Yakov returned the radio-to his belt. He stood in the Huey troopship's side door, considering the problem. He tapped the stainless-steel hook of his prosthetic right hand against the helicopter's sheet metal, then turned to the young men waiting for his command.
Manning, McCarter and Ohara, black suited in their combat armor, their weapons ready, studied the circus city beneath them.
The six men from the Air Force SWAT team checked and rechecked their gear, from time to time looking to the older man in the beret who would command them.
One of the Air Force men could not help staring at Yakov's long-ago lost right hand and forearm, and the prosthetic device that served in place of his limb.
The young man thinks I am a cripple, Yakov guessed. But I don't need two hands to lead him and these other soldiers to victory.
But what would constitute victory in the garish monument to ignorance and greed below?
The destruction of the binary gas? Killing all the terrorists? Or as Yakov's commander, Mack Bolan, stressed in every communication: Prisoners, information, anything that can lead the Stony Man warriors to the psychotic leaders of Hydra.
To defeat Hydra, it would not be enough to neutralize the binary gas threats to the cities of the United States. Not only must every gram of chemical agent be seized or destroyed, but the Stony Man warriors must confirm the destruction of all the vehicles, equipment and weapons assembled for the attack.
And the destruction of every terrorist soldier. If the terrorists trained to commit mass murder with binary chemicals escaped, then their psychotic leaders or the Soviets would simply resupply the terrorists with more binary agents. While they remained alive, they threatened all the decent people of the world.
Finally, and most crucially, the madmen who conceived and coordinated the Hydra must be eliminated. They must die or be confined within the deepest isolation cells of a high-security prison.
Yakov smiled at the absurdity. He and the other Stony Men raced from one country to another, from one battle to another, fighting terrorists, fighting mind-numbing fatigue, when they knew perfectly well who sponsored, armed and paid the terrorists.
But they could not attack the nexus of terror. An attack on the Kremlin meant war.
Instead, he and Bolan and the others must hack off the thousands of devouring heads of the KGB's monstrous Department of Terror.
The Israeli ex-army officer knew he must do the obvious. The Hydra monster must die. Yakov spoke into the intercom.
"Pilot, go down. Draw fire from the enemy." Find, then kill.
MCCARTER SAW THE FLASH of the rocket launcher. The warhead streaked down from the uppermost floor of the hotel's steel frame. It exploded in the parking lot below the helicopter.
The pilot took the troopship up and away. McCarter sprayed a magazine of 5.56mm slugs from his M-16 at the rocket launcher's position, then the helicopter returned to three thousand feet.
Even over the rotor-roar, McCarter heard Yakov screaming into the intercom, ordering the pilot to resume the low-altitude search.
Bloody fly-boy. Someone shoots at him, he forgets what we're here for. And those Yank SWATers. Waiting for us to do something. They haven't even pulled the wrapper off that door gun.
Slinging his M-16, McCarter grabbed handholds and crossed the Huey to the one machine gun. He ripped off the plastic sheeting protecting the M-60. He examined it.
At least somebody had some wits about him, McCarter admitted.
Rather than sending an M-60D door gun with the troopship, the armorer had sent a standard M-60 with a swivel-mount adapter. The weapon still had its bipod legs and shoulder stock. A quick pull would free the M-60 from the swivel-mount to be used away from the helicopter.
He broke open a can of linked cartridges and loaded the weapon. Looking over to Yakov, McCarter pointed down to the hotel. The Israeli finally persuaded the pilot to return to the search.
As the helicopter descended, McCarter opened fire almost straight down on the hotel's top floor. Watching for movement, he raked the shadows hiding the terrorist with the rocket launcher. Three-ought-eight tracers ricocheted from the steel-and-concrete structure.
No one returned the fire.
McCarter continued putting bursts into the hotel as the helicopter dropped. Finally he swept the top floor with a level burst. Tracers skipped off the concrete floor to spark against steel verticals.
Still no answering fire.
At a hundred miles an hour, the Huey circled Big Top, dived through its plastic avenues, soared over the domes, dropped to within a few feet of virgin pavement.
The pilot completed a circle of the parking lots and returned to the vast parking lot between the hotel and the dome hiding the DC-5.
