by JT Brannan
He ignored the shouts of ‘Down, down, down!’; the sight of most of the people in the room complying, going straight to their knees, then to the ground, hands over their heads, terrified of the incoming assault team, who numbered four now; the blood which sprayed from the men who tried to be brave, who tried to leap at the attackers with syringes and scalpels; ignored, too, the sensation of ice-cold fear that stabbed his own heart.
‘I’ll shoot him!’ Dementyev yelled, pushing the barrel harder into the prisoner’s temple. He shouted in English, despite the fact that they had used Russian, convinced that they were an American commando unit, here for this foreign agent. ‘I’ll blow his brains out all over the floor! I’ll do it!’
He would do it, too; would even turn the gun on himself, if necessary. He would not, could not, let them take him alive, couldn’t take the risk that they would get information out of him. If he died, it would be of no consequence; Project Europe was moving of its own accord now, a juggernaut that couldn’t be stopped. Unless they found out about it before the crucial day had been reached, and he couldn’t let that happen.
The four commandos spread out around him, and he decided to act first; he would kill the prisoner, then shoot himself, that was the only way he could guarantee they would leave empty-handed.
His finger flexed on the trigger, and he could only think of what a shame it was that he had not been able to see his plans through to the end.
Hart – experienced combat sniper that he was – shot before anyone else could, taking Dementyev high in the shoulder.
The pistol was knocked from the man’s grasp before it discharged, and Barrington was pleased with his accuracy – because the man sitting in the chair was Force One’s second-in-command, Jake Navarone. A bullet from that range would have killed him instantly.
As she moved forward though – Hejms and Chaiprasit dragging the intelligence chief to his feet, his suit red with blood, his face white with shock, as Devlin kept guard outside – she wondered if Navarone was still alive anyway. He had not reacted at all to the gunfire around him, his eyes dull and lifeless, his head now lolling about on his chest, tongue hanging out of his slack mouth.
She checked his pulse, felt its low, weak beat just discernable under the skin, and felt relief that they hadn’t lost him.
She turned, saw that Hejms was slapping a field dressing onto the bullet-wound in Dementyev’s shoulder as Chaiprasit whipped a pair flex-cuffs onto his wrists.
‘Daw,’ she said, slicing away Navarone’s bonds with a razor-sharp folding knife, ‘give me a hand here.’
Chaiprasit came to her, helped pull Navarone to his feet; they each put an arm over one of their shoulders, supporting him between them, their free hands still clutching their weapons, and began to haul him out of the room. He couldn’t even shuffle his feet, and they had to drag him forward across the tiles.
Devlin poked his head back through the door. ‘Give him here,’ he said, and quickly threw Navarone over both shoulders in a fireman’s carry. ‘Kurt,’ he said to Hejms, ‘do the same with the colonel there and let’s get the fuck out of here.’
‘He needs to be kept upright,’ Chaiprasit argued, ‘or the blood will keep pumping out of that wound even quicker.’
‘Shit,’ Devlin said, ‘better hurry up then.’
He was already on the move, and Barrington couldn’t blame him; they’d all seen Dementyev on the radio, knew that – even now – armed soldiers would be moving in on the complex from all over Moscow.
Hart and Hejms carried the colonel between them, keeping the wound above the level of his heart. They’d had to shoot him, but didn’t want him dead; there was too much useful information in his head to lose him now.
The people carrying the wounded went up in the elevator, while Barrington and Chaiprasit sprinted up the stairs, ready to cover them at the other end.
They carried on leading the group, back up the stairs, through the locked door, and out of the huge concrete cylinder in the middle of the ghostly waterpark.
They could see the van up ahead as they emerged from the concrete monstrosity, Walgren waiting there with the engine running.
They could all hear sirens in the distance, and knew they didn’t have much time left.
Dementyev had recovered from the initial shock of the bullet’s savage impact, and was regaining consciousness slowly but surely, while being careful not to give anything away to his captors.
He was handcuffed, but his legs were free. They’d bandaged his shoulder, although it still hurt like hell. But he found that the pain was useful, it woke him up, kept his mind sharp.
And yet he played on his injury, moaning incoherently, sagging with his bodyweight onto the shoulders of the men carrying him.
They hit the cold air of night as they emerged from the building, and through hooded eyes, Dementyev could see the van up ahead, waiting for them.
He could also hear the sirens in the background, coming for him.
He just needed a little bit of time.
Just a little bit of time.
‘Ahh!’ Hejms shouted. ‘Son of a bitch!’
There was a grunt from Hart a moment later, and by the time Barrington had turned around to see one man clutching his ear, the other bent double with his hands on his balls, Dementyev was already racing away into the darkness.
The sirens were louder now, and the first gunshots rang out.
‘Come on!’ Walgren called through the open window of the van. ‘They’re here!’
‘He bit my fucking ear off!’ Hejms said, ready to race into the shadows after him.
‘Leave him,’ Barrington ordered, ‘we’ll never find him in this place now. Let’s go.’
With that, she sprinted for the van, covering Devlin as he raced forward with Navarone on his shoulders.
