The Chameleon Factor

“That’s filled with guns,” Blancanales stated in a hard voice. “More than enough to fight your way to freedom. Money, too. Small, nonsequential, unmarked bills. Clothing and passports. Food, medicine, the works.”

The terrorists stood there in the chilly night, looking at the freedom given to them in a canvas sack.

“Why would you do this?” the leader asked suspiciously. “Do you support our holy cause? Who are you?”

“Your cause is full of holes, not holy,” Lyons said, flicking the safety on the Atchisson and tossing it aside. “As to who we are, we’re your sworn enemies and want nothing more than to see you bastards buried in the ground.”

The terrorists stood in confusion, the gift and the words together not making any sense.

Blancanales clicked the safety on the M-16/M-203 assault rifle combo he carried and lowered his own weapon. “We knew that there were two more members of your hate group still running around loose in the world. So we arranged for your transfer in the hope they would try to come to your rescue.”

“And they did,” Schwarz muttered, his hands holding a 9 mm Beretta pistol.

“So they are now captives of the American secret police?” the leader snarled hatefully.

Softly in the distance came the chatter of several MP-5 submachine guns all firing in unison.

“Not anymore,” Lyons stated without emotion. “You have friends, and so do we. But I’m betting that our guys just sent yours to hell.”

Fighting a shiver from the cool breeze, the leader of the Black Vipers muttered something in Arabic to the others.

“Not quite,” Blancanales answered in English. The former Black Beret only knew a few words of Arabic, but as a master of psychological warfare he could guess what the other man had said. “If we wanted you dead, we would have slit your throats when you were unconscious instead of taking off your shackles. But we’re offering something you never gave any of your victims. A fighting chance for life.”

The terrorists stood in silence, thinking hard, their scared bodies poised for flight, but uncertain.

“Surrender and go back to prison,” Schwarz said, using a thumb to click on the safety and tossing away his Beretta. “Or go for the guns. Your choice.”

Flexing his hands, Lyons lowered into a combat crouch. “But you’ll have to get past us first to reach the guns.”

“With snipers hidden in the bushes?” The leader laughed, glancing around nervously. Only shrubbery and more trees were in sight. “Why should we give you an excuse to gun us down?”

“You did that already,” Lyons said in a guttural voice. “When you bombed that civilian hospital. Now choose, or we choose for you.”

“And even if there were snipers,” Blancanales stated in harsh logic, “do you have a better offer?”

The leader waved that aside and said something softly to the other members. “We want nothing of this charade,” he said in resignation. “We surrender.” Then he whipped his arm around and threw the stone he had been palming while the others charged in a group.

Expecting the betrayal, Lyons ducked out of the way of the rock, then launched a side kick into the belly of the first terrorist, the force of the blow driving the man to his knees. But from there, he lunged forward and snapped his teeth at Lyons’s groin. The Able Team leader raised his thigh just in time and drove a rock-hard fist into the other man’s exposed neck. The bones snapped with an audible crunch, and the terrorist fell to the ground twitching into death.

Two of the Black Vipers converged on Blancanales, while the leader went for Schwarz. Although an expert with explosives and electronic surveillance, the former U.S. Army soldier had done more than his fair share of unarmed combat and simply stood motionless until the very last second. Then Schwarz twisted his fingers together in an odd way and thrust both hands into the face of the terrorist. Screaming in pain, the man froze motionless to claw at his ruined eyes.

Unexpectedly, the terrorist lashed out a kick, and Schwarz just swayed out of the way in time to avoid having his throat crushed. Darting forward, he grabbed the snarling man’s neck in a complex hold and spun him fast. Still fighting to get free, the prisoner contorted in an odd angle, there was a crack and the leader of the Black Vipers slumped lifeless into the creek with a loud splash.

Moving fast, Blancanales ducked under the hands of the first terrorist and kicked the second in the knee. The joint broke and the man dropped, only to throw dirt into his adversary’s face. Blinded for a second, he backed away quickly and felt the oversize hands of the giant terrorist close around his neck. His air was instantly cut off, and Blancanales forced himself to go calm, which used less oxygen, and fingered the other man’s arms until sightlessly finding the nerve complex in the wrist. Savagely, he buried his thumbnails into the tattoo-covered skin at just the right angle. The giant screamed in pain and let him go.

