Firebase Seattle

It was to be one which none of them would ever forget.

18

Firetrack

The impressive vehicle was totally darkened, engine idling quietly, sitting just in off the road at about dead center, maybe fifty yards from the building.

As warehouses go, it seemed small. Floodlights marked the corners at roof level but were barely visible in the choking mists. "

"I can't see a damned thing," Leo Turrin complained.

"Relax," Brognola suggested.

"It's two thirty. He's been out there about ten minutes."

"He knows what he's doing."

"Sure."

Both men were peering tensely through the wet windshield. Brognola's .38 lay on the seat beside him. Turrin was not armed. He said, "He's right, you know. This ishis element. Me, I have two left feet. And I even get dizzy in my own bedroom if all the lights are out."

"Relax, Leo. That's a hell of a man out there. He knows what he's doing."

"Hell, I know that. I just wish I knew what he's doing."

"I'd settle for knowing why," Brognola said. "What d'you suppose he's really stumbled onto, Leo?"

"It could be anything. The guy has an unca

"I'm just afraid he got quite a nose full, this time."

"Looks that way, doesn't it. Do you really think ...?"

Brognola sighed heavily and turned away from the glass. "Hell, I don't know, Leo. I'm getting so I don't trust my own guts anymore. They're tied up so often, over so much — sometimes I wonder if I've just gone full paranoid and the rest of the world is really sane and beautiful."

"Well, sure, a guy gets to that. But I don't think you're paranoid, Hal.

"From one suspect to another, eh? Thanks for nothing."

Turrin chuckled.

A misty draft swirled into the vehicle. Brognola scooped up the .38 and whirled smoothly toward the midsection then relaxed with a relieved sigh as a black-clad figure materialized there and the door slid shut.

"Home is the scout," Turrin greeted him. "What's the lie out there?"

The federal official holstered his pistol and stepped back to make room for Bolan's entry into the cockpit.

The "scout" dropped into the command chair and immediately began doing things at the mini-console. "Very close out there," he reported. "Visibility's about five feet, and I'm giving that the benefit of some doubt. Here's the setup. It's a hard house. No windows. No perso

Brognola asked, "Did you get inside?"

"Not yet."

Bolan was flipping switches, operating levers. A viewplate about the size of a small portable television screen swung into position, glowing reddishly. "Guard shack just outside the rolldoor," he continued. "There was a sentry in there, a Franciscus type."

"Was?" Turrin asked absently, gazing with interest at the glowing screen.

"Yeah, was. And there's still a vehicle at the end of the building, north side. People inside but I didn't try for a headcount. It's a crew, though."

Brognola tapped the viewplate and asked, "What's this thing?"

"Monitor for the optics capability," Bolan explained. "Watch, now, and I'll give you a look at that guardshack."

He punched a button and made a lever adjustment. A resolution of focus resulted, then a small reddish beam appeared at center screen. After another minor adjustment, the front wall of the warehouse appeared in a weirdly red-tinged circle, then the guardhouse leapt into resolution.

"Be damned," Turrin muttered. "Infra-red."

"Laser-supplemented," Bolan said.

"How far can you see with that thing?" Brognola wondered.

"In this atmosphere, that's about maximum range. I can get a mile in reasonably dry air."

"I've heard of these," the official said. "Some police agencies are getting into it. On a smaller scale, I would imagine — nothing this elaborate."

Turrin said, "People out there don't even know you're spotlighting them."

"Not unless they have receptors," Bolan said. He was busy at another set of controls. "Seeing's nice, but it's not always enough. I'm going to — Hal, you may not want to be around while this is happening. Step into the toilet if you'd rather not."

"To hell with that," Brognola growled. "I'm staying."

The JD official was "staying" for a rather mind-boggling demonstration of the warwagon's combat capabilities.

A rocket launcher was built into the roof of the vehicle — normally retracted and concealed from view beneath flush-fit panels. Upon command from below, the motorized swivel-platform raised and locked into position for firing.

Targeting was entirely controlled from the command position below, operating through electronic circuitry tied into the regular optics system. A floor-mounted, foot-controlled device which Bolan labeled "a rock-and-press trackfire" provided control of both targeting and firing without using the hands.

Reloading, Bolan explained, was not practicable during the heat of combat, though. It was a "four-shot system." Within that limitation, however, a guy with a supple ankle and a steady foot could unleash considerable destruction.

Bolan brought the system on line by depressing the "Fire Enable" button on his miniconsole. A small amber light began flashing, in an indication that the launch platform was being raised. As it locked into place, a green light signalled that event and immediately the optics were taken over by the Fire Control System. Rangemarks then became superimposed on the viewscreen, and the system was "Go."

Explaining the operations in terse reportage to his companions as he went through the steps, Bolan rocked the floor control into azimuth and range corrections, centering the rangemarks on the warehouse door.

"Last chance to tell it goodbye," he said quietly.

Turrin muttered. "I will be damned. How do you fire it?"

"Like this," Bolan replied. He banged his knee with a fist. A "whoosh" and momentary brightness signalled the departure of the "hot bird." It flashed into the foreground of the viewscreen and whizzed straight along the horizontal beam on a tail of flame to impact almost immediately on target with thunder and considerable lightning. That heavy atmosphere out there was momentarily torn by a flash that briefly illuminated the mists with white-hot incandescence and set the night trembling into retreat.

Brognola growled, "I'm impressed." It was an understatement. He could not look away. As viewed through the optics, great puffing flame-lined clouds had replaced the warehouse door as well as substantial adjacent areas.

And the "picture" was changing rapidly now as Bolan realigned targeting on a starboard scan — halting suddenly, correcting and centering on the nose of a vehicle just then emerging at high speed around the corner of the building.

Bolan thumped his knee again to depress the foot-control, and another whizzer streaked along that tu

Leo Turrin wheeled away from that with a queasy, "My God!"

"Their God," Bolan growled fiercely. "Let it eat them."

A martialing area, sure. Also, if the evidence could be correctly read, some sort of an assembly plant.

Empty crates and cartons were stacked almost to the ceiling at one end of the building. At the other end were greasy work benches, heavy tools scattered about, chain lifts, equipment dollies. Elsewhere scattered throughout the building were unopened crates of various sizes, all stacked in neat rows, each of which were identified by crude, hand-lettered signs attached to the end cases.