Hejms let out a burst of automatic gunfire into the darkness of Akvadroma, hoping for a lucky shot at the colonel, but was rewarded with silence.
‘Come on!’ she heard Barrington shout, then he turned to see her near the van, unloading her Beretta down the street on full-auto, and then he was running as Navarone was thrown aboard the van and Devlin opened fire too, then Chaiprasit, and then Hart too, recovered now after the sharp knee to his groin.
And then the whole team were at the van, hosing down the streets with their weapons, firing at the dozens of incoming vehicles. There were screams, the sound of screeching tires, the crash of metal, but rounds started to be returned and – just moments later – the entire team were inside and Walgren was accelerating out of there, even as they continued to lay down gunfire out of the rear doors, and the open windows.
It was only then that Hejms looked down at his body, saw the gruesome, loose grey sausage of his intestine sticking out of his gut, blood pumping steadily out over the van’s floor.
Barrington saw him then, said, ‘Shit, Kurt’s hit!’, and immediately bent down, covering him with one field dressing, then another as the first filled quickly with his blood.
He watched as his friends continued to lay down fire out of the van, felt the brutal twists and turns of Walgren’s driving as he tried to outmaneuver their pursuers, and then slowly, gradually, his vision started to swim, the pain went away, and his eyes closed.
Peace, he thought, at last.
17
‘What do you know about the personnel operating in Moscow?’ Emelienenko asked, and the question stopped Clark Mason in his tracks.
Things had, he thought, been going relatively well, until now; but he should have known that Emelienenko would have brought a big stick to beat him over the head with.
He’d thought he’d managed to get away quite lightly with President Chang; the man had only wanted his assurance that America would back China’s desire to ‘assist’ the Mexican government with its drug cartel problem, and keep out of her business in Nicaragua. Mason had put up a fight, but had quite happily relented in the end. Although Chinese forces on the border were a worry, it was a fact
that Mexico could do with the help.
It had been explained to him on more than one occasion that there were basically two ways of dealing with the cartels, neither of which was a political possibility for an American administration.
The first was to legalize drugs, which would – in one fell swoop – destroy the criminal monopoly on the trade. It might make sense, but there were huge swathes of the voting public that would be incensed by the very nature of such an idea. Those conservative voters had been born and raised on a diet of Nancy Reagan’s ‘Just Say No’ campaign, and they had a firm and unwavering belief in the War of Drugs; for the government to suddenly go back on that would destroy entire belief systems.
The second was to go the other way, and make a concerted effort to play the same game as the gangs; in other words, the application of violence on a colossal scale. Kill the dealers, the distributors, the manufacturers, using any and all methods at a government’s disposal. This had been tried, admittedly; but only on a small, unambitious scale. And without constant pressure, if one drug lord was killed, another would quickly take his place; but if there was the will to follow through, to match brutality for brutality, death for death, and then go one stage further, the war could indeed be won. But this tactic presented other problems, namely that it would involve a total abuse of human rights, would amount to a charter for the government to be as ruthless and bloodthirsty as the criminal gangs themselves. And who would re-elect a government like that?
The beauty of the Chinese proposal, of course, was that China was already something of a human rights pariah; she had proved that she had the will to deal with problems head-on, in a violent and direct manner. Whereas Mexico didn’t have the money or the resources or the training, and the United States could never get away with it morally, the world almost expected it of the Chinese.
They could make it work.
And if it worked, the benefit would be a massive reduction in the amounts of drugs making their way across the border into the US; less product, less market, less crime. And then Mason would reap the rewards.
And if it failed, then he could wash his hands of it entirely.
It was a win-win situation as far as Mason was concerned, especially as Chang had also offered to use his influence in Nicaragua to ensure an additional ally at the table.
Toward the end of their meeting, Chang had also asked that the administration stop giving China a hard time over the territories taken by General Wu, and since incorporated into the People’s Republic of China – namely, the Diaoyu Islands, and Taiwan. Mason had stopped short of agreeing to officially recognize the Chinese annexation of these territories – after all, Japan was a strong ally of America and still had a claim over the islands that it knew as the Senkakus, and even Chang could see the problems it might cause. But Mason did promise that – under his presidency – no more would be made about it by anyone at the White House, certainly not on an official basis.
Chang had said his farewells not long after, and Mason had barely had enough time to get himself a cup of hot coffee and a bagel before Emelienenko had arrived, fresh and ready to do business despite his ten-hour flight.
Mason had already given more concessions to the Russian president than any of his advisers would have recommended, but this latest question gave him pause. Emelienenko’s demands up to now had centered only around Mason agreeing to publicly support some of the man’s upcoming announcements. It would be nothing more than flannel really, just a few words here and there; he wasn’t being expected to put anything before Congress or the Senate, or commit the United States in any way.
And Emelienenko had already shown his willingness to give Mason what he wanted; he had already set the ball rolling with Aliasker Hudaybergenov, President of Turkmenistan, and this had enabled General Olsen to start the process of setting up bases in that previously neutral country. It was an incredibly useful concession and had, at a stroke, multiplied the chances of a swift coalition victory in Iran.
