Black Death Reprise. Don Pendleton

blasting through his ever present earbuds, “just not as accurate.”

      “But you’re sure these vents lead into the lab?”

      “Not exactly, Striker,” Aaron “The Bear” Kurtzman, head of the cybernetics team at Stony Man Farm had answered for his subordinate. “We have good photos of the roof. There’s no question these are not general air conditioning or heating inlets. We’re assuming they must be laboratory exhaust and intake. For the type of research Dr. Zagorski does, you’d want a dedicated air system. These fit the bill. We believe those vents lead into the lab.”

      Using advanced computer modeling to enhance the sonar data stream echoed back to satellite transducers, Tokaido had also drawn a rough floor plan of the second story.

      “There’s a stand-alone suite next to where I think the lab is,” he said, tracing with his finger the path Bolan would follow through the air tunnel from the roof to the second floor. He snapped his bubble gum a few times in quick succession before adding, “Private bathroom. Porcelain has a great sonar signature.”

      On missions too numerous to count, Bolan had bet his life on the accuracy of information provided by Stony Man Farm. There was no reason for him to start doubting Aaron Kurtzman’s team now.

      2

      On hands and knees, Bolan moved swiftly through the pitch-black vent, reaching the first intersection at roughly the spot where Tokaido’s diagram had indicated it would be. The air system’s intersecting branches came together between floors, meaning Bolan was already past the third, and directly above the second story where the lab was located. When he came to the T in the tunnel he remembered was close to the end, he removed the goggles and put them away, confident there were no IR sensors in the vent. Although he had engaged enemies on many occasions while wearing night-vision gear, the view in IR mode occasionally shimmered and stalled for a split second when the gallium arsenide photocathode tubes refreshed. For that reason, Bolan avoided using them when he thought gunfire was imminent.

      From his shirt pocket, he pulled a powerful penlight, switched it on, and, holding it between his front teeth, turned into the vent’s left branch. Ahead he could see the outline of an access door Tokaido had told him he thought opened onto a stairwell directly next to the lab. It was the spot where Bolan planned to enter the building proper.

      Upon reaching the door, he found it was neither secured nor grated, enabling him to turn the latch from the inside and swing the hatch open. Dropping silently onto the landing, he switched off and put away the penlight, and while walking to the stairwell entrance, drew his Beretta 93-R. Taking a deep breath, he turned the knob with his free hand and opened the door on silent hinges.

      A wide hallway with a shiny white linoleum floor stretched the entire length of the second floor, dimly illuminated by track lighting running along the ceiling. On both sides of the corridor, two or three doors were located at various points on otherwise blank windowless walls. One was guarded.

      Approximately ten yards away, two men dressed in gray jumpsuits were sitting outside a door on which a security slot similar to those used for hotel rooms was mounted above the latch. As he stepped into the hallway, Bolan’s mind registered two critical facts—each man was wearing a lanyard with a magnetic key card clipped to the end and, within easy reach, two Herstal P-90 submachine guns with thirty-round banana clips extending from their ammo ports leaned against the wall. Before Bolan had progressed three steps, one of the men lunged for his weapon.

      The Beretta 93-R whispered instant death, delivering a 9 mm Parabellum round that slammed into the side of the man’s face before exiting through the back of his skull in a rush of brain tissue and blood that sprayed a fan-shaped pattern of pink droplets onto the white linoleum. The other guard, apparently realizing that the intruder held a lethal advantage, raised his hands over his head and gazed at Bolan with calm eyes.

      He was young, perhaps in his late twenties, with pale blue eyes and a pockmark in the middle of his forehead. Across his right cheek, a deep maroon port-wine stain ran from his temple to the line of his jaw.

      “Do you speak English?” Bolan asked.

      “Oui. Yes.”

      “Where’s Dr. Zagorski?” Bolan asked.

      The man’s eyes shifted for a split second in answer to the question before he replied, “I don’t know.”

      “Are you ready to die?”

      “Yes,” the young man said.

      Bolan motioned with his pistol, said, “Open the door, or I’ll kill you and do it myself with your key card.”

      Without hesitation, the man obeyed, using the magnetic card at the end of his lanyard to gain access.

      The door opened into a cavernous modern facility approximately fifty feet square with vented work stations in every corner, large pieces of scientific equipment along the side walls, and an array of laboratory glassware that filled a series of shelves constructed from floor-to-ceiling against the back wall. Numerous beakers, flasks and spiral pipettes of various sizes were arranged on black slate-topped tables throughout the lab, creating the impression that an entire team of scientists was in the midst of conducting research.

      A doorless frame leading into a free-standing room in the far corner of the lab was in the general area where Tokaido had told him there might be a stand-alone apartment, presumably for Dr. Zagorski.

      As soon as Bolan heard the door close behind him, he rapped the guard at the base of his neck with the Beretta’s hand grip. The man exhaled heavily and went down like a sack of grain.

      “Dr. Zagorski!” Bolan called out as he slipped a nylon tie wrap around the guard’s wrists, securing them behind his back.

      A woman dressed in a dark blue night robe appeared in the open door frame, her disheveled reddish-brown hair testifying to the fact that she had been roused from sleep. Despite her rumpled appearance, Bolan recognized her immediately from the photos Hal Brognola had shown him at their initial meeting.

      “Get me a weapon,” she said before dashing back into the room.

      Bolan opened the door and grabbed one of the guards’ P-90 submachine guns leaning against the wall. As he was pulling back into the lab, the stairwell door he had used flew open, and four or five men dressed in identical gray jumpsuits charged forward, their automatic rifles spitting lead. Tossing the P-90 behind him into the lab, Bolan returned fire with his Beretta, catching the lead man in the chest with a 3-round burst. The steel-jacketed 9 mm rounds hammered him backward into the path of his oncoming comrades, who threw themselves to the floor in order to get out of the intruder’s line of fire.

      Sonia Zagorski, fully dressed in jeans, running shoes and a forest green windbreaker with large flapped pockets in the front, ran to Bolan’s side as he slammed the door.

      “Push this up against it,” she said, motioning to one of the heavy slate-topped work stations.

      The ten-foot, four hundred pound unit was on casters, enabling them to position it against the door before locking the wheels in place.

      “That won’t hold them for long,” she said while grabbing the P-90 from where it lay on the lab floor. Leaning over the fallen guard, who remained unconscious and breathing heavily, she relieved him of three full banana clips, shoving them into one of her windbreaker’s front pockets.

      “Help me drag him over to the wall,” she said, grabbing the guard by a handful of fabric at the top of his shoulder. “He doesn’t have to die.”

      Bolan nodded and they quickly shoved the limp man against the wall next to the door where he’d be away from the hail of bullets that was sure to commence momentarily.

      “Do you have rope?” Zagorski asked, as if she was leading Bolan.

      “Can you use that?” he replied, motioning to the submachine gun while pulling the grappling hook and cord from its pouch.

      The attractive doctor, in whose hands