recently, nobody had even known there was anything wrong.
Bolan turned to study the base of the tower. He gave it the once-over with a critical eye before locating a power panel. Just visible above the forest floor was a heavy, thick cable that ran from the power box and disappeared into the woods. From that point he could see what would have been just passable for a foot trail. He considered following it, but thought better. Daylight wouldn’t last forever and he didn’t have time to risk moving off the target or losing the trail.
No. Better to let the enemy come to him.
Bolan pried the panel open with his combat knife and quickly studied the rat’s nest of connections. He located the neutral and cut the thick cable of twisted-pair wires inside. If the tower was that critical to whomever had installed it here, and the Executioner bet it was, it wouldn’t be long before someone came to investigate.
Bolan closed the panel and made for the woods as close to the box as possible. He knelt behind thick foliage he found nestled between a pair of giant pines and settled in to wait. Yeah, they would definitely come to him.
* * *
BOLAN DIDN’T HAVE to wait long—about fifteen or twenty minutes by his reckoning—before someone approached the tower making enough noise to raise the dead. At first the soldier couldn’t believe it, but when he saw the reason it didn’t seem so incredible. The man who came through the trees to Bolan’s left, just about where he’d seen the makeshift path, was fat and clearly out of shape. Even from a distance the Executioner observed that the man’s face was beet red from the exertion, and he was wheezing loudly.
The man finally reached the tower and stopped to catch his breath. Droplets of sweat beaded his forehead, those that weren’t already plopping onto the ground from his face and neck. Armpit stains were visible. Why anyone would have sent a guy of this girth and poor physical condition to investigate a tower on a forest mountain was anybody’s guess.
Bolan stepped out of the bushes and approached the man, the .44 Desert Eagle up with sights pinned on the man’s chest. The man could barely catch his breath and he seemed even less able to do so when he first noticed the big guy dressed in camouflage fatigues toting what looked like a cannon in his hand. The man did nothing to hide the surprise in his expression.
“Whoa,” he said, raising his hands. “What the hell is this?”
“This is where you stop asking stupid questions and start answering some of mine,” Bolan said coolly. “That work for you?”
“Um, yeah...just...easy, man. I’m not in a hurry to get killed.”
“And yet you’re still talking.” That shut him up. “What’s your name?”
“Ah...Ducken,” the guy replied. “Horace Ducken. Look, can I...? Can I put my hands down? My arms are getting tired.”
Bolan almost cracked a smile. Ducken was a heart attack waiting to happen. He’d only had his arms up a moment. The Executioner thought about making him keep them up, a little incentive not to try anything, but then he nodded. Might as well let the guy off the hook. Maybe it would buy him a little good will.
“So tell me, Ducken...” Bolan began. “What are you doing up here and what do you know about this tower?”
“I just maintain the thing, man.”
“Alone?”
“Alone? No, hell...shit no.”
“Then start telling me something of substance,” Bolan replied. “Or I may make you put your hands up again and keep them up forever.”
“Look, I’m not doing anything wrong,” Ducken said. “I lost my job with Paradine-E and—”
“Wait a second,” Bolan cut in. “The electronic security firm contracted to the DOD?”
Ducken nodded.
“All right, go on.”
“I was just trying to make some cash, man. My mom had to put up for a second loan on her house after I lost my job, and I couldn’t afford to let her lose it.”
“How did you come into this work?” Bolan asked, nodding in the direction of the tower.
“They came to me, man. I mean, I’m no Snowden or nothing. I didn’t tell them anything about what I did for Paradine-E. I just got hired because I knew—”
He cut his words short and a look of horror crossed his face, as if he’d just almost given it all away.
Bolan considered what Ducken had said so far. It sounded plausible enough, and this setup was nothing he could’ve done on his own, especially not in his physical condition. He’d just about killed himself just climbing a slight incline to investigate the issue. Not to mention, the fat and socially awkward man in front of him didn’t strike Bolan as any sort of criminal mastermind.
“The tower’s not working because I cut the power. You think you can repair that?”
“Yeah, I guess. Depends on how bad you cut it.”
“Not enough that any simple splice job couldn’t fix.”
“And then what?” Ducken asked, scratching his neck as he considered the grim visage of the Executioner.
“If you repair it, they’ll be expecting you to return,” Bolan said, his plan already formulated. “They won’t be expecting us.”
“Us?”
“Yeah,” Bolan said. “You help me, and I’ll make sure you’re out of the way when it all goes south.”
“Oh, shit,” Ducken said. “You’re about to put me out of work again—aren’t you?”
“Afraid so,” Bolan replied. “Fix that thing.”
Ducken turned his attention toward the power box, and as Bolan suspected the young man had it up and humming in just a few minutes. Fortunately there had been a toolkit secreted in a nearby compartment that Bolan had thought was a transformer box, as it was labeled such, but in fact contained an array of tools and replacement parts. At least Bolan had some inkling he was dealing with an ingenious enemy.
But who?
The question troubled him and he pondered it as Ducken led him into the woods and down the slight hill. They proceeded for what Bolan estimated was at least a quarter mile, Ducken wheezing and panting the entire trip, until they arrived at the main facility. It wasn’t impressive at first glance, mostly because it was obscured with heavy camouflage—a bunker of sorts with a low-hanging entrance and sloped dirt walls covered by brush and the tops of pine trees. Additionally there was radar-scattering camouflage netting woven into that.
Bolan grabbed Ducken by the shoulder and pulled him up short, putting his lips close to the tech’s ear while he jabbed the muzzle of his MP5K PDW into a spot near Ducken’s left kidney. “Hold it. Where are the guards?”
The tech shook his head emphatically. “No guards, man...no guards.”
Ducken held up a card and Bolan realized at a glance it was a
