Stolen Arrows. Don Pendleton
rocky ground, a side road extended to the sleepy hamlet of Aberystywyth, which was so reminiscent of his home village of Botcaku it made Zalhares momentarily homesick. The bitter memories of wearing dirty rags for clothes and going to bed hungry for countless years killed the gentle recollections of playing with his brothers and sisters. His mind returned to the task at hand. Making money.
Soon the gravel became dirt, which abruptly turned into smooth pavement again as the truck rolled along the prehistoric-looking granite dock. Wooden jetties reached out to sea, the thick planks shiny from the constant spray of the waves crashing on the pillions underneath. A motor launch was moored at the farthest slip, guarded by several large men in raincoats. Two were smoking pipes, one was eating an apple, all were carrying Uzi submachine guns slung beneath yellow slickers.
More guards occupied the launch. A lone figure stood on the foredeck armed with an American surface-to-air Stinger missile, while another watched the skies through compact Russian military binoculars. American weapons, Russian equipment, Australian-registered cargo ship, the smugglers were the UN of crime operating in these waters, a covert cartel that dealt in the oldest currency in history—human misery.
Parking the truck a safe distance away, Zalhares got out as Mizne removed the blanket and leveled the Uru out the open window. The men on the dock reacted, then relaxed slightly as Zalhares stepped between them and the unusual weapon.
“Who the hell are you?” one of the smokers demanded, resting a hand on the checkered grip of the Uzi. The bolt was already pulled, the weapon primed and ready to fire.
“I hear this town used to mine tin for a living,” Zalhares said loudly to be heard over the endlessly crashing waves.
The man with the apple tossed it away and stepped forward, wiping his hands on his pants. “Now we sell trinkets to the tourists,” he said carefully. “But it’s a living.”
Code phrases exchanged properly, Zalhares touched a gloved finger to his ear to let Mizne know to stand down.
The leader of the sailors pulled out a military radio and hit the transmit button. “They’re here,” he announced, then turned it off.
Not a phone, but a radio. Zalhares approved. With so many high-orbit satellites scanning the transmissions of cell phones, it was safer to use a short-range radio for local communications. The signal was too weak to be intercepted by the military satellites and their damn code-breaking computers.
“The cargo is in the truck,” Zalhares said, nodding in that direction. “You’ll need a forklift.”
“Jones, Smitty,” the man shouted over a shoulder. “Get humping, boys.”
The two men walked off, the third staying near the launch, puffing steadily on a briarwood pipe that looked older than the granite dock.
“So where is the Tullamarine anchored?” Zalhares asked, glancing at the rough sea. There was nothing visible to the horizon.
“Just past the ten-kilometer mark,” the man replied gruffly. “That puts her in international waters and will be hard for the Brits to get on board without a bloody good reason.”
“Then do not give them one,” Zalhares said, locking eyes with the sailor for a moment.
The other man tried to match the gaze and had to turn away. His crew were professional smugglers, hardcases and killers from a dozen countries, but this dark foreigner had the look of a buttonman, a stone-cold assassin, and the boson knew that he was out of his league here.
Standing on the dock, the two men watched as the crew of the Tullamarine removed canvas sheeting from a forklift parked at the base of the cliff, far away from the corrosive salt spray of the surf. With the Uru in hand, Mizne stood guard as they dragged out the heavy wooden crate and hauled it over to the waiting launch. Everybody stayed alert until it was firmly lashed into place again with ropes and more chains.
Checking the lashings himself, the boson grunted in satisfaction, then climbed back onto the wet jetty and pulled out the radio. “Clear,” he said before turning it off and tucking the transmitter into a pocket.
On the launch, the sailors started to release the mooring lines. The craft’s big gasoline motor purred to life.
“Anything else?” the boson asked, pulling out another apple and polishing it on the front of his shirt before taking a bite.
“Yes,” Zalhares said unexpectedly, pulling his flesh-colored gloves on tighter. “If there’s any trouble, destroy the cargo. Just firing a few rounds into the wood should do the trick. The crate is packed with thermite charges so it will burn even if you toss it overboard.”
“Fair enough,” the boson replied, taking a juicy bite. “Not going to get a refund though.”
The armed sailors laughed at that as they stored the lines in preparation to leave. Only the guard with the Stinger didn’t join in, his hard eyes never leaving the clear blue sky.
“Don’t worry about it,” Zalhares replied, turning to walk back to the waiting truck. “We have already gotten our full money’s worth from you.”
Still chewing, the boson frowned at that and glanced nervously at the packing crate in the launch. Just what the hell kind of contraband were they smuggling out of England this time?
Washington, D.C.
HAL BROGNOLA SAT hunched over his desk, looking at a picture of his family, then at the clock, and back to the telephone, silently willing Mack Bolan to call. As he stared at the photograph of his wife and two children, he felt a momentary pang of remorse over spending too much time on the job and not enough with his loved ones. But such were the demands of his career. He had no choice, really. So here he was again, behind his desk at the Justice Department on the weekend. The big Fed sighed loudly. No rest for the wicked.
The phone rang. Darting out a hand to grab the receiver, Brognola forced himself to wait until the trace circuits finished their work. It only took a few seconds before the small plasma indent screen showed the phone call was coming from a delicatessen in Brooklyn, then switched to a motel in Staten Island, a synagogue in Long Island, gas station in Harlem, Queens, Empire State Building, 42nd Street subway station, and so on, the location steadily changing every two seconds. Good, that meant it was Bolan and the Farm had tracked him down. Any phone call could be traced in time, but Aaron “The Bear” and Kurtzman the electronic wizards at Stony Man Farm had cooked up a device about the size of a pack of cigarettes that gave a hundred false identifications along with the legitimate location. It was classified as President Eyes Only and very few people in the entire world even knew of its existence, much less possessed the scrambler. Mack Bolan had the very first model released.
“Brognola,” he answered, lifting the receiver.
“It’s me,” Bolan said.
“Thank God, Striker,” Brognola exhaled, leaning back in his chair. “Do you know what Project Zodiac is?” he asked without preamble.
There was a brief pause. “I have heard rumors,” Bolan replied. “Some sort of doomsday plan from the cold war.”
“Damn close. President Kennedy wanted something to put the fear of God into the Soviets, and the CIA cooked up Project Zodiac. Twelve deep-cover agents scattered across Europe, with wives, jobs, children. They lived undercover for years before receiving their Zodiac.”
“Twelve agents, each with a code name after a sign of the Zodiac,” Bolan said. “Capricorn, Virgo, and such. Cute. Sounds like the kind of nonsense the CIA thinks is clever.”
“Yeah, you hit the nail on the head. Only these sleeper agents weren’t saboteurs sent to blow up certain targets, they were equipped with a compact nuclear device that fit into a standard-size briefcase.”
“Can it be that small and achieve threshold?”
“Different configuration,” Brognola stated, “and they work just fine. I’ve seen the films from the White Sands bomb range. Each of these has a full one-quarter kiloton