Teheran Wipeout

by Don Pendleton

  The crewmen of the Huey saw the man trying to take out their gunship with his grenade launcher, and they understood.

  The soldier at the mounted heavy machine gun in the hatchway thundered off a burst that dotted the ground where the figure below had stood when he fired his near miss seconds ago, but the target became most difficult, zigzagging around beneath the gunship's blind side again, feeding another grenade into the launcher.

  (Captain Baqir saw the man again.

  Larger than the mujahedeen, thought Baqir. The American, Bolan! Baqir had been briefed by Major Kravak.

  The pilot tried not to consider his own fate when he reported to Kravak and General Mahmoud the loss of two gunships and his failure to kill this elusive devil, Bolan, who required far more ammunition and time than tonight's timetable allowed.

  Baqir knew he must return to the base commanded by Mahmoud and rearm before commencing phase two of tonight's action: the strafing flights over the Lavizan barracks, softening it for the assault within two hours of Mahmoud's forces. Baqir knew the risk, but he knew, too, that his training and loyalty to Mahmoud will pay off. Baqir would become General Baqir as promised, but first he had to kill the infidel, Bolan!

  Baqir blinked in surprise at the speed with which the American fighting man on the ground reloaded the grenade launcher to track again at the hovering Huey. The pilot grinned when he saw the warrior down there toss aside the ammo pouch. Baqir knew that Bolan was now aiming his last grenade.

  The pilot tugged up the gunship sharp and hard, desperately trying to maneuver the chopper out of range.

  The American soldier on the ground responded to the evasive tactic, triggering the launcher before the gunship could gain altitude.

  Baqir, USAF-trained legend-without-peer in the mostly lackluster government air force — Mahmoud's influence alone kept Baqir from the Iraqi front — goosed the Huey into another sharp zag.

  Through the whirling fury, Baqir saw the flash of the grenade launcher, and the pilot's heart skipped a beat when the hurtling grenade arced through airspace where Baqir's gunship had hovered a millisecond earlier, missing the Huey.

  I've got him!

  Baqir grinned, throttling his copter around until Mack Bolan appeared, centered in the infrared target-acquisition system in Baqir's helmet. He clearly saw Bolan toss the grenade launcher away with one hand, swiveling around an assault rifle Bolan wore shoulder strapped.

  For a fleeting second, Baqir stared in wonderment at this American, a man without a country, refusing to accept inevitable defeat, every inch the awesome human fighting machine Baqir had expected.

  Captain Baqir navigated his gunship to stationary hover. The fighter pilot registered the crystallized infrared perception of Target Bolan.

  The Executioner held his fire, realizing the inadequacy of even the assault rifle at the range of the hovering copter.

  Baqir experienced only sadness. He concentrated on nothing else, in his gunship or on the ground or in the sky around him, except for a target in the sighting scope looking for cover and finding none.

  The death of The Executioner will assure the gratitude of General Mahmoud; the glory of this kill will take me to the top!

  Pilot Baqir confidently tightened on the trigger to open fire on a target he could not possibly miss.

  14

  Bolan had long lived his life knowing violent death would end everything for him at any second. There could be no other fate for a hellgrounder who lived life large the way Bolan did and in truth, Bolan would have it no other way.

  It amazed him sometimes that he had continued to outfox and sidestep the inevitable for as long as he had through the bloody miles of his adult life.

  At this instant it looked as if the sidestepping would not get it. The inevitable had come.

  The Huey gunship hovered well beyond range of Bolan's AK-47. He knew the pilot of that chopper would have his thumb pressing toward a trigger. A damn good Iranian air-force pilot would be Bolan's executioner.

  Bolan started a dodging, darting run toward high-ground cover he did not expect to reach, but he had nothing else.

  Karim Aswadi appeared on a rocky slope close beneath the hovering Huey.

  Aswadi took fast aim with a loaded grenade launcher, and a report like a popped paper bag in the wide open hills gave way in the next moment to an ear-splitting powerhouse blowup when the grenade caught the third Huey in the instant before the pilot of the Huey opened fire on Bolan.

  Bolan spun into a combat crouch, AK-47 tracking around when he saw the plummeting fireball remains of Aswadi's bull's-eye.

