by Dick Stivers
"Are you okay, Mademoiselle Desmarais?" Dazed, she nodded. Gadgets pointed to the waiting panel truck. "In there, in the truck, you'll be safe. Sit down and be calm, you're safe now."
The young woman staggered away to the truck.
Then Gadgets quickly briefed his partner. "That bitch works for the Soviets. Get her into the truck and watch her. Don't let her talk to Illovich. Tell Powell and Akbar."
"You positive? She talks leftist, but..."
"She ain't leftist, she's red. We'll put the questions to her when we can."
Coming up to them, Powell tossed a Beretta 93-R and the Able Team hand radio to Blancanales. Then, jerking the Soviet cultural secretary up by his arms, Powell and Akbar dragged Illovich to the panel truck and shoved him inside.
A pistol popped, then the Konzak boomed and glass fell around Gadgets and Blancanales. Crouching down, they saw a blood-spurting Soviet flop backward through a shattered window of the Mitsubishi.
Blancanales jammed the hand radio in his pocket, then checked his pistol. "My other equipment here?"
"It's all in that truck." Gadgets pointed to the panel truck and Blancanales jogged away. "And watch that phony Frenchy."
Tires screeched, engines roared. Past the smashed Dodge and Mitsubishi, Lyons and Gadgets saw two cars full of Soviet gunmen racing toward them. The three Mexicans fired submachine guns at the approaching cars. Lyons rushed to Gadgets.
"Wizard, shut up and kill somebody," Lyons said as he pulled grenades from his bandolier, yanked the pins and threw the grenades one after another.
The first grenade exploded in a deafening boom, the next two poured out smoke. Gadgets realized the method in Carl Lyons's mayhem. The first grenade, an antiterrorist stun-shock grenade, had been designed to neutralize airline hijackers without killing passengers. It produced a blinding white flash and deafening blast but no shrapnel. The Soviets would think they faced heavy weapons. And if any local people watched the firefight in their street, the explosion served notice to take cover.
Skidding, the Soviets stopped short. The wall of smoke rising from the other grenades obscured their aim. Gadgets selected two fragmentation grenades and threw hard. His throws did not make the hundred-meter distance. The round canisters bounced off the asphalt and popped short of the Soviets.
But a 40mm high-explosive grenade from Blancanales's M-203 scored. A headless Soviet gunman fell. Another Soviet, blood jetting from a hundred pinpoint wounds, staggered backward through the confusion and drifting smoke. A police car, racing to the scene, hit the Soviet, flipping him broken-backed through the air.
Switching to a left-handed grip, Gadgets braced his CAR against the side of the wrecked Mitsubishi and aimed semiauto slugs into the corrupt Mexicans rushing to help their Soviet paymasters. Gadgets fired five rounds, dropped three gunmen, Soviet and Mexican.
Shouldering his M-16/M-203 over-and-under assault rifle and grenade launcher, Blancanales sighted down. He fired a high-explosive round under the nearest police car.
A ball of flame rushed into the sky. Lyons threw another smoke grenade. Gadgets hit two more gunmen, then flipped on his short assault rifle's safety. He added a red-smoke grenade to flames and white smoke, then watched for targets.
Firing broke out behind them. Though the rescue and quick firefight had taken only four minutes, the Soviets had already organized a response.
Lyons had anticipated the reaction. On the intersecting boulevard, Captain Soto's antiterrorist unit ambushed the cars of Soviets and corrupt Mexican police.
"Quit it, Wizard!" Lyons shouted out. "Pol! Mr. Marine! Time to go..."
Through the smoke and flames, Gadgets saw two more cars of Soviets and police rushing into the fire-fight. Gunmen dashed from doorway to doorway. Gadgets fired single shots from his CAR, forcing the gunmen to halt.
"Ironman! The time has come to evacuate!"
While his two buddies covered him with their submachine guns, one of the Mexican soldiers backed the pickup from the wreckage. Lyons saw the pickup coming and shouted out to Gadgets, "Wizard! Get in that truck — that one! We'll be the firepower."
"The man's got the plan!" Gadgets sprinted to the pickup and jumped in with the Mexicans. They gave him a thumbs-up congratulations on the ambush.