Instantly, Blancanales launched into a karate kata, a set sequence of movements normally used to fight your way out of a large crowd of opponents but also served well if you were blind. His hands and legs flashing, he hit nothing again and again, simply protecting himself while his watery eyes slowly cleared away the dirt.

When at last he could see, the Able Team commando dropped into a defense posture just as Schwarz smashed the temple of the small terrorist with a back-kick and Lyons released the giant from a bear hug, blood dribbling from the slack mouth of the last member of the dreaded Black Vipers as the killer started on his journey into hell.

Their chests heaving, Able Team stood for a moment amid the dead prisoners, pulling in the cool air. Often they had terminated the mad-dog killers of society, but usually it was at gunpoint and rarely was justice so satisfying.

“I swore to that dying Marine we would get these scumbags,” Lyons said softly, “face-to-face. It took a long time, but the bill has finally been paid in full.”

“Those two were supposed to be mine,” Blancanales said, wiping his cheeks dry with the back of a hand.

“Aw, but you were having so much fun punching the empty air,” Schwarz said with a weak grin, rubbing his oddly lumpy shoulder. “We didn’t want to disturb you.”

“I’m not a ninja like John Trent,” Blancanales replied, linking as his vision cleared. “But I make do. Hey, what’s wrong with your arm?”

“Dunno. Hurts like a bastard, but I don’t think it’s broken.”

Going around a corpse, Lyons walked over to the electronics expert and touched the shoulder. Schwarz winced slightly.

“It’s dislocated,” Lyons said as a warning.

Schwarz nodded, knowing what was coming.

Blancanales took his friend’s arm by the wrist, then placed the sole of his foot in the other man’s armpit.

“On the count of three,” Blancanales said, gently putting some tension on the arm.

Bracing his legs against the ground, Lyons held Schwarz tight by the waist, and instantly their teammate yanked hard on the arm, twisting it just slightly along the radius. Schwarz went white as the arm snapped back into the socket.

“Wh-hat th-the hell happened to three, you bastard?” he demanded, inhaling sharply though his nose.

They both released the man.

Blancanales gestured in apology. “I didn’t want you tensing up,” he explained. “That only makes the pain worse.”

“Worse?” Schwarz gasped, gently massaging his throbbing shoulder. “How is that possible?”

“Trust me,” Lyons said in a serious manner. “I’ve been there. It can get worse.”

“Damn.”

Just then a woodlark called from the darkness. Lyons spun about at the noise, and waited for it to come again before answering. A few seconds later, Phoenix Force strode into view from the midnight shadows beneath the thick cover of oak trees.

“The prison guards okay?” Lyons asked.

“Bruised, but alive,” David McCarter said, easing the tension on his Barnett military crossbow. In the hands of the former British SAS officer, the silent-kill weapon struck like divine justice, leaving only cooling corpses who left this world with a puzzled expression of how it had happened to them.

“Although they’ll have a hell of a headache when they finally wake up,” the Briton added, slinging the bow over a shoulder. “Without the antidote you gave the Black Vipers, that bleeding sleep gas has nasty side effects.”

“But it is fast,” Rafael Encizo stated, the compact Starlite goggles distorting his face as he scanned the night for any danger, or worse, any witnesses. “And that’s what counted tonight.” Heavily muscled, the soldier moved with catlike reflexes that spoke of endless years of combat in the field.

“We took a big chance on this,” Hawkins said, nudging one of the dead men. “Not that I disagree, but it was a hell of a chance. I’m surprised that Brognola gave this mission an okay. Pleased, but surprised.”

His actual name was Thomas Jefferson Hawkins, but everybody who saw him in combat quickly accepted the nickname of T.J. Trained by the elite Delta Force, Hawkins was relentless and brutal to the enemies of freedom.