Bolan sighted the compound with his grenade launcher

A camouflage tent erupted, the nylon a flaming blossom that disgorged smoke. Bolan slipped on a pair of goggles to protect his vision, pulling a scarf up over his nose and mouth to filter out the choking cloud created by his incendiary round.

With an inferno suddenly ablaze in their midst, the militia gunmen were distracted. Billowing clouds spread through the gap created by Spelling earlier, pouring out over the pair.

“Move in,” Bolan ordered.

Spelling and Bolan charged into the churning cloud, slipping among the militia members. They had finally breached the compound, but the militia was on one side and the commandos were at their back.

The Executioner didn’t mind. He’d engineered the crossfire between the two groups. The chaos and confusion were his protective cloak, enabling him to continue his mission of cleansing fire.

Patriot Acts

The Executioner®

Don Pendleton

www.mirabooks.co.uk

Special thanks and acknowledgment to Doug Wojtowicz for his contribution to this work.

Let us take a patriot, where we can meet him; and, that we may not flatter ourselves by false appearances, distinguish those marks which are certain, from those which may deceive; for a man may have the external appearance of a patriot, without the constituent qualities; as false coins have often lustre, though they want weight.

—Samuel Johnson 1709–1784

I’ve seen too many men who have wrapped themselves in the cloak of false patriotism to excuse their bloodlust and greed. I will not shirk my duty to bring my full weight to bear upon them.

—Mack Bolan

THE MACK BOLAN LEGEND

Nothing less than a war could have fashioned the destiny of the man called Mack Bolan. Bolan earned the Executioner title in the jungle hell of Vietnam.

But this soldier also wore another name—Sergeant Mercy. He was so tagged because of the compassion he showed to wounded comrades-in-arms and Vietnamese civilians.

Mack Bolan’s second tour of duty ended prematurely when he was given emergency leave to return home and bury his family, victims of the Mob. Then he declared a one-man war against the Mafia.

He confronted the Families head-on from coast to coast, and soon a hope of victory began to appear. But Bolan had broken society’s every rule. That same society started gunning for this elusive warrior—to no avail.

So Bolan was offered amnesty to work within the system against terrorism. This time, as an employee of Uncle Sam, Bolan became Colonel John Phoenix. With a command center at Stony Man Farm in Virginia, he and his new allies—Able Team and Phoenix Force—waged relentless war on a new adversary: the KGB.

But when his one true love, April Rose, died at the hands of the Soviet terror machine, Bolan severed all ties with Establishment authority.

Now, after a lengthy lone-wolf struggle and much soul-searching, the Executioner has agreed to enter an “arm’s-length” alliance with his government once more, reserving the right to pursue personal missions in his Everlasting War.

Contents

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Epilogue

Prologue

The man in black threaded the sound suppressor onto the end of his Beretta, set the safety and holstered the gun before turning his attention to the key weapon for this mission. The Beretta M-59 rifle was a paratrooper model, with a metal folding stock. Capable of precision accurate single-shot or devastating full-auto fire, its 7.62 mm rounds could slice through a human body with ease. There was a round in the chamber and the magazine was full.

He was here, in the heart of enemy territory to take out Mahmoud Amanijad. The Muslim firebrand was a vocal opponent of the United States government’s procedures in dealing with the terrorist threat that the man had sworn his life to oppose. Amanijad, speaking before the packed audience of fellow fanatics, had been behind a plot to unleash a wave of unholy destruction through the U.S.

The crusader pushed off the safety on the Beretta rifle, setting the selector to single shot, lining up on the target’s forehead.

Deep in enemy territory, surrounded by jack-booted, heavily armed thugs in the service of the radical, reactionary government, the lone warrior would need every ounce of firepower to escape the scene unscathed, but not before he sent a message to the enemies of freedom and justice everywhere.

The crowd was on its feet, cheering and applauding the divisive Amanijad, its combined voice and racket shaking the auditorium like an artillery barrage.

The dark-clad sharpshooter partly let out his breath, holding in half as he steadied the crosshairs on the center of Amanijad’s black-bearded face.

“Too long has America lashed out blindly for the sake of the nebulous concept of national security,” Amanijad began his speech, the crowd’s tumultuous response to his arrival on stage fading quickly so that his words could be heard. “In their insane efforts to protect the needs of their money-grubbing backers, they rob the people of their rights and their voice. We are here now to show them that we will not be silenced!”

It was a planned break in the speech. The crowd, as if on cue, exploded into a cacophony of cheers. It was exactly what the sharpshooter had been waiting for. The roar of the crowd at its crescendo would drown out the muffled crack of his rifle. The marksman milked the trigger of the scoped Beretta and a single 7.62 mm round shot out of the barrel, screaming across the auditorium from the catwalk to the stage.

The speaker seized up, his handsome, bearded face replaced by horrific gore. Amanijad slumped to the polished hardwood floor in a puddle of blood.

The sharpshooter watched uniformed thugs race onto the stage. One of them spotted the sniper and pulled his sidearm from a holster.

The crowd exploded in wild panic.

The Beretta, switched to full-auto, snarled, and a salvo of rifle slugs stitched through the bodyguard’s rib cage, throwing him across the speaker’s corpse. Other security guards spotted the flaring muzzle-flash of the full-auto rifle, and their hands dropped to their guns. The marksman shifted his aim, tapping off a short burst that ripped the head off a second auditorium gunman. He whirled and raced several feet, pistol-caliber bullets ringing and clanging on the metal railing and grating at his feet.

The rifleman paused and spun, firing back at the stage, short precision bursts raking two more uniformed shooters. The sniper turned and raced away.

He sped down the catwalk and kicked open an access door to the roof.

The blaze of the sun lanced down on him, and he felt as if he’d dived through the jet of a flamethrower, but he didn’t allow himself a moment’s respite. The uniformed shock troopers would call in helicopters and backup vehicles to contain him. One did not blow the head off one of the radical government’s beloved own without incurring the wrath of a highly motivated police force.

He closed the folding stock on the rifle and slid down a roof access ladder. It was sixty feet to the ground, and the descent, sliding on the rails, would take several seconds. Gravity pulled him as he glanced around, the battle computer in his mind counting down doomsday numbers as he anticipated the arrival of armed guards.

He reached the ground after ten seconds that felt like an eternity, landed in a crouch and pulled the pistol from its holster. A quick dash through the shadows behind the auditorium would bring him closer to his wheels and escape. His deeply tanned features and a pair of sunglasses would mark him as just another driver in this land.

He charged full-out, racing toward the vehicle. Normally on an operation like this, the marksman would have his pilot, a good man who had been working along-side him for years, sitting behind the wheel. Unfortunately, the wingman was otherwise occupied. The crusader was on his own, and that was okay. Cameron Richards had fought alone before, and he was good at it.

As he closed on his car, another vehicle pulled in front of him. A pair of terrified eyes locked on him, catching full sight of him before he’d pulled on his glasses to disguise his features. There was a brief moment of uncomfortable uncertainty, the vehicle’s engine rumbling.

Richards aimed at the driver, a woman whose brown eyes widened at the arrival of the gun-toting commando. She’d seen him, could identify him, could link him to the assassination and possibly to the U.S. government, making a messy political disaster. He pulled the trigger on the Beretta and punched a 9 mm bullet through the open window and into her face.

