Читать книгу Extreme Instinct - Don Pendleton - Страница 9

Balaklava Bay, Ukraine

The land around the secluded cove was rough and seemed almost half formed. Cold and deep, the Black Sea extended far beyond the shimmering horizon to the distant nations of Turkey, Bulgaria and Romania.

The small cove was protected from the worst of the storms by a natural breaker of glassy ballast. The barrier had been strongly reinforced under the Communist regime of the Soviet Union with huge concrete slabs. Abandoned pillboxes were secreted among the arcadia bushes along the barren shoreline.

Dominating the area was a crumbling lighthouse, the cupola only splintery framework, the glass long gone and the great stone blocks weathered to a dull sheen from the constant pounding of the waves. But only a hundred feet away rose a brand-new lighthouse, even taller than the ruins, the freshly painted sides glistening with the salty spray, the plastic cupola topped with radar and microwave receptors.

A town curved along the eastern side of the cove, the fishing shacks and drying huts converted into hotels and restaurants for visiting tourists. Under the indolent rule of the czar, Balaklava had been a thriving seaport, a bustling community of fishermen and sailors, plying their ancient trade. Then the Communists seized control and soldiers forced the people to leave their homes for reasons unknown. The few men foolish enough to ask were never heard from again. Then the Soviet Union fell, and the people of Balaklava returned to reclaim their ancestral homes, and to try to build a new life as a resort community. The fishing was excellent, the vodka cheap, and there were countless subterranean caves to be explored, along with the abandoned glory of a secret naval base. The massive fleet of submarines was long gone, but the dry docks remained, as well as the facilities to house and maintain a fighting force of over a thousand sailors.

Directly across from the seaside village was a wooden dock that led directly into a volcanic cave, the entrance to the underground redoubt. At one time, it had been a shooting offense to know the location of the cave. Now it was decorated with posters and photographs from the glory days of the Cold War, along with a stenciled placard announcing the days and times of each tour.

Standing on the other side of a woven yellow rope, a fat man in a loose white suit glared indignantly. His skin was pale from a life working under fluorescent lights. Mirrored sunglasses hid most of his face, and a large Nikon camera hung around his neck.

“What do you mean, closed?” the man demanded angrily.

“Closed. As in not open to the public anymore,” the tour guide replied patiently. “The government is doing something here, and nobody is allowed inside until they’re done. Okay?” The guide enjoyed using the strange American word. He had heard it often in movies.

“No, it is not okay!” the fat man bellowed. “I’ve come all the way from St. Petersburg to see this goddamn installation, and I want to see it right now. Fuck the government!”

“In the old days, that would have gotten you shot,” the guide coldly reminded.

“But these are not the old days anymore, comrade,” the tourist sneered. “We’re a democracy now. Free men all. So fuck you, fuck the government and get the fuck out of my way, I want to see the submarine pens!”

“Fair enough,” the guide replied, unclipping the rope and stepping aside.

Triumphantly, the tourist strode along the long wooden dock and into the volcanic cave. The man removed his sunglasses to see the interior better when the light vanished. Turning, he scowled at the sight of a thick black curtain hanging across the mouth of the cave.

“What the fuck is this?” the fat man demanded loudly, looking around for somebody to berate. Then he blanched at the sight of a dozen men coming out of a duty room. They were each dressed in combat fatigues and carried automatic weapons.

“Hey,” the tourist mumbled only a split second before the mercenaries opened fire.

The silenced Kalashnikov assault rifles chugged softly, the 7.62 mm rounds tearing the fool apart. He hit the stone floor coughing and twitching, the white suit rapidly turning a deep crimson. The echoes of the muted gunfire repeated endlessly along the watery tunnel, disappearing into the distance.

Walking closer, Colonel Lindquist pulled out a Tokarev automatic and shot the civilian once more. Gurgling horribly, his head snapped back from the arrival of a steel-jacketed round, and then went still forever.

“Russians,” Novostk sneered, stiffly walking into view. “The best way to make them do something is to tell them not to do it.”

The skinny general had already changed out of the hated Soviet naval uniform, and now was back in his Slovakian uniform. It was plain and unadorned, with only the insignia on the collar showing his rank. An old Samopal Vzor assault rifle was slung across his back, and a web belt of ammo pouches encircled his skinny waist with a bulky Rex .357 Magnum revolver holstered on the hip.

“I knew we should have dismantled the dock,” Colonel Lindquist said, holstering his pistol. “Mikhail, clean up the blood. Petrov, get rid of the body in one of the submarine pens. Zhale, put up a sign about falling rocks. That should keep away the fools until we’re gone.”

