Oblivion Pact

All the way across the office was a huge dark wooden desk sporting a stained brass plaque with the name Edward Carter. A common enough moniker to sound real, and close enough to his real name so that Erik Kegan wouldn’t make a fatal slip. In spite of being a bloodthirsty monster, Kegan wasn’t a fool.

On the wall behind the colossal desk was the usual assortment of impressive diplomas, testimonial letters from satisfied clients, mostly major corporations, and quite a few newspaper clippings showing Edward Carter with the mayor, and other noteworthy folks, with everybody smiling at the cameras. All fake of course, but the pictures did show Kegan himself.

Built like a bull gorilla, Eric Kegan still had the winning smile of a politician selling used cars, slicker than a snake in oil. The only tell was his eyes. The face could smile, the mouth laugh, but the eyes stayed the same, cold and dead, like the eyes of a shark.

It was strange that a man forever in hiding would allow himself to be photographed, especially by a newspaper. Anonymity was paramount for his line of business—selling death wholesale. Maybe Kegan just liked having his picture taken. Bolan shrugged. People were often contradictory.

Lifting the slashed leather chair from the floor, Bolan checked the sides for hidden controls but found nothing. Sitting in the chair, he twisted back and forth a few times, listening for a squeak, but hearing only the rustle of his clothing.

The desk itself was huge, a monstrous slab of cherrywood, topped with green leather and edged with shiny brass studs. It was clearly an antique from a bygone age and had to weigh a ton.

Going around, Bolan checked the front and sure enough saw a line of holes in the wood from three different pistols, but none of the lead had achieved full penetration. Even his furniture was bulletproof. That was when he caught a whiff of something in the air other than the talcum powder and blood. Perfume from the woman? No, what assassin would do a job wearing perfume to reveal her presence in the dark? It might be a man’s cologne, brandy-cut tobacco mixed with the faint aroma of homogenized oil.

He checked the top right-hand drawer and there was a cleaning kit for a gun. Plus a spare magazine and a box of ammo for a 10 mm Colt Magnum pistol—semisteel jacketed hollow-point rounds. Serious ammo. Those tens hit like sledgehammers and punched holes through everything short of Threat-Level-Five body armor.

Wearing only Level Four at the moment, that gave Bolan pause. Then he moved on. Kegan had to be stopped. End of discussion.

Closing the drawer, the soldier looked over the office again and tried to reconstruct in his mind how it got this way. Everything had been smashed or slashed open, even the books on the shelves. The plastic fern in the corner had been removed from its wicker pot and wood chips were scattered everywhere. Looking for something small and flexible... Documents, perhaps?

There were three doors lining the interior wall. Wading through the mounds of trash, Bolan went to the first and found that it opened onto a short hallway with stairs going up and another door to the left that had to lead to the basement.

The stairs didn’t creak as he’d expected, which was a good sign of proper maintenance. At the top, Bolan reached a blank wall with picture-used-to-be-here stains and a short hallway. Just to the left was a modern kitchen, obviously a recent addition, with a small breakfast area.

The kitchen table was in pieces, the steel tube chairs disassembled. Same as downstairs, the kitchen had been thoroughly searched, corn flakes littering the floor, bag of sugar busted wide open. Bolan studied the sugar for patterns in the granulated surface but found none. Whatever was hidden hadn’t been found here.

Rummaging through a drawer Bolan found a can opener and wasted precious minutes opening a couple of soup cans from the bottom cupboard. He had once encountered drug lords who smuggled messages to each other hidden inside sealed cans of soup. Simply open the bottom, insert your item, then weld the bottom back on. It had worked for years before the DEA got wise, then they did nothing to stop the transfer of information, merely opened the cans, copied the messages then sealed them up again.

Moving upstairs, Bolan moved onward, keeping an ear out for a car arriving or a knock downstairs. A neighbor might have seen him enter and called the police. But this was Columbus where everybody minded his or her own business and quietly got killed without disturbing the people next door. An open doorway led to what remained of a living room, couch flipped over, cushions slit open, the covers removed from the electrical outlets, pictures off the wall, even the television set had been kicked in and the cover removed. After the assassins had been chased away by Kegan and his crew, somebody else had entered the building, and done a thorough job of searching the place from top to bottom. Smart move, and the perps were certainly thorough enough, he’d give them that.

