Bolan acted.

He thumbed the Galil onto its grenade launcher mode. He undipped one of the grenades belted to his hip. He fed the grenade into the weapon's launcher apparatus.

The Galil is supposed to be fired from the tripod position when utilizing the grenade launcher. Bolan did not have time for that. He braced himself for the coming recoil. He triggered the assault rifle. Time had run out.

The Galil's recoil practically knocked Mack Bolan backward off his feet. The world screeched of madness from the big Su-22's engines. Armageddon would sound like this.

The HE impacted the Su-22 seconds after it passed over Bolan's head. The Soviet-supplied warplane blossomed into a wildfire flower. The jet disappeared for an instant, swallowed up by explosion. Then the scorched skeletal remains of the aircraft were visible hurtling into the gloom.

Scratch one Su-22.

Bolan scanned the night. Then he continued jogging toward the Huey gunship, still idling eighty yards away. He quickly spotted the other Libyan jet, maybe two miles to the east.

The second jet was responding by heeling around for a run of its own at Bolan.

It was happening in no time at all.

The Libyan jet sailed in with its wing-mounted miniguns blasting wide open.

17

The warplane, still a mile away in the night sky but gaining fast, fired off an air-to-surface missile that fingered out on a smoking trajectory toward the grounded Huey.

Bolan saw it coming, dived, flattened himself to the sand beneath him as the Atoll missile hit and blew the Huey apart with a ground-shivering blast. The heat of the deafening blast pushed down on Bolan's back.

Bolan got to his feet as soon as the fireball rippled the airwaves above him. He swung around to meet the Su-22 that was almost overhead, its machine guns resuming heavy fire. Spurts of rock and sand geysered up in approaching lines, gaining on his position. He was slapping another grenade onto the ARM's launcher attachment when sounds of another approaching jet aircraft split the night.

The Libyan pilot wheeled away, abruptly changing flight course.

The new arrival streaked by low overhead with a slight salutary tip of the wings at the man on the ground.

Bolan saw that this was not another jet with Libyan markings. This was a Short Take-Off and Landing craft. Who else but?

Jack Grimaldi.

For a few moments, both aircraft were swallowed up by the night sky to the west.

Then Grimaldi's contact with the enemy got hot.

The 1041 fired a missile. Bolan tracked the red flame of its tail, then saw another hellfire eruption of flash and flame that lit up the sky overhead like summer lightning. The sound soon followed.

The night was still reverberating when the V/STOL returned. The unmarked American fighter jet hovered overhead for a few seconds. Then the pilot set her down twenty yards away from where Bolan stood.

The hatch popped open. A familiar figure appeared, tugging off his flight helmet.

Grimaldi, yeah.

The pilot from Stony Man dropped to the ground from the aircraft's wing. The two men approached each other. Grimaldi was all smiles.

Bolan raised his voice to be heard above the noise of the idling V/STOL.

"Welcome to Libya, Jack! Another one I owe you."

Grimaldi seemed not to hear the thanks. He gazed at the scene of carnage around them: the two demolished Hueys and the men who had died. Then he scanned the northern sky.

"I suggest that we haul ass before any more of those Su-22s decide to play backup."

They hoofed back to the V/STOL and got onto the wing.

"Those Libyan planes were sent by Shahkhia," said Bolan as they climbed into the two-man plane and donned their helmets, communicating through the jet's radio setup. "I think we've seen everything he can afford to send — and lose. But get us out of here, Jack. Any word from Hal's intel on where Jericho is supposed to meet with Colonel Shahkhia?"

Grimaldi slammed shut the Plexiglas bubble above their heads.

"Afraid not. Nothing on Eve, either. I'm sorry, Mack."

"She'll be wherever Jericho and Santos are," said Bolan. "Wherever these choppers were originally heading."

It was then that Jack Grimaldi delivered his verbal bombshell. In a few succinct words above the engine roar of the aircraft, the pilot briefed the Executioner on exactly what it was that General Arnold Thatcher had channeled to Leonard Jericho. The facts regarding Strain-7. Just the facts.

Bolan absorbed it in silence. There was plenty to absorb.

With a sudden, mighty thrust, the V/STOL picked itself up off the Sahara sands and kicked forward with body-jarring speed.

The scene of carnage beyond the cockpit blurred into memory. The Boeing 1041 became gone from that place.

"This darling's equipped with computer capability," said Grimaldi through the headset linkup. "I'm playing with coordinates over a satellite map right now. There's Aujila oasis forty miles south of here. That's all there is."

"Could be it," muttered Bolan. He tried to remain wary of the budding hope he felt at the news.

"There's a small military installation at Aujila," the pilot relayed from his computer map. "It's an outpost for desert patrol. No other settlements of any sort for a couple of hundred miles. And this is current satellite observation."

"Then Aujila it is," said Bolan. "How far?"

The V/STOL was skimming the desert at several hundred feet. Grimaldi was proving once again that he was an ace in the cockpit.

"Buddy, we are... here. Those are the lights of the oasis up to your left."

The cluster of light was now clearly visible in the clean desert air from an estimated distance of two miles. The lights were the only thing visible in the darkness.

Grimaldi did not angle the V/STOL in that direction. He held their distance by subtle control of the tilt-jet ability to brake, slip, drop.

"A recon pass is out," said Bolan. "But this is the end of the trail, Jack. That's where they've got Eve. That's where this whole deal is going to go down. How close can you land me without drawing ear or eye to us?"

Another short pause as the aircraft's computer up front fed more data to Grimaldi.

"This is a primary air lane between Benghazi and most of South Africa," reported the pilot as he hovered the plane. "If they did hear anything from the base, they might not think too much of someone zipping along a tad low. I could touch down unnoticed, oh, say, one and a half miles away from there. How would that do?"

"That would do beautifully. Then I want you to hold back with the air support. But watch for me. I'll have Eve with me."

"Down we go," said Grimaldi.

The V/STOL aircraft's jet sounds became muted as the pilot patterned into a landing descent.

Grimaldi had set them down without detection. The inky stillness surrounded them in chill silence.

Bolan went EVA. He made the short drop to the ground from the aircraft's wing, carrying a canvas bag of supplies thoughtfully provided by Grimaldi and left near his seat in the cockpit.

"How long do I wait before I worry?" Grimaldi called down to Bolan.

The Executioner eyed the luminous hands of his watch. He calculated quick mental computations regarding time, distance and what he must accomplish.

"Give me forty minutes, Jack." He was applying black facial camouflage ointment while he spoke. "Come in from this direction. I'll build my play around that." He repacked the tube of ointment and returned it to the satchel. Then he withdrew from the satchel's depths the heavy metal of his familiar armaments, including Starlite scope. "Thanks, Jack. Thanks for everything."

"Mack, wait! Give me word on what to expect. What's your strategy?"