by Tom Grace
Gilgallon checked Elli’s eyes; both were responsive to light. He then inspected the bloody wound near the crown of her head.
‘Will she be all right?’ Kelsey asked.
‘The wound’s superficial; it should heal up with minimal scarring. Looks worse than it really is.’
The corpsman then cracked open a small packet of smelling salts and held it under Elli’s nose – her eyes immediately sprang open.
‘Vat? I?’ Elli said, startled, grasping for words.
‘Easy, ma’am,’ Gilgallon said calmly. ‘You’ve got a nasty scratch, but you’re going to be fine. Just relax and let me patch you up.’
‘Four Tangos down,’ Edwards reported. ‘Anyone got a line on number five?’
Dima was slowly working his way through the ankle-deep mire of the wetlands when he heard the sounds of gunfire from both the cabin and the knoll. An explosion shattered several windows in the cabin’s central room, followed by a cloud of thick, white smoke. Then he watched as Ilya’s dash to the cabin ended when a single round fired by a very skilled sniper obliterated the man’s sskull.
‘Yop t’voi yo mat,’ Dima muttered, the all-purpose Russian profanity fitting both his mood and the situation.
As he watched the cabin, three men dressed head to toe in black scaled the levee and quickly cleared the front of the cabin for targets. Dima’s remaining comrades appeared unable to offer any effective resistance to the assault team.
Dima crouched down into the swampy water.
If I can just keep out of sight, he thought, maybe I’ll get out of here alive.
With his peripheral vision, he caught some movement to his right. He turned in time to see a lightly built man rise out of the water, leveling an HK MP5 assault rifle.
He turned, but before he could bring his weapon around, Ahsan perforated his chest with a pair of two-round bursts. Dima continued to rotate on his right foot, spiraling down into the water.
‘Tango five is down,’ Ahsan reported as he watched the man drop facedown into the shallow water.
Inside the cabin, Gates holstered his pistol and walked back to the bedroom where Kelsey and Elli had spent the past few days in captivity.
‘Max?’ Kelsey said when she saw him in the doorway. ‘What are you doing here?’
‘U.S. Navy SEALs at your service, ma’am,’ Gates replied. ‘Compliments of Rear Admiral Jack Dawson.’
‘Is Nolan with you?’
‘No, but not because he didn’t want to be. All the guys here, except Lieutenant Edwards over there, served with Nolan. We promised him we’d get you and Miss Vital back safe and sound. You okay?’
‘Other than a little rope burn around my wrists and ankles, I’m fine.’
‘How’s your friend?’
‘Your medic says Elli will be fine, just a superficial wound on her head.’
‘Chief,’ Edwards called out, ‘we got all five.’
‘Hoo-yah!’ Gates replied.
‘Hepburn, give Heaven our sit rep,’ Edwards ordered.
On the bridge of the Sharon S, Dawson took the news with a mixture of pride and relief.
‘Bravo Zulu, Angel. Heaven out,’ Dawson said, acknowledging the squad’s situation report.
‘What’s the word, Admiral?’ Martin asked anxiously.
‘The news for the most part is good. Kelsey’s fine, and Elli suffered only minor injuries. The corpsman is patching her up right now, and we’ll get a doctor to look her over ASAP. Our men took out all the Tangos and came through without a scratch.’
‘Do you want me to move us in closer to shore now?’ Harsen Smith asked.
‘That would be fine, sir,’ Dawson answered.
Dawson then picked up his satellite phone and dialed Grin’s direct line at MARC. Grin picked up before the first ring faded.
‘Grin here.’
‘Grin, it’s Dawson. We freed the hostages. Pass the word.’
‘Gladly, Admiral.’
‘Mosley, they freed the hostages!’ Grin shouted as he cradled the receiver. ‘Kelsey and Elli are fine.’
‘Great! I’ll contact the Russians,’ Mosley said. ‘Let Nolan know.’
‘I’m already typing.’
62
JULY 31
Moscow, Russia
Cooper sat patiently in Orlov’s office. Once the deal had been struck and Kilkenny had left to instruct Avvakum on using the decoding program, there was little left to do but wait.
