Don Pendleton - Twisted Path

There were two dead prison guards among the wreckage. One blood-covered body had been slashed a thousand times when he had fallen into the lens of the searchlight. The second looked as though it had been dropped from a third-story window, with splinters of broken bones sticking through the lacerated flesh. Bolan found the sharpshooter's rifle when he rolled the dead guard over, and he unbuckled a holster that contained a .357 Colt Python. He strapped it on quickly before drawing the weapon.

The entire search had taken only thirty seconds, but he was already late for the party.

Stone, Libertad and several of the terrorists waited on top of the rubble that formed a gentle slope by the breached wall. "Souvenir hunting, Blanski?" Libertad sneered as Bolan approached at a run.

Bolan ignored the remark and cast a quick glance at the terrain outside the wall. The ground was flat and featureless up to a ragged tree line more than three hundred yards away. To the left, less than a third of that distance from their position, was a low barracks. Riot-equipped guards poured from the building to join a line of at least a dozen men forming in front of the squat building.

Three bodies sprawled between the wall and the trees, while several more terrorists raced for the safety of the trees beyond. Night was falling rapidly, but not quickly enough to cloak their escape. As Bolan watched, a rifle chattered briefly from the teetering tower, stitching a line of bullets in the dust before climbing the back of the man who brought up the rear.

"If those guards set up, we're dead. Let's move." Bolan followed his own advice and scrambled over the broken concrete, taking a short drop to ground level and rolling.

He had attracted the attention of the remaining tower guard, and rounds slammed into the dirt beside him. The warrior was up and running, zigzagging toward the tree line while the gunner tried to line him in his sight.

He hit the ground once more, rolling into a slight depression that he had spotted. The Executioner sighted his captured rifle and squeezed the trigger.

The first round gouged chips from the tower wall; the second penetrated an inch below the guard's hairline, flinging the top of his skull over the side of the tower as the body sunk out of sight.

Bolan gave the thumbs-up sign to the others, who were now crouched by the base of the wall. They made their break, quickly stringing into a line with Stone, the oldest and least fit puffing away at the rear.

The prison guards weren't about to let them escape without opposition, now that they had had time to gather their forces.

A sustained chattering began as the security force advanced in a strung-out skirmish line, firing their submachine guns in rapid bursts.

The first three terrorists through the wall were the first victims, falling like rag dolls in bloody heaps, little dots of white oozing red on the dusty plain.

The others went to ground immediately, recognising that there was little chance of survival for anyone exposed to the merciless wall of flying lead pumped out by the massed guns of the advancing guards.

Their position was pretty grim. If they remained where they were, the line of advancing gunmen would overrun the escaping prisoners and they'd be slaughtered where they lay. Anyone who tried to flee would be chopped to bloody ribbons before they had gone ten feet.

Bolan knew that there was no chance of surrender, even if he was to consider that option for more than a flickering moment. The troops held a special hatred for the Path. The last time there had been an uprising at Lurigancho by the Shining Path the government had sent in the Republican Army.

Every one of the terrorist inmates at Lurigancho had been killed. The army and local prison staff even killed two hundred more of the terrorists in other Lima jails, most of whom were already unarmed.

No quarter would be given in this war on either side.

For the moment, Bolan was stuck with the Path as his temporary allies until he could use their trust to blow them away.

He had no hesitation about dealing with the prison guards. In the short time he had been at the compound, he had observed firsthand that they were as corrupt and vicious as any of the prisoners. Rumor had spoken of murder and torture as common weapons in the guards' arsenal of repressive tactics, and Bolan had no doubt it was true.

The Executioner threw down his now-empty rifle and tracked onto an advancing gunner with the Colt.

Accurate as the Python was, he had to be careful to make every shot count. His ammo supply was severely limited, and he hoped he could make the guards back off and give the escaping prisoners room to run before they were overwhelmed. One determined rush by the heavily armed troops would finish the small party, which now numbered less than ten.

Bolan focused chest high, the silhouette dim in the fading light. He squeezed once and shifted targets even as the big pistol bucked in his hand.

The first victim had barely toppled to the ground before the Executioner picked his second mark, sending another heavy slug sprinting the short distance to smash ribs and tumble through soft organs.

The warrior cored one more gunner before the troops realised what was happening. Several turned in his direction, peppering the ground with a torrent of flying metal.

Bolan tried to ignore the manglers slamming all around him as he concentrated on reloading the swing-out cylinder of the Python. He could only keep his head down temporarily and count on the shallow pit he lay in to absorb the wave of death probing for him.

The guards were still trying to brazen it out, obviously poorly trained, content to hold their position and riddle the ground around Bolan's hiding place with random shots. They seemed to be ignoring the remaining prisoners for the moment.

Bullets kicked up spurts of dust in front of and beside the Executioner, clouding his vision as he sought his targets. Pretty warm work, Bolan thought, as beads of sweat crept down his forehead. Four slow shots ventilated four more guards before one of them turned to make a break for safety.

Two of the troops turned to watch him go.

An officer came from behind the wavering line of guards and stopped the fleeing man by swinging the barrel of his pistol into the running man's face. The wounded man crashed to all fours, hands clutched over his bleeding mouth, spitting remnants of his front teeth. The officer brandished his pistol at the remaining men, shouting commands.

Suddenly the gunner at the far end of the line vanished in a cloud of flame and smoke, his body catapulted into the air on the tips of a dynamite explosion.

A second guard disappeared, and small bits of burned flesh fell to the ground in a horrific rain.

Path reinforcements had arrived, flinging sticks of dynamite among the gunmen once they had crept unseen into range. Bolan's firing had distracted the security squad enough that the new arrivals had closed the distance undetected.

The shaky guardsmen gave up the fight and fled in panic toward their base, pursued by a creeping line of explosions as the Shining Path hurried them along their way.

Bolan and the rest made the best of the lull, sprinting the last few hundred yards at a pace that made their lungs ache. The Path rear guard followed, dynamite in hand.

The reduced band gathered among the trees. Many of the surviving terrorists had already left, beginning the long journey to rejoin their cells in various parts of the strifetorn country.

Two battered vans waited, large enough to hold about ten people each. The drivers didn't look any friendlier than the rest of the Shining Path terrorists.

Libertad motioned Bolan and Stone into the back of a dirty blue van. Half a dozen men climbed in with them, and they all sat silently on rough sacks as the truck bounced crazily along the poorly paved roads that led away from the prison. The first task was to clear the area before the police and army sealed the region to start an intensive search for the escapees.