Richards vaulted across the hood of the dead woman’s car and raced to his getaway car. He climbed behind the wheel and fired up the engine.

Tires screeched as he tromped the gas, darting out of the alley and toward a main street. Even as he crossed two lanes, he spotted the shock troopers hot on his heels. Richards hefted the Beretta 59 and leveled it as an LAPD squad car wheeled toward his rear bumper. With a pull of the trigger, the window disappeared in a spray of glass. High-powered rounds tore through the policemen’s Kevlar vests, killing the driver and rendering the cop riding shotgun close enough to dead that he didn’t feel the impact as his out of control car slammed a parked van.

Richards grimaced, but he had anticipated such a response to his escape route. One police car down and his own wheels had lost their anonymity with the shattered rear window. He ran his car up onto the curb. Civilians scattered in panic. He burst out of the driver’s seat, leaving his Berettas behind and charging down into the subway. He discarded the cotter pin he’d yanked from the grenade he’d stuffed under his car’s seat.

At the top of the steps, the detonating automobile sprayed violence and horror into downtown Los Angeles. No one would be able to cut through the carnage left at the subway entrance.

The explosion also parted the crowd ahead of him. He had free sailing down to the platform and he vaulted the turnstiles. With the apocalypse detonating above him, the ticket agents weren’t interested in harassing him for his fare. Richards raced to the edge of the platform and jumped off, racing into the tunnels.

He’d stored a cache of clothes. It would take only thirty minutes to reach it and fade into the crowd.

One more enemy of the United States was dead, and the message was sent.

1

Mack Bolan looked over the reports Hal Brognola had assembled. The Executioner had been wrapping up business in San Francisco when Los Angeles became ground zero of an assault.

Bolan paused, looking at the photograph of the automobile where Rosa Trujillo had been murdered. The crime scene photos had been taken before the coroner had removed the body, and Bolan felt a knot of disgust form in his gut.

“Amanijad was a lawyer for the ACLU. He’d just achieved a court hearing for two Arab-Americans who were being held without charges,” Brognola explained.

Bolan glanced over to the lawyer’s photographs spread on the conference table. His frown deepened as he saw a photograph of a slain police officer, also murdered by the mystery assassin.

“He was sending a message,” Bolan stated.

“About what?” Brognola grumbled.

“This speech was in direct response to finally letting two men have their day in court,” Bolan said. “Someone didn’t want the particulars of that case heard.”

“I looked at the files on those arrests,” Brognola said. “It was sloppy, speculative work all around. Circumstantial evidence at best.”

Bolan nodded. “I heard about the case too. Three years without seeing a lawyer or even knowing what they were being charged with. They even spent some time in Camp X-Ray.”

“Interrogation results were inconclusive,” Brognola said.

Bolan picked up the photo detailing the carnage caused by the grenade in the assassin’s car. The shootings were acts of efficiency. Minimum firepower for maximum effect. The grenade itself provided a barrier of fire and catastrophe between police pursuit and the escaping killer. The cops would pause to help the dying and wounded, and be slowed with the hunk of burning metal barring the subway entrance.

It was a coldly efficient means of stopping the law.

He stacked the photos and inserted them back into the file folder. The images and information within were burned into his memory. He fought down his anger, cramming it into his reserves of strength to keep his mind clear and analytical. When the time came, the Executioner would take the death dealer down.

CARLO ADMUSSEN LIT UP a cigarette and caught a fierce glare from his partner, Maurice Einhard.

“Do you fucking see everything around you?” Einhard asked.

Admussen glanced around at the crates of rifles and grenades stacked around their warehouse. “Yup.”

“So the problem with starting a fire in the midst of all this fucking firepower doesn’t ring a bell?” Einhard snapped.

Admussen sighed. They’d had this argument hundreds of times. He wondered if they were becoming more like an old married couple than highly-respected black market arms dealers. “One spark in the wrong spot, and we’ll be blown clean to San Francisco,” he muttered.

“Don’t take that tone of voice with me, Carlo,” Einhard grumbled.

“They’re securely boxed, the roof has vents, and I’m here at the fucking desk, not out in the middle of our ammunition stockpiles. Rifles aren’t flammable and matches can’t set off a grenade,” Admussen retorted.

Einhard raised his hands in frustration and walked away.

Admussen tapped out some ashes and smirked.

From the shadows, Mack Bolan watched the two men bicker. When Einhard stormed away, leaving Admussen alone for a moment, he stepped from the shadows and wrapped a brawny forearm under Admussen’s chin. The limb cut off the man’s air and stopped the sudden cry of alarm in his throat.

“Hello, Carlo. You and I need to have words,” Bolan whispered.

Admussen croaked softly.

“Don’t make a sound,” Bolan warned him. He let the dealer feel the hard muzzle of his Desert Eagle against his kidney. “A hole through there will mean a slow, painful death.”

Bolan loosened his grasp on Admussen’s throat, and the death merchant took a deep breath. He glanced back, seeing the Executioner looming above him, features smeared with midnight black grease paint. Cold, deadly eyes stared out of the blacked-out face, pinning Admussen in his seat with the force of their intimidation.

“What do you need?” the gun dealer asked.

Bolan reached to Admussen’s right-hand drawer, pulling out a Glock. He stuffed it under his web belt, out of the black marketeer’s grasp. “Information.”

“I guess I can’t play dumb about why,” Admussen said.

Bolan shook his head. “Who bought the Berettas?”

“The guy didn’t have a name, unless you count Ben Franklin,” Admussen replied.

Bolan’s eyes narrowed. “Description.”

“Six feet. Brown hair. Brown eyes. Nondescript,” Admussen said.

Bolan frowned. “Got the money?”

Admussen looked at the wall next to Bolan. The Executioner saw the wall safe and gestured for the arms dealer to open it.

“We haven’t had a chance to get it laundered,” Admussen admitted. “Then the shooting happened, and I knew we’d be feeling heat. I didn’t realize that we’d be experiencing a visit from the boogey man. I was expecting ATF.”

Bolan looked out to the warehouse. Einhard was busy directing his men to pile crates into the trailers of eighteen-wheelers. “Hence the house cleaning?”

Admussen nodded. The safe door clicked, and Bolan leveled the Desert Eagle at the gun dealer’s stomach.

“Just in case you have another Glock in the safe,” Bolan warned. He opened the safe door, and sure enough, there was a handgun set next to the stacks of bills. It wasn’t a Glock, however. Bolan took the Colt Python and put it next to the Glock in his waistband. “Which is the stack of cash the buyer gave you?”

Admussen handed over a wrapped band. “I take it you’re not going to give me a receipt for that?”

Bolan glared and Admussen took a step back.

“Ten thousand dollars isn’t going to be much compensation for the lives lost because you supplied a psychopath,” Bolan stated. “Nor is it going to do much for the families now suffering thanks to your greed.”

Bolan put the cash in a plastic bag. Admussen realized that the Executioner was wearing surgical gloves. “All this money is good for is finding the madman. Prints, serial numbers. Trace evidence. I’ll find something.”

