Don Pendleton: The Chameleon Factor

The President raised a hand to massage his temple. “As of this moment, our unknown thief owns a billion dollars’ worth of American technology.”

“Orders, sir?” Brognola asked grimly.

“Search the wreckage and find out who stole the Chameleon—or if nobody did. Maybe this is all a gigantic coincidence. They do happen sometimes.”

“If it is not a coincidence, sir?”

The President leaned closer to the screen. “Then get the Chameleon back at any cost. Get it back, Hal. And if that proves impossible, then destroy the prototype.”

“Sir?” Brognola said, putting a world of questions into the single word.

“You heard me. I’ll eat that billion dollars, and another billion on top, if that’s what it takes to keep the U.S. safe. The Chameleon is dangerous enough in our hands. But at least we have checks and balances in our government. However, under the control of a terrorist group, or rogue nation, we’d never even know what was happening until Manhattan, L.A. or even D.C. was blown off the face of the map with millions dead.”

Other titles in this series:

STONY MAN VIII

#9 STRIKEPOINT

#10 SECRET ARSENAL

#11 TARGET AMERICA

#12 BLIND EAGLE

#13 WARHEAD

#14 DEADLY AGENT

#15 BLOOD DEBT

#16 DEEP ALERT

#17 VORTEX

#18 STINGER

#19 NUCLEAR NIGHTMARE

#20 TERMS OF SURVIVAL

#21 SATAN’S THRUST

#22 SUNFLASH

#23 THE PERISHING GAME

#24 BIRD OF PREY

#25 SKYLANCE

#26 FLASHBACK

#27 ASIAN STORM

#28 BLOOD STAR

#29 EYE OF THE RUBY

#30 VIRTUAL PERIL

#31 NIGHT OF THE JAGUAR

#32 LAW OF LAST RESORT

#33 PUNITIVE MEASURES

#34 REPRISAL

#35 MESSAGE TO AMERICA

#36 STRANGLEHOLD

#37 TRIPLE STRIKE

#38 ENEMY WITHIN

#39 BREACH OF TRUST

#40 BETRAYAL

#41 SILENT INVADER

#42 EDGE OF NIGHT

#43 ZERO HOUR

#44 THIRST FOR POWER

#45 STAR VENTURE

#46 HOSTILE INSTINCT

#47 COMMAND FORCE

#48 CONFLICT IMPERATIVE

#49 DRAGON FIRE

#50 JUDGMENT IN BLOOD

#51 DOOMSDAY DIRECTIVE

#52 TACTICAL RESPONSE

#53 COUNTDOWN TO TERROR

#54 VECTOR THREE

#55 EXTREME MEASURES

#56 STATE OF AGGRESSION

#57 SKY KILLERS

#58 CONDITION HOSTILE

#59 PRELUDE TO WAR

#60 DEFENSIVE ACTION

#61 ROGUE STATE

#62 DEEP RAMPAGE

#63 FREEDOM WATCH

#64 ROOTS OF TERROR

#65 THE THIRD PROTOCOL

#66 AXIS OF CONFLICT

#67 ECHOES OF WAR

#68 OUTBREAK

#69 DAY OF DECISION

#70 RAMROD INTERCEPT

#71 TERMS OF CONTROL

#72 ROLLING THUNDER

#73 COLD OBJECTIVE

The Chameleon Factor

AMERICA’S ULTRA-COVERT INTELLIGENCE AGENCY

Don Pendleton

To all of the brave men and women, who do not go

gently into that good night.

“It is the soldier, not the reporter, who has given us the freedom of the press. It is the soldier, not the poet, who has given us the freedom of speech. It is the soldier, not the campus organizer, who gives us the freedom to demonstrate. It is the soldier who salutes the flag, who serves beneath the flag and whose coffin is draped by the flag, who allows the protester to burn the flag.”

—Sergeant Dennis O’Brien, USMC

“Freedom favors the strong and the wise. May God grant that we stay both.”

—Carl Lyons, leader Able Team

PROLOGUE

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

CHAPTER TWENTY

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

EPILOGUE

Military Target Range, western Alaska

The guard went stiff as the knife blade slid into his head.

Mouthing a silent scream, the U.S. Army guard dropped his weapon as Professor Torge Johnson shoved the blade in deeper, exactly behind the right ear where there was a small opening into the brain, a slim passage known to many as Death’s Doorway.

Gurgling, the guard began to claw at his side for the semiautomatic pistol in his shiny black holster. Frowning at the man’s resilience, Johnson savagely twisted the blade to sever the brain stem. The guard went limp, his body turned off like a light switch, his rapidly dying brain only a few moments behind.

Easing the corpse to the grass, Johnson yanked out the bloody blade just as a tremendous explosion sounded in the distance. As the professor wiped the murder weapon clean on the guard’s uniform, cheers sounded from the grandstand above.

Sliding the blade up his sleeve, Johnson checked the cheap watch on his wrist. Good. Everything was precisely on schedule. Taking a cigarette pack from his jacket pocket, he carefully peeled off the back to expose a thin layer of adhesive. Reaching up, he just managed to press the pack to the bottom of the wooden seats of the grandstand overhead. As his hand came away, the pack stayed in place and there was an audible click of the electronic device arming itself.

Glancing briefly at the bright rectangle of light that marked the only door to the space under the grandstand, Johnson stepped over the cooling body of the guard and weaved his way through the maze of struts and support beams to reach the middle section. Attaching another cigarette pack there, he continued the process slowly, emptying every pocket of the deadly cargo until reaching the opposite side. Glancing back just once to check his lethal handiwork, the professor allowed himself a brief smile of satisfaction, then set his expression into neutral and stepped through the open doorway and into the bright sunlight.

Taking a real cigarette from the pocket of his old suit, Johnson lit it with a butane lighter and drew the smoke in deep, savoring the building excitement. Soon now, very soon.

Walking out of the bushes that blocked the entrance of the doorway, the man pulled up his fly and tried to look embarrassed as if he had been inappropriately relieving himself in the greenery.

An elderly U.S. congressman sitting at the edge of the grandstand happened to catch the gesture and chuckled in sympathy.

“Don’t blame you.” He grinned. “Hell of a day, isn’t it, Professor?”

Johnson pressed a finger to his lips and hushed the plump politician. Although he looked exactly like the professor, his voice didn’t match in the least. The impostor’s heart was pounding as he fingered the second butane lighter in his pants pocket. The device was actually a pneumatic dart gun of considerable power, the flesh-colored darts coated with a neurotoxin that paralyzed instantly, and death came in foaming agony a few seconds later. Come on fool, go back to the show and enjoy the last few seconds of your life. The reaction of the darts closely resembled a heart attack, especially in older people, but the trick lighter carried only three darts: two for victims and the third for himself to prevent capture. The Americans disliked torture, but in his case their military intelligence and CIA would happily have made an exception. Being captured alive wasn’t an option in his mission.