Quickly, the assigned men moved to obey. The rest stayed where they were, close to the general.

“Speaking of which, we’re ready to leave,” General Novostk said, shifting the Samopal Vzor assault rifle to a more comfortable position. The weapon was a Slovakian version of a Russian AK-47. Both the metal and wooden stock worn from years of use, but gleaming with fresh oil and polish.

“Already?” Lindquist asked in surprise. “Excellent. Has even the helicopter been dismantled?”

“Sealed off in a side tunnel,” the general countered. “I did not know if you wanted to use the Hook again.”

“Too risky, sir,” Lindquist answered. “I’ll use a boat for the next part.”

The general arched an eyebrow at that but said nothing. The colonel was an amazing officer, in spite of being a mixture of American and Slovakian blood. Clearly, there was just a touch more Bratislava in his soul than Brooklyn.

“And how is your former employer taking the betrayal?” Novostk asked, heading deeper into the dim cavern.

“Fuck him,” Lindquist snarled, clasping both hands behind his back. “He’s part Slovak himself, but harbors no ill will toward the Soviets, in spite of everything they did to our nation.”

“Then he is a fool.”

“Agreed, sir. Which is why I had no trouble killing his mercenaries to turn Skyfire over to you.”

“History will remember you as a true patriot, Colonel!”

Unimpressed, Lindquist shrugged in reply. As a soldier, it was his sworn duty to protect his homeland. The Soviet Union had plundered the natural resources of Slovakia, and that lunatic Stalin had sent millions of its citizens to the Siberian gulag work camps never to return. As a soldier, Lindquist would have much preferred a straight fight with the Russian army, but if this was the only way for Slovakia to strike back at Moscow, then so be it. Blood was blood, and terrorists were always heroes to the dead they avenged.

Turning at a corner, the officers paused at the sight of a bound man covered with chains. A soldier tried not to smile as he shoved the helpless prisoner forward. A muffled scream escaped his gag as the bound man toppled off the concrete apron, to land in the water with a large splash. He sank immediately into the depths, leaving behind a small trail of air bubbles.

“And who was that, Private?” Novostk asked casually. “Another fisherman who wandered in here by accident?”

“Smuggler, sir,” the soldier replied, giving a crisp salute.

“Indeed,” Lindquist muttered, glancing at the struggling man descending to the bottom of the pen. The water was over fifty feet deep, and soon there was only a trickle of escaping air bubbles visible in the underwater lights. “And what was he trying to sneak into Russia?”

“Heroin.”

The general scowled, then spit into the water. “No loss, then. The fool only got what he deserved. We want the Russians dead, not enslaved to that filth.”

“And what did you do with the drugs?” Lindquist asked sharply.

“Made him eat it, sir. A half kilo of Bulgarian black tar.”

“And he lived?”

Suddenly the air bubbles stopped rising from the murky depths.

“No, sir, he did not.” The soldier grinned savagely.

“Well, the fish should have a good time disposing of the carcass.” Lindquist chuckled in dark amusement. “Very good, Private. Carry on with your duties.”

“Yes, sir.”

Proceeding along the tunnel, the officers headed toward an old Soviet Union submarine moored to the concrete dock. Purchased on the open market in Amsterdam, the borderline antique had been incredibly cheap, mostly because the submersible lacked any sort of modern convenience. It was slow and noisy, the air always smelled of diesel fumes, the toilet leaked, plus the torpedo tubes had been welded shut. The submarine was useless to anybody but ichthyologists and historians. In spite of that, a group of Iranians had outbid Lindquist’s former employer, and the first assignment of the Foxfire team had been to convince the Iranians to give them the sub, in exchange for a few ounces of subsonic lead.

“How is the work of the bombs progressing?” General Novostk inquired.

“Poorly. So far, we are having no luck opening one of the T-bombs,” Lindquist admitted unhappily. “They are well sealed, and our sensors indicated numerous traps. They’re designed to never be accessed.” He paused. “We may need some special help.”

“Just make sure he is good,” the general snapped, kicking a stone out of his way. “Our contact in Mystery Mountain had said there was only a slim possibility that the weapon being tested today would contain multiple warheads, and here we are with seven of the bombs. Seven!” He shook a bony fist. “This changes everything. Four will be assigned targets, and we need to keep one for analysis—that is a given—and yet another will be reserved for an emergency. But the remaining bomb should be used immediately.”

“As a diversion.”

“Exactly. And to let the world know what kind of a horror is now loose among them.” The general sneered, touching the scar on his neck. “That will buy us enough time to complete the analysis.”

