Thoughts came to him of Eve Aguilar, a woman he cared for, who had fallen captive to his enemies during the Executioner's bustup of the Libya Connection when he had been John Phoenix.
He had come to rescue Eve.
And had not reached her in time.
The bastards had skinned her alive.
After a nod from a Syrian officer, Fouad Zakir stalked directly up the stairway to the second level, again with Bolan slightly behind him, toting the AK-47 over his shoulder by its strap in approved bodyguard style.
At the foot of the stairs Bolan noticed the stairwell continued down to the basement.
The corridor upstairs seemed crowded with soldiers armed with rifles that matched Bolan's, the uniforms and armbands running the full gamut of the Lebanese terrorist coalition.
They were all here: the PLO, the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, Amal... and now the Druse militia in the person of Fouad Zakir, who barely glanced at the corridor full of bodyguards.
The Arab terrorist crossed to the nearest door, grunted some guttural order at Bolan with a motion that indicated he should remain out there.
Then Zakir stepped inside and no one tried to stop him.
The meeting is already under way, Bolan deduced.
Strakhov would be in there now with the whole rotten bunch.
But first... Zoraya.
The men in the hallway barely glanced at the soldier who had accompanied Zakir as far as the door of the briefing room.
Bolan figured the various faction leaders would suggest facing each other across a table without being crowded by their bodyguards, yet the men in that room were not fools. At the first sound of trouble from within the summit meeting, that door would be burst inward under the power of these bodyguards, who would fall into place behind their leaders.
Some of the men in the corridor stood in small clusters, smoking cigarettes conversing in subdued Arabic while more soldiers leaned idly against walls of the passageway. But every one of them had his assault rifle inches from fingertips and the low murmur of voices could not conceal the tension.
Bolan leaned against a vacant space of hallway wall and lit a cigarette.
By the time he flicked out the match, the others had lost interest in him, accepting the image he projected.
After a couple puffs on the butt, Bolan casually ambled a few feet to the nearest stairwell leading downstairs — the same stairs he had used at dawn when his tracking of Strakhov and General Masudi brought him here. At that moment, Bolan gave the impression of the universal soldier in need of a latrine.
He rounded the corner from the others, and no one tried to stop him as he strolled down the stairs at the opposite end of the building from the Orderly Room. He touched the bottom landing and found what he remembered from his penetration of the place that morning; a side door leading out, flanked by a stairwell that led to the basement level.
Bolan continued down the stairs until he came around a turn into the well-lighted basement corridor. His brisk authoritative step only fooled the two Syrian soldiers at a desk long enough for them to see this was no officer of any of the factions upstairs but a mere Druse peasant who had somehow gotten lost.
They watched the "militiaman" approach as if he wanted to ask a question.
Then lightning-fast chops descended toward the unsuspecting troopers' necks. Both men died without a sound before they had even risen from their chairs. They sat back down with broken necks.
The absence of any other soldiers posted there told Bolan what to expect and he found it.
Nothing.
He raced from door to door of the basement, stopping to pick two of the four locks, but each room was unoccupied.
No Zoraya.
Bolan did not know whether to be encouraged or depressed, so he just kept looking, hustling back up those same stairs before anyone from above found the two dead men. That would happen before long, he knew, but so would the Israeli air strike. All that mattered now was getting to the office annex across from HQ, then hitting that meeting upstairs.
He came up the stairs and out of the building from the wing opposite the Orderly Room.
The atmosphere on the main floor hummed with activity, orderlies moving in and out of offices, Syrian field officers elbowing their way through clerks to deliver and receive vital intel on the heavy righting that could be heard like distant thunder echoing through the valleys of the Shouf.
No one paid attention to the blue-eyed "Druse" who topped those stairs and briskly left the building, walking toward the HQ annex that had all the signs of having been cleared.
Bolan had to find out what that meant.
He burst through a side entrance of the squat annex structure and knew instantly that he had stepped into the trap he'd been striving to avoid since this mission began.
The annex had been cleared, sure, and there could have been more than one reason but the main reason had to be: Bolan.
Every exit out of the hallway Bolan found himself in had been plugged up with at least two Syrian soldiers.
There were about eleven men in all and every one of them was pointing an AK-47 right at the man in Druse militia garb.
Bolan sensed movement behind and felt himself being covered from outside, too.
The only man in civilian attire in the scene also held a gun, a pistol, pointed like all the others at the figure in the doorway.
Major Kleb, GRU, wore a satisfied cat's grin that did not make it to cannibal-hungry eyes.
"And now, Mr. Mack Bolan," Kleb purred, "I think we have you exactly where we want you."
19
Strakhov tried to keep his attention on the petty bickering between the factions, but without success.
The KGB chief sat at one end of the oblong table.
The representatives from the Palestine Liberation Organization, newly reorganized under Soviet sponsorship, and a representative of the Shiite militia sat to his right.
To the KGB man's left were the ranking Syrian general of this sector and the liaison officer from another Iranian Revolutionary Guard contingent.
