Seeing Red (Gareth Red Thrillers Book 1)

by Nick Thacker

  He thought about it. His father could have put in a good word for him, but he doubted his father was in anyone’s good graces enough that a favor — one way or another — was likely. His coordinator at the camp he’d just come from had not been a fan of Gareth, always giving him hell and treating him like a recruit.

  So whomever had set this all in motion was a mystery. He wondered if that was a good thing — the person needed to keep their identity out of the picture for everyone’s safety — or if there was something more sinister going on.

  Still, it seemed odd that Gareth had been chosen. Perhaps he was in the right place at the right time, or perhaps it really was as simple as he’d imagined: Gareth Red was the most average, expendable soldier they had, with just enough of the skill sets needed to tackle this little mission and get the job done. No one back home would bat an eye if he didn’t make it out alive, and no one at the bank would owe him anything beyond the money they’d promised him if he succeeded.

  It was curious, but Gareth liked curiosities. He liked to feel needed, and he liked mysteries. He was no detective, but the bank lady had made this mission sound like it was more about shooting people than following clues. He was a history buff and liked problem-solving, so if there were a few clues to decipher along the way, even better.

  He sighed, draining the last bit of Crown and Coke, and stood up, careful not to bump his head against the hard plastic of the curved overhead bin doors. He turned and walked back toward the rear restrooms, then started opening the bins.

  Roderick had been correct. Each of the bins contained an arsenal of equipment, all packaged neatly in plastic storage containers, compressed into airtight bags, or folded neatly and placed in rucksacks.

  He felt giddy for a moment — he loved survival gear, including tents and sleeping bags and all manner of tools and gadgets. In one small bin he found a perfectly organized BOB — a bug-out bag, intended for use when ‘the shit hit the fan.’ Everything he would need to survive for weeks, even months, in the middle of nowhere, with no one around to help. Coupled with an already expert-level of survival knowledge, Gareth felt like he could stretch the BOB’s use for up to a year. After that, he’d be reliant on his environment for support.

  But he had no plans whatsoever to spend a year in this place.

  He was going to be well-prepared for the mission: take out the bad guy, whoever that may be. And he felt even more prepared when he opened the next set of overhead bins.

  An entire armory stared back at him, dimly lit by the yellow and orange track lights inside each compartment. The first bin held every conceivable make and model of pistol and handgun, and the second held small-arms fire like assault rifles, submachine guns, and even some old-school artifacts he’d once imagined collecting.

  Finally, in the last bin, he found what he was really hoping he’d find: a pair of long-range rifles. A VKS bolt-action, the Vykhlop. Put in service a little over a decade ago for the special forces units of the Russian Federation’s Federal Security Service. Full boxes of 12.7x55mm subsonic round ammunition, prepared in magazines and ready for use, all matching the weapons they were to go with.

  He felt like a kid in a candy store. These guys really aren’t on a budget, are they? he thought. There was enough firepower in here to take out an entire unit, and then some, singlehandedly.

  He hoped he wouldn’t have to.

  He left the bins open but headed back to the end of the plane, pulling out the rucksack and containers labeled ‘parkas’ and ‘snow pants.’ The rucksack had a few pairs of long underwear and heavy-duty winter socks, so he tried those on first. Snow pants and undercoat came next, followed by the snow parka. By the time he was on to the boots, he was burning up. The parka was not military-issue, but one of the fancy brands he’d seen in sporting goods stores. It was downright hot inside, and he hoped it wouldn’t be overkill to wear it around in Irkutsk.

  After trying on the clothing and finding it adequately sized, he decided to keep the boots on to break them in a bit. If he was going to be trudging through any tundra or wooded area, he’d need every possible edge, including comfortable shoes.

  He slept next, wearing the boots and the long-john underwear and a t-shirt, surprisingly comfortable. The flight attendant, Roderick, came by to check on him when Gareth woke once, but when the night turned darker and the plane’s interior lights dimmed to a nearly nonexistent glow, he passed out for good.