  A hush, absolute except for the crackling flames from the downed choppers, descended in sharp contrast to the pounding of battle. For a moment a shrill ringing clanged in Bolan's ears despite the plugs he wore, his heart bass-drumming against his rib cage.

  The two warriors approached each other while around them the surviving freedom fighters regrouped, edgy eyes watching the sky for more choppers as they counted their losses.

  Bolan and Aswadi angled abreast of each other toward the spot where they had left Grimaldi.

  "I owe you, Karim," said Bolan. 'Thanks for the fast work."

  Aswadi appeared not to hear.

  They strode past shredded bodies, torn and bleeding, scattered over the rocky ground. The two men could not miss the stunned muteness of survivors as postcombat shock set in when they saw what had happened to their friends and families.

  "If I but knew with certainty what I suspect," Aswadi growled, "I would have let the pilot fire."

  "You're wrong if you think the woman I brought into your camp called in those choppers," Bolan argued. The Executioner knew he had to go to Grimaldi, but he needed the trust of Aswadi for this Iranian hit to stand any chance at all of success. "Karim, there is no enemy ground force, remember? The army doesn't move this far away from Teheran after dark, which is why you're here. Your sentries would have spotted troop movement. Those choppers had coordinates on us."

  Aswadi paused.

  "Why do you defend the woman? You are unsettlingly sympathetic to your enemy."

  "The truth matters," Bolan growled. "Mezhabi told them where the Hueys would find your base camp, probably when he passed word about your group importing me."

  Aswadi glanced at the smoldering hulks of the downed gunships.

  "Iranian air force. Is it possible Mezhabi informed for both General Mahmoud and Khomeini's people, or does this mean something more?"

  Bolan forged ahead. "I figure it means we've got less time than we thought," he said. "We have to reach an understanding of trust now, Karim. Forget about Mezhabi as you have about whoever killed him. We have to reach Teheran and the Lavizan barracks. We have a chance unless Mahmoud is there already."

  "I follow your reasoning/' Aswadi said. 'These gunships... Mahmoud strikes tonight, as the Russian woman said, but I hesitate to trust word from the enemy's mouth. The absurd charade of proposing an alliance; only a diversion to relax our defenses on the actual eve of takeover." Aswadi chuckled without humor. "Which supports your supposition of Mahmoud striking tonight. It would seem I must agree."

  "Another reason I don't think we have to worry about Tanya," said Bolan, "although I've, ah, been wrong about the lady before. Look at it her way. The Soviets and Mahmoud knew we had Tanya in this camp. They attacked anyway because they wanted you out of the way before they took power. Tanya hasn't been gone long enough to get so far she could avoid hearing what happened here, and she'll realize the people she works for don't give a damn if they kill her. You're her enemy, Karim, but you treated her decently. If she does survive on her own in the hills tonight, she'll be out for blood, but it won't be yours."

  A freedom fighter approached on the run to address Aswadi in staccato Farsi, to which Karim issued orders. The man snapped a field salute and hurried back toward the survivors of the attack.

  Aswadi turned to Bolan.

  "We have lost more than half our men. 1 pray to Allah you are tru
e in your thinking, American. 1 believed eliciting your help in our struggle would insure victory. Will you be responsible for our destruction?"

  "Time, Karim. We have no damn time."

  "You have traveled far and risked your life for us," Aswadi decided. "The men we need for the assault in Teheran are ready to leave at once. Those remaining shall assist dependents and wounded to the refugee camp. I only hope seven of us are sufficient to assault the operation we suspect at Lavizan barracks. If it is the core of Khomeini's security, it will be heavily guarded, though the barracks will appear deserted."

  "That's why you and your men are backup," Bolan told the mujahedeen leader. "I'm going into Khomeini's operation alone."

  "Impossible! You will be killed!"

  "Not if Mahmoud is stirring the pot like we think he is; not if you're stirring Mahmoud and the Russians. I work best alone, Karim." Bolan thought of Strakhov. "And I could encounter an old friend tonight. I don't want anyone in the way when we tangle." He resumed striding toward Grimaldi.

