Altered State

Bolan was well aware that many Muslims, in Afghanistan and elsewhere, still recalled the ancient conflict of religions during the Crusades, the same way many U.S. Southerners still brooded over stories of the Civil War. Throughout the Near East, though, grim memories of the Crusades were aggravated by a Western military presence—in Afghanistan, Iraq, Saudi Arabia—and by the saber-rattling on both sides that was too often cast in terms of Muslims versus Christians.

Bolan wasn’t a religious man, by any standard definition of the term, but he knew well enough how faith could bleed into fanaticism with a little push from pastors or imams who had agendas of their own and didn’t mind using their “flocks” as cannon fodder.

Not my problem, Bolan thought, as he drew closer to the designated meeting place.

Despite the setting, his primary targets on the present mission were Americans and self-styled Christians, not Afghani Muslims. Still, it was naive to think that he could pull it off without certain natives who collaborated in the traffic that was poisoning the West.

Come one, come all, he thought. And half smiled as he added to himself, But don’t come all at once.

More soldiers passed, in vehicles painted to match their desert cammo uniforms. They all wore sunglasses, and if they noticed Bolan, none gave any sign of it. Some of the natives watched them pass, scowling or showing poker faces, but the great majority ignored the military vehicle and men in uniform as if they had no substance.

In the long-term scheme of things, Bolan supposed, that was the truth.

He marked a pharmacy ahead and on his left, which meant that he had two more blocks to go. Aside from checking to make sure he wasn’t followed, Bolan now began to watch for indications of a trap.

The problem was, he wasn’t overly familiar with Kabul or its Old City, couldn’t tell whether its normal rhythm was disturbed or right on track. Cars raced and swerved along the narrow streets, parked anywhere they liked, apparently without regard to anything resembling traffic laws, and many of them bore anomalous decals that seemed to mark them as Canadian.

Another mystery.

Nearing the rendezvous, Bolan first checked the obvious. He saw no snipers on the nearby rooftops, no one leaning from an upstairs window with a rifle or an RPG launcher in hand. No one at street level displayed a weapon, and there was none of the war-torn country’s “secret” gun shops within view, where anyone could snatch an AK-47 off the rack.

So far, so good.

Bolan carried no photos of his contacts, but he’d memorized their faces prior to takeoff on his transatlantic flight. The native, his interpreter, was Edris Barialy, twenty-seven, an ex-soldier working undercover with the DEA.

The Yank, and Barialy’s boss—at least, in theory—Deirdre Falk, age thirty-five, with twelve years on the federal payroll. Bolan didn’t know where-all she’d served, but rookies who had never stained their hands with dirty work wouldn’t be posted to Afghanistan.

Well, not unless the brass in Washington was hoping they’d be killed or simply disappear.

Another dozen strides and Bolan had them spotted. They were standing just where he’d been told they’d be, outside a theater whose faded posters showed a wiry old man with a dragon. Bolan couldn’t tell if the old man was feeding the dragon or threatening it with a spear, and he couldn’t care less.

Showtime, he thought, and stepped into the street.

“T HIS COULD BE HIM ,” Deirdre Falk said. “I think it must be.”

Edris Barialy turned to face the same direction.

“Who?” he asked.

“How many Yanks do you see heading this way?” she inquired.

“Sorry.” And then, “But there’s another one.”

“Say what?”

“Across the—”

“Don’t point, damn it!” she snapped at him as he raised an arm. “Just tell me!”

And for Christ’s sake think!

“Across the intersection,” Barialy answered, sounding chastened. “In the black Toyota. I believe the passenger in the front seat may be American.”

Trying to seem as if she wasn’t searching for the car, Falk found it anyway, and even with the windshield glare she saw four men inside it. Sitting there and watching…what?

Had she been followed? Had the men trailed Barialy separately? Were they here for some entirely different reason, mere coincidence?

Falk didn’t like the feel of that, and now that she’d had time to scope him out, she thought the husky white man in the black Toyota’s shotgun seat most likely was American. She’d found that there was something in the Yankee attitude abroad that set Americans apart from Britons, Frenchmen and Scandinavians before they spoke out loud.

So, an American, a native driver, and two backseat friends she couldn’t really see.

So what?

Afghanistan was crawling with Americans, from servicemen and-women through a laundry list of spooks and law-enforcement officers, reporters and photographers, corporate people and their bodyguards—even some freaking tourists, if you could believe it.

Money-seekers, story-seekers, thrill-seekers, mixed up with warriors and manhunters. Afghanistan absorbed them all, and if some never made it home…well, what was life without a little risk?

The man she’d marked as their contact was one block out and closing fast, as Falk played catch-up with another quick scan of the scene. Behind her, parked outside a grocery across the street, a Volkswagen with four men in it sat, immobile, waiting patiently for God knew what.

Eight men, if they were working with the guys in the Toyota. And if any of them even knew Falk was alive.

Because she planned to stay that way, she would assume that they were enemies and act accordingly. But what, precisely, could she do?

The tall pedestrian, her maybe-contact, had closed the gap between them to a half-block now. She thought he had his eyes on her, although the mirrored aviator’s glasses made it hard to say for sure, but there was nothing she could do about it.

Wave him off? Ridiculous. If she was right about him, and he was her contact, she would just be marking him for anyone who hoped to take him out. And if he wasn’t there to meet her, nothing that she did or said would make sense to him anyway.

“There’s a Toyota,” Barialy said.

“Saw it the first time, thanks,” Falk answered.

“No. Another one.”

“Don’t point,” she snapped. “Just tell me.”

Barialy did, and there it was. A third car with four men inside, just sitting there, triangulating on the spot where she and Barialy stood. Thus making hash out of her futile hope that they were in the clear.

The tall, not-so-bad-looking stranger was almost on top of them. Falk hoped she wouldn’t spook him, reaching underneath her lightweight jacket for the Glock pistol that rode her hip.

“Matt Cooper,” the stranger said as he stopped in front of her.

Falk stared into his mirrored shades, ignored his outthrust hand and answered, “Pleased to meet you, Matt, but I’m afraid we’re in a world of hurt.”

“A RE YOU SURE ?” Bolan asked, shifting gears within a heartbeat.

“Sure as I can be, until they nail us. Three cars, four men each, triangulating.”

“You were followed, then,” he said. Not quite an accusation.