“In my experience, people fear the unknown, sir,” Lindquist offered hesitantly.

“No, that is only true of the individual,” the general countered. “Nations are only frightened of demonstrable threats. The United Nations and NATO must see the weapon in operation! Then they will panic.” The old man glanced sideways. “Have you chosen a target yet?”

“Of course, sir,” Lindquist replied. “Something highly visible that the entire world will hear about.”

“And blame the Russians?”

“And blame the Russians, yes, sir.”

“Excellent. And what about the spy?”

In reply, Lindquist only gave a hard smile. The general nodded in approval. Traitors always reaped the whirlwind.

Nearing the end of the dock, the two officers paused in front of a heavy wooden table covered with electronic equipment. Sergeant Melori was bent over the devices, adjusting the controls with a fingertip. Behind the slim man stood a massive lieutenant, a borderline giant, his Herculean frame almost bursting out of the largest Slovakian military uniform the quartermaster had been able to obtain. A smoked-beef stick stuck out of his mouth as if it was a cigar, and he chewed steadily.

Only a few yards beyond were a pair of old wooden planks extending to the conning tower of a submerged submarine. The emblem of the Soviet navy had been covered with black paint and replaced with the flag of the Republic of the Ukraine, fellow victims of the savage Communists. Just a tad more confusion to any possible witnesses.

“Anything on the radar?” Lindquist asked, studying the small glowing screen.

“No, sir,” Melori replied, standing and saluting.

“At ease,” General Novostk commanded impatiently. “Give me a report on the outside world. Do we have any more uninvited guests today? We seem to have taken refuge in the main train station of Bratislava.” All of the other soldiers chuckled at the joke.

Not exactly sure why they were doing that, the colossal Lieutenant Gregor Vladislav merely grinned to be polite. Most people said things that he did not fully comprehend. But that was okay. His expertise was with weapons, killing came as easily to him as flying did to a bird. It was only people that he could not really understand. As a child, his father had wisely taught Vladislav that there was always somebody smarter than you in the world. Intelligence was rather like the martial arts; no matter how good you were, there was always somebody a little bit faster or a little bit stronger. The trick was to not attract attention to yourself, and then strike from behind.

“The outer perimeter is clear, sir,” Melori reported, fondly touching the delicate sensors. What his friend Vladislav did with a knife, he could do with electronics. Together, they were an unstoppable team. “Both radar and sonar show no unusual activity in our vicinity.”

“And what is the usual activity?”

“Schools of fish to the west, fishing boats to the east, a commercial jetliner to the far north, some oil tankers to the far south.”

“Very good, Sergeant,” the general said with a nod. “Let us know if anything approaches very fast. That will probably be the FSB.”

“Closely followed by the entire Russian army,” Lindquist added in a snarl.

“We can stop them, sir,” Vladislav stated in a voice of stone. “The missiles are live and ready to fire.”

The other soldiers stoically said nothing, but Melori seemed slightly embarrassed by the outburst.

“Yes, I’m sure the fight would be glorious, but in the end, a thousand will beat fifty every time,” General Novostk said tolerantly. “So until we’re safely back home, I would prefer to avoid the enemy.”

“Yes, sir, of course,” the lieutenant growled. “Pull back in a feint, then strike from behind.”

Patting the giant on the arm, Novostk smiled. “Something like that, old friend.”

Leaving the men to their work, the two officers shuffled carefully along the planks over the dark water.

“Why are we keeping that idiot alive?” Lindquist muttered.

“I have my reasons,” Novostk replied curtly. “And they are none of your concern.”

Stepping onto the conning tower, the officers found the watertight hatch already open. A clatter of noise was coming from inside the submarine, the command deck below a hive of activity.

As Lindquist stepped aside to let the general climb down first, Novostk touched his arm. “Are the scuttling charges ready?” he asked in a low whisper.

The colonel maintained a neutral expression in case somebody was watching them. “Absolutely, sir. Just give the word.”

“Hopefully, we will not have to,” General Novostk stated, rubbing the scar on his throat. “But it is always best to be prepared for the worst.”

Without further comment, the two Slovakians clambered into the old submarine and began the final preparations for their departure, and the beginning of World War III.

Boca Raton, Florida

SWOOPING GRACEFULLY out of the clear blue sky, the huge C-130 Hercules landed on a private airstrip on Miami/Dade Airport and taxied straight into a private hangar at the extreme end of the field.

As the massive aircraft came to a stop, the rear ramp cycled to the ground and out rolled a small cargo van, the windows tinted darkly. The unmarked van seemed perfectly ordinary enough, but it contained more armor than an APC, along with a small arsenal of military weaponry tucked inside hidden ceiling compartments.

