“It is my hope that we as a nation can work through this.”

Trofimov was somber. “But I will not lie to you. It will be difficult. We will have to make some hard decisions about our standing in the world. We will have to come to terms with the barbarism that lurks, even now, within our armed forces. This will not sit well with many of us, but I know we are up to the challenge. For TBT News, this is Yuri Trofimov.”

Schrader switched off the miniset in disgust. “Can you believe that?”

“What happened?” Bolan asked.

“They’re reporting that a bunch of our guys attacked a village in Afghanistan,” Schrader said, “totally unprovoked. Burned the place to the ground. Shot women and children, and the news report says TBT has a videotape with our guys doing it and laughing about it.”

Bolan’s jaw clenched. Things were getting ugly. And they were about to get uglier.

Sabotage

Mack Bolan®

Don Pendleton

www.mirabooks.co.uk

If you know the enemy and know yourself you need not fear the results of a hundred battles.

—Sun Tzu

The enemy doesn’t play by the rules. He will ruthlessly commit murder and a hundred other crimes. The enemy won’t stop, doesn’t feel pity and never feels shame. The enemy has to be engaged, and overwhelmed with superior force. That’s where I come in. That’s what I do.

—Mack Bolan

CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

CHAPTER TWENTY

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

EPILOGUE

CHAPTER ONE

The graveside service was drawing to a close. Family members paid their respects in turns, filing past the casket as it sat poised on its winch straps. Even for a funeral, the mood was grim; the body language of the mourners was tense, brittle with anticipation. That much was obvious as Mack Bolan, the man known to some as the Executioner, watched through a pair of compact Zeiss binoculars. He knelt on a hill in an older part of the cemetery, surrounded by grave markers that were, in some cases, almost a century old. Partially hidden behind a gnarled weeping willow that stood, incongruously, among the oldest of the tombstones, Bolan monitored the narrow, paved access road leading through the cemetery and past the temporary awning sheltering the mourners below.

The soldier checked his watch. If intel from Brognola and Stony Man Farm panned out, it could happen any minute now.

He didn’t need to check the weapons he carried; they were as much part of him as his hands, after so many missions. The custom-tuned and suppressed Beretta 93-R pistol was holstered in its customary place under his left arm. The massive .44 Magnum Desert Eagle rode in a holster on his right hip. Across his chest, he wore an olive-drab canvas war bag on its shoulder strap, over the close-fitting combat blacksuit. His pants were tucked into well-worn combat boots. His battle gear, including a Boker Applegate combat dagger clipped in a Kydex sheath in the appendix position, was concealed under his black M-65 field jacket. On the ground near his right knee, a Pelican case waited, the customized Remington 700 rifle inside another work of art by Stony Man Farm’s armorer.

Mack Bolan knelt, watched and waited, a black-clad and silent wraith watching over the final resting place of so many Americans.

The Executioner reflected upon what had brought him to this place. The scrambled phone call from Brognola had left a taste like ashes in his mouth.

“Someone,” the man from Justice had said, calling from his office in Washington, “is killing our soldiers.”

“I’m listening.”

“We thought, at first, that it was random,” Brognola went on. “Murders occur, of course. It stands to reason that some of them would affect returning servicemen and-women. But Aaron takes a special interest in veterans, especially wounded vets, and he started flagging the news reports in a database in the Farm’s computers.”

“Understood.” Bolan nodded, unseen by the big Fed on the other end. “Aaron” was Aaron “the Bear” Kurtzman, head of the Farm’s cybernetics team and a wizard with computers of all types. If it existed in the ether, if it could be located within a network somewhere on the planet, Kurtzman could find it. The computer expert was confined to a wheelchair, the result of an ill-fated attack on the Farm some years before.

“What began to emerge,” Brognola said, “was a disturbing pattern. Aaron’s computers pulled up report after report of murders across the country—involving a returning veteran of combat in Iraq or Afghanistan. Six men, three women. In two of these cases, the reports included similar crime-scene evidence, including cryptic notes about ‘peace’ and ‘love’ and ‘ending barbarous imperialism.’ When we dug further, we found that it wasn’t just those two. These notes were found at all nine crime scenes.”

“So you’ve found a serial killer, or killers, who target war vets.”

“No,” Brognola said. “That’s just it. It’s meant to look like that, but Aaron delved deeper.” He paused. When he continued, his voice was tight with anger. “Each of the funerals for the murdered men and women were…protested.”

“Protested?” Bolan asked. “What the hell for?”

“It’s becoming increasingly common,” Brognola said. “There have been a few different groups, mostly crackpots and malcontents, trying to turn funerals for our service people into media circuses. The reasoning behind it never makes much sense. And of course these bastards don’t care how much pain they cause the families, who are already suffering. But this is different.”

“Different how?” Bolan asked.

“Each of the funerals connected to this ‘serial killer’ was protested by the same group, an outfit called Peace At Any Cost. The PAAC organization appeared out of nowhere last year and started staging major publicity stunts during high-profile political events, public appearances by celebrities, even other news reports. Six months ago there was a big media feeding frenzy at the home of a mother in Florida believed to have killed her toddler. When the body was found buried behind the mother’s apartment building, the reporters were ten feet thick. Sign-wavers from PAAC showed up and turned it into a referendum on the war in Iraq, or tried to. It was a mess.”

“So PAAC specializes in veterans’ funerals for the publicity.”

“So it would seem,” Brognola said, “but peel away that layer and there’s more rot underneath. Aaron went after PAAC in a big way, once he made the connection. He found a ‘secure’ bulletin board where PAAC members keep in touch with one another and coordinate their protests. I’m sure they believe it’s secret, but nothing stays hidden on the Net for long once Aaron starts digging. He’s been keeping them under observation ever since, and cross-referencing posts to their board with what we know of the murders and protests so far.”

“And?”

“In most cases,” Brognola explained, “there’s at least a slight delay between when the murders hit the media and when PAAC found out about them and made plans to protest the funerals. But twice, they screwed up. In two of those cases, PAAC referenced the murders before they hit the news.”

“But that could be as simple as a source within the police. Or the media. Or even the coroner’s office.”

“True,” Brognola said. “Any of that is possible. Except in the case of a single post about the murder of Hospital Corpsman Third Class Charles Stevens, recently returned from Afghanistan. The post was made almost an hour before the coroner’s office estimates Stevens was shot in the driveway of his home.”

Bolan frowned. “So PAAC is involved in the murders themselves.”

“Them, and whomever’s behind them,” Brognola said. “It’s expensive to be as high profile as PAAC has become. Yes, controversy plays a role in that, but they also do a lot of advertising. Full-page ads in national papers, billboard campaigns, that kind of thing. The money has to come from somewhere, and a group this young couldn’t have pockets that deep. Aaron kept at it and followed the cybermoney trails back to the well. It’s a shell game of holding companies, fictional identities and supposedly anonymous donors acting in concert, but the money all tracks back to the same place.”

“Who?”

“His name is Yuri Trofimov,” Brognola said. “Naturalized citizen of the United States, as of almost ten years back. He was born in Russia and is now a considerably rich man.”

“I’ve heard that name before,” Bolan said.

“Yes, you have,” Brognola said. “That’s because Trofimov owns the Trofimov Business Trust. It’s a major conglomerate that first got big manufacturing and importing cheap goods from its factories in China and Russia for consumption here in the United States. Consumer electronics, for the most part—you can’t walk into a big-box store in the U.S. without seeing TBT’s imports on the shelves—but also automotive parts. Trofimov owns a considerable share of Kirillov Motors, which as of last year’s sales figures is the latest thing in low-priced, high-volume compact cars. Kirillov also manufactures, busily and discreetly, subcontracted parts for the aerospace industry, including some contracts for the DOD. Before it started making cars, Kirillov built parts for Russian MiGs, among other things.”

“That’s not where I’ve heard of him.”

“No,” Brognola said. “Trofimov is also the public face of TBT News, the twenty-four-hour cable news channel he started three years ago. In that time, it has become one of the most watched of the networks in a very competitive, cutthroat industry.”

“Let me guess,” Bolan said. “Their success is due at least partly to their sensationalist reporting philosophy.”

“Exactly right,” Brognola said. “Trofimov’s network was nicknamed the ‘Terrorist Broadcast Team’ by a popular radio talk-show hawk. That’s because TBT’s stock in trade is negative stories about the United States military and United States military personnel. Every alleged atrocity, no matter how speculative, leads their newscasts. Every negative spin they can put on military expenditures, supposedly botched military operations, and everything else to do with American war and anti-terror efforts abroad, they use. There have been low rumblings of congressional inquiry and even a few murmurs in the halls of power that use the word ‘sedition,’ but the fact is, there’s nothing that can be pinned on TBT News. Once or twice their sources have been called into question, and at least once an Iraqi war veteran has filed a civil lawsuit alleging defamation and outright fabrication of the atrocities described, but nobody’s been able to prove anything. The simple fact is that TBT News is the worst thing to happen to military public relations since the controversy over Vietnam.”

“All right,” Bolan had said, his jaw clenching. “I’m in.”

“I thought you would be,” Brognola said. “Aaron’s team gave Trofimov’s computers a cavity search. There was a lot of security, as you can well imagine. They were, however, able to dig up an interesting set of cross-referenced and suspicious facts. Specifically, Trofimov’s company owns a few other companies that in turn own a very peculiar list of business interests. These interests don’t seem to actually do anything that we can determine, but they exist, they remain on the books and, more important, they consume a lot of cash. We know that Trofimov is secretly funding PAAC, and they’ve got blood on their hands, no doubt. But that’s clearly not all, and until we know what’s going on, we won’t move directly on PAAC’s members. Plus, Trofimov is slippery. We can’t trust the legal system to deal with him if Justice sets something in motion against PAAC.”

“Which is where I come in.”

“Yes,” Brognola said. “I’ll have the Farm transmit to you the briefing Barb’s put together with Aaron’s data. You’ll have a prioritized list of TBT’s suspect businesses and holding companies, with addresses and intelligence rundowns. We’ll also establish for you a running link to the PAAC discussion board, so you can monitor what they’re doing. But, Striker,” Brognola said, using Bolan’s code name, “there’s one more thing.”

“It gets even better?” Bolan said flatly.

“Did you hear of the shooting last week at a church outside Denver?”

“I did. Two people were wounded. They said it was a random crazy with an ax to grind, a former church member.”

“That was all a cover-up,” Brognola said, “to prevent a panic. I don’t necessarily agree with the tactics used, but it was Homeland Security’s call, and they stepped in before another agency could lay claim. The church service was a memorial for Sergeant Kevin Wyle, recently returned from Afghanistan. He was shot in his home by someone aiming through the bay window of his living room. The official story bears no resemblance to the actual details, and with all the people in attendance the facts are already starting to leak. Wyle’s service was disrupted by three young men wearing ski masks, who fired on the attendees with shotguns. They fled as fast as they came. The local police have no suspects.”