  It was the captain’s words over the speaker system that work him next.

  “Time to get your winter clothes on; we’re landing at 0300 hours.”

  Gareth looked at his watch. He’d made sure to set it according to the time zone Roderick had given him, and apparently that meant they’d be touching down in less than half an hour.

  9

  YAKUTSK WAS THE SORT OF city Gareth had only ever read about. He didn’t actually think anyone lived there, and he certainly never imagined he’d be visiting. He remembered it vaguely from boot-camp nights spent playing Risk, the world-domination game, piling all his troops in the small Russian country to prevent a counterattack from Alaska and whomever controlled the continent of North America.

  He loved Risk. It was a game that balanced a perfect combination of luck and skill, two requirements for life and board games. A great strategy could win the day, but it always required just a taste of luck.

  He tried to rack his brain to think of anything else useful about Yakutsk. He knew it was Russian, in Siberia, and that it was a port city. He thought he’d read about it hosting one of the world’s best mammoth and fossil museums, but he’d never visited.

  Actually, he’d never visited Russia. He’d traveled as far east as the Ukraine, but that was only for a stopover during a training mission years ago. Russia had tempted him many times, as its rich history and significant tourist attractions often tempted people like Gareth. His interest in history, the stories behind the men and women who’d built the world, and the great wars that had been waged on just about every corner of the globe fascinated him.

  So he was at once excited to see this great land for himself, while also hesitant. He had no idea what to expect, and he had no idea what his actual marching orders were. Unlike the military, he had no brief that gave him coordinates, checkpoints, and very specific calling times to check in with superior officers.

  As far as he could tell, the banker woman and her staff on the plane intended to drop him off in a strange land and hope he’d succeed.

  He was only partially right.

  Roderick appeared just as they landed in Yakutsk, dressed to the nines in full-on winter apparel. “Another drink before we get going, sir?” he asked, his characteristic accent still strong, and still just beyond recognition.

  Gareth looked him up and down, slowly. “Uh, hey, Roderick. You getting off here, too?”

  Roderick smiled. “I am not just a flight attendant, Mr. Red.”

  Gareth nodded. “I see. Well, I was under the impression I would be working alone.”

  Roderick knelt down on a knee, and Gareth noticed for the first time that the man was still taller than him. He must have been six-five, at least. Gareth wasn’t short by any stretch, either, but Roderick had a couple inches on him.

  “You will be working alone, Mr. Red. My boss has instructed me to accompany you to wherever it is you feel it necessary to go.”

  Gareth laughed. “Well, I don’t exactly feel it necessary to go to this tiny little podunk corner of frozen hell. How about Cancun? I hear that’s nice this time of year?”

  “I am also instructed to ensure you arrive in Yakutsk safely and with preparations to embark on our mission.”

  Gareth looked up at him. “Yeah, again man. I typically work alone. Why are you tagging along?”

  “Moral support?”

  “Okay, great. Need some of that. Stay out of the way, you hear?”

  Roderick smiled. “Indeed, sir.”

  Gareth stood and walked to the back of the plane just as it
hit the tarmac. He held out a hand and grabbed the seat back behind him to hold his balance, then continued walking. He reached for the undercoat, parka, and ski pants he’d selected earlier, then began dressing.

  When he finished, they were stopped.

  “This is it?” Gareth asked Roderick.

  Roderick nodded, but was busy piling ammunition into his pockets, two rifles already slung over his shoulder. Gareth noticed a pair of Makarov pistols in a chest holster, and another .380 just above his boot.

  “You, uh, planning for the apocalypse, Roderick?”

  Roderick looked back at Gareth. “Never can be too prepared.”

  “Well, sure. But I thought this was just a find-the-bad-guy-and-take-him-out sort of mission? You’re packing like we’re going to run into some serious shit.”

  Roderick frowned. “As I said, never can be too prepared.”

