Winter Hawk mg-3

by Thomas Craig

  "You can give me a lift, maybe?" Adamov said behind him as his hand gripped the handle of the door. Then he slipped on a loose board and giggled.

  Gant seized on the advantage, gripping it fiercely. Adamov was half crocked with drink. When he turned, Adamov was holding a leather-bound silver flask in his hand, waving it encouragingly.

  "Something to go in the coffee — kill the bugs!" He grinned. "Had to start on the flask. Rum." He sniffed it. "Not bad, either. Couldn't drink the vodka — got no smell. Wouldn't have drowned in the stink of that Uzbek pig." He gestured toward the truck and its driver. "Come on, get the bloody door open — I'm freezing."

  Gant stepped into the narrow, shallow passage behind the door. Wooden floor and walls; uncarpeted, undecorated.

  "How the hell can I give you a lift?" he asked.

  "Why not?" Adamov replied, then bellowed: "Come out, come out, whoever you are!"

  His fist banged against the thin wooden wall, which groaned as if in protest.

  A door ahead of them opened. A woman in black. Muslim dress. Face hidden below the gleaming eyes. A wisp of graying hair. Olive skin. She stood aside, without reluctance and without welcome, simply attempting not to exist. Gant strode past her as Adamov would have expected Captain Borzov of the Frontal Aviation Army to do. Lift, passenger, his mind repeated endlessly, creating waves of heat. He could not, must not kill Adamov.

  Too dangerous. People might know where he was, might be expecting him. The Uzbeks knew he was here. Yet there seemed no other solution. Time was elongating, being wasted. There was no other solution…

  And soon…

  Adamov bellowed something in Uzbek at the woman, as if spiting out something that made him gag. They were evident crudities, an oath, a command.

  'Told her to make some coffee and be quick about it," he explained.

  The woman backed away, black robe sweeping the floor of the low room. Single rug, log fire — no, cakes of something that might have been dried dung — a bare table and chairs, one battered armchair near the fire. It was like a weekend cabin, suggesting no one lived there on any permanent basis. The woman closed the door of what must have been the kitchen behind her. Adamov slumped heavily into the armchair, which puffed dust and creaked with age.

  "God," he murmured. Inspected the flask, and adjusted his holster so that it no longer dug into his hip in the narrow chair. Offered the rum. "Not while on duty?" he asked ironically. "Bad for your night vision, uh?"

  Oil stains on the arms of the old chair, on the bare, scrubbed wood of the table. Gants eyes cast about as if trying to avoid the question. He did not want to drink, should not, but knew that he had to. He had to do more than keep Adamov tipsy, he had to make him drunk. Malleable. He smelled the coffee from beyond the closed door; the smells of cooking, spicy and strange, remained in the dead air of the room. There were loose threads, bare patches, in the one old rug on the floor.

  "Drink?" Adamov asked again.

  "Sure, why not?" Gant replied, taking the proffered flask and tilting it to his lips, sipping at the apparent generous swallow through clenched teeth. He wiped his hps and handed back the flask, coughing and shaking his head ruefully at the quantity he had Pretended to consume.

  You can't kill him, there's no easy way, you can't get rid of the body — so watch him. The killing of a half-drunk man slumped in an Armchair would be easy. Almost any part of him could be broken before he could even move. The situation in which Gant found himself, the watch on his wrist, the Hind outside, beyond where the ^nd rattled the window, all made him jumpy with the tension of Anting to kill and not daring to.

  He crossed to the window and tugged back the thin curtain. He hatched the garage owner straighten, check the reading, then say something to the truck driver. He removed the extension and the funnel, then clipped the nozzle of the hose to the pump. Finished. Full tanks. It was difficult not to sigh with relief.

  The woman returned and put down two tin mugs. The liquid in them was thick and black. She glanced at neither man. Gant realized she was not pretending she didn't exist; it was they who did not exist for her; simply scraps of something blown in by the wind. Adamov cursed her for not handing him his coffee by the fire. She continued to stare at the floorboards as she turned back toward her kitchen. Adamov grimaced at her bodily odor, or perhaps merely at her existence. He rose unsteadily from his chair and lurched toward the table.

  The Uzbek who owned the garage was coming toward the house, slouching against the wall of the wind. Adamov joined Gant. The two of them were framed in the square of window.