“Amateur hour,” Bolan concluded. “You think PAAC is working its way up from protests to terrorism?”

“Possibly,” Brognola said. “DHS is trying desperately to keep that from public knowledge, as I said, to prevent a panic. They’ve gotten the buy-in of most of the other federal agencies that might take an interest, including elements within Justice. While they may not be able to make it work, I see their point. Tempers are already flaring over the protests of military funerals. Can you imagine what could happen if those who are already hurting are looking over their shoulders for murderers? We could see the protesters getting shot.”

“If PAAC is in on the murders in the first place,” Bolan said, “that would be simple self-defense.”

“I wouldn’t disagree,” Brognola admitted, “but you know as well as I do that innocents will get caught in the cross fire.”

“I know,” Bolan said. “We can’t let that happen. And there’s a good chance that PAAC’s rank-and-file membership don’t know about the killings. It may not be the case that the whole group is dirty.”

“I’m going to send you the time and location of the next PAAC protest,” Brognola said, “with dossiers on the group’s leaders as we understand them to be.”

“It’s a confirmed, planned protest?” Bolan asked.

“Yes,” Brognola said. “But I’m not sure what you’ll find, exactly. Sergeant Wyle’s service was discussed on the PAAC board, but the group leadership nixed the appearance, citing schedule conflicts. That’s a little too convenient for my tastes. Whether elements within PAAC are planning similar treatment with their fellow protesters in evidence, we don’t know. It’s possible, but nothing explicitly illegal has been discussed on the board.”

“I’ll need something fast,” Bolan had said. “Something that can get me across the country and maybe even out of it.”

“It’s already covered,” Brognola confirmed. “I’m sending the data to your secure satellite phone now.”

“All right, Hal,” Bolan said. “I’m on it.”

“And, Striker?”

“Yeah?”

“Take them down. I want these people, and so does the Man.”

“So do I, Hal,” Bolan said. He closed the connection.

The conversation, still fresh in Bolan’s mind, had taken place several hours ago. The cemetery in which Mack Bolan now stood was a short drive outside of Green Bay, Wisconsin, where Stony Man pilot Jack Grimaldi waited at the Austin Straubel International Airport. Grimaldi would even now be crawling over every inch of the C-37A that was Bolan’s transportation for the duration of his mission.

The Stony Man pilot had traded up; he and Bolan had hopped an available USAF C-21A Learjet to Straubel while local federal assets had the longer-range C-37A prepared and positioned for their use. The modified Gulfstream V was a twin-engine, turbofan aircraft with an intercontinental range of 6,300 miles. This particular jet had been outfitted by a black-ops shop affiliated with the Farm. All in all, Bolan was traveling in style. Except for the new jet’s speed and range, however, these details were irrelevant in Bolan’s mind. He had work to do. He refocused his Zeiss binoculars, taking a more critical look at the scene below.

Then he heard the motorcycles.

The soldier zoomed in on the reactions of the mourners below. The set of their bodies, the way they stood or moved, indicated surprise—and relief. The loud roar of two-dozen motorcycles rolling up the access road drowned out all other sound. As Bolan watched, the men on the motorcycles brought their machines neatly into line and killed the engines. After they dismounted, they conferred briefly, and the largest of the bikers walked forward to speak with someone from the funeral party. From the man’s dress and bearing, not to mention the large zippered portfolio he carried under his arm, Bolan thought he might be the funeral director.

Brognola hadn’t mentioned these guys on the phone, but the data files that were part of Bolan’s briefing had included their write-ups. The men on the motorcycles were the Patriotism Riders, a group of citizen bikers, many of them also military veterans, who rode to military funerals to protect the families from protesters. They were nonviolent and apolitical, for the most part; they sought only to put themselves between the families and the protests to protect the relatives of dead service people. Someone within the Patriotism Riders’ network had alerted them to this service at the last minute, apparently. Bolan admired their dedication and the service they provided.

As Bolan watched, the Riders took up their position on the access road, linking arms and forming a human chain across the pavement. They stood, quiet and watching, their eyes scanning the access road, their heads slightly bowed out of respect for the mourners.

They didn’t wait long.

The funeral director and the representative from the Patriotism Riders finished whatever hushed conversation they were having. The Rider joined his fellows on the access road, while the director hurried back to the graveside. As if on this signal—Bolan realized as his brain processed what his eyes took in through the binoculars that there had to be some unseen coordination by scouts or observers hidden from view—a cargo van roared up the access road.

The van was moving too fast to be harmless. The Patriotism Riders scattered as the old Ford barreled through their ranks, narrowly missing the men closest to the center of the road.

Battle was joined.

The Remington 700 came up in Bolan’s hands as the van below lurched to a stop on whining, squealing brakes. As the van’s side door was shoved aside, the Executioner was already acquiring the first target through the Leupold telescopic sight.

The group that piled out of the van was a mixed half dozen—four men, two women. They ranged in age from perhaps early twenties to maybe middle thirties, wearing a mixture of grunge and protest chic. Each one carried a hand-lettered cardboard sign attached to a wooden handle.

Through the Leupold scope, Bolan could see that each also carried a gun.

Whether to make some political point or as a means of distracting their victims before they struck, the “protesters” were waving their signs with one hand while holding handguns behind their backs. Bolan, from his vantage, could see that clearly; the Protest Riders and the mourners beyond them couldn’t. The first of the protesters started to bring his weapon up from behind his leg.

Bolan took a breath, let out half of it and allowed the rifle to fire itself as his trigger finger applied pressure. The first 146-grain, 7.62 mm M-80 NATO specification bullet screamed toward its target. The metal-jacketed slug struck the would-be shooter before he could utter a sound, the fist of an avenging god smiting him from on high.

The gunner was dead before he hit the pavement.

For a fraction of a heartbeat, nothing moved. From mourners to Riders to the attackers themselves, each man and woman present struggled to process the sudden death that had appeared, unbidden and unforeseen, in their midst.

Then someone among the funeral-goers screamed and hell was unleashed.

Bolan was working the bolt of the Remington before the dead man completed his fall. He had lined up the next of the armed protesters as the mourner’s scream reached his ears, and he was pulling his rifle’s trigger before the next shooter in line could bring his handgun to bear on the nearest potential victim. For a second time, thunder pealed, and a second man fell dead before he knew the end had come.

One of the protesters, near the rear of the suddenly dwindling group, started to fire blindly. He emptied the .45 pistol in his fist—straight into the backs of the two women in front of him, cutting them down in his haste to react to the threat he couldn’t find. Bolan calmly worked the Remington’s bolt, tracked the shooter and put a bullet through his brain.

The Patriotism Riders had recovered quickly from their initial shock, surging toward the attacker. Several of them tackled the last of the men, burying him in a crush of bodies. Bolan caught this but ignored it; there was one other variable still unaccounted for.

The van’s engine roared to life and the vehicle started backing down the access road.

That would be the Ford’s driver, whom Bolan knew had never left the van. It was a tricky shot, through the windshield of the moving van, but there was no more experienced a sniper than Mack Bolan. He made the shot easily. Beyond the suddenly spiderwebbed windshield, the driver slumped over the steering wheel. The van slowed to crawl, and then came to rest half on and half off the access road.

Bolan ejected the empty brass from the Remington and placed the rifle on its hard case. Drawing the Beretta 93-R and flicking the selector switch to 3-round burst, he surveyed the killing ground below him as he stalked toward the aftermath of his deadly handiwork. The Riders were dragging the subdued, disarmed survivor out of the road. Several had spotted Bolan and were pointing at him. A couple looked ready to charge him, and Bolan mentally lauded them for that; they were taking no chances, and Bolan was an armed, unknown man who could be foe as easily as he could be friend.

“Cooper,” he said as he neared them. “Justice Department.”

“Justice?” One of the Riders shook his head. “Man, you ain’t kidding.”

Bolan nodded grimly. Justice, it was.

This was only the beginning.

CHAPTER TWO

Bolan stood, leaning against the nearest of the police cruisers, as local law enforcement prowled the area. Already the crime scene was being meticulously photographed, tagged and logged, while uniformed officers and a couple of plainclothes personnel circulated among the Patriotism Riders. The mourners had been questioned first, their statements taken quickly. Most of them had left. Bolan sympathized with them. Most wouldn’t be able to imagine the emotions that the family and friends of the dead serviceman had to be experiencing, with a tragedy in the family burned so raw by fresh, seemingly random terror and gunfire. The Executioner, on the other hand, had seen more than his fair share of death, tragedy and inhumanity. He understood. He also felt a grim satisfaction at being able to stop these killers before they could take more innocent lives, before they could pervert this graveside service into the type of obscene political statement their kind craved.

The local law enforcement had, as usual, been extremely suspicious. Bolan had given them his “Matthew Cooper” identification and the Justice Department credentials Brognola’s people had issued to that alias. It had still taken a few phone calls, one of them eventually fielded by the big Fed himself, before the police were satisfied. They had grudgingly accepted Bolan’s presence after that, and even done a pretty good job of pointedly ignoring him. The soldier could understand some of the territoriality that came with the job, and he knew only too well that his violent intervention wasn’t something that good cops just dismissed easily.

To those police and any other observer, Mack Bolan was simply waiting around. There was no good reason, in the minds of the police, for this mysterious federal agent not to leave the scene. Bolan imagined they thought he, too, was being territorial, perhaps not trusting the local boys to do a thorough job with the crime scene. The truth was something far different, of course. Bolan was playing a hunch, one spurred by long experience and countless battlefield scenarios.

Something wasn’t quite right, and he could feel it.

There was a loose end somewhere; Bolan was sure of it. As he stood, seemingly observing the police as they took the Riders’ statements, he was surreptitiously scanning the perimeter of the cemetery. The spotter, if indeed there had been one working with the shooters in the van, was bound to be somewhere along that perimeter somewhere, offering him a view similar to the one Bolan had enjoyed from his sniper’s vantage. Unless the man—or woman—had the sense to flee immediately when the action went down, he or she was still up there. Bolan had been watching. That feeling that he, in turn, was being watched was something he couldn’t shake. He had been under fire enough times to know to trust his gut. His finely honed combat instincts were screaming at him. He was listening.

A knot of the Riders no longer speaking with the police had drifted toward Bolan. They were a fairly typical bunch, at first glance—mostly large men in leather jackets, boots and jeans, with a sprinkling of other accessories and licensed motorcycle brand accoutrements. There were a few tattoos in evidence. They looked like bikers, but without the hard edge that Bolan had seen in so many outlaw clubs. These were simply citizens who rode motorcycles, first and foremost, and in this case for a good cause.

The nearest man, who sported a blond crew cut and wore a pair of sunglasses on a cord around his neck, shuffled closer to Bolan and cleared his throat. This was the man Bolan had seen talking to the funeral director.

“Excuse me, sir?” the man asked.

“Yes?”