Gadgets saw the taxi and the panel truck starting away. Blancanales stood on the panel truck's bumper. Holding on to one of the back doors, he fired bursts of auto fire from his M-16/M-203 at the Soviets and Mexican police rushing past the flaming cars.
Lyons tossed a grenade under the wrecked Dodge and ran for the pickup. As the tires squealed, the Mexicans grabbed his hands and pulled him in.
Behind them, the grenade blasted open the gas tank of the Dodge. But the spilling gasoline did not flash.
Soviets and Mexicans rushed the wrecked cars. Taking cover behind the cars, they fired at retreating Americans. An impact punched the Kevlar protecting Gadgets's chest. The Mexican next to him grunted and fell. Glass shattered. Bullets slammed the fenders.
Blancanales aimed another 40mm grenade at the gunmen. The high-explosive shell popped against the Dodge, and an explosive wave of flame enveloped the Dodge, the Mitsubishi and several gunmen.
Lyons scrambled across the pickup cargo bed to Gadgets. "You hit?"
"Where?"
"You got the bullet, you tell me."
"I'm okay, check him." Gadgets pointed to the bleeding Mexican.
A 9mm slug had passed through the upper-right section of the young man's chest and out through his back. He screamed and gasped as Lyons turned him to glance at the exit wound. Lyons saw no blood in the Mexican's mouth. He pushed him to the side of the cargo bed, out of the way of the others. "You'll live."
The pickup hurtled into another firefight. Lyons had anticipated the Soviets and Mexican-police units coming to the aid of Illovich. He had asked Captain Soto to organize an ambush. The Mexican antiterrorist officer had directed his men to take positions on the boulevard behind the scene of the rescue and wait.
When the Soviet and Mexican-police gunmen rushed to the rescue of Illovich, they ran into the trap. Firing from the cover of doorways or protected by trucks and cars and taxi cabs, the antiterrorist unit slammed the Soviets with fire from NATO-caliber FN FAL rifles, the heavy 7.62mm slugs punching through sheet steel and flesh.
All of the Soviet cars took hits, drivers and gunmen dying. But the Mexicans hesitated to fire on the squad cars. Two police cars broke through the ambush. One continued straight on down the boulevard, accelerating away at one hundred twenty kilometers an hour to safety. The other squad car stopped and returned the fire.
In the furious exchange of fire, the Soviet survivors organized a breakout.
At that moment the pickup carrying Lyons and Gadgets and the Mexican soldiers raced into the intersection, directly into the line of fire between the Mexican ambush unit and the Soviets. The driver attempted to steer around a Soviet car, but the rear end slide slipped, and the pickup slammed broadside into an abandoned car.
Gadgets went airborne. Lyons slammed into the side wall of the pickup and bounced back. He saw his partner rolling across the asphalt. The driver floored the accelerator, and the truck spun its tires, rubber smoke clouding around Lyons as he jumped from the back of the truck.
The abandoned car separated Lyons from Gadgets. Sprinting through the smoke, slugs zipped past Lyons as the Soviets tried to kill him. He threw himself to the asphalt and crabbed around the car, auto-fire banging the fenders and door panels. Glass showered him.
Gadgets sat against the car, blood streaming down his face, his eyes fluttering with shock. His CAR-15 lay on the asphalt near him. Lyons snatched up the weapon and slung the CAR around his partner's neck.
"Hey, Wizard, up!"
"Man, my head..."
"Don't give me any excuses. We got work to do."
The panel truck and the other car skidded through the intersection as Lyons urged Gadgets up, Blancanales and Powell spraying fire from the back doors.
Tires squealed in protest as the drivers managed very tight right turns and accelerated away.
Pulling a grenade from Gadgets's bandolier, Lyons pulled pins and threw one after another — smoke, fragmentation, shock-stun. Then Lyons threw the last grenade from his own bandolier.
The flurry of popping grenades silenced the Soviet gunmen for a moment, and Lyons dragged Gadgets away, staggering like two drunks. The car and billowing smoke behind them provided a shield. They lurched for the safety of the far curb.
A Mexican commando broke cover. With grenades in each hand, he sprinted to the car and threw the grenades into the smoke. He pulled two more from his pockets and threw them as the others exploded. Hurrying back, he grabbed Gadgets's elbow. Running through autofire, Lyons and the Mexican carried Gadgets to the shelter of a doorway.
