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  “Will do,” Bolan answered. He made certain that their hangar was secured first, cleaned his pistols, slid the Desert Eagle under his pillow and went to sleep. Grimaldi had already sacked out after making sure that Dragon Slayer was in working order.

  SEVEN HOURS LATER Grimaldi was up, having dry cereal and coffee as his morning meal, when Bolan joined him. “Mornin’, Sarge.”

  “Any word from Aaron yet?” Bolan asked.

  “Nope,” Grimaldi answered. “Want some grub?”

  “I’ll make it myself once I change,” Bolan answered. The hangar hadn’t been equipped with a locker room that had a shower, so Bolan grabbed some clean clothes and a couple of towels and washed in the sink, scrubbing himself.

  Bolan poured himself a bowl of dry cereal and helped himself to some coffee. Without a decent refrigerator, milk was out of the question. He supplemented his sparse grub with an apple.

  It was boring, waiting, but the Executioner spent the time focusing on what he needed to do. He looked over maps to keep himself sharp on the area, and after refreshing his navigational knowledge, listened to radio reports to keep abreast of international news.

  Three stories into the report, he listened to information about a Korean street gang who had robbed a federal bank in Salt Lake City. They’d escaped through the sewer system, and had set off an explosion that collapsed part of the building. Authorities were still trying to figure out the actual identities of the robbers, but promised swift arrests and resolutions.

  The mention of the Korean street gang stuck in the Executioner’s mind. The prostituted young women were being shipped to North Korea in some form of trade. They were traveling concurrently with American and European style cattle, not common to Southeast Asia.

  He’d heard plenty of rumors and stories over the years about UFOs and cattle mutilations around northern Utah, at a place called Dugway Proving Grounds. He remembered the actual facts about Dugway simply because several years ago there had been a leak of anthrax that had killed hundreds of heads of livestock in the area, and could have wiped out thousands of civilians if the winds had shifted during the containment breach.

  Dugway was one of those places that remained on Bolan’s radar. He’d encountered dozens of efforts by foreign governments and terrorists to invade American bioweapons institutes across his long and bloody career. The Executioner had also encountered Chinese crime gangs abroad who did the dirty work of Communist Chinese intelligence services on more than enough occasions to never rule out the possibility that a group of common street punks could be working for a “higher” purpose.

  North Korea was involved in smuggling humans and livestock, and there was talk of a mystery package from the captain of the freighter. And now, there’d been an incident involving a high-profile bank robbery and Korean street gangs in the backyard of one of the largest bioweapon containment breaches in recorded history.

  It added up to a strange combination that orbited Bolan’s mind. When he got on the line with Kurtzman, he’d have to bring it up.

  The laptop beeped. The monitor switched to a communication panel and Aaron Kurtzman’s voice came over the line. “Striker…”

  “I’m on,” Bolan replied, activating the laptop’s built-in microphone. “What’s up?”

  “You hear about the possible Korean street gang involvement in a Salt Lake City bank robbery?” Kurtzman asked.

  “Yeah. That got your attention, too?” Bolan commented.

  “It hit some of my buttons. I noticed something strange, too, in the livestock on its way to Korea,” Kurtzman answered.

  “Rancher brands from near Salt Lake City?” Bolan asked.

  Kurtzman didn’t sound surprised by Bolan’s wild guess. “You looked at them and recognized the brands?”

  “Nope. Just a stab in the dark,” Bolan replied. “Any thoughts on if they could have been faked?” Bolan asked, getting back on topic.

  “Brands aren’t national secrets, Striker,” Kurtzman responded. “Anyone with a good search engine would be able to pick up samples of all these brands. You’re thinking what?”

  Bolan’s jaw tensed. “Dugway, livestock and anthrax all had one point in time where they were linked.”

  “Yeah, that caught my attention, too,” Kurtzman answered. “We’re sitting on the information about the cattle brands and conducting covert inquiries about any cattle rustling.”

  “Anything?” Bolan asked.

  “Just that a rancher found another mutilated cow as of last week,” the Stony Man computer genius replied.

  Bolan’s brow furrowed. “Any photographs?”

  “I’ll transmit them to your laptop.”

  “How good is the resolution?” Bolan asked.

