Field of Fire

by Marc Cameron

  “Caribou hunters?” Beaudine gave a quick nod.

  “Could be,” Quinn said. “But the odds are against it.“

  “How far out do you think?”

  Quinn willed the little boat to go faster, but three inches of water pooled at his boots. Even with the throttle open as far as it would go, the boat moved forward at a grinding wallow, agonizingly slow.

  “I just realized this is a damn good metaphor for my life.” Beaudine looked up from her bailing and shook her head at their progress. “Seems like I’ve been fighting against the current in a leaky boat since I was a kid.”

  Quinn nodded. “She’s leaky,” he said, “but she gets the job done. According to Brian Ticket there are three big sandbars between the fish camp and Needle.” He pointed with his chin toward a long, boat-eating spit of brown that lay off the left bank like a sleeping river monster. “That’s number three, if I counted correctly. That puts us less than a mile out of Needle.”

  Quinn cheated the boat right in a wide, slogging turn. Riverbanks that fell abruptly away generally provided much deeper water than the more gradual slopes, which could run just inches under the surface for several meters, waiting to catch a boat driver unaware. The last thing he needed was to run aground on hidden sand when they were nearly there.

  Quinn breathed a little easier when they made it around the bar.

  “Want me to spell you on the bucket?” he asked. “You can drive the boat.”

  “I’m good,” Beaudine said, turning to look at him while she bailed. She’d shoved her wool hat into her jacket pocket to keep from overheating, and a gentle wind now tousled her frosted hair. Quinn made it a habit to keep an eye on her sutures, checking for any sign of infection. It wasn’t hard. Sweat and consistent exertion on the water made it impossible to keep the gauze bandage in place. Beaudine had tried at first, but eventually ripped the thing off and threw it in the river.

  So far the stitches were holding—which, considering how much Beaudine’s face twisted into a frown or grimace, was very near a miracle. Blood matted her bangs to her forehead, and her left eye seemed to be frozen in a sort of permanent squint. “Cyclops psyops,” she called it, reckoning she’d get the mental upper hand against any opponent that had to look at her. Thibodaux had been right when he’d said his cousin was crazy, but the longer Quinn was around her, the more he saw it as a good kind of crazy. No one had ever accused him of being particularly sane.

  “We should be there in less than five,” he said. “But I’m guessing we’ve got over twenty gallons of water. That extra hundred and sixty pounds is slowing us way down.”

  “Thought I warned you about that whole math thing.” Beaudine glared at him, throwing water over the side with rapid scoops from the plastic tub. “‘Join the FBI,’ they said. ‘It’ll be fun,’ they said . . .”

  Quinn smiled. A sense of humor could be an extremely valuable asset in a battle plan.

  “Seriously,” she said. “How do you want to do this if they’re already shooting at each other?”

  “I won’t be sure until we get there,” Quinn said. He’d favored strategy over tactics for as long as he could remember, preferring to work amid the big picture and let the little things flow. Explaining such a mindset so it made sense was nearly impossible, which, Quinn supposed, was why he found himself at ease working with only a handful of people, people who operated under the same philosophy and moved through life the same way. “Movements like this have to be fluid. According to Brian, the school is downriver a couple of hundred meters at the other end of the village from the airstrip. We’ll park the boat there and come in as quietly as we can.”

  Beaudine dropped the plastic tub to the floor of the boat, trading it for the AR-10 and looping the sling around her neck. Rifle up, she took a seat at the bow, scanning the banks ahead and no doubt getting her mind wrapped around what was about to happen next. The Kobuk swept back northward, funneling them into the line of winter weather but making it easier to see without the sun directly in front of them. Above, the clouds rolled in, pushed by winds aloft, but the sudden appearance of millions of drifting snowflakes brought foreboding to the river.

  “This looks so peaceful,” Beaudine said, opening her hand to catch the flakes. “Like a church.”

  The clouds began to drop snow in earnest, large popcorn flakes. Ahead, on a low hill less than a half a mile up river, the roofline of Needle school came in and out of view. Quinn let off the throttle, slowing the boat and bringing the engine noise down to a quiet burble, barely staying ahead of the current.