“Mitch Schrader, sir,” the biker said, extending his hand. Bolan shook it; Schrader’s grip was firm, but not aggressive. “With the Patriotism Riders.”

“So I gathered.” Bolan nodded. “Matthew Cooper.”

“So you said.” Schrader grinned. “You really with the Justice Department? You’re not FBI, or something?” Schrader asked.

“I really am,” Bolan said. In a certain sense, it was true. The soldier worked for nothing more than unbridled justice, justice in its purest and most righteous form.

“I wanted to thank you,” Schrader said. “The boys and I, we, well, we wondered if maybe something like this might happen.”

“What do you mean?” Bolan asked.

“Well—” Schrader shrugged “—the protests, they’re bad enough. We’ve been fighting that for a while. But we figured it was only a matter of time before they stopped being ‘peaceful,’ you know? It wouldn’t be the first time.”

“I’m not aware of any violence at the funerals of military personnel,” Bolan said warily.

“’Course not.” Schrader grinned. “You’d have to say that, wouldn’t you? But come on, Cooper, you and I both know that’s probably not true. You hear things. Most of the guys are vets themselves. We stay in touch. We network. That’s how we know what the buzz is, where to ride, what services to protect. Makes me sick.” Schrader turned and jerked his chin toward the bodies of the attackers. “They aren’t all like them, I suppose. Not all terrorists or murderers or whatever. But the ones who march and chant, they’re just as bad, aren’t they? Pissing on the graves of war dead. Upsetting the families. Turning the deaths of brave men into a political statement.”

“And women,” one of the other Riders put in.

“And women,” Schrader stated, grinning. “That’s Ben. He’s our resident equal rights activist.”

“Up yours,” Ben snarled.

“Anyway,” Schrader said, his smile fading, “I mean it, man. You didn’t just save them—” he motioned toward the few mourners still present, who were speaking with the funeral director beyond the circle of bustling police “—you saved all of us. We’d have been the first to catch one. I thought maybe, well, it’s hard to explain. But I knew coming here might be bad for us. We couldn’t stay away, though, not thinking there was a protest going down.”

“How did you find out about that?” Bolan asked.

“I got a phone call, man.” Schrader shrugged. “Last minute. Don’t know the guy. He said just that he was a fellow American, and that he knew the service today was going on, and that there was supposed to be a big peace protest here. Said he figured that would be of interest to me, and yeah, it was. It’s what we do. We stand up for people who can’t do it themselves, you know? People who’ve already given everything there is to give. You can dig that, right?”

“I can.” Bolan nodded. Indeed, he could.

“We network,” Schrader said, indicating his fellow Riders. “There are other chapters of Riders in this part of the country, and a few other groups that go by different names, folks who do the same thing we do. We stay in touch and we tip each other off when a ride comes up, especially if we think one of those protest groups, especially the crazier ones you see on the news, is aware of the service and looking to march on it. We were, all of us, on CNN just last month. But I’m telling you, Cooper, this is the first time I’ve ever gotten an anonymous phone call like that. I’m thinking now it was some kind of setup.”

“You could be right,” Bolan acknowledged. He took a small notebook from inside one of the pockets of his blacksuit. Using the metal pen clipped to it, he wrote down a phone number. The number would route a call through several satellite cutouts and eventually to Bolan’s secure satellite phone, while flagging the call as an unsecured transmission from a potentially unknown third party. No amount of tech-tracing would produce any intelligence on Bolan’s phone or the soldier’s whereabouts, but to the caller it would still appear to be a direct line. Bolan tore out the slip of paper and handed it to Schrader.

“If you hear anything more,” Bolan said, “anything through your contacts or those in your organization, call me. I’m interested in anything you hear about protests, or if you anyone calls you.”

“Here,” Schrader said, pulling out his cell phone and flipping it open. “I have the number on my phone from this morning, the number this Deep Throat or whatever called me from.” He recited it, and Bolan copied it down.

“That may help.”

“You’re wondering who’s got it in for our boys, aren’t you?” Schrader asked quietly, looking shrewd.

“Justice,” Bolan said simply. “I’m just looking for justice.”

“I heard that.”

Bolan excused himself and moved to the corpses of the shooters. He had already taken photos of each of them and sent them via secure upload to the Farm for analysis. The locals hadn’t liked that much, from their body language, but they hadn’t tried to stop him and they hadn’t asked any questions. Bolan had left the scene undisturbed while they were tagging and cataloging, but they were finished now. He knelt and carefully started searching the closest corpse.

“You won’t find much, sir,” one of the uniformed officers said. He nodded at Bolan and help up a plastic evidence bag. “I personally checked their pockets and the lining of their clothes. No IDs.”

“Thank you,” Bolan said. “Officer…?”

“Copeland, sir,” the cop said.

“Anything of consequence there?” Bolan nodded at the evidence bag.

“No.” The officer shook his head. “A few personal effects. Combs, pocketknives. A pair of wristwatches, domestic and unremarkable. Nothing, really. No car keys, no money, no matchbooks or scraps of paper. They more or less emptied their pockets beforehand, I guess.”

“What about him?” Bolan pointed to the driver, dead behind the wheel of the van. “And the vehicle.”

“We’re checking the vehicle identification number now.” Officer Copeland shook his head. “The plates came back already. They were stolen off a Toyota pickup twenty-five miles from here. I can tell you that van will come back as stolen. See that shattered side window up front, the little access window? That’s how they get in to hot-wire it. Sure sign the thing is hot. They must have grabbed it and then switched plates. It would have been enough cover in transit from wherever they got it, to here.”

Bolan nodded. He liked this Copeland. He was young but knew his business, and wasn’t afraid to share information with another department—in this case, one he had to know was decidedly above his pay grade.

“Nothing on the driver, either.”

Bolan looked over the dead men and women once more. That was strange. Amateurs were rarely so thorough, and these sign-waving shooters had hardly been professionals. They’d been sloppy, careless and, in the case of the one man who’d taken down two of his partners, dangerous to one another as much as to their targets. That didn’t make a lot of sense…unless these were the types of politically motivated pawns some greater interest, such as Trofimov, was controlling from higher up. That scenario made more sense. But if that was the case, then there definitely was likely to be someone—

“Agent Cooper?” Officer Copeland broke into Bolan’s reverie. “Uh, sir, is he one of yours?”

Bolan saw the man just as the uniformed cop pointed him out. The figure, dressed in a dark hooded sweatshirt and slacks, had taken off at a dead run from the very edge of the cemetery, headed away from the graves.

Bolan broke away and sprinted.

He raced through the maze of tombstones, dodging this way and that. The runner looked back, saw him and produced a handgun of some kind. He loosed a round, but it went wide, ricocheting off one of the marble memorials. Then they were both free of the cemetery proper, the running man cutting across a two-lane road that backed the rear of the graveyard. A Honda narrowly missed the man, the driver honking in outrage.

Bolan yanked the Beretta 93-R from his shoulder holster, risking a glance left and right before rocketing over the road. His combat boots chewed up asphalt and the muddy grass of the field beyond in long, rapid strides. The distance closed; there was a small copse of trees some yards beyond, but no real cover for the fleeing man to seek. He snapped another shot in Bolan’s direction. The bullet never came anywhere near the sprinting soldier.

Mack Bolan was a crack shot, a trained sniper and marksman of decades’ experience. Even he, however, wouldn’t risk a shot on a running man he wished to keep alive for questioning. Instead, he poured on the speed, judged the distance and then launched himself in a flying tackle. He took the smaller man around the knees and rolled through the muddy earth. He came up standing above the runner, who looked up from his back. The Beretta 93-R was trained on the smaller man’s face. His hood had come off to reveal that he was Asian, maybe midtwenties.

“Don’t move,” Bolan ordered.

The Asian was lightning fast. His body torqued and his foot came up like a rattlesnake, snapping a vicious blow into Bolan’s wrist. The Executioner lost the Beretta and took a step backward. The Asian leaped up and was at him, raining a flurry of brutal, acrobatic kicks. Bolan felt the wind being pressed from his rib cage. He reeled, clawing for the Desert Eagle still in its sheath, protecting his head with his left forearm as kick after vicious kick hammered away at him.

He ended up on his back, pulling the Desert Eagle free as the Asian man dropped a knee onto his chest. Firing from retention with the massive weapon pressed against his body, Bolan put a single .44 Magnum round through the little man’s midsection. He yelped in surprise, rolling over and off Bolan, scrambling to his feet once more and taking a few shaky steps away from the soldier.

“Stop!” Bolan ordered, surging to his feet and leveling the hand cannon. The Asian man seemed not to hear him. He took another drunken step, lost his footing and collapsed on suddenly rubbery knees. His legs were folded beneath him as he stared at the sky and took a last, ragged breath, his eyes wide.

The death rattle was unmistakable.

Bolan checked the body carefully. There was little chance a man could fake that sound; the Executioner had heard it often enough for real. Satisfied that the man wouldn’t be going anywhere ever again, Bolan searched the grass for his Beretta and surveyed his surroundings.

Silence.

The empty field bordered several properties, a couple of them residential. The nearest buildings were quite some distance away. No one had heard the gunfire, or no one thought to check it. Either way, Bolan was alone with the dead man.

He’d hoped to question the Asian, but as viciously as he’d fought, it was unlikely he’d have been very talkative. Bolan knew the type. This man was a fighter. He’d have gone down struggling.

Bolan holstered the Desert Eagle and retrieved the Beretta. He ejected its magazine, catching it in his free hand, then racked the slide and caught the ejected round in his cupped hand. He inspected the barrel of the machine pistol, peering through the open slide up the spout, making sure there was no mud or other foreign matter obstructing the weapon. Then he loaded the loose round back in the 20-round magazine.

“Agent Cooper!” Bolan turned at the sound of his cover name.

“Are you all right?” Officer Copeland asked, breathing hard as he ran to catch up.

“Fine,” Bolan said. He gestured to the dead man. “I can’t say the same for him.”

“You got him,” Copeland said. Bolan made no response as none was required.

Bolan checked the body. The man’s gun, a Glock 19, was on the ground nearby. Copeland retrieved the weapon, checked it, then unloaded it. Bolan nodded his approval. The dead man had nothing on him except a spare magazine for the Glock, a compact pair of binoculars and a short-range two-way radio, the sort of device hunters and other sportsmen used to coordinate groups of people in the field.

“Did you find one of these?” Bolan held up the bright yellow, rubberized radio. “In the van, or on any of the bodies?”

“Yes, actually,” Copeland confirmed. “It was in the van, in the back with a bunch of junk.”

“Junk?”

“An old dog blanket, a few cardboard boxes full of mostly trash.” Copeland shrugged. “The sort of thing that collects in the back of a van. It was rolling around loose back there. We thought it was just part of the debris, along for the ride after the vehicle was stolen.”

“Not an unreasonable conclusion,” Bolan said, nodding. “But this—” he wagged the radio at Copeland “—changes everything.”

