“Sorry. We’ve had a busy time. Is it cool there?”
“Cool enough, yes. How is your weather?”
“Warming up rather quickly, Simon. There’s been, uh, some confusion in the marketplace.”
“Didn’t you get our bid? We put in a sell order.”
Bolan had his head cocked toward the monitor, straining to read voice characteristics and getting nothing but soft sibilance and unemotional courtesies.
The weak side was replying: “It came too late for positive action. Sorry. Another seller cornered the market with a dump price. Haven’t you heard?”
“We’ve heard nothing,” said the whispers from the hardsite. “We have not exactly been listening. Concerns with internal communications, you know. And, of course, we’ve been awaiting your advice.”
“Yes, I understand. Well, I’m sorry you missed the action. And we’re all sorry that we couldn’t cover your bid. There was simply no way. Your, uh, competitor upstaged you. He sent it to Long Island.”
“He did what?” was the surprised strongside response.
“He sent it to Long Island. Lot dump. Nineteen tons. In a meat truck.”
Dead silence. After a moment, then: “That is very strong news. When was this?”
“About daybreak.”
“A master stroke, would you say?”
“Oh, it caused quite a scramble in the pits, believe it. Your competitor may well be on his way to becoming an overnight folk hero. You know how the brokers love to gossip.”
From the hardsite: “Well this is all very surprising. Our friend is looking stronger than anyone had suspected. Perhaps we made the cut too close. That makes it a clean sweep for his side, then. We sent out a twenty bid. We get one back, and nineteen are delivered to Long Island at daybreak. I wish we’d known this earlier, Peter.”
“As I said, it has been a warm and busy time. With the heat and all, you know, it’s sometimes very difficult to do precisely the right thing at precisely the right time.”
“Oh sure, we understand.”
“You say you got one back?”
“Yes. We got the kiss back. But rather badly used. We were forced to discard it. You can use a loss but once, anyway.”
“Uh, yes, that’s true. Are you sure it bounced back clean?”
“That’s why the internal cool, Peter. Making sure. It seems to be okay. I wish we’d known about the other. This is going to call for an entirely new sales program. Have you any advice?”
“Not at this time, not really. In a couple of hours, maybe. Meanwhile, a party of buyers is headed your way. Look for them any time within the next hour or so. At the airport.”
“I see.”
“Yes.”
“Well. Okay. It is a rather large delegation?”
“Large enough, yes. But you could supply them, I believe.”
“What is the exact purpose of the visit?”
“That has not been fully disclosed. It’s a buying trip, though, believe it. It could alter your program considerably. I would suggest that you hold further bids until they settle the market.”
“Oh. I see. Yes. Which marketplace, are they from?”
“You know.”
“Oh. Really? Okay. We’ll be on the lookout. Peter—thank you so much for the market report. But, really, I wish we had known sooner. There could have been some small recovery possible. I regret that there was not.”
“So do I, Simon. So do I. Well … watch out for local heroes. They can become very tiresome.”
“They also can be undone by heroic excesses, Peter. Has it started?”
“Oh yes, it has certainly started. That’s what I meant by holding your bids. Sorry, I thought you understood that.”
“I understand it now. Thank you again, Peter.”
A click and a hum signaled an end to the conversation. Five seconds later, the recorder shut down. Bolan removed the tape and put in a fresh one, then fed the recording to the computer for voiceprint programming.
No dice. There was nothing the computer could tell him about those voices.
There was quite a bit that Bolan could tell himself, though. Both of those guys were headshed Aces. He would bet his life on it. And the game was getting very tricky.
He reflected briefly on his recent experiences in Atlanta, trying to find a logic in the overall weave which would explain Pittsfield in more than the catch-all generality of purge.
They were purging, sure—but nothing seemed to fit the way it should. While in Atlanta, Bolan had decided that it was some sort of factional power play—the age-old game of dominance among savages, territorial disputes which were now in the early stages of move and countermove, and which ultimately would erupt into a red-hot war. It was all very disturbing, and not because Bolan gave half a damn if they all just wiped one another out—but the game never seemed to end that way. Usually it ended with one or more factions sealed more firmly than ever before at the table of infinite power.
The only reason that the mob had not succeeded in completely devouring the world until now was because of that inner balance—that competition between the savages which kept them all in various positions of restraint.
If those guys ever did succeed in becoming completely mobbed up, then there would be no stopping them anywhere. They would indeed rape the world and eat it, too.
Bolan had to find out what was happening in Pittsfield, who was making it happen, why. And not just because of Leo. Because of the entire gentle world. It could not survive the truly dominant savage.
He went outside and disconnected the tow vehicle and began laying plans for another scouting expedition. If he’d interpreted that guarded conversation between the Aces correctly, a large head party was coming in by air. Bolan wanted to be on hand to check them in and take their number.
It seemed that others shared that thought with him. When he went back inside the warwagon, the audio monitors were quivering with the ghostly echoes of automobile engines firing up and voices raised in excited exchanges. The video recorders clicked on a moment later. Bolan went to that monitor for a look.
