by Mark Dawson
“Keep it quiet,” whispered Scorpion, as loudly as he dared.
The loudest of his companions was Marko. Scorpion was a good thirty paces ahead of him, and he could still hear him breathing, the thump of his size fourteen boots on the soft, mossy floor and the cracking of stray branches as Marko walked calmly through them. It would have made less noise to simply drive the van through the forest, thought Scorpion. The van was only marginally wider and heavier than the Russian giant.
Stopping now and again, Scorpion used his scope to look at the house – making sure they kept it on their left and stayed at a suitable distance. Soon the ground began to slope up gently on the left.
The beginnings of the hill that lay beyond the trees. Scorpion got his bearings and marked the bark of a tree with a knife he borrowed from Marko. They ploughed on until they’d passed the house for some time. Only deep forest on their left. A sharp left turn, and five minutes later the house came into view again. This time, they could see the rear of the building.
Scorpion had seven men at his disposal. He didn’t know any of them. They had been bought and paid for. A military unit would attack the building as one, in a co-ordinated firing pattern with a sniper flanking one side.
This wasn’t Scorpion’s old unit. He held no loyalty to these men. The only thing that mattered was the kill. Hailey Banks had to die tonight. That was the only result that mattered. If the troublesome British agent died too, well, that was a mere bonus.
He knelt down behind a tree and thought for a moment, examining the Dragunov rifle. It looked in excellent condition. He could tell it had been fired often, cleaned and maintained well. More preferable to a new weapon that had never been fired. In his mind, he calculated the distance between the top of the hill and the house. Looked again at the rifle.
The challenge excited him. And he accepted.
It had all become clear when he’d thought of the Russians. Seven men. At his disposal. That was his initial thought, and he’d been wrong.
He had seven men who were disposable.
Beckoning the men to him, he laid out the approach.
“When I call Marko, you attack the rear of the house. All of you make your way to the top of the tree line. Take out the men at each tower. Or better yet, keep their heads down with covering fire and then rush the house. You need to get inside. Kill the agent who murdered your family tonight. Avenge them. I will be on the hill, looking out with my rifle. If the British try to run, I will pick them off. One by one. When the girl tries to run, I will have her. Remember, when I give Marko the signal, with as much speed and firepower as you have, get inside the house. Agreed?”
They agreed.
Scorpion made his way back through the trees in total silence. No snapping of branches, no heavy breathing, no loud footfalls. He moved like a breath of foul air through the forest and came upon the mark he’d left on the bark of a tree. Turning right, Scorpion soon emerged from the shelter of the forest to a tall hill. Keeping low, he moved quickly up the incline until the house disappeared behind the rise. The climb proved steep. With the rate of his ascent, by the time he’d reached the top, his legs were burning and he was out of breath. Crawling on his belly, Scorpion looked over the rocks at the precipice.
The sun was threatening the horizon behind him, and he could see the front door and the garage doors to the right.
Bringing the rifle to bear, he looked through the scope.
Nine hundred and forty, maybe nine hundred and fifty yards from the front door. Not an impossible shot, by any means. A high degree of difficulty, certainly. Conditions could have been better, but they could also have been worse. There was no wind, and he was in an elevated firing position. On the downside, it was still dark and he was shooting with a weapon inferior to his preferred rifle.
Scorpion put down the Dragunov and sent a text to Marko.
Now it begins.
13
Milton’s legs and arms were beginning to ache. He was used to being uncomfortable. That particular acclimatisation came in basic training: wading through freezing cold rivers, crawling for hours through mud and thick grasses, or even sleeping on the British Army standard military-issue mattress could be a challenging exercise in itself.
But this…
This was high on his list of discomfort.
Milton managed to get his right foot in the space between two branches, which took some of his weight, but he still had to cling onto the body of the tree with his arms. He didn’t know how long he’d been there, or when he’d last climbed a tree, but the cramp in his shoulders was worth it. He’d watched the Russians moving below him. Walking slowly toward the house, through the trees.
He’d waited until the Russians got into position. They’d spread out into a staggered firing line. An inverted V shape, with the tip of the spear being a Russian with an AR-15, right at the last tree before the clearing in between the forest and the house.
“Seven hostile targets,” said Jones, his voice loud and clear in Milton’s Bluetooth headset.
“I counted six below me,” whispered Milton.
“There’s a big man. He’s stepped out of shot. Could be approaching Lazarus from the side. I have six armed targets on camera. Looks like the heavy crew from the Russian mob,” said Jones.
“Does Hailey recognise Scorpion?”
“The images aren’t clear enough, especially on infrared.”
Jones had agreed to man the security station and feed Milton information on the Russians. This section of the forest had covert CCTV cameras. It felt to Milton like he was getting information straight from the All Mighty. He knew Hailey was sitting beside Jones in the security room on the ground floor, watching the monitors for Scorpion.
“Targets are taking up firing positions just before the clearing,” said Jones.
It was time.
Milton eased his way along the branch and leapt the last ten feet to the soft earth. Quickly, he turned and sought cover. Waited. No sounds of feet approaching him.