“Who was he?”

“My guess,” Bolan said, “is that this man was a spotter. He was watching the service and called in the gunners in the van for maximum effect.”

“Copeland,” a distorted voice said from Copeland’s belt. “Copeland, come in.” The officer unclipped the walkie-talkie from his duty belt.

“Copeland here,” he said.

“We’ve found something. That federal hotshot will want to see it.”

“That federal hotshot is right here.” Copeland grinned at the Executioner. “What have you got?”

“We found a video camera on one of the gravestones,” the voice came back. “It was still running.”

“Set to record what?” Copeland asked.

“It was pointing at the grave site.”

Copeland looked at Bolan.

“Publicity,” Bolan said. “Had this gone off as planned, they would have killed everybody down there, collected their video and left. Chances are the camera was left by this one.” He jerked his chin toward the dead Asian. “He must have decided getting clear was more important than working his way back around to retrieve the camera.”

“So if the shooting had worked—”

“If it had worked,” Bolan said grimly, “the video of those people dying would have been all over the Internet by the weekend. Count on it.”

“Bastards,” Copeland muttered.

“And then some,” Bolan agreed.

The soldier crouched over the dead Asian, once more taking out his secure satellite phone and taking a digital picture. He paused to transmit it to the Farm. No instructions were needed. Aaron Kurtzman and his team of cyber wizards would know that any corpse shot Bolan sent was a request for identification and intel. He did, however, take a moment to text message Kurtzman with the phone number he’d gotten from Mitch Schrader. It was unlikely the number would prove to be useful, but one never knew. So far Bolan’s enemies had been a curious mixture of sloppy and professional. Someone, somewhere, might have been careless and used a number that was traceable in some way.

Bolan and Copeland made the long walk back to the cemetery. The soldier’s own vehicle, a rental SUV, was parked on the opposite end of the access road leading out the front of the property. He would need to collect his gear and get back to the airport, where Grimaldi and the jet would be ready to go. While the Farm checked on the intelligence Bolan had gathered so far, the Executioner would travel to the nearest Trofimov facility from his target list. There was no telling what he’d find, but it was his experience that if he made enough forays into enemy territory, sooner or later he’d find something or someone would take a shot at him. That would be the only break he’d need.

Once the Executioner was certain how far deep the rot went, he was going to slash and burn it out of the nation’s heartland.

The Patriotism Riders remained on the scene, though the police were getting ready to pack up. The police changed their minds about that quickly when Copeland informed them that there was yet another body to account for. As they scrambled, a few of them shooting suspicious looks Bolan’s way, the soldier went to the group of Riders to see what held their attention so firmly.

“I don’t believe it,” Mitch Schrader was saying. This was met by a chorus of agreement from the others, who sounded angry. Bolan looked over the shoulder of the nearest Rider, who noticed him and moved out of the way. Sitting on one of the motorcycles, another of the Riders had a small portable television, apparently something he carried in his saddlebags. The little device showed a newscast with the TBT logo in the corner. Trofimov’s cable news network, Bolan thought.

“You’re not going to like this,” the man on the motorcycle said, looking up at Bolan. “You were military, right? You got the look.”

Bolan had nothing to say to that. He focused on the little television.

“We were getting ready to roll out,” Schrader explained, “when Norm thought to check the news, see if anybody’d gotten wind of all this.” He gestured around him. “I figured, no way, there aren’t any news cameras here, you know?”

“The locals are probably running interference,” Bolan said. “It wouldn’t surprise me if there’s a marked car parked at the entrance to this property, keeping the reporters out.”

“Figured as much,” Schrader said. “Anyway, Norm turns on the TV, and this is what we got.” He pointed to the television.

“…promising a full investigation at the highest levels of government and the military command in Afghanistan,” the young female news anchor was saying. “We at TBT are proud to bring you the following commentary from our president and CEO, Yuri Trofimov.”

The scene cut to the interior of a sumptuously appointed office. Behind a gleaming desk, Yuri Trofimov—text near the bottom of the screen identified him as such—looked out at the screen, his features grim. When he spoke, he had a slight accent, but this coupled with his expensive suit and his aristocratic manner gave him the aura of a foreign diplomat. He exuded confidence, competence and, above all, a barely suppressed righteous indignation. Bolan took one look at the man and knew he was dealing with a master manipulator. It oozed from every pore, from the man’s slicked, perfectly coiffed hair to the rings that glittered on his fingers as he clasped his hands on the desktop.

“We at TBT are deeply saddened to bring you this news,” Trofimov said. “But as always, we are committed to nothing so much as the truth, and to the unflinching reporting of that truth, no matter how graphic or unpleasant. I think I speak for many when I say, as proud as I am of my adopted country, that this is a dark day for the United States, and a day when I am ashamed to call myself an American.”

“Shut the hell up, you scumbag!” Norm interjected. Schrader shushed him, gesturing to the screen.

“It is my hope that we, as a nation, can eventually work through this,” Trofimov said soberly, “but I will not lie to you. It will be difficult. We will have to make some hard admissions about our standing in the world. We will have to come to terms with the barbarism that lurks, even now, within our armed forces. This will not sit well with many of us, but I know that we are up to the challenge. For TBT News, I am Yuri Trofimov, and I thank you for trusting us.”

Norm switched the set off in disgust. He looked ready to throw the little device.

“Can you beat that?” Schrader said. “I just…I just don’t know.”

“What happened?” Bolan asked.

“They’re reporting that a bunch of our guys attacked a village in Afghanistan,” Schrader said. “Totally unprovoked, they claimed. Burned the place to the ground, shot twenty, maybe thirty women and children. And Trofimov’s news says they have videotape of our guys doing it…and laughing about it.”

Bolan’s jaw clenched. Things were getting ugly.

They were going to get uglier.

CHAPTER THREE

“Word’s in from the Farm, Sarge,” Grimaldi said from the cockpit, his voice carrying over the jet’s intercom. “You’ve got another rental truck waiting for you at the field, and the care package you requested will be inside. The GPS unit in the truck should get you to the target location without any trouble.”

“Thanks, Jack,” Bolan said. He had finished cleaning the Remington and was replacing it in its Pelican case.

“I’ll stay with the jet once we land, and I’ll be ready to get us in the air again as soon as you’re done in Cedar Rapids. We’ll make good time to Kansas City after that. Barb confirms that your ‘driver’ should be waiting for you when we hit the tarmac again.”

“Copy that,” Bolan acknowledged.

His “driver” was, in fact, a government agent. As he always did, he had his reservations about the arrangement, but Stony Man Farm’s mission controller, Barbara Price, had done her homework. When she had contacted Bolan on his secure satellite phone minutes after the soldier boarded the new jet, she had wasted no time in breaking the news to him.

“The FBI,” she said, “wants in.”

“I’m listening,” Bolan had said simply.

“Kwok Jin,” the Farm’s honey-blond mission controller had stated. “That’s the identification that came back on your dead man, the Asian you said gave you such a hard time. I’m transmitting to you the files on the other shooters, too, but except for Kwok they’re amateur talent. Rabble-rousers with ties to known political agitator groups. Two were former members of PAAC and supposedly expelled, presumably because they were more radical than the group could tolerate. That alone says something. A couple have rap sheets, but nothing too serious. Some of the records go back quite a ways, and in one case it was a sealed juvenile case.”

“So in other words, they’re nobody. But someone put guns in their hands and sent them to kill innocent people. And somebody coordinated them and planned the operation for them.”

“That somebody was likely Kwok or, more probably, the organization that employed him,” Price confirmed. “Kwok Jin. North Korean, formerly with the country’s military. Fled the country and went freelance about ten years ago, in the company of a brother, Sun. Both of them sold the only skills they had on the open market. They’ve been mercenaries for the past decade, most of those ten years in association with one Gareth Twain.”

“I know that name,” Bolan had said.

“For good reason,” Price said. “Twain was one of the most murderous terrorists ever to work with the Irish Republican Army. He was so bloodthirsty, in fact, that the IRA expelled him. That was a good fifteen years ago. He’s been an international mercenary ever since, notable for the fact that he has absolutely no loyalties to any entity, governmental or personal. He’ll kill anyone for the right price, and no body count is too high.”

“Why hasn’t the Farm targeted Twain before?”

“He’s always stayed one step ahead of us,” Price said. “Always on the move, and always in corners of the world where the most conflict was to be had. He’s a brutal operator, and his organization is extensive, but he’s managed to blend into the background noise of the various wars being waged in the Third World and elsewhere. He really gets around, too. He’s done stints all over Africa and South America. In Gaza, while reportedly working for Hamas and the PLO, his people blew up a freighter bound for Semarang last year. He’s been implicated three times in acts of domestic terrorism in the United States, including an aborted bombing of a federal facility in Virginia, sponsored by a homegrown ‘patriot’ group, and he’s wanted for the murder of an Interpol agent in Paris last year.”

“That’s quite a résumé.”

“It’s the Virginia bombing that put him on the Bureau’s radar,” Price reported. “Their Omnivore computer processing programs, which of course Aaron has fully infiltrated, are set to flag any mention of Twain or his known associates in any law-enforcement database, including Interpol and a dozen others. We ran Kwok’s identification and it generated a flag. The Bureau contacted Justice, wanting to know what we knew, and Hal ran some interference for us. He pulled a few strings and called in a few favors. Someone on the Bureau’s end did the same. Ultimately it was decided that an agent be assigned to what Hal is characterizing as a ‘domestic investigation’ on the part of Justice and its assets. Hal, in the spirit of cooperation and goodwill among government agencies, of course agreed.”

“In other words, they’ll raise a stink if we don’t let them in the door.”

“Exactly,” Price said. “And as sensitive as this could be, considering Trofimov’s access to the media and the harm being done to the nation’s military interests, our friend in Wonderland has decided it’s best if we go along to get along.”

“That’s a dangerous game,” Bolan said. “I’m not going to scale back my mission to accommodate the sensibilities of a by-the-book FBI agent.”

“There’s where we catch a break,” Price had told him. “I’m transmitting the file to you now. Jennifer Delaney, thirty-four. Been with the Bureau for the past ten years. A decorated agent, but also one who’s been disciplined more than once. You can read the details yourself, but I’ll sum it up for you—she has a recurring problem with authority and no compunctions about bending the rules to get things done.”

“But she’s still with the Bureau, which doesn’t tolerate loose cannons.”

“True,” Price said. “Which means she’s a very good agent, for all her willingness to be pragmatic in the field.”

“I can live with that,” Bolan said.

“We don’t know who talked to whom in the Bureau, but Delaney has a personal stake in Twain and has been pursuing him since the incident in Virginia. Her partner, a Paul Sander, was the lead on the investigation that eventually saw Twain and his outfit popped before they could plant their explosives. A couple of them went down, but Twain and his key people got away. Twain shot both Sander and Delaney in making his escape. Sander died.”

“So she’s looking for payback,” Bolan said. “Can I trust her?”

