Blood Toll

“I got that impression.” Bolan nodded.

“How long do you think it will take for your courier to get that thing analyzed?”

“The device Kapalaua was carrying?” Bolan said. “There’s no way to be sure. It will be in my people’s hands within hours, conceivably. Figuring out what it is could take longer.” The Stony Man courier had met Bolan before the Executioner left the Holiday Inn. Bolan could only assume the man was even now being transported, possibly by Stony Man pilot Jack Grimaldi.

They merged onto the Lunalilo Freeway. Traffic was moving, though not particularly quickly, nor were the low posted limits helping matters. Bolan continued to follow the Malibu that carried Kapalaua. They had not gone far when he caught sight of the vans.

“Trouble,” he said simply. “Two vans, both black, moving up quickly.”

“Could be nothing,” the sergeant said.

“I don’t believe in coincidence.”

“Me neither.” Kirokawa drew her Glock 19 and flipped open her phone with her free hand and dialed a number. “Kirokawa,” she said into the phone. “Wake up. We’ve got two vans coming up fast, and you can bet they’re here for your prisoner. Take the next exit.”

“No,” Bolan said quickly. “That’ll take us into population. On the freeway we can contain them.”

“Scratch that,” Kirokawa said into her phone. “Stand by.” She looked to Bolan.

“We need to make some space,” he said. “We’ve got to keep the traffic out of the line of fire. Tell your men to get on the radio and call for backup. Then tell them to get left and put that car nose first into the guardrail.”

“What?”

“Do it!” Bolan ordered. “I’m going to follow. We’re going to slow down, get traffic moving over the right. Have your men put on their lights, ward everyone off.”

“Light ’em up,” Kirokawa said. “Siren, too. Eric,” Kirokawa said, addressing the driver of the Malibu, “we’ve got to make a stand and keep as many bystanders out of it as possible.” She described Bolan’s plan. “Can you do it?” She nodded to Bolan. “He’s ready.”

“Wait…” Bolan said. “Now!”

“Now, Eric!” Kirokawa ordered.

The Malibu, its siren wailing, its light bar strobing, executed a smooth turn across the left two lanes. Horns blared as drivers swerved to avoid the vehicle, pulling right to go around. Bolan put his blinkers on and brought the Charger roaring into formation, its tires squealing as he pulled the wheel hard over. He planted the Dodge’s nose behind the rear bumper of the Malibu, leaning on the horn all the while, making as much noise as he could to warn the other drivers. As planned, traffic started streaming around the blocked left lanes, moving right, out of what was about to become the killing ground.

“Time to move!” Bolan said. Then he was up and out, the Beretta 93-R in his left hand, the .44 Magnum Desert Eagle in his right.

Kirokawa braced herself behind the engine block of the Dodge. Officer Eric Davis and his uniformed HPD partner, whom Kirokawa had introduced back at the hotel as Charles, took up similar stations behind the front of their cruiser.

“You goin’ die!” Kapalaua shouted from the back seat of the Malibu, his voice muffled.

Bolan waited just long enough to confirm that his assessment of the threat was correct. The two black panel vans slowed, one of them cutting off a furiously honking motorist in an Audi. They rolled to a stop not far from Bolan’s makeshift roadblock. The Executioner counted a total of eight men as the side doors slid open. All were native Hawaiians who carried an assortment of weapons, including pistols, shotguns and a couple of AK-style rifles.

“Give us Bando!” demanded a tall man brandishing a sawed-off shotgun. “Give him to us and nobody dies!” Without another word he fired his weapon.

Bolan snapped up the Desert Eagle and triggered a round, the .44 Magnum bullet burning a path through the NHL gunner’s head, dropping him in a boneless heap to the pavement.

Horns sounded and brakes screamed. Bolan dived low, missing the hail of gunfire that came in response to his play. He rolled, targeting the feet of the NHL gunners as they scrambled for cover behind the vans. When he was sure of the shot, he sent a 3-round burst from the 93-R ricocheting off the asphalt beneath the closer of the two vehicles.

Bolan’s target shrieked and fell, his foot a bloody mess. The Executioner shifted his weight slightly, lying on his stomach, and punched a .44 Magnum round through the writhing man’s skull.

Two down, six to go.

BANDO KAPALAUA WASTED no time when the gunshots started. He wormed his way down low, maneuvering his large body onto the floor of the vehicle behind the front seats. Then he clenched his fists, locked his wrists and began to pull for all he was worth.

Bolan had tightly strapped the Hawaiian’s wrists. That was nothing to Bando, though. He could snap handcuff chains if he wanted to, and sometimes did it at parties or in bars when somebody was stupid enough to bet him. Screwing up his face, his cheeks growing red with effort, Bando wrenched his meaty hands. The first strap popped easily. Twisting his wrists, the massive Hawaiian snapped the second one, then the third.

