“It’s very possible,” Kurtzman said. “It’s the USS Kodiak, a fast-deployment destroyer that can do upwards of forty-six knots.”
Bolan nodded to himself: about fifty-two miles per hour. “It makes sense. Anything faster is probably out of range and couldn’t get much smaller since we’re dealing with perhaps more than ninety evacuees.”
“And that’s not counting the RBN force that may be there,” Kurtzman said.
“What else do you think you’ll need?” Price asked.
“Haglemann’s under medical care. He’s being watched by Port Adak authorities. We need to get him out of there.”
“We can send a team to pick him up,” Price said. “I know DIA agents are very interested in talking with him. By the way, your friend Shaffernik is in the clear.”
“Good. We’re chasing Moscovich, and we’re not far behind him. We lost only a few minutes, and this bird is faster than his. I think we can intercept him before he takes off.”
“What then?” Price asked.
“I want to deal with this personally, Barb. It’s important. I started this mission, and I’ll see it through. I’m going to send a message to the RBN this time. Do you know if the Kodiak has helicopter landing capabilities?”
“I’m sure it does,” Kurtzman replied. “Nearly every modern destroyer does.”
“Good. Let them know we’ll be landing with an Adak police chopper and get the captain’s clearance. I’ll also need to know their antisubmarine warfare capabilities, and if they don’t have any, we might want to send air support with torpedoes.”
“Submarines?” Price inquired. “You think the Russians might have a sub in the area?”
“I’d bet on it,” Bolan replied. “There’s no other way I can see of them getting on to and off Semisopochnoi without somebody noticing. They probably came in by submarine under cover of darkness and transported the manpower and equipment to the island via assault craft.”
“But how did they get the entire crew to that island, then?”
“That’s the part I don’t know. Maybe Moscovich will be able to tell me. If he allows us to take him alive.”
“I wouldn’t count on that,” Price said.
“I wouldn’t, either.”
Cape Chunu, Kanaga Island
BOLAN AND GRIMALDI agreed that landing the chopper on the island posed a significant risk. They didn’t know how well armed Moscovich was, and they couldn’t risk losing their one potential way off the island. Bolan intended to eliminate Vladimir Moscovich, but he was worried about the pilot. He couldn’t just assume the man had willingly brought Moscovich here. The guy could have been just a pawn in all of this, and Bolan wished for a moment that he’d asked Haglemann.
The Executioner got into position and clipped his harness to the rescue winch. It would have been easier to do this with a full crew to assist, but that wasn’t to be this time around. He just couldn’t risk injury to bystanders, no matter how willing Chakowa and his two deputies might have been. This was up to Bolan. He wouldn’t endanger the lives of anyone else to do a job that only he could do.
The soldier double-checked that the harness was secure, then swung into the air. He dangled precariously from the winch as Grimaldi fought to bring the chopper close to the rocky terrain. They had performed a single flyby of the cape and eventually spotted the metal Quonset-style building they surmised sheltered Haglemann’s jet. It sat on the cape with a long, concrete pad that probably served as the runway. Oddly, they hadn’t seen a chopper on the ground, and that puzzled Bolan. Had Moscovich known they would follow him? It was possible but unlikely—not unless they had advanced tracking equipment aboard Haglemann’s chopper. The other possibility was it had been a complete diversionary tactic. Maybe Haglemann’s pilot had been given different orders in the event something like this happened. Again, that would have depended on a whole lot of preplanning, and Bolan didn’t think it feasible.
No, somehow Moscovich was playing a dangerous game of cat and mouse.
Bolan had ordered Grimaldi to drop him more than a hundred yards from the location of the makeshift hangar on the far side of an outcropping that would obscure his approach. When they came into a hovering position thirty some feet above the ground, Bolan dropped the belay line and released the carabiner brake. He made a smooth, perfectly timed descent to the ground that would prevent minimal exposure for the helicopter but not so fast that it would break both legs on touchdown. With a quick slap of the disconnects and a salute from Grimaldi, the chopper arced up and away from the scene.