“She wants Twain,” Price said. “Wouldn’t you? But there’s no indication it has interfered with her work. There have been no disciplinary actions in her file since then, either, if it makes a difference to you.”

“I can understand.” The file was coming through on his phone. The digital photograph of Delaney showed an attractive red-haired woman with high cheekbones and green eyes. She had a small scar on her chin. According to the statistics appended to the file, she was five foot nine, with an athletic build. She’d twice won commendations for bravery in service to the Bureau. Bolan skipped the disciplinary flags; he wasn’t interested in the second-guessing of bureaucrats, who were only too happy to criticize after the fact the split-second, life-and-death decisions men and women of action were forced to make in the field.

“Delaney is en route and will meet you in—” Price paused to check something “—Kansas City. Jack tells me you’ll reach Eastern Iowa Airport momentarily, and that you plan to hit the facility in Kansas City after that?”

“That’s the plan,” Bolan said. “It’s the next logical location, geographically, on the priority list. Until something breaks free, I intend to keep the pressure on, keep blitzing Trofimov’s assets until he screams. I can’t verify the timing, though.”

“It shouldn’t matter,” Price said. “By the time you’re done in Iowa and moving to Kansas Delaney should get there not too much before you do.”

“We’ll make sure not to miss her. How much can I tell her?”

“While her interest is primarily Twain, the folks at the Bureau aren’t stupid,” Price said. “Hal chose to share some off-the-record intel with them. She’s going to be at least vaguely aware of the Trofimov connection. Officially, there’s no FBI interest in Trofimov, but unofficially you can bet they’re every bit as concerned about murderous, possibly even seditious actions taken by an American citizen to undermine the United States military. You know how much they have to dance around these days, pretending not to peer too closely into the lives of private citizens. There’s just been too much public outcry over things like the domestic wiretapping program, civil rights violations by Homeland Security, that sort of thing. The Bureau wants to know what Trofimov is up to as badly as we do, but they can’t admit it right now.”

“Meaning they’ll be happy to take the credit once I’ve found all the loose ends and burned them down,” Bolan said.

“Possibly,” Price admitted. “Hal will be only too happy to let them, too, given how the Sensitive Operations Group’s cover has to be kept out of the public eye. We can operate, at least partly, under the aegis of FBI ownership of this thing, if it plays out well.”

“It’s going to get ugly enough behind the scenes, once the body count grows. I assume Hal has worked the phones and okayed my involvement.”

“As usual,” Price said.

“All right, then,” Bolan said. “This Delaney can ride along. Make no mistake, though, Barb. I’m not going to let her get in my way. My priority is Trofimov and whatever programs he’s running to kill Americans and interfere with the military.”

“Understood,” Price said. “I doubt that will be a problem. You have goals in common. The implication here is, of course, that Twain and his people are working with Trofimov, and probably have been for some time.”

“Yes,” Bolan had agreed. “The activists, the amateurs with the guns, were obviously being run by someone else, and that someone in this case was apparently Kwok and whoever he works for. If Kwok is known to work for Gareth Twain, we likely have a winner. Twain is just the sort of gun for hire that someone like Trofimov would use. Given Twain’s history, and Trofimov’s deep pockets, it’s likely Trofimov is using Twain and his organization extensively.”

“Taking out Gareth Twain would do a lot of people a lot of good.”

“Don’t worry, Barb,” Bolan said. “I won’t leave anyone out. Anybody connected to Trofimov, everyone involved in the killings of U.S. service people and in Trofimov’s antimilitary operations, is going to answer for their crimes. What have you heard about this videotaped massacre TBT is shouting about?”

“Nothing beyond the reports so far,” Price replied. “We’re checking. So far our contacts within the armed forces are drawing blanks. The Pentagon is stonewalling, saying only that it will conduct a full investigation.”

“Which means they have no idea what’s going on.”

“Exactly,” Price said. “That’s the response they give when they’re caught flat-footed. So far, we have no confirmation of the incident itself, or even of the identities of the soldiers supposedly involved. The quality of the tape is poor. It’s going to be hard to get facial recognition, and the names on the soldiers’ uniforms are too blurry to be readable. Bear did uncover some data traffic indicating the Pentagon is trying to run some enhancement on the tapes, to get to the bottom of just who is doing what to whom. Nothing so far.”

“How bad is it?”

“Really bad, Striker,” Price said. “The foreign press is screaming bloody murder. Our own people are just as loud. The massacre is the talk of every cable news show, radio program and major network broadcast. It’s on every channel and it’s twenty-four hours a day.”

Bolan said nothing; his fists clenched in anger as he considered the implications. “All right. Let me know if anything changes.”

“Understood. Everything’s uploaded. You have all the data now,” Price said. Bolan checked his phone and confirmed that. “We’re still working on the phone number you gave us. It has several layers of redundant encryption protecting it. Bear has Akira running a back-end trace to try to find it through the network in which it’s hidden.”

“Understood,” Bolan repeated. Price was referring to Akira Tokaido, one of the Farm’s computer geniuses. “The fact that someone wanted the Patriotism Riders there, just to make sure they were killed with the others, is significant. It makes the whole thing that much bolder a statement, that much more horrible. It says a lot about the people we’re dealing with.”

“We’re on it,” Price said.

“Let me know if you find anything. I’ll see you when I see you.”

“Striker?” Price had asked.

“Yeah, Barb?”

“Be careful.”

“I will.”

The soldier had busied himself with cleaning his weapons, making sure to disassemble the Beretta and give it a thorough once-over. The usually gregarious Grimaldi was quiet, for the most part, content to let Bolan work through the operation in his mind.

Bolan reviewed the mission data on the site in Cedar Rapids. It wasn’t especially significant in terms of his priority list of targets, but it was the closest Trofimov asset. The type of operation Bolan was about to run was based on the notion of shaking the tree. You targeted the enemy’s assets, made a lot of noise, caused a lot of damage and then stood back to see what shook loose. Along the way, some of Trofimov’s secrets were bound to be exposed; the facilities, by definition, were somehow dirty, or the Farm’s cybernetics staff wouldn’t have ferreted them out as suspicious.

Trofimov’s reaction to Bolan’s incursions would tell the soldier, and by extension the Farm, everything he would need to know. Countless times, Bolan had marched willingly into the jaws of death to see what would try to bite him. This was no different.

The facility outside Cedar Rapids was ostensibly an assembly plant for DVD players. The parts were manufactured abroad, mostly in China, then imported and put together for domestic sale in the United States. The legal details were irrelevant to Bolan, but he was at least vaguely aware that such an arrangement allowed Trofimov to claim the devices were “made in the U.S.A.” while achieving the cost savings of foreign import manufacture. There were probably certain import restrictions that were also being circumvented.

What was important about this particular plant, according to reports Price had sent and the data Kurtzman and his people had compiled, was that it had never made any money. Quite the contrary; when the financial records were traced all the way to their virtual conclusions, past several holding and front companies and through more than a few creative bookkeeping tricks, the plant consumed more money than it would if it were operating at a total loss. That meant it was burning through cash a lot faster than ever it could, even if Trofimov was building DVD players free of charge. While it wasn’t unheard-of for a large company to produce a commodity at a loss, to gain market share or build brand loyalty, the degree of financial drain in this case was staggering. It was far too much for the plant to be anything but a front for something else. Bolan intended to find out just what was being done behind the scenes.

When he knew that, he’d be a step closer to learning just who and what this Yuri Trofimov was, and why the man had chosen to make the United States his enemy. Bolan had no illusions. This wasn’t an investigation, nor was it a mystery. He wasn’t a detective. He was a soldier, and he was performing a soldier’s task.

Search and destroy.

CHAPTER FOUR

Yuri Trofimov sat at his desk as the makeup girl swabbed the last of the television makeup from his face. He favored her with a smile full of perfectly capped teeth. From his elaborately styled hair to his tailored suit to his spray-on tan, there was nothing about Yuri Trofimov that was not meticulously groomed, controlled and managed to effect. The man left nothing to chance, and he was very proud of that fact.

Swiveling in his chair, he took in the view from the window overlooking downtown Orlando. Several buildings, not quite as tall as his own TBT headquarters, were still under construction. He had never quite lost the joy he had felt as a boy, watching construction work, and there were times when he watched the cranes below slowly swiveling over the steel skeletons that were taking shape in the shadow of Trofimov’s own building. Downtown Orlando had been undergoing something of a commercial revitalization for some months now, though in these turbulent economic times it was anybody’s guess how long that would last.

There were precious few memories from his childhood that were pleasant ones. Growing up, he had believed he was destined for the navy. He had never known his father; his mother, little more than a prostitute who existed on the kindness of the many men she bedded, had hinted more than once that Yuri’s father had been a naval officer. Her indifference to him had set the tone for his early life. He was neither abused nor loved, neither cared for nor hated. The empty ache left him eventually, when he learned to substitute for it other, preferable emotions. Chief among these were anger and ambition.

Young Yuri Trofimov had a gift, he soon learned, when among his peers and even his teachers in school. He had a talent for influencing others, for captivating them with his stories and with the expression of his opinions. People cared about what Yuri Trofimov had to say. They cared about his opinions. They wished to hear him when he spoke. He learned, therefore, that he had power. With a taste of power came the desire for more.

As the infrastructure he had always taken for granted began to crumble, as the ships of the former Soviet navy began to rust in their docks and to sink from neglect, Trofimov gave up the last hopes he’d held of serving in that force. Already, his mind was alive with possibilities, with ways to use his talents both to enrich himself and to extend the power he believed was destined to be his. Power over his fellow men: that was Yuri Trofimov’s greatest goal, his greatest hope and his fundamental desire. He began to make plans.

When the time had come to leave the smoking ruins of what had once been proud Mother Russia, he had done so without looking back. Russia could do nothing more for him. The post–Cold War years hadn’t been kind to the once-powerful nation and, while the crime-infested world of business in Russia held certain attractions, the market was saturated. Better to move to the West, where untapped, unexploited markets still remained. Trofimov hated the West; he hated it for what it had done to his nation, for the Cold War that had denied Russia its once-proud destiny. He hated the strutting, arrogant Americans who believed they owned the world and could tell everyone within it how to live and what to do. But he also knew that the West was his best hope for achieving his still only vaguely defined personal goals. He swallowed his pride temporarily, which was the hardest thing of all.

The teenage Trofimov had managed to immigrate successfully to the United States, illegally at first, then legally, after a fashion, many years later. He found himself, almost to his surprise, in Florida, and there he realized that his ambition alone wouldn’t be enough. He needed contacts. He needed resources. It was all fine and good to know he could influence, control, even manipulate his fellow human beings. There were few enough opportunities to do so when one was penniless and homeless on the streets of an American city.

Trofimov, growing increasingly desperate, had prowled the streets of Miami, increasingly worried that he would find himself among the city’s population of street people before much longer. Then came the break he had sought, the opportunity he needed: he saw two men bullying a third, demanding money owed them.