Fouad Zakir sat at the opposite end of the table from Strakhov. The Druse VIP wore an oily smile that said nothing.
The squabbling continued over a minor point that had temporarily slipped Strakhov's mind, he noted with annoyance.
His stubby fingers pinched up the lemon slice from the saucer of his teacup. He found the sour taste of the citrus fruit to be exquisite — a relaxant of sorts that invariably allowed him the objectivity with which to appraise situations more accurately.
He sipped the tea but still could not get his mind back on whatever these accursed Arab desert rats thought to be so important they would die over their foolish religions.. and of course to bid for power over others, such as Strakhov possessed.
He could not follow the conversation even though they had been ordered to speak in English, that damnable all-purpose language even Strakhov had to employ on occasion, a common tongue they all understood.
He could not stop thinking about Mack Bolan.
The thought of killing Bolan always brought a peculiar druglike warmth over the usually coolheaded Strakhov. He had wanted Bolan dead for a long time now and had utilized all the resources of his KGB unit and others, all without success.
The desire for Bolan's head had consumed Strakhov since the American had gone on that mission to steal a new Russian helicopter from Afghanistan and had killed the test pilot of the prototype helicopter.
The pilot's name: Kyril Strakhov.
Beloved son of Greb.
Kyril's mother had died giving birth to the boy, and Kyril's death severed something inside Strakhov that he felt might have been his last tenuous fink to anything loving or kind or caring in this hostile world.
After Kyril was taken from him, all Greb Strakhov could think of, all he ever thought of, was Bolan and revenge.
Killing Bolan, yes... and of course holding tight the reins of control over this wretched, barren corner
of the world while these camel-dung eaters fought among themselves.
The security of Strakhov's whole organization was at stake and he knew it, all because Bolan had in his possession a masteries like of all KGB agents, operations and activities throughout the world.
The Executioner had to be stopped but until now, until this pit called Lebanon, the war of wits between Strakhov and Bolan had been cat-and-mouse ploys of strategic brilliance.
Now, Strakhov knew he would be confronting his enemy.
Thirty minutes ago, just prior to calling to order this disparate collection of cretins, Strakhov had received word of intercepted CIA transmissions, not yet fully decoded but indicating that Bolan was operating in a wholly vigilante capacity with no affiliation to other factions in this area. With this news several things suddenly became clear to Strakhov. The notion of one lone commando penetrating this base before dawn today, of visiting such death and carnage, had to be considered anew in light of Bolan's presence.
The American could accomplish such a strike, Strakhov knew from experience. And so he had ordered that GRU moron, Kleb, to plant a trap in the annex building of the Syrian headquarters.
Strakhov had versed himself well in the Executioner's methods dating to before, during and after Bolan's Phoenix period.
The KGB boss half suspected Bolan would use camouflage to get himself onto this base. A man like Bolan could not ignore the obviously deserted annex. And when the Executioner stepped into that building the trap would spring tight and Strakhov would have Bolan. Greb Strakhov would avenge Kyril... very, very slowly. Strakhov expected revenge to taste most sweet.
He blinked such thoughts away and forced his attention to what had become a shouting match across the table between four of the five representatives concerning the division of Beirut once the fighting had stopped and the city was secured under Muslim control.
Strakhov stood abruptly and smashed down on the table a powerful fist that cut through all their camel dung and focused attention right where Strakhov demanded it: on himself.
"Enough! This meeting has been called to do away with bickering such as this."
The Iranian cleared his throat, the only one daring to speak back to the real power here.
"It is only that my people have fought and died for what is about to come to pass," the Iranian purred hollowly. "Is it not reasonable to expect some recompensation in the form of "Brigand" snapped the Syrian.
"You were never asked to help, you fanatic. We..."
"Gentlemen, gentlemen," soothed Fouad Zakir silkily, without taking his eyes from Strakhov. "The Major General is quite correct. To bicker among ourselves...."
The slimiest snake of them all, thought Strakhov.
"I would not think it necessary," Strakhov told them curtly, "to remind everyone here that I speak not as an individual but as a representative of the Soviet Union, and as such I do not offer you suggestions or options but orders."
That got their attention and Strakhov started to continue when an orderly knocked discreetly, stuck his head inside, then walked over to Strakhov's side. The man whispered the words Strakhov had been so eagerly waiting to hear. Now they fanned the warmth in him to a fire hot enough to burn a man to death.
"Major Kleb asks that you come immediately to the annex building," the orderly whispered in Strakhov's ear. "They have captured the man Bolan. Alive."
* * *
Bolan noticed how cocky Kleb had become in the hours since Bolan had seen him last, since this morning when Kleb had not known he was being spied upon. Bolan attributed it to the guy's abrasive mentality generally and the success of having shot Masudi to death despite the chewing out it got him from Strakhov.
Bolan still gripped the AK-47 by its strap over his shoulder.
With twelve weapons trained on him, he would have to wait for a break.
To move now would be suicide. If they had wanted him dead, he'd have been fired on already by these anxious soldiers who hung on the GRU man's every suggestion.
Kleb kept his pistol steady on the man who had stepped into the trap.
