was doing. But it worked."
"How's it compare to the Berettas?" Bob asked.
"Nine millimeter was designed for killing Europeans," Lyons told him. "For dangerous people, you need a .45."
The technicians laughed at the sardonic comment.
"Okay, okay." Randall gathered up the weapons. "Time to work. Maybe we can swap jokes after working hours. When do you need these things back?"
"Soon as possible. Immediately. Don't like being without them."
"Konzaki said you were like that," Randall added, his voice going quiet. "We got to get together and talk about that guy. You know, there wasn't a funeral or wake. Nothing. We just got the word that he was gone. Nothing else. It just seems so unreal that he isn't around anymore."
"That's the way it is. But I don't know what I can tell you about it. I'll have to check with my people about what's classified and what isn't."
"He went out on a mission with you?" Lloyd asked, incredulous. "The guy didn't have any legs."
"The action came to him. That's all I can say." The pager at Lyons's belt buzzed. "Speaking of action, I need a phone."
"There..." Randall pointed to a phone on the workbench. "And that line's secure, by the way."
"Secure from the Agency?" Lyons asked.
"No," Randall told him. "Don't say anything you don't want Langley to know."
Lyons dialed a number and waited, then punched in another series of numbers for the access code. Rosario Blancanales, his Puerto Rican partner on Able Team, answered.
"We've got an assignment," the Politician said. "When can you get back?"
"I'm at the Agency workshop."
"Let's don't talk about that on the telephone..." Blancanales began.
"This phone's secure from the public," Lyons said. "But not from the Agency."
"That's an Agency phone?"
"Just don't say anything about business. Any equipment you want me to pick up while I'm here? Agency-type equipment?"
"We can talk. It's an Agency job. We'll be going to Beirut to pick up one of their people. He's gone over to the Amal militia and the Agency wants him for interrogation here."
"Why don't they do their own dirty work?"
"The people they had are deceased."
"So they want us to go?"
"That's the mission. Pick up and bring back."
"What if their man doesn't want to come back?"
"Bang."
"Like that?"
"Just relaying the instructions. Soon as you get here, we go."
"Give me a few hours. Later." Lyons hung up and returned to the technician. "Can you do a rush job on the checkouts?"
"You're working?" Randall asked.
"Dirty work for the Agency."
Randall looked to the two other men. "What do you think?"
Bob shrugged. "Service while you wait."
6
Footfalls crunched on broken glass.
Powell lay on his living-room couch and listened as the slow, careful footsteps — advancing, pausing, advancing again — approached his apartment door.
Throughout the night, battles had raged. Militias hammered opponents with mortars and automatic weapons, explosions and firefights tearing up the neighborhoods along the Green Line dividing the city. From emplacements near the port, the Phalangists shelled the Druze in the Shuf Mountains, then Druze and Syrians replied with artillery and rockets.
The accurate 155mm high-explosive shells blasted the Christian forces near the port, but the barrages of Soviet 120mm and 240mm rockets fell throughout the city, indiscriminately killing and maiming Christians and Muslims.
One rocket hit a neighboring apartment house. Powell woke to screams and sirens. He left his bed and went to sleep on the couch. His bedroom opened to the balcony and a view of the mountains, but the living room had no windows, only a door to the hallway. The extra wall of masonry between him and the explosions would stop glass and shrapnel if a rocket hit his balcony.
Before dawn, the fighting stopped. Quiet returned as the sirens of ambulances taking the wounded to hospitals faded. The city remained unnaturally quiet, without the sounds of the morning traffic rush, as commuters and truck drivers waited in the uncertain safety of their homes rather than risk driving into another barrage of high explosives and phosphorus.
In the strange quiet, Powell listened for sounds outside his apartment door, and heard footsteps.
He thumbed off the safety on his Colt. Listening, he visualized the hallway. The explosion in the next apartment building had shattered the windows at the end of the hall, spraying broken glass over the linoleum.
Assassins did not come alone. They worked in teams. Unless they intended to bomb him. A killer? Phalangist? Iranian? Islamic Amal? Libyan? The thought of who might have paid an assassin to kill him distracted him for a moment as his memory reviewed the long list of his enemies. He gave up the effort.
Who cares who it is? They came to kill.
Slipping from under his blanket, Powell went silently into the bedroom. He put on sneakers, then his Kevlar vest. Through the dirty glass and blurry anti-shatter plastic film of the sliding balcony doors, he scanned the opposite rooftops. He saw nothing unusual, no one waiting to shoot as he came out. He slid the door open and stepped into the freezing morning.
He crossed his balcony to the balcony of the next apartment. The family living there had moved from the apartment after a hit from an RPG killed their infant boy and the grandmother. Since then, Powell had paid the rent on the apartment. He glanced through the shattered windows, saw no one in the empty interior. He hurried over the dust and blood-stiff carpets to the hallway door.
Months before, he had installed three fish-eye peepholes in this door. One lens looked to the right, one to the center, the third to the left. The three peepholes gave him a view of the entire hallway.
He saw a pale young man in heavy coat and wool hat knocking on his door. No one else.
By touch, Powell keyed the combination of the padlock on the heavy steel bar securing the door. He threw open the door and extended the pistol, sighting on the head of the wool-capped figure.
The figure turned, mouth opening, eyes going wide. Powell was almost as surprised. The person at the other end of the barrel was a woman! Stumbling backward, she almost fell, but braced herself against the wall. "Don't... don't... please don't shoot. I..."
"Who are you?" Powell demanded.
"I'm here to see..." She recovered from her shock and studied him for a moment. "I'm here to talk to you."
"Then answer me! Who are you?"
"Anne Desmarais, I'm a journalist."
"French?"
"Yes, from Quebec."
"Why you creeping around out here?"
"Creeping? The glass could cut my tennis shoes — and there are no numbers on the doors."
"Isn't that a shame. What do you want?"
"I want to interview you about the killing of George Clayton."
"Clayton who? Don't know who you're talking about. You must have the wrong address." Powell started to shut the door.
"I'll exchange information!" she called out.
"What information?"
"I don't want to talk out here."
"What information?" he insisted.
She stepped closer to him. Her right hand went into her coat pocket. Powell aimed the Colt at her face. She explained quickly, her voice tight. "I have a photo — here. This is the Iranian who had Clayton killed. His name's Rouhani."
The grainy black-and-white print showed two men talking. One had the unkempt hair and beard of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard. The other wore the Soviet-style greatcoat with the insignia of the Syrian army.
"Who's the other one?" Powell asked.
"Want to talk, American?"
"Sure, wait here." Powell closed the door and replaced the steel bar and combination lock. He waited a few seconds, then looked through the peepholes. The woman stood. No one moved at the ends of the hallway. Powell went back to his apartment. He paused to pull on his fatigue pants and shirt. Then he buckled on his black nylon shoulder holster for his Colt autopistol.
He listened for movement in the hallway before throwing open the door and standing aside.
"Who do you think I am?" she asked as she walked into his apartment.
"I don't know." He kicked the door closed and slid the locking bar across. Keeping the cocked and unlocked Colt pointed at the ceiling, he slapped the pockets of her coat with his left hand, finding a change purse, a note pad and pen, several photos, a roll of Lebanese pounds. He threw the note pad and photos on the couch. Returning to the search, he jammed his hand inside her coat to check for weapons and she slapped at him as he touched her breasts.
"Stop it!"
"Then take off the coat! Move wrong and you're dead!"