“And for that, you’ll leave me alone?” Admussen asked.

Bolan nodded.

“And I forget that I ever saw you,” Admussen added.

Bolan shook his head. “The next time you think about selling so much as a toothpick to terrorists, you remember me.”

Admussen’s lips tightened.

“Go out and help your buddy. Just don’t take your cigarette. I don’t want you blowing yourself up before you give me the pleasure,” the Executioner warned. “I’ll let myself out.”

Admussen walked through his office door. He reached the top of the stairs that led into the warehouse and looked back, but the big man had already melted into the shadows, gone from sight.

CAMERON RICHARDS got off the plane in Phoenix, Arizona, and his partner, Willem Noth, met him at the airport.

“What the fuck, Will?” Richards grunted as they met. Noth handed over a small nylon gym bag, containing Richards’s favorite pistol.

“Care to be more specific?” Noth asked.

“I thought we had presidential sanction in L.A.,” Richards grumbled.

“Plausible deniability,” Noth explained. “You can’t have the White House dancing a jig because we knocked out some Arab mouthpiece.”

Richards’s eyes narrowed. “So they have a manhunt going for me. I’m fucked.”

“Cam, you’re swearing again. Have you taken your medication?” Noth asked.

Richards eyed Noth, then grimaced. “Oh, sure. I feel betrayed, and the sudden reaction is ‘are you off your meds?’”

“You’re supposed to be taking your pills,” Noth told him. “You are an operative of the Rose Initiative. You have an image to uphold.”

“Image? As what? Some kind of vigilante loose cannon who isn’t worthy of praise?”

“Are you off your meds?” Noth inquired.

Richards closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “No.”

Noth looked at him closely. “Do you have your bottle?”

Richards fished in his pocket and took out an unmarked pill bottle. Noth pulled out his PDA and checked the contents against the readout he glimpsed.

“It’s almost time for your next dose. Humor me and take it five minutes early,” Noth said.

Richards opened the bottle and shook out two tablets. “Want one?”

“Fuck you and eat your damn pills,” Noth growled.

Richards tossed them into his mouth and swallowed. He opened his mouth and let Noth examine his cheek pouches and under his tongue for unswallowed tablets. “Happy? Let’s go get a Coke so I can wash the taste of these out.”

Noth nodded, pocketing his PDA. He took a deep breath, then raised an eyebrow.

The pair made their way to the food court, where Richards got a soft drink and an order of fries while Noth sat. The Rose Initiative operative pinched his nose as if searching thoughts trying to escape his nasal cavities.

“What’s on your mind?” Richards asked, sucking on his soda through a straw.

“Just thinking,” Noth said.

“I’m not going to be given up, am I?” Richards asked, popping a fry into his mouth. “The media’s howling for my head.”

“We’ve already got a half-dozen patsies in place, depending on where the investigation takes the government,” Noth explained. “All you have to do is lay low until we find you a new assignment.”

Richards looked at Noth, his mood darkening as he regarded the liar sitting across from him. “I know too much, despite being an overly medicated little minion,” he said.

“The smell from the pill bottle wasn’t right,” Noth admitted. “Don’t make a scene. I have a gun leveled at your gut under the table.”

“The Rose Initiative takes out a piece of trash, before it can be revealed that he’s their garbage, right?” Richards asked.

“What’d you do? Mold sugar pills to resemble the right medication?” Noth asked.

Richards nodded. “Not that it matters now. You’ve got the drop on me.”

Richards placed a fry between his lips, letting it dangle like a cigarette.

“Spit that out,” Noth ordered.

“Oh, come on, let the condemned have his last smoke,” Richards replied.

“Spit it out,” Noth growled.

Richards spat the fry with blow-gun force, zapping Noth in his left eye. The man’s reflexive jerk caused him to pull the trigger, but it also yanked his aim off target. The bullet seared into the lower spine of an elderly man sitting at the next table. The gunshot and the cry of agony created an uproar in the food court, giving Richards a chance to lunge across the table.

Noth realized he’d left himself wide open, despite the gun in his hand. He pulled the trigger again, but Richards had cleared the top of the table, thumbs rammed into Noth’s larynx, fingers closing on the back of his neck. The third shot plowed into the tiled floor, panic lashing out like a writhing mass of hungry crocodiles through the crowd. Footsteps thundered, screams mounting, drowning out the third gunshot. Richards wrenched with all of his might, Noth’s vertebrae shattering under the force of his powerful hands.

The gun clattered from dead fingers, and Richards charged through the crowd.

He had to contact his pilot, Costell, and get to the base he’d set up for himself. The Rose Initiative would be hot on his heels, and there was no telling what would happen next. Richards let himself be swept along by the running crowds, got out of the terminal and hailed a taxi.

He didn’t know why the Rose Initiative had been feeding him behavior modification drugs for the past fifteen years, but suddenly his assessment of the organization’s sanction left him alone and chilled. Richards had broken loose from their control, and that made him dangerous. The battles he’d waged across the turn of the millennium to protect his government from deadly threats had been real enough. The Initiative had a stockpile of mega-weaponry housed in its Washington, D.C., headquarters, enough matériel to render the surface of the planet uninhabitable for centuries.

Richards stuffed himself and his gym bag into the back seat of the cab.

“Where to?” the swarthy man behind the wheel asked.

Richards rattled off the name of a hotel he frequented while in town. He wouldn’t stay in the place, since the Initiative knew he’d go there, but he’d be able to find a dozen places to hole up from there. The cabbie nodded and steered out into traffic, cursing other drivers in his foreign tongue.

No wonder the President had swiftly condemned his actions in Los Angeles, Richards realized. The Rose Initiative had been using him as a puppet. A weapon to keep the public in the dark about the countless threats that were really endangering them. Richards’s covert wars kept American citizens from realizing the threats of Islamic operatives and foreign influences on U.S. soil. Rather than smear the menace across the headlines and news programs, they were quietly dealt with so that those who would profit from association with the devils could continue their underhanded deals.

It was all so clear now.

For decades, he’d been a dealer in death, and now, he knew that there was no way to take back the battles he’d waged that had enabled faceless government officials in power. Their chains hung around the American citizenry.

There had to be a way to break that relentless choke hold.

Richards knew of several militia groups who would throw in with him, powerful and trained allies who could help strike several small blows against the dictatorship he’d supported while drugged. Costell would also be a great ally, not to mention Colonel Weist and his mercenary forces.

Still, even with all that manpower, there was no way that Richards could strike a significant blow. The Rose Initiative was a monolithic force.

It would take a blow unlike anything that had been struck before.

Richards thought about the Initiative’s deadly stockpile of weapons of mass destruction. From horrendous, but specific plagues to ultra-low frequency transmitters that could instill murderous rage into entire city populations, they were tools which could carve a new future.

All Richards had to do was break into the stockpile.

That meant distractions, and high-tech equipment.

And an assault on Washington, D.C., itself.

The death dealer nodded, realizing that it would be a suicidal ploy to free the world from its hidden masters, but it would be worthwhile.

Richards realized he had to atone for his wrongs against America.

