Firebase Seattle

the gloom.

Farther down, at the storage warehouse, things were happening. The big cargo doors were open, muffled light spilling out to mingle in shining shrouds with the moist atmosphere. A truck was parked down there, backed halfway into the warehouse. Forklifts were whining around, moving freight or something about the interior.

It was not an entirely unexpected development for Bolan, even though he had earlier ascertained that no night shifts worked this particular wharf. He had, in fact, called his warehousemen friends twelve hours earlier and instructed them to 'find' the misplaced shipment and to notify the consignee.

Now the man in black was penetrating deeper for a close look at the situation, combat senses alert and flaring into that no man's land between dockside and warehouse, the AutoMag sprung and ready for instant use.

A dim human form materialized directly ahead, less than fifty yards from paydirt. Bolan froze, noisily cleared his throat, then coughed lightly and moved on more slowly.

A Bronx voice snarled, 'Who's there?'

'It's me,' Bolan replied, using the same Bronxese but with a less belligerent tone. 'How's it going?'

'How would I know? Nobody tells me nothing.' The guy was obviously a forward lookout. He was also ripe for picking. That voice revealed that its owner had been standing there quite a while — tense, uncomfortable, irritable.

And he was now moving cautiously toward Bolan, probably trying for a better view.

'Go down there and tell 'em I said to hurry it up,' Bolan commanded gruffly. 'Get some coffee while you're at it. You sound half asleep.'

'Guess I am. Thanks. I'll tell 'em.'

The guy turned and shuffled away.

Bolan immediately moved quietly along the backtrack. The lookout had accepted that 'voice of authority' all too readily. Which meant, to Bolan, that others were waiting somewhere back there in the darkness of the waterfront. In a parked car, probably. Maybe a crew leader and a couple of guns. Bolan could not let that remain at his back.

He withdrew the way he'd come, then circled quickly and quietly for the only different angle of approach — and he found them there, just up the street from the Piraeus dock, two men in a big car with a lonely vigil.

The vehicle had been parked there a while, as evidenced by the even collection of fog droplets. The wipers had been operated as the car sat, to keep the forward vision unimpaired — and there was evidence of a continuing togging problem inside, as well. The two front windows were cracked open about three inches from the top, the glass surfaces covered with the fine droplets of accumulated moisture without and condensation within.

Both men were smoking. As Bolan drew nearer, he heard the radio playing soft music. The guys were relaxed, slouched in the seats, bored. He moved softly to their rear, opened a back door, and slid onto the seat behind them.

The guy at the wheel snapped his head in a quick swivel rearward, mouth open, eyes flaring.

Bolan cautioned, 'Uh-uh' and gave him a good look at the big silver pistol.

The other guy just sat there, eyes glued to the rearview mirror, frozen. But he found his voice first. 'What the hell is this?' he blustered.

'Doomsday, maybe,' Bolan informed him. He tossed a marksman's medal forward. It hit the windshield and fell to the padding atop the dash. 'Pick it up,' he commanded chillingly.

The wheelman did so, moving slowly and carefully, turning it over and over between thumb and fingers, otherwise immobilized, speechless.

The guy beside him growled, 'What is it?'

'A bull's-eye cross,' the wheelman declared in a loud stage whisper.

'Aw, Jesus,' the other guy said, the voice dismal and demoralized. 'That's not Mack Bolan back there.'

'It is,' the Executioner assured him. 'Who're you?'

The guy had decided to try the chummy approach. 'I'm Danny Trinity. You never heard of me, I guess. I heard plenty about you, guy. This big dummy at my left hand here is Ontario Charlie Flora, my wheeler.'

That took care of the introductions, and Danny Trinity ran out of wind right there. Bolan was interested in further conversation, however.

'You boys might live a while if you play it right.'

They understood what that meant, of course. Few living 'made men' could boast of having once chatted with the Executioner. So if he was talking instead of blasting, there was double the usual hope right there.

'We got no beef with you, guy,' Danny Trinity reported, apparently clinging to hope through a very obvious bravado.

'Keep it that way, then,' Bolan advised. 'Who're you with?'

The two hardmen locked eyes for a moment.

Bolan warned, 'Keep it straight. You're talking to a guy who knows when you're not.'

Ontario Charlie took a gulping half-breath and plunged on toward hope. 'We're by way of Augie Marinello.'

Okay, that hung straight enough. Marinello, though maimed by a clash with Bolan during the Jersey war, still clung to life and to his position as most powerful New York boss.

Coldly, Bolan asked, 'How is Augie?'

'What's left of 'im, okay,' Danny Trinity sniffed. 'You didn't leave 'im much, guy.'

'I could leave you less,' Bolan reminded the torpedo. 'Where do you rank?'

'Nowhere,' the mafioso replied, a bit less huffily. 'I work a crew under Tony Vale.'

'Enforcing,' the ice man said.

'Yeah, sure. Look — you want my life history? I was born in — '

Bolan growled, 'Save it. You're a long way from your territory, Danny.'

The guy shrugged and angled a desperate toss of the eyes to his partner. 'We're on vacation,' he muttered.

Bolan lightly gouged the back of his head with the muzzle of Big Thunder. 'This piece is a hand howitzer,' he told the guy coldly. 'It spits 240 grains of hollow-nose disintegrators with a muzzle energy of more than a thousand foot-pounds. The trigger moves very eagerly to a two-pound pull. All I have to do is sigh a bit too hard and your skull will fall in like a rotten egg. And every time you say something silly, Danny, it makes me sigh with regret.'

'Okay, okay,' the torpedo said, voice ragged and choking with defeat. 'It is a sort of vacation. We're on loan. We been out here three weeks now, and this is our first job.'

'How many boys with you?'

'I brought a crew of six, plus myself. That includes Charlie boy, here.'

'What's the job?'

'This one? Hell, a milk run. We thought. The locals are picking up some stuff at a warehouse down here. We're riding shotgun, that's all.'

'Where are you shotgunning it to?'

'To another warehouse.'

'Another warehouse where?'

'Up near Everett. Know where that is? Just up the coast.'

Sure, Bolan knew where. Langley Island lay in that area.

'Let's have your hardware,' he told them. 'I don't want to see more than two fingers at a time. You first, Danny. Ease it out and pass it back.'

There were no arguments in that regard. The hardmen seemed almost happy about it, as though their salvation was thereby assured. Bolan did not have a reputation for 'killing cold.' They carefully divested themselves of offending weapons and passed them back, one at a time. Bolan threw them to the street and told the wheelman,