The Chameleon Factor - Don Pendleton

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by the waist, and instantly their teammate yanked hard on the arm, twisting it just slightly along the radius. Schwarz went white as the arm snapped back into the socket.

      “Wh-hat th-the hell happened to three, you bastard?” he demanded, inhaling sharply though his nose.

      They both released the man.

      Blancanales gestured in apology. “I didn’t want you tensing up,” he explained. “That only makes the pain worse.”

      “Worse?” Schwarz gasped, gently massaging his throbbing shoulder. “How is that possible?”

      “Trust me,” Lyons said in a serious manner. “I’ve been there. It can get worse.”

      “Damn.”

      Just then a woodlark called from the darkness. Lyons spun about at the noise, and waited for it to come again before answering. A few seconds later, Phoenix Force strode into view from the midnight shadows beneath the thick cover of oak trees.

      “The prison guards okay?” Lyons asked.

      “Bruised, but alive,” David McCarter said, easing the tension on his Barnett military crossbow. In the hands of the former British SAS officer, the silent-kill weapon struck like divine justice, leaving only cooling corpses who left this world with a puzzled expression of how it had happened to them.

      “Although they’ll have a hell of a headache when they finally wake up,” the Briton added, slinging the bow over a shoulder. “Without the antidote you gave the Black Vipers, that bleeding sleep gas has nasty side effects.”

      “But it is fast,” Rafael Encizo stated, the compact Starlite goggles distorting his face as he scanned the night for any danger, or worse, any witnesses. “And that’s what counted tonight.” Heavily muscled, the soldier moved with catlike reflexes that spoke of endless years of combat in the field.

      “We took a big chance on this,” Hawkins said, nudging one of the dead men. “Not that I disagree, but it was a hell of a chance. I’m surprised that Brognola gave this mission an okay. Pleased, but surprised.”

      His actual name was Thomas Jefferson Hawkins, but everybody who saw him in combat quickly accepted the nickname of T.J. Trained by the elite Delta Force, Hawkins was relentless and brutal to the enemies of freedom.

      Lyons rubbed a palm across his blood-smeared cheek. “Hal understands that there are some crimes,” he said softly, “for which a simple bullet in the head is not enough payment. Now the books are balanced.”

      “Starting to sound more and more like Bolan all the time,” Gary Manning said, canting his silenced MP-5 submachine gun against his hip.

      “Thanks for the compliment,” Lyons growled, almost smiling.

      “Incoming call,” Calvin James said, touching the radio receiver in his ear. Tall and lean, the night-camouflage paint only took the reflective quality off the man’s dark skin.

      “We’ve been recalled,” he stated, looking at the others. “Barbara wants us to report in person ASAP.”

      “The SUV is this way,” Lyons said, starting into the bushes. If the farm was calling during a mission, something serious was brewing.

      CHAPTER THREE

      Nome, Alaska

      Death stalked the crowd.

      A calm voice called an announcement over the PA system of the airport. Excited children ran ahead of their weary parents. An old couple walked stiffly along the carpeted corridor, holding hands and talking softly. An anxious young man clutched a bouquet of flowers and watched each arriving plane with painfully obvious impatience.

      As he stood in line at the airport scanner, the weight of the gun felt heavy inside the blouse of the disguised man. His wig itched, and his lower back ached from the weight strapped to his belly, along with the padded bra and the—

      “Next, please!” the guard called out.

      His disguise of Professor Johnson long ago removed, Davis Harrison, aka the Chameleon, waddled forward from the yellow line on the floor and placed his lady’s handbag on the conveyor belt, then paused and removed a plain gold wedding ring from his pinkie and put it in a little plastic tray. His long nails were manicured and freshly painted, his sneakers worn at the heels and his white support stockings had a small run artistically placed near the ankle, where most runs occurred in stockings. He knew his disguise was perfect, but there was still a small knot of tension in his stomach. After 9/11, the Americans had become exceptionally good at uncovering smugglers—whether it was drugs, money or weapons. He was carrying all three. Plus his technological namesake, the prototype jamming unit.

      Armed guards stood in the far corners of the airport, loaded M-16 assault rifles cradled in their arms, hard eyes sweeping the crowds steadily. Briefly, Harrison had a flashback to the armed guards walking the elevated catwalks of the Berlin airport before the Wall came down. Hard times to make a living.

      However, as the Transportation Security Administration guards glanced his way, they shifted their attention away from his face to the bulging belly, and those with wedding rings smiled. Posing as a pregnant woman was a favorite ruse of smugglers, but this one seemed to be okay. She was wearing support stockings and her ankles were slightly swollen, her wedding ring didn’t fit the correct finger anymore from the water weight gain, her ears were pierced, but she wasn’t wearing earrings, there was no scarf to cover an Adam’s apple, no razor burn on the cheeks and so on. Satisfied for the moment, their attention moved to more likely suspects.

      An Inuit woman in a neatly pressed TSA uniform at the scanner held up a restraining hand as Harrison waddled toward the scanner.

      “Your glasses, ma’am,” she said, holding out a hand.

      “Sorry, I forget they were there,” Harrison said as he passed over the glasses.

      The guard nodded in sympathy and waved him on.

      Holding his bulging stomach protectively, he squeezed through the scanner and it remained silent. It worked! Elation filled the man, but he kept his expression weary. He was pregnant now, and it was exhausting work. Remember that, fool!

      Once on the other side, the now smiling guard returned his glasses, ring and handbag, and waved for the next passenger.

      Awkwardly shuffling away, Harrison paused for a moment to glance into a convenient wall mirror as he put on the ring and glasses, and fixed his hair. Then he pretended to burp and frantically covered his mouth in embarrassment.

      ON THE OTHER SIDE of the mirror, the security guards drinking coffee watched with dull interest as the pregnant woman primped for a moment. A lot of smugglers were caught by the mirror trick. They remained icy cool at the scanner, then smirked in satisfaction at their cleverness in the reflection in the “conveniently placed” mirror.

      “Poor thing,” a soldier said. “When my sister was preggers with her twins, she belched like a sailor day and night.”

      Another man laughed. “Well, that explains a lot about you.”

      “Stuff it,” the first guard snarled, the threat softened by a half smile. “Now, your sister, whew! Let me tell you…”

      WADDLING AWAY, Harrison joined the short line heading to the China Air counter. His ticket was for New Delhi, a city closely watched for smuggling things out, but not well monitored for smuggling things into. The nation was poor. Why would anybody smuggle something into India? Harrison kept his face pensive, but smiled inside his mind. Why indeed?

      As the line to board the plane moved slowly forward, he started shifting his weight from foot to foot, and began breathing a little heavily.

      An alert flight attendant noticed the action and briskly walked over.

      “Come on, dear,” she said, smiling. “Let’s get you on board where you can use the rest room.” Her nametag said Gwenneth,

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