Cold Fusion

by Don Pendleton

  “I just hope you are right,” the scarred soldier muttered.

  * * *

  BOLAN WENT ON trust and past example in relying on the resourcefulness of the men he was working with—and they did not prove him wrong. After loading ordnance into the jeeps, they drove a short distance from the fishing village to an inlet where, under the shelter of a rock outcrop and docked at the bottom of a winding path, stood a fishing smack that was like any of those in the village they had left.

  “There have been some prying eyes, Matt. For this reason, it was a precaution to move this boat. You will see why.” Hassim had told him with a wink when they hiked down the path, each of the fourteen men shouldering a burden.

  “I’m more concerned with our transport when we get to Tobruk,” Bolan returned.

  “I have friends there. That is why I would rather there than Derna. In Tobruk I know I can lay hands on what we need. For a price, of course.”

  “Of course,” Bolan said wryly.

  They were now on the small wooden dock and watched the loading. Hassim beckoned Bolan to follow him onto the vessel, and after they had stowed their load, they went back up onto the bridge.

  “I don’t get it,” Bolan said in an amused tone. “Why hide this one? It doesn’t look like it’s any different from any other smack.”

  Hassim grinned broadly. “Of course not. That would be incredibly stupid. But then again, if a suspicious man took a closer look, as they sometimes do, he would see why a little subterfuge was necessary.”

  Bolan looked more closely at the controls of the vessel. “Show me the engines,” he asked, realization dawning. Led below deck, he could see that the small, functional engine of the smack as originally constructed had been removed. In its place were turbo engines that could propel such a small vessel at a rate that would eat up the waterways.

  “Naturally, we had to reinforce the hull. This, too, would be obvious with more than a casual examination. Otherwise, it is as it was built. No armaments, no fancy computerized shit. You can take that on and off at will. This has one function only—speed.”

  The two men returned to the deck. Hassim’s men had loaded, cast off and were settling in for the journey. The smack wasn’t built for great comfort, but as it moved out of the small inlet and into the main body of the water, gathering speed as it hit greater depth, Bolan realized that with any luck they would have little time to relax—only time to prepare for the fight to come.

  His cell phone buzzing interrupted this train of thought.

  “Striker—something very strange is happening. There’s a UN flight on its way. There’s so much fog around any intel, that I get a very bad feeling about this.”

  “Bear, if you can’t get to the root of what’s going on, then the only sensible thing to assume is that it’s trouble. Where’s it headed?”

  “Three guesses.”

  * * *

  OSTERMAN HAD RELUCTANTLY called in all the favors he had left. If the senator wanted anything else before the colonel’s retirement came around, then he truly would have to whistle. Sitting in his office at the Pentagon, Osterman reviewed his career and reluctantly came to the conclusion that it was about to come crashing down ignominiously around his ears, one way or another. Whichever way he turned, he was out of options. As he sighed, stood up, and left his office, he knew that he had set in motion a chain of events that were now beyond his recall.

  Leaving Egypt and heading for Tripoli was a UN plane carrying troops who were being briefed on a mission they believed was about maintaining security in the region. That would soon be an obvious sham to them, but they would still fight as long as they had their orders.

  Osterman had a pretty shrewd idea who was behind the other U.S. activity in the region. He knew who he would rather have at his back. Added to which, they were both homing in on an auction that broke so many international laws that it would take a team of lawyers a good decade to even get started.

  It was not going to be pretty. Osterman yearned for his log cabin by the lake. Somehow, he’d be surprised if he ever got there again.

  * * *

  FOR VLADIMIR AND Piotr, it was a pleasingly efficient journey to the oasis site that had been chosen for the auction. Coming ashore at Derna had been simple, the requisite number of U.S. dollars having changed hands. Their charges were resigned to their fate, and neither said anything at all—not even in communication with each other—during the journey. Desert-worthy vehicles were ready for the Russians and their accompanying guard. Within half an hour of landing they were at the edge of the desert and on their way.

  * * *

  FOR BOLAN AND his mercenary crew, the journey was also simple, if lacking in the more material comforts. Docking at Tobruk, Hassim greeted the harbormaster as an old friend—which, as the man was married to his wife’s sister, was not surprising. Then they quickly loaded up the jeeps that had been supplied for them by the harbormaster, who had been careful to make tracing any movements as difficult as possible.

  Bolan handed over the cash required, and they set off across the desert toward their own destination, located just outside the oasis region chosen for the auction. Here they would set up camp and prepare for their attack. Hours passed for them in journey and inaction, as they did for the Russians. Tension simmered beneath the surface as the endless dry lands gave them little to ponder other than the forthcoming firefight.

  * * *

  LANDING AT TRIPOLI, the UN plane disgorged a detachment of U.S. Marines under orders to root out and eliminate two rebel groups that would clash over intel that would tilt the balance of power in the region. Their briefing told them that they were to secure two men—clearly marked and indentified—who held the intel, and to terminate with prejudice any forces that got between them and their target. They were also told that there may be rogue American forces at work, and to disregard nationality. Anyone who was not in their detachment was to be treated as hostile. They were good soldiers who had no idea that they were on a black ops mission. They were determined to fulfill their brief as they loaded up and shipped out for the road journey to their objective.

