Op Center 02 - Mirror Image

by Mirror Image [lit]

  And because he hadn't looked at the trees in the park or the busy thoroughfare when he'd arrived, Private George noticed that the man who had been napping on the bench was no longer asleep. He was walking slowly less than two hundred yards behind them and his St. Bernard was panting. He had been running to get there, not strolling.

  Peggy said in Russian, "The Hermitage, Raphael's Conestabile Madonna, left side, every hour and half hour for one minute. After closing, go to Krasnyy Prospekt, Upper Park, lean on a tree, left arm."

  The English operative had told him where to meet her and how to stand so she'd know him.

  She hung up and they started walking again.

  "We're being followed," George said in English.

  "The man with the beard," Peggy said, "I know. This could make things a little easier."

  "Easier?"

  "Yes," she said. "The Russians know we're here, and the surveillance facility Keith was looking for could very well be involved. Anyway, if that man is wired we may be able to find it. Do you have a light?"

  "Excuse me?"

  "A match?" she said. "A lighter?"

  "I don't smoke," George said.

  "Neither do I,- Peggy said impatiently, "but pat your pockets like you're looking for one."

  "Oh. Sorry," George said as he slapped his shirt and pants pockets.

  "Fine," Peggy said. "Now wait here."

  Almost every soldier in Russia smoked, and though George didn't enjoy it, he, like Peggy, had mastered the art of inhaling the potent Turkish blend favored by Russian and Chinese militiamen-just in case Striker ever ended up in Asia. But George had no idea what she had in mind as he watched her pull a package of cigarettes from her breast pocket and walk toward the bearded man.

  As George looked down at the ground, convincingly affecting boredom, the Russian pretended to be waiting for the dog to finish up with a tree, something the dog had no apparent inclination to do. The cigarette poking from her mouth, Peggy was about ten yards from the man when he turned to walk in the other direction.

  "Sir!" she said in perfect Russian as she jogged after him. "Have you got a match?"

  He shook his head as he strolled away.

  Peggy came up behind him and, in one quick motion, grabbed the leash at the base of the loop that was slung around his left hand. She twisted hard, and in the same motion stepped around so she was facing him. He groaned as the leash cut off the circulation in his fingers.

  George saw her eyes drop to his beard. She nodded once when she spotted the wire. Peggy faced the Russian and put a rigid finger to her lips, indicating silence.

  The Russian nodded.

  "Thanks for the match," she said as she led the spy toward George. "That's a lovely dog you have."

  She was talking, George knew, to keep the Russians from communicating with their agent. As long as someone was there, they wouldn't expect the Russian to answer their questions. He also realized she couldn't shut it off, or they'd know something was wrong.

  Except for the fact that he was wincing slightly, it would have appeared to an observer that Peggy and the Russian were friends holding hands as they walked the dog. When they reached George's side, Peggy patted the Russian's left pants pocket with the back of her hand. She reached in, pulled out his car keys, and swept her free hand back and forth.

  Still grimacing, the Russian pointed toward a row of cars on the far side of the park.

  She looked at George, who nodded with understanding.

  "I'm always surprised at how passive most large dogs are," Peggy said as they walked, the dog lumbering after them. "It's the little ones who cause trouble."

  The three of them entered the park and headed toward a row of cars parked on the other side of the kidneyshaped green. When they had crossed it, the Russian led them to a black two-door sedan.

  Upon reaching the passenger's side, Peggy faced the Russian and rapped on the car with a knuckle. "Does she bite?"

  He shook his head.

  She turned the leash and the pain brought the Russian up to the tips of his toes.

  "Yes!" he said. "Be careful!"

  She gave the Russian the keys and indicated for him to open the door. He did, then pointed to the glove compartment. Peggy knelt beside the car so that he could sit down and turn the knob with his right hand. One twist to the left, one to the right, then a full clockwise turn back to the right opened the compartment. Inside was a gas canister and a switch. George knew from a briefing on taking hostages-in-place-high-ranking persons, instead of ordinary people in the street-that wealthy people, military figures, and government officials often had booby traps in their cars that were triggered automatically in the event of kidnaping. In the case of the Russians, there was typically a noxious gas of some kind that went off after a short time. The abductee, of course, would know when to hold his or her breath.

  After the Russian disarmed the device, Peggy tugged him out by the hand, took the keys, and handed them to George. She cocked her head toward the driver's side.

  George went around, climbed in, and started the car while Peggy slid into the backseat with the Russian. With her free hand, she released the dog from its collar and shut the door. The St. Bernard jumped up at the window, barking. Peggy ignored it as ' she turned down the volume on the Walkman microphone.

  "Check for bugs," Peggy said to George as she settled in beside the Russian.

  George removed the handheld bug transmitter locator from his ruck. He swept it around the car and toward the Russian. There was no loud screeching.

  "We're clean," said George.

  "Good."

  George could hear the buzz of voices from the Russian's earphones. "But I think they're talking to him. Probably wondering why the mike has gone dead."

  "I'm not surprised," said Peggy, "but they'll just have to wait." She looked at George in the rearview mirror. "What are your orders under these circumstances?"

