by Andy Farman
The Russian seemingly ignored the statement, but continued looking levelly at the pilot before speaking.
“You don’t know Con well enough to get all defensive on his behalf, so why did you get angry tonight?”
“I just told you, I was mistaken.”
The sheets dropped down to the Russian girl’s waist as she sat upright in the bed, and although Caroline should have expected the other girl to prefer sleeping naked, she blushed anyway.
“I’ll tell you why you came here tonight Caroline, and why you got mad at me, shall I?”
Caroline looked uncomfortable but did not reply.
“You thought that someone had fucked me tonight, and because that someone wasn’t you, you got jealous.”
“Don’t be ridiculous, I’m not a…lesbian!” The rest of the house was sleeping, so the last word came out as a hiss.
Swinging her feet to the floor Svetlana walked naked to the door, drawing the American inside and closing it. Caroline had been entranced by the almost feline grace with which the Russian girl had crossed the room, so much so that she was taken by surprise, but now stepped back against the wall defensively.
“It has to be difficult for you; trying to do a job you love in what must be a very homophobic organisation?”
Caroline reached for the door but the nude Russian stepped in front of her.
“I saw it in your eyes the very first time we met.”
Caroline’s heart was beating fast but she couldn’t speak, she wanted to be gone from here before someone, someone like Patricia walked in and undid her career in the armed forces of the United States. But no one walked in and the house slept soundly on.
Svetlana stepped up until they were almost touching, and reaching up she began to unbutton the shirt.
“You mentally undressed me Caroline…and all I did at the table was to let you know that I was interested too.”
“Please don’t ‘lana.” Caroline pleaded with Svetlana but made no attempt to stop her, allowing the shirt to be slipped off her shoulders and fall to the floor. Moonbeams caressed both naked young women, the auburn haired Russian agent and the blonde USAF pilot. The former traced fingertips along the latter’s flanks before bending to take an erect pink nipple into her mouth to savour the salt taste of the other girl. Caroline trembled and gasped aloud until the Russian girl covered her mouth with her own, stifling it with a kiss filled with passion and lust. Her hands guided one of the Americans up until it cupped a breast, and Caroline moaned softly as she felt the Russian girl’s nipple harden at the touch. Svetlana raised a foot elegantly to rest, leg bent like a ballerina, against the inside of the opposite knee, and thus perfectly balanced on one foot she guided Caroline’s free hand down her flat belly, and beyond..
When the need for oxygen ended the clinch Svetlana led her by the hand to the bed.
“But what about Con?”
“Con was my Control in London, he knows about every man and every girl I ever slept with. He knows that I’m attracted to you, and knowing me as he does, that you’d probably end up in my bed sooner rather than later.”
On reaching the bed Svetlana seated her on its edge before kneeling before her.
“And this is what I was thinking about doing to you, that night at the table.” Caroline allowed her thighs to be parted before her back arched involuntarily, tossing golden locks about wildly whilst whimpering with pleasure.
The day shift found Timoskova still hard at work trying to clear the interference from the download, four hours after switching monitors and rebooting his system. He was not in the best of moods as despite his earlier optimism he was having little joy with the task. Never before had he encountered such sophisticated electronic counter surveillance, but he wasn’t beaten yet, his own apartment held superior equipment and software to that which he was currently using, and the CD was in his jacket pocket.
After noting an equipment failure in the log, giving the address of the dacha, he went home, setting his alarm clock to wake him in six hours, before going to sleep himself. He would rise early and get to work on the CD before performing the nightshift again.
Indian Ocean: 0009hrs, 15th April.
The imminent arrival of Typhoon Lucinda to this area of the ocean was rather obvious on the surface, with deepening swells, rainsqualls and winds building in strength.
Below the surface it was less obvious, unless of course you worked in the sonar department and if that was the case then you had your work cut out for you.
HMAS Hooper’s Sonar Officer had undergone an exchange tour with the USN the previous year, spending six months aboard USS Seawolf on one of her cruises. Right now he was thinking wistfully of the state of the art sonar systems aboard the American vessel, as he struggled with the system aboard this vessel. They were cruising at 3 knots below the layer, whilst their tail was trailing above it as it listened for surface and sub-surface traffic; this meant that Mother Nature in a bad mood was degrading the reception.
Since reaching their patrol area they had seen not a single vessel, no smoke on the horizon, or sails either. They had seen contrails on the last ESM and visual sweep prior to transmitting a status report, which meant that the global wide cloud covering that resulted from the use of nuclear weapons in the Atlantic Ocean, was breaking up. He had felt a sense of relief as the periscope slid back down into its well, so maybe they would be spared a nuclear winter.
Twelve hours later they had been on the receiving end of communications, and their floating antennae received the daily intelligence and operational updates, along with a weather map. The weather map had told them what they would have deduced for themselves had they been a surface vessel, the glass was dropping fast.
Apart from the defective snorkel seal his boat was holding together, without anything else getting broken or bent, up to this point. It was a state of affairs that gave him peace of mind and allowed him to focus on the business at hand, but that changed a little before midnight when he was awoken by a summons to the control room.