And, yeah, a caravan was forming down there. He counted five cars through the gate, then put the warwagon in motion and began a casual descent to the state road.
So okay. They’d all go to the airport to welcome the new “buyers.”
Bolan’s old home town was rapidly becoming a seller’s market.
It was a “company plane,” yeah—a big jet which many smaller airlines would have been proud to call their own. It touched the runway with hardly a quiver and rolled smoothly into the deceleration. Bolan’s VHF radio monitors were turned to the local control channels. He had overheard the landing and taxi instructions and knew the precise spot where the big craft would be unloading her passengers. Even that fit the usual pattern. They would not debark through the regular terminal, but would unload at the base operator’s hangars.
The warwagon was a quarter-mile removed from that scene. Bolan was on high ground with unrestricted visibility, looking straight down the barrel with the entire airport complex in full side profile to his optic systems. If it had been his desire, Bolan could have read the headlines of a newspaper lying on the ground at either side of the terminal.
Except for a bit of movement in the base operator’s area, the whole place lay serenely inactive. A small single-engine plane was making touch-and-go practice landings on the main runway, yielding briefly to the arrival of the big jet, then resuming its monotonous circling in the airport traffic pattern. A service vehicle was parked in the grass near the end of the runway, while a maintenance man checked the lighting system.
Out front, two cars and a pickup truck were the only occupants of the terminal parking lot. The five big cars from Club Taconic were pulled into a semicircular drive in the base operator’s hangar area. They had been there when Bolan arrived, unoccupied except for their wheelmen, who sat tensely at their stations and chainsmoked throughout the long wait.
That wa
s a disturbing note, which Bolan had recognized the moment he made the scene.
Disturbing, because each of those vehicles had left the hardsite fully loaded. They were obviously not here to provide transportation for the arriving delegation—yet that was exactly the image being presented.
But where were the hardmen?
Bolan had been searching for signs of them for a full twenty minutes. Twice he had caught flickers of movement in the interior of the big hangar building and once he’d picked up a ghostly refraction from a service window at the office—an image of several men in coats and ties hurrying past.
A guy in mechanic’s coveralls seemed to be spending a lot of time doing nothing to a Piper Comanche in the tiedown area.
Another guy sat with an open magazine in the cab of a fuel truck parked on the service apron. Strangely, he never seemed to turn a page, and he was not really looking at the magazine most of the time.
It was a set, sure.
Super security, maybe—a courtesy to the visitors to insure their safe arrival in the city—but then again, maybe something else entirely.
Bolan had kept that scene under close surveillance throughout the wait, and now that the plane had touched down he was giving it particular attention. There was a lot of movement down there, now, though furtive and hardly noticeable even under the big eye of the warwagon. Then came the clincher. As the plane taxied to a halt, three guys stepped out of a side door at the far end of the hangar, dull blue gunmetal gleaming momentarily in the sunlight before the three disappeared once again behind a stack of crated machinery. A glimpse was all it took. Those guys had automatic weapons.
And it was a full set, yeah. Someone did not appreciate the competition in this seller’s market and they had moved swiftly and decisively to protect the territory.
Ordinarily Bolan would have sat back and watched and counted the dead, perfectly content to let the enemy engage itself. This time, it was different. He would prefer to see a natural balance of power in this arena—at least for awhile, until the various pieces could be sorted out and classified.
He had thought ahead to this moment, from that first uneasy suspicion of things awry. Now, he knew exactly how he wished to play the situation.
He punched the “Fire Enable” control on the command console and awaited the green light which would signal that the roof-mounted launchers were raised and locked. The sequence was perfect; he had a “Fire Enable Go” within ten seconds, and “Target Acquisition Positive” within fifteen.
A target grid with rangemarks became superimposed upon the optics monitor and the little red diode began its frantic flashing.
The choice of target was, of course, highly important. The Executioner did not make war on helpless civilians and innocent bystanders. He could not know how many gentle lives were caught up in that target zone, so he could not target indiscriminately. There was going to be gunplay, regardless. Innocents were going to suffer even if Bolan did nothing whatever.
And, yeah, he had his targets. It was not a kill mission, but a calculated save.
He set acquisition for automatic double and delineated the desired tracks, then balled his fist and punched his knee.
One away!
He punched his knee again immediately, and the second rocket rustled away, a flaming arrow streaking unerringly along the target path in an awesome rush of doom!
Down below, at target central, two trumpeting explosions hardly a second apart sent fireballs lifting skyward and brought a new brightness to the day.
Technology, yeah.
In the final analysis, Mack Bolan knew that all were savages and all was savagery—technology included.
The only question to be answered by lie technicians was, simply, who was to be the greatest savage of all.
For as long as he could take the fire to the others, Mack Bolan was determined that he would be.
CHAPTER NINE
The Fire
Billy Gino was the first man through the door. He stood there for a moment at the top of the steps, surveying the scene, then moved aside and sent a couple of boys down to the ground. “Check it out,” he growled. “See if the cars are ready. Give me a beep when it’s clear.”
