Oblivion Pact

“Sir, does this base have a bomb shelter, or some sort of hidden panic room, whatever the military calls them these days?” LoMonaco growled, brushing debris off her police uniform.

“If so, it didn’t appear in any of the floorplans I stole!” Greene snarled, slowly pulling a long sliver of steel from his bloody arm. “Okay, Layne, your turn. Kill them!”

“On it!” the man yelled, starting forward at a full run. “Thomas, Hannigan, Stone, Ferguson! Follow me, boys! It’s showtime!”

Spreading out so that they wouldn’t offer the hidden Mexican soldiers a group target, the terrorists raced across the base, darting from building to building, bushes to cars, never fully exposing themselves.

“Okay, LoMonaco,” Greene started, then stopped.

Buckling on a flamethrower, the woman ignited the pre-burner, then sent out a hissing lance of flame and started setting fire to anything between the library and the all-important helicopters.

As a wall of fire rose high, the billionaire nodded in approval. LoMonaco was hiding the machines from any further attacks! Smart girl. The Mexicans might still shoot more rockets, but, unable to aim properly, it would be a total gamble on their part.

Suddenly, a great commotion came from the base garage, and the metal doors were battered open as a pair of Bradley Fighting Vehicles surged into view. The squat machines charged at the library, rolling over debris, rubble and corpses. Smashing aside parked cars, the vehicles cut loose with 7.62 mm chain guns, arcs of spent brass flying away, then the 25 mm rapid-fire cannons roared into operation, the streams of high-explosive shells chewing a path of destruction across the marble face of the building. Windows shattered, doors disintegrated and hundreds of burning books were blown out of the library to flutter away like dying birds.

There was a flash on the roof, and a rocket streaked down to explode in the street only feet away from one of the Bradleys, then another from the first floor flashed right past the second one to continue onward and disappear into the distant mountains.

Slamming headfirst into the side of the burning building, the Bradley crashed through the brick wall and men briefly screamed, their cries barely discernable over the blazing chain guns. Then the second Bradley slammed through the opposite wall, and the whole library visibly shook, loose bricks tumbling off the cracking walls.

Revving their big Detroit engines to full power, the pair of Bradleys smashed through the interior walls in irregular patterns, crashing through offices, computers and lavatories, crushing a dozen scurrying soldiers. Smashing out the other side of the sagging building, the armored hulls of the Bradleys were covered with plaster dust, blood, paperbacks.

Stopping only a few yards from each other, the Bradleys unleashed their 25 mm rapid-fires again, tearing holes in the weakened walls and blasting apart support columns.

The roaring conflagration inside the library blocked most of what was happening, but everybody on the base could hear the groan of the structure as it finally succumbed to the brutal attack. A wall broke free to fall across the street, scattering loose bricks for several blocks. The roof bowed, another wall cracked open wide and the entire building collapsed into itself, throwing out a thick gray cloud of concrete dust.

Still firing, the crews of the Bradleys sent in waves of 25 mm shells, pounding the library nonstop, grimly determined to permanently end the threat of the soldiers inside the hidden bomb shelter. Tons of loose masonry tumbled into the basement, along with broken slabs of concrete, and endless piles of hardback books. Soon the basement was an inferno of fiery chaos, the roiling clouds of dense smoke rising high into the sky to form the classic mushroom pattern of any intensely hot ground fire.

Pulling back a safe distance, the Bradleys stopped and the triumphant crews climbed out to start walking back to the airfield with Layne in the lead.

“It looks like we nuked the base,” LoMonaco chuckled, easing off the straps of the flamethrower to set the empty canisters on the sidewalk.

“Pretty damn near,” Greene said in agreement, slinging the Minimi machine gun across his chest. “All right, let’s do a sweep and recover any of our people who died. Bring the bodies along, and we’ll bury them at sea.”

“Razor up, people! Get those birds hot!” LoMonaco added through cupped hands. “We need to be airborne in fifteen minutes!”

As a clean-up squad got busy with body bags, a small man wearing thick glasses stumbled out of a prefab hut. “Mr. Greene, sir! I found the Gladiator!” the technician shouted happily, triumphantly holding up a control box.

“About damn time,” LoMonaco muttered with a disgusted expression. “Is it a newer model?”

“No, sir. But it’s still fully functional.”

“Good work, Langstrom!” Greene shouted, giving a thumbs up. “Take everything! We can use it in the Triangle.”

“Don’t forget spare batteries!” Layne added over a shoulder, already heading for a Black Hawk.

A few minutes later, everybody had a seat in a helicopter, and the stolen armada gracefully lifted off the tarmac in a whirlwind of smoky exhaust and acrid smoke from the countless small fires.

Quickly rising high, the helicopters angled away from the obliterated base and followed a whitewater river to disappear into the nearby mountains, heading due north toward the United States.

CHAPTER FOUR

Bethesda, Maryland

The dark sedan pulled into the parking lot of the Ambassador Hotel and took the first spot available among the limousines and imported sports cars.

