"Got it." Ichiro began issuing orders.
Bolan climbed onto the wing of the first Zero. The body of the plane was squat, the canopy totally glass. It unlatched, then slid back, leaving a windshield in front. The red circle on the fuselage glowed hotly. It could have represented the ball of fire from a nuclear blast.
From his vantage point he could see them coming, jogging at forced march pace. They were nearing the field of barrels, which was growing by the second. Bolan slid back the canopy and hoisted himself into the plane, kicking out the front windshield.
He stood on the small seat and looked behind. Others were climbing into the cockpits, including Ichiro with his M-16 and extra clips. This may not have been the ultimate in situation ethics, but Bolan had nothing else to work with. He could have fought a holding action successfully, but it was progress he need to make right now.
"Form a line, prone!1' he called to the men still on the floor. "When I give the word, fire on the barrels!"
As his men rushed to comply, Bolan could see the Sonnojoi entering his impromptu mine field. He fought down the urge to fire immediately and bided his time, watching them move closer.
"Fire!" he yelled when they were twenty yards away, and M-16s rattled below him. There was an endless second of waiting, then the first barrel went up.
The whole tunnel shook as orange fire exploded sequentially down the long corridor like a monstrous string of firecrackers. The force nearly knocked Bolan out of the plane as men on the ground fell and loose rock dropped from the ceiling. The floor cracked beneath them.
Down the tunnel Sonnojoi screamed. Human torches ran in circles with nowhere to go. Those who escaped the blasts began returning fire as the thickening black smoke roiled through the caverns. The overworked exhaust system was no match for so much smoke.
"Let's go! Let's go! Let's go!" Bolan screamed, and his men ran to take positions behind the aircraft.
His Zero rolled quickly into the kill zone. He had the high ground and began firing down on those left alive as his plane slid into the battlefield of burning men and choking smoke.
Shotguns kicked back at him, taking out chunks of the sheet-metal body of the plane. Bolan screamed out his own heartrending frustration on man after man as he cleared a path for those behind. The stench of burning flesh was overpowering.
Sonnojoi below were tearing off their helmets as oily smoke got beneath the visors, blinding them. Bolan was losing it, too. He looked down in the cockpit and found goggles to put on.
He emptied a clip from Big Thunder and jammed in another. He looked behind at grounded Zeroes — ghost planes moving through the fog of smoke — that left a trail of bodies in their wake.
His plane suddenly veered to the right when one of his men crumpled to the ground with a belly hit. The other tried to keep pushing, but three Sonnojoi jumped him, knocking him to the ground before blowing his head off, point-blank, with a shotgun.
The plane spun, then stopped, and Bolan jumped out of the cockpit as Sonnojoi swarmed the wings. He blasted three in a line before Ichiro's plane pulled up beside him. The cop added his gun to Bolan's.
"Come on!" Ichiro yelled, and Bolan jumped to the wing of the man's plane, firing behind him to protect the men pushing the thing.
They reached the end of the burning gas field and turned to catch the Sonnojoi in cross fire. The other planes had stopped moving, bogged down in the bodies that littered the floor. The men were now engaged in hand-to-hand combat.
Bolan saw Ichiro's assistant Natsume, grab his throat, and blood welled between his fingers as he fell forward, bouncing off the wing to roll onto the burning ground. Ichiro screamed out the man's name, then jammed another clip into his M-16, methodically shooting one punk after another in the head.
And all at once the Sonnojoi crumpled, their spirit broken. They ran, in full retreat, back down the hall toward the steel mill.
"I'm going for Hashimoto!" Bolan yelled and jumped off the wing to run the corridor, heedless of Ichiro's shouts behind him.
He moved, the tension in his body driving him hard, pushing him beyond his limits. Bolan felt nothing, neither pain nor fatigue. It was as if he were outside of his body, viewing it from a distance.
Within minutes he could see the Air Force truck in the distance, O'Brian trying unsuccessfully to operate the forklift that would load his last crate into the back of the vehicle. Thick clouds of smoke rolled into the chamber with the Executioner.
