Barricade

by Lindsey Black

  ‘Are those …’

  ‘German,’ Matti acknowledged with a knowing chuckle, offering one. Kirkov took it like it was the Holy Grail and Matti lit him up. ‘Scrounged them from the south side a few months back. Best find ever.’

  ‘Really? Better than the rabies vaccine we found for Ines in the clinic? You know, the vaccine that we actually went to get, not the cigarettes?’ Sasha arched one thick brow.

  ‘Well, it wasn’t like we would have really known if Ines had rabies, he was always like that,’ Matti reasoned. Sasha laughed, a rich full body roll that thrummed through him and reminded him it had been a while. Ines’ death hadn’t left a lot of room for fun.

  The sentries emerged from the rain and clambered back into the truck.

  ‘Thanks again, much obliged,’ Kirkov rumbled and hurried back out into the rain to the door his men had left open for him. The small soldier he’d sent out remained standing beside the vehicle, watching Kirkov climb aboard. They spoke briefly and then the truck ambled off down the road.

  ‘Ah, fuck,’ Matti stared at the lone figure in the downpour, silhouetted in the truck’s rear lights. Sasha found himself agreeing with the sentiment.

  They’d lost Ines, a six foot tank of a man with a temper to match his Spanish heritage. A trained reconnaissance sniper, he’d been invaluable to the team until it went to his head.

  He’d been replaced with a gnome.

  The new soldier picked a small bag up off the ground and wandered to the gate, making no effort to hurry out of the rain, already drenched. Sasha waited until he was inside before closing the gates and slamming the locks into place, turning to take in the new recruit.

  The newcomer pulled his beanie off his head, wringing it out and revealing a head of wet black hair, longer than was usually permitted in the military but once you were assigned to the Barricade no-one cared. Sasha kept his short back and sides but Enzo was sporting a full on man bun and had no complaints. The gnome’s not-quite military standard hair wasn’t going to annoy anyone.

  A small, finely boned face of Asian origin looked him up and down and then turned to do the same with Matti. He was in the black military thermal shirt all recruits were given and the forest camo pants with combat boots, but the combat boots were personal, not the usual pair given. Most soldiers decided to find, borrow, steal or make their own boots, it was one of the few outward signs of self-expression and personal preference left to them. These boots were taller, reaching mid-calf with several heavy buckles that provided extra support through the outside of the ankle without diminishing movement. His cams were tucked in at the top and form fitting, making it obvious he didn’t have thermals underneath and revealing a trim, fit figure.

  ‘He’s so … small,’ Matti mumbled and Sasha barely restrained himself from laughing at the way Matti stared down, cigarette loose and almost forgotten in one hand, lips parted in disbelief.

  Large almond shaped eyes surrounded by thick, black lashes looked at Sasha and waited with infinite patience. The man had high cheekbones and a small mouth with full lips and a heavily defined cupid’s bow which drew Sasha’s gaze. Nothing about the runt gave the impression he belonged on the Barricade. More like a magazine cover, maybe. There was something delicate about him that didn’t match his road-weary visage.

  Sasha felt his dick harden in his pants and cursed his luck. It couldn’t have been an ugly gnome?

  ‘I’m Stepanova,’ Sasha put his hand out. ‘Sergeant, but just … Stepanova, yeah?’

  There was absolutely no change to the blank expression on the man’s face, but he did reach out to take the offered hand. Sasha regretted offering immediately. Even through gloves, the man’s fingers were like ice. Sasha held tighter and scowled, drawing the man’s hand up for closer inspection. He had gloves on, but they were thin tactical gloves instead of the issued woollen pair Sasha had on.

  ‘Your hand is gonna burn a hole in mine wearing these,’ Sasha scolded. ‘If you’re gonna get wet, wear wool not cotton. The cotton won’t dry here, and it won’t keep you warm.’ Why he felt a sudden surge of protective heat, Sasha didn’t want to consider. It was a new soldier under his command, sure, and frostbite took far too long to heal. There was that to think about, but he knew damn well other parts of his body were wide awake and suddenly trying to make decisions. Stupid. And weird.