As the door opened, a middle-aged man got out and started walking briskly toward the outside swimming pool. He wasn’t quite running—that would have drawn unwanted attention—but the man certainly wasn’t out for a casual stroll, either.

Hal Brognola was a bulldog of a man, still physically fit even though middle age had added a light sprinkling of gray to his dark hair and a bit of paunch to his midsection. Brognola was also the person in charge of the Sensitive Operations Group, a clandestine antiterrorist organization based at Stony Man Farm, Virginia. He handled a lot of black-bag operations, ferreting out the secret enemies of freedom, and bringing them to a hard and swift brand of justice.

Mack Bolan had helped put the Stony Man teams together and at one time had had a hand in running the program, but these days Bolan had an arm’s length relationship with the big Fed. He’d take on a mission if it was mutually beneficial. He rarely turned one down.

The hotel’s swimming pool was particularly busy on such a warm day, families splashing about, bored teenagers texting, a cadre of diplomats and attachés at the bar already knocking back shots of straight vodka in a futile effort to hide their early morning consumption of alcohol.

Mixed in with the others were quite a few strikingly beautiful women in skimpy bathing suits. Relaxing on chaise longues, the ladies were slowly oiling their perfect skin, obviously enjoying the admiring looks they garnered.

Slowing his brisk pace on the wet concrete, Brognola smiled at several of the older women. Then one of them smiled back, and shifted on her longue to make room for a guest. Pausing for only a moment, Brognola nodded in thanks for the offer, then touched the plain gold wedding ring on his finger and moved on. A man could appreciate a gorgeous sunrise without trying to take it home.

The damp air was redolent with the aroma of pool chlorine and coconut-scented suntan lotion, the dulcet smells of summer, and Brognola breathed it in deeply, briefly invoking memories of his younger, more carefree, days, days before he’d joined the police force and eventually entered government service.

Times past, youth gone, but sweeter still for the missing or however the poem went, Brognola thought he couldn’t recall the last time he’d read a book for the fun of it. His life was purely work, with little time for family and friends anymore. Just another sacrifice for the greater good.

A velvet rope closed off a private section of the swimming area, but Brognola walked in as if he owned the place. A frowning lifeguard started his way, but the big Fed simply flashed his Justice Department credentials, and the man turned and went back to his business watching over the assorted swimmers. This was Washington, and everybody knew not to bother a member of the Alphabet Gang at anything they did.

Stretched on a cushioned table, Mack Bolan was getting a vigorous massage from an elderly Chinese woman, his face set into an emotionless mask of control as her strong hands kneaded his bruised skin to reach the hard muscles underneath.

“Does this story have a happy ending?” Brognola joked.

Looking up, Bolan grinned at his old friend. “Better not say that again, or Mrs. Feinstein will kick your ass.”

Brognola arched an eyebrow at the Jewish name, then shrugged. After he had learned that back in the sixties the mayor of Dublin had been a rabbi, he’d stopped trying to pigeonhole anybody and simply took people as they came.

“Wu, my last name is Wu,” the woman said in lightly accented English. “My old friend is trying once more to be funny.”

“Trying?”

“No wonder so many people shoot you,” Mrs. Wu snorted, drying her hands on a towel. “You wouldn’t know a joke if it bit your ass.” With that, she slapped him on the said area, then turned and walked away, humming a tune.

“You have the strangest friends,” Brognola said with a chuckle.

Sitting up, Bolan stretched and flexed his arms, the muscles visibly moving under the skin. “A strange few,” he said. “There’s no better massage therapist than Cindy. She’s a black belt in kung fu, and can kill just as easily as heal with those old hands.”

Brognola paused, then realized it wasn’t a joke. “Cindy Wu? Like in the Dr. Seuss books?”

“I think that was Cindy Lu, and she prefers to be called Cynthia.”

Bolan slid off the table and pulled on a robe. “Walk with me.”

Moving away from the busy pool, the men entered a hedge maze and soon found a more secluded area. There was a table with two chairs, a pile of sandwiches and a pitcher of iced coffee.

“So what’s up?” Bolan asked.

“Sorry about this. I know you just got back, but I’ve got one of those feelings,” Brognola said, pouring himself a glass of the iced coffee.

“What happened?” Bolan asked, all of the humor gone from his voice and demeanor.

Laying a briefcase on the table, Brognola pressed a thumb to the glowing biometric lock. He felt a brief tingle as an electronic sensor confirmed that it was living flesh pressed against the contact plate, then it read his fingerprint, compared it to those on file. The case disarmed the self-destruct charge, then unlocked.

“Roughly twenty-four hours ago some people disguised as the Mexican police destroyed a Mexican military base in the Azules Mountains,” Brognola said, opening the case. Inside was a US Army laptop.

“They attacked the base?”

“Destroyed is the correct word.” Flipping up the screen, Brognola tapped a button, and the monitor flickered into life. “These shots were recovered from a dozen smashed cell phones, and the one security camera that the terrorists didn’t find and smash.”