As he closed on them, they abandoned the crate and jumped into the truck, leaving Hashi-san alone to face the Executioner.
The old man waited calmly, standing by his crate of death until Bolan, breathing hard, reached him.
"You are quite a man, Bolan-san," Hashimoto said. "I must assume that my daughter is dead?"
"Assume only that you're dead, you bastard," Bolan said in a low voice.
"I really fail to understand you," Hashi-san said, backing up against the crate. "We are two men of honor, operating beyond the normal constraints of society."
"I'm protecting society," Bolan said. "That's what you never understood."
"My dear man," Hashi-san replied, "I fail to see the difference in us. We both have a quest. We both... kill when it's necessary."
"I don't kill innocent people," Bolan replied and unholstered his AutoMag.
"Of course you do." Hashimoto laughed. "It's unavoidable. Wars do that."
Bolan turned a thumb to himself. "Not this war!" he yelled, the anger nearly overpowering. "Not my war. My war is against people like you. My war is fought so that innocents aren't trampled under the boots of people who think they can use flesh and blood any way they want to satisfy their own selfishness."
"But, Bolan..."
"Shut up! You can talk all night and play all the word games you want to compare us, but we're in no way alike. Don't you understand? All this, ail this pain and suffering you've caused is so you won't have to admit to yourself what a coward you are!"
The rock cracked then, Hashi-san's face sagging, his lips sputtering. He was an old, frightened man, desperately trying to keep from admitting the lie his life had been.
Bolan took a step closer. He could smell the fear rolling off the old man in waves. "They've existed like you from the dawn of time," Bolan said. "Butchers who've killed and tortured and raped and degraded, all in the name of something high and mighty that isn't real — Hitler, Stalin — join the ranks. They don't come any worse than you. I'm going to enjoy killing you. God help me, I'm going to enjoy it."
A single shot rang through the cavern.
16
Bolan sped through the remaining two miles of the tunnel, driving the Air Force jeep as fast as it would go. The surface was flat and level at first, then he hit a gentle upgrade as the entire tunnel ran upward toward ground level. He lost the floodlights then and had to drive in darkness.
Headlights on, he saw nothing but black ahead. The truck had come this way, so Bolan knew that it must lead to an exit. He goosed the accelerator and hoped for the best.
Bolan suddenly crested a hill and found himself skidding across level ground. He regained control as he drove through an empty hangar. The hundred-foot doors were pushed open to reveal the flight line in the distance. It was lit by nighttime runway lights.
A KC-135 Stratolifter sat on the line, the whole tail end of the plane hinged down to ground level as a crate marked Radar Bay was loaded into it. Mack Bolan set his jaw and drove toward it.
"Come on!" Jamison screamed from inside the massive cargo compartment as the forklift driver tried to maneuver the heavy crate up the back ramp and into the bay of the huge machine.
O'Brian stood beside him scanning the night as the forklift bumped up the ramp and slowly set the load down ten feet inside the cargo bay. Crates and equipment of all sizes stretched a hundred feet toward the cockpit.
"Get out of here!" Jamison yelled as soon as the airman had set down the load. "Quick!"
"What's the rush, Captain?"
"Ge
t out!" Jamison screamed, drawing his .45 and aiming it at the man, who got the message and put the electric truck into reverse.
"Oh, shit," O'Brian whispered, pointing into the night. "Here he comes."
Jamison saw the headlights moving closer. He grabbed the intercom mike from the loading instrument bay and called his pilot. "Waverly," he said. "Take it out now."
"What are you talking about, Hank?" the voice returned. "The bay's still open!"
"Take it out now!" Jamison yelled. "I've got bay control on manual. I'll put it up!"
"We're not tied down yet," one of his men called from deeper in the cargo hold.
"Screw it!"
The jeep had bumped up on the runway and was closing on them fast.
"We don't even have clearance," the pilot called. "Hank..."
"Listen, you son of a bitch," Jamison said. "Go now, or I'll come up there and blow your goddamned head off!"
"Roger."