  "Get your men together to pull out with us immediately. I'll say goodbye to Jack."

  "We have three physicians in our unit," Aswadi replied, turning to hurry toward his men. "We have several wounded, but one of our doctors is with your friend now. It is too early to say of course, but your friend Grimaldi... may not make it. I'm sorry."

  * * *

  When Grimaldi regained a semblance of consciousness, the first thing he managed to mumble through the waves of pain could not be understood by the Iranian women in black veils and shawls who knelt to either side of him in a tent.

  They were applying a dressing to his wounded leg, which had been straightened in a splint, he vaguely noted, while one of the women went in search of a translator. The other gestured, offering him round Iranian bread and melon, which Grimaldi refused with a faint head shake.

  He gasped sharply as the gesture sent white-heat agony through him like sandpaper against exposed nerve ends. Grimaldi fought to stay conscious, wondering just how much of a chance he had of seeing tomorrow.

  A guerrilla stuck his head inside the tent.

  "Mr. Grimaldi, I regret to say we have exhausted our supply of pain killers."

  Jack recognized the guy as one of the medics in Karim Aswadi's mujahedeen group.

  "Wouldn't take 'em anyway," Grimaldi rasped through his pain, "and you've got lousy bedside manner, doc. Where's my friend? For that matter, where the hell am I?"

  "In the refugee camp," the medic replied. "We sustained heavy losses, which is why our supplies of medication dwindle. Your friend and Karim and five others have gone into Teheran."

  "And I should be with him!" Grimaldi growled to himself, clenching fists in frustrated anger at his side, setting off another tremor of pain.

  "You are most lucky to have survived until now," said the physician. "You perhaps do not appreciate the severity of your injuries."

  "So why don't you tell me," Grimaldi rasped. "I remember being upended and hauled to cover, then... I lost it and here I am... feeling like I've been chewed by a bear and spit off a cliff. Damn! I hurt." He squinted, pain blurring his vision. He knew they had injected him with a strong sedative while he was unconscious. As the dope wore off the pain brought him awake. Now Grimaldi realized the pain would only intensify, and when unconsciousness came again it could be forever. "What... are my chances?" Grimaldi forced himself to ask, wondering why he was not aware of his own voice.

  "Not good," the medic replied soberly. "By daylight I will lack even the bare necessities to stave off infection. You require immediate hospitalization, Mr. Grimaldi."

  "And I'm another crummy statistic, huh, doc?"

  The medic smiled grimly.

  "With your spirit, Mr. Grimaldi, perhaps not. It is hoped the man Bolan can return quickly enough from Teheran, if their mission into the city..."

  "Not if, doc..." Grimaldi forced himself to ;rasp. Fight the pain. Fight the frigging pain! "With Bolan... it's when."

  "The man does have a stunning capacity for turning disadvantage into advantage," the doctor conceded. "But you must excuse me now. There are others..."

  "Of course." Grimaldi could barely whisper. He concentrated fully on grabbing on to the lucidity he felt being gnawed away by wavering emptiness erasing the edges of his vision. "Thanks..."

  "May Allah spare you, Mr. Grimaldi. You have fought bravely for His cause."

  The medic disappeared.

  Grimaldi lowered his head back to the ground, hardly aware of the tent or the buzzing of insects drawn by the nearness of death. The veiled women of the mujahedeen and everything else seemed to sink into a haziness that was closing in from the periphery of his senses, devouring his consciousness.

  This realization jolted Grimaldi with a fear like none he had ever known during his battle years with Mack Bolan.

  Deliriously, obscure images kept filtering in and out of his senses, and Grimaldi thought of the days when he had returned fresh — make that sour — from two tours of combat flight duty in Nam. Then, he had found every hoped-for door to gainful employment slammed in his face. There had been accusing glares from peaceniks as if he was a baby killer and worse, when in truth he'd almost died more than once trying to keep the baby killers at bay before they swept across Southeast Asia like a red tide.

  Grimaldi's fading consciousness grasped at memories of those days like a drowning man clawing desperately for a life raft; what remained of lucid thought through the pain told him that when thought died, it meant the end of him...