  “Khaki,” he said, wanting her full attention.

  She glanced over her shoulder. Snowflakes covered her head and shoulders like feather down. There was something in her eyes he couldn’t quite make out. Not fear. This girl was fearless. It was a look of resignation. Quinn supposed it had been there all along. Life had simply been moving too fast for him to see it.

  “This is going to be different than any raid you’ve ever been on,” he said. “You know that, right?”

  “I do,” she said.

  “I counted at least three in the plane when it overflew us at the fish camp,” he said. “But we don’t know how many there are or where they’ll be.”

  Beaudine gave a somber nod.

  Quinn continued. “I may have to do some things you’d normally arrest me for.”

  A slow smile spread across her face. “I got your back, hon,” she said. “Us Texas girls can be bitches. But we’re bitches you want on your side in a fight.”

  Quinn’s head snapped up at the flat crack of two rapid gunshots. Beaudine brought the rifle up toward the sound. Quinn began to count again. He passed the two-second mark before the double thumps of two successive reports reached his ears.

  “Over six hundred meters away,” he said, scanning the bank up river through the myriad of flakes.

  “Crack thump,” Beaudine hissed, obviously recognizing the distinctive sound of rounds coming downrange. “Are they shooting at us?”

  “I don’t think so,” Quinn said. “The bullets sounded like they were going parallel to the river, up by the school. Our general direction, but if they knew we were here we’d probably not be having this conversation.”

  The thunderous thump of another shot echoed through the still air, this one much louder and absent the preceding supersonic crack. Quinn knew it was just his imagination, but the abruptness of it seemed to shake loose more snow from above.

  “Bigger gun,” Beaudine said.

  “Yep.” Quinn kept the boat mid-river, taking it well past where he wanted to land before angling toward the bank and killing the engine.

  Beaudine held the AR at low ready, glancing over her shoulder at Quinn. There was no sound but for the slap of water against the side of the boat. “This would be peaceful if I didn’t know they were out there.” Huge flakes fell around her in the gray silence of the river, clinging to her jacket. “I can’t help but feel like we’re trapped inside some big ol’ creepy snow globe with a bunch of killers.”

  “You could look at it that way.” Quinn angled the skiff toward the steep gravel bank, well below the school. “But those killers are also trapped in here with us.”

  Chapter 44

  “Do not waste your shots,” Zolner said. Yakibov had seen the woman running toward the school first. She’d had a mobile phone to her ear, and the fool had thought to take her out with two snap shots from his Kalashnikov. He’d missed with both, but Zolner had taken care of her.

  “There is not enough time to shoot everyone with a phone.” He let the reticle of his Valdada scope settle over the gray metal box, centering the laddered crosshairs over the thick electrical cables where they exited the housing. “Think strategically, my friend.”

  The cell tower was a pitifully easy shot at a scant two hundred meters from where he stood. His shot cut the power line that fed the cellphone tower with a shower of sparks. The second would destroy the backup battery, rendering the tower nothing
more than a hundred-and-fifty foot piece of useless sculpture.

  Davydov cleared his throat after Zolner lowered the CheyTac—a signal that he wanted to speak but did not want to disturb his boss. The pilot had, no doubt, heard stories about what became of people who spoke while he was shooting.

  Zolner breathed in the smoke that drifted up from the open bolt, savoring it like a drug. “What is it?”

  “The plane,” Davydov said. “I can patch the fuel tanks but one of the bullets damaged the horizontal stabilizer. That will take me some time to fix.”

  “Unfortunately,” Zolner said, “time is something I do not have.” He ordered Kravchuk to retrieve his pack from the airplane then began to walk briskly toward the ATV belonging to a man Yakibov had killed at the far end of the runway. Kravchuk and the others’ boots crunched in the gravel as they trotted along behind him, rifles up, watching for more gunmen as they came nearer to the village.