His sonar officer was stood with the officer of the watch when he arrived, the look on the sonar officers face was one of frustration tinged with concern.
“Captain sir, sorry to disturb your rest.”
The captain could see he was holding a circuit board in his hands, an identical one lay on the chart table beside where the two officers waited.
“What’s the problem… and in lay terms, if you please?” he said indicating the electronic components.
“Captain, the central processor for the sonar systems went down, and when I replaced it with the spare I found that was crook too.”
If they couldn’t hear what was going on then there was no point them being there below the surface, they may as well be a surface vessel and go up top.
The captain could feel his temper heading toward a spike, but this was not the place to do it, not on a war patrol, so he led the officer back behind closed doors, to his cabin.
“We have to have more than one spare Harry, so what’s the story?” The officer before him was a good man, conscientious and not likely to have forgotten to stock up on departments essential stores before a war patrol.
“The SOPs state four sir, but we haven’t ever had that many aboard. When this thing, the war kicked off, I personally went to the stores but they had none in stock. The system has been one of a one for one exchange, you take the defective one in and they indent for a replacement which arrives before you are next due out.”
The captain finished the sentence for him.
“Or the cruise is delayed until it does arrive.” The captain was acquainted with national defence run by bean counters, and he now felt the urge to shout at someone except the persons who deserved to be on the receiving end were not on the firing line, they were sleeping safely at home. So instead of giving voice to his anger he took a deep breath instead, because a solution may lie elsewhere.
“Is there anything else aboard that we could use, spare processors for
other ships systems?”
The sonar officer has already thought of that and had his PO working on it.
“Yes captain, but there won’t be anything as fast as this.” He held up the defective part for emphasis. “No promises as to how well it will work, except to predict a somewhat reduced service, sir.”
A signaller encoded a situation report ready for a burst transmission to the closest satellite, and the vessel came up toward the stormy surface in readiness for its passive sweeps prior to sending.
Helmstedt, Germany: 1100hrs, same day.
For the third time that hour, mortar rounds landed nearby to a Royal Artillery Subaltern and the small party from his own unit and the Light Infantry. Debris rained down upon them as they huddled inside a warehouse loft near the marshalling yards, as the mortars once again targeted locations that could harbour artillery-spotting teams.
As the last fragment of concrete fell the young officer raised his head cautiously, and then nudged an even younger man to his left.
“I told you I was right Lance Bombardier, there was only four rounds that time…they are rationing their ammunition!”
The NCO was not as enthusiastic about the revelation, spitting dust from his mouth and grumbling.
“Well I am chuffed-to-friggin’- NAAFI-breaks for yer boss…but how do you know they didn’t just work out that they can as easily make me shit meself with four rounds, as they can with ten.”
The officer smiled good-naturedly.
“Do the batteries have enough power to send that, or should we save it for later, when someone fetches new ones?”
“I think sir, that calling in targets takes priority…I’m sure someone within earshot can count back there.”
They were on their last battery, and for the past three hours had left the radio off until they had something to call in. One of the Light Infantrymen had gone back for fresh ones two hours before, but he had not returned, somewhere along the way a sniper had probably taken him out.
A large section of the roof was now sagging inward, providing illumination that had not existed when they first moved in. It allowed the young NCO to see the edge of a painting where its dust cover had slipped. Apparently this loft was some storage area for a nearby college, and former students work was cached here. He pulled away the dust cover in order to view the artwork, liking the rich colours but knowing little about the finer points, the council housing estate he was brought up on didn’t go in much for the arts.
“Like it?” He looked over his shoulder at his boss, who’d noticed his interest.
“It would add colour to the wall of my married pad, sir.”
The officer canted his head to see it the better and wrinkled his nose critically.
“If you want colour then buy floral wallpaper, if you want art then don’t buy any of his…or her, work.”
The junior NCO looked back at it, wondering what his boss could see that he couldn’t.
“Oh I don’t know, it looks alright?”
“Look at the chimney stack at top left, and the trees on the right..…the shadows go in different directions…and the stream is tumbling downhill on the right, toward the centre of the picture, yet on the other side the waters are flowing over the weir, and also flowing to the pictures centre…same stream.”
Disappointed, the NCO pulled a face.
“I hadn’t noticed that…you know a bit about painting then, boss?”
“I thought I did once, I even had an exhibition.”
“So why aren’t you out in the Pacific painting naked bints, drinking and shagging yourself to fame and an early grave then…pardon me for saying so sir, but I’d rather be doin’ that then getting’ me arse shot off here?”
“Well a critic for a broadsheets arts section summed up the exhibition in one line…Jules Reed's work has an honesty about it, it proclaims to all who gaze on it…I can’t paint!” When the chuckles subsided he shrugged philosophically. “So I joined the army…not the Guards, that’s what the Reed’s usually do, I thought I’d join the artillery and sit safely twenty miles behind the fighting.” That was also the cause of some mirth.
“So how did that choice go down at home, if you don’t mind me asking sir?”
Jules grinned.
“My father said it probably beat proper soldiering, for a living.”
