Rogue Assault

by Don Pendleton

  “The system—”

  “Needs an overhaul,” the caller said. “That’s not my job. But while I’m here, I’m taking down a part of the machine.”

  With that, the line went dead. Mansaré cradled the receiver, left his hand upon it as he said, “God help you both.”

  * * *

  NILSON MEDINA WOKE in darkness, his whole body aching, with a smell of oil and rubber in his nostrils. Rocking motions, first dismissed as nausea from being knocked unconscious, finally combined with the pervasive odors that surrounded him to tell him he was locked inside a car’s trunk, rolling over city streets. If they were somewhere in the countryside, Medina thought, it would have been a rougher ride.

  He tried to move, testing his arms and legs, his muscles achy from the voltage that had crackled through them sometime earlier, and found his wrists were tightly bound behind his back. It felt like wire chafing his flesh, not rope or proper handcuffs. At least his ankles weren’t tied, although the confines of the trunk prevented him from straightening his legs or gaining any major leverage.

  How long had he been out? It was impossible to say. Blind in the darkness, unable to check his wristwatch, speculation was a fruitless exercise. He had been taken in midafternoon from his apartment; the events returned to him now as fractured images, then merged into a coherent memory. Logic suggested he was still somewhere in Bissau, though he couldn’t judge directions from the frequent turns that kept his upset stomach roiling.

  Finally, Medina started counting seconds in his mind, something to do while he tested the bonds pinning his wrists and found that he couldn’t escape them. Lying on his left side, he could feel his empty shoulder holster, and the folding knife he carried in a pocket of his slacks was gone, together with the rolls of currency he had retrieved from his apartment.

  What else could he tell, in his present position?

  The car that carried him wasn’t an army vehicle. His captors might be soldiers, but if so, they’d come for him without their uniforms or standard-issue weapons. Then again, it made no difference. Camara’s men or General Diallo’s, either would be bent on first interrogating him, then snuffing out Medina’s life.

  He was as good as dead. Unless...

  He had to have missed the rendezvous with Cooper by now, which meant that the American would try to find him. And upon discovering Medina had been snatched, however long that took, what would he do? What could he do?

  Medina had counted off nine hundred seconds—fifteen minutes—when the car slowed, made one final turn, then coasted to a stop. A moment later, someone popped the trunk lid, the sudden daylight forcing Medina to squint against its stinging glare. Strong hands lifted Medina from his pit and planted him on trembling legs, then urgently propelled him toward an open door. Some kind of warehouse stood before him, and the fact that no one screened it from his view affirmed what he already knew.

  They didn’t care if he identified the building, since he’d never have a chance to speak of it with anyone. Medina wasn’t meant to leave this place alive.

  Inside, crossing a concrete floor, he was escorted at a rapid pace until they reached the middle of a spacious empty chamber, echoing with footsteps. Roughly centered in the room, a straight-backed wooden chair sat waiting to receive Medina. As they reached it, someone snipped the wire that bound his wrists, then he was forced into the chair, pinned with the stun gun pointed at his chest from six or seven feet away.

  Two others went to work with duct tape, rapidly securing his chest, arms, legs. When they were done, the leader of Medina’s kidnappers lowered his stun gun, smiled and said, “My orders are to wring you dry of information. You can save us all some time—and save yourself some pain—by answering my questions honestly.”

  “And would you take my word for anything?” Medina asked.

  The leader thought about it, smiled and said, “You’re right. Let’s get to work.”

  * * *

  BOLAN STARTED WORKING from the list of targets he’d drawn up with Nilson Medina before their raid on Storm Transport. His first stop was a combination brothel and casino, disguised as a health club. Both gambling and prostitution were banned by law in Guinea-Bissau, but that didn’t seem to hamper business at the Golden Age Gymnasium.