Just like that, he was free.

Well, not free, exactly, but he was loose, and soon he would have his freedom back. It was just like the haole police—Bando savored the insult, a catch-all term for these no-breath whites and foreigners ignorant of Hawaiian ways—to put so much faith in locked doors and stupid toy plastic straps.

A bullet struck the driver’s window and several rattled the frame of the Malibu, but Bando ignored them. His people would know that he was in the back seat and would do their best to avoid shooting him.

Bando had no illusions about his own intelligence. Though he was primarily muscle, not brains, Bando was not stupid. It took no genius to figure out how his New Hawaiian League compatriots had found him. Clearly that Chinese, Hwong, had called them and provided his location.

Bando squirmed into position on his back, his zori flat against the Plexiglas partition. Then he pistoned his mighty legs, as if pressing out a squat, pushing with all his might. The Plexiglas panel started to strain in its housing. Bando then recoiled, snapping out again with his sandaled feet.

The partition gave way.

Bando immediately scrambled after it, shoving himself painfully and awkwardly through the opening. Upside down, his legs still sprawled over the passenger seat, he reached the glove box. It was locked, but the lock was a light one. Bando simply grabbed the lip of the glove box with his thick fingers and ripped it out of its housing in the dash.

The plastic evidence bag containing his revolver, his reloads and his other personal effects was inside, where he’d seen it stashed before they’d driven him away. He ripped it open, pocketing the knife and his wallet before snapping open the cylinder of the three-inch Model 29 and loading it with the .44 Magnum rounds in the speedloader.

“Hey!” someone shouted outside the vehicle. It was the smaller white cop, the one he’d heard called Davis. Without hesitation, Bando pushed the stubby barrel of his weapon against the passenger’s window and pulled the trigger.

The blast blew pebbles of safety glass across the cop’s chest, but the bullet hole in his neck meant he’d never know or care. Davis dropped and Bando crouched low, ready to crawl out the passenger’s door and make his escape.

That was when he realized the plastic bag was missing something important.

The tracking device was gone. Possibly the big, dark-haired haole cop had it. Possibly he had given it to someone else, too. If that was true, someone might be poking at it soon, maybe figuring out where it came from. Bando didn’t know if that was possible; he knew nothing about electronics. Hwong had given him the device, told him how to operate it and explained how best to put it to use in carrying out the Chinese agent’s plan. The loss of the device would not be taken lightly.

Bando knew a moment of fear, considering Hwong’s reaction. The Chinese had been very specific. Bando was to use the homing device to follow the haole spy and take back to Hwong whatever the spy uncovered. Most importantly, Bando was not to be caught, nor was he to breathe a word of his mission. The connection to Hwong was to be kept secret at all costs. Failure—and worse, discovery of the Chinese—meant more than simply a loss of the precious weapons and money Hwong was funneling to the New Hawaiian League. It meant that Bando’s family—his mother and a younger sister living in Molokai—would be killed. Their deaths, Hwong had promised, would not be swift, nor would they leave this world, as Hwong had put it, “inviolate.” To make his point, Hwong had introduced Bando to the little Chinese with the crazy look, whom Hwong had called Zho Wen. Bando would not soon forget the light of insanity that played behind that man’s eyes. Bando feared no man, he told himself, but this Zho Wen was something less than human. He would pay any price to keep such a creature from his sister and his mother.

Shaking these troubling thoughts from his mind, Bando stayed low as he climbed out of the police car. On the ground, not far from the corpse of his partner, was the other cop. He was down, clutching a wound in his belly, his face pale and covered with sweat. Bando could tell he had native blood. The Hawaiian cop looked up at Bando, his eyes unfocused with pain.

“Sorry,” Bando said. He lined up the front sight of his chopped-down Model 29. When the front blade was squarely over the center of the cop’s face, he pulled the trigger.

MACK BOLAN WENT ABOUT his work efficiently, taking targets of opportunity, the Desert Eagle and the Beretta extensions of his hands. The NHL gunners were nothing special; he had faced fighters better than these countless times. Their numbers, however, gave them a temporary advantage. It took time to defeat odds so slanted against him.

The soldier ducked back as a blast of buckshot from a sawed-off shotgun clawed the air above his head. He triggered a return volley from the Beretta, the Parabellum rounds stuttering across the second NHL vehicle.

Diana Kirokawa called out to Bolan. She’d had to work her way around to the rear of the Charger to get a better angle on the NHL gunners. Now, as Bolan looked from his own position near the lead van, he saw that the two HPD officers were down and Bando was no longer in the cruiser. As Bolan watched, the big man ran into the flow of panicked drivers in the far right lane, narrowly missing being run down. Bolan held his fire; he would not be able to take the shot, not without risking hitting someone in a passing vehicle.