2

JoAnn Wolfe looked up from the microscope as she examined a sample from the stack of bills. The Los Angeles Crime Lab night shift was no less busy than any other time of the day, but Wolfe had been given a pass on new cases and assigned to examine the evidence sample brought in by Matt Cooper on behalf of the Justice Department.

Wolfe’s dark, red tinted hair was tied back and her smooth brow furrowed with a tiny cleft of a wrinkle between her eyes.

“What?” the Executioner asked.

“I’ve got fingerprints from two sources. Both are in our database. Einhard and Admussen. They’re arms dealers. Heard of them?” Wolfe asked.

Bolan nodded. “No fingerprints from anyone else?”

“Not even on the wrapper for the stack. Normally you get impressions, and while I have fingertip shapes, there are no whorls,” Wolfe said. “Unless this guy regularly trims his fingerprints, he should have left something, but I’ve got nothing.”

Bolan frowned. “Regular use of solvents would smooth out the ridges.”

Wolfe let him look through the microscope. There were round, featureless pads left by skin-based oils on the bill that hadn’t developed fingerprint patterns.

“What about the results on the serial numbers?” Bolan asked.

“That’s something else,” Wolfe replied. “They’re discontinued currency, bills originally scheduled for incineration because they were old and tattered.”

Bolan looked at the pristine, nearly perfect bill. “Old and tattered?”

“That’s according to treasury records,” Wolfe stated. “Of course, the look of this money doesn’t match the records. Granted, the date range on the bills are correct, but they’re so clean they could have been printed yesterday.”

“Maybe they were,” Bolan said.

“If they were counterfeit, they’d have to have access to the right paper and ink stocks, and the plate patterns are perfect,” Wolfe stated.

Bolan nodded. “The right paper style for the date range on these bills?”

“Perfect. But they’ve never been used,” Wolfe said.

“And they were scheduled for destruction?” Bolan asked.

“You think the originals might have been destroyed?” Wolfe asked.

“It’s not impossible. The retired printing machinery might have been acquired by someone else to make these bills,” Bolan stated. “And they could have printed up this cash using the discard list.”

“That’s an awful lot of work for ten thousand dollars,” Wolfe mused.

“Ten thousand in this stack, for this deal,” Bolan noted. “How out of date are those bills?”

“Twenty years old,” Wolfe told him. She chewed her lower lip. “So you’re saying the machinery that printed these notes has been used for at least twenty years?”

“What cheaper way to finance a black-bag operation than to print your own cash?” Bolan asked. “Especially if you’re using the money overseas. Ten thousand a mission, give it about eighteen missions a year,” he said.

“Three point six million, minimum,” Wolfe said. “Not counting local bribes, tickets, accommodations…”

“Paying for backup,” Bolan added. “Let’s call it five million in funny money. Officially printed on retired U.S. Treasury machinery. For a black-bag operation, it’d be obscenely cost-effective.”

“That’s just one operative,” Wolfe noted. “How many organizations have only one top spook?”

Bolan nodded. “They’d be given similar budgets.”

His cell phone warbled and he plucked it from his pocket. “Cooper.”

“Striker,” Hal Brognola’s voice greeted him on the other side. “We have a possible incident in Phoenix involving our quarry.”

“So he did get on a flight at LAX,” Bolan noted.

“It’s likely. We have an unknown body at the airport food court,” Brognola said. “I’ve got local FBI agents running his fingerprints, but they couldn’t get any.”

“Just like our shooter,” Bolan told the man from Justice. “The guy removed his fingerprints. We got tip impressions, but no identifiable markings on the bills or the wrapper.”

“So we’re talking about a serious covert operation,” Brognola said.

“That’s what Wolfe’s thinking. They’re using authentic printing machinery and supplies to cook up their own cash for their operations,” Bolan said.

“Damn,” Brognola grumbled. Bolan could hear his friend gnawing at the end of his cigar on the other end of the line.

“Can you get me to Phoenix?” Bolan asked.

“Chances are that our killer’s flown the coop,” Brognola stated.

“It’d get me closer to him,” Bolan said. “I might be able to figure something out.”

“Jack’s just landed at LAX. With the Gulfstream, you could fly to Moscow if you wanted,” Brognola said. “Granted, I hope you don’t have to.”

Bolan glanced through the window of Wolfe’s lab, seeing four men in dark suits and sunglasses get off an elevator. They had visitor badges, and U.S. Treasury IDs hanging from their suit lapels.

“Jo, did the Treasury Department say anything about sending someone over to pick up the cash you ran through their listing?” Bolan asked.

Wolfe looked up from the money. “No. In fact they only wanted me to keep a couple bills for them. The rest I was told to break down for chemical composition testing. As long as I gave them the results—”

“Get down!” Bolan snapped.

The four men spotted the Executioner and his crime lab compatriot, and pulled submachine guns out from under their jackets. The only T-men Bolan knew who carried compact subguns were the Secret Service agents assigned to presidential protection details. Four counterfeiting investigators wouldn’t require that kind of firepower, especially when paying a visit to the LAPD.

Bolan lunged across the table and knocked Wolfe to the floor an instant before the safety glass of the lab blew into translucent chunks. Wolfe grimaced, Bolan’s weight crushing down on her for only an instant before he rolled off. The Desert Eagle filled his hand and he snapped off the safety with practiced skill.

Wolfe pulled her sidearm from her own holster, a .45-caliber Glock 30.

“Stay down,” Bolan snarled. Whoever the gunmen were, they were disciplined. The streams of autofire were relentless, meaning that they were staggering their bursts, allowing their partners to reload.

Bolan guessed the position of the elevator through the low aluminum wall. At least one hose of 9 mm autofire came from that direction and the Executioner triggered his Desert Eagle, burning off the massive handgun’s .44 Magnum payload. A scream of agony and a stutter in the constant cacophony of automatic weapon fire rewarded Bolan as the 240-grain slugs punched through the slim metal skin of the lab.

“Bastards toasted my microscope,” Wolfe snarled. “I want a piece of them.”

“I get first crack. If they somehow get past me, they’re all yours,” Bolan replied. He dumped the partially spent magazine and fed it a fresh stick.

“Hand over the cash and no one gets hurt!” came a bellow. Bolan grabbed a stool and swung it up through the shattered window. Uzi fire rattled, perforating the vinyl-clad seat. The angle betrayed the shooter’s position and Bolan popped up. The front sight of the Desert Eagle locked on the Uzi-packing fake Fed. A single .44-caliber round slammed the gunman in the chest, hurling him to the floor. Bolan swiveled and saw a third gunman line up on him.

More thunderbolts ripped from the Desert Eagle, but the raider dived back into the elevator.

Wolfe lunged and shouldered Bolan to the floor as another rattling snarl of gunfire swept through the window. She grunted, spinning and clutching her shattered shoulder.

“He’s still kicking,” the scientist rasped as she tried to control the bleeding.

“Body armor,” Bolan mused.

“Head shot,” she suggested.

Bolan didn’t waste the breath to let her know how obvious the advice was. He sighted on the perforated low wall and saw the flicker of movement through the bullet holes torn by the fake T-man. The Desert Eagle hammered out a rumbling thunderstorm of heavy slugs. Four rounds smashed through the sievelike wall panel, blowing it over. On the other side, the Uzi-packing man slumped lifeless, half of his face ripped off by a wide-mouthed hollowpoint round. The gun lay silenced between splayed legs.

