Force Lines

It was Grant’s version of baptism, only these waters were scalding hot, and the only stain they purified was the surface dirt and grime.

With the concrete walls spaced just far enough apart to allow a man to squeeze between, there was no escaping even a few drops.

Kramer could already feel the man’s pain. Every second in that cramped cubicle, he recalled, felt like an hour, as what seemed like no less than liquid fire wanted to eat the flesh right off the bones. A man quickly forgot about the shame of his nakedness.

As if reading the grim confusion on a few of the faces of the High Sons, Grant explained that this was penalty for failure, only it would be eternal.

And Kramer could believe it.

“Put him in,” Grant ordered.

Kramer felt sick to his stomach as the figure was shoved ahead, all but vanishing into the thick billows of steam. At the first scream, Kramer was rising from his seat. He glimpsed the victim trying to fight his way out of the watery hell but, as part of the price for such a display of cowardice and timidity, he suffered vicious blows to the head and stomach that drove him back, his so-called guardians shouting curses in his face. Of course, he could quit, holler as much, but there would be no money, and he would be sent packing, warned to never return or speak about what happened and under the most severe penalty. When it was over, when he was freed—or sometimes collapsed from pain and shock—every inch of skin would be raw, his flesh like living coals but that burned inward. There would be blisters the size of thimbles all over, a relentless maddening itch from head to toes that would last for…

Kramer suddenly realized he was heading for the door, as Grant’s voice boomed and shattered the sense he was a disembodied figure slogging through a bad dream.

“Where are you going?”

“I need to take a leak.”

It was not altogether a lie, but he was surprised at how easy, how quick the words left his mouth, then how Grant seemed so ready to accept his excuse, the man nodding, then returning to the torture show.

Mitch Kramer somehow forced himself to move, slow and steady, even as the screams of pure agony flayed his ears and hit his back like invisible fists.

THE PLAN CAME to Bolan, walked straight toward him, in fact.

Opting for the sound-suppressed Beretta, he was settling into a low crouch, poised to launch from a half circle of bramble and hanging ferns, the last of four-pound blocks just planted and primed when the first of the bone-chilling screams, muffled as they were by the wall, struck his ears. The fireworks were staggered, every third or fourth vehicle, the shaped charges just inside wheel wells closest to the few gas caps he discovered lacked the modern era necessity of locks. He counted the headwinds as another small blessing, whatever fumes meant to be ignited by the initial blast wave carried away from the sentries.

The lean figure in sheepskin coat was ambling away from his two militia pals, both of whom were chuckling and hooting about his lack of nerve while Sheepskin turned and shot them the middle finger salute. He was hollering back something about a little privacy, when the soldier judged the hang-dog expression that struck him as akin to depression, or regret. Bolan considered himself better than a decent judge of character—though the darkest corner of the human heart and mind was capable of hiding the worst of evil and treachery—and as Sheepskin shuffled closer he made a sudden decision.

A choice that would either burn him down before the mission was even out of the gate, or lead him through a back door, hopefully to step on the tail end of the vipers.

The next moment turned even brighter for Bolan. Sheepskin got the privacy he demanded, as the soldier watched the sentries vanish around the far south end. For a heartbeat or two, the warrior analyzed the look, weighed his next move against the pluses and minuses of the hard probe.

Sheepskin, the bulge beneath his coat warning Bolan he was packing, stepped onto the narrow path, took a few more strides his way, unaware of the problem ready to spring on him from little more than an arm’s length away. He put a cigarette on his lip, shook his head about something, scowled, reached for his fly. That was disgust, contempt or the expression, the warrior decided, of a man in search of a new future. Clearly, he was pondering some deep thought that had left him spooked, some far-away glaze to the eyes that Bolan would have sworn was the face of a man who had just seen a ghost—or his own death.

Just as he was torn between lighting his cigarette and tugging at his crotch, Bolan rose and surged forward. Sheepskin became aware, too late, of the dark menace boiling out of the brush. He was turning, as Bolan slammed an overhand left off his jaw and sent man and cigarette flying.

IT WAS BEYOND the point of no return, and this was only the start of the very beginning.

As Mark Drobbler trailed Infinity to the keypad on the steel door of the oversize black barn a mental picture flamed to mind, out of nowhere. He saw himself doing a rapid about-face, washing his hands all the way back to the Black Hawk. But, then what? He was too old, too tired, too set in his ways. There was nothing but an empty mobile home in the deepest bowels of the remotest wilderness to return to if he bolted. Four walls, inside of which he could sit, swill beer and whiskey and pass the time watching cable television or hang out in the local tavern for yet more drinking and mental gnawing on all that could have and should have been while…

Right. While opportunity passed him by. And if the others didn’t outright hold him in contempt for bailing, all but branding him a coward and a traitor, he would never know a moment’s peace for whatever the remainder of his days. Not without looking over his shoulder. Not without sleeping with his assault rifle set on full-auto under the covers.