Bando jumped the concrete barrier on the other side and quickly disappeared.

One of the remaining NHL gunners leaned out too far from his position behind the second van. Kirokawa punched several holes through him with her Glock 19. Two of his comrades were already down, their blood spreading in pools across the pavement. But the NHL action had already provided Bando Kapalaua the diversion and time he needed to escape.

“Go! Go!” one of the gunmen shouted. The remaining NHL gunners began piling into the second van, which was already moving. Bolan left cover and emptied both of his guns into the rear of the fleeing vehicle, pocking the rear panel doors with holes and spidering the rear windows. Burning rubber, the big cargo van sped off, clipping a civilian vehicle trying to skirt the carnage.

Bolan ran to Kirokawa. He dropped the magazines in his pistols, reloading from the spares on his blacksuit under his windbreaker.

“Bando’s escaping,” Bolan informed her. “We’ve got to go.”

“We aren’t going anywhere.” Kirokawa shook her head. She nodded first to the remaining, bullet-scarred van, then to the police cruiser and the Charger. At least two tires on each vehicle were flat, shot through.

Bolan’s face darkened. There was nothing to be gained in cursing their luck. He moved cautiously around the side of the Malibu, taking in the scene.

Kirokawa followed, gasping when she saw what was left of Officers Davis and Charles. “I’ll call for an ambulance,” she said, pulling out her phone, her Glock still held in her right hand.

“Don’t bother,” Bolan said, kneeling beside the corpses. He checked first Charles, then Davis, just to be sure. “They’re gone.”

Kirokawa holstered her Glock. “Damn it all to hell!”

Bolan nodded slowly. Davis’s eyes were open in death. The Executioner, using his fingers, gently closed the man’s eyes. Before Bolan was finished in Hawaii, Bando Kapalaua would answer for his crimes and for these murders. This time, though, he would not answer to a revolving-door system of legal technicalities and soft-hearted judges.

This time, Bando Kapalaua would answer to the Executioner.

5

Hwong Zhi and his elite squad sat quietly as the Chevy Suburban carried them to their destination. The early-morning sun was already bright and hot. From behind the tinted side windows, Hwong watched the passing scenery. There were so many Americans and tourists going about their lives, oblivious to what was about to happen. The next day, or perhaps the one following, they would wake up in a world no longer dominated by the United States.

After so many years and so much preparation, it was hard to believe that the moment was finally here. He had long thought that when the moment did arrive, he would feel nervous or perhaps elated. He was forced to admit, however, that he felt nothing except the usual tension that came with executing a mission.

There was little of logistical value in their target. The raid, the first in the series of attacks that would commence the SST’s Honolulu operation, was largely symbolic in nature. It was designed to shake up the local authorities and create the sort of public panic that Hwong knew would facilitate the rest of the plan.

From a pocket of his ballistic-fabric load-bearing vest, Hwong removed a small transmitter device. This device was connected, through a wireless mesh network, to similar devices across the city, all carried by SST deep-cover sleepers. The devices were disguised as a variety of harmless everyday objects, most often pagers or cell phones. While of limited range on their own, each was a transceiver, capable of receiving and rebroadcasting encoded signals. Every one of these transceivers had limited range individually, but more than enough to reach the next nearest unit, which in turn retransmitted any signals sent on the encrypted frequencies. A chain was formed—a chain or web that blanketed the entire island and was impossible to pinpoint or even to jam easily. The devices were an outgrowth of the technology developed by the SST to jam and control local communications and data transfer.

Hwong regarded the device for a moment. Then he pressed his thumb against one of the buttons on its face.

Immediately, the devices carried by the elite squad began to vibrate, the buzzing faint but audible in the truck. As one, the six men under Hwong’s direct command turned to him, their faces impassive, their mood nevertheless expectant.

“We attack now,” Hwong said.

The doors of the Suburban swung open. Hwong and his team, wearing combat fatigues and boots, as well as load-bearing vests, fanned out from the vehicle, seeking targets of opportunity.

When the first targets were in range, they opened fire.

A family of four wearing bathing suits, the father carrying a plastic cooler on one shoulder, were the first to die.

Ala Moana Beach Park, acres of sand and recreational facilities, lay before the SST operatives, crawling with citizens enjoying the warm, sunny day. To Hwong, even at this distance, the water seemed impossibly blue, the beach altogether beautiful. He could appreciate beauty, he thought to himself. Executing his mission did not mean he could not recognize small wonders of that type. He was still thinking this when he targeted a fleeing woman, her long hair splaying out behind her as she fell to the sand a bloody, crumpled mess.

Somewhere behind Hwong, Wu’s heavy machine gun opened up, the rhythmic thunder of the weapon as pitiless as the sound of the waves lapping at the now bloody beach.

“Fan out,” Hwong ordered. “Sweep the beach. Fire at will.”

