Don Pendleton: Twisted Path

"It seems like weeks since I was last in the fresh air. You lose all sense of time underground."

"Speaking of time, we don't have much of it to waste. Let's get moving."

"Why? Is something going on that I should know about?"

"You'll know when it happens."

They trudged over the broken ground, stumbling among the protruding stones and ancient ruins that poked through the dust. The moon had moved halfway across the sky. Bolan found it difficult to believe that only a few hours had passed since he'd entered the Shining Path headquarters.

They had trekked a few hundred yards and were about to enter the desolate village when they heard a dull roar behind them. A faint tremor vibrated beneath their feet.

The cave mouth exploded with a spout of flame, spewing a mixture of pulverized rock and dust.

The mountain above appeared to settle, as a portion was sucked down to fill the collapsing interior chambers.

Bolan paused a moment, thinking about the men trapped inside the mountain. A fitting end for murderers who ruthlessly butchered their fellow man.

Two bodies littered the ground near the exit. Libertad cursed. Idiots, all of them. They had had a perfect opportunity to destroy the invaders and had let them get away.

They had paid for their stupidity, and their failure would only make his success the more brilliant by comparison.

He stepped into the underbrush, confident of his ability to track and kill the American monsters.

This was a game that he had practiced for years, hunting the government pigs in the wilds of the mountains. He had always been victorious. Soon Blanski's head would be in his sights.

Libertad had moved only a few dozen yards from the exit when he was knocked to the ground by a gale-force wind. He felt the ground heave under him, and heard a grinding rumble from behind.

He knew immediately what had happened. "The dynamite," he moaned. Libertad hated to think what a blow this was to the organisation. Most of their supplies including weapons, dynamite, food and money had been scattered in underground chambers. The terrorist doubted that even a bent nail could be recovered now.

Many of the movement's great leaders had died this day.

He had lost his torture chamber, but he would still make the American pay.

He moved out, noticing for the first time how much his back hurt. The explosion had peppered him with rock chips it was almost like being blasted with a load of buckshot.

Libertad would attend to that later, after he had destroyed the Americans.

He crept forward in the darkness, and it was almost as if his feet remembered the ground beneath him from the many times he had walked it in the past. Ahead, he heard the jabbering of the foolish academic, Stone.

The terrorist gave a guttural snarl and picked up his pace.

Bolan and Stone were in the middle of the plaza between the temples. The former professor was indulging his interest in the ruins and was explaining his theories to Bolan.

"Listen, Stone, if you want to stay and explore, fine. I'm leaving." Bolan stalked off across the square.

Stone hurried to catch up. "All right. But I don't see why you are being so objectionable. With the Shining Path destroyed, there probably isn't another human being within ten miles. So what's the hurry?"

Bolan wasn't sure. His finely honed combat sense told him they weren't alone. There was someone on their trail, and he meant to find out who it was.

He signaled to Stone to go to ground at the base of a statue of an ancient reclining god and shifted off to the left, doubling back.

He waited behind a tumbled column, hardly breathing, until a faint shadow appeared and disappeared between two monuments. From the way the shadow moved, Bolan had been spotted, and the hunter was trying to turn his flank.

Bolan had learned that trick years ago. He watched the shadow weave and duck one more time. The guy was good, not giving Bolan a clear shot as he moved.

The next time the invader shifted position, Bolan moved stealthily to a stone obelisk farther left. When the hunter moved again, it was evident that he hadn't seen Bolan change cover.

The mystery man didn't know it, but the hunter had become the hunted. His next move would be his last.

When the shadow broke cover again, Bolan cut loose with the AK-47. The tracker screamed and toppled, thrashing, to the ground.

The Executioner stepped warily forward, the barrel pointed at the wounded man's chest. He stopped three feet away from the sprawled figure, who was moaning in the moonlight.

"Ah, Libertad. How nice to meet again."

The terrorist had a slug in the shoulder and another in the belly. Stone came charging up, anxious to see what had happened.

"Blanski, you dog..." Libertad found it hard to choke the words from between pain-stretched lips.

"If I really was an animal, I'd leave you here to fry."

"You mean you will save me?"

"In a manner of speaking." A gunshot rang out, followed by dead silence. Then, gradually, the faint night sounds resumed.

As his chauffeur drove him across the city in a limousine, General Arturo Palma raised his head from the report he had been reading and wondered for perhaps the thousandth time what had become of Blanski and the de Vincenzo woman. He knew that he should have killed both of them earlier when he had the chance. That way he would at least know now where they were.

Palma hadn't heard from Antonia since she had fled Lima. She represented a danger, particularly when out of his sight, for if word of his tenuous connection to the Shining Path ever surfaced it would ruin his political career.

His plan to use the Shining Path to further his ambitions was a good one, and Antonia had proved to be the perfect link.

He must keep his eyes open now to spot another likely contact among the prisoners he captured.

The limousine halted at a traffic light. A foolish waste of his time, the general thought. He made a mental note to arrange for a police escort in future to save himself from these bothersome delays.

As he stared uninterestedly out the window, he noticed a man fifty yards away raise an object to shoulder height and aim in his direction.

Realization hit Palma with a wave of shock.

His hand fumbled for the door handle just as the rocket was launched.

The limousine and Arturo Palma exploded in a fireball of scorched metal and charred flesh.