“Coordinates?”
There were four numbers, typewritten, literally. This wasn’t from a printer, this was clearly an old style typewriter generated page. And below the numbers a short, simple message:
For your friend if he’s interested in Crimson Rush.
“What’s Crimson Rush?”
Leroux quickly explained the search request he had received from Kane, and the lone report he had found. She paled.
“This is huge!” she whispered, looking around nervously. “Do you really think this could be real?”
Leroux shrugged. “All I know is Kane was on an op, requested intel and was almost immediately retasked. And we went to DEFCON Four. If Crimson Rush is indeed in play, life as we know it could be over until this is stopped.”
“Do you think they’ll call up the National Guard?” asked Sherrie as she pulled out her smartphone and entered the coordinates. She showed him the results. “Germany.”
“They’ll have to. I can’t see them not locking down the country,” whispered Leroux, still not convinced that everything they said wasn’t being listened to when they were here despite the agency’s assurances. “Imagine if this got out to the public? There’d be mass panic, especially in the cities.”
Sherrie nodded.
“You better get that message to Dylan right away.”
“Are we sure they’re coordinates?”
Sherrie shook her head.
“No, but I’m sure Dylan will know what to do when he sees the message.”
Hotel Arena City, Grozny, Chechen Republic, Russian Federation
“What the hell am I supposed to do with this?” asked Dylan Kane aloud as he read the secure message from Leroux. The accompanying email was equally baffling. Grey Network? Old man on a bench? Germany? DEFCON 4? None of it made any sense.
And that assumes these are coordinates.
He punched them into his secure laptop and they zoomed in on an area of south-western Germany, the Black Forest. All he could see were trees, the canopy thick. If there was something on the ground, the trees were definitely hiding it.
But the message specifically mentioned Crimson Rush.
There was no way that was a coincidence, and no way anyone could have known about it without insider access. The fact that their internal search networks were tapped was concerning enough, but the fact this Grey Network had been able to act so swiftly, detecting the search, identifying the analyst and the requesting asset, and putting their own asset into play within hours was terrifyingly impressive.
Which meant it had to be taken seriously.
Germany?
If indeed these were coordinates it did make sense. A lot of the old Cold War spies retired to Germany, especially what was once West Germany, many of them having spent decades there before the Berlin Wall fell. It was home to them, America a distant memory for some, a way of life now foreign.
He opened the attachment for the briefing note Leroux had found, the lone mention of Crimson Rush he had so far been able to find. As Kane read the contents his heart rate picked up more than a few beats.
If this is in the hands of terrorists, we’re in deep shit.
Using his secure phone he quickly booked a ticket to Moscow, the only destination available out of Grozny, and began to pack, his mission here no longer of any importance. If the intel he had just read was accurate, he had no doubt the nation’s entire intelligence apparatus was reprioritizing.
Barr Lenin, Moscow, USSR
February 6, 1982
West sat in the darkest corner he could find, his back to the wall with a clear view of the door. He had used this place before, it making dive bars back home look classy. The windows were filthy, blackened by years of soot and pollution on one side, cigarette smoke and puke on the other. Lights were at a premium, most coated in a heavy filth causing the new ones to glare conspicuously. Fortunately those seemed to be focused over the bar, its wood scarred and chipped by years of abuse, mostly inflicted by Illya, the bartender who had worked the nightshift for as long as West had frequented the place.
Illya never acknowledged knowing West beyond bringing him a bottle of vodka and a glass. No words were exchanged, which was just the way West liked it. As usual he was pretending to be drunk, waiting for his contact to show, if he were going to show. West was pretty confident he’d be here, he almost always was, the man an habitual drunk who lived nearby.
Besides, he had slipped a note under the man’s door then knocked long enough to hear noises from the other side as someone in the man’s family awoke.
If Sergie wanted his payday, he’d be here.
It had been almost half an hour and West had to admit he was beginning to think Sergie had fallen back to sleep when the door opened and the bar’s fifth patron entered, shaking the snow off as he scanned the bar. Eye contact was made and Sergie shuffled toward him, no need to fake being drunk, he clearly was.
He sat down without a word, motioning for a second glass to be brought. Illya smacked one down on the table, its cleaning pedigree in question, clearly not pleased to see Sergie. He returned to his perch behind the bar without saying a word. West wasn’t sure if he had ever heard the man say a word in the decades he had been coming here.
He looked at Sergie.
“Why’s he not happy with you?” he asked in English.
“I might have thrown up here last night. I can’t remember.”
“You really have a problem, my friend.”
“I know,” said the man, shrugging his shoulders. “It dulls the pain of my miserable existence. I live on the wrong side of an invisible curtain, forced to serve a state of equals while those around me enjoy more equal lives than I, with a bitch of a wife who hates me for it, and two ungrateful brats who constantly remind me I am a failure in a country that doesn’t reward success.” He drained his glass. “So yes, I have a drinking problem. One of many problems, this one at least bringing me some pleasure at times.”
