Don Pendleton: Meltdown

The huge brown circles made an interesting mosaic when viewed from the high slope. Heavy snow underfoot hampered the lone figure's descent as he headed toward the deadly brown scars. He paused to listen and to look when he reached the bottom of the hill. But there was only the wind swirling flakes of snow about him.

Somewhere out there in the bone-chilling cold, he knew, were three men. And Mack Bolan wanted them badly. He wanted them dead or alive.

Dunford, Idaho, was a godforsaken place. It was five hundred square miles of nuclear nightmare: plutonium reactors, waste recycling plants, high� and low-level facilities for waste storage. Dunford had it all. The large dead circles, so perfect from above, were signposts. Under each was a storage tank, some holding a million gallons of boiling radioactive liquid; tanks that were too hot to get close to, and too hot to stand a blanket of snow. And right now, as the moon slipped behind a lowering cloud bank that threatened to dump still more snow, three men were preparing to blow one of those tanks sky-high.

The boiling death that would be released by the explosion would kill every living thing it touched. The plant would be contaminated for thousands of years, permanently shutting down one of the keystones of America nuclear defense system. Bolan couldn't let that happen.

He had to find those men. Now.

But where the hell were they? he wondered. Which tank did they want to hit? In his arctic whites, Bolan was well camouflaged, but Dunford was too big for him to cover on his own. There were nearly two hundred tanks, and his prey wasn't likely to be too particular. Any tank would do, just as long as it was full of hot water. Bolan had a list of the full tanks, but so did the men he was hunting. Even knowing which ones were empty, which were full of salt cake, still left him nearly a hundred to watch. He had to move, and keep moving.

There was less than an hour left. The tank was supposed to be blown at three a.m., and it was already after two o'clock. He moved along the aisles of snow between the tanks, crouching to get a better angle of sight, hoping to pick up the silhouette of at least one of the three men against the dark gray horizon.

He stopped again to listen. What was that? he wondered to himself, trying to shake the spooky sensation of being alone in a white hell. He heard it again, this time a little louder. A crunch-someone approaching through the snow. Then he heard voices. They were off to the left, and some distance away.

Falling flat, he inched around to face the direction of the sound. The voices were still unintelligible, but the men were obviously coming his way.

Fast. He reached behind to unsling the white-shrouded rifle, careful not to make a sound. The terrain before him sloped away at a sharp angle. He would have to be quick, and deadly. There was no time to race around the frozen hellscape tracking phantoms.

He'd much rather make a few ghosts of his own and be done with it.

The first guy came into view about two hundred yards away. He was turning to look over his shoulder. Bolan steadied himself, readying for three quick shots, and then he saw the second man. Steady now, steady. One more, and he could end it. But the first two stopped. One of them turned and waved impatiently, then dumped a heavy pack in the snow and walked back the way he came.

The other man waited, looking around nervously.

Bolan readjusted the rifle's sight and watched.

He'd teach them something about patience. Not that they'd live long enough for it to be of any use. Soon the guy was back, half pushing and half dragging another man. "Keep it down, for crissakes, why don't you?" the man who had waited cautioned them.

"What are you bellyachin' about? There's nobody within two miles of us. Come on, let's get it done." He was bending for his pack as Bolan zeroed in on him. The target hoisted the heavy pack and shrugged into the shoulder straps, then reached into his pocket. He pulled out a piece of paper, unfolded it and looked around, as if trying to get his bearings. "One-oh-seven-B ought to be around here somewhere." He surveyed his surroundings for a moment. Satisfied, he stuffed the paper back into his pocket and pointed to his left. "It's right over there. Let's move it."

Bolan wanted to take him out first. He seemed to be the leader of the group. Without him, the other two would be disoriented, easy pickings for the Executioner. Bolan kept the man in his cross hairs and waited as the group moved forward. Soon, all three were visible in his sight. Bolan squeezed off the first shot. The boom of the big Weatherby Mark V echoed through the still night as the target's head shattered. The bloody spray was dark and shadowy against the freshly fallen snow. Bolan squeezed off another round before the body of his first target had reached the ground. This time he aimed a bit lower, drilling his man through the chest. A dark stain spread across the saboteur's arctics, and he flew backward, his arms windmilling as his nearly lifeless body fought to keep its balance.

But these guys weren't amateurs. The third man had dived into the snow at the first shot, and now he started to scramble back down the slope. Bolan fired a round into the guy's pack. The dull thud of the slug hitting home goosed the guy into a frenzy. He swung his submachine gun into action and sprayed his fire up and down the snowy hill.

Bolan knew the man had no idea who, or where, his target was. Still, the big guy knew a wild shot could kill just as easily as a well-aimed one.

Bolan moved off to the right, angling down and away from the line of fire. There was a low mound of snow about thirty feet away. It wouldn't provide much cover, but it meant Bolan was not out in the open.

Bolan held his fire, not wanting to reveal his position unless he had something to shoot at. The guy seemed to have regained his composure. He had stopped firing, perhaps to reload, or maybe just to listen.

Bolan froze where he was.

Suddenly he heard footsteps. Somehow the guy had managed to get far enough down the hill to stand without showing himself. Bolan jumped to his feet and raced after the fleeing gunner. Finishing the job was going to be more trouble than he had anticipated. But that was good.

It confirmed Bolan's suspicions that he was dealing with something insidious and deadly.

As the fleeing man's footsteps receded into the night, Bolan plunged on in pursuit. Running was sluggish in the heavy snow, and he had to stop repeatedly to make sure his prey was still on the move. The last thing the Executioner wanted was to run right up the barrel of the guy's gun. Off in the distance, the nightmare machinery of the reactors loomed against the dark gray sky. There were flashing red lights atop the cooling towers, containment buildings and steam-belching stacks. Security lamps backlighted the towers, filling the horizon with bulky shadows. Scanning the terrain in front of him, Bolan finally spotted a thick white figure struggling toward a wooded strip that ran parallel to the security fence. If the running man managed to reach the fence, Bolan knew he would never catch him. The Executioner fell to one knee and sighted in on the fugitive just as the target tripped and disappeared.

As if sensing the presence of death, and his narrow escape, the man did not rise immediately. Bolan waited, patiently scoping back and forth along the perimeter. He would wait until the target got to his feet before making a move. Bolan knew his own position was tenuous. The damn contrast of white and dark would give him away, just as it had given the fugitive away. But Mack Bolan had time.