Bolan drew his Beretta 93-R and began to cross the unsteady ground at an easy trot, diligent to watch the terrain ahead for any hazards. It wouldn’t do to twist an ankle on approach. As he traveled, keeping a wary eye open for threats, Bolan considered alternatives that would explain a lack of activity at the hangar site. One might be Moscovich had ordered the pilot to ditch the chopper somewhere else and make their approach to the hangar on foot. That would make sense, since anyone performing a flyby would look for the chopper on or near the hangar. Again, though, it would have meant Moscovich thought someone might pursue them. That didn’t make much sense under the circumstances. Yeah, he’d seen Bolan, but the soldier firmly believed Moscovich thought he’d killed Haglemann with that head shot. He hadn’t bothered to put an extra bullet or two into him; he wouldn’t have left the guy alive for fear the man would talk, which meant Moscovich believed Haglemann was dead.
The only thing that made sense was that the chopper had either gone down somewhere else, and they were approaching the hangar on foot, or they had landed and used a wheeled maintenance lift to get the bird inside the hangar. In either case, it was unlikely they’d had the time to take off. Bolan intended to see to it they didn’t get that chance.
As he drew nearer, the soldier stopped to observe for any movement or activity. The place was eerily quiet, and his combat senses were alerting him to danger. Something just didn’t feel right to him as he looked toward the area below. There hadn’t been time to grab his equipment, so he was going into this with only his remaining grenades, the Beretta 93-R and the Desert Eagle as his battle weapons.
Bolan’s eyes scanned across the windswept tarmac. He had to admit the place had been kept in good repair. The Quonset hut looked equally well maintained with all the windows intact. He finally reached for the field glasses tucked in his belt and put them to his eyes. He checked each of the four windows that lined the hangar building on this side of the small ridge, but he didn’t see anything moving inside. He wondered for a minute if the place was deserted, but then he noticed the odd way the windows cast a black sheen in the prismatic hue effect of field glasses when he looked through them at a certain angle. They were tinted! It explained a lot, and Bolan cursed his bad luck as he stored the binoculars.
He left his cover and started down the rocky decline, careful to test his footing first so he didn’t dislodge any rocks. He was midway down the slope when the crack of a gunshot rolled past about a moment after a bullet struck a boulder nearby. That had not been an ordinary shot. It had come from a rifle and at a pretty good distance, no less. Bolan scrambled to get cover even as another bullet burned the air just past his head, and another report rumbled through the air. He risked a glance from behind the large rock where he took shelter. He couldn’t tell from where it originated but felt pretty certain he was dealing with an amateur. The sniper had not waited until Bolan was in the open. Not that it would matter. If he couldn’t get to the hangar, he wouldn’t be able to stop Moscovich from escaping. And he wondered if he had fallen into a trap.
* * *
VLADIMIR MOSCOVICH EJECTED the second round from the rifle, then drove the handle home to load a third cartridge. It had been nothing short of good fortune that Haglemann had a number of hunting rifles and shotguns aboard his jet. The pilot had pointed them out, advising that Haglemann
often was invited to go hunting during his business trips. And while apparently the guy hadn’t exactly risen to the level of being a consummate sportsman, he had been more than willing to participate if it secured his business interests and helped him forge new partners who could enrich him in some way.
What a slob. The poor bastard had been nothing but a user of everything and everyone around him. Well, he had paid with his life for that, and Moscovich had been the one whose pleasure it had been to end Haglemann’s existence. Now, he had an opportunity to end the existence of the man who had destroyed everything the Nasenkos and Godunovs, along with many others inside the organization, had worked toward.
Moscovich fixed his eye to the scope and watched for movement. In his haste, he had unthinkingly fired at the American when he still had somewhere to take cover. Stupid. He couldn’t believe he’d done something as amateur as that, and yet he also knew it wouldn’t matter much. There was no way a lone man could survive out here for long. Moscovich wanted to kill him, certainly, but if that wasn’t in the cards now, then at least he could stall long enough for them to escape.