  Bolan wasn’t a member of the “gym,” and he had no appointment. Neither fact prevented him from dropping in as afternoon bled into evening, finding the joint in full swing. The doorman who met him and reached for a pistol went down on the spot, blood leaking from a Parabellum keyhole in his forehead. The hostess scampered off, shrieking to beat the band, and Bolan let her serve as his announcement for civilian players to evacuate the premises.

  As for the staff, he welcomed any efforts to eject him.

  When the exit stampede began, Bolan helped it along with an M-84 stun grenade, lobbed high across the chaos of the main casino floor, exploding with a brilliant flash and thunderclap as Bolan kept his eyes averted, distance and the cotton stuffed inside his ears reducing the concussive impact of the blast. He didn’t need to hear the panicked players crying out in Portuguese, had nothing to discuss with them as long as they were bent on leaving, and the guards—well, they were absolutely going down.

  It turned out there were six of them, besides the late doorman. Bolan saw two appear upstairs, where they’d been keeping track of johns, maybe indulging in some voyeuristic action, while the other four came out of nooks and crannies on the gaming floor. The fleeing customers, dealers and hookers helped confuse them, while the Executioner was marking targets, lining up his shots by order of priority.

  He took the closest of the gunners first, with short bursts from his FAL carbine, the first two down and out before they had a chance to use their weapons. The third guy fired his shotgun, splattering a couple of the gamblers who were slow clearing his field of fire, then Bolan dropped him where he stood, while he was jacking up another round.

  Next, Bolan shifted to the upstairs shooters, caught them on the stairs, trying to get an angle on him with their SMGs. Before they managed it, he stitched them both and brought them tumbling down to ground-floor level, arms and legs entangled as they hit the bottom and lay still.

  Which still left one.

  The last man standing grabbed a naked working girl as she ran past him, used her for a human shield, his pistol jammed against her head. It was a risky ploy against a stranger who had come in shooting, lobbing stun grenades, but maybe it was all that he could think of.

  And it didn’t work.

  While Bolan’s target shouted threats at him in Portuguese, he aimed and stroked the carbine’s trigger once, sending a single NATO round to close the gap and punch the loudmouth’s ticket where he stood. The hooker gasped, then squealed an octave Bolan hadn’t heard before and sprinted for the nearest exit.

  Done...except for bringing down the house.

  And with the final cakes of Semtex he had liberated from Storm Transport, that should be a breeze.

  * * *

  EDOUARD CAMARA GLANCED UP at the sound of rapping on his office door, already open, and saw Aristide Ialá’s young replacement standing on the threshold, looking glum. Camara almost groaned, but caught himself and asked, “What is it now?”

  The young lieutenant, Almami Silva, entered and moved hesitantly toward Camara’s desk. “There’s been another incident, sir,” he said.

  Camara felt his stomach clench but tried to keep the grimace off his face. “Tell me,” he ordered.

  Silva briefed him on the mayhem at the Golden Age Gymnasium. At least six dead, the place demolished with explosives, while their customers, dealers and naked working girls scampered over the Luanda neighborhood, dodging authorities. Camara didn’t want to think about the money it would cost him to set up another comparable operation.

  If he even could.

  The hammering he’d ta
ken in the past day and a half had clearly shaken General Diallo’s confidence in his ability to lead the Family. Indeed, Camara’s own self-confidence was waning. What else could he do to salvage his pathetic situation, if Diallo and the army couldn’t even find their common enemies?

  “All right,” he said to Silva. “You’ve informed me. If there’s nothing else...”

  “There is, sir. While speaking to our man with the Judicial Police, I learned their missing officer has been located.”

  “What?” Camara’s head snapped up, his eyes pinning Silva’s.

  “Rather, I should say he was located, but has now apparently been kidnapped.”

  “What?” Camara felt foolish repeating himself, but the news was astounding. The man who had infiltrated his Family found, then abducted? “Explain,” he demanded. “What happened?”

  “Details are few, sir,” Silva replied. “It seems that this Medina visited his flat in Cupelon de Baixo and was taken there. Neighbors reported a disturbance. By the time that officers arrived there was no sign of him.”