Watching the hotel's upper floors, McCarter saw the rocket flash. But before he could lift the M-60, the rocket hit the tail rotor.
Metal screamed. The frame shuddered as the tail blades disintegrated. The Huey dropped ten feet to the asphalt. The skids crumpled, the helicopter bounced up. The fuselage spun once in counter-revolution to the main rotors, then the pilot shut down the engine and the aircraft crashed to the ground.
Shouting, falling over one another, Phoenix Force and the Air Force SWAT team evacuated the wreck. McCarter grabbed an extra can of linked cartridges for the M-60, then he jerked the weapon free of its door mount.
Auto fire came from the domes. Another rocket streaked down from the hotel. Its miss peppered them with bits of asphalt. The helicopter pilot fired at the hotel with his .45 pistol.
Another rocket hit the helicopter, this time punching through the engine and banged-up fuselage. Avgas exploded in a sheet of flame.
Backlit by the fire, the men of Phoenix Force snapped into action, spreading out on the parking lot's asphalt, functioning like a micro army as they fired and maneuvered, then advanced for the cover of Big Top. The SWAT unit added their firepower to the rush.
Forty-millimetre grenades, continuous M-16 bursts, deadly accurate fire from McCarter's M-60 preceded the SWAT team.
Gaining the shelter of a walkway's low wall, Yakov buzzed Encizo.
"The helicopter's down. We are now in the park."
"We saw the rockets. Want us to clean out that hotel?"
"No. Join us. First we attack the aircraft and the chemical weapons. Over."
Yakov shouted to the men around him. "The aircraft!"
Pushing back the cocking knob of his Uzi with his stainless-steel hook he used as a hand, Yakov led the way, McCarter one step behind.
Lights came on as dusk faded to night. Crouching behind Yakov, McCarter saw a shadow move ahead of them. A three-shot burst from the M-60 spun an Arab in a security-guard uniform out of the bushes. An AKM clattered to the walkway.
A muzzle flashed. Concrete chipped near McCarter's leg. Ohara's and Manning's M-16s ripped the area. An Air Force man threw a grenade far ahead of Yakov.
After the grenade's pop, McCarter rushed ahead of Yakov, firing the M-60 from his hip, chopping ornamental bushes, shattering windows, punching holes in walls. A shadow broke cover.
Nine-millimetre slugs from Yakov's Uzi sent the terrorist sprawling.
Ohara ran to the wounded man and tore the AKM out of his hands. The helicopter pilot took the captured weapons, plus the stripped bandoleers and grenades from the Palestinian's uniform.
Firing came from the far parking lot, one weapon an M-16, the other a booming .44 Magnum. A 40mm grenade exploded against the front of the day-glow orange dome.
Swerving wildly across the open asphalt, the bullet-pocked, fire-scorched pickup truck with the shattered windows and windshield dodged AK fire from the hotel and the dome. The .44 from the pickup boomed again and again, the revolver's heavy slugs crashing through the dome, continuing through the interior.
Yakov motioned the group forward in a rush. He led them to the base of the dome, spraying fire. Behind the cover of an eight-foot-tall clown's head, he gripped his Uzi in the pincers of his steel claw and worked t
he magazine release with his left hand, then jammed in the new magazine.
Every shadow, every place of concealment took bursts of auto fire from Phoenix Force. The pickup screeched to a stop. Encizo popped a high-explosive 40mm grenade at the terrorist gunmen before sprinting to re-join his compañero's. The highway patrolman, squatting behind the pickup to reload his Ruger, spotted a gunman perched in the dome's steel frame and dropped him.
Crouched with Yakov against the clown-head, David McCarter saw how the terrorists had converted the dome into a hangar. A wide flat lawn fronted the dome, with only a low curb separating it from the parking lot. To allow the entry of the DC-5 cargo liner, the dome's steel struts had been cut away for approximately twenty-five percent of the circumference. Through the large space, the terrorists had towed or pushed the plane inside. Tire and boot prints marked the lawn in front of the dome.
But on three sides of the dome, the steel strut work rose undamaged from its foundation wall. On those sides, a sunken garden framed the dome. McCarter, the SAS veteran, knew where he would attack.
