Dick Stivers - Amazon Slaughter

Remingtons and G-3s fired in one continuous roar as the Indians riddled the carved wooden partitions and painted screens inside Wei Ho's palace. Double-ought blasts ripped gaping holes through doors, walls, priceless Chinese art.

Able Team searched for Wei Ho. They killed everything that moved. A boy wearing a girl's gown and makeup ran from hiding, took a burst from an Indian through the back. Serving maids attempted a last desperate defense of their master with the AKs of dead guards. They died.

Lyons kicked a door as slugs punched through the wood. Spinning aside, he ran a few steps, slammed his shoulder against the wall. The carved partition crashed inward, knocking two Chinese guards to the floor. Lyons waved a burst of steel shot over them, their bodies suddenly masses of torn flesh and spilled guts. He saw the old man.

Wei Ho wore a gray English suit cut in the style of the thirties, his thin gray hair combed flat on his skull like a bank clerk. Rimless spectacles perched on the bridge of his fine-boned nose. He sat at a lacquered table, papers and blueprints spread before him.

"Would you kill a defenseless old man?" Wei Ho asked, his whine accented with the preciseness of British schooling.

Lyons brought up the Atchisson even as the old man's clawlike hand flashed. Dropping low, Lyons saw darts shoot over his head. He decided not to give the warlord another instant of life. He triggered an auto-burst of steel high-velocity shot through the ancient body. The three blasts ripped the old dart-wielder in two.

Rushing in, Blancanales saw the blank-eyed torso and arms drop to the floor, thrash for an instant, blood turning the conservative English suit's fabric to black. Lyons stared down at the dead Chinese. How could a frail old man contain so much evil as Wei Ho did?

"I think you killed him, Lyons. Now move it. We gotta hold this place until the cavalry arrives." Blancanales lifted his hand radio to his mouth. "Gadgets, he's dead. Lieutenant Silveres. Lieutenant! Send out the calls."

On the river cruiser, as the gunners on the deck continued raining high-explosive grenades on the mercenaries, Lieutenant Silveres pressed the transmit button of the long-distance radio, having been briefed by Gadgets on its workings, and sent a high-speed taped message by satellite to American stations in Bolivia, Peru, Washington, D.C., and Virginia.

Then he changed frequencies to radio his commander in the nation's capital of Brasilia.

"Men of the American Phoenix have torn into the heart of a great sickness. I was with them. We live. It is great to live! It is great to be here at this victory, greater than you will ever know! Allow me this moment of glory with these men. Then I return. But such men as these will never leave me in spirit. I salute them in your name. These damn Yankees...!"