A cabinet shuddered as more submachine gun fire rattled from the direction of the elevator.

“My paperwork,” Wolfe groaned. Her face was screwed up in pain. “Dammit, stop shooting my files!”

Bolan rose to his feet and aimed at the gunman he’d nailed in the legs. The man swung his Uzi and pulled the trigger, but the weapon was empty. The Executioner vaulted over the cabinet and the low wall, spearing through the window. The third and fourth shooters were nowhere to be seen. He saw the wounded gunman struggling to reload his Uzi, but Bolan kicked the weapon from his hands and smashed his heel against the man’s jaw on the swing back. Lab staff members came running.

“Officers! Secure this man!” Bolan snapped. “Get a medic for CSI Wolfe!”

“They moved out that way,” a technician said. She held the side of her face, a shredded strip of skin livid from where she’d been pistol-whipped with an Uzi. “There’s a controlled access stairwell, but they shot the lock to shit.”

“I’m on it. Someone get on the radio and tell everyone to keep out of these guys’ way,” Bolan ordered. “They don’t care who they kill.”

“And you?” the hurt tech asked.

“I keep them from killing,” Bolan said, racing off toward the stairwell.

3

The Executioner heard the gunmen’s thundering footsteps below him in the stairwell. Bolan took the flights fast and furious, hopping when he was halfway down and rolling along the walls to eat up his forward momentum and get turned around to take the next flight. He was almost to the second floor when he heard the emergency exit slam open one floor below.

Bolan swung around and saw a dark-suited fake Treasury agent swing up his machine pistol. He lurched backward. A stream of 9 mm slugs filled the air where his head had been only moments ago, plaster chewed out of the under-sides of the stairs above his head. He aimed his Desert Eagle and spiked a quartet of .44 Magnum slugs at the shooter. There was a snarled curse of panic as the man retreated.

Bolan bounded down the final steps as he holstered the big handgun and pulled his shoulder-holstered Beretta. The two men, posing as federal agents, had infiltrated the Los Angeles Crime Lab in an effort to gain control of counterfeit cash that Bolan was investigating. The two had survived the initial conflict, and the Executioner was going to keep the pair from escaping.

At the bottom of the steps, he burst into an alley and spotted the pair piling into their car. The Executioner raised the Beretta and ripped off a 3-round burst that took out the rear window of the car. They had a driver waiting behind the wheel, and he gunned the engine, tires spewing smoke before they caught hold and pushed the car forward.

Hot pursuit time, Bolan mused as he charged the length of the alley, punching more rounds, this time ripping 9 mm bullets into the road by the tires. After two tribursts, the right rear tire of the sedan exploded violently, flopping on its rim. The right fender screeched, wailing as it was shredded on contact with the wall, pulled off course by the deflated ring of floppy rubber.

Gunshots tore through the rear window, automatic weapons in the hands of the fake Feds churning out slugs. Had the driver not been in a struggle to maintain control of the limping sedan, the gunmen could have nailed the Executioner as he charged after them. But rather than hit their target, autofire sprayed wildly. As it was, the sedan ground to a halt, the front bumper rammed into a telephone pole. The driver ground the stick shift, trying to get the car into Reverse.

Bolan fired again, sinking another burst through the rear window, and suddenly the two muzzle-flashes became one. Bolan ducked behind a large garbage bin and reloaded his Beretta, knowing that at full gallop, he couldn’t have been certain of a direct, fight-stopping hit on one of his opponents. Rather, it was likely that the silent weapon needed recharging, or had jammed.

Sure enough, a handgun took up the slack of the quieted Uzi. Bolan took a moment as bullets hammered the garbage bin, drew and tapped off his Desert Eagle with a few deft movements. He swung around the side with the Beretta and the .44 Magnum pistol in each hand. The sedan lumbered relentlessly back toward him, the enemy driver trying to turn his car into a missile.

The Executioner’s handguns blazed out thunderbolts of Magnum firepower and sputtering lightning jolts of 9 mm bursts, ripping a dozen slugs into the charging beast. Then he whirled and jammed himself in the walkway between two structures.

The sedan bulldozed past, hurtling the garbage bin onto its side with a thunderous crash.

“Luke! Don’t stop shooting!” a voice cried from the dark car. The rear passenger door was visible to Bolan in the walkway, and he could see an Uzi-toting man kneeling on the backseat. Bolan raised his Desert Eagle and fired twice. The second bullet was insurance in case the window deflected the first shot, but both Magnum slugs detonated gory holes through the gunner’s back, sprawling him across his wounded partner.

“Stop the car!” Bolan shouted.

The driver leaned back to the rear of the car, leveled a pistol and opened fire. Bolan hit the sidewalk as slugs ripped into the brick around him, knocking loose explosions of stone splinters that rained down on him.

The sedan lurched forward, mangled metal chewing at the front tire, but the driver managed to wrestle some speed out of the damaged car.

Bolan burst into the alley and continued the chase as the enemy driver urged his wheels along. Wrecked as it was by impacts and tire-shredding bullets, the automotive dinosaur finally slowed enough to make foot pursuit possible.

But the driver suddenly jammed the car crosswise at the end of the alley, forming a barrier. The two survivors got out. One was hobbled by a bullet wound that had torn a chunk of muscle out of his thigh. The driver hooked his arm under the wounded man’s and lurched into the street, aiming his handgun at the windshield of a passing SUV.

Bolan reached the alley’s end and vaulted over the car, just as the driver deposited his wounded partner into the SUV. On the ground a woman, her chest bloody, gasped as she clutched the spreading dark smear. The Executioner stopped long enough to see if there was anyone else in the vehicle who could be a hostage. Bolan’s pause to ensure the safety of innocents provided time for the fleeing driver to swing his pistol around and open fire. The driver blazed away at the Executioner and forced him to race in a serpentine charge for the nearest available cover. Bullets smashed the concrete at Bolan’s heels.

The Executioner fired at the grille of the stolen SUV, hoping his Desert Eagle would have enough punch to render the massive V-8 engine useless to the escaping murderers. If he could force the pair into retreat, he could check on the woman and apply emergency first aid.

The driver was a wily, quick snake, however, diving into the seat well and jamming on the gas with his hand. The SUV lurched and rocketed down the street.

Bolan raced to the wounded woman.

“Can you talk?” he asked.

She winced, and blood trickled from her nose. The right side of her chest showed a ragged laceration, indicative of a glancing wound through her upper chest. The bullet went in, but had deflected off a rib bone and exited the side of her chest, slashing across her biceps. It was a grisly injury, but survivable. A closer examination showed that her nose was swollen from a brutal impact. Bolan was relieved to see that the nasal trickle wasn’t bright red as if from an injured lung.

Bolan looked at the SUV as it disappeared into the distance.

A trio of LAPD squad cars screeched to a halt. The Executioner had his Justice Department badge around his neck, but he still held his hands up as the cops got out.

“Agent Cooper, FBI!” he announced. “Get this woman an ambulance.”

HENRY COSTELL PICKED UP Cameron Richards in a nondescript, rusted old van. Richards didn’t have to ask if his pilot and wheelman made certain that the vehicle was clean of any tracers or identifying features.