  “Taken, but not killed,” Camara said. “Why not? You’re certain that he’s not in custody?”

  “Not with his own force,” Silva said. “I’m sure of that.”

  It clicked then, for Camara. Who else would be looking for Medina? Diallo’s men. The Special Intervention Force.

  But if they had Medina and the general hadn’t seen fit to tell Camara, what did that mean? Was there any reason to conceal that information from Camara, when a simple thirty-second phone call could have put his mind at ease?

  One reason, possibly. And that one amplified Camara’s stomachache tenfold.

  Diallo had to be planning to dispose of him, perhaps to blame this pig Medina for the deed.

  Well, two could play that game.

  The general was powerful, of course. But he wasn’t invincible.

  * * *

  THE FORTUNE CLUB was a saloon with a backroom bookmaking setup. The building wasn’t much to look at, but Medina had told Bolan that the place booked bets on everything from soccer to auto racing, turning a profit for Edouard Camara’s syndicate that averaged 480 million CFA francs per year. Call it a cool million dollars untaxed for the Family network.

  About to go up in smoke.

  Bolan left his Peugeot in the club’s parking lot, dusk coming on as he stepped out of the car and took his automatic rifle with him. Pockets heavy with grenades, he crossed the gravel lot and pushed in through the swing door, then was enveloped by the tavern’s murky atmosphere. His eyes adjusted quickly, while the patrons sized him up; they spotted the weapon in his hands, and conversation died as if someone had flipped a switch to kill the sound.

  Bolan didn’t know the phrase in Portuguese, so he used English. “Everybody out! Right now!”

  For emphasis, he raised the FAL carbine one-handed, ripped a 5-round burst across the ceiling and then stepped aside to dodge the rush of fleeing customers. The bartender was slower, reaching underneath the bar for something he kept hidden there, and by the time he came up with a stubby shotgun, Bolan had him in his sights.

  One round from twenty feet punched through the barkeep’s forehead, slammed him backward, bringing down a shelf of bottles that exploded as they hit the concrete floor. Between the gunshots and associated racket, Bolan figured that the backroom gang had to be on full alert, and that was fine.

  He wasn’t taking any prisoners.

  Clutching a frag grenade in his left hand, its pin discarded, he approached the only other door in sight, his carbine leveled when it suddenly flew open and a short man with a shiny pistol in his hand emerged. Bolan triggered a 3-round burst to clear the doorway, made an underhanded pitch with the grenade, then sidestepped to avoid stray shrapnel when it blew.

  The blast cut off a symphony of excited voices in the back room, Bolan closing rapidly to peer through smoke and settling plaster dust. He counted half a dozen men scattered around the room, two obviously dead, the others stunned or wounded. The explosion had upended tables, carpeting the floor with betting slips that gave him an idea.

  Bolan made one quick circuit of the room, finishing off the four survivors with one point-blank NATO round apiece, then went back to the bar and found some bottles on a second shelf that had survived the barkeep’s fall. Returning to the back room, Bolan poured their contents on the betting slips, drew a trail of alcohol across the threshold as he left the room, then found a book of matches on the bar and struck a light.

  In seconds flat, the back room turned into a crematorium, smoke rising to the ceiling and expanding there, worming its way into the bar beyond. Destruction of the betting slips, Bolan surmised, would leave Edouard Camara at a loss to say which bettors had been winners on the day’s assorted contests, adding one more stressor to the gangster’s crumbling life.

  A relatively small thing, maybe, but the Executioner would take what he could get.

  * * *

  NILSON MEDINA CLENCHED his teeth and strained against the duct tape that confined him as the cattle prod sent bolts of lightning through his flesh. With each shock, he imagined that his heart had stopped, wondering whether this would be the last time, if it wouldn’t start to beat again.