  * * *

  PIOTR AND VLADIMIR arrived at their destination, gratified to see that their paymasters had learned from their recent errors, and that the site of the auction was fenced by motion detectors and cameras as well as patrolled by a force that—with the addition of the men who had traveled with them—was twice the strength of the one in Jordan. After an inspection and debriefing with the ex-Gaddafi general who had been hired to head up security, they settled their charges in a trailer that was guarded by two assigned gunmen. It was only then that the ex-military man indicated they should follow him to the tent that served as mission base.

  “Gentlemen, I have received this communication. I think you should read it,” he said in clipped, heavily accented English before turning a laptop screen to them. Vladimir allowed Piotr to read the communication.

  “Well?” he said when the fat man had signaled his completion of the email with a snort.

  “It seems that you may have a chance to extract payment for what happened in Jordan.”

  “They know where we are?”

  “Whoever employs them, much as we are ourselves employment, has hacked our paymasters’ communications. They know our location. Of course, by the same token, our paymasters have been able to back-engineer that hacking, find their own backdoor and inform us of where they can be found.”

  “They will, of course, be aware of this?”

  Piotr shrugged. “Perhaps not. Not yet. But still we should assume as much. It may be as well to preempt them and neutralize a threat while extracting some revenge.”

  Vladimir smiled coldly. “This is something that I could like very much.”

  Chapter 12

  Present day

  The cr
ackling radio signal came through. “We lose contact with two. Others circle and close. Orders?”

  Vladimir drew back his lips in a mirthless grin that was more of a snarl. “I want some alive. I have matters to settle.”

  Piotr raised an eyebrow. “We send in a force half their size, lose a third, and you want prisoners?”

  “Toying with them,” the tall Russian shrugged. “Having fun.”

  “This is not the time to do that,” Pitor snapped at him. “They should be eliminated. We are not here to run risks.”

  “What risks? They have lost men, they will lose more. We already outnumber them here. We have excellent security precautions in place. And we have a man—” here he indicated the general “—who knows a little about the extraction of information. Why not? After the problems they have caused, a little relaxation may be pleasant.”

  Piotr sighed. “Very well.” He leaned forward to deliver his orders. The men had been sent out with ancient tech so that any capture or decease would leave a false marker of technical capability. As far as Piotr was concerned, this was another unnecessary conceit on the part of his compatriot—but he knew very well how difficult Vladimir could be if crossed, and his cooperation was a continuing requirement. As he spoke clearly and concisely to the straining ears of the men in the field, Piotr hoped that technical and language issues would not cause a last-minute stumble.

  If so, then he would finally have to call time on Vladimir. And he did not wish to do such a thing after so many years.

  * * *

  BOLAN AND HASSIM marshaled their men in the center of the camp. The grenades had caused chaos and made it hard for them to direct forces, as it had made any kind of accurate estimate of the enemy hard to ascertain. Bolan worked on the assumption that there had been four pairs of men at regular compass points and that two pairs had been eliminated. Three directions of attack, then, and probably six men—the attackers were outnumbered, but against this they had the darkness and the front foot as impetus.

  He barked at Hassim’s men, directing three pairs of them to strike out in the direction of remaining fire while the rest set up covering fire. They were pinned down and ripe to be picked off unless they took the offensive.

  Sami and Husni would circle north, Rafik and Aref would take the south, and Riad and Kamal would cover the remaining compass points. Their orders were simple—exterminate with extreme prejudice. It was vital that they wipe out this opposition. As they sited the directions from which fire was emanating and started their crawl toward the enemy, Bolan and Hassim directed the remaining men to lay down a concentrated stream of suppressing fire that would hold the enemy to the positions located by their own fire. As this proceeded, Bolan used the RPG-7 that they had brought with them to send out a series of shrapnel grenades that would possibly do some damage, but would certainly help in pinning the enemy down to one position. He was cautious with the grenades as their ordnance was limited, and picked his spots with care.

  The tactic was obviously working. As the seconds ticked by, the fire raining back on them in return grew sparse, dwindling to a trickle as the focus of the action shifted to the darkness of the dunes. The men in the camp were reduced to the status of onlookers as flashes of fire and the distant chatter of SMG fire described a firefight in which they could be nothing more than onlookers due to the risk of taking out their own men.

  Even this distant fire—observed from three compass points as an obscene light show—dwindled into silence, and the men in the camp fell into a tense silence as they waited.

  Sami and Husni returned over the sands, triumphant. Sami carried weapons and communications equipment that he dumped in the center of camp. Hassim picked up the ancient tech and gave Bolan a puzzled look.

  “This?” he queried. “Old shit, Cooper. Not like our boys at all.”

  Bolan said nothing, pondering the situation. His ruminations were interrupted by the return of Riad and Kamal, who also carried the old comm equipment and some ordnance with them.