West couldn’t argue with the man’s logic, nor would he want to. This man’s very condition made him vulnerable which made him valuable.
“Perhaps we can help each other,” said West, sitting nonchalantly, his voice low, barely audible over the howling wind outside and the scratchy record playing at the bar, Tchaikovsky if he wasn’t mistaken.
It’s always Tchaikovsky.
“I think I am being watched, my friend. There is a car outside my apartment all the time, and I found a bug in my bedroom.”
“Is it still there?”
“Yes.”
“Good. Then all they will hear is your wife yelling at you. You never discuss business at home I assume.”
Sergie shook his head emphatically.
“Never. I’m not a fool. That bitch would turn me in for a loaf of bread if she knew what I was doing.”
“Good. The longer she hates you for your miserable life, the more believable it is that you aren’t getting anything on the side.” West paused for a moment, leaning in slightly. “What are you doing with the money?”
Sergie looked around cautiously then leaned forward, his voice even lower.
“I don’t spend it, I keep it hidden somewhere for what you Americans call a ‘rainy day’.”
“Just how rainy a day are we talking about?”
“The moment I ever see a chance to get out of this country, I will take it.”
“What about your family?”
“To hell with them,” he said, leaning back then immediately lowering his voice as the bartender glanced in their direction. “They’d leave me to rot if they had a chance, so why shouldn’t I?”
West pursed his lips, nodding slowly.
Sergie Tuzik was a perfect asset. A drunk who hated his life and his family and who didn’t spend the money he was given in exchange for information. It made him almost above suspicion, but if he were under surveillance, it meant something had happened to put him on the KGB’s radar.
Then again it could be paranoia. The KGB might have bugs i
n every apartment in the concrete grey slab Sergie lived in.
But West knew the KGB. They were paranoid, but with good reason. And they wouldn’t hesitate to bug an entire building just for one man’s apartment if they felt he might be a traitor. Sergie had access to information as part of his job. He had obviously kept his alcoholism out of the office, otherwise they most definitely would have revoked his security clearance and probably sent him to Siberia to dry out. The very fact his information continued to prove solid was why West continued to come back to him, time after time.
Sergie was his asset. He doubted the man would dare speak to another agent unless he knew West was dead and no longer available to provide money. A trust existed between the two of them that both would break if needed, this not a comrades-in-arms type bond, merely an acknowledgement between men of the risks both were taking.
“What is it you want this time?” asked Sergie, pushing the vodka glass aside, as if the extra few inches of distance would sober him up.
West paused as the record was flipped, the bar quiet for the first time since Sergie had arrived. The lonely tones resumed and West took a sip of his vodka, still on his first glass.
“We need to know what Crimson Rush is.”
Sergie’s eyebrows shot up as his eyes, glassy and red, burst into fiery orbs of fear. He shook his head repeatedly, pushing back from the table.
“Not that.” He pulled his jacket on. “We cannot see each other again.”
Rather than make a scene, West let the terrified man leave and finished his drink. He dropped some rubles on the table along with a sawbuck to ensure he’d be remembered next time and treated in the exact same way. With a nod to the bartender he stepped out into the now heavy snow and plodded after Sergie. He knew the man wouldn’t get too far ahead in his condition, and it was essential he talk to him further.
Even if he couldn’t catch up, he at least knew two things. One, Sergie knew what Crimson Rush was, and two, it was important enough to terrify the man, a man who had betrayed his country repeatedly by passing extremely sensitive information to the West. For him to be this scared Crimson Rush must be several orders of magnitude more important than anything so far.
Which meant much more money would be needed to grease the man’s palms, or if it could be arranged, an extraction to the West and out of Mother Russia.
And if the man’s hatred of his family were indeed genuine, then it would be far simpler to accomplish than moving four people including two children.
He could see Sergie ahead, stumbling through the snow, the treads on his boots seemingly bare as West strode confidently forward, his tread designed for just these conditions and now a special order from a custom design-house that any discerning customer could order, thus eliminating them as a CIA identifier.
“Sergie!” he called when he was close enough.
Sergie turned then tried to speed up, only to slip and fall on the ground with a curse. West caught up and helped him to his feet.
“What would it take for you to get me that information?”
Sergie couldn’t make eye contact, but he was prepared for the question.
“You need to get me out of the Soviet Union.”
“Done.”
Sergie’s eyebrows shot up.
“And my family.”
It was West’s turn.
“I thought you hated them.”
“I do. But they’re my family.”
West bit his lip then nodded.
“Okay, I’ll see what I can do. But I’ll need that intel before anything can happen.”
“How long?”
“I’ll get a message to my people. Shouldn’t be too long.”
“How long? Days? Weeks?”
“Tomorrow, but nothing starts until I see that intel.”
“I’ll get it, but it will be hard.”
“Why?”
“If you knew what Crimson Rush was, you’d understand.”
“What is it?”
