Dick Stivers - Deathbites

No one tried to stop him.

Katz threw his bag of tools into the rented van and drove away. No one was remotely curious about an old tradesman leaving an old building.

July 14, 1012 hours, Houston, Texas

The commander of the Texas Harassment Initiation Team looked over his men. He was proud of them. He had recruited and trained them himself. He was about to prove that he was worth every cent of the three thousand dollars a week he had been paid. This unit was not about to fall on its face like some of the others had. He decided to make his summary of the briefing extremely short.

"Remember, A and B teams close in on the target. First, eliminate all the workers except the computer scientists — we'll use drugs to debrief them later. Then let the specialists take what they need from both the electronic and paper files before you destroy and retreat.

"C and D teams, you have the more difficult job. Someone is going to try to stop us. You are to keep a quarter-mile circumference around A and B teams at all times, during the raid and during the travel to and from. The moment another force tries to hit A and B teams, you close in and eliminate. Is everything clear?''

No one said anything.

"Then get to your assigned cars and let's put the show on the road."

Houston is a city where no one moves without a car.

HIT had their office and training center outside the 610 circle, near Genoa Airport. They had their own cinder-block building and parking lot. In the lot the group leaders began directing the men to their assigned transportation.

The last man was out of the building and the first car was moving out of the gate of the parking compound when the machine gun on the roof opened fire.

Tracers zeroed in on the engine of the lead car, bringing it to a standstill in the middle of the exit gate. The tracers then probed the back of the car until they found the gas tank. The only two terrorists to escape the inferno were cut down within inches of the car.

From a rooftop over five hundred yards away another light machine gun opened fire. A three-round burst perforated every terrorist who tried to regain the door to the building. Soon the door was well blockaded by the bodies piled against it.

"Take out those gun emplacements!" The command was shouted from between two cars. It was easier to issue the command than it was to perform the feat. Every time a head showed, a three-round burst went through the vehicle and the body behind it.

The tracers continued to stream from the roof of the terrorist stronghold. Gas tank after gas tank ruptured into a geyser of flames. Soon commands could no longer be heard over the screams of the dying. Two minutes later, the only sound in the enclosed parking lot was the crackle of flames and the pings of stretching metal.

Gary Manning on the roof of the terrorist hideout gave the thumbs-up sign to David McCarter who had been doing the sharpshooting from the roof of the more distant building. McCarter grinned and waved.

Both quickly picked up their Heckler & Koch HK21E machine guns and began their retreat. McCarter used his paratroop training to jump from the low building, cradling the machine gun in his arms. He held it almost tenderly, thinking that he could have done the same high-accuracy job from twice the distance with that beautifully machined, twenty-two inch barrel. He laid the gun on the back seat of a rented Lincoln and peeled rubber to the front of the HIT building.

Manning came around the corner and put his Heckler & Koch HK21E on top of McCarter's. He then threw a couple of jackets over the hardware and climbed into the front. The first siren could be heard faintly.

"Piece of cake," Manning said as he moved sedately away from the building.

"Let's go get us some Houston hospitality." McCarter grinned.

July 14, 1050 hrs, Salt Lake City, Utah

A weary Carl Lyons sat at the back of the Stony Man executive jet.

Rosario Blancanales walked back toward him.

"Carl, Katz's on the blower," he said. "He's got bad news."

Lyons grumbled to himself all the way up the aisle of the plane. He collapsed into the copilot seat without acknowledging Jack Grimaldi. He snatched up the microphone and growled into it.

"Yeah, Katz."

"I just came from a get-together in Seattle," Katz said, his voice sounding scratchy through the descrambler. "Old Ma Jishin's been gossiping on the telephone again. Time for all raids is now eleven hundred hours, local time."

Lyons glanced at his watch. "That's six minutes from now."

"Right."

Lyons glanced at Grimaldi, whose fingers were flying over his custom flight computer. He did not have to ask the question.

Grimaldi reported. "I can have you over Anderson Androids, the most probable target, in eleven minutes. Can we get a confirm?"

"You going to stand this can on its tail again?"

"Why not? It's fun."

Lyons spoke into the mike again. "Katz, we can reach the target about five minutes after hit time. We need a monitor on the police channels and a confirmation of the target.''

"I'll arrange for the police to give it to you. That way they'll be expecting some 'experts.' You have id if they ask?"

"I'll dig it out. Thanks, Katz."

"No problem. Out."

Lyons went back to Pol and Gadgets.

"Let's get ready. We'll have to walk the rest of the way. Soft armament. The wolves are going to reach the sheep first. Try the gray jump suits and use body armor."

All members of Able Team scrambled to equip themselves and be ready in time to jump.

"Why gray?" Gadgets asked as he put on the jump suit over the custom-made flak suit with its heating-cooling system.

Lyons was selecting id folders from an attache case full. He passed two out to his teammates and pocketed one himself.

"Just a hunch. The most probable target is one of these modern ultrasecure places with no windows."

"Got you," Pol answered. "Good thinking."

"I'm packing extra Gerber Mark l's," Gadgets remarked.

"We may need C-4. Pack lots," Lyons told Gadgets. "Also dig out those infrared flashlights and the goggles that go with them."

"Those damn things must weigh five pounds," Pol complained.

"I'm going to carry an Ingram," Gadgets said.

"No .45s! Uzis with disintegrating ammo and flash suppressors for everyone," Lyons barked. "Move it. We must be about there. Silenced Beretta 93-Rs in the shoulder rigs. Stun grenades only."

Grimaldi stuck his head around the door to the flight deck. "Probable target confirmed. I dump you in 150 seconds from... now. Good luck."

Able Team nodded. Their mental clocks were counting down as they scrambled into the parachutes.

Officer Pat Malone and his partner, Officer Inez Gallic, were the first to answer the report of explosions and gunfire in a new industrial park, east of the University of Utah. It was in one of the new buildings, Anderson Androids Ltd.

The terrorist techniques had been crude, but effective. They had gone to the only entry — it consisted of an outside door, a very small entrance hall, and two electronic doors that led farther into the building — opened the outer door and tossed in a large bundle of explosive. They had then ducked back out and braced the outer doors. The force of the explosion in the small foyer had blown both of the security doors right off their hinges, but the outside doors, which had been braced, were still functional.

Now the terrorists had automatic rifles covering the only entrance to the building. There were not even any windows that could be broken for entry. The building was nothing more than a very fancy concrete box. Those inside were completely dependent on artificial lighting, and air-conditioning.