“You’re clear to move,” said Jones.
Drawing his Glock, Milton moved toward Lazarus House in a crouched position. He was approaching the armed force from their rear. The last thing they would expect. His gaze flicked between the forest bed and the trees ahead of him. As long as he made it to the first man without being detected, he had a chance. Moving quickly and keeping a light step was a skill all by itself. There was a method to it, like everything else. Heel, toe. Heel, toe. He was careful to only apply his weight once his boot had already touched the ground. That meant each step had to kiss the earth as softly as a baby’s lips on a kitten. The movement is alien at first, but Milton had practised until he felt like he could walk on water.
“Coming up on target one, sixty feet away on your eleven o’clock,” said Jones.
The first target came into view. The man had his back to Milton as he craned his neck around the tree to get a good look at the building ahead. He wore a woollen hat pulled down tight on his head and held a mini Uzi down by his side. The next target was only six feet in front of the first man. The next, seven feet ahead of the second, and this man was the lead. The top of the inverted V.
As Milton closed in on the first man, he picked up a large rock about the size of a loaf of bread and continued his silent approach.
At six feet from the first man, Milton raised the rock over his head with his right hand. It wasn’t easy, the damn thing must have weighed twenty pounds and it was difficult to handle. Springing forward, he brought the rock down on top of the man’s skull. The thick, woollen hat muffled the worst of the sound – a dull, wet, crunching noise. Instantly, the man fell to the ground, and Milton had his Glock up, selecting the next target.
A burst of fire from the towers of Lazarus House broke into the trees. The Russians returned fire. And Milton had his chance. He had to time it perfectly. If the Russians discovered him, he was outnumbered and outgunned. The only hope of staying hidden lay in timing his shot so that the
report from the Glock was masked by the sound of Russian fire.
A single crack from the Glock and the next man in front of him went down with a bullet in the back of his neck. His legs simply folded beneath him, like a puppet who’d had its strings severed.
Milton’s shot had been half a second too late. It sounded out around the forest, unmasked by the Russian machine gun fire.
“On your right, at three o’clock,” said Jones.
Milton dropped to his knees, spun and fired quickly. More on instinct than sight. He missed the target, his round sending a burst of tree bark into the air. The man he’d aimed at had ducked behind an old, twisted oak. Milton found cover behind a tree of his own, waiting for the next burst of gunfire from the Russians on his left or the lead man, something to cover the sound of his own gun.
None came.
Instead, he heard Jones in his ear.
“Three men, they’re rushing your position. Get out of there!”
Milton resisted the urge to flee. He knew there was no time when he saw the muzzle of an old M16 coming around the tree trunk.
14
When Scorpion heard the first shots, he began his routine. His eyes closed as he laid his head down on the grass, feeling the dew on his face. Spreading out his arms and legs, he began to feel his own weight on his chest. The slow rise of his body with each intake of breath. Visualising the target in his sights, Scorpion became wilfully conscious of his body. He felt every beat of his heart. He felt his calf muscles and the backs of his thighs stretching. The pull of his biceps, the sound and rate of his breath.
Target. Breath. Target. Breath.
There was nothing in his mind other than that visualisation. The bullet ripping into flesh. He lay there with only the soft zephyr of air coming and going from his lungs as gently as the new tide.
Within seconds his heart rate dropped. He’d discovered that nothing improved his target shooting more than yoga and meditation. He needed to be at one with the rifle. Still and sure as granite. Shooting a target at this distance required more than simple talent or technique. It required total commitment. Mind and body in complete stillness. One millimetre of movement, and the round would fall short of its destination.
He sat up on his elbows, found the grip of the Dragunov with his right hand, and the right side of his face rested on the cheek guard. He popped the cover on the optical sight and stayed focussed on the garage doors.
The shot window would be small. A second. Perhaps two. No more.
The Scorpion lay in wait.
15
Over his career, Milton had spent hundreds of hours on the firing range. Thousands of rounds spent. And in the current situation, none of it helped him in the least.
It’s one thing to put a hole in a bullseye from a hundred yards, it’s another thing when the target is three feet from you with an M16 in your face.
That is a different skill. In that case, the gun is a hand-to-hand weapon. And the most effective ever built.
Milton grabbed the barrel of the M16 with his left hand. The shooter reacted in the natural fashion; he began to pull at the rifle, trying to dislodge Milton’s grip. Only Milton was not resisting, he was using the enemy’s inevitable and predictable reaction against him.
Instead of pulling back, Milton stepped toward the shooter, putting the working end of the rifle safely behind him. As he did so, he saw the shooter’s face for the first time. A well-kept black beard, brown eyes that were as wide as the moon. Milton could no longer use the sights to aim the Glock. Instead, he kept his wrist straight.
And pointed.
A shot from the Glock took the Russian with the M16 in the belly. Milton moved closer, grabbed the injured man, and used him as a shield, hugging him close. Two swift movements of his gun hand. Left and right. Half a second. Two shots.
Two bodies.
Both men who stood behind the Russian with the M16 were hit. Each had taken a shot to the centre of their chest.