The curtains were off the windows, and the blinds torn down, the weighted bottoms cracked apart. Impressive. Bolan never would have thought of hiding anything inside the bottoms of venetian blinds. He was starting to get the feeling that whatever Kegan had hidden had to have been found and was long gone. But he still had to double check. Just the chance of stopping Kegan was worth the effort.

Down the hall was a bathroom with grout dust covering the fixtures. Somebody had run a knife along the wall tiles to look for fresh work over a secret panel. They really were good! Bolan filed that trick away to use himself sometime in the future.

The bedroom looked like a hurricane had hit a rag factory. Nothing was intact. Feathers swirled about his shoes from pillows gone to heaven. The northern wall was a single expanse of closets with a bare top shelf. Bolan probed for a panel leading to a crawl space or attic, but found nothing except dust and deceased spiders.

The light-switch panels had been yanked off the walls, exposed wires dangling dangerously loose, and the carpet was torn up in several spots. A rush of adrenaline was building within Bolan. Time was short, the numbers falling, and he wondered if there was any place they hadn’t looked.

Going to his personal favorite spot to stash important things, Bolan lifted the ceramic lid off the toilet tank and looked inside. Nothing there but water, the usual mechanical works and a drained sanitizer cylinder. The pros who’d hit this place would never have missed an area so obvious as the toilet tank. But had they searched everything?

Tucking away the Beretta, Bolan pulled a knife. Grabbing hold of the copper support rod to hold it steady, he slid the blade along the slightly slimy rubber. The knife slipped once and cut him, but no blood welled from the wound. Just a surface scratch. Bolan proceeded more slowly, switching to a fillet blade and sawing through the resilient material, rather than trying to slice it apart like a ripe melon. The slick bulb wasn’t cooperative, but he finally got through, and a clear corner triangle of a plastic bag jutted into view.

Forcing the blade along the side of the bulb, Bolan widened the cut until it was big enough for him to grab and pull it apart. There lay a clear plastic bag filled with maybe a dozen film negatives. Going to the sink, he wiped the bag off on a dingy towel bearing the name Sheraton. The bastard had millions in a Swiss bank, but stole hotel towels?

Opening the sandwich bag, Bolan lifted out the negatives, only touching them by the edges, and held a strip to a flashlight. They were negatives of a passport, birth certificate, college diploma, dental and general medical records for a Shawn MacTeague of Glasgow, Scotland. The man in the photos was Kegan. Bolan knew that the man spent years building a perfect identify and with these gone, Kegan would have no place left to run. He’d be forced to make a stand and fight, which was exactly what Bolan wanted.

Slipping the bag full of negatives into a pocket, Bolan paused to text a brief message to a friend in Washington: Kegan was Shawn MacTeague, Glasgow.

Done and done. Now if Bolan was killed, Hal Brognola at the Justice Department would make sure somebody else finished the job. Mostly Bolan worked alone, but every now and then he did find it convenient to have backup, and he could trust Brognola with his life. He had many times before.

Giving the apartment a fast once-over, Bolan checked a few more locations where small items could be found, then eased down the stairs. Mission accomplished!

Bolan was halfway down the stairs when he heard the front door crash open, and people stomping into the building, working the arming bolts on automatic weapons.

CHAPTER TWO

“Kill everybody you see!” a man growled, his voice nearly inhuman in its violent rage.

Nice to meet you, Eric, Bolan thought sarcastically, pulling the safety ring on an antipersonnel grenade. Then he released the handle and flipped the sphere down the stairs. It hit the landing hard and bounced around the corner. Instantly, Bolan surged into action, running for the living room.

“What in the...run!” a man screamed, the blast cutting off the startled cry.

The entire building seemed to shake from the force of the fiery blast, windows shattering on the ground level, and a couple of alarms cutting loose with deafening sirens.

So much for hiding in the shadows, Bolan noted, diving through the cracked window. Welcome to the light, Eric!

