LITMIR.BIZ

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Captain Hofflower was returning, stuffing his MEU (SOC) custom 1911 into its holster with one hand, holding a small black box with the other hand.

      “I recorded everything,” he said, tossing over the digital recorder. Bolan caught it with one smooth motion.

      “Make sure that someone sends me a new recorder. With all the features,” the Marine captain said.

      “How much did he have? Nutshell version,” Bolan said.

      “Well, he helped load the van with explosives for the 1983 Marine barracks attack.”

      “That was more than two decades ago.”

      “He’s forty-three. And he’s been Hezbollah since he was a teenager,” the captain explained.

      “The tanks?”

      “Given to him by his commander. He doesn’t know exactly where they came from.”

      “Who’s his commander?”

      “A creep named Faswad.”

      Bolan closed his eyes and reviewed his mental files. Imal Faswad moved into the Bekaa Valley after Bolan rampaged through to take out a terrorist-backed drug cartel. He’d been behind some major counterfeiting of American hundred-dollar bills, approximately fifty million worth, before the U.S. Mint updated to the new bills. The Hezbollah headman was someone who was never quite on the top of the Executioner’s “to do” list because he was mostly attacking people who could, and did, fight back. Bolan’s previous interest in Faswad was derailed when the guy’s headquarters was blasted to atoms by an Israeli air strike and a dozen thousand-pound bombs.

      It looked like it was time for the Executioner to pay Mr. Faswad a visit to find out why he was suddenly selling off tanks.

      “Who did Sinbal come to sell the tanks to?” Bolan asked.

      “Somewhere in the piles of grease you left littered all over the place, there was a party of Filipinos who are, er, were with Abu Sayyaf.”

      Bolan’s jaw clenched for a moment. Abu Sayyaf was aligned with al Qaeda. Another case of unfinished business that the Executioner would have to get to.

      “You sure I got them?” Bolan looked around. “A lot of guys just took off running.”

      “Well, give me a good DNA lab, we’ll know for sure,” the Marine replied.

      “All right. I’m lucky I got a single prisoner for you to interrogate,” Bolan conceded.

      “Thanks for helping bring a little justice to the Corps,” Hofflower said, putting out one beefy paw.

      Bolan took the hand, remembering what felt like a lifetime ago, his own incursion to avenge Marine blood. He could feel the bond with the fighting man before him.

      “It’s time to unass and blow this Popsicle stand,” Hofflower called out, pulling Bolan effortlessly to his feet. “It’s good to have you aboard, Colonel.”

      “Thanks,” Bolan answered. They got into the Seahawk and Lieutenant Ellis pulled the chopper into the sky, rising a half mile before stopping.

      Hofflower handed over the radio detonator to the Executioner. “Your prerogative, Colonel.”

      Bolan accepted the detonator, flipped up the safety cover on the firing stud and thumbed it down. Even through the rotor slap and vibrations of the SH-60’s powerful turbines, the shock wave from detonating the tanks was palpable. Concentric rings of smoke, indicating the rippling forces that devastated the armor, were still visible down below.

      That was just the opening salvo to the scorched earth process being undertaken.

      The four orbiting Marine Seahawks were armed with artillery rockets and Hellfire missiles. Pilots and gunners opened fire instantly on the ground where the terrorists sought to sell the Devil’s tools. Explosions formed a scouring cloud of devastation that swept from the four corners of the auction ground toward the middle, shredding and splintering anything in its path. Stomped flat as if under the feet of giants, the hodgepodge mixture of surviving jeeps, guns, helicopters and low-speed jets, as well as various missiles and other explosives, disappeared in a cacophony of devastation that Ellis yanked the SH-60 out of just in the nick of time.

      Bolan could almost reach out the side door and touch the blossoming mushroom of smoke from the hell blitz.

      An explosive start to a mission that promised more such devastation ahead.

      3

      It was time for the weekly mail drop, and J. R. Rust, posing as a journalist, stepped up to the cage, smiling.

      “Your new cameras and printer are here, Mr. Russel,” Rudiah, the mail clerk, notified him. He was wrestling a box onto the counter.

      Cameras and printer? Rust thought. The box looked fairly large. “I hope the editors thought to include an instruction manual this time,” he said.

      Rudiah almost said something, and then smiled tightly.

      Yeah, the Lebanese post office wasn’t at all interested in what James Russel was receiving in the mail from America, Rust thought sarcastically. He looked at the return address and saw it was from Egypt, but labeled from a blind intel dump that a man named Striker had set up with him. Rust had worked with Striker and a covert strike team on two dangerous operations, one in Pakistan, and one in Lebanon, racing to deal with forces ready to blow the Middle East wide open in a nuclear conflict.

      Since then, Striker had tapped Rust personally, knowing that the CIA man had his ear firmly planted to the ground in regards to Middle Eastern politics and terrorism. Born eating and breathing the cultures of the Islamic nations from the Mediterranean through the Kashmir, Rust was an expert not only in Arabic dialects but mannerisms and mind-set. This ingratiated him to the movers and shakers of the nations he frequented. Either as an invisible part of the embassy staff, or, slightly more out there, as a journalist, Rust was able to blend in, become a fly on the wall, and get information to the ears that needed to hear it.

      Rust thought about the need to get information to the right ears, and thought of 2001. Maybe that was why a veteran CIA man was so willing to buck the system and risk his job by leaking information to a phantom not even the Company was sure about. Striker went to the field and actually put boot to ass.

      He signed for the box. The damn thing weighed a ton.

      Hauling it under one arm, he left the post office. That’s when he saw a dark-featured young man out of the corner of his eye. Rust’s alarm bells went off when he knew that the young guy didn’t fit in. There was something wrong about him, but he couldn’t place what.

      Things were really tight now. Unbalanced and hindered by the heavyweight box, he couldn’t rapidly reach the tiny Glock 26 he had nestled in an ankle holster. He knew how to draw quickly with the ankle rig he wore, but that was with his hands free and his ability to turn unhindered by a big, heavy box. The CIA man was of a mind to just dump the box, but that wouldn’t be good for his health if the package contained a bomb.

      “Russel,” a voice called. It had a mixed Midwestern and South Florida drawl to it, and Rust had to look twice at the man who spoke using the voice.

      It was the guy who set off Rust’s instincts. The features were a little too dark for Egypt, and not hooked enough to be fully Semitic, but he did look like he fit in Lebanon, even though his manner was that of a Westerner. The hair, though, was nappy and short to his head, and dark eyes studied him carefully.

      “Russel, I’m here on ranch business,” the man said. His hands were occupied, filled with a rolled newspaper in his left and a bottle of water in his right.

      Rust relaxed. It was kind of an unwritten code among the agents in the area that they have their hands filled when they met, to distinguish friend from foe. Empty hands meant that the person you were meeting wanted his options open to immediately grab a weapon. The plastic water bottle and newspaper,

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