Dressed in loose civilian clothing, the men of Able Team were planning on making this mission a soft recon, low and easy. But just in case of trouble, they also brought along some heavy iron.

Suddenly the radio speaker built into the ceiling crackled alive. “Sky King to the Senator,” the voice of Jack Grimaldi said over the background static. “Sky King to the Senator, ten-four?”

“Ten-two, Sky King,” Rosario Blancanales said into a hand mike from the passenger seat. “This is the Senator. Is something wrong?” Glancing into the side mirror, Blancanales watched the door to the hangar close as the building itself dwindled into the distance.

“Negative,” the pilot replied. “Just wanted you to know that I should have the Hercules refueled and ready to eat clouds in an hour, just in case we have to leave in a hurry.”

“Roger, Sky King. Much appreciated,” Blancanales said with a wan smile. “We’ll give a holler if things get exciting.”

“You do that. Tails high, brother! Ten-two.”

“Over and out,” Blancanales replied, returning the mike to its clip.

“‘Tails high’?” Schwarz asked from the rear of the van, stuffing tools into his belt pouch from a small worktable bolted to the wall.

“Hermann, not even I understand the humor of pilots,” Blancanales sighed, opening a ceiling compartment to take down an M-16 M-203 assault rifle combo.

Broad and powerful, the man radiated charm the way a furnace does heat, only the salt-and-pepper hair suggesting his true age. A master of psychological warfare, Blancanales had talked his way out of more hot spots than could be easily counted, and had earned his nickname of “the Politician,” a thousand times over.

“I think the thin air makes them crazy,” said Carl “Ironman” Lyons from behind the wheel, shifting gears to accelerate the van. The Able Team leader was a stocky man with short blond hair and cool blue eyes. “Or rather, it makes them even more crazy,” Lyons amended, turning onto an access ramp. “All pilots are odd to begin with.”

Schwarz was busy tucking a U.S. Army laptop into a black shoulder bag. Even though the battlefield laptop was sheathed in bullet-resistant titanium, the bag was a ballistic cloth resistant to fire, knives and most small-caliber rounds. If anything, Schwarz believed that planning for a disaster was the best way to achieve success.

A stocky man with short brown hair and full mustache, Schwarz had a friendly, smiling face and bright, intelligent eyes. An expert in electronic warfare and countersurveillance, “Gadgets” Schwarz designed most of the communications equipment for the Farm. Barbara Price had been known to joke that Schwarz could chew a toaster and spit out a cell phone. The man could make, repair or alter anything that used advanced electronics, including high-explosive booby traps.

Chuckling in agreement, Blancanales closed the grenade launcher, then eased a clip of 5.56 mm hardball ammunition into the receiver of the assault rifle. Before Able Team left for the mission, John “Cowboy” Kissinger had tried to persuade Blancanales to take along one of the XM-8 assault rifles that would soon be replacing the old M-16 as the standard weapon for the entire United States military. But Blancanales had declined, at least until the Pentagon removed the “experimental” prefix from the sleek weapon. The XM-8 looked great on the gun range, but the difference between that and actual combat was often measured in the length of a dying soldier’s prayer.

Still sitting at his small workbench, Schwarz began to whistle as he opened a wall compartment and removed an XM-8 assault rifle. The new weapon gleamed with oil and polish. Working the arming lever, Schwarz inserted a plastic clip. The 5.56 mm HEAT rounds inside were clearly visible through a clear plastic window.

“Had a little talk with Cowboy, did you?” Blancanales asked mockingly.

“Why not? We’ve got to field-test these things sometime,” Schwarz stated, checking the 40 mm grenade launcher attached to the side of the XM-8 assault rifle.

So far, he approved of the new weapon. The XM-8 had excellent balance, an oversize ejector port to reduce jams, ambidextrous safety and was a good two pounds lighter than an M-16. That didn’t sound like much, but after a twenty mile run through the jungle, that measly two pounds could feel like half a ton. Two pounds lighter, yet it had greater range and was significantly quieter.

“Five miles to the cemetery,” Lyons announced, checking the navigation unit clipped to the dashboard. “Better get those out of sight.” Near his sneakers was a long box marked with the name of a local florist. It was tied with a ribbon and smelled slightly of gun oil.

“Anything on the radar?” Blancanales asked, working the slide on his Colt .380 automatic. The weapon was equipped with a bulbous acoustical silencer. That made it harder to draw fast, but the acoustical silencer would last forever, unlike a conventional silencer, which only worked for a few rounds.

