Bolan saw checkpoints at all roads into the street leading past the main gate. Additional two-man patrols walked beats along the stretches of dark street between the checkpoints and the front entrance. A penetration by force was out of the question.
Even in blacksuit with the night goggles and all his firepower, Bolan could not take on this whole security setup from the outside. He might be able to bust out that way because they would not be expecting that and could therefore be outflanked no matter what the odds, but as for getting inside those walls, the best, the only way would have to be a soft probe.
Bolan heard the heavy rumble of a large vehicle approaching through city streets toward one of the checkpoints. He crouched on an opposite ledge of the flat roof and spotted a two-and-a-half-ton supply carrier coming in from the west. The vehicle was still a block away, rumbling closer by the moment to a spotlit checkpoint two streets from the command compound.
Bolan could discern six raydoviki armed with rifles, standing around a GAZ patrol car and a BTR armored vehicle, the 7.62mm SGMB submachine in the BTR aimed at the narrow spot in the concertina wire that stretched from one side of the street to the other, the gap in the wire only wide enough for one vehicle at a time to pass through.
The approaching military carrier shifted into lower gear, its engine sounds distinct on the night air.
The truck was a supply carrier of the flatbed variety, the bed empty, perhaps returning late from a delivery to a detachment in the field or to one of the outposts. Bolan hurried into action, retracing his route via a doorway from the roof to a stairway inside, past closed doors of apartments down to a deserted dirt street.
The building reeked of too many people living too close together. Or maybe I smell their fear, thought Bolan. Kabul had the same beleaguered air he remembered from Saigon. And Beirut. He angled away from the building, a crouched shadow and nothing else as he speed-jogged along a course to a point one block short of the checkpoint, then he crossed over.
He stopped.
One of the two-man foot patrols strolled by within ten feet of him without knowing he loomed there, ready to strike.
He chose not to take this pair. He had to make it over to the next street. He let them talk and walk past, two raydoviki chatting in Russian.
Bolan knew enough of the Russian language, having studied every spare moment he had between missions.
He had already used it with acceptable results.
The conversation between these two, as with most soldiers thrown together during a long night's sentry duty, touched on the subject of women as they receded into the night, away from Bolan's position. After the sentries had passed far enough away from him on their rounds, Bolan continued on his track toward the street along which the approaching supply truck would come, after it passed the checkpoint. He heard the vehicle brake for the checkpoint and the voices of the sentries interrogating the driver.
The night is so quiet, even silenced reports from the Ingram would carry, Bolan thought. Until he had Lansdale, the warrior would have to play this one quiet. But hard!
He encountered another two-man patrol walking its beat near the intersection midway between the blocks separating the high command from the checkpoint.
This couple did not know of their encounter with the Executioner until the heartbeat of their death.
He came at them fast, the edge of each stiffened hand slashing downward hard enough to break both necks.
The soldiers crumpled to the pavement at Bolan's feet with soft sighs.
One block over, the sentry at the checkpoint waved the supply carrier through. The driver upshifted and Bolan knew he had less than half a minute now or he would miss the chance.
He dragged each dead soldier by one foot until the bodies rested hidden behind stacked hay, well out of sight of anyone passing on the darkened street.
He selected the jacket and headgear of the dead man closest to his size. The uniform was too small, but Bolan thought it would do in the dark for sentries well into their shifts, who would not be as sharp as they should be.
He hurried back to the intersection and stood in the middle of the street as the truck approached, the way a sentry would during a routine double check.
Bolan raised a hand in an authoritative signal to halt, reasoning that since there were guard patrols stationed along these approaches to the compound, it would not be unusual for these patrols to do spot checks along the last stretch to the main gate.
Bolan intended to use their tight security measures against them, bending adversity into an ally.
The intersection positioned him exactly midway along the two-block stretch between the checkpoint and front gate. If he worked this right, those at either end of the stretch would interpret the truck's stopping as nothing more than a spot check.
The truck braked, its front end stopping less than a foot from Bolan, Bolan approached the driver's side of the truck. He saw a second man in the truck cab.
At first the sleepy-eyed driver saw only the Soviet army jacket and headgear where he expected to see a sentry, but when Bolan stepped up, the driver got a better look at the soldier who had stopped them, saw the blackface, the night goggles and started to open his mouth. The Executioner tugged open the driver's door, reached in and rapidly pulled the driver out, down into a raised knee that smacked the man's face with such force, Bolan heard the neck snap. He caught the failing body in the crook of his left arm. With his right he threw the combat knife across the few feet of space in the cab before the shotgun rider could angle his weapon around. The soldier had no time at all because the blade buried itself to the hilt into his heart, killing him as dead as the driver.
Bolan continued at high speed, staying away from the headlights at all times, everything happening so fast that, yeah, the seemingly distant checkpoint in one direction and the base at the other end of the dark street appeared to be buying this as just another security check by an enthusiastic sentry.
The Executioner dragged both bodies from the truck to an entranceway between two shops that looked deserted. He retrieved his knife, cleaned off the blood on the corpse's uniform and hustled back to the supply carrier. Bolan climbed into the cab and started the truck moving, closing the cab door as quietly as possible. He pulled out a treated cloth to remove much of the facial blackout goo with hurried swipes.
He drove at a moderate speed and reached into the cab's glove box where he found military orders for the driver's last run, as is customary with motor-pool drivers in armies around the world.
Satisfied, he left the orders where he found them, closed the box and slowed the truck when he reached the closed main gate and guardhouse of the compound.
He stopped the truck and feigned grogginess from lack of sleep. He saw a sentry approaching.
"Your orders," the guard snapped in Russian to the dim outline behind the steering wheel in the cab at a height that made the shadows only murkier. Bolan reached over routinely, snapped open the glove box and handed the orders down.
The sentry studied the papers in the light from the guardhouse where the other two soldiers had their machine guns trained on the cab. The guard looked up from the papers for a closer view into the shadowy cab.
Bolan felt hackles rise on the back of his neck, his finger tight around the trigger of the Ingram MAC-10 that rested across his lap. He was ready to blow this sentry to bits and drive the truck through that iron gate into the jaws of hell itself if it meant pulling Lansdale out of here and finding out what the guy knew about the Devil's Rain.