In the twenty minutes since Kilkenny had departed, Leskov remained at his post by the door, distracted from his watch over Cooper only by the status reports he received from the security teams posted around the building. Each time a report came in, Leskov cupped a hand over the earpiece and cocked his head slightly – a habit rooted in years of combat.
The phone on Orlov’s desk rang, and he answered it. Cooper watched, hoping to pick up clues from Orlov as to what he was being told. The man’s brow creased, as if some external pressure were trying to hold the thoughts inside his head. Whatever the news, the look on Orlov’s face told Cooper that it was unexpected.
Orlov tilted his head, cradling the phone with his shoulder, and turned around to face the computer on the credenza behind his desk. He pressed down on the keyboard hard enough for Cooper to hear the impact.
‘Oksanna,’ he summoned without turning away from the video display.
Zoshchenko rose and quickly moved to his side. Orlov struck a few more keys, his growing anger becoming more evident.
Orlov looked up at Zoshchenko, puzzled; she shook her head in reply, offering no answer as to what they were seeing on the monitor.
‘I don’t care how you do it, just stop it!’ Orlov shouted into the phone before slamming down the handset. ‘Dmitri, we’ve been shut out of our computer networks. Have Avvakum’s guard find out what Kilkenny is doing. Now!’
‘Da,’ Leskov said before calling out the order into the thin microphone that curved from his earpiece to the corner of his mouth.
‘What is that?’ Avvakum asked when a tiny animated blinking red light appeared in the lower-right corner of the screen on Kilkenny’s laptop.
‘A message.’
Kilkenny clicked on the blinking light, and a small window appeared in the center of his screen. Two lines of text scrolled up from the bottom of the window.
GOOD NEWS: BOTH HOSTAGES RESCUED!
BAD NEWS: SOMEBODY HAS NOTICED OUR
HACK. HEADS UP!
Kilkenny smiled, relieved.
‘What does this mean?’ Avvakum asked, becoming anxious.
Kilkenny looked at her and saw the fear rendered plainly on her face. He reached over and grasped her hand.
‘What this message means is that two good people are now safe and that Orlov’s people have noticed something terribly wrong happening inside their computers.’
Kilkenny turned back to his laptop and closed the window. As the window disappeared from the screen, Avvakum’s oversize guard opened the door to her office and shouted something in Russian at Kilkenny.
‘I don’t understand what he’s saying,’ Kilkenny said to Avvakum while keeping his eyes on the Russian.
‘He wants to know what the fuck you are doing,’ Avvakum said, translating the guard’s demand literally.
‘Tell him I’m decoding information for his boss.’
As Avvakum translated his response, Kilkenny waved the guard over, motioning with his open hands at the screen to emphasize that this is where he should look. The bulky guard moved around Avvakum’s desk to get a better view. One half of the screen showed a matrix of Wolff’s encrypted characters; the other displayed a slowly growing string of mathematical formulas and German text.
As the guard leaned close to inspect the laptop, Kilkenny reached up with both hands, grabbed two large clumps of the man’s greasy brown hair, and pulled down. In the same motion, Kilkenny sprang up from his chair, swung his right leg back, and then drove his knee up into the guard’s face. Driven in by Kilkenny�
�s hiza geri knee kick, the guard’s lip mike tore the corner of his mouth and dug a groove into his cheek before it snapped free of the ear-piece. Blood flowed freely from the man’s battered nose and mouth.
The guard groaned, dazed, as Kilkenny tilted the man’s head slightly, then quickly wrenched it as if he were unscrewing it from a socket. The stack of vertebrae that formed a shallow curve in the guard’s neck collapsed, the twisting motion too quick for the neck muscles to counteract.
‘You killed him?’ Avvakum gasped out.
‘It’s not like I had much choice in the matter. Orlov wants us dead.’
Kilkenny laid the guard on the floor, then inspected the damage to his leg. Two of the man’s teeth had ripped through his khakis and were now imbedded in his knee. Avvakum winced as he pulled the two incisors out and tossed them in the wastebasket.
‘Don’t worry, I’ll be fine,’ Kilkenny said as he inspected the two punctures in his skin. ‘I just hope he had all his shots.’