  Rum breath, a hand on his shoulder, a grin near his face, eyes unfocused. The familiar voice.

  "Come on, comrade, you can spare the time to give me a lift to Samarkand — nice brothels in Samarkand, good clubs. For the tourists. Clean girls, dirty nights!" He roared with laughter, slapping Gant across the shoulder blades four, five, six, seven times.

  "Anyway," he continued, leaning heavily against Gant, slopping a few drops of the thick black coffee down the front of Gant's flight overalls. "I reckon you can't refuse me, can you? Can't refuse me, mm? More than your future's worth for HQ to get to know you were all the way up here. What you up to, comrade? What's your game?"

  His stubby, thick forefinger, the trigger finger, was prodding against Gant's breastbone, six, seven, eight, nine times, to emphasize the force of his suspicions… twelve, thirteen, fourteen…

  Gant caught and twisted the wrist to which the prodding finger was attached. Adamov yelled in pain.

  "Don't do that, comrade," Gant hissed. "And don't even ask. He released Adamov's wrist. Immediately, the hand made as if to strike, then dropped to the man's side, obeying the gleam in Gant s eyes.

  "All right," Adamov snapped. "Fuck your business, anyway.' 'He turned away—

  — out of the window's well-lit frame, which showed him and Gant like objects in a camera lens to the two Uzbeks. The garage owner was near the window, turning to the steps of the porch. Adamov was pouring more rum into his coffee, his face twisted against the pain in his wrist.

  "OK, a lift is what you want — you can have it," Gant announced, his voice full of mock comradeship and loud enough to be heard—

  — movement, quick and sudden, his hand coming down across the back of Adamov's neck, rabbit-punching him even as he turned. Coffee flew at the chair and fireplace, sizzled on the burning dung, splashed on the dirty floorboards. Adamov's eyes glazed at Gant hugged the body against him.

  The garage owner entered the room sullenly, staring. Adamov leaned against Gant, his unconscious breathing loud and drunken. Gant glared at the Uzbek. He hefted Adamov's weight against his side and growled: "He's drunk. Understand? You speak Russian, pig?" He winced inwardly at the obligatory insult. The Uzbek nodded, rubbing his unshaven chin. Then shrugged.

  "Pay me," he announced in a thick, almost indecipherable accent. And held out his hand to underline his demand.

  "The army pays," Gant replied. The man was in the doorway. Adamov's weight bore against him. He wanted to flee.

  The Hind was outside with full tanks. Reaction to the blow he had struck at Adamov coursed in him. Two minutes before windup, all systems on-line, takeoff. The empty, clean sky was two and a half minutes away from him.

  He flung Adamov into the narrow chair, which squeaked on the bare boards but did not overturn. The GRU captain lay like an abandoned ventriloquist's dummy. The Uzbek's eyes narrowed, and his hands twitched about his belt as if he were searching for a weapon he had mislaid.

  Gant reached into the zippered pocket on the breast of his flight overalls. The Uzbek flinched. Perspiration hovered along Gant's hairline. He pulled out a notepad, a pencil held against it with a rubber band. He removed the band and flipped open the pad.

  "Come here," he snapped, and moved to the table. He began writing. Each sheet of the pad was headed with the insignia of the Frontal Aviation Army and the details of his regiment. He made out a receipt, snapping only once at the Uzbek t
o check the amount of gasoline he had supplied. Then he tore off the sheet and handed it to the Uzbek. "There — an official receipt. Any complaints?" His hand rested lightly on his hip, just above the holster.

  The garage owner shook his head, reluctantly. He folded the recept with an air of resignation and slipped it into the pocket of his haggy trousers. Then he wiped his hands on his coat, as if they had become contaminated.

  "Good," Gant remarked. "I'm taking this one. Tell your pal, the driver." He plucked Adamov's frame from the chair with ease and moved with him to the door. "Open it." The Uzbek scuttled to do so. Action revived Gant. He lugged the unconscious captain into the corridor, the man's boot toes dragging like fingernails down glass. The Uzbek pressed back against the wall as Gant flung open the outer door and leaned into the wind, clutching Adamov like a shield.

