Don Pendleton - Beirut Payback

When he did approach Beirut and the Phalangist positions, he would need to ditch the jeep, of course, but in his withdrawal from the Shouf, these wheels could serve him well. And if he encountered Druse or Syrian checkpoints and the Syrian army markings did not do the trick, well, he had the Beretta and Big Thunder and the AK-47.

He negotiated a down-curving bend and found a spot he remembered.

He tromped on the brakes and his vehicle shuddered to a grinding stop, halting sideways across the road.

Bolan scrambled from behind the steering wheel and hustled up a steep incline beyond the culvert on one side of the road to a rim of wild shrubbery.

He would have less than a minute before his pursuers rattled around that bend after him. Bolan hoped like hell they had not sent more than a truck or two, which could be manageable.

With General Abdel dead Strakhov would assume temporary command back there, until the Syrian chain of command realigned itself after the Executioner's hellfire.

The Russians called themselves "advisors," sure, but everyone knew who really called the shots and that would go double for a vip from the head shed.

A hothead Syrian might send every trooper on the base in pursuit of Bolan, but coolheaded Strakhov would know better. He did not yet know of Bolan's presence in the area and would read this hit-and-git strike as possibly the work of government commandos testing the reflexes of the enemy preparatory to a follow-up strike.

Strakhov would most likely send a squadron after the stolen vehicle, but with the main force remaining at Zahle.

Pebbles and small rocks skittered down the incline behind Bolan's hurried climb, when a troop carrier came roaring down the grade and around the bend. The driver was too busy negotiating the turn and braking to keep his truck on the road and not hit the jeep to notice the telltale traces of an ambush setup.

Bolan had the AK-47 ready from cover shrubbery on the high ground overlooking the road. He had parked his vehicle far enough from the curve in the road to allow the driver to halt his truck without crashing into the jeep, but close enough to fully occupy the driver's attention.

The troop truck fishtailed to a stop.

There were angry shouts from the men in the rear.

Then those shouts and everything else got buried beneath the bucking reports of Bolan's rifle as he riddled the cab of the truck, pulverizing windshield and the heads of the driver and another man in a shower of glass and gore.

The Executioner came loping down the incline as two soldiers started climbing out frantically from under the tarp at the back of the truck.

Bolan squeezed the AK'S trigger, and twin sprouts the color of the red dawn exploded from shattered bodies that collapsed like discarded toys onto the road behind the vehicle.

Bolan approached the troop carrier and underhanded a grenade into the rear of the truck before anyone else could try to get out.

Then it was too late for any of them to do anything but disintegrate. The blast catapulted the carrier onto its side, leaving the tarp, machine and occupants in shredded ruins. The explosion echoed from mountain to mountain.

Bolan hurried back to the jeep, which he had left idling, and got the hell away from there before any more trucks decided to give chase when they got no word from this one.

He had to get back to Beirut, the city of hate.

Back to where the hellfire flamed hottest.

For the mission; for Zoraya and Selim.

For Lebanon.

For the War Everlasting against cannibals like Greb Strakhov and everything that ultimate savage stood for.

A new day, right. A new war. The Bastard in Black would see them both through to the bloody finish.

Bob Collins awoke with a start and reached for the .45 automatic he always wore in a shoulder holster. He relaxed when he realized Also Randolph was the man shaking him awake. Collins sat up on the cot in their "office" and blinked the sleep from his eyes.

He and Randolph were partners and sort of friends, CIA agents who had risen through the ranks to find themselves stuck with the worst assignment of all.

"What the hell is it?" The sleep had been fitful but welcome just the same, a respite from Hell.

Collins and Randolph had not only been stuck with the undesirable job, but were right smack in the middle of it and there was no escape at all.

"Wake up." Randolph shook him some more. "We've got trouble."

Collins reoriented himself to the CIA monitoring station: the basement of a closed vegetable business owned by a Company front in the Christian sector of Beirut. Like living in a dungeon, Collins thought again. Then he shook the depression and glowered.

"Okay, Also. Trouble. Trouble in Hell. Give it a name."

"Bolan," Randolph replied, and that woke Coffins up all the way. Randolph moved to lean his bulk against the battered table in the corner where they kept the scrambler phone to the embassy. He lit a cigarette. "Just got it. Thought you'd want to know." Collins turned on the hot plate to heat water for instant coffee. The cellar room felt as claustrophobic as ever.

"And I suppose our orders are to keep this sector wired for public enemy number one."

"You got it. Make that world enemy."

"I know the standing orders on the guy," Collins grouched. "Shoot on sight. I wonder what the hell Mack Bolan is doing in Beirut, now that he's put himself against the KGB.. They're all over this rathole, sure, but nothing that hasn't been going on for a long, long time. Maybe our buddies in Mossad know."

Randolph grunted and lit another butt.

"Buddies, uh-huh. Depending on which way the wind is blowing out of Washington and Tel Aviv this hour. And I don't think we're going to be such buddies with Mossad after you hear the rest of what I just got."

Collins spooned coffee into a cup, added hot water and stiffed.

"So tell me, Also. We've got to hit the streets in the middle of everything that's going to bust loose today, keep our cover intact and monitor the fighting and not get killed. Now we've got Mack Bolan and orders to terminate a guy the Vietcong, the Mafia and all the terrorists in the world couldn't kill. A guy who was on our side until a few months ago and maybe he still is. And you say you've got something else."

Collins looked at his partner. "Maybe we ought to pack a suitcase and slip out and go home, Also. You ever thought of that?"

"What the hell brought us into this, anyway? A few months ago this guy Bolan would've come to us for help. Now we're supposed to kill him. And all the rest of it. I don't want to die in Beirut. Do you want to die in Beirut? We've been conned, Also. Let's go home." The cynicism disappeared from Randolph's face, and all of a sudden he looked honest and as tired as Collins felt.

"Dammit, stop it, Bob. Get it together. You know it's not as easy as that and it does mean something. Even if you did get out that way you'd get what Bolan got." Collins sipped his coffee.

"You're right. Sorry about the whining, Also. It won't happen again. But you want to know something... what Bolan got ain't so bad. He's got himself, buddy. They took him but he got himself back and his name and his soul with it." Randolph dragged on his cigarette.

"I know what you mean. We're on the same side as he is in a way, but orders are orders. The Company can't allow anyone running around tackling wild, unsanctioned actions in sensitive areas like this the way Bolan does."

"He gets results, Also. And I don't think we have to worry about too many people trying or even coming close to what Bolan has done. The Executioner is one in ten million. No, make it one of a kind. That's Bolan."

"So our orders suck," Randolph grunted and the cynical tone returned. "So call up the embassy on the scrambler and tell them the orders suck. And see what they give you back. These orders come from the top, pally. And the orders say: terminate Bolan."