Engines already revved, the huge bird started down the runway, jerking the forklift off the side of the ramp. The operator screamed as the weight of his machine came down atop him. Sparks flew where the ramp dragged the runway. O'Brian watched as the jeep almost caught them.
"What do we do?" O'Brian yelled into the rushing wind.
"He's your problem," Jamison said. "You handle him!"
With that he shoved O'Brian out the back of the plane and reached for the ramp door control.
* * *
Bolan watched as a man came flying out of the back of the plane to land hard on his hood. The Executioner veered, and O'Brian scrabbled for the windshield, trying to grab hold of something.
Big Thunder lay on the passenger's seat. The Executioner picked it up and fired through the windshield. O'Brian's guts exploded. The sergeant lost his grip and slipped from the jeep, bouncing once on the runway before lying still.
Bolan jammed the gas pedal down as the plane picked up speed, and then he heard the hum of the motor that raised the ramp flush against the plane. The sparks stopped as the door began to lift, and Bolan pushed for the last ounce of go in the jeep. His front wheels bumped up onto the ramp.
Half of the jeep was on the ramp before its back wheels were lifted off the ground. The passenger's side window blew out, and Bolan caught a glimpse of Jamison firing at him before the captain disappeared behind some equipment.
The ramp was closing, and the jeep balanced on its end. Bolan stood up in the seat and climbed over the broken windshield. He ran down the hood and dove for the inside of the plane, hitting hard and rolling to a stop beside the crate containing the bomb.
Seconds later the jeep rolled down the ramp toward the inside of the jumbo jet, wedging itself into the gap between the ramp and the plane. The ramp stalled, halfway open, with a horrible grinding noise.
Bolan ejected the clip from Big Thunder and planted another. The plane was building up speed. O'Brian's body was a distant dot on the landscape. There was a radio somewhere near him because Bolan could hear the pilot frantically calling.
"Jamison! The damned ramp's not closed yet! We're going too fast to stop now — I don't know if I can... get it... I'm going to have to try for it!"
Bolan peered around the side of the crate, and shots rang out from three places in the cargo hold. Great, the Executioner thought. Jamison had buddies on board.
The plane tentatively left the ground, only to bounce back again, shaking the crate and moving it a foot backward toward the open hold. Bolan could hear the engines straining against the drag of the ramp.
"... end of the runway!" the pilot was screaming, and he tried to raise the plane again, this time just barely staying up.
A wrench lay on the floor near Bolan's feet. He picked it up and tossed it, timing himself for the hit. He jumped just as the thing rattled to the ground. The two gunmen and Jamison reacted immediately. They came up to shoot at the noise, and Bolan leveled his weapon, squeezing as soon as the quarry was in his sights. The man took it in the side of the head and went down bloody. The other two ducked down, and Bolan had just evened the odds by a third.
The engines whined, and Bolan saw treetops through the open hold. A branch had got caught in the ramp and broke off inside the plane.
They rose sharply then, the angle of ascent increasing to almost fifty percent as the ship bucked. And all at once unsecured freight began shifting quickly toward the back of the plane.
Bolan jumped aside as the bomb crate slid backward, jamming himself against the curved ribs of the aircraft as boxes and equipment moved quickly in his direction.
Everything was shifting, dangerously on the move. The bomb crate slid all the way back, wedging to a stop against the jeep Bolan had driven into the plane. Other boxes moved out the back of the plane and into the night.
"I can't gain altitude!" the pilot screamed into the radio. "There's too much drag!"
The second gunman was knocked down by a sliding crate. His eyes widened as he bumped against the side of the jeep and tumbled down the ramp and out. The man's screams were lost in the pitiful cry of the plane's overworked engines.
Now there was only Jamison and the pilot — and a hydrogen bomb that could go off at any moment.
The inside of the bay was lit in a red glow by the emergency lights. Bolan, holding onto the ribbing, tried to bring himself to a kneeling position to get a look, but Jamison fired whenever the Executioner showed himself.
The engines were opened to full throttle. It was the only way the pilot could keep the few hundred feet of altitude they had. And Bolan began to understand something the pilot probably already knew: they could never land this way.
