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The good fighters of old first put themselves beyond the possibility of defeat, and then waited for an opportunity of defeating the enemy.
—Sun Tzu
I’ve always considered the police warriors on the same side. Yet it is my duty to protect them just as they are charged to protect America’s citizens. In that, I’m utterly convinced I have done right.
—Mack Bolan, aka The Executioner
Nothing less than a war could have fashioned the destiny of the man called Mack Bolan. Bolan earned the Executioner title in the jungle hell of Vietnam.
But this soldier also wore another name—Sergeant Mercy. He was so tagged because of the compassion he showed to wounded comrades-in-arms and Vietnamese civilians.
Mack Bolan’s second tour of duty ended prematurely when he was given emergency leave to return home and bury his family, victims of the Mob. Then he declared a one-man war against the Mafia.
He confronted the Families head-on from coast to coast, and soon a hope of victory began to appear. But Bolan had broken society’s every rule. That same society started gunning for this elusive warrior—to no avail.
So Bolan was offered amnesty to work within the system against terrorism. This time, as an employee of Uncle Sam, Bolan became Colonel John Phoenix. With a com¬mand center at Stony Man Farm in Virginia, he and his new allies—Able Team and Phoenix Force—waged relentless war on a new adversary: the KGB.
But when his one true love, April Rose, died at the hands of the Soviet terror machine, Bolan severed all ties with Establishment authority.
Now, after a lengthy lone-wolf struggle and much soul-searching, the Executioner has agreed to enter an “arm’s-length” alliance with his government once more, reserving the right to pursue personal missions in his Everlasting War.
Contents
Chicago, Illinois
Sunlight cut through the unseasonably cold September morning air and melted frost off the street-side café sign. Despite the low temperature, Richard Walburn fully intended to enjoy this Labor Day holiday by having coffee and bagels at Forno Vicinato with his wife and son. Besides, they were bundled into their fall coats, and it would warm up quickly according to WGN-TV’s weather forecast the previous evening.
“Morning, Silvi,” Walburn said as he entered the café.
Silvano Marchetti returned the greeting with a broad grin. “Rich, my friend. How goes it?”
“It goes.”
Marchetti nodded toward the silhouettes of Walburn’s wife and son, who’d taken seats at a table just outside the window. “I see you brought the family today.”
“You know it,” Walburn replied. “A day off is a rare treat in my world. You take all those moments you can—”
The blast rocked through the interior of the café with such force it blew out the front windows.
Later, witnesses would say they felt the sidewalk rumble as a piece of sharp metal seemed to erupt from the storefront and decapitate Kathy Walburn. Members of the forensic team had to collect various parts of young Daniel Walburn from the rubble.
Nobody inside the Italian café survived, and it would take hours for Emergency Management officials to confirm that Detective Richard Walburn, a fourteen-year veteran of the Chicago Police Department, was among several people who had died in the blast.
* * *
That evening, Detective Sergeant Mick Brett of the warrant squad sat in his unmarked unit a block from the home of one of Chicago’s most wanted criminals. The PD’s Intelligence unit had known for some time the location of the US residence of Axel Madera, a man wanted on at least a dozen charges and most of them class A felonies. Unfortunately, they hadn’t been able to verify until recently that Madera even occupied the structure. Word had it he’d been lying low at some hideaway just across the US-Mexican border in Brownsville, Texas. Then an eagle-eyed TSA camera agent at McAllen Miller International