to haul out a S&W .38 revolver and a brand-new Glock 18. The Smith & Wesson had been with the Justice man since his tour of duty in the old Mafia Wars, but middle age was taking its inevitable toll and the massive firepower of the deadly Glock machine pistol was a welcome addition. As Bolan liked to say, a man could never have too many friends or too much firepower. True words.
Working the slide on the 9 mm machine pistol, Brognola thumbed back the hammer on the police revolver and took a defensive position behind the car. It wasn’t much, but some protection was better than nothing.
The sound of the approaching vehicle could be heard long before it appeared around a bend in the Whitehead River. Charging along the riverbed, the tires of a big Hummer threw out a wide spray, creating a traveling rainbow behind the speeding military transport. The soldiers wore the uniforms of Green Berets, and the men in the back openly carried M-16 assault rifles.
Vaguely, Brognola remembered there was a military base somewhere in the nearby mountains, but could not recall the exact name. However, if these were fake soldiers, the killers had done an excellent job. As far as he could tell, these were the real thing. He tightened his grip on both weapons. But a fool often dropped his guard for a friendly, smiling face. As the director of the Special Operations Group, Brognola had made a host of enemies over the years, and he had simply accepted it as part of the job that someday, somewhere, they would find him alone and extract a terrible revenge.
Barreling out of the river, the driver parked the Hummer on the sloped bank. A lieutenant stepped out and started to give a salute, but stopped himself just in time and changed the gesture into removing his cap.
Brognola grunted. So far, so good. Soldiers did not salute civilians. But he was still far from being convinced. “Morning,” Brognola called, leveling both guns. “What can I do for you, Lieutenant?” The man’s heart was pounding in his chest, but his palms were dry.
“Recognition code, Alpha Dog Bravo,” the officer said crisply, then waited expectantly.
“Zulu Tango Romeo,” Brognola replied, giving the countersign for the week and lowering the guns. “Okay, what the hell is going on here?”
“Sir, somebody needs to speak to you immediately. Your cell is out of range, so our CO sent us out on recon,” the lieutenant explained, donning the soaked cap. “Since everybody knows about this fishing pool, we checked here first.”
“Fair enough,” Brognola said, tucking the Glock into his belt. The service revolver was slipped into a pocket of his jeans. “That somebody got a name?”
“Yes, sir. Eagle One.”
Instantly all reticence was gone and Brognola walked over to the Hummer, holding out a hand. As he got close, the corporal in the back proffered a hand mike attached to a large transmitter situated between the seats.
Accepting the mike, Brognola impatiently waited while the soldiers moved away from the vehicle to give him some privacy. They might not be sure who he was, but they sure as hell knew the identity of Eagle One.
When the Green Berets were far enough away, Brognola thumbed the transmit switch and repeated his name, slow and clear. There was a brief pause as the signal was encoded and relayed across the continent via a series of military satellites. Once NSA equipment on the other side analyzed his vocal patterns to ascertain it actually was him, a familiar voice crackled over the speaker.
“Sorry for the interruption, Hal,” said the President without a preamble. “But I needed to talk to you immediately, and there was no time to fly you back to D.C. We have a problem in Russia.”
“Is Striker in trouble?” Brognola asked.
Striker was one of the many code names for Mack Bolan.
“Not at the moment, Hal, no. This is something completely different,” the President stated. “Just a few hours ago, a NATO courier delivered a coded report to the joint chiefs. One of their spy satellites detected a tactical nuclear explosion near Mystery Mountain.”
“But that is not a nuclear facility,” Brognola said, sitting inside the Hummer. The seat was damp from the rush up the river, but he paid it no mind. “The mountain mostly works on experimental weapons, plasma lasers, coil guns, orbiting kinetics, microwaves, robotics and such.”
“Correct. And this was nothing new. Just an ordinary nuclear weapon.” The President paused. “Except that the flash signature was Chinese.”
The words were said quite simply, but Brognola exhaled as if punched in the stomach. China nuked Mystery Mountain? “Has that been confirmed?” he demanded brusquely.
“Triple checked from multiple sources.” The President sighed. “There can be no mistake. The nuclear weapons of every nation are completely different, and the flash signature of the fireball cannot be faked to resemble another. This was a Chinese nuke.”
“Son of a bitch,” Brognola whispered. “How could a goddamn Chinese ICBM get that far inside Russia without being shot down?”
A scholarly man, the new President really did not approve of the crude language, but said nothing. Brognola had to be accepted on his terms, and thus was one of the very few people in the world who could address him this way. “It wasn’t an ICBM,” he corrected. “Just a tactical nuke. Barely a half-kiloton yield. Probably a suitcase model, very similar to our own man-portable charge.”
“Well, that’s something, then.” Brognola sighed, looking across the river. “There could not have been that much damage. With any luck—”
“Hal, the base was obliterated. Utterly destroyed.”
“With a tactical nuke?” Brognola scoffed. “That’s not possible, sir, unless… Goddamn it, the Chinese nuked the dam and flooded the base.”
There was an affirmative grunt. “As usual, Hal, you are correct. The death toll is in the thousands and the base will never fully recover. There is simply too much contamination.”
“The Kremlin must be going insane.”
“That’s putting it mildly,” the President agreed. “Their president has already contacted me to remind me of our mutual defense pact.”
Which was the first step toward declaring open war, Brognola realized, shifting the Glock in his belt to a more comfortable position. A goddamn nuclear war. “Any response from China?”
“They say it is a Russian trick, and are massing troops along the border to repel a possible invasion.”
“Which means Russia is doing the same thing to stop them from invading. Right?”
“Actually no,” the President said, speaking slowly. “The Kremlin has authorized a full mobilization, land, sea and air, almost everything they have. However, all of it is heading toward Mystery Mountain. Not China.”
“But why—?” Brognola inhaled sharply. “China had nothing to do with this—the nuke was a goddamn diversion.” The man ran stiff fingers through his hair. “Something was stolen from Mystery Mountain,” he stated with conviction. “Something new, and big.”
“Sadly, that is the same conclusion that my chief of staff, the national security adviser and I each arrived at about an hour ago,” the President stated forcibly. “We have no idea what this new weapon could be, but the