Daggers of glass cut into the trench coat, but the body armor underneath protected Bolan from any serious damage, and he landed sprawling in the fork of an oak tree, startling a small squirrel.

“Better run, amigo,” Bolan whispered, sliding down the tree to land in a crouch, both of his weapons drawn and at the ready.

Lights began to appear in all of the nearby houses, people roused by the explosion, and a couple of big men carrying M16 assault rifles appeared from around the front of the building.

Bolan and the gunners opened fired in unison. They missed, he didn’t, and they fell away into forever, their chattering weapons strafing the open night sky.

As much as Bolan wanted to walk around to the front and take out Kegan right now, there were too many civilians in the area to risk a gun battle. He felt sure that had been part of the man’s defense strategy, and the soldier couldn’t fault the bastard for coming out with a winning plan. People dressed in pajamas and slippers, armed only with flashlights, were starting across the street, and shuffling this way. In spite of that, Bolan still hesitated and took a step forward, then he saw a couple of kids appear, and a pregnant woman. Time to go.

Whirling, Bolan took off at a sprint and hit the back fence at a full run. He easily scaled it and paused, with one leg in sight until he heard somebody curse. Then he dropped over, just as a hole appeared in the old wood, spraying out splinters from the thunderous passage of a big-bore round.

Aiming at the sky, Bolan answered back with two shots from the Beretta, then took off again, jumping over an inflatable pool and dodging patio furniture. A glass door slid aside and out waddled an enormously fat woman cradling a double-barrel shotgun and wearing a fierce expression.

“Trying to rob me again, motherfucker!” she snarled, discharging both barrels.

Moving fast, Bolan got out of the way in time, and only a few of the lead pellets hammered him across the back of his armor. Christ, this was a nightmare! He had civilians coming out of the woodwork! Had to move this fight to something more secluded before innocent lives were lost.

Skirting a huge Cadillac, Bolan heard scampering claws and flipped his gun in the air to grab the Beretta by the hot barrel. A split second later, a huge Doberman charged into view, and Bolan neatly clubbed the animal unconscious with a single blow to the skull just behind the ears. The dog dropped with a sigh, and the soldier continued running, almost becoming entangled with a tricycle, and hopping over a low hedge.

Reaching the relative freedom of the street, he shot out the light on the corner, and quickly dropped the partially used magazine to slam in a fresh one. Suddenly, a car appeared at the end of the street. The headlights were off, and Bolan could see the dim silhouettes of men holding long objects out the open windows.

Dropping into a crouch, Bolan switched the Beretta to 3-round-burst mode, and emptied the entire magazine into the front of the vehicle. The stuttering barrage smashed both headlights and took out a tire, then the hood flipped up as the radiator exploded into a hissing geyser of steam.

“Get that son of a bitch!” Kegan screamed from inside the car, and the darkness became alive with the bright flashes of automatic gunfire.

Already running low and fast, Bolan took cover behind a Ford Pinto just as the first hail of lead arrived. The car rocked from the arrival of the military rounds, more glass shattering, then there came the strong smell of spilled gasoline.

Springing along the row of parked cars, Bolan heard the car ignite into a fireball as more house windows started lighting up, dogs began to bark from everywhere, and in the distance there came the long, drawn-out howl of a police siren.

Not pausing for an instant, Bolan pulled out a flash-bang grenade, armed the device and flipped it over a shoulder. He heard the doors slam shut on the crippled car and men cursing, then the grenade detonated. Designed to incapacitate an enemy, not kill, the stun grenade banished the night with a magnesium-fueled flash ten times brighter than the sun, along with a bone-jarring boom.

As Bolan dove behind a mailbox, he dimly heard the other men weeping and cursing, their weapons wildly discharging as leaves fell from the trees from the passage of the bullets.

One more corner, and Bolan saw a huge BMW motorcycle parked at the next corner. It was sleek and shiny and looked like polished speed. The front wheel of the BMW was covered with a bright yellow locking clamp, the infamous Denver Boot. A single kick disengaged the fake plastic clamp, and Bolan climbed onto the bike, twisting the ignition.