  How long had it gone on, so far? Medina had no more idea of that than where he was, in fact. The jolting charges stunned his brain, made him lose count of passing seconds as he tried to push the pain away and hold it at a distance. All in vain, since he couldn’t escape the prod or taunting laughter of his captors.

  But the man in charge was getting irritated now. The exercise was clearly losing its amusement value. There was anger in his voice as he bent to ask Medina, “Have you had enough?”

  Medina spit a glob of blood from where he’d bitten through his tongue, then forced a smile and said, “I’m fine. But make it easy on yourself, if you get tired.”

  “So, you’re having fun? Let me make you happy, then.”

  The prod came back, jammed in the crease below Medina’s navel, and his spine arched with the contraction of his muscles as the voltage seared through them. Medina heard someone squealing, a high-pitched shrilling sound, and realized it was his own voice, taut with agony. The perspiration on his chest and stomach seemed to crackle. He imagined sparks erupting from his flesh.

  The prod withdrew, and when its user bent to stare at him again, Medina saw the other man was sweating, too. Was it that muggy in the warehouse, or was he unnerved by Medina’s resistance to this point?

  “I can keep this up all night, you know,” he said. “We have more batteries.”

  Medina forced a smile that felt as if his cheeks were splitting open. “Good,” he wheezed. “I was afraid you might run out.”

  “You’re quite the hero, eh?” his tormentor inquired. “Do you suppose that your American will appreciate the sacrifice? Does he remember you at all?”

  “You’ll find out when you meet him,” Medina said. “I would love to see it.”

  “But you won’t, will you? I doubt you’ll be alive that long—or I could fry your eyes out with the prod, right now.”

  “If it amuses you,” Medina answered back.

  “Get on with it,” one of the other said. “The eyes.”

  “In a moment,” the leader said.

  He turned back to Medina, “I am curious, sincerely. Why this loyalty to one who has abandoned you? You’ve barely known him for a day, and yet you’d suffer all of this—face death—to keep us from him? Why?”

  Medina didn’t have to force the laughter, and it pleased him, seeing that it took them by surprise.

  “You think I go through this for him?” he asked. “You’re fools. I do it for myself and for our country, to be rid of pigs like you.”

  The prod man blinked at him and said, “You don’t know me.”

  “I’
ve known you all my life,” Medina said. “You’ve made my homeland what it is today. Now do your worst to me. Your time is almost up.”

  “We’ll see,” the other man said, and raised his cattle prod.

  12

  Edouard Camara knew the time had come to flee his home and find a safer hiding place. It galled him, living like a fugitive, but what else could he do? In theory, he ran Bissau’s most powerful crime family and had the full weight of the nation’s army behind him, but theory and reality had diverged radically since yesterday. Camara’s empire had been shaken to its very roots, and now he had good reason to believe that General Diallo might be turning on him. At the very least, critical information had been kept from him, and what might happen next?

  Camara drew no satisfaction from the news that one of his attackers had apparently been captured. How could that console him, when Diallo hid the fact, or when the rogue policeman’s comrade still kept striking at Camara’s properties?

  The Fortune Club was gone now, with its cash and betting slips. This time tomorrow, hundreds of gamblers armed with that news would be clamoring at him for payment, insisting that they had picked winners in this or that game. Camara could dispute it and refuse to pay, but with his staff dead and their records burned to ashes, what excuse could he propose? Even refunding bets would leave him in the red, since he had no idea of how much any given bettor may have wagered.

  No. The time had come for him to run and hide. A quick move, without warning or a large phalanx of bodyguards, should do the trick. Downstairs and out, into his waiting car, with just Almami Silva and three men, including his driver. The rest of his force would be waiting when he reached his place in the country, with walls, wooded grounds and defenses to stand off all comers.

  He was ready. Picking up the overnight bag he had filled with bare essentials—toiletries, the currency and precious gems from his wall safe—Camara left his office, calling to the others. “It is time! We’re leaving! Everyone, come on!”