  Bolan picked up one of the old radios. It crackled impotently. “Either we just got unlucky and were attacked by a bunch of desperados on the make, or our target force is trying to throw us off the scent. This isn’t the kind of thing I would expect from them. Maybe that’s the point.” He looked up with a sudden realization. “Where are Rafik and Aref?”

  Hassim looked concerned. “If these kids are back, they should be. Unless...”

  Bolan organized the search party. It was still night-black in the desert, silent and forbidding as he and two others swept out in an arc to cover the area of the last firefight. He expected to find the corpses of the two older fighters, perhaps with one of their enemy. Certainly one must have gotten away if both of Hassim’s men had been taken out. And yet, despite the signs of combat, and a dark splattering revealed by flash to be the blood of at least one man, there was no sign of anyone living or dead.

  The party of three men congregated then returned to the camp empty-handed to be met by a grim-faced Jared. He held up one of the old walkie-talkies.

  “This shit is still working. They’re not answering, but they know I can hear because I’ve tried to send. That’s why they’re doing it.”

  “Doing what?” Bolan asked, though he was certain he knew the answer.

  “They’ve got my boys. We need to move now, as they know where we are, but I’ll tell you this—they’ll know our plans. One way or another,” he added meaningfully. “But we’re going to get them first, Cooper.” He fixed Bolan with a stare that determined no argument.

  “No one fucks with my boys. We die fighting, fine. That’s the risk we take. But not this shit. This is personal, now.”

  * * *

  “WILL HE LIVE long enough to verify whatever his piece-of-shit friend says?” Piotr asked Vladimir as they stood in front of Aref. The old fighter was trussed to a chair, his wounds staunched and roughly patched. He had lost a lot of blood on the thirty-kilometer journey to the auction site, and was barely conscious. Unaware, even, of the electrodes attached to his testicles and wired up to a battery that the Libyan ex-general had on a small table, attached to a voltage meter.

  Vladimir shrugged. “I don’t really care. They will follow, we know where they are located and their likely routes, and so we will be able to face off with them. If we get any detail from these two assholes, then so much the better. Truthfully, it will just make me feel better to see this scum suffer before they die. Carry on with the interrogation.”

  Piotr’s face remained set. He had no objection to torture, per se, but felt that this was wasting time and effort, and was—perhaps more worryingly—another example of Vladimir letting his feelings overrule his professionalism.

  Piotr slapped Aref hard across the face to bring him out of his semiconscious delirium. He barked a question at him, which the wounded man seemed to have trouble understanding beneath the fog of pain. Piotr gestured, and the Libyan smiled slyly as he twisted the voltage meter, watching his Arab victim writhe and wail in sudden agony, trying to lift himself from the chair and away from the source of pain, but unable to do so because of his bonds and his own diminishing strength. Piotr slapped him again, barked another question that was answered only by a scream of pain as the Libyan gleefully increased the voltage.

  It was going nowhere, and it took only a few minutes for the combination of his injuries and the shock treatment to take its toll on Aref’s constitution, his heart unable to take the strain.

  Piotr sighed heavily as he gestured for his men to untie the corpse and dispose of it, replacing him with the terrified Rafik. The wizened and battle-hardened man was no coward in combat, and had been taken relatively unharmed only after a blow to the head during hand-to-hand had blacked him out. However, this was not combat—he was powerless at the hands of men who would cause him slow pain with no chance to fight back. He had heard his friend and fel
low fighter die. He had no intention of giving them anything, but this did not quell the fear that rose in his breast as he was pushed into the chair, secured and connected to the battery.

  Vladimir stepped forward, grinning mirthlessly. He could see the fear in the old man’s face, even though Rafik fought to keep his face still as stone. Vladimir came up close, looked Rafik in the eye and laughed gently.

  “Tell me and it’ll be quick,” he taunted. He was rewarded with a glob of phlegm in the face as the old man made what he knew would be his last show of defiance.

  Vladimir betrayed no emotion as he stepped back, straightening and wiping the spit away with a tissue. He said nothing to betray the anger inside as he nodded to the Libyan, and the first charge wracked the old man’s genitals.

  “I haven’t even asked him a question as yet,” Piotr said mildly.

  “Ask him now,” Vladimir snapped, indicating the Libyan should kill the charge. “I doubt he’ll talk. Scared but stubborn. Perhaps if he were not the enemy, I may admire his stance. Perhaps...”

  He stepped back and indicated that Piotr take over questioning. The fat Russian asked a few questions regarding the strength of the opposition force, their armaments and their battle plan. Each was met with a stoic silence broken only by agonized screams of pain as the charge was sent through Rafik’s lower body once more, each time increasing in strength. After the last, he blacked out, and with some irritation Vadimir slapped the Arab until he came around. He was rewarded with a barely audible comment on his mother’s facility with donkeys.

  Vladimir stepped back, wordlessly striding to where the Libyan sat. He brushed him aside and turned the voltage up, allowing the charge to continue as the Arab writhed and squirmed, his screams becoming frail as pain sapped the strength from his body. The air was filled with the stench of burning hair and flesh mixed with the voiding of the Arab’s bowels as Rafik passed into merciful unconsciousness.

  Piotr reached across and killed the current, taking his compatriot’s hand from the battery.