Kleb's moist smile said he savored this moment.
"Major General Strakhov will be with us directly."
Kleb had dispatched an orderly to interrupt Strakhov in his meeting.
"And now, Mr. Bolan, you will kindly drop your weapons and if you try anything untoward, I shall be forced to shoot off your kneecaps."
Kleb started to say something else.
An ear-piercing sound signaled the approach of jet fighter planes.
The first in a line of explosions started eating up the perimeter with bellowing chomps.
Bolan seized the instant. He crouched, reversing the AK-47 in the flash that every eye in that room, including those of Major Kleb, were wrenched fearfully from the American. Bolan opened fire on the nearest four men, pulping them to sprawled carcasses before the line of explosions quit.
It ended only a few hundred yards from the annex building, the echoes swallowed up by shouts, then another high-keening fighter plane hurtled in low to blast two of the barracks to hell.
Some of the survivors in the annex turned and fled, preferring Israeli jets to the hell-bringer with the AK-47.
Two of the soldiers who stayed tried to bring up rifles, but the AK yammered some more on automatic and the pair were hurled back into a wall as if punched by an invisible fist. When their bodies finally came to rest, parts of them stuck to the wall, glistening red.
Some of the same heavy-caliber projectiles blasted Major Kleb's kneecaps in bloody splats of gore.
Kleb cried out and fell to the floor, his pistol flying from fingers numb with the pain ripping through his every nerve end. He cried out again when Bolan knelt beside this terror merchant and pressed Kleb's throat to the floor with the AK.
As more jets flew low overhead and more shouts and antiaircraft gunfire and explosions rumbled from outside, Bolan spoke very calmly.
"The woman. Zoraya. Where is she?"
"Z-Zoraya?" the GRU man gasped. "Please... I cannot stand the pain!" Kleb screamed hysterically.
"The woman," Bolan repeated. "Where is she, Kleb?"
"This... there is no woman!" Kleb shrieked. "The pain! Please... kill me!" Kleb lapsed into a quick word or two of Russian.
The Executioner twisted the rifle with a harsh yank across Kleb's throat.
The Russian died instantly with a broken neck and no more pain.
Well, he did ask for it, Bolan thought as he moved on.
The soldiers had scattered from the buildings that they all rightfully considered the main targets of the air strike.
Bolan exited the annex building in a dash toward the nearest entrance to the Syrian headquarters.
His instinct told him to believe Kleb's dying statement.
No woman, Kleb had said.
Zoraya was not on the base.
And that left the Executioner's main objectives: a summit meeting of terrorist cannibals on the top floor of the Syrian headquarters. And Major General Greb Strakhov.
Antiterrorist guns pounded vainly at the expertly piloted attack jets that swooped in from unexpected angles. Their strafing runs turned the Syrian base into a shrieking feast of burning death.
Bolan knew the chance he took by entering this building. But the stakes were too high for the Executioner to turn back when he could accomplish what he would when he hit this bunch upstairs.
Bolan had committed himself totally to establishing a crack in the wall of violence that had kept this country destabilized for so long.
This hit would accomplish a lot and no way could a man like Bolan walk away from such a responsibility.
He gained entrance to the headquarters building easily enough in all the excitement. Those staring and crouching every time a jet whistled by or an explosion burst saw a Druse militiaman hurrying back to his post to protect Mr. Zakir.
No one tried to stop "Druse militiaman" Bolan. He took the steps upstairs at a run. Halfway up th
e stairs he passed a window that overlooked the area separating the building Bolan was in and the annex where he had slain Kleb.
Strakhov, a Russian officer and two Syrian soldiers were hurrying into the annex.
Bolan kept moving up the stairs, gripping the AK-47. He could not run back and forth.
First the warlords of terror.
Then Strakhov.
If Bolan survived.
The confusion he expected in the meeting area from the air strike would work greatly to Bolan's benefit, as would the element of surprise.
He hit the top landing of the stairs on the run.
The banshee shriek of a jet fighter screeching by overhead as Bolan hit that top step suddenly gave way to a thunderclap that made him deaf for a moment.
All he could feel were the shock waves of an explosion that catapulted him into the air. Amid flying mortar, sound and blinding fury, he knew he was airborne, a direct hit on the building pitching him into what seemed like a yawning pit.
He did not know if he was dead or alive as the maelstrom swallowed him whole.
20
Bolan kept himself stuntman-loose. The force of the blast deposited him roughly onto his back, the momentum propelling him along the ground. The explosion had rattled him, but as far as he could tell there were no bones broken.
He rolled over onto his stomach, his fists still clenched around the AK-47. He brought up the assault rifle instinctively to firing position while he shook his head to clear the sense-tumbling reaction of having been pitched through space.
The Executioner sized up the scene in the hallway at a glance, choosing his targets, squeezing off tight bursts from the AKBLEDG at anyone with a weapon.
Sunlight flooded through a ragged gaping hole in the wall and roof behind him at the top of what had been the stairs, onto the grisly remains of soldiers caught by flying brick or shrapnel.
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