Flipping open his multiband impulse transmitter, the Able Team electronics specialist laughed as he keyed a series of digital codes. "Now you see them..."

Simultaneous explosions ripped the darkness in one shattering crack of C-4. A sound like hundreds of flying bullets followed as a storm of steel pellets penetrated the distance, shattering glass, bouncing off steel, imbedding in wood, rattling on sheet metal.

The return fire had died. In silence, the contrasand North Americans dragged their prisoner into the panel truck. Brushing glass and plastic shards off the seat, Blancanales turned on the ignition and accelerated away.

"Take the same way out as we came in," Gadgets shouted. "That way's got the radio-pops."

"Hit the button on the bedroom!" Lyons told Gadgets.

"Ain't safe," Gadgets answered. "Gotta wait until we're around the corner."

With the muzzle of his Konzak, Lyons smashed what remained of the windshield. He jerked back the actuator to chamber the first 12-gauge round. But he saw no targets.

Skidding around the corner, they saw the effect of Gadgets's radio-detonated claymores. Where a group of militiamen had been firing from the barracks, only rags and torn flesh remained. Vast streams of blood flowed from headless, limbless corpses. The volleys of steel pellets had denuded the grounds of landscaping, shattered every window, punched hundreds of holes in the barracks.

Gadgets keyed another code. Another blast shook the night. "I declare that guy gone."

Roaring through the complex, they encountered other headlights. Militiamen were running in all directions. In the confusion, no one fired at the speeding truck. Lyons, low in the seat, kept his Konzak ready. Gadgets, looking back, saw the living gather around the dead. A few rifle shots resounded from inside the bungalows.

Blancanales maneuvered the Dodge between a large truck and a cargo container in the storage area, parking behind a stack of telephone poles. As the others dragged out the Syrian, Blancanales braced his silenced Beretta on the poles and methodically extinguished the lights along the security perimeter. In the distance, the one-sided firefight continued.