Kilkenny then grabbed the guard’s body underneath the arms, dragged it out of Avvakum’s office, and laid it down in the center of the empty lab.
‘Why did you put the body out here? Won’t the others see what you’ve done?’
‘I hope so. This guy is my scarecrow; if his comrades see him lying here lifeless, maybe they’ll think twice before coming in here.’
Kilkenny stripped off the guard’s shoulder holster, strapped it on himself, and quickly checked the weapon. He then patted the guard down and found two more full clips of ammunition.
‘Let’s get back in your office,’ Kilkenny said as he pocketed the extra clips.
Once inside, Kilkenny stood in front of his laptop computer. ‘I guess I can shut this down now.’
He closed the translation program, powered his laptop down, and disconnected the cables. ‘Can I ask you a question?’ Kilkenny said as he shut the laptop and slipped it back into his briefcase.
‘Certainly.’
‘Why did you send me that fragment of Sandstrom’s research?’
‘I am a scientist, not a thief. I wanted to know the truth.’
‘Sometimes the truth isn’t pretty,’ Kilkenny replied, turning to face her, ‘and very soon it’s gonna get downright ugly. Stay close to me, and just maybe we’ll both get through this alive.’
63
JULY 31
Moscow, Russia
Out of the west, a matte gray Mil Mi-38 helicopter raced over Moscow’s outer periphery. It roared over the VDNKh, as the All-Russian Exhibition Center was known, and crossed Prospekt Mira. The pilot changed the pitch on the Mil’s six rotating blades, adjusted the throttle on the twin TVD-300 turboshaft engines, and brought the ship into a thundering hover over the VIO FinProm building’s flat roof. Ballast aggregate flew out in all directions, propelled by the downward thrust of the helicopter, and hailed onto the ground below.
The royal blue flag that so proudly bore Orlov’s golden double eagle snapped crazily in the rotors’ gale-force blast; the fabric around the flag’s eyelets quickly tore free, and the shredded emblem fell into the street.
As soon as the Mil parked itself over the building, doors on both sides of the craft slid open and armed men in black ninja suits rappelled down onto the roof. The blue-and-white cars of the Moscow Militsia suddenly appeared, choking off Prospekt Mira and all secondary streets around Orlov’s building. Two large black trucks pulled up, one at each end of the long slab of a building, and disgorged two additional elements of the Alpha assault force. Three coordinated, well-armed teams of fifteen men poured into the building, routing Orlov’s perimeter security as they pressed their attack.
Orlov’s office reverberated with a deep rumbling like a continuous explosion of thunder.
‘Victor!’ Zoshchenko screamed, afraid.
‘Dmitri,’ Orlov shouted over the noise, ‘what is going on?’
‘Government forces are attacking the building, Victor Ivanovich,’ Leskov replied, piecing together the jumble of reports flooding through his earpiece. ‘My men are moving into defensive positions. You should evacuate.’
Of all the people in the office, only Cooper seemed unaffected by the mounting chaos. The aging spy leaned back into the sofa and folded his hands over his stomach.
‘I’d surrender if I were you,’ Cooper said. ‘It’s your best chance of staying alive.’
Orlov turned and saw Cooper sitting as serenely as a Buddha. Sporadic bursts of gunfire could now be heard.
‘You are responsible for this!’ Orlov shouted.
‘I can’t take all the credit. You have a lot of very powerful enemies.’
Pistol in hand, Leskov ran to Orlov. ‘You must leave, immediately.’
‘Give me that,’ Orlov barked as he took the pistol from Leskov’s hand.
Without a second’s hesitation, Orlov raised the Glock and fired three shots into Cooper’s chest.
Cooper slumped back on the sofa. Blood poured out of his chest with each beat of his heart. Though pained, Cooper managed to lock eyes with Orlov.
‘Fuck your mother, Victor Ivanovich,’ Cooper said defiantly, his voice beginning to fail. ‘You’re finished.’
Orlov shuddered at the pronouncement but said nothing. An explosion sent tremors through the building. Zoshchenko ran up to Orlov and grasped his shoulders.