Then he realized that Jamison knew it, too, and that if any of them were going to stay alive, they'd have to bail out. He rose again, holstering Big Thunder so that he could pull himself along the ribs of the aircraft with both hands.
He saw Jamison's shadow working his way along the secured freight to the cockpit door. He opened the door and disappeared.
Bolan slowly made his way toward the front of the plane. He had to somehow make sure the plane was over the sea and away from civilization before it crashed. He reached the front just as shots rang from the cockpit. Using secure rods along the front, Bolan slowly pulled himself to the door. The Pacific Ocean twinkled under a full moon below him, through the open ramp.
He made the door but couldn't draw a weapon and open the thing at the same time. Bolan grabbed the knob with both hands, and the door swung open, almost dislodging him. He grabbed the inside door frame and pulled himself up in time to see Jamison pulling a life vest and parachute off the dead pilot's body. The aircraft was now on autopilot.
He saw Bolan and growled like an animal, his own weapon a handhold away. Jamison took the chance, letting go of the seat back to grab for his gun. He lost his footing immediately and fell back to hit Bolan in the doorway.
They both tumbled through the doorway and down the inside of the cargo bay toward the open ramp. As they rolled, the man planted his teeth in Bolan's arm.
The Executioner beat him on the head with both fists as they fought for what Bolan expected was the last seconds of their lives. He dislodged the man's teeth, then broke them with a hard upper right. Bolan and Jamison rolled over and over toward the rapidly approaching open bay.
They came to the end of the hold, banging once against the bomb crate, then bouncing onto the disabled ramp itself. Bolan released the man and grabbed for a handhold. His fingertips locked in the joining crease of the ramp. He clung to the half-open door.
Jamison held on to Mack Bolan's belt. His body floated like a flag in the rushing winds. He scrabbled for a foothold, getting one knee back on the lip of the ramp. Both men pulled with all their strength toward the inside of the plane.
Bolan got a handhold on the bumper of the twisted jeep, pulling himself back up as Jamison grabbed the inner rim of the hatchway.
No sooner had they gotten inside than Jamison launched himself at Bolan again. The man's mind was gone,
he was lost in a frenzy.
He attacked like an animal as both men tried to grab on to the jeep. They flailed at one another with their free hands. Bolan finally managed to get a leg planted between the busted bumper and the jeep itself.
Both hands free, he grabbed Jamison with one and pounded his head with the other. Then he lifted him bodily, like a wrestler, brought him over his head and threw the kicking animal out the back of the plane. Moonlight glinted off Jamison's uniform buttons as he fell to his death.
The Executioner turned immediately and began making his way back to the front of the plane. When he reached the cockpit, he put on the pilot's Mae West and parachute.
Bolan pulled the pilot's body out of the seat and studied the instrument panel, locating the fuel gauge, direction finder and altimeter. He knew very little about flying the plane, but native intelligence could take him as far as he needed to go.
The fuel was burning at an incredible rate, already a fourth gone. At that pace the plane wouldn't fly for long. They were sitting at just under four hundred feet, not great for jumping, but he knew he had little choice. It was heading due east, which meant there was nothing between the plane and the empty ocean except Midway Island, nearly twenty-five hundred miles away. The plane couldn't make it nearly that far the way it was burning fuel.
Bolan took a deep breath and made his way out of the cockpit, working quickly down the ribs to the open bay. He didn't want to think about it. He simply reached the ramp, opened his arms and let himself be swept away.
He became the night, floating with outstretched arms. He pulled the cord as soon as he was clear of the plane. The chute opened, jerking him violently. Bolan had about a minute to appreciate the vast emptiness of the Pacific Ocean before he, too, became a part of it.
He hit water, bobbing under. His first priority was to get out of the chute before it filled with water and dragged him under. Bolan got it unclipped and it floated away, leaving him alone.
The Executioner was down. He looked to the east. If his calculations were correct, he should soon see a brightness on the horizon. And within minutes the light of an artificial sun rose like daybreak in the east.
Code of Dishonor Page 17