  ‘Then don’t hold onto my hand.’ The soldier pulled his hand free, but the words seemed almost stuck in his throat and his voice had a husky quality to it Sasha thrived on.

  ‘I’m Raikkinen.’ Matti didn’t offer his hand. He took a long draw of his dying cigarette and extinguished the butt under his heel, eyeing Sasha dubiously, reading him effortlessly.

  ‘Ioane,’ the newcomer acknowledged and then he grabbed a box and headed for the stairs. One would almost call it fleeing. Sasha let him go, waiting until he could no longer hear footfalls and then groaning, turning to share a distraught look with Matti.

  ‘Well. This is going to be fun,’ Matti groused.

  ‘How are we supposed to explain to Enzo that they replaced Ines with that?’ Though really, Sasha was just trying to explain to himself that he was going to have to keep his hands off. His fingers were itching. That hadn’t happened since he left the academy.

  Matti grabbed a box of medical supplies. He always grabbed medical supplies first, because he insisted the medical officer should unpack everything himself.

  ‘Look on the bright side,’ Sasha grumbled, still trying to convince himself this wasn’t a disaster in the making.

  ‘We’re on the Barricade. It’s almost winter. There’s barely seven hours of daylight already. Soon the sun will stop rising. What bright side?’

  ‘We won’t have to feed him much,’ Sasha reasoned, moving past Matti to take the stairs two at a time.

  There was a pause behind him and then Matti’s laughter echoed up the stairwell. It had been a while since he’d heard the sound. It was a start.

  3

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  Jett loved to tilt his ear closer. Scraping the whetstone down the length of steel, absorbed in the whispered whistle as it sang with the oil. He loved the subtle sweetness of honey, the lingering touch of trees and summer.

  Somewhere, something was still alive.

  The Barricade was exactly, and yet nothing at all, like what he had imagined. Jett stood in the middle of his room and took it in while he dripped a small lagoon onto the stone floor. He’d known it was big, but the picture he’d had in his head had not proven an adequate rendition. Travelling down the highway and watching it rise up ahead of the truck had been breathtaking. Rumbling alongside it in the truck had been humbling.

  It should have been impossible, but fear went a long way in convincing people to do the strangest things and those who hadn’t been persuaded with fear had been swayed by money. Unemployment had been at an all-time high and being paid to build the Barricade had not only fanned the fires of national pride but had put food on empty tables and given soldiers a purpose after the successful campaigns south into Poland, Germany, the Ukraine, Kazakhstan and Korea.

  Russia had decimated Korea.

  Not that he knew anything about it besides what he’d been taught or read in books. But seeing the Barricade was like being dropped into an entirely new panorama. Being there put a whole lot of things in perspective, like the fact he was attracted to his sergeant.

  Sighing heavily, Jett peeled his soaked clothes from his body and towelled himself dry, raiding his dry sack for a pair of underwear and some thermals. He was freezing, but that was nothing new, and considering his state of arousal probably wasn’t a bad thing. He found a dry beanie and put that on too but left his feet bare while the floor was wet.

  The room was simple; a large wooden bed that had clearly been built for someone a lot bigger than him, not that he was going to complain. It was heaped with folded blankets and two thick pillows, pushed into a corner alongside the heating pipes. Beside it was a desk a
nd chair and against the far wall, an empty bookcase.

  They’d removed all traces of the man who had lived there, leaving a blank slate for him. Jett wasn’t sure if he should be thankful or insulted, and honestly he didn’t particularly care. They’d left him two towels and for that he was grateful.

  There was a large closet built into the wall and he unpacked his meagre belongings. He’d carried a change of clothes and a set of knives in his dry sack and packed everything else in the box. The customary five uniforms, extra underwear, thermals, a heavy coat and an absurd amount of socks. Other than the box, he had a crate and he shoved the whole thing into the cupboard, notching it into the base where it fit perfectly, as if made specially to sit there. It probably had been. He unlocked it and stroked the black lacquered sheaths of his Ssangdo blades but didn’t take them out. He closed the lid and the closet and went to pick up his wet clothes, taking them downstairs to the communal bathroom where there was a line to hang wet clothing set up.

