Agent of Peril

by Don Pendleton

  Geren looked up and down the wall they were against. “I like your style.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You don’t waste any time,” Geren said.

  “Quick and quiet,” Bolan cautioned, looking into the cave. He shouldered the M-4, clicking on the infrared illuminator atop the barrel of the compact assault rifle. His rifle’s scope showed the inside of the cave in an eerie green as the invisible waves reflected off the targets they hit. Since the scope was not light amplification, he wasn’t blinded by the small utility lights scattered throughout the interior of the mine entrance.

  Soldiers moved with a purpose, spreading out, their rifles at the ready.

  They were expecting trouble, either having detected the helicopter flight as it passed over the blasted lunar landscape of the sands leading up to the plateau, or they knew from Bolan’s raids in Cairo that trouble was coming. From their reaction, the whole base had been put on full alert. He examined their weapons through the scopes, but the forces of General Idel weren’t equipped with night vision. He wasn’t splaying a suicidal beacon across them, pinpointing his position behind the infrared spotlight on his rifle.

  “They know we’re here,” he whispered to Geren. “Or that we’re on our way.”

  The Israeli woman nodded and slung her rifle tight across her shoulders. “Tofo just showed up. He’s moving under their cover toward one of the sheds at the far end of this level.”

  Bolan nodded. “I’ll say hello to them. You intercept Tofo.”

  Geren smirked. “I was just going to ask. Be careful.”

  “If I were careful, I wouldn’t be taking on a mountain full of madmen by myself,” Bolan replied.

  He opened up, sweeping the cavern with the silenced M-4, soldiers screaming as swift, quiet bolts of death burst through them.

  17

  “What the hell is that?” Nateg asked as he gripped the controls of the idling AH-64 Apache. The sight of nearly thirty soaring darts tearing from the side of the Jebel El Tih took him totally by surprise. The big, dark-skinned Egyptian pilot looked at his co-pilot and gunner, a light-eyed wolf of a man he’d known for years. “Cruise missiles?”

  “No,” Ekan answered gruffly. “Unmanned drones. Can’t tell what kind for sure, but we’ve got to do something.”

  Nateg shook his head. “What about the unit?”

  Ekan could see Nateg’s eyes following the departing drones. There was a slim chance that the pair could do anything at all.

  “This is Deathbird to Nova, Deathbird to Nova. Major, we have to do something to intercept those things,” Ekan radioed.

  “That’s a positive,” Major Fesjad answered. Nateg heard him clearly. “We’re here to stop a war with Israel, and those things could be the spark.”

  “Do it,” Ekan said to the pilot.

  Nateg pulled up on the cyclic, throttling the gas turbine engines to their utmost. The Apache shot into the air like a rocket, at well over 2000 feet per minute. Not the fastest of helicopters, it had an amazingly agile climb rate, and the Egyptian pilot thrust the gunship along.

  “Ekan, do you have anything on those things?” Nateg asked.

  “They’re Predators,” he answered as he swept them with the Forward Looking Infrared cameras of the skyship. “And they’re in dash mode. They’re doing at least 220 kilometers per hour.”

  “They have the jump on us, but we can catch up,” Nateg told Ekan.

  The wolfish gunner looked at his old friend, then gave him a small salute. “Do it. We’ve got a war to prevent!”

  TERA GEREN RACED ALONG, keeping one step ahead of a cloud of gunfire that was divided between taking her down and catching the tall man in black who was raining devastation on the improvised aircraft hangar. If she hadn’t been running for her life, she would have admitted that using the mouth of the mine as a launch point for unmanned drones was a brilliant maneuver.

  Since the craft were being used on a fire-and-forget basis, there would be no need to land them safely. The drone controllers wouldn’t need to thread the needle, just finish their job then send the unmanned vehicles crashing into the sand like lawn darts.

  Geren launched herself and hit the ground like a lawn dart herself. She landed behind a heavy crate that absorbed a sudden hailstorm of autofire. Coming up with her M-4, she returned fire, focusing on Kalashnikov muzzle-flashes, taking out two gunners before diving behind cover again.

  More gunfire ripped and tore the air over her head, hungrily seeking flesh and only impacting on stone. A round bounced and nicked her calf. She winced as her black BDU pants swiftly began soaking with her blood. She ignored it and crawled along. Tofo was crouched in front of a shed, onefisting an Uzi like something out of an action movie, sweeping the mouth of the cavern.