He had crept up the alleyway until he was close enough to hear the conversation. The two men worked for a local loan shark. The third man owed a great deal of money. He grew increasingly combative as the two enforcers threatened him. It quickly became evident to Trofimov that these men were overmatched. The third man was bigger and appeared stronger. As Trofimov watched, the big man suddenly, with no warning whatsoever, punched one of the two enforcers square in the jaw. He kneed the second, dropping him. Breaking into a run, the third man hurried past the very spot where Trofimov stood.

He tripped him.

The big man hit the pavement of the alleyway. He struck his head as he fell. He was either dead or unconscious as Trofimov stood over him, checked his pockets and took his wallet.

“Hey, kid,” one of the enforcers said. It was the one who had taken a knee to the groin. “Gimme that wallet.”

Trofimov tossed the wallet to the man without hesitation, as if this had been his intent from the start. He regarded the enforcer coolly; the enforcer stared back. Finally the other man said, “What? What the hell you want?”

“I want a job,” Trofimov said.

The enforcer seemed to think about that for a moment. He looked down at the debtor and then back to his partner, who was slowly struggling to his feet. “What do you do?” he asked.

“Name it,” Trofimov had said.

The enforcer laughed. Eventually he nodded. “Come on, then.”

That had been the humble beginning from which Yuri Trofimov built his empire. He had at first worked his way up in the hierarchy of organized crime in Miami, learning the violent ropes. His talent for persuading people, his guile, his natural, snake-oil charm served him well. He moved up within the ranks. When he had enough support, when he had co-opted enough of the organization, he took it over from within, then fought a war with those who disagreed with his palace coup. Finally he ruled uncontested. He leveraged his money and his power into several legitimate enterprises; the boom in consumer electronics and the new Internet age helped him along the way.

When he had the time, he attended college. In business school he learned the formal terms behind what he had found through hard-won and bitter experience. Then, in journalism school, he found the true means of channeling his natural abilities. Always, he branched out, expanded, reinvested. His legitimate empire, on the backs of his criminal enterprises, became truly, remarkably, breathtakingly powerful.

He expanded from electronics into heavy industry, buying shares in the few Russian businesses that showed financial promise, greasing the wheels back home and in the United States with plenty of bribes. When he couldn’t use his power or his money to get what he wanted, he knew who to hire. He learned just how much was possible if one sought the services of armed, amoral men, the types of men who fought wars for hire, the types of men who could be counted on to take their money and quietly go about their business. As his ties to such mercenaries deepened, his reach grew. Those who wouldn’t bend to the will of Yuri Trofimov often found themselves dead, victims of random street violence, presumed gang shootings or even open massacres whose perpetrators were never caught.

Always, Trofimov was careful to keep his own record, his own reputation, clean. He knew as well as anyone that the government of the United States had its suspicions, but was hamstrung by its own rules. For all its tough talk about homeland security, its posturing and its saber rattling, it didn’t have the killer instinct it needed to deal with the likes of Yuri Trofimov. Thus he would continue his work, under their very noses. They would be able to prove nothing. They would never be able to assign to Trofimov the blame for the storm that was to come.

Eventually he bought his United States citizenship. It was easy enough—a bribe here, a favor there, the gentle application of political power over there. He followed the models established by other businessmen before him, never reinvented the wheel if he didn’t have to do so. When TBT and its news network finally burst on the scene, Trofimov was more than prepared to take market share by giving his viewers what they wanted. He traded in the sensational, the outrageous, the bloody, the messy. Always, his hatred of the West came through, and it tapped the streak of self-destructive, self-loathing guilt some of his now-fellow Americans seemed to feel about themselves and their nation.

For many men, this would have been enough. Riches. Influence. Swaying the cultural pendulum and affecting the collective consciousness of the most powerful nation in the world.

Yuri Trofimov wasn’t most men.

He wouldn’t be truly satisfied until the United States, the embodiment of the hated West, suffered as his homeland had suffered. Only when the arrogant United States knew the pain of losing its military might abroad, only when the miserable United States was humiliated on the international stage as the Soviet Union and later Russia had been, only when the United States military—the truncheon with which the Americans beat all around them—was utterly disgraced would Yuri Trofimov be truly satisfied.

And thus he had, using the great wealth and power available to him, embarked on the elaborate plan that was to be his life’s crowning achievement. He was going to destroy the United States military, using the Americans themselves to help him do the work.

He had, of course, no compunctions about breaking the law. He had begun his life as a criminal; laws were for other men, not the rich and powerful like Trofimov. As long as he was smart enough not to get caught, and he had always been smart enough not to get caught, he could do as he willed, pay whom he wished to kill whom he wished. It was the way of things. Simple violence solved many problems. Complicated, crafty, deceitful violence…well, that solved so much more. And of what use was power if it wasn’t applied, used to shape the world in the way the man wielding that power saw fit? That was, after all, what had first attracted Trofimov to wielding power over others: the ability to manipulate and shape the world by affecting the will of other men and women. He let his hatred guide him. He would shape the world.

He started by infiltrating and then co-opting most of the Peace At Any Cost group. It was the largest and had the most influence on the antimilitary scene within the United States, a fact born out by the copious research his people at TBT News conducted at his direction. It was simple enough to liberate from the group those members willing to take the next step, to use actual violence in fighting the hated American military and what it represented. Trofimov himself had selected the first targets. He had made certain that these baby killers, these returning war criminals, knew that they weren’t safe in their own country, weren’t safe from the horrors they had inflicted overseas.

He hadn’t counted on the American government covering up the crimes, however. This robbed his murders of the impact they were to have. He fought his propaganda campaign on many fronts, including spreading and sensationalizing the reports of the latest high-profile military atrocities, and he manufactured these accordingly when it was required. This helped, but it didn’t fully compensate for the covered-up killings of returning military personnel. Then TBT News had run a report on the growing popularity of protests of military funerals, and Trofimov had another stroke of brilliance. He had his PAAC people use their groups to promote more such protests, and when the time was right, he had the elements within PAAC that he controlled break away and begin the killings anew.

Of course, the peace activists were difficult to control, and had no training in violence or the use of weapons. That didn’t matter. Trofimov had access to more than enough men and matériel to train and direct these useful idiots. He had called in his mercenaries and made sure they knew what he wanted, then allowed them to run the operations as they saw fit. He still suggested targets, but on the whole, the operation ran without his direct involvement. This was good; it increased the level of plausible deniability he held, further insulating him from exposure, keeping him and his reputation safe while his people brought his will to fruition.

But all of this was just the start. It was a taste of what was to come, the barest tip of the operations his personnel were running. When Trofimov actually stopped to consider the vast scope of the operation, the world-changing audacity of it, it awed even him. It was a fitting life’s work, as he saw it. It was an appropriately bold testament to the power wielded by one Yuri Trofimov, and the legacy left behind by the application of that power would be a different world. That world would be one in which the United States military, humiliated and diminished, would have far less power over the lives of every other person on the planet…and thus, the United States, the West itself, would be diminished. That was Trofimov’s goal and his life’s work. That was, he had decided some years earlier, the true end goal of his life, the end toward which the means of his wealth was working. He would not fail.

He would change the world.

The clearing of a throat broke him from his introspection. He swiveled in his chair again, facing the interior of his office, and steepled his fingers.

Trofimov frowned as he looked over his guests. These men were, truthfully, really more employees than guests, but he prided himself on his cultivated manners, and so he treated them as if they weren’t simply hired help. Yuri Trofimov might be nouveau riche in the eyes of what passed for aristocratic society in this part of Florida, but manners were as important to him as all the rest, the trappings and the plans and the plots and the schemes. He was a rich man, first and foremost; he could afford himself a few affectations, could allow himself a few indulgences and even pretenses.

“You just gonna sit there mooning all day?”

Trofimov’s frown deepened as he focused on the speaker. Gareth Twain lounged insolently in the nearest padded office chair. Trofimov spared him a withering glance and then scanned the other visitors to his high-rise office. He had taken little notice of them when they filed into the room; now he supposed he would have to deal with them.

One of Twain’s people, an agitated Korean, paced back and forth by the door. In the lounge chair on the facing wall, cigarette smoke curling up to the ceiling, Mak Wei watched with feigned indifference. Mak was yet another Chinese operative late of the People’s Liberation Army. Trofimov had enough information on Mak and his handlers to know that the Chinese had tried more than once to mount plausibly deniable operations on American soil. Trofimov also gathered that several of Mak’s predecessors hadn’t fared well, either failing in their missions directly and fatally, or failing only to return to China to face the wrath of their superiors. Trofimov hadn’t bothered to look too deeply into this; it would have nettled Mak to discover the probing, anyway, and the man was touchy enough at the best of times. Trofimov supposed he didn’t blame him, given just how notorious the Chinese government was when it came to operations of this type.

The shaven-headed Twain, who looked and dressed like a surly stevedore, was head of the many mercenary forces in Trofimov’s employ. He performed his work well, and always did as asked with no complaints and no argument. Trofimov imagined he could tell Gareth Twain to drive to the nearest elementary school and shoot dead every child on the playground, and Twain would merely quote a price before calmly leaving to perform the deed. It wasn’t clear to the businessman exactly why Twain did what he did, or what the man cared about. Perhaps he cared about nothing; perhaps he had no goals save the earning of money through the relative ease of his casual brutality. It didn’t matter to Trofimov—though Twain’s arrogant, cavalier manner irritated him. The big, ruddy, bullet-headed Irishman seemed always to be laughing at him, and at everyone else he met. Trofimov imagined that this was because, in his mind, Twain was picturing the murder of every human being he encountered. The Russian could live with that. The money he paid Twain kept the man in check, or at least directed his madness toward the targets of Trofimov’s choosing.

The slight, dark-haired, sallow-skinned and physically gaunt Mak Wei was more of a mystery personally, but his personal motivations were irrelevant. Mak was a Chinese operative, and thus he did as he was told. His goals were the goals of his government. In this case, Communist China wanted very much to see the power of the United States diminished, so much so that it was willing to risk running black operations such as Mak’s current mission. The agent was funneling Chinese equipment and munitions to Twain’s mercenaries, and providing Chinese security personnel of his own to augment Twain’s forces. Both men, working in concert, pursued the goals Trofimov set for them. Mak was smart enough to know that Trofimov’s master plan was sound but, more important, he knew he had to allow for a certain degree of distance between his government and Trofimov. That meant that whenever possible, he would defer to Trofimov so that his government wasn’t directly involved in the violent actions that resulted.