‘Come now,’ Emelienenko chided, ‘let us play games no longer. I know that the agents that have been operating on Russian soil are from western intelligence, and I therefore know that – even if you do not have direct involvement in these operations yourself – you can certainly use your influence to find out.’
Despite his words, it was clear to Mason that Emelienenko believed that he did have direct involvement; and what was worse, Mason thought, was that he was right.
Damn Cole, and Vinson, and the whole stupid lot of them!
‘It would be unfortunate in the extreme,’ Emelienenko said, ‘if a member of the Security Council were to exercise its right of veto . . . or if President Hudaybergenov were to suddenly change his mind . . . or if the Iranian regime was to catch wind of the coalition’s strategy. Any if which, if people do not tread carefully, might serve to upset a favorable outcome, no?’
The Russian president’s icy blue eyes held Clark Mason’s, until the American was forced to look away, head bowed.
Hell, Mason thought, what did he owe those sonsofbitches at Force One anyway? President Emelienenko had already shown himself to be more of a friend to the United States – to him – than any of those bastards at Forest Hills. He’d been wanting to get rid of them for a long time anyway, hadn’t he?
And the Russian president held the key to American success in the palm of his hand.
So what the hell are you waiting for?, Clark Mason asked himself. Just do it, already. Just do it, and get it over with.
‘Okay,’ he said finally. ‘What is it that you want to know?’
‘Kurt’s dead?’ Cole asked in shock from the safe house communications room.
‘He’s been shot,’ Vinson corrected him, ‘but he’s not dead yet. Moscow station have got him now, giving him emergency care. But the whole situation is . . . volatile. Our guys killed a lot of people to get out of there. The whole of Moscow is looking for them, and I mean the whole of Moscow, they’re already being labeled foreign agents by the press, which is interesting – or disturbing, actually – because normally this sort of activity is attributed to terrorists or armed criminals. The intelligence community normally protects its own.’
‘Jake?’ Cole asked.
‘He’s safe,’ Vinson confirmed, ‘or at least as safe as CIA can keep him for now.’
‘How is he?’
‘We can’t really assess that yet, Mark. He’s . . . been through a lot.’
Jake Navarone was Cole’s good friend, but business was still business. ‘Can he talk? Has he given us any information?’
‘Not yet, Mark, no. And unfortunately, Colonel Dementyev slipped through our fingers.’
Cole sighed. So much gambled, and they still didn’t have any hard intelligence to show for it. But at least, Cole thought with some comfort, they had Jake back. And yet if Kurt had to die because of that . . .
He wiped the thought from his mind; there was no point armchair-quarterbacking himself now. The risk had been worth taking; it wasn’t just Jake’s life they’d wanted to save; it was the information in his head that they needed. Although, of course, he would have ordered the rescue even if Navarone had known nothing. His men had to believe that their comrades would come for them; it was part of the game, and one Cole strongly believed in.
‘How’s everyone else?’
‘Daw had a round graze her neck, a lot of blood, but nothing too serious. Devlin got one in the calf, muscle’s all torn up, but – again – it’s nothing life threatening. Chase went through five districts,’ Vinson added, ‘that Walgren chap is one hell of a driver. Good job the weather was so bad, meant that choppers couldn’t be put up, and limited the use of their traffic cameras. You know,’ he whistled, ‘between you and them, Moscow’s been left in rather a mess.’
‘But we still don’t know anything,’ Cole said angrily.
‘No,’ Vinson sighed. ‘We still don’t know anything. Unless Jake suddenly starts talking, it looks like it’s down to you again, old chap.
’
18
‘You are okay, my friend?’ asked Mikhail Emelienenko, looking at the screen of his videophone as it showed the bandaged body of his ally in the hospital bed.
‘I’ll be okay as soon as I’m out of this damned hospital,’ Dementyev said grumpily. He’d wasted too much time today already, and now this . . .
But at least, he reflected, he was still alive, which was more than could be said for a lot of his compatriots.
‘How many?’ he asked, turning to one side to get more comfortable, the pain bothering him now despite the morphine drip.
‘Twenty SVR guards at Akvadroma, four civilian staff who tried to get involved, then twelve more SVR troops during their getaway, along with ten FSB officers and eight city cops.’
‘That’s some body count,’ Dementyev commented sourly.
‘Yes,’ Emelienenko said, ‘and yet, if played right, we can make use of it. The media has already made clear that it was the work of foreign agents, and President Mason has stupidly agreed to furnish me with all the details. The public – even the world at large – will know that we are already under attack from foreign aggression.’
‘Yes,’ Dementyev choked, blood caught in his throat. The feeling made him nervous, vulnerable, and he saw the plan spiraling out of control in front of his eyes. He looked right into the videophone camera, his face close. ‘But we need to push things ahead,’ he gasped, ‘bring the schedule forward. They’ve been at SVR headquarters, they’ve got that man back, they might know something, they might know everything . . .!’
The look in Dementyev’s eyes was wild, Emelienenko could see it even through the screen of the videophone; the man was out of control, and yet Emelienenko agreed with him. The wolves were circling, and their time was being cut short.