  Geren brought up her M-4 and ripped out a short burst, but was too slow. Tofo moved to cover instants before her bullets struck.

  An arm reached up and over a stack of tires piled outside the shed, Uzi in fist, and began sweeping the ground with 9 mm slugs. Geren retreated, curling up as bullets tore after her. Dust flew all over her, but the only injuries she got were stings on her cheeks from where chips of flying stone struck her. Tofo withdrew his Uzi and ran to the door of the shed. Geren tried to catch him with a hail of M-4 fire before he escaped to harm Alex Kalid.

  MAJOR TOFO DIVED THROUGH the door, bullets seeking his flesh but finding only unfeeling wood. His Uzi was empty, and he realized how close to death he’d just come.

  That’s when he heard the singing of steel in the air and ducked under a ribbon of crimson-tinted silver that would have taken his head off. Instead, the chain whip smashed hard into the doorjamb, cracking wood in a sickening crunch. Knowing his head could have been burst like an overripe melon spurred Tofo into action, swinging the Uzi toward his attacker. It was pure instinct, and he pulled the trigger without any effect.

  A savage, naked figure grabbed the Uzi with both hands, driving it skyward. A long, lean leg hit Tofo in the groin, but the Egyptian renegade twisted his hip, catching the knee on his thigh. Tofo pulled down with both hands on the automatic weapon, yanking the taller man off balance and sending him skidding across the floor.

  Alex Kalid landed on his shoulder, but rolled quickly to the balls of his feet, crouching, hands held like claws. He wished he hadn’t dropped the chain when he went for the Uzi, but since the weapon didn’t show any sign of being loaded, he felt some solace that he wouldn’t die naked, plugged with a belly full of lead.

  He’d sell his life only after he had no more enemies to kill.

  Kalid lunged, his whole body stretching like that of a great cat. His clawed fingers bypassed the swatting Uzi’s frame and clutched Tofo’s uniform. His full weight threw the Egyptian rogue back against a crate that snapped under their impact. Tofo brought the Uzi around again, but instead of hitting Kalid in the head, the metal bounced off his burned and tender shoulder. The impact hurt like hell, but the ex-black-suit hung on, leaning into the renegade. He freed up a hand and introduced the heel of his palm to Tofo’s nose in an explosion of blood.

  Tofo roared in anger and raked his fingers down Kalid’s burned and battered back. Lightning flashed through the naked man’s entire consciousness, but reduced to savagery, he was unhindered in his tactics by the pain. He screamed madly into the face of his foe.

  Tofo stopped struggling, eyes wide in horror at Kalid’s lunacy. Kalid’s teeth bared and flashed, sinking into the bridge of the Egyptian’s bloody nose, crunching through bone and cartilage before tearing free.

  Tofo struck hard, punching Kalid away from him, holding his shattered face.

  Kalid spit out a chunk of flesh.

  The pair circled each other. Tofo took his hand away from his savaged face to pick up a pipe. Kalid stooped, scooping up the empty Uzi, holding it upside down like a side-handle baton.

  Tofo swung first, and Kalid reacted with the Uzi, metal clanging on metal. The frame of the submachine gun took the impact of the pipe, sp
aring Kalid a broken arm. He lifted one foot and rammed it into Tofo’s gut, pile driving him backward across the floor.

  He was about to move in for the kill when the door slammed open, a body tumbling inward. Kalid whirled to meet the new threat but recognized the figure instantly. He glanced through the open door at a rifleman, then dived aside, barely avoiding a burst of autofire. Tera Geren came up from the floor, dodging toward cover as bullets perforated the wall.

  Finally she came to a halt and was face-to-face with Tofo, looking stunned at the gaping hole in his nose.

  Tofo took advantage of her shock by grabbing the barrel of her rifle. The two of them wrestled, Geren struggling with the weight of the rifle as the stronger, deadlier Egyptian started to pry it loose from her grasp.

  Getting both hands on the barrel, Tofo tried to pull the weapon free, but Geren let go, throwing her whole weight on top of the noseless terrorist, bringing both hands raking into his face. Her gloved fingers blunted her clawing attempt, but she still gouged the Egyptian’s eyes, making them burn.