Trofimov had first made contact with the Chinese through diplomatic back channels years before. Communist China was the last of the truly powerful, centralized command nations. If the world were to have a new superpower, it would have to be China; only China was poised to fill the vacuum that would be left by a faltering United States. At first, Trofimov’s overtures were rebuffed. As he grew in power and influence, however, China’s government began to take notice. Eventually they had assigned Mak Wei to Trofimov, and a very profitable alliance was born. Through Mak, the Chinese supported Trofimov’s efforts. When America ultimately fell, it was the Chinese who would benefit. Trofimov knew that the gratitude he hoped would be shown him by the resulting Chinese superpower wasn’t guaranteed. That didn’t worry him, however. His own power would be as great, if not greater, once America fell. He would be in a position to command China’s respect, if not its thanks. The world order that emerged would be closer to the one he desired, and that was really all that mattered to him. In this manner, Mak and his government were also “useful idiots,” after a fashion. The difference was simply that they weren’t stupid like the peace protesters Trofimov used so easily.

Trofimov finally spoke. “You requested this meeting, Gareth. You tell me what it is you want.”

“It isn’t what I want,” Twain said. “It’s a new wrinkle. A new problem.”

“Then tell us what it is,” Mak Wei said quietly, breathing out a plume of blue-white smoke, “and we can all address it that much more efficiently.”

“You’ve met Kwok Sun.” Twain jerked a thumb toward the man by the door. “Poor bugger’s gone and lost his brother, hasn’t he?”

“Lost him? How?” Trofimov asked.

“Jin was assigned to that bunch out in Wisconsin,” Twain said, “handling the PAAC splinter bunch.”

“They turned on him?” Trofimov asked.

“Nah, nah.” Twain shook his head. “He was ambushed. They moved on the funeral like you wanted. Full kit, armed to the teeth. Only, somebody was waitin’ for them. Shot down every one of the civvies, then ran down Kwok Jin and plugged him.”

“How do you know this?”

“Paid me an informant in the police department out there.” Twain grinned, as if this were the most brilliant maneuver ever conceived. The man’s mannerisms were that of a much less professional killer, and Trofimov knew this for the ruse that it was. Gareth Twain was cunning, vicious and completely pragmatic. He liked to be underestimated. It was habitual with him, Trofimov was sure.

“You are saying your men were intercepted by law enforcement?”

“Are you kidding me?” Twain was suddenly indignant. “First, they wasn’t my men, except for Jin. Second, no cop or even Fed, hell, not even a Royal loyal would ha’ done as this fellow did. Shot them all down without so much as even a by-your-leave, no warnings, no ‘Stop, police,’ or whatever the hell else. Just bang-bang-bang, you’re all dead, and Bob’s your uncle.”

“Spare me the colorful argot,” Trofimov said. “You forget that I know you’re not quite the Irish rube you pretend to be.”

Twain frowned, but wisely said nothing.

“This is an unfortunate complication,” Mak Wei put in, sucking the last of his unfiltered cigarette down to his stained fingers. “It could indicate that we—that you, Trofimov—have finally raised the attention of some governmental or legal entity. The operation could be in danger.”

“Not buyin’ it,” Twain said. “You know who I think it is? I think it’s the Mob. Some competing ‘interest,’ and the kinds of folks who don’t mind plugging a few of the other side’s boys to make a point.”

“That makes no sense,” Mak said disdainfully. “Why would a criminal concern care about political protests or political murders?”

“An investment in the status quo, perhaps,” Trofimov offered. “The Mafia and the CIA once worked together in an attempt to kill Castro, perhaps more than once. There are criminals, and there are patriots. They aren’t necessarily mutually exclusive.”

“Perhaps,” Mak conceded. “But you forget, I have knowledge of operations, of actions against United States interests, that you do not. The methods employed are brutal, yes. They are not consistent with the usual manner in which the Americans do things officially. Unofficially, my government is quite certain that elements at least affiliated with the United States government are quite prepared to use violence, and to use it preemptively and overwhelmingly to protect American interests.”

“What can you tell us about this?” Trofimov asked.

“Only what I have said just now. There are few specifics.”

“Well, that hardly helps us, does it?” Twain snapped. “And in the meantime now I’ve got to watch my back, and yours, and wonder where this trigger-happy goon is going to show next. The entire operation could be compromised.”

“Is that a problem, Twain?” Trofimov asked directly. “Are you saying you aren’t up to the challenge?”

“Not hardly.” Twain grinned wolfishly. “I’m just warning you. It’s going to get bloody.”

“Then let it get bloody,” Trofimov said. “Now go, and do what I pay you to do.”

CHAPTER FIVE

The neighborhood around the assembly plant outside Cedar Rapids was fairly sparse and largely industrial. Mack Bolan was grateful for that; it reduced the chances of innocents wandering into the cross fire. He parked his rental truck a block away, scanning the area for threats and spectators. He saw no one.

The care package he had requested from the Farm was in a hard-shell case in the back of the truck. It was a Tavor TAR-21 assault rifle fitted with a 40 mm M-203 grenade launcher. The 5.56 mm modular Israeli bullpup-style rifle, which looked like something out of a science-fiction movie. This gas-operated select-fire rifle had a cyclic rate approaching fifteen rounds per second on full automatic. The compact weapon, coupled with the power of the grenade launcher, was just the thing for the mission on which Bolan was embarking.

The soldier made sure his movements were concealed within the rear of the truck, checked his weapons and slung the Tavor along the side of his body. The weapon wasn’t truly concealed, but it didn’t need to be. Bolan intended to make a significant first impression, and fast. He slung his OD canvas war bag across his chest on its broad shoulder strap, making sure his extra magazines, explosives and other weapons were in place in the bag and in the pockets of his combat blacksuit. He didn’t bother to don his field jacket.

A parking lot fronted the assembly plant. Three or four cars were parked here; none of them was remarkable. Bolan gave them a casual glance as he passed, stopping at the double doors to the plant itself. He pushed one open and quietly stuck his head inside, looking left and then right.

Nothing.

The foyer was empty, the floors a dusty and ancient linoleum that hadn’t seen a good waxing in years. Bolan walked through the first set of doors and paused, peering through the gap between the inner doors. Beyond, he could see a fairly typical light industrial area. Workbenches were arrayed across the plant floor, which had a high ceiling and walls dotted with dusty, multipaned windows. Many of the windows were painted over. Fluorescent lights suspended from the high ceiling buzzed and cast a greenish-yellow hue over the interior. At the rear of the floor space, which was at the far end of the building, Bolan saw a sign that read, simply, Office.

The benches held many cardboard boxes, plastic racks and rows of what, from this distance, appeared to be circuit boards. Men in casual street clothes—Bolan looked carefully, but saw no women—were standing among the benches, half-crouched as they bent over their work. Some of them wore magnifying lenses on straps around their heads, presumably for seeing the fine details of complicated work.

In short, the plant looked like exactly what it was supposed to be.

Bolan was mildly surprised by that. He had expected to see something far more nefarious. He started to back out the way he came in, careful to keep the Tavor out of sight behind his leg.

A shadow moved on the other side of the door, and Bolan’s combat instinct prompted him to hit the floor. A bullet burned past him. The gunner on the other side of the double doors continued to shoot through the barrier, apparently sighting through the gap between them.

Bolan rolled out of the path of the bullets, bringing up the Tavor, surging to his feet. He angled his fire down, careful to avoid indiscriminately spraying the room beyond the doors, instead triggering a withering blast at knee level. The gunner on the other side of the doors screamed.

The soldier kicked the doors in, stepping over the writhing gunman as he did so. The workers beyond scrambled for cover. Pausing over the wounded man, Bolan kicked his handgun away.

“No one move!” he ordered. “Lay down your weapons and place your hands behind your head!”

Movement from two directions caught his eye. A stream of full-auto fire, the unmistakable, hollow metallic clatter of Kalashnikov rifles, ripped through the space, shredding the components on top of several benches between the shooters and Mack Bolan. The soldier dived and rolled to the side, angling toward a heavy metal rolling toolbox. The toolbox rang like a bell as 7.62 mm fire from the assault rifles ripped into it.

The Executioner fished a flash-bang grenade out of his war bag, considered it and grabbed a second. He yanked the pins from each bomb in succession, then whipped the grenades in opposite directions, toward the points of fire converging on his location. Curling his chin into his chest, he squeezed his eyes shut, opened his mouth and covered his ears.

The searing flashes were accompanied by a deafening wallop. Even though he was prepared for it, Bolan’s ears were ringing in the wake of the powerful light-and-sound explosions. He surged to his feet, breaking cover with the Tavor’s integrated red-dot sight seeking targets. The first AK gunner had dropped his rifle and was holding his eyes, staggering back and forth in place. Bolan put a 5.56 mm round through his head and made a quarter turn, bringing the second man into line. That man was starting to recover, and clawed for a handgun in his waistband. Bolan burned him down with a short burst.

The soldier checked his six, then each point of the compass, assessing his surroundings. Somewhere, a worker whimpered. Bolan tracked the noise and found a twentysomething man with lanky blond hair, dressed in a flannel shirt and ripped jeans. He was cowering under one of the workbenches. He still wore a wrist strap connected to a ground wire, a precaution against electrostatic discharge.

Bolan gestured with his rifle. “You.”

The young man’s eyes went wide. He looked left, then right, crouched on his back in a near fetal position. “M-m-me?” he stammered.

“You.” Bolan nodded. “How many armed guards?”

“What?”

“Armed guards. Men with firearms. How many in this facility?”

“J-ju…just those two,” the young man managed to tell him. “Plus the guy at the door. Jesus, you killed them. You killed them both.”

“Stay with me,” Bolan said, kicking one of the man’s feet with his own combat boot. He didn’t bother to point out that he hadn’t, in fact, killed the door guard. “Focus, kid. Why were they here? Why attack me?”

“I don’t know,” the young man admitted. “We…we just work here, man. We just work here.”

“Work here doing what? What are you building?”

“How should I know?” the man said, indignant. “They give us the specs and we build the boards. I don’t ask. I get paid by the board. I just do my job.”

“Get up,” Bolan said. “Get the rest of the workers together. Get out of here.”

“Why?” the kid asked, pulling himself up, using the workbench for support. He was rapidly regaining his composure; it was dawning on him that Bolan didn’t intend to kill him.

“You’re out of a job, kid,” Bolan told him. “Get the others and get gone. Don’t make me tell you again.”

The young man did not need any further urging. He ran among the benches, grabbing each of his fellow assemblers, urging them on and even shouting at them when they hesitated. Under Bolan’s watchful eye, the workers hit the bullet-pocked double doors and ran for it.

The numbers were ticking down in the soldier’s head. One of those workers was bound to call the police, if a silent alarm hadn’t already been triggered. He thought it unlikely, though, that there was such an alarm, at least not one connected to local law enforcement. Those whose facilities were guarded by gunmen wielding presumably illegal, full-auto Kalashnikovs probably didn’t welcome police involvement in their affairs.

Still, one of the assemblers was probably on a wireless phone to the cops right now. Bolan would have only a little time before the place was overrun.

The wounded gunman was still rolling around on the floor, holding his legs and groaning. Bolan walked up and stood over him, the Tavor held loosely in one hand, the barrel of the rifle pointed at the man’s forehead.