Bullets chipped the stone walls above them and ricochets whined into the distance as Lyons looked for Soto. A soldier with a medical kit tried to strip off Gadgets's weapons and gear, but Lyons pushed away the soldier's hands. "Forget it! Where's Captain Soto?"
"There. The Captain is there," said the man, pointing down the boulevard. "But your man is bleeding. We must help..."
"Let him bleed! We got to get out of here!" Lyons growled.
"Thanks a lot, Ironman," Gadgets said as he struggled to his feet. He leaned close to Lyons's face and blew blood off his lip, spraying a red mist into Lyons's face. "I like you, too!"
"Shut up and move — that car! Get in there."
A ricochet slashed Lyons's right shoulder and continued into the armhole of his Kevlar battle armor. His face contorting, he arched back with agony as the jagged metal slashed across his spine.
Gadgets reached out and steadied his friend. He forced a laugh. "Ironman gets his. Time to retreat."
Lyons twisted away from Gadgets's hands. "I didn't get shit! Shoot me nine zip all day long. Get in that car. In the car! Move! Move! Move!" Lyons raged, shoving Gadgets into the car. He pulled Mexican commandos from their cover and pointed to their cars.
"But American," one soldier protested. "The Russians, they come..."
A bandolier of FN FAL magazines and grenades crossed the Mexican's T-shirt. Lyons jerked a smoke grenade from the bandolier.
"I'm covering, go!" Lyons turned and threw the smoke grenade into the noise of Soviet submachine guns. He rushed along the sidewalk. "Soto! Everyone out. We got our people. Go! The Soviets don't matter now."
Soto shouted to his men. Young soldiers dodged from cover, working closer to their cars as the Soviets continued firing.
Grabbing grenades from a soldier, Lyons threw another canister of smoke at the Soviets. Then Lyons ran through the chaos with another grenade in his hand, his Konzak hanging from his shoulder by its sling as he searched for wounded. Soto shouted out.
"American! We go, we are ready!"
"No one missing?"
"All are here..."
As Lyons ran for the cars, a burst of fire whined off the stones. He felt a slug stop in his Kevlar. Spinning, his right arm cranking back with the grenade, Lyons faced a Soviet with an Uzi.
The heavy canister of explosive and steel slammed into the Soviet's chest, staggering him back. The Soviet reached for his Uzi.
Lyons had not pulled the pin of the grenade.
Crossing the distance in three running strides, Lyons kicked away the Uzi, then dropped down and smashed the Soviet in the face with the butt of his Konzak. He hammered the struggling gunman to death.
Rifles fired. Lyons looked up, saw a Soviet flipping back.
"American!" Soto shouted.
Blood and flesh covered the Konzak. He sprayed a 7-blast burst of full-auto 12-gauge, then jerked out the empty mag and reloaded on the run back to the waiting cars.
Lyons stopped with one foot in the car, the blood-slick Konzak pistol grip in his hand as his eyes scanned the street.
Nothing moved. He heard only his blood hammering in his ears. He flipped up the safety of his assault shotgun and fell into a seat as the driver accelerated away.
Sirens screamed.
16
"You cannot torture a Soviet diplomat."
"Why not?" Lyons asked.
Captain Soto watched as Blancanales poured rubbing alcohol over the blond North American's wounds. The alcohol splashed over the gouge in his shoulder and the long gash across his back. Then the medic wiped away the clotted gore. Soto watched for any change in the man's expression.
He saw the North American's eyes squint, his nostrils flare. Did he feel the searing pain?
"Why not? Tell you what. After we get the information we need, the dead meat gets disappeared."
"He is a diplomat, my friend."
"Politics?"
"International law. The customs of my country."
They sat in the office of an auto-repair garage. After the rescue and firefight, the North Americans of Able Team and the captain's disguised soldiers dispersed to avoid the police responding to the alarm. The carloads of fighters then assembled at this garage, a complex of offices, workshops and parking lots.
No one feared the curiosity of mechanics or customers. The facility served only the Condor Division, the elite battalion of the Mexican army dedicated to the extermination of foreign terrorism and the drug trade.
