LITMIR.BIZ

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the prisoner was secured, the Executioner turned to the distraught woman. Bolan judged her age at early twenties, at most. Smeared makeup and tangled blond hair did not hide her good looks. The pirates had obviously known what they wanted when they picked her out of the crowd. Bolan eased closer to her, slowly, careful not to startle her.

      “I’m going to remove that,” he said as he reached for her gag, his tone calm and reassuring. He was no stranger to dealing with the victims of crimes such as the one he had just averted. “Don’t cry out when I do, please. Everything is going to be all right.”

      The woman let him take off the gag. She froze for a moment, then threw herself at him, shaking uncontrollably, trying and failing to choke back deep, wracking sobs. Bolan, the Beretta still in one hand, hooked one arm around her and let her cry. “My name is Cooper,” he said, using his Justice Department alias. “Matt Cooper. I’m here to stop what is happening.”

      The woman sobbed something against his chest. It took Bolan a moment to realize she was saying something coherent. “The…the lounge,” she managed to utter.

      “What lounge?” Bolan asked.

      “Deck…deck five, and six,” she stammered. “The big lounge with the casino. They’ve got them…got them all there.”

      “The hostages?” Bolan asked. The young woman nodded. “All right. What’s your name?”

      “Kris…Kristen.”

      “All right, Kristen,” Bolan said. She had recovered enough to realize she was half naked. She found her clothes, which were rumpled but intact, and quickly dressed. Bolan turned away and checked the bound pirate once more, making certain he was still out and not playing possum. Then he reached out and beckoned to her, careful to keep his expression and his body language neutral.

      “Where are we going?” Kristen asked, clearly terrified.

      “To another part of this deck,” Bolan said. “These are officers’ quarters. We’re going to find you another room. You’ll lock yourself inside and stay there. Don’t come out unless I come back for you or you hear a rescue team on the ship. All right?”

      Kristen nodded, eyes still wide. After locking the unconscious pirate in the cabin and tucking away the pistol he’d recovered, Bolan took the woman by the hand and led her forward, listening carefully and moving as quietly as he could. Kristen, in bare feet, made no sound as they walked. The soldier finally found quarters that looked suitable and checked to make sure the door could be securely locked from the inside.

      “You’re going to leave me here?” Kristen asked.

      “Don’t worry,” Bolan said. “This will all be over soon. Stay inside, make no sound and leave the door locked no matter what you do. Can you do that?”

      “Yes…I think so.”

      “Good,” Bolan said. “Lock the door now.”

      He waited as she did so. Then he found the nearest companionway and took it to the next deck. Deck 4, according to the details in his PDA, was roughly two-thirds guest cabins forward and amidships, with more officers’ accommodations aft. Before he could approach Deck 5 and the casino lounge, Bolan would have to sweep Deck 4 for hostiles—and he would have to do it silently. He could not afford to alert the pirates guarding the hostages, nor could he risk having enemies approach from below when he did make his raid on the lounge.

      Time, he knew, was precious. There was a chance the pirates he’d taken out would be missed, even discovered. He would have to take his battlefront to the enemy before that happened, to retain the element of surprise.

      With the Beretta 93-R in his fist, its sound suppressor firmly in place, Bolan slipped wraithlike among the cabins of Deck 4. For the most part, the area seemed deserted. Bolan had checked almost all of the guest cabins—in some cases finding clothing and other belongings strewn about, as if searched none too gently by pirates looking for valuables—until he found one where two men were sleeping.

      The first pirate had passed out on a sofa in the suite’s small living area. Empty champagne bottles littered the carpeted deck around him. A second snored loudly in the bedroom beyond. There was no telling why, on a ship full of empty cabins, these two were sharing living space. The most likely explanation was that they’d been partying with booze taken from the ship’s stores. Bolan knelt silently over the emaciated, Indonesian man, who wore a pair of cut-off cargo pants and clutched a beat-up rifle. The man awoke startled and struggled to aim his weapon. Sliding the knife quietly from its sheath, the Executioner drew it across the man’s throat. He had no choice. The man had to be dealt with before he could raise an alarm.

      The Executioner slipped into the suite’s bedroom and found the snoring pirate. The man was Asian, dressed in a dirty tank top and jeans. A machete had been left on the floor next to the bed. Bolan saw, then, that the bedclothes were stained with blood. Someone had died there, and died hard. Bolan’s features creased grimly as he looked down at the sleeping predator.

      The man’s eyes fluttered open. As he opened his mouth to shout, Bolan let the knife in his right hand fall. While the blade was still in the air, his fingers found the butt of the suppressed Beretta. The weapon cleared leather with a practiced movement. As the muzzle came on target, Bolan’s finger took up the slack on the trigger, the entire motion smooth, fluid and fast. The 9 mm slug punched through the pirate’s open mouth and ended his cry before the shout could escape his lungs.

      The Executioner wasted no time. He searched the bodies, again finding nothing useful. Then he stripped the bolt from the rifle and left it in a wastebasket in the suite’s bathroom. Finally, he retrieved his knife, cleaned it and sheathed it.

      He was back on the hunt, moving from cabin to cabin, listening for movement and carefully, quietly checking each chamber. He could not leave anyone, could not risk discovery. The operation hinged on clearing Deck 4 before he made his run on Deck 5.

      He checked his ruggedized PDA once more as he reached the aft third of the deck, the change in décor and the signs warning “crew only” telling him he was once more exploring officers’ quarters. He had checked only two of these, finding them ransacked and devoid of personnel, when he found the first of the canisters.

      The waist-high metal cylinder was bright yellow and emblazoned with chemical and biohazard warnings in Cyrillic. The warnings looked as if they had been spray-painted on recently. They were much more clear than the fading paint on the scarred metal tanks themselves. Bolan had enough experience with the language—and what the words on the canisters represented—to know he was dealing with something very dangerous. He found several more canisters in more of the unoccupied cabins. Unlike the first few, however, these had electronic devices of some kind attached to them, blinking green LEDs on each device indicating they were active and possibly armed.

      They were detonators.

      The engagement had suddenly become something much more than a simple hijacking. Bolan used the built-in camera in his wireless PDA, capturing digital images of the canisters and close-ups of the electronic detonators. He transmitted these to Stony Man Farm immediately, relying on the satellite encryption built into the device to safeguard the intelligence he was providing. He would have to risk the transmission itself. It was unlikely the pirates had the kind of sophisticated gear that could detect outgoing wireless phone signals, satellite or otherwise, but it was not impossible. Given the weapons of mass destruction he was now standing among, they could have anything. He would take the gamble in order to learn precisely what he was dealing with, if possible. Hundreds of lives could depend on it.

      Bolan completed his count of the canisters and began to work his way back to the companionway that would take him to the next deck. Until he heard from the Farm he could do nothing but continue. He was about to check his weapons once more before ascending when he heard the faintest noise behind him.

      The soldier whirled and ducked as he did so. The machete sang through the air and crashed against the metal bulkhead. Bolan brought the Beretta up and just as quickly lost it; a savage, numbing blow slammed into his wrist and sent the pistol flying onto the

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