“Passive is clear,” Schwarz reported, checking the machines. “We had a ping before, but it was just a traffic cop checking our speed.”

“Are you sure?” Lyons demanded, signaling to change lanes.

“Hell yes, I’m sure,” Schwarz snorted, crossing his arms defiantly. “The day I can’t tell the damn difference between traffic radar and a missile getting target acquisition, please shoot me.”

The other men accepted that, and settled in for the long ride. There were small airports a lot closer to the Bonaventure Cemetery that the commercial one they had used, but none of them were quite large enough to accommodate a C-130.

Only a few minutes later, they reached Boca Raton. The cemetery was located outside town, safely behind some tree-covered hills, and thus out of the sight of the most-elderly townspeople so as to not impolitely remind them of their own mortality.

Sculptured hedges divided the different sections, and an artificial waterfall splashed down from a central hillock to form a shallow stream that meandered through the lush greenery. The sprawling cemetery was a rich green, the perfect condition of the smooth expanse almost resembling a golf course. On the crest was a stand of oak trees with a tiered fountain splashing playfully inside the cool shade. Only the neat rows of orderly headstones marred the sylvan expanse. Only a few monuments stood amid the others, along with a row of garish mausoleums.

A high stone wall completely encircled the cemetery, and the front gates were simple affairs of wrought iron, thick enough to stop a Mack truck.

“Very impressive,” Blancanales muttered as they drove through. “I’ll bet they have very little trouble with grave robbers here.”

“This is Boca, you idiot, not Transylvania!” Schwarz snorted in amusement.

“No, Politician is right. Lots of rich folks live around here,” Lyons agreed, driving along the curved roadway. “And most of them want to be buried wearing their favorite gold watch or diamond jewelry. A fast man with a shovel could make a small fortune if he struck right after the funeral of a millionaire.”

Disgusted, Schwarz frowned. “When I die, just drop me into the sea with my dog tags and a rock for ballast. You can keep everything else.”

“And the way you play poker,” Blancanales added, “that’s all there will be—tags and a rock.”

“Bitch, bitch, bitch, that inside straight paid for your new plasma screen, didn’t it?”

“For which I thank you, in high definition and Dolby stereo.”

“You’re welcome, old buddy.” Schwarz chuckled, patting the other man on the shoulder, then his face tightened. “Oh, shit, this is a trap.”

“Yeah, I know,” Lyons growled, slipping a hand inside his windbreaker to loosen the Colt Python in his shoulder holster. “I just spotted it a second ago.”

The other men needed no further encouragement to ready their weapons for combat. The van was filled with the soft metallic clicks of working arming bolts and safeties disengaging. Every car in the parking lot was dusty, and badly needed to be washed, as if they had been there for days without moving. This was exactly the sort of detail that a street cop looked for to spot an abandoned vehicle parked along a busy downtown street. Now, a grieving family might leave a car here for a few hours, or even overnight, but certainly no longer than that, and not ten of them. That was way beyond the limits of probability. These cars were merely window decorations to make the place look more inviting and less empty. Which meant the entire cemetery was a trap. But was it for them or somebody else? Did the enemy know Able Team had arrived, or were they still waiting for a target? Only one way to find out, and that was to go ask them, face-to-face.

The loose gravel of the parking lot crunched under the tires of the cargo van as Lyons casually headed into the far corner and stopped well away from the other cars.

“Get hard, people,” Lyons said, pretending to adjust his collar to activate the throat mike hidden underneath. “If this is not for us, they will not want to damage the van and give away the show. Whoever this is, they’ll wait until we step outside and then take us down hard.”

“Blood on the gravel being a lot easier to disguise than a burning car wreck,” Blancanales added, adjusting the flesh-colored radio bud in his ear. Unless the entire cemetery was mined to blow, any snipers would have to wait for the Stony Man operatives to reveal themselves to become targets. The soft recon had just gone hard.

“Especially this one,” Lyons said, brushing away the top of the flower box to extract a massive Atchisson autoshotgun.

“Confirmed,” Schwarz stated, looking through a scope of the new XM-8 rifle. “We’re already painted with a UV laser from somebody in those trees on top of the hill. I can see it sweeping back and forth, waiting for us to step outside and say welcome.”

Tugging on a dark baseball cap to cover his blond hair, Lyons started to reach for the hand mike, but stopped just in time. Even if the sniper was scanning the EM bands, he’d never be able to decipher the encoded transmission, but the mere fact that there had been a transmission would tell him far too much. The last thing they could do was call for help, because it would literally be the last thing they ever did. Their pilot, Jack Grimaldi, was on his own.