The rifleman with the task of watching their six hissed a warning, and silence fell instantly. He lay peering cautiously through a hole in the wall, not letting sunlight fall on him as he watched the alleyway that led to the buildings rear doors. The rifleman took aim at the top of a helmet whose wearer was moving steadily closer to their building, moving cautiously from the direction of friendly lines, but that didn’t mean he was a friend. Two more helmets came into view, and he was looking down on the trio with a critical eye as he assessed their tactical movement. As one came to a turn or a junction he bellied down, removed his helmet a peeped around the corner keeping his head to the ground, not a place a waiting enemy would be aiming for. Another would then aim his weapon around the corner, showing as little flesh as possible, just two hands, an arm and half a face, dominating the space whilst the other two crossed and one returned the favour at the other side as he joined them.
By the time they had come twenty-five metres the Rifleman grudgingly allowed that they knew what they were doing. They were now close enough for him to note the shape of the helmets and pattern of the helmet covers.
The subaltern had crawled up beside him, peering out from the other side of the hole.
“We got any yanks working with us sir?”
2Lt Reed thought for a moment. “1CG’s got a couple of companies worth, maybe they’ve come up and rejoined the brigade?
Jules Reed signalled for the other two members of 2LI to go down the three floors and challenge their visitors, whilst the rest kept a sharp eye out.
Five minutes later a bemused Rifleman came back. “We got a Yank para sarn’t major wearing a Brit RSMs insignia on his smock and a pair of 82nd Pee Eff…whatchamacallits.”
Arnie Moore had left both his troopers downstairs because he wasn’t intending on stopping overlong, and 2Lt Reed watched the big American appear and squint as his eyes became accustomed to the surroundings
“Mr Reed sir…Sarn’t Major Arnie Moore. Colonel Reed sends his compliments, along with your own COs, and strongly suggests that you rapidly un-ass this AO ‘cos since your last transmission it seems bad things are about to happen sir, and they haven’t been able to reach you by radio.”
A palm sized, woven coat-of-arms, did indeed hang from the zip of the American’s smock, its presence on the paratrooper was not necessary, even given his unique position, but Arnie wore it in memory of the big Guardsman, who even whilst mortally wounded had smothered a hand grenade with his body. The younger Reed knew little of events in his father’s unit, and let it go without comment.
Half an hour later found them inside Warriors from 1CG, and heading through abandoned NATO positions as fast as they could travel, without throwing a track.
Above them and to the northwest, the RAF Tornadoes and USAF F-16s of the wild weasel sortie turned onto their approach routes to the town, to clear away the danger to the lumbering C-130s and the large devices they carried. There were four of the Hercules transports, flying in a wide spread diamond formation from RAF Lyneham in Wiltshire. Ideally the weapons would have been dropped simultaneously on all the towns held by the Russian airborne troops, but suitable airframes were in ever shortening supply, and these four would reload several times before the mission was complete.
Smoke from fresh fires burnt on the ground far below the Hercules as they rolled in on their IPs, but being high above the cloud ceiling they could see nothing of this. They could not know for certain if the wild weasel had done its job effectively, until the time came to enter enemy paratroops air defence zone but no threat warnings sounded when this line was crossed.
At the release points, drogue chutes pulled the he
avy, fuel air weapons clear of the aircraft before static lines deployed the main chutes, and the C-130s banked for home.
The Warriors had still been in the outskirts of the town when fast jets tore past overhead, and despite the bright orange identification panels on the APCs roofs, their occupants cringed in expectation of a ‘friendly fire’ hit.
Accidents happen in war, but they seem to happen most frequently to armoured vehicles.
The vehicles were clear of the last buildings when charges vaporised the contents of the weapons, and then ignited them in four colossal detonations five hundred feet above the ground.
The effects bore striking similarities to that of a detonating nuclear weapon, though not as far ranging and the flash dazzled rather than blinded.
The weapons detonated roughly over the enemy forward positions, on the north, east, south and western perimeters, immolating anything exposed and sending blast waves outwards. Those not burned alive suffered asphyxia, as all available oxygen was consumed by the fireballs. The centre of the town was spared the worst of the super-heated air, but the centre was where all four blasts met.
At his headquarters in Braunschweig, Colonel General Alontov was informed that communications had been lost with the headquarters of the 2nd Guards Shock Army’s airborne division, in Eisleben. His signallers had already been trying for several hours to re-establish communications with their own Helmstedt brigade when this occurred, and Alontov was no great believer in coincidence. There had been numerous reports of huge explosions heard in the distance; by troops in the east of the town at the time communications had ceased with Helmstedt.
They had been experiencing little difficulty holding their own perimeter against NATO, the local forces they faced were reservist units as NATOs main combat power was tied up along the Elbe and Saale, trying to contain the foot holds that the Red Army had established.
Alontov was well aware that a single British brigade was all that was tasked with destroying the two airborne divisions, in their rear. Even the most average second lieutenant knew that the smallest formation with any chance at completing that task, should have been an entire Army Corps, a mere brigade was wholly inadequate. So Alontov knew all along that NATO would have to try something else in addition, or else lose Europe and its armies there.