  ‘You get unpacked okay?’

  Jett took a deep breath before turning, and then wished he hadn’t. He almost choked on his tongue.

  When he had found out he was being stationed, he’d read hundreds of reports about District Six-Six-Six and the team who worked it, but nothing he read had prepared him for standing at the front gates while Sasha Stepanova lectured him about gloves and held his hand.

  In his military photos, Stepanova looked hard and feral. He was a tall man, about six two if Jett had to guess, and he had a perpetual scowl on his face, brows drawn low and steel blue eyes cold. He had a way of staring through a camera, as if he could read the photographer’s intentions and found him wanting.

  In none of his military photos was Stepanova naked save for a towel wrapped low on his hips while the hot water steamed off his skin in the chill air, a small smile on his relaxed face. He looked more like one of those carved statues than a flesh and blood human being.

  ‘Fine!’ Jett forced himself to keep his gaze on the man’s face, but it wasn’t helping. Something was trying to punch its way free of his stomach and he felt the overwhelming desire to vomit. He’d never experienced anything like it in his life.

  ‘Are you okay? You look … pale.’ Stepanova was frowning at him, reaching out as if to lay a hand on his forehead to check his temperature. Like he was a child. Jett ducked the hand and hurriedly hung the last of his clothes, aware of Stepanova watching him and hating it. Or not hating it enough, he couldn’t figure out what was going on but it was hard to breathe.

  ‘I’m fine,’ he got the last sock hooked over the line and was left with nothing to do but look over at the sergeant again. He was just standing there, lips parted as if he wanted to say something but thought better of it. He had the most amazing mouth.

  ‘Well, breakfast is usually at six. So … yeah.’

  Stepanova had been gone for a full two minutes before Jett realised he was still holding his breath and exhaled explosively. He fled the bathroom and went back upstairs to his room, slamming the door louder than he intended and hoping he hadn’t woken anyone.

  He realised no one had given him a sentry and was quietly grateful. He checked his alarm. It was almost four, so whoever had the last shift was likely already upstairs. He’d have to find out when his shifts were at breakfast. And meet Enzo Angelo. He wasn’t looking forward to that. He’d done his research on the team and knew if he was going to have trouble it was going to come from Angelo.

  Stepanova was top of his class at the academy and had been assigned to one of the worst infiltrated sections of the Barricade. It was now one of the least crossed areas. He was an intimidating man and an extraordinary strategist. The President even knew his name, and said he was a man who ‘knew how to get things done’. Whatever that meant.

  Raikkinen was a forced conscript from Lapland. An ingenious chemist and a highly regarded medic, he was known for making Stepanova’s plans a reality. They’d done some really stupid things over the years, but Raikkinen had made it successful, which said a lot about him, considering most conscripts would sabotage everything they were involved in in the hopes of being released for incompetence. Raikkinen appeared to have no such agenda. He either really enjoyed his job, or he respected his leader. Jett suspected the latter.

  Angelo was an enigma. He’d been a forced enlistment from an immigrant family. Immigration was rarely permitted; you had to apply to be permitted across the Barricade, and then you had to enlist and pass training and give up citizenship from Europe, but perhaps the worst element was promising your offspring to the military. All of which Angelo’s parents had agreed to. He and Ines had been taken from the same immigrant village.

  Jett was intensely aware he had taken the place of a very deceased Ines Montegro and that if anyone was going to have a problem with that, it was Angelo. Not that it was Jett’s fault, someone was always going to be sent to fill the position and it was never going to be that person’s fault Montegro had died, but people were rarely rational about such things.

  He woke five minutes before six. His head felt stuffy and he couldn’t feel his feet. He realised belatedly that he’d forgotten to put socks on and his feet were blue tinged. Rushing from the bed, Jett raced to the closet and pulled on two pairs before pulling his cams over his thermals, pulling a puffer vest on over his skivvy. He still had a beanie on and he couldn’t be bothered brushing his hair, so he left it and pulled his boots on, pleased that they had mostly dried through the night. Wearing them would dry them out the rest of the way, provided he didn’t go stomping through puddles again.