  Gareth looked his flight attendant up and down once more, again surprised by the amount of surprises the man had up his sleeves. The real surprise will be if he knows how to use all that gear, he thought.

  “And yes,” Roderick said. “I know how to use this gear.”

  “Well then,” Gareth said. “Let’s get a move on. Don’t want to waste daylight.”

  He looked out the porthole window in the plane’s fuselage and saw that it was far from daybreak. They’d have plenty of daylight to spare, even if they walked to their next destination.

  Gareth flung on the overcoat — a parka that seemed to be made of an entire polar bear, then tucked everything in and tightened the belt around his waist. He made sure he grabbed two extra pistols, not wanting to be outdone by his new flight-attendant-turned-assassin buddy, and then he went in for the piece de resistance: the rifle he’d seen earlier. He hadn’t done much training on it, but it was a solid piece, and this one seemed to be in fine condition. Oiled and ready for a battle, weighted and sighted just as he would have done.

  “Ready, Mr. Red?” Roderick asked.

  Gareth nodded. “Even if there’s an entire Russian army out there, I feel like we’ve got enough to take them.”

  He walked toward the front of the plane, where the main exit doors stood open. The cold air hit him as he neared the door, but it didn’t truly affect him until he’d reached the threshold.

  A gust of wind hit, nearly knocking him backwards into the mess area near the cockpit. He caught his balance, noticing that Roderick was already out and waiting for him.

  “Come on, Mr. Red. A little cold never killed anyone.”

  Gareth steeled himself, pushed forward, fighting against the wind, and thrust his hesitant body through the open door of the plane and out into the tundra.

  There was wind. There was no humidity. There was a dry, life-sucking air. And there was cold.

  So much cold.

  The cold he felt was the worst feeling he’d ever experienced in his life, and he felt every ounce of his body retreating back into itself, trying to escape it.

  The wind was howling, deafening even, but Roderick turned and yelled to Gareth anyway.

  “Welcome to Yakutsk, Mr. Red.”

  10

  THE TRUCK WAS THE KIND of piece of crap Gareth would have expected to find in Mexico, when he’d spent a summer there studying geography and Mayan history. Riding low to the ground, the smallest tires he imagined could be street legal, and an engine that whined harder than a vacuum clearer trying to suck up an entire swimming pool.

  And yet that was their ride. Roderick jumped into the driver’s seat, eagerly ready to get out of the cold, and Gareth — faced with the option of getting inside the truck or standing out in the blistering cold — followed suit.

  His gear made it difficult, but he managed to swing his rucksack and rifle up and over the seat back onto the tiny rear seat area where Roderick had laid his own gear. He then moved the front seat back a bit, to account for his longer legs, and then jumped in.

  The truck was barely warmer than the outside air.

  “This thing have heat?” Gareth asked.

  Roderick looked at him. “After we get moving, yes.”

  “Well then let’s get moving, compadre. I’m freezing my —

  “You’re the one who took so long,” Roderick said. “Let us get moving.”

  Gareth stared at his companion. Is this guy for real? He shrugged it off. Whatever.

  Roderick began driving away from the plane, ostensibly waiting on a tarmac no one could see under the blizzard conditions they were in. Snow piled high on the runway, and Gareth only hoped his new teammate had the sense to turn on a GPS navigation unit.

  But he saw no such unit.

  “How do you know where you’re going?” Gareth asked. “I can’t even see the road.”

  “No road here,” Roderick said.

  Gareth waited, but apparently that was the entire answer to the question.

  “Right,” he said. “Got it. So where we headed?”

  “Oymayakon,” Roderick answered.

  “Is that… like… on the beach? Where there’s sunlight?”

  “No,” Roderick said. “Coldest city on earth.”

  “And we’re going there… now?”

  “Well, two days.”

  Gareth was starting to get pissed. “Hold on, Rod. You’re telling me we just flew halfway around the world and we’re not even there yet? We’ve got two more days of this shit?”