A large man in a bathing suit, his physique heavy with muscles, attempted to rush them from the side, perhaps thinking to tackle one of the men, maybe even wrestle a weapon away and turn it on the operatives. Hwong thought perhaps that was what he would do, were the situation reversed. The would-be hero got no closer than ten feet before a burst from Tsai’s UMP dropped him in his tracks. The .45-caliber rounds had made quick work of the poor fool, but still Tsai paused to fire another burst at the prone figure. The man was thorough; Hwong would grant him that.

The plan called for the team to sweep up the beach to a designated pickup point, where the driver of the Suburban would be waiting for them. It was not far; the purpose of the exercise was not to cover a great deal of ground, which would only expose them to possible counterattack. No, the purpose was to create as much death and fear as possible, violating this idyllic tourist spot and notifying the Americans that they were not safe, even in the “paradise” that was Hawaii.

When the authorities reacted to this seemingly pointless act of terrorism, it would destabilize them all the more when the SST’s Honolulu operation continued to roll on. Dealing with the aftermath of a terrible public shooting, they would be unprepared for a malicious incursion on their own soil, a choke hold that the SST’s sleeper cells had been planning for the better part of a decade.

IN HIS HOTEL ROOM, Mack Bolan sat on the edge of one of the twin beds. A quick shower and a few cups of coffee from the two-cup coffeemaker in his room eased his sore muscles and got him awake and functioning. Now he contemplated his latest care package from John “Cowboy” Kissinger, Stony Man Farm’s armorer and weaponsmith.

The Stony Man courier delivered the package late the previous evening at Bolan’s request for additional firepower. Kissinger had provided extra ammo, as well as explosives, including incendiary and conventional grenades, not to mention several remote-detonated plastic-explosive units. There was even a tactical folding knife, made by German-based Boker, which Bolan clipped to one of his pockets.

The centerpiece of Kissinger’s latest offering, however, was a modular FN SCAR-L, a light combat assault rifle chambered in 5.56 mm NATO rounds. Fed by Kissinger’s specially modified M-16 magazines, the weapon could fire 600 rounds per minute in full-auto. The fire group also had a semiautomatic mode, but no provision for burst fire. This version had a short barrel, an adjustable plastic stock, an Aimpoint optical sight and plastic forward grip, with a SureFire combat light and LaserMax laser sight mounted to its accessory rails.

Kissinger had included separately an FN EGLM 40 mm grenade launcher with ammunition. He had also sent a tactical harness, allowing Bolan to sling the weapon freely under his right shoulder. It was short enough that he could conceal it, somewhat awkwardly, beneath his three-quarter-length windbreaker, though the barrel would be exposed. It would do for the Executioner’s purposes, however.

Bolan placed the magazines and several grenades in his green canvas war bag. He would sling the bag over his shoulder after shrugging into the FN SCAR’s harness, covering the works with his windbreaker in an effort not to terrify any casual observers.

Bolan’s secure satellite phone began to vibrate. He flipped it open and put it to his ear. “Striker,” he said.

“Hey, Striker,” Barbara Price said. “How are you holding up?”

“All right,” Bolan said.

“No word on Kapalaua?” the Stony Man mission controller asked.

“No,” Bolan said. “HPD is working on it, but he’s gone to ground. He took down two of their own, so they’re highly motivated, but it’s clear Kapalaua’s not working alone. Somebody’s running him.”

“The Chinese, you mean.”

“If that’s who we’re dealing with. I was hoping you could fill in the blanks with the materials I couriered to you.”

“Bear has some information for you, in fact,” Price told him. “It’s fairly extensive. I’m transmitting a text file to your phone, but he’ll give you the highlights.”

“Thanks, Barb.”

“Watch your back, Striker,” Price said.

The connection was transferred to Kurtzman.

“Hey, big guy,” Kurtzman said. “You receiving the file?”

“Coming through now,” Bolan acknowledged.

“Here are the highlights. The numbers you found, which Jimmy Han must have uncovered after he penetrated Cheinjong, are a hexadecimal code. Specifically, the sample he transcribed corresponds to command and control codes. These are so new, I didn’t recognize them at first—it was Akira who spotted them.”

Akira Tokaido was the youngest member of the Farm’s cyberteam, an expert hacker in his own right.

“Command and control for what?”

“The complete stats and abstract are in the white paper we’re transmitting to you,” Kurtzman said, “but the codes are for something the Chinese have been developing in secret for a few years now.”

“There’s no doubt?”

“None,” Kurtzman confirmed. “The housing you sent us matches up with what little intelligence we’ve got on the system. This is guarded at the highest levels of the Chinese government, but like with everything, there have been some leaks. We don’t know what the Chinese call it, but the CIA calls it EMPeRS, ‘the Emperor.’”

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