Infinity was punching in the sequence of numbers, then Drobbler found those lifeless chips of glacier ice were looking back at him, as if the black op was having second thoughts about something.

Drobbler broke the stare, scanned the dark wood-line. He was sure that hidden cameras, motion sensors were all over what was another classified U.S. government compound. Up to then he’d only heard a word or two about what waited inside the black barn, aware that the bulk of the matériel had only been shipped by van and military transport with U.S. government plates two days ago.

The door opened on a soft pneumatic hiss.

“After you, Mr. Drobbler.”

Without hesitating, lest that stare turn even darker, Drobbler was past the man. Three steps inside the sprawling makeshift factory and he caught his breath, braking to an abrupt halt. The walls, he reckoned, were soundproof, had to be since the noise of hydraulic drills driving home bolts and the hiss and spray of blowtorches assaulted his senses, and would have carried clear to town, a short distance away.

A look to his side and Drobbler found the twelve handpicked Sons of Revelation. They were grouped around a large steel table, poring over what he knew were blueprints, computer-enhanced specs, to a man as grim as death. Two men in black raid suits with shouldered HK subguns were hovering behind them as they ran down mission logistics and parameters.

The drills suddenly ceased. Two figures in face shields stepped back from the rear of the bus they worked on, the blue-orange flames from blowtorches shrinking as Infinity rolled out to the middle of the floor. He was all award-winning actor, that one, eyes beaming as he claimed the spotlight. It was his world, no question, and this was his stage.

Drobbler took a few steps toward Infinity, one eye running the length of the leviathan. It was painted black, and for the life of him he couldn’t tell where the windows began and ended. Eagle Charters was painted in bold white letters above where a cargo hold would have been. The single door to the front portside was open, with three steps leading up to a walled-in cubicle where the driver sat.

“There it is, Mr. Drobbler. Attila. In just a few minutes, it’s all yours.”

Drobbler saw Infinity motioning for him to step his way, then the black op slipped the subgun off his shoulder.

“Coming your way inside, gentlemen!” he called, then cut loose with the subgun.

Drobbler flinched as the first few rounds scorched the hull, his ears spiked as those bullets, muzzling at what he believed was 400 meters per second, marched a line of sparks down the side. Ricochets went screaming toward the nose end, the wall beyond and beside the entrance door absorbing more slashing steel-jacketed hornets. Drobbler felt a flash of gratitude that Infinity had seen fit to pull him away from Attila at the angle he now stood. Infinity shifted his aim, drilling some rounds where Drobbler suspected the windows were positioned. A split-second pause, then the black op burned out the clip, the final rounds pounding the rear tire with a peculiar loud thud.

Infinity was all smiles behind the rising cordite as he said, “You like it?”

Drobbler examined the bus, stem to stern, top to bottom, but couldn’t spot the first nick, dent or scratch. Without a close-up inspection, though…

“Well?”

“Let me guess. The tires are reinforced by Kevlar?”

“And the hull is all titanium-plated. Double-layered where the driver sits. Nothing short of a cruise missile will knock him out of his seat. Hubs, axles, the whole chassis is reinforced steel with, again, a titanium coat.”

“Windows are bulletproof, I gather?”

“Better. Right around your gun revetments and the driver’s half of the window it’s diamond layered.”

Drobbler took another long hard look at it, their beast of burden. “Nothing short of a cruise missile, huh?” he muttered.

He had to admit he was impressed, but if he was supposed to be grinning like a school kid and jumping up and down…

The black op rolled past Drobbler and dumped the large nylon bag at his feet. He zipped it open, and Drobbler beheld the down payment. Three million dollars, rubber-banded stacks of hundreds, stared him back. He was about to bend, thinking he should touch a few stacks, just to make sure it wasn’t too good to be true, when Infinity took a step toward him.

“You can count it on your own time, Mr. Drobbler. Right now, we have work to do and not much time to do it in before you and your men ship out.”

“THE CHOICE IS REAL SIMPLE.”

The voice was graveyard, icy, with no room for compromise. It matched the coldest set of blue eyes he’d ever seen. Those eyes, framed in the black-face of combat cosmetics, told stories all by themselves.

Bad stories. Real stories. Stories about death and pain and misery, and, Mitch Kramer could damn well believe, more given than received. This was not some weekend local yokel stumbling about the woods, playing paintball grab-ass with a few drunken morons.

This was the real deal. This, his gut screamed at him, was Death in human flesh.

Something hit his stomach, and Kramer saw it was his wallet. He was told to get up, wondering if he moved fast enough for the man’s liking, but it was all he could manage just to get his legs back on the ground. He rubbed his jaw, worked his mouth, tongued his teeth. All there. The big man knew, then, about applying just the right amount of force where it didn’t go too far, break something, put a guy in a coma or in the ground. Cop stuff. Or military training?