The boys went on down and hurried across to the hangar—a distance of about 100 feet. He watched them inside, then sent another pair down with instructions to cover the debarkation from the tail of the plane. Another pair descended to cover the forward area.
David called out to him from the interior: “How does it look, Billy?”
He stuck his head inside for a moment to reply, “Looks pretty clean, sir. Almost deserted. Line of cars over by the hangar—should be ours. It’ll be just a minute or so.”
He was just in the process of returning his attention to the outside situation when something very remarkable happened over there in that “line of cars.”
Billy had but a flashing impression of some object streaking across the terminal area and impacting in the midst of those cars. He was nearly thrown to the ground by the concussive force as a fireball whoofed skyward and one of those vehicles disintegrated right before his eyes—and he was still trying to save himself from a fall when another streaker rustled across for a quick encore.
As the second vehicle went to hell the instant way, Billy flung himself flat atop the boarding platform and screamed the unnecessary warning: “Everybody down!—get down!—it’s an ambush!”
A furious fusillade from several choppers unloading in concert tore out of the open hangar to spray the big plane at window level from head to tail. Continuous muzzle flashes from the side of the hangar ripped the flight deck and demolished all the glass up there. His four boys on the ground were all down and only the angle of fire coming up that steel ladder was saving Billy Gino from an identical fate.
He had his .45 in his paw and roaring back defiantly before he was even consciously aware that he had responded. Someone had run forward to the flight deck and was shooting through the shattered windows. He heard David yelling for people to get up and return the fire. Pistols began crackling from several smashed windows along the cabin line.
He could see people moving about inside that hangar, now, and there seemed to be some confusion in that sector.
Some guy over there yelled, “It’s a suck! We’ve got fire behind us! That’s our cars burning back there!”
So much had happened in so short a time. It could not have lasted for more than a few seconds. Debris was still settling from those blasts in the vehicle area. Besides the two cars which had been blown away, two more were ablaze and a fifth was smoking and blistering from the intense heat.
But that was not the end of it.
Almost as if to punctuate the worried shout from the hangar, another of those whizzers came streaking in and hit the fuel truck.
Billy Gino momentarily blacked out. He felt rather than heard the explosion and had an instant visual perception of the awesome firestorm radiating away from the strike; the next awareness was of shit flying through the air everywhere, and of so much heat that he thought his flesh was afire. He was still lying atop the boarding platform. The shooting had stopped completely.
He dragged himself inside the plane and lay there sucking air like a fish out of water.
David was on his hands and knees, staring at him with a shocked look in his eyes.
“For God’s sake, what is it?” Eritrea asked his bodycock.
Billy Gino did not even attempt to reply to that. The answer was too obvious.
What it was, David boy, was doomsday. And the heat from hell had already arrived.
CHAPTER TEN
Shockwaves
The survivors were huddled in blankets in the main terminal building, a thoroughly subdued and thankful bunch if Billy Gino had ever seen it.
Cops were all over the place, of course—and they’d reconstructed most of it to their apparent satisfaction. The really surprising thing was that they did not seem to be throwing any weight against the Long
Island visitors. In fact, they were giving them the same courtesies and consideration as the other “victims”—the airport employees who’d been seized and bound by the “gunmen” when they had taken the place over.
The big guy in plain clothes had identified himself as a Captain Weatherbee. He was a homicide dick. The other one was a detective sergeant named Pappas. Neither had said a hell of a lot, although it was pretty obvious what they were thinking. They’d given no more than a passing squint at Billy’s credentials and gun permit. Really, the guys were being pretty decent about the whole thing. Maybe the whole scene was just too much for a town the size of Pittsfield to handle—or to even want to handle. Although certainly they seemed to be taking care of the “disaster” with admirable efficiency. Paramedics were all over the place, tending to minor hurts, and the ambulances were screaming back and forth in a steady stream. And you sure couldn’t fault those guys in the fire department, the way they’d come in there and …
Billy Gino shivered.
Most of the stuff in those ambulances was going to be DOA. Billy was still trying to figure out why his own mortal clay was not among them. His whole face was singed. He did not have an eyelash left and he probably would not need to shave for a week. Yet, he’d suffered more pain from summer sunburns, as a kid.
David had a small cut under his left eye—from flying glass, probably—but that was about the extent of his injuries.
It was a damn miracle.
And, sure, Billy Gino was counting his blessings.
He’d lost about a dozen boys. Also the flight crew. Also the company plane, although it could maybe be salvaged if they could ever get it dug out of the the damn foam. He had six walking wounded and two more on stretchers who had at least a fifty-fifty chance. The rest of those bodies—in roasted bits and pieces, mostly—belonged to someone else. Billy would not even attempt to estimate their number. Maybe another dozen, maybe more.
But Billy Gino had been hurt enough, yeah. Half his force was gone. And the others were plenty demoralized.
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