The big engine softly came into life. The only visible signs of operation were the dashboard indicators starting to glow softly, and the shaking of the muffler exhaust. One of the main attributes of the Beamer bike was that it used a transmission instead of a chain. That reduced the noise level significantly. Add a few modifications to the muffler, and the BMW become a purring mechanized ghost, barely discernable from a yard away.

“Fuck, fire, he’s got a bike!” a man snarled, an M16 cutting loose with a long burst.

Several of the 5.56 mm hardball rounds ricocheted off the dark pavement as Bolan lurched away, missing the man by the thickness of a prayer. Accelerating as he braked, the soldier took the corner fast and low, throwing out a leg to keep from toppling over. The friction nearly tore the combat sneaker off his foot, but he made it out of sight intact, then he slowed to a crawl, the huge engine barely ticking over.

Lost in the sounds of people, dogs and police, Bolan couldn’t hear any pursuit, so he fired a couple of more rounds into the air to give them a lock on his position. Bolan knew this was a dangerous game, but he wouldn’t kill civilians, even by accident.

A few moments later, something large and dark appeared at the far end of the road, then the halogen headlights crashed on, fully illuminating both man and bike. For a moment, Bolan realized that he might have overplayed his hand. That was a military Hummer!

As the huge vehicle surged forward with a full-throated roar of controlled power, Bolan twisted the throttle and silently streaked away. This was going to be close....

Just then, a police car flashed through an intersection, the light bar flashing and siren howling.

Knowing the local PD was no match for the kind of firepower carried by Kegan and his street soldiers, Bolan angled away from the police and took off down a side street, then popped a wheelie to get over a high curb and started through a weedy field.

The Hummer stayed right on his tail, the military vehicle taking the curb with barely a jounce.

Hanging on to the handlebars with all of his might, Bolan plowed through the weeds and cut across a Little League baseball field. As soon as he reached bare earth, he fishtailed the bike to throw up a cloud of dirt, then swung around the concession stand and came out the other side with his second handgun ready.

As the bright headlights of the Hummer appeared within the swirling cloud, Bolan used both hands to aim and fire the massive .50-caliber Desert Eagle. The big-bore rounds slammed into the engine, and it whoofed into flames.

The vehicle streaked past Bolan, the men inside screaming and cursing and fighting to get out of the burning vehicle. One dove to the ground and hit hard, his bones audibly cracking from the impact. As he rolled along, more bones snapped, then he slammed headfirst into the dugout, and stopped moving or making any noise.

Shooting out a tire on the Hummer, Bolan helped the driver bring the big car to a ragged halt. Then he switched weapons and raked the smoky darkness with the Beretta, the stream of 9 mm Parabellum rounds invoking a series of painful cries, and then deep silence.

Kicking down the stand, Bolan reloaded, then warily approached the burning car, his every combat sense on the alert. Unless Kegan had hired fools, the men were either dead, or only playing possum to lure him in closer. But either way, he had to see Kegan’s lifeless corpse before allowing this matter to end.

Bolan was only a few yards away when the Hummer unexpectedly detonated, the blast illuminating the entire ball field and throwing him backward. The breath was knocked out of him as he hit the ground, then the soldier rolled over and came up with both guns primed, searching for targets. But there was only the smoking ruin of the Hummer strewn across half the ball field, bits and pieces of sizzling flesh lying scattered about in grisly display.

For a long moment, Bolan watched for any signs that Kegan or one of his people had survived the stentorian explosion, then reluctantly holstered his weapons and walked stiffly back to the bike. He had to consider this mission a failure. Kegan might be dead, or he might not. Not even a team of forensic scientists would be able to tell for sure from that level of fiery destruction. Once more, Kegan the Unkillable had escaped.

Climbing back onto the BMW motorcycle, Bolan revved the engine and checked for any damage from shrapnel, then drove away into the night, heading for the main road out of town. His trench coat had a dozen holes in it, but it still served the basic purpose of hiding the majority of his weapons. If his radar-detector pinpointed any cops, he would simply swing off to the berm and get behind the bike, pretending to fix the engine until they were gone.

Worst-case scenario, Bolan would use the FBI commission booklet he had stashed in the luggage compartment of the bike. It was real enough for the locals, just not good enough to stand up to the scrutiny of the FBI, or any of the other Alphabet Agencies.

