Pressure Point

Mochtar fumbled through the footlocker and uncapped a bottle of hydrogen peroxide. Not wanting another reprimand, he fought back an urge to tell Bolan he ought to get out of his HAZMAT suit. Instead, he followed orders and drained the bottle as Bolan rubbed his hands in its flow.

Once he was finished, Bolan grabbed a roll of gauze. As he wiped his hands dry, he told Mochtar, “I didn’t mean to chew you out like that.”

“Not a problem,” Mochtar said. He reached into the footlocker once more, then handed Bolan a small oxygen canister rigged to a lower face mask. “This might help with that cough.”

Bolan grinned at Mochtar. “You catch on fast.”

“I’m trying,” the rookie replied. “You were right. I guess at times like this you can’t worry about going by the book.”

Bolan pressed the mask to his face and opened the canister’s feed line. He was filling his lungs with pure oxygen when the cabin resonated with the staccato blasting of Kissinger’s M-16. Grimaldi had pulled up over the mountain and Kissinger was firing at snipers perched high above the roadway.

The Executioner moved closer to the open doorway and glanced over Kissinger’s shoulder. He saw two snipers wearing the long white robes that were a trademark for the Lashkar Jihad, ducking for cover among the rocks. They were under fire not only from Kissinger, but also from the other Black Hawk. At the base of the mountain, clouds of black smoke snaked up from the bombed-out remains of the Bio-Tain delivery truck’s front cab, while ruptured containers in the rear hold continued to release clouds of toxic vapor. A handful of bodies were scattered about the roadway near the truck, some felled by the gas, others during the exchange of gunfire. Sergeant Latek and another KOPASSUS commando were crouched near a remaining section of guardrail, flanking Major Salim. Latek was firing into the mountains while the other attended to their fallen commander. Apparently Salim was still alive.

Bolan impatiently tossed aside the oxygen mask and shouted to Grimaldi, “Put her down over there by the railing.”

“Will do,” Grimaldi shouted back.

Bolan turned to Mochtar. “We’ll be upwind from whatever’s seeping out of that truck. You think we can skip the gas masks?”

Mochtar stared down at the roadway, then told Bolan, “At this elevation the wind’s always shifting. Besides, to get to Salim we’ve got to go around the truck.”

“Masks then, you’re saying.”

“Full suits would be even smarter,” Mochtar said. “And you should put on a fresh one.”

“I had a feeling you were going to say that.”

There were several unused HAZMAT suits stored in sealed packets behind the footlocker. Mochtar handed one to Bolan, telling him, “Put the gloves on before you change so you don’t recontaminate yourself.”

As he changed, Bolan asked Mochtar, “You seen combat before, Rock?”

Mochtar shook his head. “Just training exercises,” he confessed. “I’m ready, though.”

“Good,” Bolan said, “’cause if they nail you, there’s no playing dead. It’ll be the real deal.”

Mochtar finished transferring a few first-aid items into a fanny pack, then strapped the pack around his waist. “I’m ready,” he repeated.

“Then let’s do it,” Bolan said.

CHAPTER SIX

Once he’d set the Black Hawk down on the tarmac, Grimaldi left the turboshafts running and remained at the controls.

“Go get ’em, guys!” he called out to the others.

“I’ll sit tight as long as I can.”

Bolan suppressed a cough, crouched before the side door of the cabin, then leaped to the roadway, rifle in hand. Mochtar was right behind him. Kissinger dropped to the ground last, carrying a lightweight collapsible stretcher along with his assault rifle.

Almost immediately they were greeted by a hail of gunfire from overhead. The men quickly dropped and rolled to the cover of several large boulders crowding the road’s shoulder.

“Nothing like a little rain on the parade to spoil a guy’s day,” Kissinger groused.

Bolan replied, “Yeah, well, at least there’s a way to stop this kind of rain.”

He raised his rifle to his shoulder and scanned the mountainside until he had one of the snipers in his sights, then squeezed the trigger. The carbine bucked hard against his shoulder. Fifty yards up the mountain, a sniper reeled off the escarpment he’d been perched on and tumbled headlong down the steep facing, striking the road ten yards from the delivery truck.

