Don Pendleton: Lethal Payload

Dr. Mohammedkhani was not going to be terminated, nor even arrested. She would unknowingly do her job and make sure the upcoming launch went off perfectly.

Dr. Seth was the enemy. Bolan suspected he was not who he pretended to be. The Bear was right. There had been no modifications to the rocket nor any special reentry vehicle built. The weapon was the satellite itself. It would fall with much less accuracy than a guided rocket—but even if it missed Washington completely, some part of the U.S. eastern seaboard would be turned into a radioactive wasteland.

Nothing was going to interfere with the upcoming launch.

Bolan knew that he was about to die in a tragic helicopter accident.

The Executioner

#239 Hostile Proximity

#240 Devil’s Guard

#241 Evil Reborn

#242 Doomsday Conspiracy

#243 Assault Reflex

#244 Judas Kill

#245 Virtual Destruction

#246 Blood of the Earth

#247 Black Dawn Rising

#248 Rolling Death

#249 Shadow Target

#250 Warning Shot

#251 Kill Radius

#252 Death Line

#253 Risk Factor

#254 Chill Effect

#255 War Bird

#256 Point of Impact

#257 Precision Play

#258 Target Lock

#259 Nightfire

#260 Dayhunt

#261 Dawnkill

#262 Trigger Point

#263 Skysniper

#264 Iron Fist

#265 Freedom Force

#266 Ultimate Price

#267 Invisible Invader

#268 Shattered Trust

#269 Shifting Shadows

#270 Judgment Day

#271 Cyberhunt

#272 Stealth Striker

#273 UForce

#274 Rogue Target

#275 Crossed Borders

#276 Leviathan

#277 Dirty Mission

#278 Triple Reverse

#279 Fire Wind

#280 Fear Rally

#281 Blood Stone

#282 Jungle Conflict

#283 Ring of Retaliation

#284 Devil’s Army

#285 Final Strike

#286 Armageddon Exit

#287 Rogue Warrior

#288 Arctic Blast

#289 Vendetta Force

#290 Pursued

#291 Blood Trade

#292 Savage Game

#293 Death Merchants

#294 Scorpion Rising

#295 Hostile Alliance

#296 Nuclear Game

#297 Deadly Pursuit

#298 Final Play

#299 Dangerous Encounter

#300 Warrior’s Requiem

#301 Blast Radius

#302 Shadow Search

#303 Sea of Terror

#304 Soviet Specter

#305 Point Position

#306 Mercy Mission

#307 Hard Pursuit

#308 Into the Fire

#309 Flames of Fury

#310 Killing Heat

#311 Night of the Knives

#312 Death Gamble

#313 Lockdown

#314 Lethal Payload

Lethal Payload

Don Pendleton

Honor et Fidelite (Honor and Fidelity)

Legio Pastria Nosta (The Legion Is My Home)

—Motto of the French Foreign Legion

A solider who betrays his comrades is the worst kind of traitor. He will have no honor when he faces his Executioner.

—Mack Bolan

THE LEGEND

Nothing less than a war could have fashioned the destiny of the man called Mack Bolan. Bolan earned the Executioner title in the jungle hell of Vietnam.

But this soldier also wore another name—Sergeant Mercy. He was so tagged because of the compassion he showed to wounded comrades-in-arms and Vietnamese civilians.

Mack Bolan’s second tour of duty ended prematurely when he was given emergency leave to return home and bury his family, victims of the Mob. Then he declared a one-man war against the Mafia.

He confronted the Families head-on from coast to coast, and soon a hope of victory began to appear. But Bolan had broken society’s every rule. That same society started gunning for this elusive warrior—to no avail.

So Bolan was offered amnesty to work within the system against terrorism. This time, as an employee of Uncle Sam, Bolan became Colonel John Phoenix. With a command center at Stony Man Farm in Virginia, he and his new allies—Able Team and Phoenix Force—waged relentless war on a new adversary: the KGB.

But when his one true love, April Rose, died at the hands of the Soviet terror machine, Bolan severed all ties with Establishment authority.

Now, after a lengthy lone-wolf struggle and much soul-searching, the Executioner has agreed to enter an “arm’s-length” alliance with his government once more, reserving the right to pursue personal missions in his Everlasting War.

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

“Death to the United States!”

The words were spoken in Arabic, but the Executioner had heard them before, all too often. They were being chanted in such an orgiastic frenzy that Mack Bolan could hear them clearly on the lagoon. Drums and other percussive instruments beat in rhythm to the thundering chant.

“Death to the United States!”

Bolan’s canoe slid through the rollers and crunched to a halt in the sand. He stepped into the foam of the Java Sea and dragged the outrigger out of the surf and onto land. The beach was a patchwork of grays, greens and blacks in his night-vision goggles. The chants grew louder and even more excited. There was exultation in the voices of the chanters, and beneath that, expectation. A clear baritone called out and was met by at least thirty voices in answer.

“Death to the United States!”

The call and response grew more and more savage. Bolan smiled grimly. The pandekar was in fine form.

“Death to the Great Satan!” a new voice shouted.

Bolan shook his head. The mullah was not willing to be outdone.

The Executioner was wary of rescue missions. They threw every single advantage into the hands of his opponents. He was always outnumbered, always outgunned, and savvy enemies always had multiple opportunities to kill their captives or use them as shields. Bolan, himself, was always in dire risk of killing those he had come to save. The fact was that in the past two years hostage rescues in the Pacific had not all gone according to plan. American and Australian rescue missions in the Philippines and Indonesia had resulted in dead hostages. It seemed as if fate dealt from the bottom of the deck and gave all the high cards to the goblins. It was the same old situation. Bolan was one man, and he held but a single card.

In special operations circles it was spoken of with awe. It was known as surprise. It trumped everything, and there was nothing sweeter when it was achieved.

The chanting from beyond the tree line degenerated into wordless howls and screams of rage. Bolan wasted no time as he marched up the beach.

The voice of the pandekar boomed forth. Pandekars were master teachers of pentjak-silat, the national martial arts of the Indonesian archipelago. Along with the great technical skills they developed, they were renowned spiritualists, famed for their supernatural powers, rumored to include telepathy, mystic healing and clairvoyance. They were thought to be invulnerable.

Pandekar Binpadgar Regog was a master of the Jokuk style, and was considered by his followers to be a mystic. When the Taliban mullah Abu-Hamid al-Juwanyi had fled Afghanistan during Operation Anaconda, Regog had welcomed the refugee mullah as a divine sign. Al-Juwanyi’s teachings of jihad against the United States had been welcomed and were taken on with religious fervor by Regog and his followers.