Assassin's Code. Don Pendleton

but not so high they would need oxygen. Keller looked askance at Bolan and finally aired the question that had been bothering her the entire day. “So…”

      “Yeah?”

      “Didn’t this guy try to kill you this morning?”

      “That he did.”

      Bolan and Keller watched as the jumpmaster solicitously gave Ous a fresh bag. He had stopped vomiting and now he was hyperventilating. Ous was wide-eyed as he worked the barf bag like a bellows.

      The jumpmaster gave Bolan a sidelong look. “You jumping into a hot LZ with this guy?”

      “He’ll be fine once he has dust beneath his boots,” Bolan replied, “and with luck the LZ won’t be hot until we light it up.” Bolan checked the pair of Navy MP-5 SD-N sound-suppressed submachine guns a final time and then attached the weapon and his pouch of six magazines to his web gear. Ous’s gaze flew around the cabin in mounting panic as Bolan clipped his weapon to his harness. He gasped as Bolan pulled night-vision goggles over the man’s eyes.

      “Listen, you’re going to be fine,” Bolan said. “Just remember what I showed you. Arch hard when we go out the door. I’ll take care of everything else.”

      The jumpmaster assisted Bolan in buckling in Ous. The soldier could smell the fear oozing off the man. So could the jumpmaster, and he gave Bolan another look as he gave the straps and buckles a second going over. The intercom crackled. “One minute! Going dark!”

      The interior cabin lights went off, and the red emergency lights came on. Bolan pulled his goggles over his eyes and adjusted the gain slightly. The jumpmaster opened the door and the wind roared into the cabin.

      Keller put a hand on Bolan’s armored shoulder. “Luck!”

      “Thanks!”

      “One minute!”

      Bolan nudged Ous, and the two of them did the awkward tandem-man shuffle to the door. Ous made a terrible noise in the back of his throat.

      “Remember,” Bolan said. “A hard arch!”

      “Get ready!” the jumpmaster shouted.

      The intercom crackled for the final time. “We are on target! Jumpers away!”

      “Go! Go! Go!” the jumpmaster called.

      Ous’s hands slammed into the door frame in mortal terror.

      “Go!” the jumpmaster called.

      Bolan spoke above the roar of the wind in the door and tried to take a step forward. “Ous! We gotta go!”

      Ous’s body went rigid.

      “Go!” the jumpmaster bellowed.

      Ous shuddered with horror in the door frame.

      “Ous!” Bolan snarled in Ous’s ear. “What’s your wife’s name?”

      “What…”

      “Your wife! Her name!” Bolan demanded.

      “Yamina, my wife’s name is—”

      “Your children! Their names!”

      “My son, his name is Esfandyar,” Ous replied.

      “And your daughter?”

      “Afshan.”

      “For them, Ous! Yamina! Esfandyar! Afshan! You’ve gotto do this! For them! I’m with you.” Bolan spoke with deadly seriousness. “God is great, Ous, and by God our cause is righteous!”

      Ous squeezed his eyes shut, clenched his teeth and released the door frame. “Allahu akbar,” he whispered.

      The jumpmaster gave Bolan a helpful slam between the shoulder blades with both hands. “See ya!”

      Bolan and Ous flew out into the jet stream. Ous failed to give Bolan a hard arch and they tumbled wildly in the shrieking, streaming darkness with Ous screaming in the Tajik of his youth and flailing his limbs. Bolan idly considered choking him out. He still owed the Afghani for the six surgical stitches in his arm. Bolan let him flail a few moments more. Despite what one saw in the movies, it was almost impossible to have a conversation during free fall. The soldier waited for a few more moments as they fell like stones to the dark Earth below. When Ous momentarily ran out of breath. Bolan slapped him hard on the side of his helmet. Ous stopped his flailing. Bolan slapped the helmet once, twice, three times more.

      Ous suddenly got it and managed his arch.

      It was enough. Bolan extended his arms and legs to make ailerons of his limbs. It was awkward with a large man strapped to him, but the big American managed to gracefully turn the two of them over into a belly-down position. He pulled the rip cord and the big tandem chute deployed. Ous clenched like a spider about to get stepped on as their straps cinched against them with the sudden pull. The roar of free fall disappeared. The strain was gone and their legs dangled like a carnival ride as Bolan took the toggles. He began a slow, comfortable spiraling descent over Ous’s village. Ous lifted his head slightly and began peering around, taking in the world below him through the greens and grays of night-vision equipment.

      “It is not an unpleasant sensation,” he stated.

      “No, it’s not,” Bolan agreed. “Which house is yours?”

      Ous examined the village beneath them and pointed. “Slightly away from the main village, to the west, among the orchards, there.”

      It appeared a life of war hadn’t treated Omar Ous too badly. His house was bigger than most. Not bad for a wanted man. Bolan took in what looked like perhaps four or five hectares of orderly, terraced rows of fruit trees and a corral and stable for horses. It appeared Ous owned a Toyota Landcruiser and an ex-Soviet era GAZ-69 utility vehicle. Bolan picked a lane in the trees about a hundred yards from the house. They were the best source of cover on the valley floor. “Get ready, lift your legs…now!”

      The earth swung up beneath Bolan’s boots and he flared his chute. A few cherry branches broke as the shrouds enveloped them, and the trees took the two warriors’ combined weight. The crackings and snappings seemed as loud as gunshots, but no gunfire or shouts of alarm ensued. Ous became a deadweight as they lost all lift. Bolan bent his knees and they both hit the ground in a fairly professional manner. It was cherry-picking season, and a small hail of fruit fell upon them from above. Bolan instantly got him and Ous separated and out of their harnesses. Both men unclipped and checked their weapons. Bolan flicked his selector to full-auto. “On my six.”

      “My family—”

      “I’m on point, Ous.” Bolan moved through the heavily laden trees. He dropped to a crouch behind the bole of a tree by the edge of the orchard, and Ous knelt next to him. There was a nicker from the stables and a goat ambled past, drawn by the smell of the fallen cherries. “You notice anything?”

      Ous stared at his house for long moments, nearly vibrating with the need to burst in with guns blazing. “Yes, my dogs should have already greeted me or attacked you.”

      That was enough for Bolan. He clicked his link. “Bear, I’m calling the domicile taken. High probability of hostiles and hostages inside.”

      “Copy that, Striker,” Kurtzman came back.

      Bolan turned to Ous. “You have stairs that lead to the roof inside?”

      “I do.”

      Bolan took out a padded grapnel and coil of rope from his pack. “Cover me. Come quickly when I give you the signal.”

      “Indeed.”

      The house was the usual Central Asian structure, a hollow cube with a courtyard inside. In Ous’s case it was a cube with smaller cubes attached as outbuildings. Bolan ran across the dead ground waiting for the weapons in hiding to open up, but made it to the side of the house unscathed. Bolan tossed the foam-covered grapnel up and over the roof. The rasp of the rope