Welcome to Afghanistan, where the rape of a nation is resisted today by scattered bands of these brave mountain men who had summoned Bolan to join them.

Bolan ranked this country as priority number one in the Executioner's new solo war against the KGB, the worldwide terror organization of the Soviet Union.

The Executioner had first visited this far-off corner of the planet in the midst of a very personal crisis involving a KGB'-sponsored assault on Bolan's base of operations, Stony Man Farm, in the Blue Ridge Mountains near Washington, D.C.

That attack had claimed the life of April Rose, Bolan's woman, and the big soldier still had not worked through the full effects of that loss on his soul.

Bolan's bloody mile of war against the KGB had taken him to Afghanistan and had established a blood debt between Bolan and malik Tarik Khan — the same man.

Bolan and Alja's patrol had an appointment to meet within the next few hours in the foothills outside Kabul, the nation's capital. Bolan had saved the life of Tarik Khan's son during that first mission to this land and the malik, or honored man, considered this a blood debt. The mujahedeen had made contact with Bolan this time by an excessively roundabout method, because Bolan was on the terminate list of the CIA and every other Western power spy agency for his "unsanctioned" activities — no matter how successful — against the KGB.

Initial contact came through a coalition of seven Pakistan-based groups that had waged the guerrilla war against the Soviets since the Russian invasion of Afghanistan: the Islamic Alliance of Afghan Mujahedeen. Bolan's last stop before infiltrating Afghanistan had been the refugee camp in Peshawar, Pakistan.

The scene of human squalor and misery at the camp had at first made Bolan's gut ache, then knotted it with anger.

Something had to be done to stop the cannibals of the Soviet war machine, damn straight. That is why the Executioner returned to Afghanistan. They had moved out at dusk toward the narrow passes through snowcapped mountains to the northwest. Hiding from Soviet air and ground patrols, they traveled by night with packs on donkeys.