“The numbers are falling, brothers,” Blancanales stated, draping a bandolier of clips and shells around his neck. “If we take too much longer, the sniper will know we’re wise, and then all hell breaks loose.”

“For him,” Lyons whispered menacingly, easing open the driver’s side door and slipping quietly outside.

Crawling on their bellies into the flowering shrubbery, the three men snaked along the wood chips covering the dark soil. The smells of nature surrounded them, but their focus was on the copse of oak trees on top of the distant hill.

Entering a thick growth of laurel, Schwarz swung up the XM-8 and looked through the built-in telescopic sights to try to find the source of the UV laser. The beam entered the shadows in the crown of the tree and vanished. He knew where the sniper was located, but could not get a clear view.

“This could be a friendly,” Schwarz whispered, shifting position in the greenery. “The Feds or even Homeland.”

“Unlikely,” Lyons began as a flash of light came from within the oaks and a fiery dart raced down the hill to violently explode on the side of the van.

The strident concussion seemed to shake the world, it was so loud, and the car alarms on the other vehicles in the parking lot began hooting, whooping and blaring.

Swirling around, a thick cloud of smoke masked the van as a soft rain of shrapnel sprinkled the gravel. But as the dark fumes cleared, the cargo van was still there. A side panel had been burned completely clean from the explosion, and the bare armor underneath now exposed.

“Well, he knows who we are now. Go, go, go!” Lyons commanded.

The Stony Man operatives broke cover to charge across the open field of gravel and dive for safety behind some granite headstones.

Almost instantly, there came the hard chatter of a powerful machine gun, and the headstone shook from the arrival of hot lead, sharp chips flying off from the hammering impacts.

Recognizing the sound of a FN Mini-Mi, called a M-249 SAW by U.S. troops, the Stony Man team waited until the 200-round belt cycled empty, then they moved again, fast and in different directions. Only a suicide gave an opponent a group target.

As the SAW lurched back into operation, Blancanales and Schwarz took refuge behind a tall hedge, only to recoil from a pungent reek. Looking around, they spotted the tattered body of an old man in work clothes next to a lawn mower, his dried blood splattered over the machine. The hedge had hidden the corpse from them in the parking lot. Filled with a cold certainty, the Stony Man operatives knew in their guts there would be more corpses scattered around the beautiful cemetery.

Carefully aiming between the body of an angel and her outstretched wings, Lyons cut loose with a long burst from the Atchisson, the sustained discharge briefly sounding louder than the rocket attack. The leaves in the copse of trees shook wildly from the arrival of the steel buckshot, but there was no answering cry of pain or spray of blood.

Chattering away once more, the SAW probed the hedges randomly, and Lyons responded with another barrage, letting Blancanales and Schwarz jump ahead several rows. Racing behind a hedge, they fired short bursts from their own weapons into the air. Both of the grenade launchers could reach the trees by now, but the team wanted the man alive. This mission was still basically a recon, and hard intel was the goal, not revenge.

Slapping in a clip of rubber-tipped stun bullets, Schwarz angled a long burst at another obelisk near the top of the hill, and he managed to get some of them to ricochet into the trees. The SAW stopped firing, but only for a moment. Blancanales tried the same tactic from a different direction, but the results were sadly the same.

“Hollywood to Sky King,” Lyons subvocalized into his throat mike, firing a short burst into the trees. “We have a guests at the party. Repeat—” A strident squeal erupted in his earbuds, and the man bit back a curse as he turned down the volume. The radio signal was being jammed.

As if focusing on the brief transmission, the SAW rattled the headstones around the man, the 5.56 mm rounds annihilating more flowers and bushes. Blancanales and Schwarz answered on full automatic as Lyons sprinted for the protection of a granite bench. He made it just in time, a single round plowing through his shirt to glance off the body armor underneath.

Once more the M-249 roared into life, spent brass tumbling from the crown of the tree like hot autumn leaves. The billiard-table-smooth field of grass churned from the arrival of the hollowpoint rounds, and several headstones were knocked over, leaving a large gap in the neatly trimmed hedges.

Sending back a full drum of cartridges in reply, Lyons cursed at the realization that the sniper was creating a shatter-zone, an open space that Able Team would not enter without getting torn into pieces. Smart. Too damn smart.

A grenade came sailing out of the trees, arching high into the clear blue sky. Quickly jerking up the Atchisson, Lyons emptied an entire drum of 12-gauge cartridges, and the grenade detonated harmlessly over a reflection pool, the halo of shrapnel hissing into the water.