Car headlights pierced the darkness as they turned a corner. Sergie cursed and crossed the street without saying a word. West decided not to follow. He had to get a message to the outside immediately. He continued toward his hotel, the car passing by, the occupants, probably KGB, ignoring him as he stumbled to the ground, his drunken antics not worth a second glance. He fell into a doorway and sat down, quickly removing a small pad and pen, writing out his message in memorized code, folding it in quarters then continuing toward his hotel. He crossed the street and entered a phone booth, the dim bulb inside bathing him in unwelcome light as the door closed. He quickly pulled out the phone book, leaving it open to the government listings, then stuffed the piece of paper behind the phone.
He stepped back into the street and continued for his hotel, the dead-drop message complete requesting the immediate extraction. The phone booth was one of many drops around the city that were constantly monitored by agency staff, most working for the embassy, watching for the open book. Someone would drift in, see what page it was open to, close up the book and surreptitiously pull the paper, palming it. Once retrieved it would be transmitted within an hour.
Responses were never left at the same spot.
As he approached the hotel he froze for a moment then darted into a doorway, poking his head out slightly. What he saw had his heart pounding.
A light was on in his room.
Outside Grozny International Airport, Chechen Republic, Russian Federation
Present Day
Dylan Kane squatted on the outskirts of the airport, his one carryon bag laying in the dust beside him. He surveyed the area spread out below him, the joke of the word “international” in its name obvious. In Chechnya, you could fly anywhere as long as it was Moscow. Light security ringed the fenced in airport, nothing more than when he had first surveyed it upon arrival. His extraction was originally supposed to be over land and across the border into Georgia which at the moment was fairly Western friendly, especially after the Russian invasion during the Olympics.
And they gave them the Winter Olympics!
From Georgia he had many options, not the least of which was a real airport. Alternatively he could arrange an exit via boat, or hike it to Azerbaijan and one of the not-so-secret Israeli or US bases.
But now time was of the essence.
He couldn’t waste the time it would take to go overland and sneak across the border. Roads had checkpoints, and here the definition of a road was very loose. It wasn’t like hopping on the I-90 and doing sixty for a few hours. In fact, the only road that went south that wasn’t a yak trail ended more than sixty miles from the border with Georgia, apparently the two countries never friends, and as Soviet provinces, not strategically important enough to warrant links.
So he had chosen the airport. It was risky, very risky, but he had been through worse. He had paid a local gypsy cab to take him, and in the chit-chat the man had told him in Russian that security had been tightened, authorities looking for some American who had killed a local. Knowing full well they were looking for him, and he obviously wasn’t a local, he’d at a minimum be questioned for hours if not days, and if released, might be released into the hands of the Russians, a prospect he didn’t savor, the Russia of today far closer to the Soviet Union than most would like to admit.
In fact, it was worse. With the price of oil so high, and the nationalization of the oil companies, the Russian government was swimming with money, and was rearming.
And not only were they rearming, they were recreating the Warsaw Pact, just with different members. Signing non-aggression and mutual defense pacts with their neighbors, including China.
They were resurgent, with overflowing wallets.
Just wait ten years, it will be Cold War II.
Kane had exited the cab early and taken to surveying the airport, debating his options. If he were flying out of here he’d need to get aboard a plane by bypassing security. Getting into the airport would be easy, the perimeter security light, t
he additional security apparently focused inside the terminal. But any plane he’d get on would take him to Moscow, where he’d have a hell of a time trying to evade their security.
He began to eye the smaller aircraft, a few Cessna sized planes. They’d have the range to get him to Georgia, but not the speed if he were chased down, and with the Russian Stavropol airbase less than two hundred miles from here, he needed speed.
He smiled as he spotted a tiny, bright red plane being fueled far from the terminal. If he could make it there, he just might have a chance. He jumped to his feet and began to jog down a back alley toward the airport. The alley quickly ended, leaving him in the open, the airport ring road directly in front of him. He heard a bell ring behind him and he turned to see a kid on an oversized bike. He flagged him down, and in Chechen offered him twenty US dollars to borrow the bike.
The deal was done in seconds.
Kane pointed to where the bike would be, slung his bag over his shoulder, and began to peddle as fast as he could toward the south side of the airport where the private hangars were, and his possible salvation, as the kid began to run home, waving the green bills over his head.
It didn’t take long for Kane to reach his destination, much of it a slight downhill grade, and as he neared, he slowed down to observe security. They were clearly not focused on this side of the airport, the main terminals on the north side. One roaming patrol had passed him without a glance and was now at the far end of the ring road, turning left and out of sight. Other than that he spotted some guards at an access gate and nothing else.
Ditching the bike out of sight of the road, he quickly made his way toward the fence using the brush for cover. At the fence, obviously designed to only keep wildlife and the innocent public out, he untwisted the metal tie holding the chain link to a pole, then pushed the fence aside, shoving his bag under then himself. He replaced the tie, leaving it loose should he need to escape this way, marking the pole by drawing a line in the packed dirt, giving it a darker hue than the surrounding soil that would stay visible enough for the next hour before the sun baked away the moisture.
Cold Warriors (A Special Agent Dylan Kane Thriller, Book #3) Page 6