Survival Mission

Something about the tall man, when he turned to glare at Kostka on the sidewalk, had persuaded Kostka in a heartbeat that they would be wise to let him think he had escaped, then run him down and kill him while his back was turned, and either retrieve their prisoner or eliminate him at the same time. That would leave important questions still unanswered, but Kostka thought that was preferable to the American’s escape.

No one could blame him for the breakout. That would fall on Emil Reisz—who, if he had an ounce of luck at all, was lying dead at the gymnasium with his two stooges. Kostka had been early to relieve Reisz, and for that reason alone had caught the prisoner and his still-unknown benefactor at the scene. Five minutes later, and they would have gotten clean away.

Still, if he lost them, there would be no one else Kostka could blame. They were in hot pursuit, well armed, but if they could not salvage the debacle he would be the loser. Might wish he was dead himself when time came to deliver the bad news.

Just make it right, he thought, and hissed at Durych with a fresh demand for speed.

“We’re gaining,” Durych snapped. “Be ready!”

In the backseat, Kostka heard his other soldiers—Michal Lobkovic and Zden

k Vojan—cocking pistols. They were both fair shots, but Kostka didn’t like the thought of either firing past him from the rear while they were racing through the streets. Half turning in his seat, he said, “Be careful if there’s shooting. I don’t want a goddamned bullet in my ear from one of you!”

Vojan grinned back at him and said, “I never shot a man by accident.”

“Let’s keep it that way,” Kostka answered, turning back to watch the Volvo as it swung around another corner, vanishing from sight.

“Will you—”

“I know,” Durych said, interrupting him. “Speed up! Get closer! Work a miracle!”

“I need a driver, not a priest!” said Kosta.

“Hold on!” Durych warned as they reached the corner, rounding it in a skid that was barely controlled.

Cursing came from the backseat as momentum threw Vojan and Lobkovic together for a second, banging shoulders. Kostka powered down his window, sight wind whipping at his face and ruffling his short hair as he thrust his shooting arm outside the car. Another half block closer, and he could attempt a shot. One of the rear tires, or perhaps the driver, if he got a lucky break.

Where was the passenger? Kostka saw nothing of him, guessed that he was probably slumped over, maybe rolling in the backseat. Either way, it helped to have him clear of any shot that Kostka tried to make. Retrieving him alive would be a bonus; catching both runners alive would be sweet icing on the cake.

But he would settle for a pair of corpses if it was the only way to stop them.

Dead men couldn’t answer questions, but neither could they squeal to the police.

ANOTHER BLOCK, and Bolan heard a heavy, restless shifting in the seat behind him. Glancing in the rearview mirror, he saw Andrew Murton’s head block out the glare of headlights from the chase car.

“Better stay down,” he advised his passenger. “They could start shooting anytime.”

“Ah wanna hep.”

“You want to help?” Bolan said. “Lie back down so I can use the mirror.”

“Gimme guh.”

Not likely, Bolan thought. The last thing that he needed was a punch-drunk shooter blasting out the Volvo’s windows, peppering the houses that lined both sides of the street.

“I say again—”

He saw the muzzle-flash before his lips could form the order, jigged the steering wheel and knew they’d literally dodged a bullet in the night.

“Get down!” Bolan barked, relieved to see the shadow figure in his mirror disappear. Bolan knew Murton had endured an ordeal that would break a lesser man, but that would not prevent him from knocking Murton cold if it became a matter of survival.

One more muzzle-flash from the pursuit car, just as Bolan swerved into a side street on his left. Again, the shot went wild, buzzing away to who knew where. With any luck, the slug would strike a tree trunk or an empty vehicle. The flip side was a bedroom wall or window pierced, a sleeper shocked awake by sudden agony—or never waking up at all.

The hunters didn’t give a damn about potential bystanders. They had a job to do and they were focused on it to the exclusion of all else. Professionals. Nothing but victory or death would stop them.

Bolan was determined that they would not win.

Which left one option.

First, he had to find a killing ground that minimized the prospects of collateral damage. There, if he could locate such a place before a bullet found one of the Volvo’s tires, its fuel tank or its engine block, he’d make a stand and see what came of it.

Back to the map he’d memorized from the internet. Off to the east, three-quarters of a mile or so, the Vltava River surged against its banks, the waterfront including warehouses for cargo shipped by barge from Germany and Austria. Deliveries might be ongoing at this hour, but the traffic should be relatively light, and there would be no tourists loitering around the docks to serve as targets in a shooting gallery.

The chase car lost a little ground to Bolan on the turn but soon began to make it up again. He gave the driver credit, wishing at the same time that he’d blow a gasket, have a heart attack, whatever might truncate the chase without a battle to attract police.

Too late, he thought.

Some neighborhoods of Prague might tolerate a shot or two around midnight, but Kunratice did not strike him as one of those. If someone—make that several someones—hadn’t called the cops already, Bolan would be very much surprised. That thought turned up the ticktock volume of the numbers falling in his mind, but Bolan dialed it back again and focused on his half-formed plan.

If he could—

Hold on, what was this? Another pair of headlights coming up behind the chase car, not dawdling like a local coming home after a night out on the town. He couldn’t call it a pursuit, at least not yet. There were no flashing lights, no siren to suggest an officer behind the wheel.

A second chase car? Reinforcements summoned via cell phone or some other means to help the first team close their trap? If that were true, there might be anywhere from two to five or six guns in the second vehicle. The odds against survival may have doubled.

And what difference did it make?

Bolan had never been a quitter, knew the meaning of surrender but had never practiced it. Eight guns—or even ten—made life more difficult, definitely. But he had beaten worse odds in the past and walked away from the situation. The bottom line: even if death was certain for himself and his companion, he would fight until his last round had been fired, then take it hand to hand. Unless they dropped him with a lucky shot, the hunting party’s scarred survivors would not soon forget their meeting with The Executioner.

He might even return to haunt them in their dreams.

“WE HAVE A TAIL,” Durych announced to no one in particular.

Kostka spun in his seat so quickly that he strained his neck and almost yelped at the onslaught of sudden, piercing pain. He saw headlights behind them, clearly following the Citroën.

“Who is it?” he demanded.

“Do prdele! How should I know?” Durych answered sharply.

“Not the policajti,” Vojan offered. “They’d have lit their Christmas tree by now.”

“Friends of the one we’re chasing, maybe,” Lobkovic suggested, sounding worried.

“Only joining in just now?” Kostka replied, half speaking to himself. “Where have they been?”

“Who cares?” Vojan retorted. “Do you want me to get rid of them?”

“Not yet. The one we want’s still in the car ahead. But watch them and be ready if they try to overtake us.”