Crouching behind a marble statue of Venus, Blancanales sharply whistled to catch the attention of the other men, then he raised a fist, splayed his fingers and flashed two. Silently, Lyons and Schwarz nodded in agreement.

As the other men opened fired with their weapons, Blancanales stepped to the left, then spun around and sprinted to the right. His heart pounded savagely in his chest, and he almost tripped at the startling discovery of a young woman lying dead in the grass. Jumping over the body, Blancanales did a shoulder roll and took cover behind a wide obelisk. Forcing himself to ignore the deceased civilian, the soldier concentrated the M-203 on the distant trees.

Running low behind the hedges, Schwarz discovered more bodies, a family this time, including a swaddled infant. Snarling, the soldier stood and fired the grenade launcher. The 40 mm shell sailed up the hill to arc between the oaks and slam into the tiered fountain, blowing debris in every direction. Softly, somebody cursed in pain, and a large machine gun tumbled out of the branches to smack onto the sodden ground. It looked like an M-249 SAW.

Suspecting a trick, the three Stony Man operatives patiently waited, reloading their weapons. A moment later there was a powerful boom from within the trees and a headstone violently exploded, throwing out a corona of broken granite. When the smoke cleared, the headstone was gone.

That had been a Barrett 25 mm rifle! Blancanales realized, blood trickling down his face from a cut on his temple. Bolt-action, 5-round clip and way too accurate for this short a range. We’ll have to do something about that double-quick.

Another headstone detonated, closely followed by a statue of Jesus, and Schwarz grunted from an impact on his body armor as he fired the XM-8 assault rifle. However, there was no feeling of a spreading warmth, which meant there had been no penetration. Level Five ballistic cloth was a foot soldier’s very best friend. Tomorrow his bruises would hurt like hell, but right now his job was to keep low, move fast and stay alive.

With the stink of propellant and old blood in his nostrils, Lyons spit the foul taste from his mouth, and eased in his last ammo drum from the Atchisson. After this, he would be down to the Colt Python. Even worse, these last cartridges were all fléchette rounds, stainless-steel razor blades would mince a grown man into hamburger in a split second. Not exactly what he would have chosen to capture an opponent. However, that gave him pause. Fair enough.

Drawing the massive handcannon, Lyons dashed sideways, triggering both weapons. The sniper attempted to aim the Barrett just ahead of the running man, and make him run into the deadly blast, but Lyons constantly changed direction until he reached the temporary safety of a headstone, only to roll into the shallow runoff from the waterfall. Half a heartbeat later, the headstone detonated like a bomb.

Thumbing in a fat HE shell, Schwarz launched it high into the sky and it hit on the far side of the hill, the roiling blast achieving zero results.

Taking a moment to catch his breath, Blancanales spun around the granite slab to fire his own grenade launcher. The 40 mm stun bag disappeared into the trees yielding no effect. But a large swatch of leaves was gone, leaving a deadly gap in the protective cover of the lush greenery.

Understanding what the man was doing, the other Stony Man operatives now attempted to do the same, their stun bags ripping away the leafy boughs until something metallic was seen nestled amid the thinning foliage.

Thumbing in a loose cartridge, Lyons scowled at the sight. Son of a bitch, that was an Auto-Sentry! With the knowledge that there was no living opponent in the tree, he unleashed the full might of the Atchisson. Leaves exploded into the air in a whirlwind of destruction, and something man-size fell to the ruins of the fountain.

Giving the fallen machine a wide berth, the Stony Man operatives warily checked for any other Auto-Sentries in the trees and bushes on the hillock. When satisfied that they were alone, the men approached the Sentry. They scowled in open disapproval at the sophisticated device. The video camera was still attempting to aim the lethal Barrett toward them, a LAW rocket launcher clicking futilely. The antenna was gone, so the deadly machine was merely attempting to perform the last command it had received.

“Whoever installed this here was watching through the camera until activating the jammer,” Schwarz said, swinging around his laptop. “They waited until those poor folks back there were in the proper position, and then killed each one, making sure the bodies fell behind cover to not warn anybody pulling into the parking lot.”

“Ruthless,” Blancanales muttered in open disgust.

“Monstrous,” Lyons amended, resting the hot barrel of the Atchisson on a broad shoulder. “They were watching the cemetery through that video camera, until we arrived. Then they put the Sentry on automatic, and activated the radio jammers.”

“And burned out the transponder,” Schwarz added glumly, lifting a piece of melted electronics. “There’s no way we can track them through this.”