“Terrorist is a big leap from thieves,” Bolan said, his full attention centered on the disjointed images: running shoes, a rain of spent shells, fire and destruction everywhere. A soldier firing his handgun from the ground, then instantly torn apart by converging streams of bullets from several different directions.

“Are those M16 assault rifles?” Bolan asked, furrowing his brow.

“F88,” Brognola corrected him. “Standard issue for the Australian military. They use the same ammo that we do, but it cycles a little bit slower than an American version.”

“That’s what caught my attention,” Bolan said, playing the images again.

Brognola was impressed. Bolan heard the difference in the middle of a firefight? “Now, they didn’t take the payroll in the commander’s safe, or even the loose cash in the register at the officer’s club. They did take a hundred kilos of pure heroin that was waiting to be incinerated, but ignored an even larger amount of crystal meth.”

Bolan gave a low whistle. That made no sense since the meth would be worth twice, maybe three times, more than the heroin. Everything seemed to point to the thieves being be narcoterrorists, but again, why leave behind the crystal meth? Why in the world would anybody need that much heroin?

“How do you know they’re not really the police, the drugs are purely misdirection, and in fact this was some kind of a political junta?” Bolan asked pointedly.

“No way they’re blue,” Brognola stated. “The fat guy is way too big. The woman is too short. The Mexicans have a minimum height requirement for female officers, and there is no record for anybody over seven feet tall ever working for the Mexican police.”

“Fair enough. Okay, what did they take?”

“Mostly heavy weapons, rocket launchers, Stinger missiles, radar defusers, VX nerve gas, and every working gunship on the base. Nineteen to be exact.”

“What types?”

“Mostly Apache and Cobra, but also a couple of armed Black Hawks. Not state-of-the-art, but all in perfect working condition, and armed to the teeth.”

“Maybe they plan on selling the helicopters. The Apaches alone would fetch a small fortune in certain parts of the world.”

“I wish it was true.” Brognola frowned. “However, they also took a Black Hawk medical unit.”

“Any blood missing from the base hospital?”

“According to the records, about a hundred units of blood plasma, and ten more of AB positive.”

“But nothing else?”

“Just the usual medical supplies, sutures, bandages, forceps and such.”

“AB positive is a pretty rare blood type,” Bolan said slowly.

“Yes, it is,” Brognola said. “So I ran that through the Interpol database, along with the general descriptions of the three people armed with unusual weapons.”

Bolan understood. Most of the thieves were carrying an F-8S. Anyone carrying a different weapon would be either a specialist, who might have a crime record, or else he or she was the person in charge.

“Now, the fat guy has an XM-25 grenade rifle,” Brognola said flipping through the shots to find the ones he wanted, then freezing them. “The woman has a Neostead shotgun, while the giant is carrying an F88 assault rifle...but has a Falcon automatic pistol in his shoulder holster. Everybody else is carrying a police-issue Glock.”

“What did you find?” Bolan asked, suddenly interested.

“Again nothing,” Brognola admitted honestly, taking a sandwich. “The President thinks I’m overreacting. But he’s a politician, and I’m a street cop.”

“Correction. The top cop for the nation.”

“Just a cop all the same. Half of this job is going with a gut instinct, and I’ve got a bad one on this thing, Striker,” Brognola said with a grimace. “There was just something hinky about these three, so I ran their descriptions through the entire government database. That brought up something.”

He took a bite of the sandwich, chewed and swallowed. “The giant appears to be Dalton Greene, the Australian billionaire, which makes the other two his bodyguards, Victor Layne and Samantha LoMonaco.”

“How hard is that intel?”

“Weak, only around fifty percent accurate.”

“Weak is a nice way to put it.”

“Accepted. Then I read that Greene and his bodyguards all died in a fiery car crash last week, the bodies burned beyond recognition.”

As the pictures on the screen stopped, Bolan sat back in his chair. “Chalk up another win for the gut instinct,” he said slowly. “This reeks to high heaven.”

Dalton Greene had been on Bolan’s radar for quite a while. There was nothing specific, just a lot of little indicators that the Aussie billionaire was dirty.

“How did they take the base?” Bolan asked.

Brognola shrugged. “Forensics isn’t sure yet, but I think they staged a riot in Cancun yesterday, then ambushed the police and stole their cars.”

“You think?”

“None of the police officers who responded to the call have been found yet. The attack zone was swept clean. Literally swept clean, like it was a zen rock garden.”

“Which means the cops are most likely shark food at the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico.”

“Probably.”

This was an interesting puzzle, Bolan realized. Greene was rich enough to buy the number of stolen helicopters, plus the weapons, on the black market. So why would he go to all the trouble to steal them? Merely to hide his identity, or was there something darker at play, some twist that he couldn’t quite see yet?

Reaching out, he tapped a button to start the flow of chaotic images once more. By now, Bolan was starting to get a bad feeling in his own gut. Ruthless, patient, cool and bloodthirsty. These were hard boys with a game plan. That always spelled big trouble.

“It looks like I’m going to Mexico....”

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