In Mexico, drugs and terrorism represented two faces of the same threat. Terrorists financed activities in Central and South America by the sales of drugs to the United States. Drug gangsters — dope warlords and Castillian bankers — ran the drugs north through Mexico, then smuggled weapons and dollars south through Mexico.
When an assignment required unmarked or special-purpose vehicles, mechanics provided the cars or trucks to the battalion units. The mechanics also performed the most detailed searches of seized vehicles. Though the employees worked in what appeared to be a commercial auto garage, the workers received checks from the Republic of Mexico.
This morning, after meeting Able Team at the international airport, Captain Soto gave the mechanics an afternoon's holiday. He knew the methods of Able Team. He knew his unit would see action.
Lyons considered his words, then spoke as Blancanales bandaged his wounds. "Captain, you're talking about a senior officer in the KGB. He is a cold killer. He thought nothing of joking with my friends as he took them to their execution. He's made a career of execution and torture. You heard the transmissions from that mansion. They tortured that Iranian until he broke. Then they probably put him in a hole and covered it up. We're not talking about a human being. We're talking about a torturing, murdering Soviet monster. There will be no political problems created. He will simply cease to exist when we learn..."
"And you, American? You would torture him? Then murder him? In the street a few minutes ago, in combat, I saw you as a soldier. You fought, you risked your life for your friends, then you risked your life for my soldiers. You would not escape without searching for wounded or men left behind. I respect you. But now you would torture and murder? If you did not say it yourself, if I did not watch you say the words, I would not believe it."
"Illovich is a Soviet. An officer of the KGB..."
"And in El Salvador, the death squads say 'Soviet' and they murder teachers and doctors and campesinos."
"Yeah, but we know, we're positive, absolutely..."
Blancanales cut Lyons off. "The captain won't allow it. This is, in fact, his operation. It became his operation when we entered Mexico."
"Yeah, yeah, all right..." Lyons thought about the problem for a moment. "How about if I kind of terrorize him? Don't actually touch him?"
"How?" Soto asked.
"I've got my ways. And then later on, we let him go?"
Again, Blancanales stopped the argument. "Illovich is a professional. Do you believe, even if you tortured him, he would break? I believe, that if we approach him correctly, he may cooperate."
"You're kidding! Why do you think so? "
"Understand. He had a plan worked out. His men would destroy the I
ranian gang that wants to kill our President. To cover up the Soviet Union's role in the action, he intended to leave our bodies there. The bodies of two dead Americans and a Lebanese — all past or present employees of the United States government. If we take his explanation of 'world peace seriously, he would therefore accomplish his objective without seeming to involve the Soviet Union in the problems of the United States and Iran. I can understand that."
Lyons nodded. Pulling on a clean shirt over his bandages, he called into the garage. "Hey! Mr. Marine! Come here."
"What do you want, crazyman?"
"Just come here, will you?" Lyons turned to Blancanales. "He heard Illovich give that speech. We'll get his opinion on a straight-out request for continuing cooperation."
The Texan bebopped into the office, snapping his fingers to a beat only he heard, singing the words, "Kill, kill, kill. Make the world safe. Kill, kill, kill..."
"Cut it out," Lyons told him.
"So what's the plot?" Powell asked. He swung his hand to slap Lyons's back. "How you feeling, tough guy?"
Reflexively, Lyons's left hand flicked out and hit Powell's arm precisely above the elbow, on the inside where the nerves and tendons controlling hand motor function passed through the joint. The flick stopped the slap before it touched his wound.
"Excellent block!" Powell grinned. "Shotokan?"
"Shotokan street style. What's going on with Frenchy? She staying away from the Russian?"
"Crowd of vatostrying to romance her. She's still shaking from the cowboy movie. And don't worry about Illovich hearing you all. The Wizard's got head-phones on Illovich, blasting him with Mexican radio. Old man's rocking 'n' rolling, shaking his bones."
"Everyone in Texas talk like you?"
"The Wizard from Texas?"
Blancanales interrupted the banter. "When Illovich delivered his world-peace speech, you think he was sincere?"
"I don't know. I know I got some peace for him. Peace by .45 Colt automatic pistol."
"That will not happen," Blancanales stated. "You think he would help us get those Iranians?"