“Wait a second. Those are blocks of C-4 inside the Sentry,” Blancanales said with a frown. “If this thing was designed to explode and destroy any possible evidence if somebody captured it, then why didn’t it?” Slowly he smiled. “Oh, right.”

“Exactly,” Schwarz agreed, patting the laptop. “They were jamming us, but we were also jamming them.”

Lyons almost smiled. “You’re a devious man, Gadgets.”

Blancanales snorted. “Never saw an Auto-Sentry equipped with multiple weapon systems before. That also something new, Gadgets?”

Attaching some wires to an exposed circuit board, the man shrugged. “Nothing I ever heard about. Must be a modification they did. Clever idea, though.”

“Yeah, clever as hell,” Blancanales muttered, glancing back at the dead people sprawled in the ruined shrubbery. From this angle, he could see that the team had missed several corpses scattered around the hillock.

Typing some commands into the laptop, Schwarz grinned in satisfaction. Reaching past the twitching Barrett, the man yanked out some wiring, and the Sentry went dark and still. Instantly, the jamming field went off the air.

“Sky King to Rock Hounds. ETA, four minutes.” Grimaldi’s voice blared in their earbuds. “Repeat, ETA three minutes.”

“Sky King, this is Hollywood,” Lyons said quickly into his throat mike. “The party is over. Return to base. We’ll—” He glanced down at the van in the gravel parking lot. The chassis was dented, but still serviceable. Even the Lexan plastic windows were intact. However, all four of the tires were flat. “We’ll grab a cab, and be there soon.”

“What happened to your roller skate?”

Lyons grimaced. “Somebody brought a firecracker to the party.”

“Ah, understood, Hollywood,” Grimaldi continued smoothly. “I’ll have Bear call off the local cops, and send a couple of blacksuits to recover what’s left of the van.”

“Much appreciated,” Lyons said, listening to the howl of sirens growing steadily louder.

“All a part of the service, Hollywood.” Grimaldi chuckled. “This is Sky King, returning to blacktop. See you soon. Out.”

“Over and out,” Lyons said, brushing back his blond hair.

The three men waited expectantly for a few minutes until the police sirens abruptly stopped. In the ringing silence, the decimation of the cemetery somehow seemed even worse than before.

Loosening the clips and wires, Schwarz returned the laptop to his shoulder bag, then began ripping out the circuit boards from the Sentry.

“All right, anybody feel like checking the grave of the Russian janitor?” Lyons asked, clicking the safety on the Atchisson.

“I’ll do it,” Blancanales snorted, swinging up the M-16 assault rifle. Sweeping the rows of headstones, he found a fresh mound of dirt, checked the name on the headstone and then fired a single round. Instantly the grave exploded, blowing a geyser of dirt and rocks toward the clouds.

“Yeah, thought so,” the man muttered, lowering the assault rifle. “You would have to be a fool to booby trap an entire cemetery, but not the main reason we came here.”

“And whatever else these people are, they’re not fools,” Lyons agreed dourly, bending to recover one of the empty 25 mm rounds for the big Barrett.

Inspecting the bottom, the man was not surprised to see there was no lot number on the brass. There was no way to trace the ammunition. The Stony Man team used something similar in their weapons, as did the CIA, Navy SEALs, Homeland Security, British MI-5, the Mossad, a lot of folks who wanted to keep their involvement in clandestine operations out of the public scrutiny.

“Then again, maybe they are,” Schwarz muttered in a measured tone, extracting a tiny microprocessor from the morass of wiring and holding it triumphantly to the noon sunlight.

FIVE MILES AWAY in nearby Boca Raton, an armed man on the roof of the tallest downtown building released the telescope. When the transponder signal of the Auto-Sentry stopped broadcasting, that meant the jammer was in operation, which meant the balloon had gone up at the Bonaventure Cemetery. However, he was safe. No matter what sort of advanced military opticals the invaders might have with them, there was no way for anybody to find him this far away without astronomical-grade equipment, the kind that could not be transported without a hundred men and a fleet of trucks.

Pulling a PDA from his belt, the man thumbed in a coded text message, then sent it out over the Internet as a microsecond T-burst. The message was simple and concise. “Package delivered, goods en route.”

Tucking away the device, the man wiped his prints off the big telescope and headed for the elevator. Time to go home. Briefly, the mercenary wondered if the three men were with the FBI, CIA, NSA or more of those triple-damn Homeland Security agents. Those were very hard boys, and mighty hard to stop. Then again, it really didn’t make a difference. Once Westmore had them strapped down to a surgical table and then began to remove pieces of their internal anatomy, they’d talk.

Everybody always did.