  "The manual says that if we're discovered, we disperse and get out."

  "Safety first," she said. "Our manual says that too."

  "It's more for security," said George. "We know things the Russians would love to-"

  "I know," said Peggy. "But what do you really want to do?"

  George replied, "Find out what's going on at the Hermitage."

  "So do I,- said Peggy. "So let's see if our friend and his beard can help." Peggy pulled a dagger from the sleeve behind her lapel and put it under the Russian's left ear. She released the leash and said in Russian, "What's your name?"

  The Russian hesitated, and Peggy pressed the needlesharp tip of the blade against his superficial temporal artery. "The longer you take, the more pressure I apply," she said.

  The Russian replied, "Ronash."

  "All right, Ronash," said Peggy. "We're going to make sure you don't tell your friends anything in code, so say exactly what I say. Understand?"

  "Da. "

  "Who is in charge of this operation?"

  'I don't know," he said.

  "Oh, come now," said Peggy.

  "A spetsnaz officer," said Ronash. "I don't know him."

  "All right," Pegg said, "Here's what you tell them:" 'This is Ronash, and I wish to speak with the spetsnaz officer in charge.' When he gets on, give me the unit."

  Ronash nodded tightly so as not to run the knife through his throat.

  George glanced at her in the mirror. "What are we going to do?" he asked in English.

  Peggy said, "Head for the Hermitage. We'll find a way in if we have to, but I have a better idea."

  As George backed the car from the parking area, the dog stopped jumping. It just watched, its great tail wagging, as the car pulled away. Then it settled down on the grass, its big head flopping to the side and dragging the rest of its body with it.

  So much for industry in the post-Cold War Russia, the Striker thought. Even the dogs don't want to do any heavy lifting.

  As he swung the car toward the main thoroughfare, and then along the Obvodnyy Canal toward
the Moskovsky Prospekt, George couldn't help but marvel, by contrast, at the way Peggy had executed her duties, with cool efficiency. Though he didn't like having had his mission command posture usurped, he was impressed by her style and her ability to improvise. He was also damned curious and a little excited to see where all of this would lead-despite the fact that he was already up to his neck in waters that were definitely rising.

  FIFTY-THREE

  Tuesday, 10:07 P.M., Khabarovsk

  With all the hi-tech wizardry the military had put at his disposal, Charlie Squires couldn't understand why they didn't have nonfog night-vision goggles instead of these "foggles," as the Strikers had nicknamed them. Sweat pooled on the inside bottom of the lenses, and if you covered your mouth with a muffler, as he'd tried to do, the perspiration warmed, turned to vapor, and you couldn't see. If you didn't use the muffler, your lips froze together and the tip of your nose went numb.

  A warm face wouldn't matter much if he dropped off the hundred-foot-high cliff, so Squires chose to see-as much as one could see with thick snow swirling around. At least he could see the cliff.

  Squires was descending, buddy style, with Private Terrence Newmeyer. One man started rappelling down the cliff, got a foothold, then extended a hand and steadied the other as he descended a little further. In the dark, on icy cliffs, Squires didn't want anyone rappelling without something for guidance-though he had to admit, these weren't the worst conditions he'd seen. Squires had once been invited to participate with Israel's Sayeret Giva'ati, the elite reconnaissance brigade, during their "hell week" training. The exercises included climbing down a twenty-four-meter-high cliff and then running an obstacle course. The olive fatigues of the soldiers were ripped to shreds by the end of the drill, though not from the cliff itself- throughout the descent, officers had been pelting the soldiers with both Arabic epithets and rocks. Compared to that climb, this one-foggles and all-was a day at the beach.

  About fifteen yards from the bottom, five yards to their left, Squires heard Sondra yell at them to wait. Squires looked down and saw her huddled close to her climbing partner, Private Walter Pupshaw.

  "What's wrong?" Squires shouted as he stole a quick look at the horizon. He was searching for smoke from the locomotive and didn't see it-yet.

  'He's frozen to the cliff," Sondra yelled back. "He tore his pant leg on a rock. Looks like perspiration stuck the lining to the ice."

  Squires shouted down, "Private Honda, get me an ETA on the train!"

  The radio operator quickly set up the TAC-Sat as Squires and Newmeyer made their way toward Pupshaw. The officer settled in slightly above and to the right of the Private.

  "Sorry, sir," Pupshaw said. "I must've hit a real icy patch here."

  Squires looked at the soldier, who resembled a big spider plastered to a wall.

  "Private DeVonne," Squires said, "you get above him and dig in. I mean, hold on real tight. Private Newmeyer, we're going to use our rope to try and free him."

  Squires grabbed the line that held him to Newmeyer and whipped it up, so it was resting on Pupshaw's arms, in front of his face.

  "Pupshaw," Squires said, "let go with your left hand

  and let the rope fall to your waist. Then do the same thing with your right."

  "Yes, sir," Pupshaw said.

  Both Newmeyer and Squires lent him their hands for support as, cautiously, Pupshaw released his grip on the rock face with his left hand, then grabbed it again when the rope had slid down. He repeated with the right hand, and the rope was now level with his belt.