  Grimaldi winced and gave a yelp as he looked at a cow head, its lips seared away to expose bare teeth. “Good grief!”

  “Good enough,” Kurtzman answered.

  “Sorry,” Grimaldi replied.

  Bolan looked at the carcass a little more closely. “Interesting.”

  “What?” Kurtzman replied.

  “The soft tissue was all excised—lips, organs, eyes…”

  “Yeah. Same as always.”

  “And bloodless. No mess on the ground,” Bolan added.

  “Standard operating procedure with all these mutilations,” Kurtzman responded. “No clues left behind as to how these things were slaughtered on scene, and yet no blood was found.”

  “And if you were a homicide detective, what would you conclude?” Bolan prodded.

  “That the animal was slaughtered somewhere else and brought to the ‘crime scene,’” Kurtzman stated. “But these are animals that should have been missing in the morning.”

  “Allegedly,” Bolan responded. “After all, cows are cows.”

  “There are some distinguishing marks, and the brands…”

  “Aaron, what was the age range among the livestock found on the freighter?” Bolan asked.

  “Various ages, and various stages of marking. Striker, what are you getting at?”

  “This makes a good smoke screen,” Bolan stated. “If people are wondering why one animal was brutally mutilated in a manner that leaves no forensic evidence, they might not be looking at something else.”

  “Like contraband inserted in the carcass’s body cavity?” Kurtzman replied.

  “More than one carcass, likely,” Bolan stated. “It’s an open field, right?”

  “So, the one missing animal…”

  “Would be matched up to a body that, after all the mutilation, would be as identical as possible,” Bolan stated.

  “Some corpses have been described as outsize for the missing animals, as if they’d been mutated…”

  “Or it was just an animal with similar fur patterns as the smaller missing cow. Hollowed out with its soft tissue missing, it would look like something could have deformed the animal,” Bolan explained.

  “You take all the fun out of conspiracy theories,” Kurtzman mumbled.

  “I’ve yet to run into a conspiracy that was fun,” Bolan retorted.

  “Usually because they’re out to kill you,” Kurtzman added.

  “There’s that,” Bolan replied. “Smuggling from Korea to Utah…but not the other way around?”

  “Perhaps the exports from the area are of a more subtle means,” Kurtzman mused. “Though, that explains why the bank robbers were armed with 5.45 mm ComBloc ammunition.”

  “Five point forty-five?” Bolan asked. “Usually street gangs use either stolen National Guard M-16s, in 5.56 mm, or AK-47s smuggled up from Central and South America, in 7.62 mm. That’s still cutting-edge equipment. How’d you find that out?”

  “FBI agents at the scene figured it out after they tore apart a police car,” Kurtzman explained. “I’m sending what reports we have. Unfortunately, any other forensic analysis is going to be put on hold since half the bank collapsed.”

  “The hostages?”

  “Alive and well,” Kurtzman informed him. �
�The FBI and police rushed the bank as soon as the robbers disappeared into the basement. They evacuated everyone before the building came down.”

  “Anyone hurt?” Bolan asked.

  “A SWAT commander suffered a broken collarbone and three broken ribs, and an FBI contract agent took a whack on the head, but they’re okay.”

  Bolan nodded. “Who was the contract agent, one of our blacksuits?”

  “No, but he’s a friend of one of our irregulars, Kirby Graham,” Kurtzman stated. “I don’t know if you met…”

  “Close Quarters Combat training in hazardous material environments, three years ago,” Bolan stated. “It was a refresher course for me as much as it was for them.”

  “Good memory,” Kurtzman complimented.

  “It helps in this business,” the Executioner replied. “And the contract agent?”

  “Old college buddy of his, Professor Stan Reader.”

  “I’ve heard of him, too,” Bolan stated. “Buck Greene and I have wanted to vet him for the blacksuit program, but he’s just a shade too high profile to fit in with the Sensitive Operations Group. Nuclear physicist and a professional biathlete, among other things.”

  “Get in touch with Graham,” Bolan stated. “If Reader’s up to it, I’d like them keeping the Farm informed of everything on Utah’s end of things.”

  “You’re not coming back here?” Kurtzman asked.

  “I’ll be taking the scenic route, Aaron,” Bolan told him. “I hear that North Korea is quite pleasant at times like this.”