Cutting through a quiet shopping mall, Bolan took an on-ramp onto the elevated 465 beltway, and rode in somber contemplation until reaching the exit for the Columbus International Airport.

Throttling down the engine, he swept down the off-ramp, when there came a distant flash of light and a fiery dart streaked out of the night to impact on the ramp. A roiling blast shattered the concrete, and Bolan went flying. Soaring through the air, he forced himself to relax in an effort to not break his bones, and bit down on a sleeve. As little as it was, the cushioning effect might save his teeth. But no matter how he looked at it, this was going to be a bad crash.

In a jarring thud, Bolan landed in the swampy marshland around the airport, the splash of mud jutting yards high. An unknown length of time passed, then the soldier jerked awake, a hand clawing for the Beretta. It was gone, but the Desert Eagle was still at his side.

Weakly standing, Bolan wobbled as he desperately attempted to remember what had just happened. Clearly, there had been some sort of explosion, but what had detonated, he had no idea. Everything was a blur of chaotic images in his head. Then he saw the crumbling exit ramp, the burning motorcycle and everything came rushing back with the speed and ferocity of an express train. The ramp had been a trap!

Obviously, Kegan hadn’t been killed in the Hummer. Bolan had no idea how that was possible, but now the gunrunner and his troops were in hot pursuit. Having seen the horrors Kegan did to enemies to make them talk, Bolan decided he wouldn’t let these animals capture him alive. Everybody could be broken given enough time. Everybody. That was just the hard reality of life. A soldier simply had to decide what was more important, a few more minutes of life, or dying with dignity. And hopefully taking a couple of the bastards with you straight to hell! he thought.

Suddenly, there was a flash of bright light on top of the elevated roadway, and a fiery dart lanced across the field to slam into the smashed motorcycle. The explosion threw chunks of burning bike far and wide.

Diving to the side, Bolan rolled through the reeking mud trying to get far away from his point of arrival, then started crawling deeper into the gooey marsh until he reached scummy water. Pausing to catch his breath, Bolan felt his ribs grind and wondered if he had a full break. The body armor had saved his life, but now it was deadweight, and he reluctantly cut it free.

Moving with speed, he holstered the Desert Eagle and did a quick check for any further damage, then dug out the small medical kit behind his back. Thankfully it was still intact, and Bolan shot himself full of painkillers, just enough to dull the pain without impairing his judgment. Then wrapped duct tape around his muddy chest. For about the next hour, he’d feel fine, then all bets were off.

Struggling to recall the details of the airport, Bolan glanced at the starry sky to get his bearings, then headed due north, away from the airport. That would be another trap.

Finding a culvert, Bolan sloshed through the dirty water, disturbing countless frogs and huge clouds of buzzing insects. He may have been stung once or twice, but the painkillers were doing their job, and he felt nothing. There was only a sort of throbbing in his limbs from the combination of drugs coursing through his veins.

The culvert fed into the Ohio River, but bypassing that, Bolan continued northward until he encountered an old abandoned cement factory. It was quite possibly one of the worst locations he had ever found for making a last stand, but the huge feeder towers made an excellent landmark. Now he turned sharply west, wading through fields of debris and garbage, rats constantly underfoot, until he spotted a small squat building set alongside the river.

As Bolan stumbled for the ancient factory, there came unbidden into his mind the adage: to achieve success plan for failure. He thought that was Ben Franklin, but couldn’t be sure at the moment. However, it was absolutely true. Bolan laid out a plan for battle with extreme care, and no matter how perfect it seemed, he always memorized an escape route. On the roof of the cement factory was a duffel bag full of food, medical supplies, weapons and a cell phone. Everything he needed to keep breathing, and to call for an immediate evac. Just a few more yards, is all, he thought, almost there...

The boom of a long-range sniper rifle echoed across the landscape, and Bolan felt something hot briefly tug on his wet shirt. Damn, that was close! From the sound he could tell it was a .50-caliber rifle, and those were very bad news. Even the worst one he knew about still had a range of a quarter mile, and the best easily tripled that. As long as he was outside, he was in range for the hidden sniper. Only one answer to that problem.