while he was airborne and slammed him facedown into his own blood.
The other commando loosed a short burst from his Uzi.
The spray of tumblers made dull little pops as they stitched a ragged line of holes across Captain Wade's chest. Half a dozen rounds kicked the security officer backward. He maintained a grip on his chattering M-16 for two or three seconds before he toppled back into some shrubbery and out of sight.
That last burst of slugs stitched the last commando from crotch to neck, killing him on his feet. The man's knees buckled, and he crumpled to the ground.
Another boom rumbled across the Blue Ridge landscape to accompany the first grayish rays of dawn on the eastern horizon.
This time it really was thunder.
A fine mist began.
Bolan did not holster the stainless-steel AutoMag. He did pause long enough to pump a fresh magazine into the butt.
Rafael Encizo approached him from where Kurtzman and the others had been ambushed.
Then someone emerged from the farmhouse and also approached Bolan. His heart skipped one beat as it always did whenever he saw April Rose.
She and Rafael reached Bolan at the same time.
Bolan gave Encizo a relieved brother-grip handshake.
He gave April one healthy hug and a kiss on those lovely full lips.
'Welcome home, soldier,' she whispered shyly, and her eyes, close to his, said it came from the bottom of her soul.
Bolan kept an arm around April's waist. He didn't feel like ever letting go, but his eyes were iced when he glanced at Encizo.
'How's Bear?'
'Not good,' grunted Encizo. 'Looks like he caught two. One in the gut, one along the temple but we can't tell how deep. Doctor from the house is with him now... but it doesn't look good.'
The rains came. The sky rumbled again and a breeze came up when the mist turned to showers. The slanting rain drifted across the new day's first light to the east and pattered across these combatants and felt real good.
Bolan looked at the beauty hugged against him.
'Able Team? 'he asked.
'Bear got our satellite linkage restored just when the attack started,' April told him. 'They were putting finishing touches on the repairs when... the ambush got them. Bear had already sent me back inside to contact our man in New Delhi. Able Team hit The Dragon's fortress before we could reach them.'
Rafael Encizo chuckled when he saw the grim look come into Phoenix's face.
'It's not what you think, Colonel. I guess we forgot who we were dealing with. The Dragon got away and left some firepower behind to eliminate Able Team. Trouble is, he didn't leave enough. Able took what The Dragon left for them and spit out the pieces.'
April Rose saw something over Bolan's shoulder. Her eyes widened frantically, and she held out a hand.
'Don't — '
The woman moved suddenly in Mack Bolan's arm, swinging around to his left side at the same instant a sharp, single gun report punctuated the sounds of the rain.
April emitted a piercing scream and became a deadweight back in Bolan's left arm. He wrapped his left arm tighter around her to keep her from falling, knowing already what had happened.
Balancing the weight of the woman with his left arm, the Executioner whirled in a bent-knee crouch.
The security officer, Wade, was flattened out on the ground where he fell after being shot, except that Wade wore a bullet-proof vest. He had killed Miller and the other commando to prevent them from talking and exposing him. He wasted them then got sloppy thinking he could put a bullet in Colonel John Phoenix.
April had seen Wade 'rise from the dead' and aim the .45 at Mack. She had stepped in the way of the bullet.
Although Wade was not hurt, the impact must have rattled him. Now he leaned against an oak, shifting the Army issue .45 for another fast shot at Bolan.
The Executioner triggered the faithful .44 five times. His marksmanship was so accurate, the last four shots encountered nothing except bark.
The first slug had blown away Wade's head.
The lifeless body slid to the base of the tree, the ancient oak too stately to be his gravestone, the hieroglyphics, made by the bullet holes a fitting epitaph.
Then Bolan looked back at the woman he held.
April's head was resting on his shoulder, the way she always did when they relaxed during those infrequent moments of intimacy between his missions.
He could not see the wound. He was glad for that. Her eyes were closed as though she were asleep. The rain washed her hair of blood.
The rain washed away his tears as Mack Bolan looked skyward at those stormy heavens. He was not aware of the activity around him.
Part of his world had ended.
'They'll pay,' he vowed to a dead woman and to a universe that rumbled its foreboding thunder in response. 'Whoever is responsible for this... I'll track them to the ends of the earth. They will pay.'