  “And what time is that?” Kurtzman asked.

  The Executioner took a deep breath. “Blitz time.”

  He signed off and prepared for his infiltration of North Korea.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Salt Lake City, Utah

  “Now take it easy, Stretch,” Kirby Graham admonished as Stan Reader pulled on his shirt. “You took a good clobberin’ when that bank fell on you. You’re lucky to have had such a short hospital stay.”

  Reader glanced at his old friend. “You know I bounce back pretty well. Once you showed me that a few knocks won’t kill me…”

  He stood and fought off some momentary dizziness. “Lieber still mad at you?”

  “He’d take a potato peeler to my ass and dip what’s left over in lemon juice if he could,” Graham replied. The Fed smirked.

  “So what’s so funny?” Reader asked.

  “Seems I had an old boss call in some favors to cover me,” Graham stated.

  “An old friend? Wasn’t me, Kirby,” Reader said.

  “No, not you,” Graham replied. “I did a little hush-hush security work at an installation a couple years back.”

  “CIA?” Reader asked.

  Graham shrugged. “Never really could tell. But I know I have the Justice Department watching out for me. Even though Lieber has me and Rachel in the dog house, there’s nothing they can really do to us with my guardian angel.”

  “So you really don’t need me to bail you out?” Reader concluded, looking a little crestfallen.

  “Aw, come on, Stretch, you know I’d join you in a heartbeat,” Graham stated. “Even if we were just running a garage or a greasy diner.”

  “Kirby, you’re sheep-dipped. Maybe by the CIA, maybe by someone a little more covert. You think they’ll let you gallivant all over the world with me?” Reader asked.

  Graham shrugged. “They gave me a ring while the doctors were still running X-rays on you. They’re interested in having you pitch in here.”

  “Me?” Reader asked. “And you told them I’d help? You know, I have some morals, Kirby.”

  “Yeah. These guys that have me sheep-dipped, they’ve got some morals, too.”

  Reader frowned. “What do they want?”

  “To keep them informed of our progress in this investigation,” Graham said. “Their usual resources are busy, but one will be here soon enough.”

  “Resources,” Reader repeated. This time it wasn’t dizziness, but nauseous dread. “Is that what they call ‘assets’ now?”

  Graham looked defeated at the implication. “This isn’t the Company, Stretch.”

  “And whoever we catch isn’t going to be outsourced to Egypt to be tortured?” Reader asked.

  “No way,” Graham stated.

  Reader’s lips were drawn into a tight line as he considered the identity of Graham’s mystery controllers. There had been a few cues in what his friend had told him that they were of a covert nature, and extralegal. The Justice Department wouldn’t bypass Special Agent in Charge Lieber to tap a low-level agent to get all the dirt on an investigation. And Lieber would tell the Justice Department whatever it wanted to hear.

  It also had to have been a small organization from the mention of its resources being previously occupied. If that was the case, then it couldn’t be the CIA, since the Company had thousands of agents and operatives inside and outside the United States that they could call upon for assistance. Graham pinned his involvement with these people as stemming from a covert security posting a few years back, so they had the resources to legally employ law-enforcement operatives, but not use them as these “resources.” He regarded Graham for a moment.

  “All right, Kirby. I’ll help out,” Reader stated.

  A small organization, utilizing a network of law enforcement, and perhaps even ex-military men to supply it with intelligence and information outside conventional channels intrigued the polymath. It was one way to slip the fetters of interagency petty rivalries, without being a form of monolithic bureaucracy such as the Department of Homeland Security had proved itself to be. Perhaps he’d have an opportunity to learn more about these mystery men. If they were behind similar skullduggery as the “School of the Americas” or the “Air America” torture transports to Egypt, then Reader would bow out and try to salvage his friend Graham from their dark ways.

  Either way, Reader already had one mystery to solve, and there was no way his intellect would allow such a puzzle to remain unanswered.

  Stony Man Farm, Virginia

  HAL BROGNOLA RUSHED into the War Room as fast as he could, out of breath thanks to his race from the helipad.

  “Has he crossed yet?” he asked.

  Barbara Price shook her head, watching the transponder on the enlarged map. Grimaldi was still some distance away from North Korea. “They aerially refueled Dragon Slayer just a few minutes ago when they hit the Tushima Strait.”

