Until these guns were used to kill people in Peru.

The Executioner wasn't going to let that happen this time. Payment was due in full for what had gone down already, and he was going to collect.

Starting now.

Bolan had seen what looked like an Uzi resting against a box between the workers. No doubt more firepower lay around the area within easy reach. Five to one odds. Not bad, particularly with the advantage of surprise. However, he didn't want to chance that the guy in the office might signal McIntyre before Bolan arrived to deliver his own personal greeting. He decided to be patient a short while longer and see if a better opportunity presented itself.

Bolan's moves were restricted as long as he was on the upper level, so his first problem was to find a way down without alerting the crew. Discarding the coveralls to increase his mobility, he crept to a rear corner stairway that led to the lower level. The ground floor was littered with old packing materials and drums, so it would be easy to conceal himself once he got there. But he'd have to wait for a distraction, since the stairwell was in plain sight of everyone below.

He resumed his watch, steeled to the waiting by long hours of suspense on a thousand battlefields.

Hurry-up-and-wait was an experience familiar to every soldier, and Bolan had learned to master the boredom without sacrificing his alertness.

Sometimes the numbers counted down fast, and when he had, Bolan could move with the speed of a striking cobra. But he believed that when time allowed it was better to let the other guy make the mistake, the momentary inattention or bad move that made the difference between life or death. It was always a gamble when the Executioner went into battle. One stray bullet by a panicked gunner could obliterate the best-laid plans. War was sometimes a matter of luck, and you had to take your chance and roll the dice with your life bet on the outcome.

But the secret was knowing how much to leave to chance.

In half an hour the workmen had finished packing the illegal arms. The bearded guy emerged from the office to inspect the handiwork, and after a cursory check, he gave his okay. One of the crew jumped aboard a parked forklift, rewed it up and loaded the truck.

Bolan decided that this was the best opportunity he'd have. Unleathering the Beretta, he padded down the stairs, eyes fixed on the chatting group. He was conscious of the stairs creaking under his feet, although the noise couldn't penetrate far above the roar of machinery.

He found an ideal spotting post behind a large old boiler, which afforded a clear view of the office and the single exit, as well as the area around the truck.

When the last crate was stowed, the driver switched off the lift and joined his friends. Bits of conversation drifted to Bolan's hideout, informing him that the guard was to be relieved in eight hours.

Three of the workmen departed while the remaining two made themselves comfortable for the long watch ahead. One pulled a holstered pistol and a small radio from a cloth bag and settled them on a box. He lit a cigarette and tuned in to an L.A. Kings game.

The other gunman sat beside his Uzi and pulled a comic book from a shopping bag.

The two gunners were on the opposite side of the warehouse, near the office entrance. Both were facing the door, although "watching" was too strong a word for the minimal attention they were paying to their job.

Bolan waited another few minutes to be sure that one of the other three wouldn't return for some reason, then began his stalk.

Circling wide to the far end, he eased his way through the dimly lit edges of the warehouse.

Part of his attention was focused on the lazy guards and part was required to make sure that he didn't slip on any of the abundant oil slicks or walk into cast-off bits of garbage.

It would be so easy to just pick off the thugs, seize the weapons and turn them over to an openmouthed Kline. But the agent had been adamant that the big guy keep his hands clean and leave the muscle to the Bureau.

Bolan had to smile as he recalled his brief conversation with Special Agent Kline from a telephone booth at the commuter terminal of San Francisco International.

"Kline? Blanski. I want you to get your team together and be ready to move at my signal. I've got a few things to check out first, and then we should have McIntyre in the bag."

The announcement for the flight to L.A. interrupted him as he was about to sign off, giving the Fed an opening.

"What the hell are you talking about, Blanski? Where are you? I didn't authorize any of this." Bolan could almost feel the receiver heat up in his hand as Kline's anger was transmitted across the connection. "Blanski, I want an explanation and full details."

"You'll get what I give you, and that's all you're getting now."

"Who the hell do you think you are? There are procedures that must be followed, and I'm not about to blow this case on account of some undisciplined renegade, even if you are connected." The sarcastic emphasis on the last word was not lost to Bolan.

Kline clearly had no appreciation of Bolan's take-charge way of doing things. He obviously hadn't learned that procedure was of little value when the top-ranked crime mongers were involved. The criminal elite were rats, clever and wary, and if you gave them even a second's head start, they would take advantage of the delay and scramble back into the gutters and garbage piles where they'd come from.

Still, a little PR wouldn't hurt, but he had better be fast. The last call for Flight 602 to L.A. rang through the busy terminal. Bolan softened his tone slightly. "Don't worry, Kline. I'm just going to recce the situation and relay back. Then you can swoop in for the kill."

The agent seemed slightly mollified; either that or he recognized when he was outmatched.

"Listen up, Blanski, and listen good. I want this reconnaissance of yours clean."

Here it comes, Bolan reflected, the FBI by-the-book lecture. He knew it by heart and had to restrain himself from just dropping the receiver and letting Kline ramble on to himself.

"In other words, look but don't touch. The minute, and I mean the very minute that you have anything, I expect this phone to ring. Make no mistake, if you so much as muss the hair of any of the suspects your ass will be wrapped so tight in interagency paperwork that you'll be lucky if you ever get out from under. And I don't care who you're working for. You got that?"

"I heard you, Kline." Bolan hung up and ran for the plane.

He shoved Kline's warning into his mental file under C, for crap, then coiled for action.

Fifteen feet away from the two guards, Bolan let loose with the Beretta, one silenced round exploding the radio into chips of circuit board and flying plastic.

"Don't even think about it," Bolan growled as the two men spun to face him. The man on the left, the older of the two, settled back with an expression of anger written across his face as he slowly raised his hands above his head. He didn't spare a glance for the holstered pistol three feet in front of him.

The second guard was young, long-haired and muscular. Eyes flickering back and forth between Bolan and the Uzi just beyond arm's reach telegraphed the kid's foolish impulse.

"Get your..." Bolan barked, but the kid made his move anyway, falling to his left. Battle-trained reflexes gave the proper response, and the Beretta spit a 3-round burst as the guy dived for the Uzi.

All three rounds grouped around the gunner's left ear, blowing his brains in a red hail over his bag of superhero comics. Bolan felt no remorse. The kid's own stupidity in making a suicide play had killed him.

That's what happened when comic-book fantasy was confused with real life.

The surviving gunner raised his hands a little higher, eyes bulging as his companion collapsed across the Uzi.