  Zolner was cognizant of the danger, but didn’t let it worry him. In his experience people ran from the sound of gunfire, not toward it. He was careful and cunning, but he was also realistic and resigned himself to the sure knowledge that he would never hear the bullet that eventually killed him.

  “These people are foolishly innocent,” he said as he walked. “They have taken our only clear path of escape.”

  “How shall we deal with this, boss?” Kravchuk asked when they’d reached the nearest ATV. It was a red Honda, newer and still idling. The body of its former owner sagged to the side, one arm draped across a rifle that was wedged against the handlebars. A think trickle of blood ran down the other arm where it hung, fingers dragging against the snow.

  “Check the other machine for fuel,” Zolner said, once Yakibov had pulled the dead rider to the ground and he could look at the gauges. “This is almost full but I must have some to spare.”

  “We will go after them on the machines?” Kravchuk said.

  “No,” Zolner said. “I will travel much faster alone.”

  Davydov ran back from the other machine with a red plastic fuel tank. It was flat, held four gallons of extra gas, and fit perfectly on the rear rack of the Honda.

  Zolner took a sling from his pack and attached it to his rifle. The CheyTac was big and heavy, not the sort of rifle that was carried with a sling, but this was a unique circumstance. He replaced the covers over his scope and threw the sling over a broad shoulder so the barrel was pointed upward.

  “It is imperative that no one in this village be allowed to call out for help,” he said. “Their mobile phones will be of no use, but they are certain to have VHF radios with which they can communicate with passing aircraft.”

  “It will be impossible to locate every radio in the village,” Davydov said.

  Zolner cinched his pack down tight over the top of the plastic fuel canister, then glanced up at the pilot. “I only counted fourteen homes when we flew over this little shithole. Might I suggest it would be easier to deal with the handful of people here than to find all the radios.”

  Each of the three men gave him a curt nod. If any of them were upset about being left behind, they had enough sense not to show it.

  “Very well,” Zolner said, swinging a long leg over the four-wheeler. “But do not waste time. The men will be straggling back in from their hunts at any moment.”

  “We’ll come for you once I repair the plane,” Davydov said.

  “Fine,” Zolner said. “But the loose ends in the village are the priority. Help the others with that first. My gut tells me these agents of the FBI Ishogin told us about might still show up. Make certain they do not pose a problem for me.”

  The men turned to go without another word, each, no doubt, going over the possibilities of being left alone in the middle of nowhere with a captive group of women and children. Zolner gunned the engine on the ATV, taking a shallow ditch off the gravel road and onto the rutted trail down which Volodin and the girl had escaped. He came upon their tracks half a minute later. They were clean and clear, crossing patches of melting snow and depressed berry bushes, easy to follow.

  Zolner glanced back over his shoulder at his three men as they walked toward the village. Yakibov had a peculiar bounce in his gate as if he were on his way to a carnival.

  It was rare for Zolner to find himself disturbed by another man’s behaviors—but he thought of the smile that had spread over Yakibov’s face and wondered idly as he rode what kind of woman would marry, and have children with, such a beast. Women knew, even if they did not admit it to themselves, what sort of men they married. It was impossible to look into Yakibov’s eyes and see him for anything other than what he was. The former Spetsnaz soldier was surely a sadistic killer and he made no apology for that fact—at least not when he was in the field. It was difficult to think of such a man cheering on his son at a football game. Most people walked through life staring down at their shoes, but someone, anyone who looked at the man’s eyes, was sure to notice the blackness there.

  Zolner did not see himself as sadistic. He killed, and he killed often, but death was merely the end result. The joy came from the pursuit, the science of the shot, the competition between the shooter and target, between predator and prey. He rarely gave any more thought to the actual death at the other end of his shot than he had given the bell at the top of the rope he’d had to climb in secondary school. No one cared that you had rung a bell. It was the trip up the rope that mattered.