  The delirious American on the desolate Iranian ground reflected on Bolan and what he owed the big guy.

  Grimaldi owed his life to the Executioner and not only from those times when Bolan had pulled Grimaldi's bacon from the grease in battle. Sure there had been those times, and Grimaldi had felt privileged to return the favor more than once during the missions when Jack flew Bolan and provided air cover. Beyond that, though, Grimaldi knew he would owe Big Guy Bolan until his dying breath.

  When the veteran Nam pilot had been unable to find work on his return home, an uncle offered Grimaldi a gig flying some "execs" in and out of Vegas. Even after Jack got hip to the fact that his uncle, not to mention the "execs," worked for the Mafia, Grimaldi had not let it bother him much. He had had no real contact with hoodlums, the killers, heroin pushers and pimps chipping away at a great nation from within like a rotting, unstoppable cancer.

  The Executioner had blitzed the operation that Grimaldi was flying for, and Grimaldi knew that by all rights the Man From Blood should have iced the pilot along with the hoods Jack saw Bolan blow away. It had been an audaciously wild-ass Executioner strike, but Nam-vet Bolan had sensed something in Grimaldi, maybe a kindred spirit gone wrong, and the Executioner had spared Jack.

  Bolan had wised up Grimaldi, and in Bolan, Grimaldi had seen a smidgen of his own potential for the Right Way. From that moment on Jack had served as Bolan's pilot and combat support, their hellgrounding together spanning Bolan's war against the Mafia, the Executioner's stint for the government and Bolan's recent outlaw missions against the KGB and Major General Greb Strakhov in particular.

  Grimaldi realized that these images of his life, flashing before his eyes remained as only the last, faint flickers of a dying candle, a sliver of light against a smothering pool of Stygian gloom creeping in from all sides. Grimaldi fought to hold on to even that, living, he knew, only in his mind and that ready to go, too.

  Grimaldi had always considered himself an optimist, almost too much sometimes, but now as the spreading murk of unconsciousness swallowed him, he heard a calm little voice somewhere inside his head telling him to relax, to accept the inevitable because he had reached the end.

  Grimaldi began to slide into unconsciousness, not accepting one damn bit of it, fighting it all the way, inevitable or not.

  Final fleeting flashes swept over him: Bolan attacking what could be the heart of Khomeini's power; an Executioner taking on impossible odds against a would-be
dictator, Mahmoud, and his gangsters; control of this war-torn country to the victor unless the Ayatollah's forces sliced their own cut of tonight's action.

  And Grimaldi could only pray to God that his friend returned in time to keep Mrs. Grimaldi's little boy, Jack, from buying the farm in this refugee camp somewhere in godforsaken Iran.

  Grimaldi, backsliding Catholic at the best of times, prayed to God for a world gone mad.

  Grimaldi slid off the edge into unconsciousness, his soul screaming protest as the darkness swallowed him.

  Don't let me die!

  No!

  No.

  No...

  15

  Rashad Hashem, a lieutenant in the army of the Islamic Republic, knocked briskly on Colonel Rafu's office door in the nether region of a deserted wing of the Lavizan barracks in northeast Teheran.

  The sprawling, supposedly deserted complex gave Lieutenant Hashem a foreboding chill, first felt during the preceding week when Hashem's security force had received orders to remain at the barracks on twenty-four-hour standby alert. The call had been in response to the intel tremors of a mujahedeen plot to assassinate the Ayatollah.

  The eerie, looming barracks buildings bespoke unworldly echoes to a soul sensitive to such things: too many atrocities committed here too recently for Rashad's liking, to say the least.

  Hashem longed for the prerevolutionary days, when his most pressing concern would be no more than a sheep strayed from his flock; the days before this ominous premonition when there had been no reason for his gut to be tight, his throat parched, his fingers somehow restless near his Tokarev pistol.

  Hashem heard Rafu's brusque command to enter. The security officer of this top-secret operation working out of Lavizan barracks stepped into the office, mentally debating whether or not to mention his premonition to his commanding officer.

  Rafu, an animal-featured hulk of a man who reminded Hashem of an ape in uniform, glared up from shuffling a handful of manila folders into a briefcase.