"What are we waiting for, the bloody Marines?" McCarter shouted out.
Yakov answered him. "You first, young man."
"And so I am..."
Sprinting ahead, holding the M-60 ready, McCarter heard a roar of automatic fire as his compatriots sprayed the dome. AK slugs zipped past him. He jumped from the walkway and thrashed through the garden's decorative shrubs.
McCarter threw himself against the foundation wall of the dome. He set the machine gun on its bipod. Then he aimed three long bursts at the muzzle-flashes in the landscaping.
The line of men reloaded, the fire fight dying out for a moment. McCarter lay in the shrubbery. He heard the clatter of magazines against receivers.
Inside, voices shouted in Arabic, Spanish and Russian. McCarter heard metal scrape on concrete. He looked up.
An AKM barrel slid through a hole in the dome's plastic skin. With weapon braced, one of the terrorists was waiting for the attackers to rush.
McCarter took a grenade from a thigh pocket. He pulled the pin. He eased up. The terrorist's AKM barrel wavered only inches from his face.
Phoenix Force and the Air Force SWAT team suddenly broke cover in a surging line of men and fire.
In one motion, McCarter wrenched away the Kalashnikov and shoved the grenade through the hole in the plastic. Someone screamed. An AKM sprayed a point-blank burst above McCarter as he threw himself flat again.
The advancing SWAT team sprayed the area. Only an arm's reach above him, slugs pocked the concrete. McCarter drew himself into a ball as chips of concrete rained on him. Ricocheting slugs thumped into the ground. One punched into a box magazine on his bandoleer.
"Watch it, mates!" McCarter shouted.
His grenade had popped. Bits of plastic were fluttering in the air like confetti. Jerking the cotter pin from another grenade, McCarter let the lever flip free, counted to three, and exposed only his hand as he threw it inside the dome. He waited for the pop, then lifted his M-60 over the low wall.
Through shredded plastic fabric, he saw a death-black DC-5 cargo liner. Work lights bathed the interior in a glare brighter than day. He saw fighters and technicians everywhere.
Trucks clustered around the cargo liner. Pickups carried tools and pipes. Three heavy trucks, stakes sticking up from their flatbeds, carried drums of aviation fuel. A pump line ran from the drums to the plane's wing tanks.
Palestinians in checkered keffiyehs and desert khaki uniforms ran from place to place inside the dome, peering out at the attack, firing bursts, running to new positions.
Hispanics in street clothes and security-guard uniforms argued with a Palestinian officer in a beret.
A young African with tribal scars patterning his face ran directly at McCarter, not seeing the Englishman as he stooped to check two bloody comrades. The African left the dead men and took his RPG launcher to the dome's perimeter wall. Not more than two steps from McCarter, he set down a vest of rockets and loaded a warhead.
As the African peered into the night for a target, McCarter shot him point-blank with the M-60.
McCarter reached through the geodesic struts to grab the RPG launcher and the vest of rockets. He keyed his hand-radio.
"Yakov! What's the delay?"
Figures thrashed through the shrubbery. McCarter raised the M-60, saw the Israeli and Encizo side by side. He motioned them over and pointed inside.
"Looks like they're refuelling that bugger," McCarter told them. "I took an RPG from one of them. What do you say we do a quickie on them? With all that petrol there—"
His Israeli leader did not answer. Letting his Uzi hang by its sling, Yakov keyed his coded hand-radio. "Manning, Ohara. Do you have your positions?" "Here with two of the SWATs," Manning answered.
"I am in position, sir. An American waits with me."
"Keio, cease firing. Move yourself and the American with you to the other side. Manning, we wait now. Do not fire unless you must. Encizo—" Yakov turned to the Cuban "—circle the dome. Fire only if you must. Check the positions of our men. We cannot allow any of the enemy to escape. One of them may be a leader."
Encizo nodded. Crouching below the level of the foundation wall, he moved away. Yakov keyed his radio again.
"All of you, listen. When you have your positions, I will demand the surrender of the terrorists. Do not resume firing unless I order you to do so."
"What's with you now, Father Time?" McCarter demanded. "You're going to let those bloody murdering lunatics live? That helicopter hit you in the head?"