“Los Angeles was a screw job, Hank,” Richards explained. “I think I was set up for a fall.”

“It means they’ll want to retire me and the others, too,” Costell said. His close-cropped blond hair was a fuzz on top of his round, big-eared head.

“I can’t believe that after all we’ve given them…” Richards said. He took a deep breath, putting the frustration away for later. “I’ve saved this country from countless threats.”

“You’ve saved the whole world,” Costell explained. “It doesn’t matter. The weaklings in government aren’t strong enough to do what has to be done against the hordes hemorrhaging through our southern border, or the maniacs in the Middle East.”

“Don’t even get me started on some of the shit we’ve seen in China,” Richards whispered. “Hell, we’ve seen so many things that could destroy the world that we wouldn’t have to look far.” He paused for a moment.

“Why not?” Richards asked.

“Why not what?” Costell asked. “Destroy everything we’ve worked for?”

“We know enough to destroy the puppet masters,” Richards said. “The ones who’ve been pulling our strings, the ones who’ve been pulling the strings of our enemies. We could take out the whole set of them, maybe give this world another chance.”

Costell pulled into a parking lot and turned off the engine. “They’ll kill us, no matter what we do,” he admitted.

“This way, we not only give ourselves a measure of vengeance, but we create a new world. A world where people can live like they were meant to, by their own wits and courage,” Richards said.

“There’d be battles across the country, not to mention international conflicts. And all we have is Weist and his men on our side,” Costell countered.

“Not just him. We’ve got tabs on dozens of groups who would jump at the chance to play with the toys we’re going to pull out of the chest,” Richards stated. “We could build an army.”

Costell stared, unfocused, out of the windshield. He didn’t see the storefronts before him, but instead he saw a world that could be forged in the fires of a single act of apocalyptic revenge. He glanced back to Richards. “What would we use?”

“We’ve got everything from the Rage Pulse to Blue Fire,” Richards answered.

“That stuff is under lock and key. The Initiative wouldn’t let us touch it when we still were their trusted soldiers,” Costell said.

“So what?” Richards asked. “We know where we can get it. They might have had contingencies for us, but we’ve got our own ideas.”

“You’re not really paranoid if they are out to get you,” Costell agreed. “So we bust in, and pop off some doomsday weaponry.”

“And if we’re lucky, we can survive,” Richards said. “But if not, we at least hit the real bastards.”

“We’ll need transportation,” Costell noted.

“First we call up Weist and his boys,” Richards said. “I’ve got some ideas for a ride that will get us exactly where we want to be.”

4

Arnold Dozier didn’t speak as Bolan entered the interrogation room. The Executioner simply stood there staring at the man he’d captured in the crime lab raid.

“So, what’s your plan?” Dozier asked. “How’re you going to break me?”

Bolan leaned over the table and opened the handcuffs connecting Dozier to the mooring pipe on the table. Dozier looked at the loosened fetters, then rubbed his wrist. He’d received some bruising from the LAPD cops who’d walked him in there, but nothing that couldn’t be put down to Dozier’s own clumsiness.

“I’ve got nothing on you,” Bolan said. “You’re a free man.”

“Really?” Dozier asked.

“Apparently you don’t exist,” Bolan replied. He tossed the fingerprint chart on the table. “Arnold Dozier died ten years ago. And frankly, I don’t have any known jurisdiction over the reanimated dead.”

Dozier sneered. “You’re kidding, right?”

“Nope,” Bolan said. “Blow.”

Dozier looked at the fingerprint chart in front of him.

His prints had been run and had come back as those of a dead man. He suddenly realized that Bolan and the LAPD had a list of paperwork on him. Photos, prints, and even if it all led to a dead end, the Rose Initiative wasn’t going to take a breach of operational security lightly.

The big man turned and opened the door. Dozier looked past him and saw a row of grim-faced lawmen, some tightening grips on batons, others flexing their fingers through gleaming brass knuckles.

“So what’s that?” Dozier asked.

“You’re dead. You shouldn’t worry about that,” Bolan said. “Now blow.”

Dozier knew the cops were waiting for their chance to give him some payback for the attack on their crime lab. “Why didn’t you ask anything?” he said.

“Frankly, I don’t have the time,” Bolan answered. “You’re obviously inured to interrogation techniques. Torture, drugs, sensory deprivation.”

“But everyone breaks eventually,” Dozier said.

“And while I’m doing that, the rest of your organization continues its operation, killing innocent American citizens,” Bolan countered. “I’d spend the time to break you at the cost of what, thirty? A hundred? A thousand lives? Nah. I’ll just let you go as a goat. When your friends pop up to eliminate you, I pounce on them. I work up the food chain. A worm to catch a small fish. A small fish to catch a big fish. A big fish to catch the shark.”

Dozier shook his head. “They’ll know I didn’t talk.”

“Like you just said—everyone breaks. Especially after the beating you’ll take from my friends,” the Executioner said.

Dozier frowned. He reached for the handcuffs. “I’ve got rights.”

Dozier’s head bounced from the force of Bolan’s fist, and he sprawled across the floor.

“I told you, you have no rights. You’re a dead man,” Bolan stated. “Now get out of here.”

Dozier looked at the gauntlet he’d have to run. He knew the big man was right. There was someone out there who would eliminate him. He struggled to sit in the chair, holding on to the restraint bar. “I’m staying,” he said quietly.

Bolan’s next punch rocked Dozier’s head.

“Ask something!” Dozier snapped, thick, blood-filled spittle spraying all over Bolan’s pants.

“It’ll be a dead end,” Bolan replied. “Now go.”

Blood dripped from Dozier’s mouth. “We’re government. Not Treasury. We’re called the Rose Initiative,” he said.

“Never heard of it,” Bolan said.

“Rose Initiative,” Dozier repeated.

He regarded the Executioner. This was a man used to violence. He could see the hardness in his expression, the streaks of scar tissue on his skin. His very stance was one of restrained, explosive violence. But except for a few love taps, Dozier was unharmed.

“I told you, that name means nothing to me,” Bolan replied. “Maybe if you make it mean something, I won’t hang you out on the street as bait.”

“The Rose Initiative is a semiofficial entity. We’ve had the blessing of various administrations since the fifties,” Dozier said. “But we don’t officially exist. Not on paper. Any sanction we get is merely implied.”

“This way if you get caught, you can be denied—operating outside of government policy,” Bolan surmised.

Dozier nodded.

“Who do you report to?” Bolan asked.

“Nobody official,” Dozier said. “We’re in the cold.”

Bolan frowned. “But still close enough to the warmth to get legitimate T-man badges.”

Dozier shrugged. He winced at the simple motion, remembering how the big man had used enough leverage to almost pop his shoulder out of shape.

“Who told you about the money at the crime lab?” Bolan asked.

“It came up on a computer watch,” Dozier answered.

Bolan nodded.

Dozier wiped blood from his mouth. “I don’t have anything on the upper levels of management. I’m just a grunt.”

“Who’s your immediate superior?”

“Winslow Spelling’s about the only one I can assume is still out and around. He came with us as our driver, and the man’s a snake,” Dozier said.