‘Victor, they’re going to kill us!’ Zoshchenko screamed. ‘We have to surrender! You have money; you can make a deal to save us!’
Orlov looked into Zoshchenko’s teary eyes with disgust, then squeezed the Glock’s trigger. Zoshchenko staggered back, and he fired again into her chest – she collapsed onto the floor. Orlov handed the pistol back to Leskov.
‘How long can your men hold the building?’
‘Ten, maybe fifteen minutes.’
‘Long enough. Let’s go,’ Orlov said, leading the way out through the office’s private exit.
Seven Alphas eliminated the two men guarding the main hallway and then entered Orlov’s executive suite. They found Cooper slumped on the couch and Zoshchenko lying on the floor.
‘Corpsman!’ one of the Alphas called out.
The corpsman placed two fingers on Cooper’s neck.
‘This one’s dead.’
He then moved over to the woman.
‘Pulse is weak and she’s lost a lot of blood, but she’s still alive.’
64
JULY 31
Moscow, Russia
Near the center of the building, adjacent to the main vertical riser for electrical and communications wiring, Arkady Malik sat in front of a wall of small black-and-white video monitors, each displaying a feed from a closed-circuit camera mounted somewhere in or around the building. Malik watched nervously as several of the monitors relayed images of the battles taking place not far from where he sat.
Leskov punched in his access code and opened the door to the building’s security center. He and Orlov jogged down the short hallway, past a flush steel door and frame, and turned into the room where Malik sat.
‘Malik,’ Leskov shouted, ‘how’s the perimeter holding?’
‘Our men have fallen back from the main entry points on the first floor and from the roof access points.’ Malik played the keypad in front of him like a piano, cycling manually through all the available cameras, both inside and outside the building. ‘We’ve lost about a third of the first and fifth floors but still control all of floors two, three, and four.’
Several of the monitors showed some of Leskov’s men exchanging gunfire with men dressed in black ninja suits.
‘Fuck, it’s Alpha,’ Leskov cursed. ‘Victor, my men will make them pay for every square meter of the building, but it’s only a matter of time. We are outmanned and out-gunned.’
‘What is the status of the tunnel?’ Orlov asked.
Malik brought up different camera views on a bank of four monitors. The first displayed a large steel vault door mounted flush to a concrete wall. The second showed the back side of the door
from a distance inside a concrete tunnel wide enough for three people to walk abreast. On the third and fourth, Orlov saw the far end of the tunnel, where it reached the Metro’s Chelobitevo Line tunnel running beneath Prospekt Mira.
The workmen renovating Orlov’s building had discovered the abandoned tunnel while replacing outdated utility feeders. Though not shown on any of their drawings, the tunnel had been used for material storage during the construction of the Metro line, then abandoned once the work was completed. Orlov had the tunnel extended beneath the building, where it terminated at the flush steel door.
‘Tunnel is clear on both ends,’ Malik responded.
‘Show me Avvakum’s lab,’ Orlov demanded impatiently.
Malik typed in another number. The static on the one large monitor was replaced by an image of an empty lab space. Using the thumb-dial controls for pan-tilt-zoom operation, Malik swung the camera around and adjusted it to zoom in on the doorway that led to the lab’s office suite. The body of Avvakum’s guard lay prone on the floor near the center of the lab.
Leskov slammed his fist into the desktop with such force that Malik jumped back, startled.
‘The incompetent fool! I told him Kilkenny was a dangerous man and that he shouldn’t take his eyes off him. Now Kilkenny is armed.’
‘Are Kilkenny and Avvakum still in the lab?’ Orlov asked.
‘Da, Victor Ivanovich,’ Malik replied. ‘I haven’t seen anyone in the corridors.’
‘Dmitri, take Malik and kill them both.’
‘Gladly.’
‘I’ll wait for you here. When you get back, we’ll use the tunnel.’
‘Malik, what’s left in the armory?’
‘A few pistols and a couple of Krinkovs.’
‘Get them,’ Leskov ordered. He then handed Orlov his pistol and a spare clip of ammunition. ‘Take this. Keep an eye on these monitors. If Alpha breaches our defenses before I get back, go.’