Without taking his eyes from the scene inside the dome, the veteran of two desert wars and a hundred covert operations answered the rude young brawler.
"One does not win by killing. That only litters the world with corpses. If I must kill to take the victory, I will. But my first and only intention is victory."
"When we kill them all and we can go home," McCarter said, "we've won. Why get philosophical in a fire fight?"
Yakov indicated the terrorist fighters and technicians with his steel pincers. "If we kill them all, do we know who sent them?"
"Everybody knows. . .
"Who? The people of the world? Corpses give no confessions. And if we kill them all, do we learn where the others hide? Do we learn who are their leaders? If we kill them all, other groups still threaten American cities. The other groups threaten the world. It would have been best if these vermin were never born, but killing them is not the victory. Victory is to eliminate the threat. Therefore I will offer them surrender. If they cooperate, they live."
"You of all people, going soft on crazies. Old man, that's the PLO in there. Libyans. Cubans."
"You want only to fight, David. If you must fight, first win. Win, then fight."
"If you say so."
"My young friend," Yakov added, "load that rocket launcher immediately."
Gunmen continued firing into the night. Phoenix Force and the Air Force SWAT team held their fire, silently moving into their positions. One by one, Ohara, then Manning, then Encizo reported from their positions.
In the dome, the Palestinian officer in the beret gathered a squad of front-line fighters and directed them toward the parking lot. The squad ran across the cavernous interior. They crouched near the improvised entry for the DC-5, then waited as their leader continued arguing with two Hispanics.
"We are ready," Yakov muttered. Taking a deep breath, he shouted into the dome, first in Arabic.
Palestinians fired at his voice. AK slugs clanged off the steel struts to buzz into the night. Yakov ducked. He stood up again to shout in English.
"Surrender and you live! Fight and you die!"
A Palestinian boy with a Kalashnikov ran toward Yakov. As the teenager brought up the assault rifle, a .44 Magnum revolver boomed, the young terrorist's life ending as a slug smashed through his chest, spraying blood and flesh into the air behind him. The corpse fell back, still gripping the AKM.
&nbs
p; The other terrorists took cover among the trucks and landing gear and stacked crates. Voices shouted to one another in several languages, some raving, others imploring, one barking sharp commands.
Another voice called out in Spanish. Other voices answered in Spanish. Shouted arguments broke out.
One terrorist threw down his AKM and ran for an exit, his hands high. An auto burst from a Palestinian killed him.
Hispanics sprayed slugs at Palestinians and Africans. Two young Hispanics in khaki fatigues broke cover and fired their Kalashnikovs wildly at the other men. They ran for a hole in the dome's fabric.
One of the running men pointed his AKM behind him and fired a one-handed burst to empty the weapon. He dropped the magazine, kicked it away as he ran, pulled another from his web gear. The man reloaded as he ran into the muzzle of a Palestinian's rifle. A burst through his gut, then a three-shot burst into his head ended his escape.
The second man dived at the plastic fabric of the dome. The material did not rip. Stunned, one arm hanging limp, he crawled along the perimeter, looking for a hole or rip, a way out of the killing ground. ' Palestinians fired at him, hit a leg, wounded him a second time in an arm. Other Hispanics, concealed throughout the area, returned the fire.
A knife slashed through the fabric. An arm grabbed the wounded Hispanic and dragged him out. Another one sprinted for the hole in the dome, died as three AKMs fired.
Yakov's hand-radio buzzed. Encizo reported.
"I have him. They are Cubanos comunistas. He says the Arabs have gone insane."
"Who is the Palestinian officer? Ask him."
Inside the dome, the Palestinians exterminated the Cubans. Darting from cover to cover, the Arab gun-men searched out every one of the Cubans, shot them or battered them to death with AKM butts.
Encizo answered. "He is a big man. A leader. This comunista says the Arab brings orders to kill the city of Dallas. But that was not the plan, he says. I tell you, Katz, this is exactly what happened in Florida. The crazies want only to kill. They kill each other."
"What are his wounds?" Yakov asked.
"He will live. Until maybe I kill him."
Super Bolan - 001 - Stony Man Doctrine Page 19