  Voices drifted down the stairs and he followed the gentle echoes into the living space. A kitchen sat against one wall, a small dining table and four chairs in front of it taking up half the tower. The other half had a large bookcase, a fireplace and three large couches. One couch had a massive white dog sprawled on its back, legs twitching to whatever images were conjured by its dreams.

  ‘That’s Anna,’ Raikkinen waved toward the dog with his spoon from where he sat at the table, a bowl of steaming porridge in front of him. Stepanova sat opposite him, Angelo sandwiched between them. Jett couldn’t help but think the seating was deliberate, though by whose design he couldn’t begin to say.

  Jett grabbed a bowl and spoon, filled it with oats and waited for the water to boil again before adding it to the bowl and stirring in a spoonful of honey. He took the empty seat, aware of all three men watching him.

  ‘You straight out of the academy?’ Angelo did not sound pleased by the idea.

  ‘Yes.’ After all, it was an academy. Of sorts. Just not the same academy they’d gone through. But they didn’t need to know that. Sometimes, Jett had learned, agreeing was the easiest way.

  ‘Well that’s fucking great.’ Angelo’s glare would have peeled paint, had there been any on the stone walls. Instead Jett simply felt tired and forced himself not to squirm while he ate his porridge.

  ‘Matti and Enzo are gonna do a sweep on the south side and try and move some of those bodies. We’re providing cover.’ Stepanova explained the morning. ‘It’ll give you time to get acquainted with the Barricade and watch how a sweep goes.’

  Jett nodded. He was well enough acquainted with the Barricade, having defended the truck along its base for the past week, but he didn’t bother to say so. He knew it was more likely Angelo wasn’t ready to work with him, and Jett was more than willing to give him space. Besides, he was excited to see the world from above.

  ‘It’s cold up top,’ Raikkinen reminded him, watching him over the rim of his thin, wire-framed glasses as if he were a curiosity. Jett nodded to show he’d heard and understood but didn’t feel the need to contribute to the conversation.

  Angelo shoved his chair back and hurried downstairs. Raikkinen sighed heavily and followed far more sedately, leaving Stepanova sitting there, arms crossed, watching him eat.

  Jett deliberately focused on his spoon, shovelling the porridge into his mouth and swallowing. Dipping the spoon
. Put it in his mouth. Swallow. Why was the man staring at him? And why was he so freaking attractive? Put the porridge in your mouth. It was almost creepy to have a face that symmetrical. Swallow.

  ‘Seriously?’ Stepanova arched one heavy brow at him and moved to the sink to wash his bowl. Jett hurriedly ate the rest of his breakfast while Stepanova wasn’t staring at him and then waited. He didn’t want to crowd the kitchen, something that only seemed to amuse Stepanova further. Sasha finished washing up his dish and deliberately took a large step to the side to dry it with a tea-towel. The way his mouth curled in one corner was a little terrifying and Jett hurried to obediently clean his dish.

  When he was finished, Stepanova handed him the tea towel, leaning down so he was at eye level. The scrutiny was terrifying. Jett held his breath until Sasha abruptly turned and headed for the stairs.

  ‘I’ll meet you up top in ten.’ Sasha didn’t wait for a response.

  Jett hurriedly dried the bowl and put it away. He went back to his room and grabbed his heavy winter military coat and went to the armoury upstairs, pleased when he arrived first.

  There was a large cage against one wall of the turret with a small arsenal ranging from handguns to rocket launchers and a rack of grenades. Beside the cage was a whole cabinet of bullets for each weapon, clearly labelled and stacked for ease of access. There were several long knives, kept in wetted sheaths, oil gleaming on the blades in the low fluorescent light where they peeked out by the handle. He ran his fingertips over a smooth, buttery leather hilt on a thin blade but didn’t pick it up, unsure if they were personal weapons or public property. He knew how he would feel if anyone touched his personal blades.

  A long table was pressed against the opposite wall, several laminated maps strewn across it and more hanging from a filing rack to the side. Jett wandered over and examined the map on top of the pile.