  Chapter 45

  The crack of gunfire sent a quiet calm settling over Kaija Merculief. Up to now, all her battles had been fought from behind a computer or at the counter of a post office. She knew what she was doing was important. Her mother had assured her of that. But the fact that someone was actually shooting at her cemented the fact. This was real. Someone thought what she was doing was important enough to try to stop her. The idea of it only strengthened her resolve.

  She’d considered pushing her father off the ATV and leaving him alone on the tundra by the time she’d made it five miles out of the village. The man was a millstone around her neck, and she would have gone through with it but for the fact that it would not do any good. Rostov’s men would certainly kill the muddleheaded chemist for her, but nothing would stop them until they had retrieved the New Archangel. Kaija and her mother had not put up with years of Kostya Volodin’s foul breath and awkward embraces to lose the prize at the last moment.

  Rostov and his cronies at the Kremlin were weak. Oh, some of them had vision. A very few understood the path necessary to bring about a Novorossiya. Kaija’s mother had known. Her mother had taught her the truth of a New Russia, a Russia free from the tyranny and oppression of the capitalist West with its embargos and sanctions. A New Russia where the Orthodox Church and its people would be pure from the money-lending zhid. Kostya Volodin was a bumbling fool, but his creation would be an enormous step toward real progress.

  Kaija had already sent two shipments to the United States. Her mother’s friends from the Black Hundreds had contacts with fishing boats that went to St. Lawrence Island in Alaska. At that point it was a simple matter to mail the two chemicals, in separate packaging, to the village of Ambler where Kaija’s friend Polina had carried them down to the lower forty-eight for delivery to other Black Hundreds contacts already in the United States. It might have been easier to mail them directly, but the contacts in the States had an aversion to post offices, feeling they were death traps crawling with federal agents. The events in Dallas and Los Angeles had proven the pipeline worked.

  It could have gone on forever, had Kaija’s imbecile father not thrown everything away in a fit of humanity and drawn the attention of the authorities to his work with the white bellies of ten thousand dead fish. If Kaija’s mother had been alive, she would have stabbed the old fool to death in his sleep.

  Kostya Volodin may have been a brilliant chemist, but he was a tool of a weak state machine—and too much of an idiot to see that Maria Merculief had rejoined him with their daughter after years
of separation only to gain access to his work.

  Kaija’s mother had taught her well. The parental love of a man for his long-lost daughter blinded him more than his feelings for his estranged love. Had Maria come back to him alone, he would have accepted her with open arms, but his rational, scientist’s mind would have been skeptical of her motives. But Kaija’s return chased away the last shred of doubt. To see his daughter again under any circumstance clouded the idiot’s judgment. He would see things as he wanted them to be, rather than the way they actually were.

  Reality, Maria Merculief had explained, had no place in a father’s notion of his little girl. And Kaija planned to leverage that weakness until she had no more use for the man—a time that was rapidly approaching. For now, he provided a handy human shield in the event one of Colonel Rostov’s goons got close enough to shoot at her back.

  Volodin gripped the metal rack beside his padded seat with one hand and held the wool hat down on his head with the other. Kaija could hear his pitiful grunts and ooofs as she took the ATV up the rutted trail as fast as it would go. The knobby balloon tires crackled on the wet ground, cushioning some of the bounce, but throwing up an enormous amount of mud.

  He shouted over the whine of the engine. “Are you sure you know where we are going?”

  “No,” Kaija said, not really caring if he heard her or not. She would never, ever forgive him for slapping her for simply stating the truth. She had studied a map on the wall of the hangar where they’d slept in Nome, and knew Ambler lay somewhere ahead of them, but had no idea how far. That too was her father’s fault. When she thought on it, there was a lot for which she would never forgive the man. But that only made it easier to do what she would eventually have to do.

  Kaija was no martyr. She was young, with hopes and dreams of seeing the New Russia herself, but her father had given her no option but to flee with the remaining New Archangel. Once they reached Ambler and Polina had taken the chemicals to where they could do the most damage to the United States, Kaija could give herself up to Rostov’s men and blame the entire sordid mess on her father. He was certainly too far gone in the head to deny it. Even now, he probably believed the whole thing was his idea.