“I want to know everything you know about your employers and this facility,” Bolan said. “I don’t have a lot of time. If you can’t tell me anything, your usefulness to me is limited. If I have to hurt you to make you talk, I will.” This was a bluff, of course; Bolan, the man once known as Sergeant Mercy, would never torture a helpless, unarmed and wounded man. The Executioner had seen far too many victims of torture and interrogation in the course of his personal war. He would never join the ranks of the butchers who did such things to prisoners. This particular prisoner, however, couldn’t know that.

“Don’t, man, don’t,” the gunner said, clenching his teeth through the pain. “I got nothin’ here.… Let me—”

The revolver appeared in the man’s hand as if by magic, pulled from a holster in his waistband, behind his hip. Bolan triggered a single round from the Tavor into the man’s head, the shot echoing across the assembly plant floor.

Searching the dead man’s pockets, Bolan finally found something of value: a laminated identity card bearing the corporate logo of a company called Security Consultants and Researchers. The letters SCAR were emblazoned in heavy block letters across the bottom of the card, which also bore the man’s name. Bolan took a moment to remove his secure phone, snap a digital photograph of the card and transmit the image to the Farm. He took and sent a picture of the dead man, too, for confirmation of ID if nothing else.

There wasn’t much more time. Bolan began to move among the assembly tables, snapping photos of the components he saw waiting there. These, too, were transmitted automatically to the Farm for analysis. He gave the rest of the room a cursory search, then paused outside the door to the office, ajar by perhaps two inches.

Standing to one side of the threshold, he reached out and gave the door a push. As he yanked his hand back, a shotgun blast ripped through the flimsy hollow-core door, throwing splinters in every direction. There was the unmistakable sound of a pump-action shotgun being racked. A second blast, deafening in the close quarters, followed the first.

Bolan wasted no time. As the gunner beyond desperately racked his pump shotgun again, the soldier planted a combat-boot sole in what was left of the door, shoving it aside as he plunged through. The man standing in the cluttered office looked up in stark terror as the soldier hurtled toward him. Bolan slammed the butt of the Tavor into the shotgunner’s head. He collapsed without a sound. The shotgun hit the floor, its action still open, another round from the tubular magazine waiting to be pushed into the chamber.

The man was dazed but not completely unconscious. Bolan propped him up against the scarred wooden desk that dominated the little office. A name tag on the man’s stained and rumpled white, button-down shirt read Hal West, Manager. He didn’t have the look of a professional; he looked like exactly what he was, the manager of a mechanical assembly plant. Bolan searched the man’s pockets and turned up a wallet, a pair of car keys and a few other personal items. Bolan found a pair of glasses in a vinyl case in the man’s shirt pocket. He took these out, unfolded them and placed them on West’s face.

“West,” Bolan said. He snapped his fingers in front of the man’s face a few times.

“Wha…?” West sputtered.

“West,” Bolan said more forcefully. “Wake up.”

“Who…who are you?” West managed to focus on the soldier.

“I’m with the government,” Bolan said. He risked flashing his Justice credentials. It was a test, and he wasn’t disappointed. West’s eyes went wide and he visibly paled.

“You…you’re…”

“That’s right,” Bolan said. “You just took a shot at a government official.”

“I’m sorry!” West blurted. “I didn’t know! I thought… I mean… I thought you were…”

“Slow down,” Bolan said, though he was keenly aware that his own time was running out. He would have to move fast if he wanted to get out of the building before becoming entangled with the local law.

“They just told us to keep an eye out,” West stated. “They said if anyone ever showed up and got violent, it was the terrorists. We couldn’t trust the workers, of course, but I brought the shotgun in from home, kept it here in the office.”

“Terrorists?” Bolan asked. “What terrorists?”

“You don’t know? That isn’t why you’re here?”

“Why don’t you tell me,” Bolan said.

“The parts—” West gestured toward the wrecked door “—the assemblies. We’re making transmitters.”

“Transmitters,” Bolan said. “Not, say, parts for DVD players.”

“No, no,” West said. “That’s the cover. That’s what they told us to say if anybody asked. They said it was top secret. The folks on the floor didn’t know, just management. Just me.”

“Who is ‘they,’” Bolan said, “and what exactly did they tell you?”

“Consolidated Funding and Liability,” West said. “That’s who pays us, anyway. That’s who hired me to run this place. They told me it was top secret, told me I would be helping my country. They said the transmitters are used by the Department of Defense. Missiles or something, hell, I don’t know. I didn’t need to know. The components showed up, and the plans were given to me, and my people just put the boards and everything else together. We didn’t need to know. It was better if we didn’t, they said.”

“Who at this Consolidated Funding and Liability did you actually talk to?” Bolan asked.

“Some guy.” West shrugged. “He said his name was Richard Smith, which I thought was strange.”

“Why?”

“He was Chinese,” West said. “Or Japanese, or Korean, or whatever. Beats me. But he had an accent and didn’t look like a Richard Smith to me. But I figure, the government, it has its secrets and its reasons.”

“How were you contacted to take this job?”

“I just answered an ad in the paper,” West said. “They told me I was hired, and then told me I was sworn to secrecy, and told me it was my patriotic duty not to tell anybody what was really being built here, because it was for defense. Of course, man, why wouldn’t I? I love my country. I’d never sell it out.”

“How did they know they could trust you?” Bolan asked.

“I guess they must have looked at my records,” West said. “I mean, I just assumed I have a file somewhere, you know? And they paid me a ton of money. A guy would have to be crazy not to take that deal. Six figures to watch the factory floor and not tell anybody we’re making transmitter parts. Seemed okay to me, and I’m as patriotic as the next guy. They arranged for the security guys, too. I figure they’re like, what, contractors, like those guys in Iraq, right? Those company guys who go over and guard convoys and stuff. They never talked much and I didn’t ask. Why did you shoot them?”

“Because they were trying to shoot me,” Bolan said. “West, forget everything you were told. This wasn’t a government facility. You’ve been duped, plain and simple.”

“I…what?”

“You weren’t protecting a government secret,” Bolan said. “I have my suspicions, but let’s just say you were working for the other side.”

“Oh, God,” West said. “You’re kidding. What, like terrorists?”

“It’s difficult to say,” Bolan said. “Don’t worry about it. Cooperate and everything will be fine.” He stood and helped the still-wobbling West to his feet. “Leave that shotgun right where it is. I suggest you get out of here and wait for the cops. Tell them what you told me. Are there any schematics or plans here?”

“Oh, God,” West said, ignoring the question. “Oh, God, I tried to shoot a cop.”

“I’m not a cop,” Bolan said.

“You might as well be!” West said. “Look, man, you gotta help me. You gotta make them understand when they get here. I was just trying to do my patriotic duty, man. The owners said that ecoterrorists might show up and want to take us down, something about lead in the circuit boards. I didn’t ever figure it would come to that. Man, man, you gotta help me. I wasn’t trying to kill a cop, honest!”

“I’m not a cop,” Bolan said. “Listen to me. Are there any schematics or plans here, any data on what you were building?”

“I’ve got them,” West said. He rummaged absently around on his desk before producing a flash drive, which he handed to Bolan. “This should have all the latest designs on it. They haven’t changed much. Everything’s very much at the component level. No real way to tell what these go into, or what they do beyond the most general.”

“All right,” Bolan said. “You should—”

“You! In the building!” a voice amplified by a megaphone shouted from outside. “Come out with your hands up!”

“They’re here already!” West said. He bolted before Bolan could grab him.

“Wait!” Bolan said.

“I have to make sure they understand!” West called, running. “I’m no cop killer!”

Bolan took off after him, but as West hit the double doors, the soldier had one of his battlefield premonitions, a flash of instinct. As he threw himself to the side of the doors, catching a glimpse of West running outside through the outer pair, he realized what had tipped him off. There had been no sirens.

The automatic gunfire cut down Hal West. Bringing up the Tavor, Bolan quickly loaded a 40 mm grenade in the launcher mounted under the barrel.

He waited for a lull in the gunfire, indicating the men outside were reloading. The Executioner had expected them to stagger their fire, but they were apparently overconfident in their numbers. He risked a quick peek around the edge of the doorway, through the mess of what had once been both sets of double doors.

Two gray Suburbans were parked out front. The men firing from behind the cover of those vehicles wielded M-4 assault rifles, dripping with accessories. Every weapon had an elaborate red-dot aiming system, foregrip, laser and flashlight pods, and a variety of other add-ons.

“There!” one of the armed men pointed in Bolan’s direction. The soldier ducked back behind cover as 5.56 mm bullets chipped away at the battered door frame.

He’d seen enough. He thrust the snout of the Tavor and its grenade launcher through the opening, trusting to luck and his own speed to prevent the weapon from catching a round, then he triggered it.

The grenade caught the lead Suburban, blowing apart the first quarter of the vehicle and sending hot shrapnel in every direction. As the explosion died away, the soldier could hear the screams of his enemies. There was more than one wailing voice. At least two, perhaps more of the shooters had been caught in the blast.

He reloaded the grenade launcher, then repeated the same rattlesnake-fast movement, shoving the nose of the weapon into the gap of the doorway and triggering a second grenade. The explosion, like the one before it, brought a wave of heat pressing through the shattered double doors. Bolan waited and was rewarded with a secondary blast of some kind. Something in one of the damaged vehicles, perhaps extra fuel, perhaps explosives, had caught and detonated.

Sparing the corpse of Hal West a final glance, the Executioner walked out into the flaming hellscape.

Bodies were scattered in and around the two burning vehicles. Some of the shrapnel had damaged two of the nearby parked cars, shattering their windshields and flattening a tire on the closer vehicle. Bolan checked each of the dead men, making sure no one was playing possum. He found only one man still alive, lying on his back behind one of the shattered trucks, staring into the sky trying to breathe with a collapsed lung. His shirt was soaked through with blood. An M-4 lay on the asphalt nearby, forgotten.

Bolan stood over him. He aimed the Tavor at the man’s head, one-handed.

“You’re…one…tough bastard,” the dying man gasped.

“Who do you work for?”

“Card’s…in my pocket,” the man said. Evidently, as death approached, he felt no compelling urge to remain loyal to his employers.

“SCAR?” Bolan asked.

“Yeah,” the man wheezed. “Was…Army.”

“And now you’re a mercenary,” Bolan guessed.

“Yeah.” The wounded man’s voice was growing weaker.

“Why?” Bolan asked. “What’s going on in there? What are you protecting?”

“Beats…hell…out of me.” The man grinned. “They…pay.”

“Was it worth it?” Bolan asked.

The dead man stared up at him, unseeing. He would never answer that or any other question.

The Executioner shook his head. They fought for money, and they died for nothing. He had seen it countless times.

Shaking his head again, the soldier shouldered his weapon and hurried back to his vehicle. There was much more work to be done.

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