  Brognola inhaled deeply and watched as the helicopter wended its path slowly north. “If the Koreans or the Chinese catch wind of this…”

  “Mack sanitized Dragon Slayer, and we have his and Jack’s cover identities ready for a system purge if anything goes wrong,” Price explained.

  “I know procedure,” Brognola grumbled. He took out a cigar and clamped it between his teeth, working out tension as he ground the butt. “We’ve gone over it too many times before.”

  Price let her boss blow off some steam. When it came to Brognola’s friendship with Mack Bolan and Jack Grimaldi, there were few ties stronger in the world. The thought of having to sever all ties with the men and allow them to fall into enemy hands galled the head Fed. She knew that all three of them would move Heaven and Earth should the others fall into trouble. That kind of loyalty could become a liability to the Sensitive Operations Group at Stony Man Farm, but so far, they had weathered every storm.

  “It’s just a routine invasion of a hostile, sovereign nation, Hal,” Price said, ignoring the irony of her own statement. “Jack and Striker have done this hundreds of times before.”

  Brognola’s jaw clenched, and Price knew that he was remembering every time the warrior and his pilot had been captured or injured. Price did everything in her power to keep such memories at bay, but even though she had been the mission controller at the Farm for years, there was no way she could match the depth and breadth of Brognola’s relationship with Bolan.

  “Why are they approaching from the East Sea?” Brognola asked. “That wa
sn’t in your briefing.”

  “Aaron cracked the hard drive Bolan recovered from the Koreans’ submarine. They were en route to Wonsan to look up a General Chong.”

  “Anything on that yet?” Brognola asked.

  “We have NSA satellites checking the area out, but no obvious activity so far,” Price responded. “Jack’s going to drop him off and then pop back down to a naval observation craft we’ve got parked offshore in South Korean waters.”

  Brognola frowned. “Make sure they don’t get too close. Just remember the Pueblo.”

  Price nodded. She knew of the U.S. naval intelligence ship that had been seized by aggressive patrol boats from the North Korean navy, decades ago. It had been a black eye to the United States, and another incident, with a high-tech prize like Dragon Slayer on board, would turn Southeast Asia into a powder keg.

  Mack Bolan wasn’t walking the razor’s edge now. He was cutting his feet on the blade, and only his and Grimaldi’s skills could keep his blood from spraying the U.S. government in the fallout.

  It was risky. And when Bolan called Stony Man Farm for the intelligence update and to inform them that he was going into the enemy nation, it wasn’t to ask permission. Such a request would have been construed as nothing less than an act of war, even if it was in utmost secrecy.

  The Executioner wasn’t a government employee, and there was a conspiracy summoning him into the depths of an enemy stronghold.

  And he either succeeded, or the world would be drawn into a war that could explode into a three-way conflict with China.

  Brognola chewed on his cigar, reminding himself to breathe as he watched Dragon Slayer close with the Korean coastline.

  Tongjosun Bay, North Korea

  IF THERE WAS ANY POINT where the Executioner would have had the option of turning back, they’d long passed it as Jack Grimaldi skimmed the helicopter along at more than 200 mph, its belly only a few feet above the bay, racing parallel to the coastline toward the crook of its elbow. Bolan was dressed in black, simple peasant clothes stuffed into his waterproof backpack. A Beretta 93-R knock-off made by the Red Chinese NORINCO company nestled in his underarm holster, loaded with a flat-based 15-round magazine. A second holster rode on his right hip, but that would disappear completely under baggy pants and a jacket. The big man tilted his head back and placed in the brown contact lenses that masked the piercing cold blue of his eyes, then tested the feel of the semihardened prosthetic appliqués to the orbits of his eye sockets, to duplicate the epicanthic folds of an Asian. He checked the mirror, and his dark-tanned face and Asian eyes made him appear less likely as an American intruder. Bolan’s command of Korean was sketchy at best, though, and he was too large and powerfully built to make a convincing Korean. However, with his paperwork, a much better knowledge of simple Chinese, and his mastery of Vietnamese, he would be able to pass himself off, for a few moments, as a Chinese citizen of ethnic Vietnamese descent. He’d be treated like a third-class citizen if he was noticed.