Now he had time to aim. One man was in such bad shape he didn’t need an extra bullet. But one did. A tap to the forehead before Milton angled the Glock and put one in the head of the man beside him. The body dropped, and as it did, Milton could see a Russian in the clearing beyond, rushing the house. The dust clouds from ricochets twirled around the advancing Russian’s feet. Just ahead. Just behind. The MI5 men were not the best marksmen, and their weaponry was not built for accuracy over long distances.
“There’s a potential breach. Get Hailey out,” said Milton.
“Roger that,” said Jones.
Milton checked the Glock. Three rounds left.
An array of automatic weapons lay at his feet. He left them there. No way of knowing that those weapons would fire without testing them and giving away his position in the process if the gun proved operational. Nothing got a man killed quicker than a feed jam on an automatic. Milton couldn’t take the chance.
He heard more firing from the British operatives and nothing in return. Either the Russian had advanced to the house, or he was dead or hiding. Milton couldn’t see him. He had to trust that MI5 had finally done something right.
There was no time to go hunting for the last remaining mobster. He needed to move. Milton had one chance of catching Scorpion, and he wasn’t going to waste it. Not today.
Milton set off, staying within the forest and circling back toward the front of the building. He no longer cared about revealing his position. If he came under fire, he would have a few seconds to duck to cover. A target moving through a forest at speed is hard to hit even if the shooter unloaded a full clip from an automatic.
Scanning the trees as he ran, Milton checked for hostiles. He glanced to the left as he passed the base of a wide oak tree, and then his feet left him.
For a second, he thought he’d run full speed into a tree. If felt like a thick, stiff branch had caught him in the chest. His momentum swung his legs forward, his torso twisting and the air punched clean out of his chest. He lost his hold on the Glock.
He landed awkwardly with his right shoulder the first thing to hit the forest floor. Such was the impact that took him down, he could already feel a sharp pain radiating from his neck before he hit the ground. He imagined it was what whiplash felt like.
When he opened his eyes, he saw spots floating in the air. He felt sick, and the pain in his right shoulder and neck were becoming a single paralysing mass. He looked up to see the tree branch holding a nine millimetre Beretta. The branch began to tilt down toward him. His right arm wouldn’t move, the pain took his breath away, and instead he kicked out at the gun. It was the big Russian that Jones had talked about on the phone. The man was so big that the Beretta almost looked like a toy gun in his massive hands. Milton’s heel connected sharply with the Russian’s wrist and he watched the gun fly from his grip.
He tried to sit up, but his body wouldn’t obey. The Russian stood over him, and those big hands came down. One grabbed his jacket, the other his pant leg. The Russian’s head looked like a wrecking ball. Milton thought about punching him with his left, but the sheer size of that head made him think again. If he punched him, he’d probably break his hand on that head. A sledgehammer might not survive an impact with that skull.
Milton reached for the zipper on his jacket, but it was too late. He was suddenly airborne. This monster had picked him up off the ground, dead weight, and hurled him at a tree. The only thing Milton could do was cover his head with his left hand. His body spun, mid- flight, the forest a blur, until his lower back found a tree trunk. That stopped him, but the world kept spinning.
Maybe he blacked out for a second, he couldn’t be sure, but it seemed that the Russian was right on top of him immediately. He saw the big man raise his boot for a stomp. He had to hold onto a tree to steady himself while he wound up that leg to come down on top of Milton’s face like a pneumatic press.
Milton’s left hand found the zipper at the neck of his jacket. He pulled it all the way down, exposing the antique sa
wn-off. He grabbed the stock, aimed it upwards, between the Russian’s legs, and pulled both triggers.
The gun bucked in his hand, sending a needle of pain into his wrist. A wet slap hit the tree opposite him, and the Russian was no longer there.
Milton got to his feet. Swore, looked around for the Glock. He found it next to what was left of the Russian. He caught his breath and checked the magazine. Two rounds in the mag and one chambered. Searching the dead leaves, twigs and moss, Milton couldn’t find his phone or earpiece. He must have lost it when the Russian tossed him. He looked for the dead man’s Beretta, but that, too, was lost amid the dead leaves. He stood still, thinking. He couldn’t afford to waste any more time. He had to move.
Slowly at first, Milton began to run. Within twenty feet he was pumping his legs, faster and faster, and trusting the adrenaline to fight the pain. He’d given the evacuation signal for Hailey to be moved. Milton should have been in position by now. He should be covering her.
And he was nowhere near.
16
Hailey sat by the monitors, with Jones, and watched Milton wade through the Russian mafia. At times, she couldn’t look. These were real men meeting a very real death. Great journalism is all about empathy. That was what she’d been taught at the start of her career. It had been both a blessing and a curse. Her writing captured the human cost of conflict, and each death that she’d witnessed, each aftermath, each blazing hill, each crying child and desperate mother had left its mark on Hailey. Her duty, her gift, was to pass that mark onto the reader.
Jones turned and nodded at Sanger. He had stood behind them both, watching Milton work.
“Hailey, it’s time,” said Sanger.
She stood, felt her legs wobble and grabbed onto the back of the chair. Sanger took her arm.