  Tofo screamed and released the rifle, but smashed one fist against Geren’s head. She went rolling, dazed, but still ready to fight.

  Tofo blinked away the eye gouge, turning the rifle around so he could fire. Kalid leaped into the fray, bringing down the Uzi like a hammer. Tofo barely managed to block the swinging steel of the SMG with the body of his own weapon. That didn’t prevent Kalid from straddling the grounded Egyptian.

  Tofo didn’t bother righting his weapon. Instead he fired off a punch into Kalid’s much abused abdominal muscles. The naked man curled up over the fist, and the Egyptian grabbed a clump of hair. A boot flashed out of nowhere.

  Tofo screamed as his forearm broke from the force of Geren’s kick. Kalid brought the Uzi, barrel first, down into Tofo’s chest, stabbing and beating, metal holding strong as bone and gristle crunched beneath it.

  “Alex!” Geren shouted.

  Kalid sagged. The Uzi had punched through Tofo’s rib cage in a dozen places.

  “Hi, baby, was traffic bad?” Kalid asked, still straddling the dead man. Blood smeared across his face, chest and hands, only barely covering his burn marks.

  Geren looked at him, then choked back a sob. “Terrible. I ran over a sheep, and a camel shit in the road.”

  Kalid nodded. He threw his arms around her and they squeezed each other tight.

  “COLONEL STONE, CAN YOU hear me?” the voice blasted, tinny in Bolan’s earpiece. It was Major Fesjad, contacting him over the radio set that was plugged into his ear.

  He couldn’t put his full concentration on what was being said, devoting his efforts more toward laying down a hot and heavy stream of cover fire for Tera Geren. However, return fire was starting to cut too close to him. Bolan dodged sideways, avoiding a blast of bullets. He came up from the shoulder roll, M-4 tracking and blazing before he managed to get to the cover of the far wall of the cavern.

  “I can hear you, but could you hold on a moment?” Bolan requested, crouching tightly behind cover. He pulled out a grenade, flipped out the cotter pin and tossed the bomb around the corner. It bounced four times before coming to a halt, a shattering explosion rocking the mine entrance. Dust showered from the old ceiling, but it held.

  Bolan knew another earthshaker like that wouldn’t be good for anyone’s health.

  “I got a moment,” Bolan said. “The drones…”

  “We’re sending the Apache after them. I’m sorry for compromising the perimeter, but…” Fesjad spoke up.

  Bolan ran the comparative speeds of the combat helicopter and the unmanned spy drones through his mind quickly. “That might be enough, but if we can hit the command-and-control center, that’ll give your Apache even better odds.”

  “You’re pinned down,” Fesjad began. “Need help?”

  “I don’t want any indiscriminate fire,” Bolan said.

  “You won’t get any. Tell us where not to shoot,” Fesjad requested.

  “There’s a supply shack. Rear right corner of the cavern,” Bolan replied. He gave the shed a burst of illumination from his M-4.

  “Keep the illuminator on it,” Fesjad said. There was the bark of an order, then suddenly the Westland Commando popped out of the darkness. Hovering off the lip of the mine entrance, the side of the machine came alive with flickering tongues of flame, a broadside of automatic fire ripping into the gaping maw of the mountain. The thunder was deafening, but Bolan kept his illuminator aimed at the shed that Geren had disappeared into moments ago.

  The gunners aboard the Westland Commando were tracking their targets with savage precision. Bodies flopped about as M-60s and M-16s spit flaming death from their barrels.

  The firestorm ended suddenly, and an eerie silence fell over the mine entrance.

  “I’m going in, cover me,” Bolan requested.

  “We have your back. Wish we could land to give you more support,” Fesjad responded.

  “Negative…stay in place. You lose my transmitter, then you can come in, unless my partners make it out there, then nuke the damn mountainside.”

  There was silence on the other end as Bolan ate up the ground with long, loping strides. He reached the shed. “Is that clear?” he asked.

  “That’s clear, Colonel. But I’m not going to sacrifice you to appease your guilt,” Fesjad said.

  Bolan mulled it over for a moment. “This isn’t about guilt. If I’m dead, and my partners get to your helicopters, just drop whatever hell down the mine shafts and scoot. I don’t need a grave, but I’m not looking to end up in one. Out.”