  "Okay," Squires said. "Private Newmeyer and I are going to climb down together. We'll put our weight on the rope so, hopefully, it'll slice through the ice. DeVonne, you be ready to take his weight when he comes free. "

  "Yes, sir," she said.

  Slowly, Squires and Newmeyer descended in tandem, on either side of Private Pupshaw, the rope snagging on the ice where it had formed between the Striker and the cliff. It held for a moment, and the two men put more and more of their weight on the line until the ice shattered in a rain of fine particles. Squires had a firm grip on the cliff, DeVonne was able to hold onto Pupshaw, and after a tense moment when the rock beneath his right boot gave way, Newmeyer was able to regain his footing with a steadying hand from Pupshaw.

  "Thank you," Pupshaw said as the four of them made their way to the bottom of the cliff.

  When Squires reached the bottom, Sergeant Grey had the team gathered beside the track. There was a space of some ten yards between the base of the cliff and the track; to the west, roughly thirty yards away, was a clump of trees that appeared to have died sometime before the Russian Revolution. Private Honda was already on the TACSat, and when he got off, he said that upto-the-minute NRO reconnaissance put the train at twenty-one miles to the east, traveling at an average of thirty-five miles an hour.

  "That will have them here in just over a half hour," Squires said. "Not a lot of time. Okay, Sergeant Grey. You and Newmeyer rig one of those trees to blow across the track. "

  Sergeant Grey was already unloading the C-4 from the pouches in his assault vest. "Yes, sir."

  "DeVonne, Pupshaw, Honda-you three start for the extraction point and secure the route. I don't expect we'll find any disagreeable peasants out here, but you never know. There could be wolves."

  "Sir," said Sondra, "I'd like-"

  "Doesn't matter," Squires cut her off. "Sergeant Grey, Private Newmeyer, and myself are all that's needed for this part of the plan. I need the rest of you to cover our retreat, if it comes to that."

  "Yes, sir," Private DeVonne saluted.

  `Squires turned to Private Honda, briefing him about the remainder of the mission. "You report to HQ as soon as the bridge is in view. Tell them what we're planning to do. If there's a message from them, you'll have to deal with it. We won't be in a position to use our radios."

  "Understood," said Honda.

  As the three Strikers started off through wind-gusted snows that ranged from ankle-deep to knee-deep, Squires joined Sergeant Grey and Private Newmeyer. Grey was already pressing small strips of C-4 to the trunk of a large tree near the tracks. Newmeyer was cutting the safety fuse, leaving the timer fuses they'd brought for Squires to use later. The safety fuses were marked in thirty-second lengths and he had measured out a piece ten lengths long.

  "Make it four minutes," Squires said, looking over his shoulder. "I'm a little antsy about the train being so close that they hear it."

  Newmeyer grinned. "We all did the fourteen-mile timed run in under a hundred and ten minutes, sir."

  "Not in snow with full gear you didn't-"

  "We should be okay," Newmeyer said.

  "We also need to leave time to throw snow on the tree, so it looks like it's been there a while," Squires said. "And me 'n' Grey have another little job to do."

  The Lieutenant Colonel looked ahead. In five minutes, they could reach a concave area of granite some three hundred yards ahead, one that would protect them from the blast-assuming the concussion didn't bring the cliff down on them. But Grey was experienced enough, and the explosives were small enough, that that wasn't likely to happen. That would still leave enough time for one of them to come back and clear away any traces of their tracks in the snow: it had to look as though the tree had cracked and come down by itself.

  Grey rose when he was finished, and Squires squatted as Newmeyer lit the fuse.

  "Let's go!" Squires said.

  The Lieutenant Colonel helped Newmeyer up and the three men ran toward their little sanctuary, arriving with a minute to spare. They were still catching their breath when the sharp report of the low-explosive blast tore through the night, followed by the brittle cracking of the tree trunk and a dull thud as it hit the train tracks.

  FIFTY-FOUR

  Tuesday, 11:08 P.M., Hokkaido

  The two-crewmen "glass cockpit" was low, flat, and dark behind a narrow, curved windshield. Three of the six flat color screens in the cockpit formed a single tactical
panorama, while an extra-wide HUD-heads-up display-provided flight and target information that expanded upon the data contained on displays mounted inside the visor of the pilot's helmet. There were no dedicated gauges. The displays generated all of the information the pilot required, including input from the sophisticated sensors mounted to the exterior.

  Behind the cockpit was a matte-black fuselage sixtyfive feet, five inches long. There were no sharp angles on the flat-bellied craft, and the NOTAR tail systemno tail rotorand advanced bearingless main rotor made the Mosquito virtually silent in flight. Ducted air forced, under pressure, through gill-like sections in the rear fuselage provided the craft with its anti-torque forces; a rotating directional control thruster on the tail boom enabled the pilot to steer. Already relatively lightweight because of the absence of driveshafts and gearboxes, the craft had been stripped of all extraneous gear, including armaments, which cut the aircraft's empty weight from nine thousand to just six thousand,