The American poked his head out from behind the shelter of a large boulder, and Moscovich got his first close look at the American through the scope. Chiseled jaw, dark hair, a strong chin and nose and a look of intense determination. A formidable opponent, to be sure.
But a dead one, Moscovich thought as he eased back on the trigger.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Bolan risked another glance, looking for any sort of clue as to the sniper’s location. The shooter had to be relatively close, probably nestled in the opposing rock face that ran off the back corner of the hangar. Based on the direction from which the first two bullets had come, Bolan was betting on the several summer pines standing close together. Their full, green branches would make for perfect concealment from the naked eye.
As Bolan ducked behind the boulder once more, another shot rang out. He heard the round zing past him just overhead and tried to ignore the fact that had he waited another millisecond it probably would have gone right through his skull. So the sniper now had his location—there would be no second chances. The smoky visualization of a plan came to his mind, and Bolan keyed up the transmitter.
“Striker to Eagle One.”
“Go.”
“I’m east of the hangar on the rock face leading to the tarmac. I’m pinned down by a sniper in a stand of trees to the northwest of my position. I need you to buzz him, see if you can flush him out.”
“Roger that, I’m inbound.”
Bolan yanked one of the two smokers from his belt; it was white. Unlike traditional M308-1 White Smoke grenades in use by special warfare units of the US Navy, these variants were the brainchild of John Kissinger. They not only produced more smoke but featured a round tube on the bottom that extended the burn rate.
Bolan waited until the last possible moment to yank the pin from the grenade and toss the bomb very gently to his left so the upwind draft would bring it toward his area of operation. As soon as the grenade popped off and the smoke thickened enough to obscure his movements, he could just make out Grimaldi buzzing the area above the trees. The Executioner left the shelter of the boulder and charged down the uneven ground as fast as he could. At one point, a rock shifted out from under him at a soft spot, and he tumbled, banging his knee on the sharp rock and tearing his black suit. Bolan leaped to his feet, biting past the pain and continuing down the slope.
The Executioner reached the bottom and charged across the open ground until he reached the exterior border of the Quonset hut. He knew from that position the sniper wouldn’t be able to see him. Grimaldi radioed him a moment later to advise he’d flushed out the sniper, just as Bolan had hoped.
“He took a few shots at me with the rifle, but I don’t think he hit me.”
“Roger that,” Bolan replied. “Get out of there and stand by for my signal.”
“Copy and out,” Grimaldi replied.
Bolan checked the action of his .44 Magnum Desert Eagle, then tried the door at the side. It was locked. He considered trying another approach through the main doors but dismissed the idea in the next instant. With the door locked and the sniper, who most certainly was Moscovich, otherwise occupied, Bolan knew this entry point would be the last one the enemy expected. In fact, he was betting the pilot was alone inside the building. He leveled the pistol at the door lock, turned his eyes and squeezed the trigger. The big gun boomed in his fist and the 300-grain boat-tail slug punched through the lock like a sledgehammer through a block of ice, destroying the mechanism entirely and leaving a gaping hole in its passing.
The Executioner eased the door open and slipped inside.
He crouched and let his eyes become accustomed to the gloom. The sun had penetrated the horizon quickly, lighting the dawn with furious colors as it normally did this far in the northern hemisphere. A cold shaft of sunlight from the front hangar doors, which were cracked just a bit, streamed through the narrow opening. The hangar had no smell but that of chilled air and chemicals, mostly lubricants and solvents, and the metallic twinge of aircraft aluminum. To one corner Bolan spotted Haglemann’s chopper.