  Steps — yes. He counted them, careful of his balance. Dirt, and no noise from Adamov's boots until they reached the concrete and the toes of his boots began to scrape once again. "Fucking passengers!" Gant yelled to the wind, for the driver's benefit. "Bastard's drunk as a skunk and passed out!" The driver, leaning out of his cab, smoking, tossed his head and grinned, as much at Gant's struggle with Adamov as with relief that the GRU man had found other company.

  Gant turned to the driver. "You shouldn't have let the officer drink so much," he barked. The driver was indifferent.

  Gant leaned the unconscious Adamov against the fuselage of the Hind and slammed back the door of the main cabin. Then he bundled the body aboard. He glanced at his watch. Twelve thirty-five. He climbed into the main cabin, squeezing close to the auxiliary tank, which occupied most of it, and dragged Adamov to one of the fold-down seats troops used when being transported. He fumbled the straps — excitement now outstripped him, making him clumsy in his furious haste — and strapped Adamov into the seat. He reached for some webbing and used it to bind the captain's hands. Finally, he gagged Adamov with — Mac's scarf, lying on the floor. He removed Adamov's pistol from its holster, dismissed Mac's memory, and turned away. He jumped down and slammed the cabin door shut. If Adamov woke, it wouldn't matter. He was no longer a problem. Dumb, secure, and unarmed.

  He climbed into the cockpit. Shivered. The driver watched him from his cab, the garage owner from the porch. He touched at the controls, the panel, other instruments, then began.

  His hands reached, gripped or touched, flicked or depressed, bringing the Mil to life. The auxiliary power unit he had left on. He pressed the start button of the first of the Isotov engines, moved the throttle lever above his head from Stop to the ground-idle position. The engine began to wind up from a hum to a grumbling murmur. He pressed the second start button, moved the second throttle lever. The turboshaft hurried in pursuit of the noises from its companion. Slowly, the rotors began to turn, drooping at first, then gradually smoothing into a disk. Gleaming in the wind and moonlight, the Hind began to buck, as if restrained by a trap.

  The woman was standing on the porch behind her husband, night pressing around their shadows. Gant reached up and moved the throttles to flight-idle, released the rotor brake, engaged the clutch. His eyes scanned the instruments as they came on-line, especially the fuel gauges; and the temperature, and pressure and output power, he reminded himself. This is gasoline, not kerosene. For the length of his journey, the ordinary automobile gasoline would do no harm to the engines, but its performance had to be watched— closely.

  He flicked on the moving map. The rotors flurried dust around the cockpit, and the scene was dimming. Two minutes. The Hind rolled forward as he released the brakes, away from the canopy over the pumps. The place was suddenly very small, a needle in the haystack of the landscape around him. But he had found it, and that was all that mattered. Relief was now far too late and unimportant.

  He glanced to either side, then over his head. Clear. He was well clear of the corrugated roof and the power fines. The Hind continued to waddle, ready to lift. He eased the column laterally, in the direction of the wind.

  He raised the collective pitch lever, applied rudder to remain headed into the wind, and felt the Hinds undercarriage lift from the ground and the wind buffet the helicopter. Then he increased his airspeed and entered a climb of more than two thousand feet per minute, rushing up like an elevator on the side of some tall building. The ground diminished beneath him, bathed in moonlight. Gant checked the moving map, his distance and course. Two hours' fly-tog. He moved the column to starboard, and the helicopter banked. He eased back on the stick. On the moving map, he watched the white dot that was the Hind resume its original course. Baikonur lay almost due north. He glanced at his watch once more. Twelve-forty. He was late; darkness already seemed to be slipping away like water to a drain. The moon was old and lower in the sky. His head spun with the flickering, separate illuminations of times and distances. He had just enough time — just enough — to get out again, with Kedrov, before daylight. His pulse slowed and his temperature seemed fall back toward comfort. Just enough time.

  Be there, you bastard — be there!

  * * *

  Priabin wanted to bruise Rodin's face just as the boy's father had done. Urgency should be obeyed, not put aside like a book being loaned between friends. Kedrov was out there in the marshes, for the taking. Valery Rodin, having admitted him, seemed only to want to prolong the conversation. He was greedy for company.