  “Less than two days,” Roderick replied, his eyes not leaving the ‘road,’ or whatever it was he thought he saw in front of them. “I drive fast.”

  “Even better. Driving fast on… whatever it is we’re driving on… just to get to someplace even worse. Christ, no wonder they’re giving me…” he stopped.

  Gareth didn’t want to out the full details of his situation, for fear that his teammate, for better or worse, wasn’t privy to the same information about Gareth’s pay.

  “Your one million dollars US?” Roderick said.

  Gareth looked over at the driver.

  “I told them it was high, but they disagreed.

  “Ah, well, thank them for me.” Gareth turned to look at the white nothingness outside his window. “Asshole.”

  “If it makes you feel better, they are only paying me half that,” Roderick said.

  Gareth smiled, then looked back at Rod. “You know what, buddy? It does make me feel better. It makes me feel much better. Thank you for that.”

  Roderick, for the first time since they’d met, smiled.

  “Oh, and you’re a human, too, I see,” Gareth said. “That’s also nice to know.”

  Roderick looked over at Gareth. “I am very much human, my friend. Wife and children, even.”

  “Well it sounds like we’ll have plenty of time to chat about them, won’t we?”

  “Two days. Or less. I —”

  “I know,” Gareth interrupted. “You drive fast.”

  11

  AND DRIVE FAST HE DID. They stopped twice — once to fill up at a gas station, and another time to relieve themselves on the side of the road. Gareth was able to sleep most of the way, and Roderick never asked him to drive.

  Gareth was fine with that arrangement, even though he was still a bit confused about who this guy was and why he was here with him. He knew unknowns were a huge liability to any mission, but Roderick, so far, seemed to have a good head on his shoulders.

  Even better, he was clear about the hierarchy: Gareth was in charge, and Roderick didn’t seem to have a problem with that. He’d even gone so far as to tell Gareth that he was making half the pay.

  So Gareth decided to keep his mouth shut and see what became of all this. Maybe it would be a simple mission — just a smash and grab, take out the bad guy and get home — or maybe it would be something Roderick’s skills — whatever they were — would be useful for. Either way, Gareth knew his mission was simple: find whoever it was killing these rich folks, and take them out of the equation. It would be straightforward, clean, simple. Not much to it.

&nbs
p; After being in the car for the better part of thirty hours, Roderick pulled over at a rest stop.

  “Here,” he said.

  “Here… where?” Gareth asked.

  “Oymyakon. Coldest city on earth.”

  Gareth had also checked that stat during their drive. Oymyakon was, in fact, the city with the coldest recorded temperature in history. At one point in the town’s history hitting nearly minus-100, Oymyakon was little more than a backcountry town on the way to somewhere else. Two days — or less, if Roderick was driving — from Urkutsk, Oymyakon was nothing but a stop off, a few buildings scattered about near a gently sloping mountain range.

  “Okay, now what?” Gareth asked. He figured that the entire reason Roderick had been sent here with him was to play the role of some sort of sage, or at least a right-hand man. So far, too, it seemed that Roderick had knowledge that Gareth would need.

  “We need to find the person we’re here to find.”

  “That’s cryptic and completely unhelpful, Roderick.”

  “Well, do you have any better ideas?”

  Gareth thought for a moment. “Do they have any McDonalds’ here? I could use a burger.”

  “No.”

  “Okay, then let’s find your guy. Who is he?”

  Roderick made sure Gareth was looking before he spoke again. Even though they were still in the relatively warm truck, he lowered his voice. “The victims have all been heavily invested in a single company. A textile firm, called Likur Holdings.”

  “Textiles?”

  “Just a holding company,” Roderick said. “Likely something entirely different. But it tends to be easier to trade and hide from authorities when the company is legally registered that way.”

  “Got it. Okay, so we’re trying to find Likur Holdings? Way out here?”

  “The woman you spoke with on the phone is my boss as well. She knew most of the victims, and she says it is likely the person we are here to see could be one of the victims as well.”