'I want you guys to hear something.' Gadgets took the scanner/auto-recorder from his pack and rewound the cassette. 'The name of the Outlaws' leader is Horse. That's what the LAPD file said, and all the calls I've heard, the name of the man giving the orders is Horse. But listen to this.'
He touched the play button. 'Horse, this is your friend. Answer.'
'Yessir! This is Horse. Is there anything you need?'
'No, everything's fine. I'm quite comfortable. Brief me...'
Gadgets played the conversation through. 'That went out on a different frequency. What does it sound like to you?'
'Sounds like this isn't all Horse's game,' Lyons replied. 'He's just the front man.'
'Is he talking with someone off the island?' Blancanales was fieldstripping the Beretta, spreading out the components on the plastic map. When the Outlaws had captured him, they had experimented with the weapon. He was checking it thoroughly, cleaning it like it had been violated.
'Maybe on a boat,' Gadgets pondered. 'But hardly the mainland. No way.'
'So we have some mastermind floating offshore directing this horror show...' Lyons said. 'You think all this could be a grab at those six scientists? By commies, terrorists? Except that that guy speaks perfect English. He couldn't be foreign.'
'Too perfect,' Blancanales said. 'Remember, those eggheads are here by chance. They wanted a quiet place, this was close. They could've gone to Lake Tahoe. The man talked about 'the seizure of the island, and about money. If he only wanted those six, why not grab just them? Why take everyone on the island?'
'Yeah, very curious.' Gadgets fast-forwarded the tape, stopping to listen to snatches of conversation.
'What else you got?' Lyons asked.
'I don't know. Been kind of busy, haven't had a chance to listen...'
He caught another snatch of the calm, educated voice. '...I can't help you there, Horse. Do what you think is necessary.'
Gadgets rewound the tape and found the beginning of this later conversation. 'Any developments, Horse?'
'Yeah, more trouble with heroes. I've lost a couple of men to local crazies.'
'Your men can eliminate the opposition. Has there been any attempt yet to land security forces?'
'I don't know. There was nothing on the radar, but one of my men says they've got a commando over on the other side of the island.'
'Is that in fact true? If the authorities have ignored your stipulations...'
'We'll know soon enough. I'm going to, ah, put the questions to him myself. I've sent some men to bring him here. If he's a cop...'
'You will need to impress the authorities. If he is one of these local residents, I suggest you make an example of him.'
'Oh, yeah!'
'I'll call you again...'
'Wait, sir. I need to be able to call you.'
'Please don't. There is no privacy here. You could compromise me.'
'Yessir, I'm sorry sir.'
'Speak with you again in an hour.'
They heard Horse again: 'Blackie. Come in! You got that commando? Blackie!'
Lyons now wore the biker's black leather jacket. 'Sorry, Horse. Blackie is Missing In Action,' he said under his breath.
Finished with the Beretta, Blancanales field-stripped and cleaned the captured Heckler and Koch G-3. 'As long as they don't identify us,' Blancanales reasoned, 'we don't have to worry about the bikers taking it out on the hostages.'
'What do you make of what he said?' Gadgets asked suddenly. 'He said, 'There is no privacy here. You could compromise me.''
Lyons counted off the points on his fingers. 'One, he isn't alone. Two, the people he's with don't know what he's doing. Three, he isn't a resident. He used the words, 'one of these local residents,' right? He said it like he thought they were a lower life form. Four, we don't have time for a mystery. I say we hit the airport, the radio station, and every Outlaw patrol and outpost we can find. What do you two think?'
'Why the airport?' Blancanales asked. 'He's got the place radar tight, nothing can come in.'
'It gives the Feds and the LAPD an option. If we don't make it, they could land assault squads if things got desperate...'
'If we took out the radar!' Gadgets pointed to Mount Black Jack on Blancanales' map. 'Right there. The radar station's in town, but the actual scanning equipment's up on top of this mountain. We hit that equipment, he's blind.'
'Can't do it.' Lyons shook his head. 'Assault units would be a desperate, last-chance gamble. And hitting the radar wouldn't help. He'd pull in his men, kill the hostages before the assault teams got into town.
'And another problem. We are not making informed decisions. We won't be able to devise a real plan until we know what's out there. Time to move.'
'Time to forward all this information to Brognola,' Gadgets added. 'Maybe Stonyman and the LAPD can work out a plan.'
Lyons paced the dirt road while Gadgets prepared his transmission. Dictating into the recorder, Gadgets detailed what Able Team had seen and heard. He summarized their discussion on a possible coordinated assault. Then, plugging in the scrambler module and speeding up the tape to ten times normal, he transmitted the information. Anyone intercepting Gadgets' transmission would hear only a shriek of electronic noise. Finally Gadgets packed his equipment: 'Ready to go.'
Blancanales gave the captured G-3 a last wipe, snapped in a magazine. 'Loaded.'
Lyons stared out at the dry hills rolling west to the Pacific. Steadily, a wide grin grew on his face: 'Gentlemen, I have the perfect plan. Simple, straightforward, very effective.'
'What's that?' Gadgets asked.
'We kill them all.'
8
Crowning the mountainous interior of Catalina, the Airport in the Sky equalled its name. The engineers who had created this marvel of beauty and utility leveled the peaks of a mountain range to sculpt an artificial plateau high above the island. The airfield viewed the surrounding island, the vast Pacific to the west, the San Pedro Channel to the east, and when the winds blew away the smog of Los Angeles, the hundred miles of coast where the metropolis met the ocean.
Resident commuters, regardless of how often they flew in and out, enjoyed every flight. To the islanders returning from the concrete and glass maze of Los Angeles, the landing field seemed to be a platform floating between the blue-domed heaven of the sky and the primitive paradise of their isolated home. To the uninitiated tourist arriving from the mainland, their flight's descent to the field provided the first thrilling vision of an island wonderland known for its unique natural beauty.
Even those tourists who come to the island by boat often included the Airport in the Sky in their schedule, leaving the island's only town in buses and rented cars and following the winding, back-switching road through canyons and hills to the high airfield.
Able Team followed the same road, but did not continue to the man-made plateau of the airport. They stopped short. After studying their topographical maps of the island, they concealed their commandeered motorcycles and hiked up a steep gorge to the flat mountain crest.
At the top, on their bellies in the dry brush, they saw the Early California-style airport facilities two hundred yards to the north. They scanned the exteriors and the windows and doorways of the buildings with binoculars and the eight-power scope of the Mannlicher sniper rifle.