  "Let's talk about Lightning, shall we?" he snapped at Rodin. Technique, often a steel rope, frayed and parted; as likely now to injure him as Rodin. He knew he could blunder in this situation, go astray and cause Rodin to clam up. Then he would have nothing.

  He swallowed the whiskey Rodin had poured for him and attempted to calm himself. The room incensed him as much as it had done on his visit earlier that evening. The molding and frieze and the smell of hashish and cognac; the scent of his own expensive Scotch whiskey. Priabin felt the anger mount. This boy must not be allowed to waste his time.

  "Let's talk about Lightning," he repeated. His tone was threatening.

  Rodin's head snapped up. His eyes were wakeful, clearing from their drugged, drunken glassiness. Then the young man shrugged. Priabin sighed inwardly and controlled his own anger as Rodin continued talking as though Priabin were some kind of confessor figure, not a KGB colonel. Rodin was not afraid of Priabin, or of his rank or organization. Priabin was, in Rodin's eyes, the only visitor who was not dangerous. Ludicrous—

  Priabin felt the battery and the tiny microphone against his ribs. It was recording the maudlin details of Rodin's past; nothing of importance.

  "I'm to train for the Sukhoputnyye Voyska, the Ground Forces, would you believe — specifically, the Tank Troops. I am to become a career soldier, hence the Academy." His lips pouted with anger, helplessness. "A career officer," he barked thinly, the noise of a beaten animal protesting.

  "But why?" Priabin asked.

  "To make a proper man of me, of course." He sneered. "I'm to follow in his footsteps." His voice was a venomous hiss. "And it gets me out of the way very neatly," he added.

  "Why?" Priabin asked, too eagerly.

  Rodin winked at him slowly, exaggeratedly. "We'll come to that, all in good time."

  "I meant, why now? Why change branches of the service? Why are you in the GRU if your old man wants you to be a tank officer?"

  Rodin swallowed cognac. He was very drunk, but somehow in command of the situation. Priabin could not bully effectively; and could not leave, despite images of Katya and Kedrov, Dudin and his men going to the girl's assistance. He had to know, had to open the oyster that was Valery Rodin. However long it took.

  "Most of his closest pals in Stavka are in the intelligence directorate. It just worked out that way. And he could really trust those pals to keep an eye on me — keep me under control?" He giggled, but the noise was cynical, contemptuous. "And in this God-forsaken place, he can keep a personal eye on me. He can surround me with watchers."

  "And now you think he's had enough?" Technique. Pa
tience coming like a memory of training, calming Priabin's anxiety.

  "Right. That's right. He's bloody had enough." Rodin tossed his head. His eyes glazed once more. He stared down into his lap as he sat on the beanbag like a Buddha; a thin, blond idol. "I told you, didn't I, that all I wanted was to paint?" He looked up, and Priabin nodded as if interested. "I've told everyone," Rodin added ironically. "But you, I didn't fill in all the details. My mother plucked up the courage to put the idea to him, when he was home on leave. She made sure he had the best food the housekeeper could cook and she could buy — French wine, good cognac, a cigar. He was expansive, know what I mean?" Again, Priabin stifled his impatience and nodded. "When Mother put it to him, he just looked straight at me, sardonically, and nodded like a judge. He even smiled, but that was cold, too." Rodin waved his free hand, shooing away the oppressive dements of the memory. "He went to the experts, to academicians, touting some of my watercolors, my sketchbooks, and canvases like a Penniless student, and showed all of them. It took him a week altogether. Then he came back, with a typed report, summarizing everything they'd said. Top copy for me, carbon for Mother. He made us sit there, in front of him, on dining chairs, and read the report."

  "And — they said you were no good?" Priabin said softly into the silence. The words echoed like the splashing of pebbles in a deep Weil. He saw Rodin once more without barriers, and could not avoid Pity for him.

  Rodin nodded furiously. "Yes, yes, that's what they said. They confirmed all his suspicions, answered all his prayers. I'd never make it as an artist. He had me in an army training school inside a month. Mother never raised the subject, ever again. All the theater visits stopped, the allowance was strictly controlled, no parties, and above all, no friends of a certain kind — I'm quoting him. I couldn't be unsuccessful, not as his son. So he put me in the army, where if your father's a general you can't possibly fail." Rodin wiped his pale hps, rubbed a hand through his fair hair.