if the camouflaged crazies were chasing him or what, but all he saw was black forest, trees trunks rising everywhere like a huge fence, their branches looking like skeletal fingers reaching for him.
Joe knew they couldn’t have gone more than a half mile at the most, but his journey back seemed to be a marathon. Every time he thought he’d round one more turn and find the clearing and campsite, he only saw more dark trail. At last, however, he saw the welcoming glow of the fire. Trying to shout, but too winded to do anything more than wheeze, Joe staggered out of the woods toward the laughing and drinking group, which hadn’t noticed him yet.
George was the first to spot him lurching from the darkness. “Hey, the prodigal architect returns! Hey, buddy, you all right?”
Joe nearly fell as he tried to reach his roommate, going down to one knee as he fought for breath. He held out his hands, still sticky with Brandy’s blood. “Help—please—”
“What the fuck happened, Joe?” George held him up as the rest of the group clustered around, their questions flying.
“Did you guys have an accident?”
“Is Brandy injured?”
“Where is she?”
Joe labored to talk in between breaths. “She’s…she’s dead, and we’re next…killers…in the forest…coming after me—”
“What the hell are you talking about, Joe? And where the hell’s Brandy?”
Joe grabbed George’s down vest and pulled him close. “She’s dead, goddamnit! And we’re next if we don’t get outta here right fucking now!”
“Holy shit, you’re serious, aren’t you—” George had straightened and was looking around when Joe heard a strange noise, like cloth tearing. He looked up to see George staring at him with unfocused eyes, a small hole in his forehead leaking a trickle of red down his face. His roommate fell backward onto the fire, making Sandra scream as his body started burning.
“Oh shit—they’re here!” Joe sank to his knees as he realized what he’d done. “I led them right to you.”
Sanjay and Sam ran for the Jeep, while Sandra tried to pull George’s body from the fire. Joe looked back to see two camouflaged men appear from the woods and track the two running students. He heard that strange ripping cloth noise again, and both Sanjay and Sam fell to the ground near the Jeep, motionless. One of the men peeled off toward the two fallen students, while the other headed toward the fire.
Falling into shock, Joe could only watch as the man approached the fire and put a quick burst of bullets into Sandra’s chest. She flung up her arms and fell across George’s burning body in the fire, which was popping and crackling in the flames, the stench of burning flesh making his stomach clench. Through his numbness, Joe heard the tearing cloth sound again, and slowly looked over to see the far man putting bullets into the heads of his friends.
“Sorry, man.” Joe looked up into the muzzle of the automatic weapon pointed at him, the masked man holding it shaking his head. “Just in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
The end of the submachine gun spit fire at his face, and Joe knew nothing more.
Chapter 1
Four days earlier
Mack Bolan strode through the luxurious casino floor of the Marina Bay Sands Singapore, oblivious to the bells and clatter of sophisticated slot machines and the chatter and exclamations of well-dressed men and women trying their luck at dozens of gaming tables. His feet sank into soft, plush carpet, while attractive staff served drinks to the high rollers, but he ignored all of the activity, his eyes alert for just one man.
Dressed in a tan sport coat, black short-sleeved shirt and navy slacks, Bolan blended easily into the crowd of natives and foreign tourists, despite his height and imposing presence. The clothes were brand-new—mainly because his luggage had been lost by one of the six airlines he had been on in the past four days, and was presently at least twenty-four hours and several thousand miles behind him. Bolan himself felt edgy from two weeks of nearly constant travel, all in pursuit of one man.
Kim Dae-jung was a renegade nuclear scientist who’d defected from North Korea after working ten years at the highest levels of that country’s nuclear program. The U.S. had mounted an audacious, top-secret mission to free him, only to suffer the embarrassment of having him give the slip to his handlers and walk out of his hotel in Sydney, Australia. Since then, he’d been traveling around the world, freely spending the ten million he’d stolen from the North Korean government, rarely staying more than one night in the same place, and being chased by an assortment of agents and operatives from several nations, including assassins from his homeland who were tasked with assuring Dae-jung took any military and national secrets to his grave.
Despite his flamboyant style—he favored Dom Perignon champagne and the most expensive luxury suites in every hotel he’d been at—the diminutive Korean had the devil’s own luck, escaping government dragnets in several countries. The President had contacted Stony Man Farm and requested that Hal Brognola see if Bolan was available to perform an extraction on short notice.
Along with much of the American intelligence community, Bolan considered North Korea to be one of the largest threats to U.S. security, second only to China. The knowledge inside Dae-jung’s head could give analysts invaluable insight into that country’s nuclear program. After hearing from the big Fed, Bolan had been on a flight to Australia in three hours.
From there it had a bewildering tour of cities around Southeast Asia. He’d picked up the high-rolling scientist’s trail in Port Moresby and had missed him by three hours in Manila. From there, Bolan had passed through the glitter of Hong Kong, Tokyo and Bangkok, until they all blurred together in swaths of neon and steel, mirrored skyscrapers and plush hotels. Every time he landed, he was just one step behind the man. Along the way, he’d crossed paths and swords with men and women from British and Russian intelligence, as well as at least two hit teams, one from North Korea and a Chinese group. Brognola and Bolan figured they wanted the scientist dead before he could reveal China’s sales of enriched plutonium and other nuclear material to the regime.
This luxury hotel was the best lead and the closest he’d been to Dae-jung so far.
The soldier finished his sweep and found an unoccupied table at the bar, ordering a ginger ale from the server who magically appeared at his elbow. “I’ve canvassed the entire casino floor. Plenty of whales swimming in this ocean, but Dae-jung isn’t one of them.”
His words were transmitted through a tiny, flesh-colored microphone glued to the base of his jaw. They were then sent through a relay of satellites back to Stony Man Farm in Virginia, and the gruff answering voice of Hal Brognola came back to him through an equally tiny earpiece in his right ear. Both communication devices were slaved to the smartphone holstered at his belt, which provided power and a signal boost as well as high-level encryption for both sides of the conversation, ensuring no eavesdroppers.
“If he’s not there, he’s probably in his room. Have you identified any hostiles on-site yet?”
“None I can see—if they are around, they’re staying out of view.”
Brognola chuckled. “Easier for them than you, eh, Striker?”
Even through his fatigue, Bolan smiled. “Yeah—unless I’m crouching, it’s hard for me to blend in. Do we know which room he’s in? There are a lot of suites in the hotel, and I’d rather not kick in the wrong door if I can help it.”
“Akira says a man matching Dae-jung’s description is staying in the Chairman Suite on the fifty-fourth floor. He’s working on getting you access to the secure elevators as we speak.”
Bolan drained his ginger ale in one long drink and set the empty glass on the table. “Tell Akira he’s got about three minutes to open those doors.” Rising, he walked toward the casino’s main doors, which slid open at his approach, the air-conditioned