  The Executioner was ready to blitz on, but he had two people to find first.

  TERA GEREN LOOKED UP AS the Executioner burst through the door of the shed. He looked at her, then at Kalid. Both of them were covered in blood.

  “Striker!” Kalid said.

  “Are you two hurt?” Bolan asked.

  Kalid shook his head. “The blood belongs to Tofo.”

  Bolan looked at the battered corpse in the corner. He chucked his parka to Kalid. “This will partially cover you.”

  Geren began ripping off her parka as well. “He can wear mine as a kilt.”

  Kalid slipped Bolan’s jacket over his shoulders and tied Geren’s around his waist, moving it so only one hip was bared. He looked down at himself, then moved over to the corpse, pulling off the combat boots. A few grunts later, he was shod. “All right, let’s finish this.”

  “No, you two get out to the helicopter and wait,” Bolan said.

  “I have two words for you, Colonel. ‘Fuck’ and ‘that,’” Kalid said.

  “I’ve heard of a commando assault, but doing it while going commando?” Bolan asked.

  “I’ll need a gun,” Kalid said.

  Bolan unsnapped his gunbelt, handing over the Desert Eagle and the spare magazine pouches attached to it. “Trade up to something bigger. And aim high. At least you can grab a pair of pants if possible.”

  The Executioner and his allies spun, heading out the door.

  18

  Nateg and Ekan kept the AH-64 hot on the tail of the swarm of drones. Ekan was busy scanning them, waiting for the powerful engines of the Apache to get them within dogfighting distance of the deadly sky darts. The powerful imaging lenses in the nose gear of the Apache were meant to enable pilots and gunners to lock on to targets miles distant and destroy them without the enemy even knowing they were there. Unfortunately, the air-to-air options of the nimble gunship were limited to the 30 mm cannon nestled under its sleek frame.

  “Closing to firing range,” Nateg said.

  “The Predators have something on their underwing hard points. I can’t tell what, yet,” Ekan replied.

  “Missiles? Those things can hold up to seven hundred pounds,” Nateg said. “That’s enough for some serious block-buster action.”

  “The image isn’t clear. I don’t think they’re Hellfire missiles, they just look like dumb bombs,” Ekan noted. The wolf-faced gunner squinted, as if to incr
ease the power of the Apache’s technology.

  Nateg checked his radar screen. “We’re in range. Let’s fire a few rounds and see what they’re packing.”

  Ekan took the stick and keyed the M-230 chain gun into helmet control. Once he got the aiming reticle floating on his helmet’s visor, he drifted it over one of the Predators. Even so, he held the stick, wanting some extra finesse. The chain gun’s “true” aim and his helmet’s aiming point were divergent for a moment, his hand and eye coordinating. Then he depressed the firing stud. It was a short press, less than half a second. Five rounds belted out of the 30 mm cannon.

  Explosive shells slammed into the Predator. The Predator was meant for reconnaissance, not for slugging it out with other aircraft. The machine flew to pieces instantly.

  As the Predator disintegrated in midair, one cylinder fell away from the side, tumbling toward the ground.

  Ekan took that moment to lock on the object, and he fired a short burst at it.

  The drum disintegrated with the explosive force of the single 30 mm round that did impact with it. Nothing happened except for a spray of mist filling the air.

  Ekan felt his bowels tighten, and he looked at Nateg.

  “Hell,” Nateg grumbled. “Those drums are full of chemical weapons. Where did they get them?”

  “Who knows? Syria? Maybe it’s just pesticide. Either way, it’s too dangerous to be let loose, come on!”

  Ekan began sweeping the sky with the Apache’s M-230, tearing another Predator in two before the flight broke up, swarming in all directions.

  The drones were suddenly aware that an even nastier predator was among them.

  BOLAN TOOK THE LEAD, M-4 tracking as they made their way along a metal catwalk. The mine entrance had a tunnel that hooked to the left and led to a shaft where the catwalk stretched out to take miners to a hydraulic lift. Getting on board would attract attention the trio didn’t need. Bolan shouldered his M-4 and swept the lift’s structure, looking for the bottom. Through the green haze of the rifle’s scope, he saw a landing with a tunnel leading off of it, gunmen lining up, ready to respond to anyone coming down by way of the elevator.