At the center of the massive Quonset hut was a sleek plane, a Learjet make that Bolan bet cost Haglemann a pretty penny. Probably a fifteen to twenty million dollar aircraft sat there in the gloom, and Bolan couldn’t help but wonder how much of the money that had bought it was blood money. What did it take for a man to betray his morals and his country in the name of a fast buck? The Executioner had never been able to understand greed as a guiding principle. And yet it never failed that some people in the world eventually allowed the spell of wealth to overcome them, and ultimately it was the love of money that also proved to be their downfall. From the lowliest, two-bit gangster to some of the most powerful empires, greed had acted as a cancer that consumed the souls of those men as much as they had consumed the souls of their fellow man.
Bolan eventually spotted movement in the cockpit of the plane, shadowy reflections of the pilot. The guy was probably doing his preflight check, unaware of any trouble sneaking up on him. That was fine with Bolan. He wanted to verify the pilot’s level of involvement, anyway, and this was his chance. The Executioner approached from the tail section and ducked under the rear fuselage to find that the steps were down. He drew close and crouched. If he attempted to climb the steps with stealth, the pilot might detect the vibrations in the plane as he ascended. He would have to make fast entry and get the man covered.
Bolan took a deep breath and charged up the steps, swung to his right and sprinted up the aisle. He reached the cockpit in under three seconds. The pilot turned, and his eyes went wide as he looked down the gaping muzzle of the Desert Eagle.
“Wh-what the f—?”
“I’ll ask the questions,” Bolan cut in. “You’ll give answers. Where’s Moscovich?”
“Who?”
Bolan had his first answer, even if the pilot was unaware of it. “The guy with the Russian accent. The one who shot your boss and hijacked your plane. His name is Vladimir Moscovich. He’s a cold, calculating terrorist who has killed American service personnel and destroyed military equipment with wanton disregard for human life. And I’m here to stop him. Understood?”
“Yeah,” the man replied. “I get you.”
“The only question that remains, then,” Bolan continued coolly, “is whose side you’re on.”
“He forced me to fly him here,” the pilot replied. “I mean, he had the gun on me. He offered me money, but he said he wouldn’t kill me.”
“What did he offer you money to do?”
“Just fly Mr. Haglemann’s plane to the continental US. He didn’t even tell me where he wanted to go. He just said that if I took him there he wouldn’t kill me. That he’d let me go.”
“And you believed him?”
/>
“Yeah.”
“Well, the last man who trusted him was your boss, Haglemann. He’s now lying in a hospital with the better part of his face hanging in shreds from his head. I don’t suppose you’d want to emulate him.”
“No.”
“I thought as much. Then you won’t mind if I secure you in the back until this is over. Right?” Bolan waved the muzzle of the big pistol. “Get up.”
The pilot obeyed, and Bolan backed out of the cramped space to give him room. As soon as the man had cleared the cockpit, the soldier grabbed him by his shirt collar and steered him into the rear cabin. He sat him in a rotating seat, ordered him to face the wall and secured his hands to the seat with thick plastic riot cuffs he had on hand.
The soldier turned and descended the steps just in time to see Moscovich enter the hangar through the small opening and lean his body weight into one of the doors to shove it back. He was tall but not muscular, really. He had almost a lanky build with wavy, dark hair that hung down to his nape. His nose and lips were thin, and his cheekbones were high enough he nearly looked part Asian. The Russian crime lord apparently hadn’t seen Bolan yet, his eyes having failed to adjust immediately to the gloomy interior, but as he finished moving the door open and turned, he noticed the soldier standing there with the Desert Eagle pointed in his direction.
“Vladimir Moscovich, I assume?”
The Russian froze and looked directly at Bolan for a moment before glancing at the hunting rifle he’d brought back to the hangar.
“Don’t even try it,” Bolan said. “You’re not that fast.”
“I must commend you, American,” Moscovich replied in heavily accented English. “I made a very bad mistake. I underestimated you, and that should never have happened.”
“No, it shouldn’t have,” Bolan said.
“I must know one thing.”
“Ask.”
“Are you the one who killed Yuri Godunov and crushed our plans to dominate the West once and for all?”
War Everlasting (Superbolan) Page 24