“Where does this snake have his nest?” Bolan asked.

Dozier rattled off the name of a hotel and room number. “If he’s still there.”

“So why did you come after the money?” Bolan pressed.

“To cover up our involvement with the renegade,” Dozier admitted.

“The assassin went rogue?” Bolan asked.

“Killed his handler at LAX. He’s officially off the reservation,” Dozier said. “We’re trying to burn any leads back to us.”

“So who’s your rogue?” Bolan asked.

Dozier winced. “Cameron Richards.”

“Identifying features?”

Dozier shook his head. “The man’s a complete chameleon. It’s why we picked him, because he can disappear in a crowd.”

“He didn’t disappear yesterday. He went through the crowd like a chain saw,” Bolan growled.

“He might be off his medication,” Dozier mused.

Bolan tilted his head.

“Mood suppressants keep him malleable enough for our purposes, yet leave him lucid enough to be a top line operative,” Dozier explained. “Richards was a washout from special operations. His whole team is. Too violent, too ready to buy into whatever holy crusade. Richards was a true believer, and we milked his psyche to take advantage of that.”

“So why Amanijad?” Bolan asked.

“Discrediting the hard-core factions. We wanted it to look like one of the radical right decided to begin the second Civil War early,” Dozier said.

“Second Civil War?” Bolan asked.

Dozier nodded. “From the ashes of modern corrupt society, a new phoenix will rise. That’s the joke of the Initiative’s name. We’ve already risen.”

Bolan’s eyes narrowed.

“Richards has taken on real threats as well. But he’s still convinced that the union will shatter again. And this time, the rift won’t be healed,” Dozier said.

“You’re cultivating this?” Bolan asked.

“No. A little tension is good. It keeps the attention off us while we do what we have to,” Dozier explained. “The problem is that some of the hard right have been…examining some of our roots. Conspiracy theorists who in their quest to find the New World Order were sniffing too close to our home.”

“And for that, dozens of innocent people had to be killed and wounded?” Bolan asked.

Dozier nodded. “Corpses made by our enemies create excellent distractions.”

“Then you’re going to love this, Dozier,” Bolan said. He turned toward the open the door.

“What are you doing?” Dozier asked.

“Walking out. You can go run to the Rose Initiative, and you can tell them I’m on their trail,” Bolan explained.

“What?”

“You think I’m going to give my word of honor to a liar and a murderer? Get real. I’ve got what I wanted,” Bolan told him. “You are the purest form of scum I’ve dedicated my life to destroying.”

“The Rose Initiative will kill me!” Dozier cried.

“Someone should,” Bolan said. He closed and locked the door behind him.

Brognola would have someone take care of the venomous thug.

ALLISON CALLAHAN WAS a classically beautiful woman. She had thick, lustrous strawberry-blond hair and a curvaceous figure, and Bolan could see a keen, calculating intellect behind her sparkling hazel eyes. She examined Bolan as if he were a slide subject under a microscope. She held out her hand and he took it. Her grip was firm.

It made sense. As a forensic scientist, Callahan had developed a handshake that was cop-proof. She had to have expected Bolan to come forward with a knuckle-grinding grasp. Her smile was all the evidence the Executioner needed to ascertain the truth of his suspicion.

“You must be Agent Matt Cooper,” Callahan said. She eyed his knuckles. “Been having a rough day.”

“Chasing down the thugs who attacked the crime lab,” Bolan said.

Callahan looked him in the eyes. She wasn’t convinced by Bolan’s explanation. The bruises on his strong, callused hands were too livid to be anything other than fresh.

“Having a talk with one of them,” Bolan added.

Callahan nodded. “He most likely deserved everything you gave him.”

“He’ll be regretting his decision for a while,” Bolan said.

She looked questioningly at him, but the Executioner’s cold gaze informed her that the subject was closed.

“What have you got for me on the three you got to see?” Bolan asked.

“We’re running checks on them now,” Callahan stated. “The coroner examined their stomach contents, thinking we could narrow down where they were before they launched the raid.”

“Any luck with that?” Bolan asked.

“I was going down to trace to check it out. Feel up to looking through vomit?” Callahan asked.

Bolan shrugged. “I’ve done worse.”

The corner of Callahan’s mouth rose slightly. Bolan could tell she was feeling him out, to see if he was worth working with. He knew that too often, when a cop was hooked up with a federal agent, there was a quick contest of wills.

Sifting through the partially digested last meals of three men he’d killed was undoubtedly a test of Bolan’s mettle.

As they entered the trace lab, Bolan looked at the three pans filled with bile and chunks of food. Callahan handed Bolan a box of latex gloves, and he donned a pair.

“Looks like Mexican food at first blush,” Bolan said. He leaned forward and took a whiff of the contents of one tray. “Hard to pin down the exact kind, though. The stomach acid’s altered the smell. Might be El Salvadoran or even something farther south.”

Callahan nodded in approval. “Some of the spices we’ve found are indicative of Honduran cuisine. It narrows things down significantly, as the Honduran community is fairly compact.”

Bolan took his note with the hotel listing given to him by Dozier and compared it with a map that Callahan had placed on the light table. “This last known address also fits with the area. We might not have an exact restaurant, but we do have someplace to look.”

“I’ve also had some of the other crime-lab staff go over the tires of the vehicle left in the alley. We’ve got soil samples, and signs of fresh tar in some of the treads,” Callahan added.

“Repaving? Or was it just loose pellets dropped in a pothole that didn’t melt together?” Bolan inquired.

Callahan’s smile widened. “So the super Fed knows his way around an investigation.”

“Not my specialty, but observation has always been a skill of mine,” Bolan answered. “I pass your test?”

Callahan nodded. “Yeah. You’re in my cool book. And yes, unlike most people, I really do have a book of cool people.”

Bolan nodded. “Thanks for the heads-up. I’ll take a trip over to the neighborhood and see if anything’s popped up.”

“By yourself?” Callahan asked.

Bolan nodded.

“You’ll at least need backup,” Callahan offered.

“Jo Wolfe got shot today hanging out too close to me,” Bolan countered. “Don’t worry. I’ll be back. I want to see if you manage to pick up anything else about these men.”

Callahan looked skeptical.

“These men were part of a supposedly top-secret project. Look close to see if they have any special immunizations or radioactive trace elements in their bloodstream,” Bolan said. “The sooner I spread this investigation out of the Los Angeles area, the better chance I have of finding out where my quarry’s off to.”

“The Hondurans aren’t going to just roll over for you,” Callahan warned.

Bolan wasn’t fazed. “By the time I’m finished with them, they’ll come to heel.”

COLONEL JACOB WEIST LOWERED his binoculars, then glanced over to Richards and Costell.

“You mean to tell me that we’re going to break into one of the most highly defended installations in this country and fly out with advanced, high-tech helicopters?” Weist asked.

Richards nodded. “Pretty much.”

Weist grinned and scanned the horizon. “The base layout is fairly generic. We could make the most effective equipment retrieval with a Delta Seven assault pattern, given the troops I have with me.”

Richards agreed with a slight grunt. “That’s what I was figuring too.”

Weist let the binoculars hang on their strap. “I can’t believe the Initiative tried to make you into a scapegoat.”