Before seeking out another target, Bolan stole a quick glance at Mochtar. The younger man was firing uphill as well, hands steady on his rifle, no sign of fear in his eyes. Bolan was relieved. During his years in combat, he’d come across many a soldier who’d frozen when confronted with his first taste of combat. Mochtar seemed in control, though. That was one less thing to have to worry about.

“Let’s see if we can get close to Salim,” Bolan said, glancing down the road. He turned to Kissinger. “Give us some cover, Cowboy. We’ll return the favor once we reach the major.”

“Works for me,” Kissinger said, feeding another ammo clip into his rifle.

Bolan advised Mochtar, “Try to vary your speed and zigzag as best you can. Don’t make yourself an easy target.”

“Got it.”

Kissinger tapped the headset built into his helmet and said, “I don’t want to rush you guys, but Jack says the bird’s taking a few hits and he doesn’t know how long he can keep ’er down.”

Bolan looked back at the Black Hawk. He could see puffs of raised dust where gunfire was pounding the asphalt around the chopper, and several times he heard the plink of rounds glancing off the Black Hawk’s fuselage. The chopper was built to stand up under light fire, but there was no sense pushing their luck any more than necessary.

“Ready?” Bolan asked Mochtar.

“Ready.”

Bolan rose to a crouch; Mochtar did the same. The Executioner held out one hand, index finger extended, flexing his wrist for a three-second countdown. On three, he lunged forward, zigzagging up the road, staying close to the stretch of guardrail that hadn’t been taken out by the runaway bus. Mochtar followed suit, staying ten yards back. Behind them, Kissinger fired steadily into the mountains. The other Black Hawk, meanwhile, provided additional cover, sending a fierce stream of .23-caliber rounds from its Brownings at other sniper positions.

As he ran forward, Bolan surveyed the roadway, trying to account for all the men who’d evacuated the bus before its ill-fated plunge into the ravine. Latek was still crouched alongside the major with another of the commandos, and Bolan saw three men trying to make their way up the steep mountainside. Another three soldiers lay dead on the road, felled either by snipers or the poisonous fog from the delivery truck. That left two men unaccounted for. Bolan hoped they’d turn up alive, but he feared they might have fallen to their deaths at the bottom of the ravine.

As they made their way past the Bio-Tain truck, Bolan sized up the remains. He doubted the vehicle would yield any useful information, at least any time soon. The cab had been all but obliterated, and the cargo hold was clearly contaminated by ruptured tanks. Any evidence that hadn’t been destroyed by the explosion would likely be ruined once a CBR crew arrived and doused the vehicle with chemical retardant. If they wanted any answers as to where the herbicides were headed, they were going to have to take one of the snipers alive and wring the truth out of him. So far Bolan had counted at least twelve of them up in the mountains, and only three had been killed that he knew of. Judging from the steady flow of gunfire still raining down on the asphalt, Bolan figured they were going to have their hands full.

When they reached Salim, the commando leader was unconscious. Like Latek and the other soldier huddled next to him, he was still wearing his full HAZMAT suit. Mochtar spoke quickly to the others, then checked over Salim while Bolan took up position near the railing and fired into the mountains, covering Kissinger’s approach.

Once he’d finished inspecting Salim, Mochtar raided his fanny pack for a gauze pad.

Bolan asked him, “What’s the verdict?”

“He took a bullet in the neck, just above his vest,” Mochtar reported, reaching inside the major’s HAZMAT suit and pressing the gauze against the wound. “It missed the artery, but he’s losing a lot of blood. Weak pulse, too. We need to evacuate him back to Samarinda ASAP.”

“What about poisoning?” Bolan asked. “That cloud rolled right over him before it came down on me.”

“He’ll need to be tested,” Mochtar said, “but the entry hole was small, and these suits are bulky enough that a fold might’ve kept out any contaminants. We’ll just have to wait and see.”

Once Kissinger caught up with them, Bolan relayed the information, then grabbed Salim under the arms and signaled for Mochtar to take his legs so they could transfer him onto the stretcher once Kissinger unfolded it.

“We’ll carry him,” he told Mochtar. “Follow alongside so you can keep a hand on that wound.”

Latek spoke up in halting English. “We will cover you.”