From ten feet away, the encrusted metal looked as if it had been there forever. A closer look revealed a few shiny scratches, bright metal where none should have been, that reflected the light, winking as the half inch of water ran over it, rippling a little as it passed over the thick lip of rusty steel. With a combat knife, he worked the plate up, taking care not to let it slip back. Obviously designed to respond to pressure, the device would be harmless unless he lost his grip and dropped the plate back into place.
It was almost six feet long and eighteen inches wide. When it swung open, Bolan jerked it by one end, twisting the other back away from the crevice it concealed. Training the light into the smooth pool of water, he spotted a slab of C-4 plastique in a clear plastic container sealed with waterproof tape. The bomb nestled comfortably down among a cluster of pipes that ran through the floor and disappeared under the wall on either side. Three pressure detonators, sprouting wires running to the plastique, were held in place by a twist of copper wire bound to the topmost pipe.
Around each, a tight spring, resistant enough to support only the plate, waited for a careless foot to spurt electricity into the small detonator clearly visible through the transparent plastic. Had Bolan stepped on the plate in the dark, he'd have been quivering jelly oozing down the wall in nanoseconds.
Cordero's handiwork, Bolan thought.
He wondered what kind of nerve it took for a man to hunch down over that lethal package, knowing that a single mistake would blow him to pieces. But it was a peculiar courage that enabled one to take such risks, only to slaughter innocent people by the hundreds.
Carefully Bolan severed the gleaming copper holding each spring trigger in place and let all three sink into the water and out of sight. He stepped over the trench, looking back at it for a moment, then shaking his head. That one had been too close.
Harding had upped the ante. I must be getting close, Bolan thought.
Bolan knew he'd been lucky that time. And he knew a man had only so much luck. He'd long since exhausted his allotment, but at the moment it was his only ally.
The tunnel started a gentle curve to the right and sloped more sharply downward. His feet started to slip on the damp stone underfoot, and he braced himself against the wall with one hand. Holding the torch in his injured hand, he tried to keep his balance without losing the slender security of the light. The floor levered out after fifty yards or so, and he was grateful for the reprieve.
Carlos had given him his M-16, and he slipped it off his shoulder, carrying it with his finger through the trigger guard and the safety off. Every now and then the spare magazines in his pocket clicked together with a sharp snap, and he shifted one to the other side. He knew only too well that his situation was too precarious to let something like that make the difference between living and dying.
The character of the walls began to change now. In addition to the massive stonework, massive steel beams stabbed down into the ground on either side.
Others, just as sturdy, bridged the paired beams.
Bolan realised that the nature of the city above him had changed. Heavy weight, too heavy to rely just on stone and mortar, pressed down on the tunnel. He must have come nearly to the waterfront now, with its huge warehouses, some of them full of newly unloaded cargo and others, abandoned, lying empty and lifeless as bleached skulls on a desert floor.
He had been surprised not to have encountered an intersection, and grateful, too. Surprised because such tunnels usually snaked and interlaced in mazelike tangles, and grateful because this particular one did not. And he realized, too, that it was by design. Harding must have deliberately chosen a building giving access to a tunnel he could seal and control without attracting attention. That could only mean that Harding himself lay in wait at the end of this damp, murky passage.
Bolan shut off his light and stood still. The humming was much louder, but he still wasn't able to identify it. Turning on the light once more, he moved more quickly, watching the floor for another trap, but saw nothing. Then a heavy slam resounded through the tunnel, and shouting voices echoed off the clammy walls.
Bolan skidded to a halt and clicked off the light again. The noise intensified, as if a door had been opened somewhere on a room full of heavy machinery. Then, as suddenly as the first clap of thunder had come, the humming died, not fading away, but abruptly and completely cut off, as if something had been shut down.
A dim glow filtered to him now, but he could see nothing directly. He had to get closer, and he had to do it in the dark. Again relying on the wall to guide him, he inched forward, tensing his muscles, prepared to stop at the first sign of resistance to a poised foot. The voices continued to reverberate through the tunnel, and a spear of light slashed along the far wall from around a tight bend.
Heavy feet splashed in the water, and the light bounced up and down. Bolan flattened himself behind one of the steel pillars and pulled his Beretta out. He set it on single shot and held his breath.
From the sound of things, two or three men were in the tunnel and headed his way. He eased around the pillar and skipped to the next, just before the bend in the passage. The voices sharpened, and Bolan caught a scrap of conversation as he leaned into the wall.
"Son of a bitch is probably dead. Old Juano doesn't fuck around with them traps. One of the three should have worked. Bet we find a few hunks of raw meat and a pile of rock."
"No way. We would have heard something, man."
"Not necessarily. You can't hear shit with that fucking conveyor going."
"When's it going down, anyway?"
"The witching hour, babe. In the midnight hour. Cordero blows half the city in two hours, or some shit, and then we do our thing."
They were talking about him.
And they were in for a surprise.
Bolan held the flashlight in one hand, the Beretta in the other. He aimed the flashlight along the barrel of the deadly weapon and trained both on the bend in the tunnel, his thumb poised on the light switch.
The flashlight came into view first, but Bolan waited to get a look at the odds. Behind the man with the light, in the reflected backwash, he saw two more. All three were armed with AK-47's. None of them seemed overly concerned they might not be alone in the tunnel.
Bolan aimed carefully and fired once, taking the last man out first. The Beretta spat, an ugly little cough, and the slug plowed through flesh with a wet smack and broke bone with a sharp crack. The tail stumbled, his arms just shadows flailing at his chest, then he fell over, cracking his skull against the stone wall.
His companions didn't react at first, but the man with the light seemed to have sensed something. He swiveled back and swung the light around. The second man bumped into him and nearly tripped.
"Hey, Randy. What's with you?" The man with the light seemed confused. Bolan took his companion out with his second shot. The man staggered back under the impact of the 9 mm slug. He dropped to one knee, waving his arm wildly and trying to raise his rifle to shoot something he couldn't see.
The man with the light found Randy in his beam, and Bolan saw the bright blood smeared on the shirt front.
"What the?.." Then the light went out. Bolan heard footsteps, and he stepped away from the wall, clicking on his light at the same time. He picked out the running man instantly and fired just as the man started to shout. The slug slammed his skull forward, and an eerie geyser of blood and brain tissue spattered the far wall of the tunnel as the body fell away from under the gory cloud.
Bolan started forward, cautiously damping the light against his hip. He heard nothing but his own footsteps. Letting a little light seep out, he stopped beside Randy to snatch his AK and a spare clip. Bolan ignored the remaining two bodies, stepping over the dead man with the flashlight. The light had gone on when he fell, and it lay in the water, its broken lens flecked with blood, turning the water a pale ruby color until the tube filled and the light died out.