“It’s not so much that,” Richards replied. “I’ve been looking online, and the blame seems to be resting on our fellow true believers. The cover story for my op was changed, and now the last people in America who actually remember her purity and ideals are coming under blame for my so-called terrorist attack on Los Angeles.”

“They tried to kill you, though,” Weist said.

“No, they noticed that Cam was no longer under their chemical leash when he reported to his liaison,” Costell said. “With those drugs still running in our system, we wouldn’t think to look if the right people were taking the blame for the death of that anti-American Arab.”

Weist shook his head. “I knew it was too much of a good thing to be paid by the government to fight the important battles.”

“I’m just glad we pulled you off of your coyote patrol,” Richards noted. “We need good men. All the good we can find.”

“You have us,” Weist responded. “We can stem the tide of illegals across our border anytime. But when our own leadership betrays us…”

Weist grimaced. “I can barely believe it. But ever since we stopped taking our vitamins, you’re right. Everything is clearer. I’m no longer in the same haze I used to be.”

“You’re asking questions,” Richards explained. “The pills, they nullified our ability to reason, without hindering our tactical abilities.”

Weist’s eyes narrowed. “We can use the advanced X-birds in that facility to give us all the advantage we need against our enemies.”

“We’re not going to run,” Richards said. “We’re going to take the fight to them. But if we take down the Rose Initiative and the traitors they prop up, then we’re leaving our nation open to our enemies.”

Weist looked askance. “Not only that, but if we take down the puppeteers, the country will turn against itself. It’ll be a civil war again.”

“A civil war, war with China, the mullahs and the Mexicans hitting the disparate parties,” Richards said. “Apocalypse in a bag.”

“So what do we do?” Weist asked.

“We get those choppers, and we get to some truly nasty weaponry,” Richards said.

“The Extinction Archive!” Weist exclaimed.

“None other,” Richards confirmed. “From there, we can easily take out any opposition, including China.”

Weist rolled it over in his mind, and he nodded. “Fuck all of them before they fuck us again.”

Richards smiled, looking at the base. “How long before we make our move?”

“Give me two hours,” Weist said.

“Two hours,” Richards repeated. “Two hours, and the first step in freeing this country will be taken.”

5

The Executioner moved easily, slipping into the shadows of the alley. He grimaced as he mentally reviewed his war load, concerned about the implications of using too much firepower in the middle of Los Angeles. With his signature pistols riding under one arm and on his right hip and a sound-suppressed assault carbine in a gym bag, he had enough firepower to take on a company of enemy soldiers, and yet, only a few blocks back, children sat on a curb, fiddling with tiny electronic toys in their chubby little palms.

The building he was closing in on used to be an old machine shop, but an arm twisted here, and a leg broken there, informed him that it was a refuge for members of the Honduran immigrant community who could find easy profit in black market weapons and illicit narcotics. Bolan knew if something went wrong, he would drop a war in the middle of a civilian population. Unlike Richards, the rogue government assassin he sought, there was nothing in the Executioner’s heart of hearts that could allow a battle plan that turned unarmed bystanders into targets. And yet, except for targeting those who weren’t part of the battle, Richards’s extraction plan resembled the kind of hit and run blows against enemy governments that the Executioner specialized in.

Though he and Richards paralleled each other tactically, ethically they were polar opposites. Richards saw his duty to his government as a license to kill without restraint. Bolan was obligated to his duty to justice, which meant that the only ones who should suffer directly by his hand were the predators who inflicted their own suffering.

The smell of gunpowder was strong as Bolan closed in on the machine shop. A burly, bullet-headed man stood guard, the ugly outline of a heavy handgun bulging against his washboard stomach as he leaned against the back door. Cruel, dark eyes scanned the alley as Bolan nestled in the doorway, observing him.

The door guard was a hardened professional thug, observant and obviously quick. Only Bolan’s stealth and the lowering of the sun in the sky, extending shadows, gave him an element of surprise. Bolan set down his war bag containing his collapsed assault carbine and stepped out of the shadows. He had his Beretta shielded from view behind his leg, and the alley was empty enough that a stray shot wouldn’t end up in a noncombatant.

The tough guy saw Bolan and didn’t even offer a vocal challenge. His instincts were good, and his hand dived to the pistol-butt poking out of his waistband. With the Beretta already in hand, the Executioner had the advantage, snapping it up and punching a sound-suppressed bullet through the bridge of the gang member’s nose. The 9 mm slug drilled through bone and brain, and lifeless fingers dropped the thick, ugly pistol in his hand.

Bolan turned back and scooped up his rifle, pulling it from its concealing case. This wasn’t going to be a soft probe, but the quiet approach had already been risked. The moments before the contraband runners discovered that they were under attack were falling away quickly, the countdown to a full-fledged conflict was evaporating like alcohol under a blow torch. He strode swiftly up to the door the thug had been guarding, and pulled the trigger on the Masterkey shotgun under the barrel of his carbine. The “key to any door” was a 12-gauge chunk of enamel-fused lead filings weighing an ounce, a hybrid slug of metal and polymer that disintegrated on contact with a lock, but in the process rendered the lock useless. A blunt gas collecting canister on the nose of the Masterkey muffled the thunder of the shotgun’s bellowing report, but the door still slammed open violently, its clatter alerting a pair of men looking over an open crate of hand grenades.

The handguns jammed into their belts informed Bolan that they weren’t choir boys, and the Executioner milked the trigger on his folding stock VEPR, the stubby suppressor swallowing most of the chatter of the American-made AK-47 as its 7.62 mm COMBLOC rounds ripped into one heavily tattooed gang member as his hand dropped to the pistol at his side. The other one gawped at the Executioner in stunned shock, so Bolan reversed the VEPR and smashed its tube-steel buttstock hard into the man’s chin, knocking him senseless. He relieved the prisoner of his handgun.

Bolan rested his foot on the stunned man’s thigh and replaced the VEPR with the huge, gleaming Desert Eagle. The big .44 Magnum pistol was pure intimidation. The big American addressed the dazed arms inspector in Spanish.

“You sold some Uzis to a group of white men,” Bolan said. “Where are they now?”

“I don’t know anything about that,” the gang member answered.

The blocky muzzle of the Desert Eagle crashed across the man’s cheek, splitting skin and laying bone bare. “Who would?”

“Armageddo,” the wounded man grunted.

“He in the building?” Bolan asked.

“Next room,” the Hispanic answered.

“What does he look like?”

“He has devil horns tattooed on his forehead. Bright red, amid the crown of thorns,” the gang member stated.

A second swipe of the big Magnum’s barrel to the temple left Bolan’s captive unconscious on the floor.

“What the fuck is the noise in here?” someone cursed, opening the door, gun leading.

Bolan checked for the devil horns, then pulled the trigger on the Desert Eagle, spearing the hapless man back through the doorway, a gaping hole in the center of his face.

The Executioner burst into Armageddo’s workplace as the arms dealers were still gawking in shock at their dead partner thrown to the floor. Bolan was in the room among them, even as the corpse flopped on the floor tiles, transitioning from the Desert Eagle to the folding-stock rifle. The gang members scrambled in wild panic as the heavily armed Executioner exploded into action.